Topic 6 – Living and Working on the Web Module Summary

My experiences of this Living and Working on the Web module have been interesting. Before commencing it I would have said that I had a decent grasp of many technological methods that are gradually expanding into our every day lives. I was capable of writing in HTML to a decent standard, could program in BASIC, had a relatively fast word-per-minute typing speed and had used various different programs such as Microsoft Word, Excel, Access as well as Macromedia Flash and Dreamweaver to a passable standard.

However, the use of social media was something that I had never anticipated would be a fundamental factor in any attempts to get a job in the future. Previously, my use had solely been consigned to using Facebook on a personal level as well as various other sites such as Imgur and several football forums. As you might guess, this has not had a great bearing upon my online profile in a professional measure.

Living and Working on the Web has allowed me to increase my online profile and forge links with others in the field of technology and communications. However, on reflection I should have made more of an effort to connect with people in the field of work that I wish to go into. However, this was made more difficult by the lack of people in the criminal justice system who are communicable via social media. This may be because of restrictions on the information that can be broadcast through the media and has significantly restricted my efforts to connect with people via the medium of Twitter (my profile on this can be found by clicking on the image below). Despite this, I have managed to increase my standing online through Twitter, just not in the manner I had hoped, with my number of followers increasing to 76; several of which hold some standing in the world of technology and social media. On top of this I have also increased the number of people I follow which can increase my standing further through retweets and hashtags. This is a massive increase on my previous use of Twitter, which had been dismally poor despite having an open account for several years.

On top of this, I have also created a profile on LinkedIn, which can be found by clicking on on the image below. I have found this more useful than Twitter for interacting with those in my preferred field of work due to the ease at which I can read information that is shared and has relevance to criminal justice policy. According to LinkedIn my profile is now at ‘Expert’ level and, while I have a relatively small number of  ‘connections’ at 11, it is an improvement on the online professional profile that I had before the start of this module. Even more encouragingly, in the last 30 days my profile views has increased by 29%.

Topic 5: Open access to online materials for all – utopian dream or unstoppable force?

The emergence of the internet as one of – if not the most – important and used tools for the dissemination of information and resources has led to fervent discussion around the issue of the protection of the rights of those who create this information and/or products.

In recent years this has reached its peak in the media with the emergence of acts such as the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA), the ridiculously named Preventing Real Online Threats to Economic Creativity and Theft of Intellectual Property Act (PROTECT IP Act or PIPA) and the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), pieces of US legislation that aim to stop the illegal spread of material such as films, music and games.

While not on the same level budget wise as internationally released and advertised products, other information is also available relatively freely on the web. This is expected to change in time though, with estimates claiming that around 90% of information will be pay-to-view within three years. Despite this, there are still some such as the @ccess Initiative who are campaigning against the disproportionately expensive fees charged by scientific journals for subscriptions despite the internet actually lowering their running costs drastically.

At first glance, the benefits of open access educational material being available for free seem manifold. It provides a multitude of resources for people to use at their own leisure and for their own research, improving the probability that advancements will be made as well as:

• Less expensive for students who would otherwise have to buy material contained in textbooks etc.
• Information can be disseminated quickly and efficiently without the need for expensive printing and shipping costs.
• The information can be accessed anywhere that has a connection to the internet.

However, while there are many advantages there are also a variety of disadvantages to offset them:

• Making everything open access may lower the quality of academic material.
• Without paying for professional translations it would be difficult to disseminate a lot of information due to it being written in English originally.
• While the ability to access information from anywhere via the web is an advantage, it does not benefit those who are unable to connect to the net.
• It may be very difficult to sustain an entirely open source network of resources indefinitely due to the lack of funding. This might affect the quality of the research.

References

http://gizmodo.com/5877000/what-is-sopa

http://www.thedrum.com/news/2013/04/12/90-online-content-be-held-behind-paywalls-three-years-media-company-survey-suggests

http://libguides.umuc.edu/content.php?pid=98930&sid=742401

 

Topic 4 – Reflective Summary

Right, reflective summary time. First thing to reflect on is the fact that this is late due to the distractions that come with finishing a term (aka drinking far too much then recovering and realising how little money you have until your next student loan payment). So my self organisational skills and time-keeping are clearly things that I need to pay more attention to.

It has been intriguing to look at the ethical implications of the use of social media in the educational and business sectors. The effects that it can have on anyone who uses social media are widespread as evidence by the way the #HasJustineLandedYet? incident had on Justine Sacco’s life; effectively costing her job after it came to public attention. The way in which businesses can also intrude on the privacy of individuals and use the information gathered to decide whether or not to employ a person.

