Media Deprivation = FAIL

So I really tried to avoid the use of media as much as possible, however, it wasn't even an hour after I woke up that I was checking Facebook and Gmail. Literally purely as a reflex, the first thing I did upon opening my laptop was check social networking. I have noticed that many times when I want to check my email or visit some other site, I instinctively start typing in Facebook, without thinking.

After class, I would normally troll the web or watch Netflix to relax before getting ready for work, so I tried to avoid this by occupying my time at the DDS. Without a book or anything to entertain me (except watching all the miserable people), I sat in the DDS for an hour and a half before getting my license. Sometimes I like to drive with no music, today I was more ADD than normal, and found it necessary to chat on the phone (rather than to myself) the entire trip there and to work.

At work while answering calls, it was difficult to pass the time without Wikipeding or Googling something my whole shift (my job is less work and more thumb twiddling). On the way home, I called my beau and made dinner plans so that I wouldn't sit at home on the computer. Since it was late, we ended up at Taco Mac with 50 TV's surrounding us the entire time. It was to chilly to eat outside, so there were times my eyes wandered to the screen, especially when Nick went to the bathroom. I couldn't resist looking at the televisions when there was no one to talk with. It almost felt as if I were being attacked by all of the televisions surrounding me. I guess the reason I gave in was because I needed to look occupied or just have something to do while I was waiting. When we got back, I realized what a bust this plan was, and in seeking entertainment and something to zone out to, we threw on Netflix and I hopped on Blogger to post.

Experimentation!

Some of us remember doing experiments in school, but if you're anything like me, everything you learned about science came from this guy:

Bill Nye used countless experiments to show many scientific principles at work. In studying media effects, we can also use experiments to prove or disprove theories.

Experiments are very helpful for media effects research because they give us an opportunity to gather data that is relevant to our research under controlled conditions. In content analysis, researchers can only describe media content, and in using a survey you are simply asking people to recall past experiences which is as flawed as a person's memory.

Most often when examining the effects of the media, we seek to find an identifiable variable in the media that has a cause on the dependent variable (usually people's actions, thoughts and behaviors). Since one can measure an infinite number of variables with experiments, it is a great tool to eliminate extra variables that might also be responsible for the relationship. In a causal relationship like this, experiments are the best to observe the presence of a relationship.

Bill Nye influenced me in my love of science and even my vegetarianism! Love him!!

Social Media: Motivator or Distraction

In this article from the New York Times, author Noam Choen reviews an interesting thesis conducted by a Yale graduate student that provides an interesting viewpoint on the effects of social media that I feel relates to the DailyKos article in an interesting way. In his thesis, Media Disruption Exacerbates Revolutionary Unrest, Navid Hassanpour examines the effects of President Hosni Mubarak's decision to cut off Internet and cellphone service in the middle of the Tahrir Square riots. He concludes that this was a poor decision because it involved citizens who did not previously hold a political opinion about the situation, it prompted more face-to-face activism, and it decentralized the rebellion thus making it more difficult to control.

I would have to agree that while social media sites are great for people to come together and discuss like interests, I have not seen much actual activism influenced by these means. Everyone is more than happy to post status updates about whatever cause interests them that day, but anymore than that would require a major catalyst for change. In this case, the incitation needed to move the opposition from a virtual world to the real world was provided by the government when they removed these avenues of communication.

I feel that this relates to the DailyKos article because it provides a current example that validates the claims that Friedman and Kohn make about social media hindering the face-to-face activism of yore. Due to the fact that the government restricted the use of the Internet, the activists had to find another way to vent their feelings. Since they couldn't do it from the comfort of home, many went to the streets. This illustrates many of the concerns that Friedman and Kohn have about social media.

This also validates many of Logothetis's claims as well. Without the social media, these people would have never assembled together in the first place. But that is not enough to incite the kind of change that the protests accomplished.

All in all, I feel that social media is a powerful tool for this, but we also gotta get off our butts from time to time and get the word out.