The Newseum & NPR

While I took a trip to D.C. earlier this month, my club and I had the privilege to tour NPR and go to the Newseum. This trip really allowed me to explore new avenues of journalism as well as learn more about the history of journalism and the impact it's had around the world.

NPR was one of the coolest experiences I've had the pleasure of doing. From being registered and security cleared, to keeping our phones in locked slips, to walking through the NPR Newsroom, it was a complete dream. Every aspect was so chique and cool and welcoming, yet so organized but mildly chaotic all at once. I had never been a big podcast person, but since my tour, i've found myself indulging in more podcasts.

The Newseum is such an iconic yet underrated museum. It's so underrated and unappreciated that they're closing it at the end of the year. While other museums are cool, I feel as though the Newseum has a true civic purpose for Americans; to promote journalism and the first amendment. This museum has it all, a really cool FBI section, equipped with the Unabomber's cabin, an internet tower from the top of one of the Twin Towers that miraculously survived 9/11 rather well, a moving photography gallery that highlights crucial moments in human history and captures the realness of situations (It's so powerful I was in tears looking at every single photograph and reading every single caption), and even a hands-on experience where you get to choose a prompt and script and become a news reporter for a minute, then watch yourself take on the camera. The emphasis on the first amendment and the freedoms we have as americans that other countries don't was incredible. I just think, as impressive yet dysfunctional as our US Postal System is, we should find it odd to keep a huge postal museum yet remove the one that discusses our liberties and shines light on the power of journalism through such a dark and unpredictable time.

Presentation Review

I thought everyone had really insightful and interesting topics. Just like with my own groups' topics, I was shocked to see how common and popular some of these things are without even being conscious of it. I think one of the most interesting things we learned about was Five Eyes.

Five Eyes grasped my attention because of its depth and oddity. The Five Eyes consist of 5 countries; the US, New Zealand, Australia, the United Kingdom, and Canada. I think its ironic that these countries are very caucasian dominated, hence the term white privilege. The Five Eyes is an intellegence sharing pact. Starting back in the World War 2, it's grown beyond communications between the UK and US to a more in depth, freakier, privacy invading organization.

5 Eyes freaks me out because whats to stop these countries from leaking information or using information in the wrong way. The ramifications of this could be detrimental, and this means that each of our privacies could be shared with those around the world, whom most of us would consider other countries to have no business in each of our personal affairs.

                            

Ted Talk Review

Ted Talks are really something I value. I love how engaged and interesting the speakers are.
I really found this Tattoo guy to be rather peculiar yet intriguing. I've never thought as my print on the internet to be a tattoo, more like a sharpie marker mark on your hand; hard to get rid of, but possible if you try hard enough and have enough hand sanitizer and a tolerance for rubbing skin on skin. I also really enjoyed his relations to his tattoo theory to Greek mythology. 

Cathrine Crump's video grabbed my attention because of her topic. It's insane that surveillance equipment is so capable of tracking us and everything we do. It's a complete violation of privacy. Especially the license plate tracker, that piece of equipment has so much power. To be able to capture and store the data of every person, innocent or guilty, is insane. 

I also loved and found to be very ironic the one about phones and wiretapping. We've had huge US presidency scandals about wiretapping, yet here we are, wiretapping our own citizens and invading in privacy. It's wicked unethical and rather hypocritical. I was relieved to hear that companies have been working to combat this, such as apple with protection against wiretapping within texts from iphone to iphone, same with whatsapp.

We say the US is the home of the free, but technology is making it out to be more like the jail of the "free".  We should definitely work to evolve this issue and work towards better privacy rights.

Presentation and Confirmation Bias

I think the topics my group is covering are actually very eye opening. I feel as though we as a society all know about these things, but we don't know terms or the science behind it, or we experience these things but don't even realize it's a legitimate phenomenon. 

The topic I chose to cover for my groups presentation is Confirmation Bias. Confirmation Bias is a dangerously common thing, and countless people are guilty of acting in such a sense. Confirmation Bias is defined as the tendency to interpret new evidence as confirmation of one's existing beliefs or theories. In english, this basically means that we tend to lean towards news and/or news sources that reinforce something that we already believe to be true. Along with this, we choose to ignore the news that goes against our views, perhaps by pinning it out to be fake news, when in reality, it most likely isn't. 

