Who is Johnny Lindquist according to the internet?

I've been on the internet for most of my adult life, and it has followed me for quite a while now. So in order to find out how it views me today let me start from the beginning; when I first wandered on to social media and internet interactions. Social media had been around and was a presence around my middle school days; however, I did not log on due to my mother banning me from "those sites" until I rebelled against her my sophomore year of high-school and joined facebook since myspace had all but died by then. As I grew so did my likes on facebook the predominate platform of social media I used and still do today. I don't know why, maybe its the one horse town I grew up in, but I never ventured out to other venues of social media besides Youtube, which I started watching at around the same time I logged on to facebook.
My first ever post.

 
After a few years online (all my highschool years) it had found out all my interests, music I liked, career plans, my close friends, what I look like, places I've been, where I live, where I went to school, who I went to school with, and the list goes on and on. With all of this information its clear it all describes a person, but does that person really have a face? Can the internet truly know me? There are countless fake and counterfeit profiles made every day, so what more is needed for the internet to frame me to my fullest extent? The answer lies within my online purchase history. The internet knows that I occasionally rent text books online along with buying motorcycle parts from numerous websites. This is where the internet knows me at times better than I know myself and this is my most profitable information for it to use and sell. According to the internet I, Johnny Lindquist, am a 22 year old male college student who has a passion for cars/trucks/motorcycles, and metal music along with a girlfriend of one year. How do I know the internet thinks this is who I am? Its because of the sharp advertisements directed at me. From band tee shirts, riding gear, engagement rings, textbooks, and even an ad for a technology school that had me thinking second thoughts about my major and school. However the internet will never know me on a personal level, that is until it creates a AI conscientiousness and has a one to one conversation with me but that might not be for awhile.

For some added bonus brownie points here are some "recommended" videos for me from my Youtube feed.

I've thoroughly enjoyed taking this class, as it has truly been one of higher education that I have sought after while attending here at DSU.  
Thank you for your time and teachings.
And again thanks for reading.

Sincerely,
Johnny Lindquist

Facebook Ad

For some reason beyond me and my computer the only way facebook would let me create an advertisement was through this window, but hopefully this will or in a hypothetical sense would have worked in real life.

FB Campaign

My Facebook campaign's objective was to create a community around motorcycles in St George and Southern Utah. To accomplish this goal I set out to by posting news, seasonal photos, informative links and shared content from main stream sources along with inviting my friends. When writing my posts I tried to get responses in the form of likes or comments (like a poll) from my subscribers. I also had a photo-sharing contest in the works, but due to my circumstances this semester it never came into fruition. There was a few other things I wanted to do to try and get the ball moving but didn't get around to doing like: putting up flyers near motorcycle parking on campus, creating bike meets, going for a community rides, ect. I didn't really cross promote, other than having a couple of my friends share the page,
since I don't have a tweeter account or any other forms of social media other than YouTube with my 4 subscribers.
This has been an insightful assignment, I learned how difficult it is to run a public relation sort of endeavor or any kind of social media outlet. One thing is for certain I can take away from my page is that the majority of people that will see ones post will be in the afternoon and evening, not in the morning and not late at night, since that is where I reached the most people.

My facebook insights only go as far back as when I achieved 30 likes which was October 26th.

Here is my reach outlook.

Page views.

Posts
Having a theme I've noticed has helped reach and engage more viewers. Some of the themes I chose to use were things like "Two Wheel Tuesday, TGIF and sometimes #wideopenwednesday "

Overview

Overall as a Self Evaluation I think the page could have been better since I don't think its blossom'd into its full potential. There was definitely more I could have done and wanted to do throughout the semester, but due to getting a a part time job and living in my own apartment for the first time, instead of a dorm, and all while going to school full time made it hard to come up with better content and getting people involved to like the page. I can see my some people are able to make a profession out of running social media accounts because to be good at it, it definitely requires a lot of work. The page even peaked at 31 likes at one point but however it since has fallen back to 30.     

On a side note I can't find some of the insights that other people have found in class (who likes my page?) along with finding the right create an ad page since it just creates a pop up for me to fill out and pay for instead of the needle one we discussed in class. Is it the computer I am using or something else? because I Still want to do the ad assignment if I can. 

Many thanks for reading

Johnny Lindquist.

Chicago/Frankfurt sustainability of eliminating carbon based energy consumption.