This intrusion and the public backlash that may be experienced by some surely requires some form of ethical guidelines to minimise the damage done to personal reputations? Is it right that a company can reject you for a position based upon what you do in your private life?

Looking at this has definitely made me realise that everything you post can have ethical implications for you in your offline life as well as online, but it has also made me think about measures that should be put in place to limit the impact it can have. With proper measures in place – either enforced by the social media companies or a higher authority – the abuse dished out to individuals and the invasion of privacy committed by potential employers could, and some would argue should, be negated.

Topic 3 – Reflective Summary

Examining the ways in which you can – and possibly need – to create and maintain a professional profile in this day and age really opened my eyes to the extent to which it can have an effect on our relationships with potential employers. This was driven home by Laura’s announcement on her blog (laurajhiggins.wordpress.com) that she had successfully managed to get an internship with Disney using social media – although she does state that it was mainly used to initiate contact, her CV being what she feels was the deciding factor in their decision to hire her.

Seeing someone in the same position make concrete progress in employment using social media is encouraging and has also provided extra motivation for myself and, I imagine, several others on the course to redouble their efforts. I will freely admit that my use of social media in a professional sense has been lacklustre so far; I rarely use Twitter to interact with those in my chosen degree field and have barely touched LinkedIn since creating my account. This is something I will look to improve on dramatically, especially over Easter after most of my university essay deadlines are over with!

In regards to my blog post on this topic, I believe that I could have written much more on the development of a professional profile past the initial creation stages that I focused on (as pointed out by Jazz Curzon). While this is an important stage, I could definitely have provided more information on the latter aspects of the process.

Topic 3 – Developing an online profile

Discuss the ways in which an authentic online professional profile can be developed.

A professional profile is becoming of increasingly great importance in the employment market today due to the massive expansion of implementing technological – specifically web- and social media-based applications – within the workplace. Statistics published by Office for National Statistics (2013) show that 43% of the total businesses surveyed used a social media site such as Facebook, Twitter and/or LinkedIn; 81% of large companies use them while only 42% of ‘small businesses’ use them professionally. Recruitment Buzz also states that 2 out of 5 employers use social media to screen out potential candidates depending on their online output (2014).

Because of this, it is imperative that people start to use social media to develop a professional online profile in order to maximise their employability. There are many different ways in which this can be achieved. Firstly Sue Beckingham (2013) states that first impressions count; it is likely that a web search of your name in any application i.e. Google, Facebook, Twitter etc. will be one of the first steps an potential employer will take, therefore it is vital that the information on your front or profile page is relevant, clean and professional – so no pictures of you vomiting after a night out!

Beckingham also maintains that we should develop and online profile in order to distinguish ourselves from those who we might share a name with – something that, fortunately, is quite easy for me as the only other prominent figure with my name that shows up in a Google search happens to be a fictional comic book character! This can be achieved by engaging with others who are prominent in the field you aspire to be a part of; interact with them and share useful information with them.

Lontos and Ciske (http://www.fairfaxcountyeda.org/8-steps-professional-online-presence, no date) make several recommendations, one of which is that you should develop two online profiles: a personal one and a professional one i.e. a private Twitter account for interacting with friends and family and a professional account to disseminate information and your views to employers and others in your field. This helps potential employers to only see that information which you wish to be public and maintains a more professional outlook.

The Ohio State University (http://asccareerservices.osu.edu/sites/asccareerservices.osu.edu/files/Building%20a%20Professional%20Online%20Presence.pdf, no date) also has several tips for their students regarding the use of social media in a professional capacity. Not least of which is their suggestion to decide on one username so that people know who you are regardless of which application they are viewing you on; a similar suggestion by both OSU and Lontos and Ciske is to use the same profile picture of yourself to provide authenticity and continuity across the web.

REFERENCES

Beckingham, S. (2013) Building Your Professional Online Presence. Available at: http://www.slideshare.net/suebeckingham/building-your-professional-online-presence (Accessed: 09 March 2014).

http://asccareerservices.osu.edu/sites/asccareerservices.osu.edu/files/Building%20a%20Professional%20Online%20Presence.pdf (no date) (Accessed: 09 March 2014).

http://www.fairfaxcountyeda.org/8-steps-professional-online-presence (no date) (Accessed: 09 March 2014).

