Serve a little.

I sit and ponder the ills of the world....

Wrongful Conviction and the Deaf. A man has been in prison for murder since 1994. He has three children who were placed in the foster care system and raised without him. He has a grandson he has never met. He is Deaf. I am 99.9% sure he is innocent. I have been working on his case since January 2007. It has consumed me. I wrote a forty plus-page memo regarding facts of his innocence, what transpired between police officers and this man and deaf witnesses with no interpreter present (leading to awful miscommunications), means by which evidence was hidden and information about who I think actually committed the murder, among other things. I submitted such memo to countless justice/deaf-centric organizations. One has taken interest. Why aren't people clamoring to free this man (and those like him)? Perhaps I am the insane person here--it has consumed me; it keeps me awake at night; I cannot celebrate holidays without thinking about how he has missed so many over the past seventeen years; I think of how much his childrem must have missed out on.... Would you believe that none of the deaf-centered organizations assisted? Nope. Not one.

So many people/organizations talk about equality and justice, and yet so few act to make such ideas more than mere ideas.

I look forward to the day when people match their walk with their talk. Then we can actually bring about the changes we seek that human kind so greatly deserves--especially our historically disenfranchised brothers and sisters.

There is always a place to invest your humanity in humanity.

Wow...

LONG TIME NO BLOG...



So much has transpired in my life since my last post. This will be my personal blog instead of a class blog as I am no longer in university. :d)

I'm not exactly sure where I should begin...

Perhaps, I should begin with the Rights of the Deaf...

Yes. I think that is the perfect place.

My name is TL and I am Hearing. My life's work is to tear down the barriers that exist b/t the Deaf and the Hearing world--to open the world's eyes to the beauty of equality of all audiologies...that sounds funny. Really though acceptance (not tolerance!), equal access and equal opportunity are paramount in the fight for Deaf Rights.

What have I done lately? Thanks for asking!

There's Embracing Lambs, Deaf Community Friends, Deaf Camps Inc., Deaf Blind Camp, my boy's home children, trips to Guatemala, assisting attorneys with Deaf Clients (which I will one day name H.E.A.R.D), and of course, my personal favorite, teaching salsa to Deaf students :d).

When I return, I will expound.

TL

Get Rid of your Surfboard, a Lifevest will be More than Enough!

So get this...You no longer have to "surf" the net, now you can just tred in the shallow end of the kiddie wave pool *laughs*

So my friend in Afghanistan just informed me about a site that takes all of the randomness out of surfing the net. Ironically, it's called StumbleUpon. The user fills in some informaton about their personal interest and then the site actally finds sites/blogs/videoos/etc. that you will supposedly like. It will "learn what you like and make better recommendations." Did you hear that, the website knows what you like "better" than you know what you like!

Upon further exploration, I learned that the site is basically a DeL.icio.us for surfers. The site only reccomeneds sites that have been suggested by other like-minded users.

The whole thing is hillaraious to me. It's like a counter-intuitive oxymoron...LOL. I thought surfing the web designed to be an adventurous waste of time that sometimes allows you to stumble onto a pot of gold, but I guess the idea behind StumbleUpon is to help the user save time while wasting time???

Hmmm, sounds kinda silly, but the 2,302,816 Stumblers (including my friend-go check out her blog abou StumbleUpon) seem to thouroughly enjoy it...

If Uncharted Territory of Social Networking Proves to be Anything Like the F-22....

Chapter Eight of "The Hidden Powers of Social Networking" reminded me of something slightly off topic....

I recently learned about Air Force/Lockhead Martin's plunder with the F-22 Fighter Jet. This jet, was supposed to be the next-generation of air superiority for our military--and at over $350 million per craft, you'd pray that this statement was true!!!! Yeah, well, not so much.

So, the very intelligent folks at Lockhead/Boeing/USAF did not seem to think that the jets would ever cross the International Dateline. They did. And when they did, all the computers in the jet (including navigation) shut down and all communication was lost. Although the Air Force likes to downplay this blunder, six pilots nearly lost thier lives on that day.