I actually have a PERFECT example. This week, I was accepted to be a student on Semester at Sea for the Spring 2020 semester. This voyage is my dream, and i'll literally be able to practice exactly what I want to do for a living, because I will be taking feature writing, which means i'll be able to write stories in countries about other cultures and people, and give them a spotlight in the world. While I am only seeing the absolute positives to this situation, and am only capable of finding good reviews and what not about SAS, no matter how hard I try to find some sort of negative. Yet, when my mom decided to research SAS, she immediately was capable of finding news about very story sea experiences and a few accidental deaths, most of which dating back to over 10 years ago. While I understand there are dangers about going abroad, something like this is not going to taint me from wanting to go, as I know how to handle myself abroad. Regardless, this is a prime example of confirmation bias. Because of how desperate I am to go on SAS, I'll always lean towards the positive news. But, because my mom is rather against it, she'll lean and search for articles and reinforce her statement that it's dangerous. 

My Online Presence

As a young person in our society, naturally, I am a very connected person. I have lots of social media accounts/apps, friends on facebook, followers on instagram, and connections on Linkedin. I honestly probably have a massive online footprint, as I'm very active on social media, because I talk to a lot of people and I love commenting on my friend's posts to hype them up. I was interested in learning more about my online footprint, and I found this site that offers modules and education on your footprint, and how to reduce it. Although I do a lot online, I do not necessarily have a "personal" website which I periodically update or anything. The closest I have to that is this class blog.

I am an adamant user of Snapchat, Instagram, Linkedin, and occasionally Facebook, but these days only to keep up with Sorority information. What I post on these sites varies. On facebook, I rarely ever post or like things, it's just a died out thing for me besides a way to keep up with information from friends and family. On snapchat, I post about my day and maintain bonds with my close friends, and on instagram, I post events in my life and pictures I take of myself, places I go, or pics with friends to share with my followers. If someone were to visit my instagram page without knowing anything about me, they'd learn my name, what I look like, my majors, and links to articles I have written. They would also see that I have traveled a lot, that I am a member of Kappa Delta, and have access to other people's pages from those that I follow, and those that I tag in my posts.

3.28 Social Media and the Diffusion of Innovation

Social Media, predominantly Snapchat and Instagram, is a driving force in the world of Millennial's and Gen Z, or people born from about 1985 to 2010. The youth and future of the world have taken to these applications because of its immediacy, the content it offers, the realness of it, as well as the fact that it is an outlet for people to express themselves and let people who they cannot see everyday in their lives.

While facebook has fizzled out in regards to popularity among the younger generations, Snapchat and Instagram have thrived. Instagram allows its users to post pictures of whatever they please to express their interests, connect with others, and follow other accounts that cater to their interests, such as news outlets, clothing brands, "meme" pages, friends, etc. Snapachat offers real time communication, via sending "snaps", or quick selfies of yourself or a picture of whatever it is you want, with a caption written on the picture, or by the newer addition of texts. Snapchat partners with Bitmoji, a program which allows users to create their own avatar, which provides stickers you can use in your snaps or to send to friends. Your bitmoji is also used to show your location, if you choose, on "snapmap", which gives people access to know where their friends are, and to click around the map to see popular events that are going on that people have willingly posted about on a more public form, rather than just delivering the information to just their friends on the app.

                     


Instagram and Snapchat have their pros and cons, however. Regarding IG, unless your page is private and people must request to follow you, your page is totally open for anyone to view. Anyone at all can also send you direct messages, which can be clickbait or scams. If you do not follow the person, however, you may decline access to the message for security purposes. For snapchat, due to snap maps, anyone can see where you are, which can make people rather uncomfortable, but only if you choose to. Snapchat also is a limited app timewise. If you post on your "story", it is only available for 24 hours, then gone forever unless you save your snap to your camera roll.

Christchurch and the Press

On March 15th, 2019, a gunman opened fire on worshipers in a New Zealand Mosque, killing 49 on site. Adding yet another mass shooting to a seemingly never-ending list, the press covers the Christchurch Mosque shooting. The press treats this situation similarly to others, yet there is one big difference.

After years of giving the shooter the undeserved fame of having his face plastered across early morning television shows while glossy eyed news observers reel in details of facial features, the sometimes small smirk of satisfaction mass shooters wear after their deed is done, eyes that lack a soul, the amount of melanin in their skin which ultimately dictates the backlash we will see, imagining the now wiped away marks of blood of innocence that coated his weak, ill, and radical self. His name rings through our brains, Nikolas Cruz, Dylann Roof, Eric Harris, Dylan Klebold, and hes all we talk about throughout the day.

This shooting, we saw something different of the media. I can't tell you what the name of the Christchurch shooter is. I cannot tell you what race he is. I cannot tell you what religion he is. For once, the press didn't release his name or his face on a broad audience. This is a step in the right direction, because when mass shooters overwhelm our news and social medias and occupy our minds, we open the door for new mass shooters to plot and take action, while we continue to shed less and less tears, and send out our thoughts and prayers, while victims are crying out silent, unheard wails of policy and change.