Office for National Statistics (2013) Business use of social media. Available at: http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons/rel/rdit2/ict-activity-of-uk-businesses/2012/sty-ecom-2012.html (Accessed: 09 March 2014).

Recruitment Buzz (2014) The role of social media in Pre-Employment Candidate Screening – Statistics and Trends. Available at: http://recruitmentbuzz.co.uk/the-role-of-social-media-in-pre-employment-candidate-screening-statistics-and-trends/ (Accessed: 09 March 2014).

Reflective Summary – Topic 2

This week we were tasked with looking into the merits and disadvantages of using multiple online identities and whether or not using more than one can affect our interactions online. This topic has been very interesting, especially with a lot of recent relevant news stories to link them with.

Before this, I had not given much thought to the ideas of anonymity and authenticity on the web despite being a walking example of the problems we face when deciding between them; something that could be said of most people. Looking at this has really opened my eyes to decisions we make unwittingly when creating different user accounts for different web based services.

It has also been extremely interesting and useful to be able to apply some of my sociological knowledge gleaned from my criminological studies to what I feel is becoming an increasingly relevant aspect of modern society. Being able to use Erving Goffman’s dramaturgical metaphor in conjunction with online personas has undoubtedly increased my understanding of the way in which he speaks about the use of roles and how individuals are constantly adapting their behavioural output depending on the actions they are expected to take and the context of the setting.

This was highlighted when talking to rknowles92 about how authenticity, integrity and anonymity take on different degrees of importance in different situations i.e. how the role of an academic or expert in a field automatically attributes a level of respect and trust towards their output than someone who does not possess the qualifications for this role.

On the whole, it has made me think a lot more about whether or not I maintain a high level of inter-connectivity between my online personas. While using a single username and password may make it easier to remember, and lend authenticity to what I say from every account, it also means that you lose a certain amount of security and privacy; always having to think about what you say and how it could be interpreted by followers of each account.

Topic 2 – Online Identity, Integrity, Privacy and Dogs

“On the Internet, nobody knows you’re a dog.” (Steiner, 1993)

I could be a dog; I might, for example, be a German shepherd. The chance of this scenario being true may be highly unlikely but it does serve to highlight that the online identities produced by individuals may only be showcasing a facet of themselves that they have selected. Many even present different aspects of their personality via different sectors of the internet and even within these parts of their persona that they choose to display online, they are able to filter out that which they do not wish to be seen i.e. the ability to ‘untag’ yourself from drunken photos taken upon completion of the Centurion challenge.

How many people on the internet are dogs? Source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/87776777@N00/2316926513/

The degree to which many sites such as Facebook and Google have implemented such a high degree of interconnectivity throughout the web has led to some – such as Aleks Krotoski (2012) – pointing out that it allows us to imbue our online personas with much greater authenticity than before. If, for example, information on the internet can be easily traced back to a renowned academic, we are far more likely to respect the work than if it had come from an anonymous internet identity. In this way, a single online identity can provide much greater scope for networking and sharing of information in the professional realm. This opinion has been echoed by Facebook founder Mark Zuckerburg who has accused those who use multiple online identities as “lacking integrity” (quoted in Helft, 2011). While this may bear some relevance when considering those who use the internet to seek out prey i.e. paedophiles and those who ‘catfish’ others, the average person should surely be allowed to retain some personal privacy?

Should all online identities be interconnected? Or is Zuckerberg slightly biased? Source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/crunchies2009/4258728914/

The contrasting view is that the use of multiple identities allows us to segregate the different parts of our lives, enabling us to keep them a secret from those we do not wish to see them i.e. a girl in one of Costa and Torres’ (2011) studies chose a different username/identity for every online service she used so that it could not be traced back to her ‘real-life’ personality. However, it begs the question of whether we are obliged to choose between a single online identity that is seen as trustworthy and ‘authentic’ or multiple personas that allow us to retain some semblance of privacy?

REFERENCES

Costa, C. and Torres, R. (2011) ‘To be or not to be, the importance of Digital Identity in the networked society’, Educacao, Formacao and Technologias, April [Online]. Available at: http://eft.educom.pt/index.php/eft/article/view/216/126 (Accessed: 22 February 2014).

Helft, M. (2011) ‘Facebook, Foe of Anonymity, Is Forced to Explain a Secret’, The New York Times, 13 May [Online]. Available at: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/14/technology/14facebook.html?_r=0 (Accessed: 22 February 2014).