I say all of this because it goes to show the humanity behind technology. Often times when we get into uncharted territory and build these grandiose, billion dollar projects that we think are perfect, they are not. Human error is real.

We went from checks, to debit/credit cards, to online banking, to shopping online....All the while, more and more identities were being stolen. When does it stop? When someone who "actually matters" loses their identity. (NOW BEFORE YOU GUYS GO JUMPING DOWN MY THROAT, I'M JUST POSING A QUESTION....FOOD FOR THOUGHT IF YOU WILL). I think privacy/security and technology(all kinds--from online banking to social networking) often find themselves at odds.

I think Cross and Parker's analysis of "Ethical Considerations" in chapter eight might be the most important of all of the sub-texts. Technology is a very powerful tool. It can be used to help AND it can be used to harm. Often times, like in the case of the F-22, we do not even realized the changes that can come about with the advent of new technology. We need to be very aware of the future impact technology may have on our lives.

Corporate blogging...Now comapnaies really have to Manage Chaos...

So here's the deal. Live television/radio and the internet are synonyms for INSTANTANEOUS. This means that the information dissemenated through any of these means if any company/corporation intends on controlling the message, that message must be controllled before the information is broadcasts.

This is why Scoble's Manifesto clearly states that an individual should talk to his or her boss prior to bloging about the workplace or about the company The mediums of today are not forgiving. With the advent of Web 2.0, the things you say or do can be posted in a forum or on YouTube within seconds. Some would argue that this makes messages more salient. I would argue that messages are much more ubiquitious.

Companies have free reign over their employees. They can and should be allowed to control who they hire and fire. Thus, if you say or write something a company is not so fond of they have every right to make any sort of sanctions against you.

Since we're talking about message control....

I think now's a good a time as any to bring up Mr. Imus' "slip of the tongue."

Don Imus learned the hard way. Sure, he is allowed to have his own opinions. More power to him! BUT the venue in which you choose to express that view must be chosen very, very carefully.

There's a Manifesto for this Stuff!

So, Mr. Kyte taught me much more than I initially thought!

As I reflect upon Scoble's Manifesto in Naked Conversations and Tom Kyte's visit to my class, so many things begin to come together.

First, I would just like to say, who'da known there was a manifesto for this stuff!!!!!

Okay, sorry. I digress...

So, Mr. Kyte mentioned a lot of different things in passing that I think deserve further evaluation (whether or not Mr. Kyte knows it--and he will after this because I'm sure he's following statute number 21 (HI TOM!!!)-- he is the poster child for the Weblog Manifesto) :

1.) He mentioned that he is open and honest when blogging. --Imperative, according to Scoble, when establishing lasting relationships with readers.

2.) He did not exactly say this, but it could be ascertained from the wealth of knowledge that he possessed, and by his reader base (focusing moreso on his corporate blog), that he is the oracle on Oracle.

3.)He mentioned that he was just coming down from his brief hiatus from blogging and that he was focusing on his family life. --Scoble says that readers pick up on even the faintest decay in your writing.

4.)He clearly has the support of his company. They seem to back him 110%, even in the face of insane sueaholics who literally go to the ends of the earth-and back-just to sue him.-Scoble says that the big whigs need to know what's going through your head before you blog about the company. Now, that is not to say that corporate bloggers should be beholden to their employers (that would violater statute number 29 ) But they should think about how much they value their jobs before they post anything insane about the company. Don't wanna end up like Mark Jen!

4.5) He is a firm believer in non-coercive blogging...LOL.--that's all she wrote on this point....LOL!!!

Hmm....what else...(***she's thinking***)
Ahhh yes! (Epihpany)

5.)He responds to his comments!- This is uber-important. His number of readers would dwindle very quickly if he was not so engaged. The frequency of his postings also astounds me.

6.)He's definately got statute number 3 in the bag--Human voice. Come on people, the man is hillarious!

Well, I think that's all for now. I'll add more as I think of 'em. Thanks for coming by Tom. I really enjoyed the talk. Great job Professor Melander!

Virtual Teams...

