Final Portfolio
Even before taking this class, I was using Web 2.0 practices in discourse on and offline. But something I have quickly learned is that just because I use it doesn’t mean everyone else uses it. I started to notice that in 2016 but ever since the pandemic started in 2020. Something that I have always done when doing research into a topic is trying to find the original source that the reporters are pulling from. I always take information that I find on the internet with a grain of salt unless it’s from a reliable source or the person itself. As someone who has family members and friends who will run with any conspiracies, they find it kind of scary how they will believe any of it just because it aligns with their beliefs.
One of the things that I enjoyed doing this semester was interviewing friends about their majors, sadly though I waited till the last two writer’s posts to do it. I have always loved learning about something new, so I interviewed my friend who is an Education Major. Then her roommate is both a Sociology and Anthropology major with a minor in French. I wish I started doing these earlier in the semester, but I am still happy I did it. I have always felt like have learned more and you can get more out of in-person discussions. Like in class when we would have our in-class discussions either after our free writes, analyzing a reading, or talking about the chapters we would read the night before. With my fellow students who sat at my table around me or with the whole class itself. Another one of the writings I did for the blog post was about the unjust firing of Melissa Barrera for her comments about the Palestine-Israel War.
There is plenty I have taken away from the readings at the beginning of the semester that I have used when doing research for the class and outside the class. In Chapter 6 we read about Google buying YouTube in October 2006 and now what it has become, as well as how it has altered the way people receive information or are entertained. For myself personally, that’s where I go for movie reviews or movie news. One of the YouTubers whom I go to for both movie reviews and news is John Campea he has been doing YouTube since its inception in 2006. He does a daily live stream throughout the week where he will pull up movie articles from sites like Variety, The Hollywood Reporter, JoBlo, Deadline, etc. He will even show the article on screen which helps me, personally find it better so I can go to the source. How the show goes is he will read the article so you have time to form your own opinion and then he will give his own, along with his co-hosts. This is how the news should be reported no matter what it is about. That is what the class and Web 2.0 practices have reassured me. We live world today where everyone is extremely divided, ever since 2020, sometimes I feel like we are getting better but that feeling doesn’t last long.
I once heard something that makes total sense to me, at least. Everyone is a fish who used to swim in their own ponds but now with the internet, all the ponds have been connected to make one giant ocean that can never be disconnected. But this doesn’t even just apply to YouTube itself, it applies to the internet overall. Something that I go back to every once and a while is a site I found when I was writing the Misinformation Refection during midterms. Is a site called Worth It or Woke, it was one guy writing all the reviews for them and the site sounded like and looked exactly what you would expect a site with a name like that to look like. The reason why I found this site was because I was doing research to find examples of how people bend the truth or narrative to fit their own agenda and this site fell into my lap. The website is full of one singular opinion and no differing thoughts or ideas, leaving no room for open and thoughtful discussion about movies, the user base is just Republicans who think their opinions are the only thing that matters and nobody else is better than them. Overall, this website isn’t worth the time to read unless you need a quick laugh about the stupid thoughts of people who never even took the time to see the movie and form their own thoughts. What makes the site even better is the constant pop-up ads that look like they were made in the early 2000s or it’s just a PNG that doesn’t load and all it says is click here on it. The site also has an ad-free membership you can sign up for, along with a shop to purchase a wide range of merchandise with political messaging all over it. Nothing is cheaper than five dollars. The memberships cost $32.30 annually or $3 annually or you can donate money to the site. One of the biggest scam ads on the site is one of those win-a-vacation ads, this one is for a trip to Hawaii. This site can be used as an example for many of the chapters that we read throughout the semester.
This leads me to the second question ‘’why is conscientious digital citizenship vital for public writers?’’ We live in a world where anyone can write about anything, whenever they want. They can claim it’s fact and people will believe it no matter what, yes, I understand that some people do it just for fun but then some people will twist the narrative or make up something completely false for either monetary gain or in some sort of clickbait to enrage their followers. Sadly, some people are too far gone and will believe anything they read as long as it aligns with their beliefs. Then if you try to argue them, they will keep moving the goal post so they can never be proven wrong. It’s just bizarre to me how people just believe anything and everything they read on the internet. Especially from sites like Twitter or other sites that aren’t known to have the best track record.
When Melissa Barrera was fired from the upcoming movie Scream 7, I saw it on an Instagram post first that was a screenshot of a Twitter post. So, I thought it was fake, even when I googled it nothing from any reliable sites had an article about it. But as time passed more publications started writing about it then finally bigger, more reliable publications published articles about it. One of the problems is today people will rush out articles or videos just so they can be the first ones to cover something no matter how big or small. At the end of the day, it’s all about clicks and they don’t let the story develop or wait for new information to come out. Since there is so much information being thrown at people today, it is easy to get overwhelmed, forget something you saw, or just simply move on from it quickly. Hence why social media is an endless rabbit hole you can go down and just lose hours upon hours of your time.
Look at something like SIFT we learned about in class, but it is also something I have been using my whole life without knowing it. Hence the Melissa Barrera firing was a time I used SIFT. I even mentioned it as an example in my writer’s blog. I could rant all day about people not doing the proper research into topics. It’s either because they don’t want to because they refuse to, don’t have time to, or are just lazy. For whatever reason a lot of people are afraid of learning something new or don’t like it when people disagree with them because they take it as a personal attack.
Overall, Web 2.0 practices and discourse have created massive shifts in American and global civic life. In both positive and negative ways. Just look at today’s political climate and how toxic it is. You can also see how it has seeped its way into fandoms day to day-to-day life or online discussion of anything. Even though it can be quite entertaining going down the rabbit hole of the internet of bizarre things you can find online. But it also breaks my mind because I can’t wrap my head around how people come to these conclusions. I do too that one day the conscience of digital citizenship vital for public writers will increase but I feel like sometimes online discourse takes one step forward and then two steps backwards. I am also noticing that people are getting annoyed with how toxic the internet has been for public writers. All I know is I will use the techniques I have been using and learned from the class when I do research in the future.
