E-mail as an online social network

"What we've got here is a failure to communicate." - Cool Hand Luke

One year, for my birthday, I got a Winnie the Pooh Stationery Box. I had some stationery with butterflies on it too, but I definitely liked Winnie the Pooh better. I used this stationery like it was my job. I used to write letters to my best friend on Long Island, my elementary school friends, my cousin and my aunts and uncles.

That stationery set was the last I ever received—because then we got a computer, and letters were out and e-mail was in.

E-mail is an often overlooked online experience. When we think about social networking, we often jump to sites like Facebook, MySpace, LinkedIn, or Twitter. But what about e-mail? Shouldn’t it be included too?

Think about it—every single student at this University has a mail.umd.edu account. So do TAs, professors, advisors, administrators—even departments have UMD addresses. Do they all have Facebook? No. MySpace? No. LinkedIn? No. Twitter? Half my friends don’t even understand what Twitter is, let alone have one. Whether or not we use our @umd.edu address or have it forwarded to another e-mail provider, we all have one. E-mail is an often overlooked social networking tool.

I guess it boils down to how you define social networking. www.pcmag.com defines online social networking as:

“A Web site that provides a virtual community for people interested in a particular subject or just to "hang out" together. Members create their own online "profile" with biographical data, pictures, likes, dislikes and any other information they choose to post. They communicate with each other by voice, chat, instant message, videoconference and blogs, and the service typically provides a way for members to contact friends of other members.”

Now think about your email provider (or providers—I personally have 3 email addresses.) UMD mail is simpler than most, but if you have yahoo or gmail, hotmail or aol you probably have the majority of the options mentioned in the definition of online social networking. Admittedly, it lacks the glitz and glamour of sites like Facebook, but it definitely gets the job done. It connects you to people-whether 1-on-1 or 1-on-10 (etc.)-it allows you to share pictures, documents or folders, and it's private. Whereas many sites are specialized (Facebook is for friends, LinkedIn is for colleagues) email allows you to send pictures of your spring break trip to your friends, a list of snacks to your mother who's coming to UMD to save you from diner food, one of those super annoying messages about how you'll die in 10 days if you don't forward this story, or a cover letter and resume to a prospective employer.

So how 'bout it? How do you guys feel? Is e-mail online social networking or is it just a way for us to communicate?

Response to Cell Phone Study

"When it comes to privacy and accountability, people demand the former for themselves and the latter for everyone else." -- David Brin, American sci-fi writer

Girl in the blue shirt broke up with her girlfriend, very tall Maryland guy “CAN’T HEAR YOU,” drunk girl walking home “doesn’t need you to come get me, I’m FINE,” guy leaving my COMM class apparently really hates our teacher, and loud girl in the library does not enjoy when people, namely me, politely ask her to shut up or go talk somewhere else. (There are shhhh! Signs everywhere. It’s a library, what did she expect? I’m not trying to be the library police, I just want to study. She might’ve been annoyed, but I was thanked by several people on my way back to my seat.)

How did I learn all these things? It really was not that hard. I listened. I walked around campus for the last week and I eavesdropped on every single phone call I passed. Mind you, I was forced into eavesdropping on most of them because most people

A. Don’t care how loud they’re talking

B. Don’t know how loud they’re talking

C. Really want me to hear their conversation.

This week, in JOUR289i, Info3pt0, we had to read a study titled “Cellphones in public: social interactions in a wireless era.” The study identifies cell phone users as singles and withs, singles being those who are alone, and withs being those who are accompanied by at least one other person. The majority of the people I noticed on campus were singles, but my observation of my friends’ cell phone usage qualified each of us as a with, since we were together.

(I believe that these, along with other terms like normative cell phone behaviors and caller hegemony were easy to understand, and largely correct.)

Although this study was written five years ago, and the world of cell phone technology changes weekly, the validity of the study is still relevant. While phones have changed, most phone-behaviors have not. The study discussed nonverbal communication while talking on the phone (with the caller and with the other person they’re with.) I noticed this quite often in my observations, and many of the motions seemed to be frustration – waving hands, shaking head, rolling eyes – and these motions were the same for both singles and withs. I also noticed myself engaging in “other activities” when my friends were on the phone. I would check my phone, read the Diamondback, pick up my laptop, drink my coffee – something to occupy me while I was essentially being ignored. Interestingly – all of my friends turned away while talking on the phone, avoiding eye contact like the study suggested (another reason I believe the results are still very valid.)