Here is my research slides on Chicago/Frankfurt sustainability of eliminating carbon based energy consumption.

Here is some links to my research

Here is an article about how the University of Illinois at Chicago

http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/collaboration-between-university-of-illinois-chicago-and-new-energy-innovations-inc-enhances-the-development-of-new-clean-energy-source-300027394.html

green frankfurt

http://www.frankfurt-greencity.de/en/environment-frankfurt/climate-protection-and-energy-supply/what-we-are-doing/

Automatic Attitudinal Response Post

From looking back so far in this class many of the subjects we’ve covered have opened my mind and eyes to things I would usually pass off in not caring about and ignore them. However there is a post that I found that I’ve written to be an automatic attitudinal response on my own behalf which was an OTM response during the first week of October and its coverings of the story when the pope visited the US. I’m not sure how I made the original response that is was so AAR, maybe I chose a boring story to cover where I didn’t really think about it too much or maybe there is some other reason why this post was so automated I don’t really know but it still happened. I made a pretty bland post to begin with about what happened and what could be said about it, but the biggest part of this post’s AAR was that I failed to look deeper in the areas of psychological and cultural aspects in the minds of us Americans and what can be said about us in-particular instead of what can be said about the media and political candidates. What kind of light is shed upon Americans when we look towards such a figure of peace and prosperity and attack him while he is trying to help everyone he comes in contact with? Of course there is some subjects that the pope and church have very conservative views (meaning the most historical form and sense of the word conservative and not the political party) on topics like gay marriage ect.. but the fact of the matter at hand is that this guy was just trying help people for the greater good and we made a sideshow out of him. This could be seen as the mass of Americans have an ethnocentrism problem since everyone thinks the US is all mighty in its ways of world police and fixing problems that we see outside help to our own problems in being threats to us. This can be seen pretty easily since in a sense we think “we Americans are the best at everything because we are the best and this is ‘MERICA’!” This head up our own butt thought process is a logical fallacy in its own and begs the question how can we fix this problem if we can’t even see it because our heads are so far up there. How can I and more Americans change our thought process so that everything we come across isn’t always an automatic attitudinal response? Does this problem stem from coddling the youth, group think theory, or some other psychological process we have yet found? It would be interesting what others think on how to solve this problem.

Thanks for reading.

OTM: Safe Harbor No More.

Lately a small battle has been won in the war of internet privacy; The high court in Europe ruled on the side of Max Schrems, a law student from Austria who received evidence from facebook that his rights were being infringed upon. This ruling will hopefully help Americans wake up to the use and abuses of their private data; it has certainly woken up some of the companies at fault in the USA as to having just as manly customers in Europe as in the states and how they have to change their policies in order to not be banned from European servers and clients. This is foreshadowing of events and court cases to come Max and the host of OTM think as this ruling will be just the tip of the iceberg that follows making a better future for the internet and the people who use it.

Physical: The court ruling will start stricter laws that affect internet traffic that comes and goes out of europe. Some of these new rules will enable their citizens to be forgotten by companies; for example, after a period of time a company has to delete any data on that person which gives a whole lot more privacy to that individual than what they had before.

Temporal: This court ruling sided just last week so it is very relevant to us right now; however, it has taken some time to come fourth. From the story, big internet companies like facebook have been ignoring privacy laws set up by the Europeans for quite sometime time now as Max found out about it in 2010 five years ago. It is interesting what other counties will come next to defend their people.

Psychological:  Like Max more people are becoming concerned about the use and storage of their private web data. They are demanding more privacy and stricter laws on how companies use this data and how long they can keep it. Max and others like the hosts of OTM hope that this court case and its ruling will stir-up people in the US to stand up against companies for their personal data rights.

Social: This could start snowballing all the way around the globe and be big enough for when it hits the US it will no longer be able to not care about this issue, particularly because the US is the leader in internet businesses. With more and more people around the world becoming educated on the internet and how internet companies behaved I think we’ll see a huge movement for change; like the guest host said during the broadcast, the internet is more like the wild west now than it ever was before. Like the wild west, the internet will settle down from the coming of regulations that will protect people from present day data barons, data ransom outlaws, data rustlers, and virtual vigilante gangs.  

