Observations: The Final Straw
Observations, my semester-long blog comes to an end. We’ve been through so much, but, alas… this is the final project.
BECAUSE this is hyperpublic, let me explain the prompt (I’m talking to you, future employers stalking my “digital footprint”).
- Discuss five top #smpasocial tweets from the semester.
- Reflect on this godforsaken blog.
- Discuss other classmates’ (not godforsaken)blogs.
I’m going to combine these points of instruction to fit my style of stream-of-consciousness blogging. But, overall, I’m going to reflect on this blog, what I’ve experienced in social media these past few months, and what I’m concerned with/about moving forward. •
To start, a new tweet:
This one kills two birds with one stone. For me, this blog is ABOUT Medium. I currently use Wordpress for MediaFile and Wix for my personal site, so I wanted to try something new. Since I had but a few posts on Medium before August, and publishers have flocked to Medium as a content management system (CMS) in recent months, I figured this could be an informative project. I could simultaneously explore Medium as a social network and, more importantly for my studies, determine the limitations of an all-in-one CMS.
Bill Simmons’ The Ringer made noise when it launched natively on Medium. And a number of established publishers, like The Awl, transitioned their sites to Medium.
Through this process, I’ve learned a lot about the platform. I have little-to-no faith in Medium as a social network, but as a CMS there is a lot of potential. •
This blog was also a chance to write creatively.
This was one of the lessons I personally considered during my social media fast, though I forgot to write about it at the time.
In journalism, it’s either a.) a hard task, or b.) inappropriate to write with a creative voice. If poorly executed, creative attempts in journalism can come off as tacky.
And on social media, it’s just plan hard. How do you find creative ways to express yourself in 140 characters on Twitter? Who will read long, creative Facebook posts?
But, in longer-form blogging, I had an opportunity to flex these muscles and this was a lot of fun.
LET’S TALK ABOUT MY FAVORITE BLOG NOW!
Since, I am consistently writing, editing, tweeting, and posting about journalism, I wanted to write about whatever I wanted. Sometimes, I wrote about the news, but often I’d just pull out a snippet from a moment in time.
“I wish I could write songs about anything… other than death.”
When I pressed play on a six-month-old NPR Tiny Desk Concert, I was shocked for the first time in a long time.
I wrote:
“Like a plane breaking the speed of sound, Julien’s voice pierced through my consciousness. It’s not hyperbole at all — it’s one of those moments where you feel slapped in the face by something so unexpected. Like seeing someone you know you’re going to be best friends with — or going to fall in love with.”
Not only did I find myself immersed in this unbelievable voice, I found myself completely intoxicated by Julien Baker’s completely absurd and tragiromantic story of drug abuse, struggles with her sexuality, and faith in God. She’s my age.
So, as I listened to more and more of Baker’s work, I started writing my blog post. I was searching for an escapist topic du jour and this one hit me hard.
Almost two months later, I’m still feeling the effects. •
Two blogs I loved:
Rachel Faulker’s “Thoughts for Bailey”:
“Thoughts From Places is a space for quiet observations,” Rachel Faulkner writes on the homepage of her blog. Rachel’s writing style is pretty to say the least. More importantly, it’s real.
“Dear Bailey,” she wrote to her little cousin. “Two weeks ago when I was in Denver with you & the rest of our family, you told me you were so excited that we were going to have a woman as our president.”
“Bailey, I’m sorry. I’m sorry that the country let you down this election.”
“Because you’re going to grow up in a world where your president thinks women are objects, which he can grab whenever and wherever he pleases.”
“Because this might have been our grandma’s last chance to see a woman in office.”
When Donald Trump was elected president, all I could think of was the heartbreak felt by every woman I loved so much in life — my girlfriend and my sister, but even more so my mother and my grandmother. I’d never heard my mother so upset outside of a cemetery.