This was an interesting week for me to do this study, since my phone is more or less on the fritz. My own cell phone behaviors were very sporatic—since my phone likes to turn off whenever it pleases, so my calls were often interrupted, cut short, or prevented altogether. This led to many frustrated nonverbals by me, in addition to a bunch of “Seriously!?” and “This is driving me crazy” and a few other choice words after each ended communication attempt.

I personally have never witnessed anyone using a cell phone to cheat. I have noticed texting during classes, I myself text during class, and I’ve even noticed texting during exams, which I can’t do since I need to focus on one thing at a time. I also notice people playing games on their cell phones in class. One of my friends has Tetris downloaded on their iPhone and I’ve seen her get a new high score several times in COMM class (the same class that I caught the boy talking on the phone about how much he hated it…hmm.) Another cell phone behavior I notice a lot is people using their cell phone as a flashlight. People drop things, and everyone pulls out a phone. People can’t see where the last step is, somebody’s right there with their phone. I do it too, but my battery life just is not what it used to be, so I try to stray away from that action.

All in all my studies of people’s cell phone behavior were interesting. I certainly heard some conversations that I did not care for, did not care about, and definitely would have lived if I hadn’t heard them. A lot of the time I am amazed at just how far people are willing to go on their cell phones—people have conversations that I would not even begin to have in public, especially on a college campus where any number of people you may know could very well be in your immediate vicinity.

In the end I guess we’re all guilty. We’ve all done it sometime, right?

Phones of the future, straight from the past

Last time I talked about today’s views of cool future phones. But we already own pretty cool phones, we’ve all seen an iPhone or a BlackBerry, and it seems that each new phone has something better than the rest.

But what about before there were cell phones?

Star Trek’s Captain Kirk had his own communication device. The “communicator” allowed Captain Kirk direct contact with his ship, in the event Kirk ever needed Scotty to, ya know, “Beam me up!” The man credited with the invention of the cell phone, Martin Cooper, says that Star Trek’s communicator was an inspiration for the world’s first mobile device.

www.thinkgeek.com -->

Dick Tracy is a hard-ass, crime-fighting, bad-guy-catching, super-smart detective from a comic strip that ran from the 1930s till the late 1970s. One of Dick Tracy’s crime-fighting tools was a two-way wrist radio that allowed him to call the police department when he was in pursuit of super villains.

http://bit.ly/c786y4

LG seems to have stolen this idea to make a device Tracy would’ve been jealous of. The touch screen wrist watch was supposed to debut last year, though I’ve never seen it.

Ever seen Get Smart? A comedy satiring the secret agent lifestyle, the star of the show, Maxwell Smart, or Agent 86, had phones incorporated into several of his items of clothing throughout the show. Most notable was his shoe phone, which, of course, required he removed his shoe each time he needed to use it. What if he was in a foot chase and needed back up? Well, I have no clue. http://bit.ly/9Tn950

http://bit.ly/azKgvL

Last but certainly not least, everyone’s favoring falling-with-style toy, Buzz Lightyear. Buzz had a panel on the arm of his space suit that he could use to contact Star Command (or thought he had, since he was obviously oblivious to the fact that was a toy until Sid tries to kill them in as sadistic a nature as possible.)

>http://bit.ly/aFN50y

I’m certainly less creative than the producers/writers/geniuses behind these ideas, so as I grew up, my fake cell phone consisted of: my hand. Lame, I know. But it’s a start right?

Anyone know of any other (what I’m calling) past future views of cell phones? Let me know if you do! They’re pretty entertaining…

HAPPY SATURDAY :) GO TERPS!!

Back to the Future 3.19: Cell Phones!

Photo from: http://bit.ly/cIkQe3

"I like my new telephone, my computer works just fine, my calculator is perfect, but Lord, I miss my mind!" - Anonymous, but funny.

What’s 2 pounds, has to be recharged after every half-hour of use, and costs $3,995?

Why, the first cell phone of course!

Hitting the markets in 1984, Motorola’s first cell phone DynaTAC8000X, was more than 12 inches long -- Imagine trying to fit that in your pocket.