Thanks for reading

Climate Change 1.0

Climate Change 1.0

It has become the agenda, the main topic of discussion, the most prevalent in both the media and political domains now that the subject of gay marriage has been dealt with by the supreme court. It’s become so big, so mainstream, that it can no longer be ignored. Around 98 percent of scientist around the world are arguing for action even though it might be too late. Like today in class where we talked about how the oceans would rise and we thought so; we don’t live there so why should we care? Well my friend climate change affects us all in one way or another. To see some of its effects that are happening right now watch this video by Discovery News. Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wzyZg985pBY

Here is a video explaining the threat of climate change toward the nation of Maldives and other island nations.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FRzO4HlPUUw

Its safe to say that there is so much massive evidence and scientific reviewed papers and journals on climate change that to deny it would just make a means to display how ignorant someone can be. St George is already really hot, how much harder would it be for people to live here if it were to be even hotter?  California right now is suffering a huge drought, what would happen if a drought that size hit the midwest, you know the breadbasket of America? If you want to see the effects of a limited water supply you don't need to look farther than the conditions of developing countries. Also If that wasn’t enough convincing for you just go to your local store and check the price of bottled water to that of soda.

Of course there are always two sides to a story and if this issue was easy to solve it probably already would have been fixed. Nearly all of our energy needs are met through the use of fossil fuels or nuclear energy here in the US. These sources don’t stop working when the wind doesn't blow or the sun don’t shine unlike green energy availability; hence why finding a solution to climate change isn’t as easy as just taking the bus or walking to your destination.  

Religion 3.0

As seen from today’s class discussion, religion has been diminishing from newer generations because of the introduction of the internet into our society.  There are outlets on the internet that have made expressing religion easier. These outlets are seen from apps designed for religion itself or just the use of social websites like seen in this article I found here.

Link: http://www.worldreligionnews.com/religion-news/christianity/5-ways-social-media-connects-religion-to-younger-generations

On the other hand, where traditional religions are stagnating on bringing in new members there has been some new brand new religions birthed through the internet. For example there is a religion based off of file sharing on computers. It is even recognised as real religion in Sweden.   There are some even weirder ones out there that you don't have to look far on the internet to find; however you’ll probably be the judge on their authenticity.  

I found the file sharing religion here, It is number ten, the first one shown so you don’t have to watch the entire video. This is just for citing where I found it and the guys who make these videos cite their sources and from my experience on youtube seem to be that they aren’t really biased and are more concerned with facts.  

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=461IR-Pa2JI

Darkode and what happens on the dark side of the web.

Darkode and the dark side of the internet. In this weeks story we followed an old woman and her experience from being hack and the tale of how some of this dark side of the internet culture started. It began as a kid in his parents basement with an interest in computers and then over the course of time blossomed into the world’s hub for black market computer hacking. I won’t get further into the story because as a class we all listened to the same story this week.

Physical: With more and more people gaining education on how computers work some use their knowledge to prey on others for financial gain in the form of file/data ransom or by other means. The FBI took down this black market website darkode and made a large number of arrests; however, due to the nature of the internet the site sprung right back up again just two weeks later. When I talk about the nature of the internet in this sense I am talking about how anyone from anywhere can make an input to create and add code to something like a website. Computers and the internet have been a great tool for man but as seen with any tool, it can be used to create positive or negative aspirations and we as a people need to educate ourselves and others on how we can protect us from these attacks.

Temporal: The timing of when darkode was taken down was just three months ago. We will see more events like this were a governing body will try to stop or lay siege to places on the internet’s dark side in an attempt to help people from criminal activity, but we do not know when the web and computers will be safe if ever from vicious persons.

Cultural: Computers and the web have created a diverse cultural of people from those who like pictures of cats to people who ransom anonymous innocent users for untraceable currency. I see it as being very ironic that some of these people doing these crimes has a sense of power now when ten or twenty years ago they could have been the geeks and nerds picked on in highschool. Since computers are constantly being upgraded and updated the culture of us as people I feel like update and upgrade with it but at a slower pace.

Social: The way the internet works in layman's terms is that computers talk to one another to create this network of information. That in a sense makes computers probably close to as social as us maybe? Anyhow the acts of cyber terrorism are being more seen today through the news and other media outlets which can better enlighten people about the dangers they face with their computers.