The most important point I found in Cross' Book (chapters 2&3) was the importance of collaboration across hierarchies. I think that often times people understand the importance of lateral communication in organizations and fail to remember the importance of communication with said chain of command. The smoothness of this process (hierarchical feedback/communication) is a great determining factor to the company's success. If the process is slow, and the staff member can not make a move without feedback from the Manager, and there are three or four links in the proverbial chain, then the company could quite possibly be missing out on all sorts of time-sensitive opportunities. This is the type of problem the military often faces.

Another key point that I thought might be worth exploring is the importance of alliances across organizational boundaries. Stove piping is a problem that can easily be avoided if this sort of cross-organizational communication occurs. We saw this problem with the information given in regards to a substantial portion of the false information feed to the public in regards the the Iraq invasion.

I think "network awareness" is also another key point in the success of an organization. If everyone knows who is in charge of what aspect of business and exactly what everyone specializes in, then processes move much more swiftly. We work in the age of globalized corporations. Most companies set up headquarters in one country and have numerous hubs in different countries (and more often than not, on different continents). It is extremely important to maintain open communication not only within that particular hub, but throughout the entire company at every location. This prevents needless overlap and wasted expenses.


Cross,Rob. The Hidden Power of Social Networks. Boston: Harvard Business School Press, 2004.

If Only We Were Colorblind...

I was originally going to write about the issue of trust, as addressed by Cross in The Power of Social Networking. I changed my mind.

A number of students raised some very interesting points in class yesterday. Someone mentioned the effects of race on an individual's social network. My mind immediately went to a book that I had read a few years back. Why are all the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafateria?, was an eye-opening book about why different ethnic groups seem to ally together, and why they seem to always be seen together in the cafaterias of the world (okay, at least here in the U.S...LOL). Beverly Tatum used school as the primary example in her book, but the concept can definately stretch to the university and corporate levels.

I think it's interesting that even within our own Social Networking Class that the students of different ethnicities and/or fraternities and sororities tend to almost exclusively socialize with one another-- & they always sit with one another--myself included. Beverly Tatum says that these types of "affinity groups" are positive and that they help to facilitate "identity exploration." BUT, she also says that it is important to prepare our youth for leadership in the 21st century, and this includes education on race and education on how to cross racial boundaries.

...A perfect segway back to the topic of our reading...

Social Networking in the workplace is affected by a number of things. While Cross touched on trust and a few other technical aspects of working relationships, it is important to remember the realities of other barriers to social networking and try to address those as well. Whether or not we admit it, everyone has prejudices. ace, class, gender, physical handicap, and age are all factors that affect the networking process. Knowing this is half the battle....where you go from there is all up to you. I think it's more a matter of willingness to leave your comfort zone than anything else.

I am eager to see who sits in a differnt place next time we meet!!!

Toppling Tyrannies through Texts

Who'da thunk it???(Pardon the colloquialism and poor grammar) Smart Mobs really shocked me this time! To think that a government can be transformed through mobile devices is one thing, but to be completely overthrown...unheard of!

I think that this use of technology to mobilize such a massive number of people was so successful because texting had become such a staple in the country. I also believe that they had grown weary enought of the oppression they faced by the Estrada government to make concious efforts to change thier lives.

I think this political anomoly could teach us a lot. I think that it just goes to show how much of an effect people can have when they mobilize for a cause that they truly believe in (or for a war that they oppose ;)) Often times, we feel that the government is to strong, or too large and that we citizens have so little clout that what we probably would not effect much of anything anyway. This is simply not true--just look at the example given us by the Philipine people.




"The world is moving so fast these days that the person who says it can'tbe done is generally interrupted by someone doing it." - Harry Emerson Fosdick

TOM KYTE

Well, I must say that I was pleasantly surprised at just how intelligent this guy was. What stuck out most for me was his insatiable appetite for knowledge. Mr. Kyte said that he read numerous publications every morning in an effort to absorb as much knowlege as possible.

It is amazing to me that he has been in the business of social networking since the begining. I did not even realize social networking was around in 1994. The metamorphasis of his career was amazing as well.