Rachel’s blog post was short and sweet, and it struck me to the core. But, this was just one of her many posts that resonated with me. •
Elissa Nuñez’s “Combating the Rise of Far-Right Conservatism Globally”
Elissa is an excellent writer. She has a great reporter’s voice, and and ability to tackle complex problems with ease. While I really enjoyed all of her blogging this semester, her latest post, “Combating the Rise of Far-Right Conservatism Globally” was particularly impressive.
“As a former resident of the neighboring Czech Republic, Austria’s election results made me think about the pervasiveness of xenophobia across Europe and its rampant dispersion over the last year,” she wrote. “Why has anti-refugee rhetoric seems to have stuck in countries like the Czech Republic, but not enough in Austria to topple the political establishment? And if Austria could combat the rise of anti-migrant sentiments, what could other countries do to create a similar outcome?”
I rarely find myself interested in reading other students’ political essays or blogs, but Elissa’s is clear, concise, personal but removed, and really very informative. •
Next, this was a tough semester for social media.
From Pepe the Frog memes to (((echoes)))), Donald Trump’s alt-right supporters were the closest thing I’ve encountered to evil on social media.
I’ve seen images of Jewish journalists photoshopped into gas chambers. I’ve seen Nazi regalia adorn a cartoon frog molded to Donald Trump’s likeliness.
I saw Twitter, a place where I BREATHE and THINK and EMOTE turn into the biggest cesspool for white supremacy and anti-Semitism. And, it really sucked.
Twitter has an issue with anonymity. While it’s in a corporate bind — slowed growth in user base and no obvious buyer ready to swoop in — Twitter relies upon its active users for revenue. But, so many accounts are anonymous and harmful. Satirical accounts, and even most mild trolls, are relatively harmless, but this election cycle has shown how awful Twitter users can be. And, Donald Trump repeatedly appealed to the worst of his followers, tweeting a photo of Clinton with cash and a Star of David, retweeting an account called White Genocide, and so much more.
Blogging on Medium has been a good way to get away from the political noise. But, it’s also been a good place to vent when Twitter has just become too disgusting. •
I’m scared about privacy.
Privacy Part I
As I began to type this section… about privacy concerns… my mother’s Facebook account was hacked.
Well, not hacked. Some user made a clone of her account and started friending her friends.
I’ve been at home in New Jersey — and my parents are, classically, asleep at 10:30/11:00pm.
My girlfriend alerted me that she got a friend request from my a fake version of my mom’s account. My brother and I reported it to Facebook. Apparently, other users did as well and Facebook responded in minutes and deleted the fake account.
I got into my mother’s phone and added some extra security to her account (I know, that sounds ironic). All is well.
Privacy Part II
Over the past few months of Russian hacking, I’ve become a little paranoid. I’m trying to use more encrypted messaging. I have two-step verification on virtually all of my apps. I’m limited location-based data flow to the biggest corporations including Twitter (Uber is messing with me right now).
It’s hard, but it’s something I’ve been grappling with. In revisiting these tweets, Dan’s New York Times data breach quiz has me thinking that this is something I’ve gotta reflect upon. •
Hey, I got the MediaFile Twitter account verified!
But, I still haven’t convinced Twitter that I deserve that precious blue check. We can’t all be the brilliant Andrew Desiderio.
I took a break from writing this paragraph to apply again — for the fourth time — for Twitter verification. In the application, you have to list web links confirming your identity and importance. You also have to write a 500-word submission about why you deserve verification. And, lastly — a recent addition — you need to upload a photo of your ID. Every time you get rejected you have to wait 30 days to reapply. Today was day 31 evidently. Wish me luck! •
Conclusion. I want to keep up my Medium blogging. I’ll remove it from the tag “Observations” … but, free-form essaying is important. It’s a little bit rambling and a little bit magazine writing, a little bit expressive and a little bit sloppy too.
I expect to encounter Medium as a professional CMS. Something works. Customization is hard, but the platform is beautiful and undeniably seamless. The all-in-one model works most of the time. For the purposes of Observations, it’s worked just fine. Farewell. •