Psychological: These events I think can be very psychologically disturbing. For those who use computers but don’t know a lot about them they can see this as never being safe again from criminals. The evolution of internet crimes has evolved from spamming, to viruses, and now to file ransom; so that asks the question what is next? The only limitations it seems are what these hackers can think up next in their imaginations. Will we see real life kidnappings from people’s cars being hacked as they drive them? You may laugh at this assumption but care to think how close we are to self-driving cars. They can already track where you are from your phone, you know that device which everyone has from seniors to children have now. We know they sell or rent the technology to anyone relatively cheaply. So what will happen when it falls into more sinister hands?  It really calls for a voice of concern on how we can protect ourselves from these criminals.

Thanks for reading.

Privacy 2.0, The beginning of no privacy?

In our present day we live beside computers, not above them, beside them literary. I was taught in school from an early age how to be “Proficient” when using one but what they didn’t teach me is how monitor the privacy setting on it so that any joe off the street could hack into the computer I was using and see everything I’ve done on it and probably more some. Now to be clear computers are not limited to your at home PC or Mac laptop, they are found in your phone, your car, your child’s tablet, even in your credit cards there is a computer chip in there too. I found this video where this guy is interviewing a man that attends ,every year, this convention of hackers and government associates that work in the hacking of computers and privacy and how the mission of these conventions are to enlighten the public on how easily they are vulnerable to cyber attacks. CAUTION: this video does contain some strong language due to its unprofessional nature: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kq3_7ahmjJY

So how can you keep yourself safe against criminals that want to spy and use your data? Well you could seek further education and become an expert into how computers work or just google how to avoid having your information stolen on computers but there is more to it than just that. Websites collect your data without you even knowing about when you use them. Ever care to read that twenty page document that pops up when you first use some software or a website called the “term and conditions” ? Inside that legally binding document is a contract that you sign when you click you’ve read it, which allows them to do whatever they want almost since you agreed to it. It almost begs the question is there such a thing as privacy anymore let alone a new form of it called privacy 2.0? Yes you have curtains and doors on your house that block people from looking in but if spy movies have taught us anything, that is if someone want to listen in or look in on you they’ll find a way. Maybe the only true privacy we can fathom now is if one were to move to the last frontier, Alaska or some other extremely out of the way place, but then again there are satellites looking down at you and if you don't think there is just go to google maps, and in street view you can find a picture of your house.

In some of my other classes such as Voice and Civility in Public Discourse we have been studying Edward Snowden and how he has blown up the discussion and attention toward privacy and how the US government was ignoring the fourth amendment when it collected billions of data on its citizens with them knowing about it. From these other classes I have gotten a somewhat of a background to how privacy works today; however I’m not sure if anyone really has it all together when they talk about privacy because the tools in which it is broken are constantly being updated. I had almost no knowledge of metadata or how privacy is viewed today before I came to college this semester but after finding out more about it, it can be pretty scary to think about not knowing who’s listening in on your phone or computer’s webcam. So that begs the question, Is privacy 2.0 the era of no privacy?
Thanks for reading.

OTM: The Pope is Not a Politician

During this week pope Francis visited the United States. He is only the third papal ever in history so far to come to the US so it would seem that the media would pay much attention to him and respect his messages, however this is not the case as seen through this week’s on the media show. Listening to the program they showed, or since this is a radio show played, that the media was covering the pope and his visit as if he were a politician running for office. Some newscasts went as far as saying that the pope’s approval ratings were low instead of just conveying his message for people to be more compassionate and to promote peace.

Physical: Pope Francis visits the US and during his tour is made into an “larger than life character” for the media to over-analyze while misinterpreting and contorting his messages.

Temporal: This event happened last week so it's very relevant and that this is only the third time the pope has came here it would signify that this event should have received better coverage in light of just listening to what he had to say instead of portraying him as a political figure.

Social: I feel like this could make people see the pope and the catholic religion in a bad way since the media has shown him in a light that depicts him as a governing body influencing political agendas including elections for presidency. The people viewing the media when trump called out the pope saying that the things he was saying were going to make isis go after him could cause backlash around the world seeing that at this point in time trump has the best shot for being the next president.

Physiological: This event could cause people to totally misinterpret the pope’s message of be nice to others and promote peace into him becoming a communist. The image of the pope inside the minds of people viewing the media could cause them to make a change from seeing him as an advocate helping humanity to dark person trying destroy america.

