Exegesis

Today, the World Wide Web is merely in its teenage years and has already been adopted by millions of people around the world. Many people admitting they are not able to function without their daily web ‘fix’. One ever growing Web 2.0 platform is ‘Wikis’ which provide a research starting point. Social Media Rivers have created an ever increasing population watching, interacting, playing games plus much more. What direction is the future of the web and how far can this technology go? Using the WWW is life changing because it opens up theories and information to the world, allowing us to grow, make new friends and has honed my potentials as a person.

When researching any topic, I critically examine words of the topic to gain clear explanation. In the 1980’s I would refer to a dictionary or encyclopaedia. Today, for billions of people and my first source location is called the wiki. A Wiki is an embodiment of collaboration, coordination and contribution of information on the web. Wikipedia was launched in January 2001 by Jimmy Wales and Larry Sanger. ‘Wikipedia’ is derived from the Hawaiian word wiki, meaning quick, and pedia (short for encyclopaedia). Wikis are a free, collaborative edited source of information. The introduction of hyperlinks in wikis creates a never ending source of knowledge. Wikipedia has harnessed the true power of web 2.0 and hypertexting.

The idea behind wikis is that they provide a space where multiple people can simultaneously work on one interlinked series of hypertext pages. Essentially, a wiki is a series of database driven pages that can be added to and edited by anyone with the appropriate permission. The use of private wikis is limited to a specific group of users, while in open wikis the ability to edit is available to anyone on the WWW. Given this emphasis on the collaborative potential of wikis, it is not surprising to find they are used extensively in business, where members of a team can work on a given project at the same time through an intranet-based wiki.

To date, Wikipedia is freely available in over 285 languages and contains over 22 million articles. Articles have been written, updated and monitored by ‘good Samaritans’ around the world. Wikipedia has about 100 000 regular active contributors, however, anyone who joins the site can edit. If you sign up with a Wikipedia account you are able to sign up for notifications or alerts if a particular item you are policing is edited. “Wikipedia recognizes the power of reputation and encourages contributors to become ‘registered users’ by outlining the benefits of having an account. According to Wikipedia there are now over 4million registered user accounts”. (Denise Anthony, Sean W Smith, Tim Williamson. November 2005). Every change to a Wikipedia article is best thought of as a proposed edit; it shows up the minute it is made, but it is still subject to future review and revision. In the case of vandalism, the review process can happen astonishingly quickly.

Another useful tool used within Wikipedia is Hypertext. Hypertext displays text on a computer or other electronic device with references (hyperlinks) to other text that the reader can immediately access, usually by a mouse click, key press sequence or by touching the screen. Hypertext is the underlying concept defining the structure of the WWW.

Hypertext and links are also used in Social Media Rivers. Hypertext and links are also used in Social Media Rivers. A user creates their online identity, summarised by Helmond 2010, “Identity 2.0 type of identity, placed within the period of Web 2.0, is always under construction, never finished, networked, user-generated, distributed and persistent.” The trend to interact, watch and share our lives and businesses with other users via Social Media has never been more available. The incredible speed of continuous content being added to a few social media sites can be seen at this flash presentation: http://www.personalizemedia.com/garys-social-media-count/ Social Media is ever growing and the aforementioned flash application shows just how active and dynamic the Social Media, Mobile users and Game Business is.

Everything we do online can be potentially visible for the whole world to see. Internet footprints are left every time we add media or content to the web. Digital shadows are where information has been added to the web by friends or family. Users can be tagged in a photo or post by others if privacy settings have not been set accordingly. Digital shadows are content that follows a user into real life, for example, Star Wars kid. Rivers are how the content is read and all the tiny bits of information collected and identify the users’ online identity. Social Media Rivers can be created by a range of different tools like re-blogging platforms (Facebook) or micro-blogging tools (Twitter). To personalize Anne Helmond (2010) “our identity online has a continuous partial presence due to social media rivers and search engines that organise and construct your identity online.”

Anne Helmond (2010) lists 6 characteristics to your identity:
1. Perpetual Beta; everything is open to change on the web. They always ask you to share more information about yourself.
2. Computer Network; identity is networked and information is displaced throughout.
3. User-generated identity (i.e. by other users) – fragments of social media
4. May not be generated by ourselves creating a digital shadow and internet footprint.
5. Distributed; identity 2.0 is distributed.
6. Indexed; if it’s not indexed in search engines, the identity does not exist.
7. Persistent; internet footprints and digital shadows never completely disappear. Your digital identity can be rearranged and fade but does not disappear and will outlive our real life existence.