We’ve obviously come a long way since then. We now have phones capable of lasting days without being recharged, we can send messages, we can take and send pictures – all on one handy, less than 2 pounds 12 inches, device.

Even with the glitz and glamour of the current phones on the market today, we are constantly dreaming up new ones. Phones with projectors, phones that can transfer talk to text, phones that will gather all of our news and read it to us, phones that can do our math homework: WHATEVER. The crazy thing is, these dreams can be reality. It was the late great Dr. Seuss who said “Oh the things you can think up if only you try;” try we do, and succeed we will. Phone technology is becoming faster, smarter, quicker, better and it’s becoming more and more personalized, which is just what we, as consumers, crave.

A 2009 CNN-Technology article discusses how the cell phone is battling to become the only thing taking up space in our pockets. (That still wouldn’t have helped the DynaTac8000x. Seriously? Did you have to carry a separate bag for that thing?) “Some analysts say that within five years, mobile phones in the United States will be able to make electronic payments, open doors, access subways, clip coupons and possibly act as another form of identification.” (One slight problem-these phones would make Identity Theft for Dummies a whole lot simpler: steal the phone!)

This article on huffingtonpost.com is called “Future Phones: The 17 Coolest Concept Cell Phones.” They are not kidding, some of these things are awesome. Necessary? Probably not. Superfluous? Probably. Awesome?

Absolutely.

Gender Divide...why?

"In the theory of gender, I began from zero. There is no masculine power or privelege I did not covet. But slowly, step by step, decade by decade, I was forced to acknowledge that even a women of abnormal will cannot escape her hormonal identity." -- Camille Paglia

It’s no secret: men and women approach technology in different ways.

Why is this though? Why did this digital gender divide evolve? Many studies have “proven” its existence, citing that women use the internet mainly for social reasons and that men will play games, do work, etc. But why? Why don’t women use it for the same reason? What’s preventing them? What caused the crack in the usage distribution.

A Stanford study published by ITandSociety.org, called Gendering the Digital Divide, says that it comes down to gender. Gender, as defined by www.dictionary.com, is sexual identity in relation to society of culture, or the condition of being female. Note that this is different from sex, which is defined as the male or female division of a species, especially as differentiated with reference to the reproductive functions. Sex is biological, gender is not.

The study says “Women and men use the Internet differently and in different amounts because of social expectations guided by gender roles.” Women use the Internet less than men because they’re expected to. There are also things preventing women from using the Internet as often as men, like taking care of a family. “Women’s experiences with technology have historically been limited and dominated by men,” according to the Stanford study.

Technology can be looked at from many different perspectives: I believe that gender is one of them. It’s an important factor to consider when looking at reasons for technology, uses of technology, and the future of technology. What role did women play 20 years ago, what role do they play now, and what role will they play 20 years in the future? It’s our generation that gets to decide the answer; I’m going to do my best to make it a positive one.

WDYT? NBD? IDK!

“Grammar, which knows how to control even kings.” -- Moliere

IYO..txt grmr = ndb?

Or, in your opinion, is text grammar no big deal? Or do you think that it’s leading to student’s poor grammar usage in papers, emails, homework assignments and everyday life? Is texting to blame?

Well, IDK.
There’s no doubt that text messaging is all about convenience. It’s usually quicker to send a message than to call someone, wait for them to pick up, say hello, ask how their day is, and then get to your point. While making a phone call may be uncomfortably awkward while in the classroom, on a bus, or in a crowded room, texting allows people to send almost covert messages to each other without causing any ruckus. Since texting has become a phenomenon, texters have created their own language through which to communicate, of course adding to the quickness and ease of texting.

Is this language invading other aspects of our society?

My teachers seem to think so. At the beginning of each semester, every single one of my teachers needs to explain to me that emails are a type of formal communication. That means complete sentences, punctuation, capitalization—the works—and really, can you blame them? I often find myself neglecting to capitalize the letter “I,” I use the acronym IDK at least 5 times daily, and sometimes writing out full sentences feels like a chore.