 Cultural: What can be said about our culture if we paint the pope in the media the way we do? Media is thought to reflect the ideas and morals of society. In this case did we really care to listen to the pope or did we make him a figurative punching bag like an escape goat for the political runners to point fingers away from themselves?

Thanks for reading.

Democracy 2.0 The online constituents presence

Democracy 2.0 / Democracy and political influence in social media.

As I was researching this topic I came across to links that helped me understand it more thoroughly that what I had known about it before. Here are the links

http://journalistsresource.org/studies/politics/digital-democracy/social-media-influence-politics-participation-engagement-meta-analysis

http://www.business2community.com/social-media/impact-social-media-democracy-0911687

The articles tell us that social media or what they call Social Networking Sites (SNS) undoubtedly have the ability to bring people together and create democracy like what was seen in Tunis and now in Syria but on the opposite side of the scale, SNS usage of democracy and politics is less certain. From data collected we know that around sixty percent of adults in the United States are on some form of social media and engage in posts and comments related to politics when they become large public discourse agendas; however from the research collected so far these waves of information in the political sense away from revolutions don’t ster up much difference in voter turnout or gaining or losing votes for a person running for office. Its seems like more research is needed in order to conclude these topics. There is one segment of these studies that shows significant amount of voter turnout and political involvement is the youth crowd as seen in the 2008 election of president Obama.

From what I gathered from my research is that these new tools of social media and SNS are bring more people together in political events that in turns strengthens democracy for the people participating because not only can they get more information and share it to educate more people but from voicing their thoughts makes them better at civility. There might be a negative side to this aspect as well the more I think about it. Many people who are proficient in social media often customize their news feeds to show only the things they like to see and read, because of this they might only get a biased portion of a candidate or bill instead of looking at it from both sides to truly understand it; hence they are left with only their partial knowledge and this could be harmful to democracy. So with social media and democracy one might have to take it all in with a grain of salt.

Thanks for reading.

OTM: Exxon's History of Climate Change Research

This week’s On The Media story I chose to cover is Exxon’s history of climate change research. I found this topic to be quite interesting because it seems that the changing of climate due to pollution is getting ever bigger in the media world. So here is so back story to the report. Throughout the 1970’s Exxon was not just doing research into climate change and how the ocean absorbs Co2 from the atmosphere but they were leading it. Thats right, through found documents one of the biggest oil companies out there was in front calling for change and more research knowing that if earth’s global temperature increased it would have massive negative effects on living things on the planet. Then after the price of oil sank in 1986, Exxon had to layoff hundreds of workers including those scientist researching climate change. Not until the year 1989 was the topic of climate change brought up again did the media see Exxon have a stance in the issue claiming they knew nothing of the topic and founded groups to defend and question the claims of climate change.

Physical: Exxon went 180 degrees from leading and calling for action in climate change research to denying it not knowing anything about it. Pollution from the burning of fossil fuels makes the air we all breath toxic along with changing the climate faster than what most organisms can adapt to.

Temporal: The topic of climate change began in the 1970’s with little coverage of the research and today is one of the biggest issues and problems facing our society today. Also nearly 100 percent of scientist around the world are concerned about the effects of climate change.

Social: What we are seeing from Exxon, a large oil company, is almost a direct parallel to what happened with the tobacco industry. The companies themselves knew of the danger of their products well in advance to the general public and then hind or denied evidence of harmful effects.

Psychological: Exxon has lied about their research and its finding even when they knew the consequence the whole time. This is a textbook scandal when in part infuriates the public and governing bodies finding out evidence that they were lied to which reflect a negative public image of the company occurs. After an event such like this one it is hard for those companies like this one to recover for example look at the BP oil spill and the negative backlash it had both environmentally and in public discourse.

Cultural: I feel like once this information of negligence becomes better known to the public we’ll see people coming together both in protest and in social media to support better understanding of climate change and what we can do to help stop it. This could also be seen as people writing to their government representatives asking for more regulation or more research in helping the matter at hand.   

Thanks for reading.

Learning 2.0: Innovating the way we teach classes.