Every day we seek to become more intertwined with the web. Either actively in terms of seeking out information to aid us in whatever endeavour we have embarked on to finding a relationship. There has been a spark in people choosing to place more importance in their cyber existence than their real life. Sometimes this provides an escape from real life and “exist” what might otherwise not be possible. For example, becoming a member of the opposite sex; or shoot to kill that rewards instead of a penalty. Some query if this is having a detrimental effect on our physical world and how we view it. However, the web is itself the greatest example of the largest social network and just like our off-line social networks; we have the choice of how we participate in this global collective.

A common feared part of Social Networking is privacy. Privacy is about protecting the identity of users, and usually embedded in the features of social networking platform to enable the users to decide how much content others can view and who can view it. Discussion about use of data, in particular Facebook has raised concerns. This topic was recently raised in a facebook conversation ( a section from this discussion is submitted Appendix A). A handy site recommended by fellow student to monitor Facebook settings is http://lifehacker.com/5813990/the-always-up+to+date-guide-to-managing-your-facebook-privacy Boyd (2009) mentioned privacy concerns as a major theme in cultural and critical discourse on social networking, and outlined ‘SNS’ as challenging legal perspectives of privacy. Also, asks “do police officers have the right to access content posted to Facebook without a warrant?” When do you think a social network is private and when is it public?

I hope our online privacy is under greater surveillance and we feel comfortable to grow with the future of the WWW. Kevin Kelly (Author of ‘What Technology Wants’) presented a talk on how potentialities such as cloud computing and the semantic web will evolve over “the next 5,000 days of the Internet”. Kelly predicts a machine called the ‘One’, will be very intelligent and able to think for us. “The Semantic Web is not a separate Web but an extension of the current one, in which information is given well-defined meaning, better enabling computers and people to work in cooperation.” (Berners Lee, Hendler & Lassila, 2001)

In essence, what is being implied is currently a person needs to instruct the computer what to do. Web3.0 is whereby the computers work for us, instead of us telling the computer what to do. A great example of the machine being able to think for us is the “Internet fridge” concept. The idea is the internet in your fridge is able to stocktake through RFID or bar code at any time advising a shopping list of items required. This refrigerator was an unsuccessful product because the consumers have seen it as an unnecessary product and due to the high cost (more than $20,000).

I find the most impressive of the Web 3.0 technology currently being built is ‘Project_Glass’. Today, there are more than 1.35 billion users of a smart phones/tablets in the world. This tool is our phone, email, diary, weather, music, camera, to name a few of its abilities. Part of the Google X Lab working on the project ‘Google Glass’ has also worked on other futuristic technologies, such as a self-driving car. Project Glass will be a hands-free device by simply wearing a pair of glasses. Everything you need or want to know, find, or listen to is driven by your own voice command and viewed like a desktop in front of your eyes. It appears an augmented reality is the future.

In summary, the web is for many, a very important daily habit by opening theries and information. Whether it be for work, studying, or personal; all aspects continues to grow at an exorbitant rate. We are able to grow our knowledge and find answers to nearly any question via Wikipedia. We find long lost friends and we choose to have a very active or little social existence with our online identity using Social Media Rivers. Plus we look forward to a fast paced online future showing vast technology advances, and this undoubtedly will hone my potential as a person.

References

Anthony Denise, Smith Sean, Williamson Tim, April 2007. The Quality of Open Source Production Zealots and Good Samaritans in the Case of Wikipedia. Department of Computer Science Dartmouth College.

Boyd, d. m., & Ellison, N. B. (2007). Social network sites: Definition, history, and scholarship. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, 13(1). Available at: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1083-6101.2007.00393.x/full

Helmond, A. (2010). ‘ Identity 2.0: Constructing identity with cultural software.’ University of Amsterdam Anne Helmond. New Media Research Blog. Available: http://www.annehelmond.nl/wordpress/wp-content/uploads//2010/01/helmond_identity20_dmiconference.pdf

Leaver, T. (2011) .Your digital shadow [Lecture]. Retrieved from http://dbs.ilectures.curtin.edu.au/lectopia/lectopia.lasso?ut=2417
Leaver, T. (2011). Social Me(Dia)Rivers [Course notes]. Retrieved from http://lms.curtin.edu.au

Tim Berners-Lee, James Hendler and Ora Lassila. Scientific American 2001. The Semantic Web (a new form of Web content that is meaningful to computers will unleash a revolution of new possibilities). Retrieved from http://lms.curtin.edu.au