Krotoski, A. (2012) ‘Online identity: is authenticity or anonymity more important?’, The Guardian, 19 April [Online]. Available at: http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2012/apr/19/online-identity-authenticity-anonymity (Accessed: 22 February 2014).

Steiner, P. (1993) ‘On the Internet, nobody knows you’re a dog.’ [Cartoon]. The Cartoon Bank, 05 July [Online]. Available at: http://www.thecartoonbank.com (Accessed: 22 February 2014).

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Topic 1 – Digital ‘Residents’ and ‘Visitors’ – Reflective Summary

So it’s the end of the first topic for the ‘Living and Working on the Web’ module. We’ve looked at the way in which people make use of technology, specifically how they use the internet and social media in their day-to-day lives. In particular, we have studied the theories of Prensky and his natives/immigrants and White and Le Cornu who stressed visitors/residents, and evaluating the merits of each and their application to internet usage. Reading about these theories and the way in which they have had an effect on the delivery of educational material in the UK and America.

The application of these theories to our own internet usage has been very interesting and has enabled us to place ourselves on the resident/visitor spectrum depending on whether we view the internet as a tool or place. Personally I would place myself much closer to the resident end due to my use of Facebook, football forums and Imgur as ‘places’ in which I can share my own ideas and experiences while interacting with those who have the same interests as myself.

In addition to the academic reading we have also been tasked with creating or adding to our digital personas in order to increase our levels of employability. While not previously a massive user of Twitter despite having an account for several years, it has been illuminating to note the ease with which connections can be forged within your employment area of interest solely by posting interesting and relevant information – I have been followed by several prominent bloggers and a relatively large online newspaper due to my posts in the span of a fortnight – something which can only be beneficial.

Despite this progress, I still feel that I need to further increase my use of social media such as LinkedIn to increase my connections within the areas that I wish to advance in professionally. While I have increased my Twitter output, the majority of it has been focused around this module. To improve I need to increase the output but post more information and interact with those involved in criminal justice or immigration.

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Topic 1 – Digital ‘residents’ and digital ‘visitors’

The concept of the digital visitor and the digital resident is a progression from earlier work submitted by Prensky (2001) in which he suggested the existence of the digital native and immigrant. The difference between native/immigrant is much more concrete with natives being described as those born roughly between 1980 and 1994 that have grown up immersed in the digital world of video games, internet and computers and immigrants being those others that have had to assimilate themselves into the newer technology.

The digital resident/visitor theory grew around the criticisms levelled at Prensky’s work centring on the lack of empirical evidence to suggest a divide as pronounced as he was suggesting. Bennett et al. (2008) found that while Prensky’s ‘natives’ might have a superior level of ability in some areas such as e-mailing or word processing the majority were not involved in the creation of new media content for the web.

To address these criticisms the resident/visitor theory was put forward. Residents are described as those in the population that see the web as a ‘place’ in which they can socialise with those who share the same interests as themselves. This might take the form of blogging, Facebook, YouTube or Twitter, forums and other social media facilities and allows the resident to effectively live out a proportion of their lives online.

Conversely, visitors see technology and the web as a collection of ‘tools’ to perform specific tasks without feeling the need for a permanent online presence. This reluctance to maintain a digital profile is often attributed to fears over security and/or privacy as well as a view that the broadcasting nature of social networking is egotistical (White and Le Cornu, 2011).

This is not to say that residents refuse to use the ‘tools’ available on the internet or that visitors will not use the web for private digital communications i.e. email or Skype; the two categories are not diametrically opposed.

This presents us with a much less rigid framework to describe the technological capabilities of individuals – one that does not use age as a specific distinguishing feature. Instead of the definitive ‘boxes’ of immigrants/natives, individuals are placed on a spectrum with resident and visitor at either end. Residents are capable of using the internet as a tool just as much as visitors, while visitors might have a greater grasp of technology than some residents.

Word count: 394

REFERENCES

Bennett, S., Maton, K. and Kervin, L. (2008) ‘The “digital natives” debate: A critical review of the evidence’, British Journal of Educational Technology, 39(5), pp. 775-786. [Online] DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-8535.2007.00793.x (Accessed: 03 February 2014).

Prensky, M. (2001) Marc Prensky. Available at: http://www.marcprensky.com/writing/ (Accessed: 03 February 2014).

White, D.S. and Le Cornu, A. (2011) ‘Visitors and Residents: A new typology for online engagement’, First Monday, 16(9), September [Online]. Available at: http://firstmonday.org/article/view/3171/ (Accessed: 03 February 2014).

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