Some scholars seem to believe that texting is a good thing. Kids need to read and write possibly hundreds of times daily to communicate. Timothy Shanahan, president of the International reading association, believes that texting puts pressure on students to be capable and efficient readers. “With so much written chatter, being able to read and write have become definite social advantages. There is simply much more pressure to know how to read than in the past…” This article points out that having a different set of words and abbreviations forces students not only to be comfortable with different styles of writing, but to understand in what situations to different aspects of language. (graphic = www.helium.com)

Students now need to know how to write research papers formally, to correspond correctly with friends, colleagues and authorities. Students also need to be able to converse quickly through text messaging, and more importantly, they need to be able to distinguish between all of these circumstances.

This article on associatedcontent.com, called Texting is Not the End of English Grammar , argues that while ostensibly, text messaging seems to disregard all rules and regulations of grammar, intrinsically, all of these rules are still coming in to play. The grammar may be implied, rather than immediately obvious. While punctuation is not always included, it is implied by spaces. (ex. I love u c u l8r – no punctuation, but it is assumed that the two phrases are separate and independent thoughts.)
So what is it? Is it helping or hurting? Is texting making today’s younger generation illiterate, or is it making them adaptable?

Idk. L8r g8r.

Girls just want to have f...errr, Social Media?

“We are working hard to build a service that everyone, everywhere can use, whether they are a person, a company, a president or an organization working for change.” –Mark Zuckerberg, on Facebook getting it’s 200 millionth user.

University of Maryland Students: 36,000

2009 Population of the Unites states: 305,529,237

Facebook Users: 400,000,000 +

There are more then 400 million active Facebook users. There are only 305 million people living in America. 70% of Facebook’s users do not live in America, according to Facebook’s statistics page.

Facebook has come a long way since it’s conception in 2004 in the Harvard dorm room of Mark Zuckerberg.

Facebook appears to have “stolen” many users from the now-old MySpace. The following chart shows a downward trend in MySpace users since Dec. of 08 occurring simultaneously with an upward surge in Facebook users. (Interestingly, the bottom line, Twitter, seems very stagnant. Has Twitter hit a user plateau?)

(Photo from www.marketingcharts.com)

Facebook and MySpace appear to have different age demographics, with MySpace appealing more to the younger ages (<18)> However, on both sides, female usage is higher than male usage. A study by iStrategyLabs
states that, in 2010, 54.3% of users are female, while 42.6% are male (apparently 3% are “unknown.” I’m going to assume that means unlisted.) According to Quantcast, a Web site that has its basis in viewing statistics and demographics of other websites, females also account for more than half of Twitter users. For the past few years, men have dominated the internet and comprised the majority of internet users, but on many social networking sites, women rule.

Twitter:

So why is this? Why are female users more prevalent on social networking sites like MySpace, Facebook and Twitter? And what does this mean for women in social media?

“One word: Opportunity,” according to Jessica Faye Carter, a columnist featured on Mashable.com. According to Carter, social media not only presents the opportunity for companies to reach women (as consumers or employees,) but also for women to “lead, effect change, innovate, and build relationships across sectors, locally, nationally, and globally.” Social media may be helping to decrease the gender gap in online usage. Carter says that women now comprise 47% of mobile web users, a number representing a 43% increase between 2008 and 2009.

But why is social media the thing bringing women to the Web? What is it that is alluring about these sites?

Some say it boils down to science. Males are better at math and spatial reasoning, and women are better at tasks involving information processing and interpreting social information. (this article) Author Louann Brizendine, in her book The Female Brain, says that while men’s brains need to process 7,000 words per day, women’s brains need the power to process 20,000.

So is there really a biological reason for this? Do our female brains direct us towards social networking sites? Did my brain make me sign up for Twitter?

Maybe.

The ventral frontal cortex (VFC) of the human brain has been identified as the main player in social cognition (tasks including facial recognition, perceiving and experiencing emotion.) A specific part of the VFC, called the straight gyrus (SG,) may be responsible for better social awareness and interpersonal perception. According to studies done by Professors Wood and Nopoulos of the University of Iowa, the SG is larger in grown women. Interestingly, “psychological gender,” or whether you identify more with masculine or feminine traits, also has an effect on the size of the SG. So this introduces the age-old nature vs. nurture debate. Are women better communicators because genes influence their brains, or because social pressures cause them to more highly develop the part of the brain associated with communication? . (this article)

Whether it boils down to genetics, stereotypes, or pure coincidence, women have finally found an online world they can rule.

(For more stats on the gender differences in social media usage, check out this website!)

Happy Friday! :)