Learning 2.0, what happens when I think about that term is that this second version should be better than the one before it. So thinking logically Learning 2.0 should stand as learning in a new and better way. As I was researching this well informed topic I was starting to notice something. We as a class represent Learning 2.0 because of our means of coursework and research. We’ve all created blogs and posted to them along with our own facebook pages. This is totally different than anything I have done in a classroom setting before so this course is unique to me. I believe that just from this first third of the semester that I’ve learned things in a new and better way than traditional course work and I think that more and more class throughout k-12 with colleges will adopt this new set of learning tools. I also read this article here which helped me understand how their new forms of social media can enhance the learning experience.  http://www.edudemic.com/how-to-use-social-media-as-a-learning-tool-in-the-classroom/

I remember going into the third and fourth grades and learning how to use a computer. Looking back my parents must have been astonished that I was learning how to operated such equipment at such a young age because that how I felt when I found out ,a year out of high school, on the local news that children in younger grades than I had been in at the time were learning how to use an Ipad and do their class work on it. These new forms of education through technology and social media will create faster and higher levels of education. Thirty years ago most people didn’t learn algebra until upper level college courses and now in our present times kids are learning to do algebra in middle school. Its interesting to see what will fit into our general education systems in the next ten years and I think technology and social media will only boost its potential.

Thanks for reading

OTM:3 Refugees or Migrants.

During this week’s show of media coverage I listened to the topic story: Refugees or Migrants. They talked about how people getting ready to run for political office and news agencies are using the two terms interchangeably, or just stating that there is a migrant problem in Europe. The reason behind this change in terminology, as the show went on with its guessed speaker telling us to question political terminology, is that countries are allowed by international law to put up fences and deny entry of migrants; however a country is not allowed to deny refugees entering.  

Physical: With the name change of hundreds of thousands of people fleeing their home countries in order to find safety, they can be turned away from help and shelter. It pretty close to dehumanizing these people who are in need.

Temporal: There are still thousands of people coming into countries every day by any means possible, either by land, sea, or air that are dying trying to find safety. So instead of deciding what we should call them we need to focus more at the problem at hand and aid them to prevent further loss of life.    

Cultural: What can be said about a culture or society that places high values on helping others but turns away people in need when the burden becomes too big? Our county, yes the USA has only taking in 1500 Syrian refugees but we have committed to accepting 10.000 more over the course of a year. Is this figure comparable to those counts that european countries have taking in?  Germany has taking in 100,000 so far along with Sweden taking in 50,000 plus. We could be somewhat accountable for these people since we indirectly helped them win a civil war to kill their dictator but who remembers stuff like that since it happened a couple years ago.

Psychological: What happens when you dehumanize people? That's when you stop thinking a person is a living human being and instead see them as an animal or less. For starters it could spark a mass genocide. The Nazi's didn’t murder six million Jews over night. It was a slow process that started out with them changing the definition of a political term. The Psychological aspect of these refugees is extremely important so that we a people all living on earth don’t make the same mistakes that we did in the past.

Number figures found at this website article.   

http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/09/16/us-syria-crisis-usa-idUSKCN0RG2O320150916

Facebook Campaign Gear Heads OF Southern Utah

Link: https://www.facebook.com/GearHeadsOfSouthernUtah

My page's purpose or mission is to create a community hub for car culture and other things that are related to that nature where people can come together to discuss cars, bikes, trucks, mods, events, cruises, meets, ect. I want to establish a better culture of people who are into this genre in the Southern Utah area.

Personas:

Jim is a 35 year old man with a family who enjoys working on his classic car on the weekends and frequents GHOSU often to check in to see if there is a car show to take his family to so they can get a perspective of the classic car scene. He shares his work on his car so others can follow along in the build process.

Taylor is a early twenties female who like to ride her motorcycle when she has free time away from work or school. She goes on GHOSU to look for fellow riders whom to go on cruises with. Also she contributes to online content of the page to try to reach out toward other female riders with tips and tricks about riding.

Matt has just turned 18 and his parents have bought him a entry level used truck, Matt is into trucks but doesn't know any places to go off-roading so he hits up GHOSU to inquirer about easy trails he can take his rig and is met with lots of hospitality and is invited to go on a poker run with some other members. Matt also contributes to the page by sharing content he finds entertaining on the internet that is related to trucks.

Bill is a 65 year man who is retired from his long career as a import car mechanic. He checks out GHOSU regularly to check out what others are posting about vehicle modifications. He owns a heavy modified vintage BMW set up to "haul the mail" and likes to produce how to videos then posts them so others have an idea of DiY  that they could do to their own car.