He also spoke about the importance of a name and of someone's reputation...It's important to be the "voice that is heard above the crowd," he said...And how right he is... He gave a great example: When he is verbally assaulted by other bloggeers, he no longer has to argue for himself...he has a devoted following who does that for him! (a little push in the direction of the negative comments does not hurt though... ***wink, wink***)

The lawsuits were interesting too...can you believe the gumption of some people...Hey, at least he had done his legal homework!!!! Maybe he should have worked out the kinks in his book as well as he did the kinks of law and order in Austrailia...what a loser!!!!

I digress....
So I checked out some of the sites he mentioned in class and found some of them to be quite entertaining/informative...(LOL). Of them...fark.com and reddit.com are my favorites.

Choices continued...

All right folks....

In my previous blog, I wrote about choices and about the importance of making good ones. I made no mention of everyone being perfect or of everyone being undeserving of second chances...I work for the Public Defender's Service for God's sake!!! However, I do believe that in life, you can only blame YOURSELF for the decisions that YOU make.

Before all of these social networking sites made it so easy for employers to look into people's backgrounds, private investigators and government officials pryed into the lives of prospective employees. And maybe all of this snooping does abridge people's right to privacy, but employers should know who they are hiring for a job. Whether they get the dirt the old fashioned way or by new means, they're gonna get it...plain and simple.

Poverty, Injustice and Wars are all sustained by greed and ignorance. Certainly if people thougth more about the choices they made prior to entering a war, discriminating against someone because fo the color of their skin and lowering the taxes for rich, we would not have as so many issues as we do today!

CHOICES

I don't know...maybe it's just me, but I have absolutely NO sympathy for anyone who places damning photos of themselves up on networking sites. Now, if someone else is the culprit of posting this information, then maybe I might sympathize a little. I am a firm believer in not doing anything that you wouldn't want your grandmother to find out about, so forgive me for my apathy on that particular topic.

I do find it hilarious though that sites like, ReputationDefender.com and Namyz are actually making money "clearing" peoples' e-records. (I hope people realize that they can do this on their own)

I think if more people spent time thinking about what might happen to their future prior to making silly decisions that all of this could be avoided and they could save themselves a lot of embarassment, time, money...oh yeah, and future job opportunities.


"The choices we make dictate the lives that we lead." ~Danny DeVito, Renaissance Man

“A media system wants ostensible diversity that conceals an actual uniformity” ~ Nazi Doctor Joeseph Goebbels

This theme, "Social News" is especially interesting to me. I spent an entire semester researching the effects media on society and politics alike and I feel quite strongly about a few areas concerning this particular topic.

I think that the media, once nominally accepted as the informational hot spot, is in a state of disarray. I feel that it is important to understand the nexus between the political and economic arena and the media in order to comprehend the media as a whole. We live in a capitalist society(definition: driven by money). The media system is not owned by the state, like those of communist countries, instead it is run by a few enormous conglomerates. This corporate control of the media enterprise has ensured that the elite administer the media in a fashion that would suit them, however subtle or inadvertent that might be. In Smart Mobs, Howard Rheingold mentioned citizens "becoming the reporters." (pp 168-169) While I do believe that this social take over of the news was a step in ther right direction, I feel as though this may have created more problems as well.

Here's how:

In the article, “Bad News,” Richard Posner argues that the conventional news media are besieged for a few reasons.

1. The corporatization of the media has much to do with the failure to accurately report a great deal of important business dealings (or scandals if you will). See documentary, Orwell Rolls in his Grave, to learn how "lies become the truth."

2. New media (i.e. Blogs, cable news) have caused an explosion of consumer choices, thus a grapple among media to secure a larger audience.

3.Hard news (homelessness, the economic degradation of the lower class of America, the real issues in the war in Iraq) does not sell. Soft news (Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt’s new baby, Tom Cruise’s latest outburst, Police chases) sells, so the media give the people what they want—entertainment (mixed with tidbits of information here and there).


Posner acknowledges the fact the emergence of new media sources has placed pressure on both owners of news media and journalists alike. With a quickly diminishing budget, the owners are forced to let go of some of the reporters. Now, there are five journalist pulling the same work load as ten before and these journalist are still trying to beat the bloggers to the punch on stories. These factors have led to accidental inaccuracy as well as the blatant erroneous reporting of late. Posner argues that the struggle for a greater viewing base has had a sensationalizing effect on the media and has amplified partisan reporting.

Corporate power, wage disintegration, growing inequality between the rich and the poor, and the disappearance of the middle class are just a few many core issues of class that have completely fallen off the media map.

Million dollar question:

If something happens and it's not reported, did it happen at all???

LOL!!!!

I read the necessary pages of Naked Conversations, and the "Blogs Will Change Your Business" article. I find it quite amusing that people actually think a corporation giant (ie Microsoft) will ever change its ways due to a few measely people writing letters. Now comes my tirade on the decline in social activism...

See, what corporations and politicians alike are sure of is that no major social reform has ever come about without massive mobilization of people AND feet in the streets. That is to say...words on a page are lovely, sit on your computer all day long typing all but incognito blogs, but until a critical mass emerges and takes action against the "issue of the day" then NOTHING is going to change. Corporations laugh in the virtual face of bloggers!

I belive it was in the article, something to the effect of, "blogging is not a business elective. They are a prerequisite." I would argue that this is a statement handed directly down from corporate America. If they can keep people in front of their computers and out of the streets and out of congress and out of their own headquarters, then their work is done. They have NO worries and they know it.


They are LOLing at all you bloggers....Muahhhahahahahahahahahah!!!!!

Social Networking and Collaboration...

Upon the completion of the assigned readings for tomorrow's class, only one of the topics remains with me...SUSTAINABILITY...

Although "sustainability" was never used in Smart Mobs, I do believe that is what Mr. Rheingold was referring to when he mention the regulation of the use of common areas (i.e grazing pastures, aqueducts, etc). (p 34/35) While I do not feel as though he did a good connecting this story to social networking as a whole, I do feel as though this story is analagous for two different situations.

1.) How big can the internet grow without over-running itself???

2.) Is it possible for a network (on a smaller level...maybe Facebook) to become too big.

3.) Who should be in control of regulating the internet???( This is a whole other blog post...Keep your eye out for this one....)

While the first question is far beyond the reaches of my current intellectual capacity, I do have an idea about the latter. I would say that Facebook is a prime example of a network becoming too large. At its inception, Facebook was just a community for college students. It was great!!! Over the past eighteen months or so, it has drastically changed. It went from being a college network, to a high school and college network, to being a network open to the public. I noticed that it was much more difficult to locate people because there were so many more "Joe Shmoe's" in such a large network than in the network of yore. This was just one of many issues that arose from the evolution of Facebook. There were also security/privacy issues that arose with some of the new "features" installed in Facebook.

I dunno, I just think it is important not to spread too thin....and large networks tend to do exactly that.

"The Father of the Internet"

I was fortunate enough to have the opportunity to attend Vinton Cerf's lecture this past week. He is an invaluable source of information! I learned so much.

Surprisingly, the crowd was about 90% native-spanish speakers....Why is that you ask???

Well, the main topic of the night happended to be bringing information to Latin and Central Americas...more importantly, bringing information and technology even to the poorest in those countries. There is an alliance between "Microsoft, Intel, and One Laptop per Child [Organization], " that will aid in this massive effort in information sharing.

He encouraged people to think about infrastructure and not just temporary fixes. Often times the U.S military, and even the Peace Corps will enter a foreign country with great intentions and help "fix" a problem. Often times, when they leave, the village collapses. This is a direct cause of this lack of building infrastructure.

I found it very interesting the change in internet usage over the past 30 years. Asia is leading in internet usage with a whopping " 380.4 million users", to North America's "227.5 million" users.
Europe follows close behind and Latin America is running a distant fourth. Cerf pointed out the fact that these numbers, while they seem inconsequential, are very important in determining, "content, products and services of a country. In "1997 there were a mere 22 million computers, now there are over 600 million." This milestone does mark the advent of a new type of consumer, thus is imperative that the market change in order to cater to this new consumer.

His most important point of the night was, "Information is not power, it's the sharing of information that's power." Power is multiplied when we share it... he gave a great example dealing with the scientist of the human genome project:

Scientist who wish to publish any information on the human genome must share the information with the scientific community. He explained in detail how they keep a check on this information sharing while ensuring to promote research and developement.

Sources:
Vinton Cerf Lecture

The over-simplified, complicated Network diagram

From a political perspective, this diagram spells disaster. Anytime there is one or a few indidviduals with a monopoly on the wealth of knowledge held by a community, there is chance for tyranny, or stagnation. There must be a "gadfly to wake the sleeping horse" (Plato, Apology)! If at any time in a community relies upon one source and one source alone for its information, disaster and tyrrany are probably soon to follow.

What is more, from a stategic standpoint (military) this network diagram wreaks of disaster...

Everyone in a system (also called network) has to have some knowledge of all of the working parts or that organization. This is the logic behing the military hierarchical method of information dissemenation. In order to keep the working parts of any machine moving, everything and everyone has to work together. If for some reason, unbenounced to the network, Paul goes senile, should the machine break down, or should, Helen, Sue, John and Lisa be able to keep the machine moving???

Just a few thoughts...that's all for now.

Social Networkers vs. Social Butterflies

I think it is very important that social networkers not be confused with socialites. Mr. Rheingold seemed to put a great deal of value on the importance of raw numbers in a social network as opposed to the effectiveness of the prongs within an individual network. For example, lets compare someone like Paris Hilton to someone like Donald Trump. True, they both have a great number of associates in their social circles, but who has the most social capital??? I would argue that Donald Trump's power greatly surpasses that of Paris Hilton's, not because he does a better job with his money or because he even has a greater number of people in his circle. His ability to connect with people on a business level combined with his ability evaluate a person's future contributions to his social network prior to adding them to his network greatly increases his social capital. Although Paris has a great deal of associates in many different professional circles, her social capital is not nearly as great as Donald Trump's.

There were a few points Rheingold held that I disagreed on. Mainly...

In my past experience, I find that social networks are not always strengthened by technological advancements. In my short lifetime, I have moved a great deal of times. I remained very close to a great deal of friends from second and third grade by maintaining constant correspondence with them via mail--whenever one of the two of us was in the position of possibly moving we would notify the other. Upon the advent of the internet, I found it very easy to put off writing due to the fact that... "I have their e-mail address saved somewhere." I found it harder and harder to keep in contact with people because I had grown lazy and dependent upon the computer to tell me exactly where they were. In many instances, when I finally got around to writting these individuals, much to my dismay, I would recieve a "Mail Delivery Failure" notice in my INBOX.

I read, Democracy and Technology, by one, Richard Sclove for one of my other courses. I learned that the social life of the Ibiecan people of Spain all but collapsed as a result of the implementation of a new technology in the 1970's. As harmless as running water might seem now(because we know nothing else) and as advantageous it may have seemed then(possibly save time & money), the effects it had on the social life of the Ibiecan citizens were dubious at best. Prior to the implementation of running water in this Spanish village, waterholes and wash basins were a place for seemingly superfluous chatter between women and a time of bonding for sons and fathers. Upon the advent of this great technological advancement, the social happenings of the village dissapeared.

The internet allows you to network with many people, yes, but how many people is too many??? How many people do you think someone knows on their friends list of 3,000 people. The internet weakens social ties (or creates fallacious ones) on many levels:

1.) You have so many people to keep up with you can only leave brief notes to keep up with them.
2.) You don't really know the people you call "friends" online anyway, but your network is up to some outrageously large number and you are satisfied because you think you are a great networker.
3.) You become dependent upon technology and end up neglecting your responsibilities as a connector...You get pushed to the spot of that peripheral person and don't even realize it.

Intro

I, Talila Lewis, on my honor promise that my blog is true complete and acurrate to the best of my knowledge and ability. This blog is for course purposes only.