Like my page and become a Gear to the community!

OTM "The Bitter Advertising of the Iran Nuclear Deal"

Backstory, Congress is getting close to passing an international agreement that will limit Iran’s nuclear development by lifting economic sanctions. There has been speeches, rallies and million of dollars spent on both sides of argument of support or discredit. With the use of rhetoric both sides have twisted the facts of the deal for their side. OTM’s guest host told us about how this deal is beneficial compared to scraping it and hoping that the next presidential committee would come up with something better. So this “deal” essentially better than nothing.

Physical: If this legislation is passed it will be the first step in better foreign relations with Iran while limiting their nuclear development including the chances of a nuclear war. This would be a major leap forward toward peace in the Middle East.

Psychological: Opposing sides of the argument say that rules set in the agreement for allowing inspections of nuclear sites and military bases in Iran are too relaxed in time frames; comparing Iran to a drug dealer with a twenty four day warning to hide drugs and evidence, but in this case weapons of mass destruction. This applies to psychology well since this is causing fear in the people watching the development of the deal (fear of nuclear war) and making them write to their congressmen to stop the legislation.  

Temporal: If this agreement is past it will be the first time in history that Iran and the US have come together democratically in an attempt to settle political differences for peace since Iran became an independent state.

Social: The news of this matter coming to congress’s attention has had substantial attitudes shown through paid media campaigns. All this propaganda has people spit on their position of the deal venting how they feel about it on their social media accounts making posts slamming or praising the event. Social media has made it possible for people to reflect how they feel by informing major mainstream media outlets which I feel bring people closer together through this communication.   

Cultural: I think if this agreement is passed more people will feel like what happens over there effects what happens over here so to speak. While naming this agenda a “deal” many people gather ideas about it before learning exactly what it is to begin with which in turn causes missguided arguments and backlash on the part of the legislation. In the world we live in today there is a “World Economy” that dictates the markets of many nations including the USA and having sanctions reducing trade on another country’s market is hurtful to capitalism.

Racism 2.0, About ones face on the WWW.

I'm not the best person to talk to when it comes to racism mostly because it hasn't played a large part in my life growing up but just because it hasn't been a problem for me doesn't mean its not a problem for others or our society. Yes everyone is different but we should all be equal because at the end of the day we are all Americans.

let me start this blog with a little background on myself. I am a 22 year white male from Eastern Utah who basically didn't have any first hand experience with large confections of race or racism until I came to college here at Dixie and became friends with people who had. I went to a small high school (roughly 130 people in my graduating class) were there were a large population of Hispanics and Latinos and Whites but they from my point of view got along pretty well. There is always going to be young people juiced up on hormones that are eager to provoke fights and conflicts but will that stage of adolescent ever pass? hopefully. A lot of people say racism is learned and passed down through parenting but how much of that is learned from the media and more importantly through social media.

The article I read that stuck me the most is this one that talks about how some people think that racism on the internet isn't real.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/olivia-cole/on-the-oftrepeated-lie-th_b_4575754.html

The people who I've been able to really call racist are older people I've worked around in construction instead of the high school kids who sit next to each other calling themselves racial slurs to gain a reaction from the students around them when the teacher isn't there. However this isn't the case with online interactions. I'm not sure if many of you are familiar with communication terms but the term face is used to describe how someone thinks they are seen by others. Your face is made up by how others perceive you as a person. This is done by information collected over time to establish knowledge of that person in order to reduce uncertainty about them. While online one can become anonymous. They have no other post, comments, or information about them so they are more free online to say whatever they want without hurting their “face”; so is that racist remark made by them reflecting who they really are? The content is real. It had to be typed into a computer and the post button had to be clicked. It might not be as prevalent on social media outlets like Facebook where you need to fill out your first and last name, but if you’ve ever scrolled through the comments of let's say a YouTube video ,where people can make up any user name, there isn’t a progressive topic of discussion. Its nothing but racial slurs, hate, and garbage coming out of the fingertips onto people's keyboards. We shouldn’t dismiss what we read online as “oh those are just angry, mad trolls on the internet looking to vent because everything thing on the internet is premeditated. They had to think about it and then type it out and then on top of all that press send. Its not like someone stubbing their toe and yelling out profanity, it's cold sought out racism that by all means is real. Just because it happens online doesn’t mean it’s not real.

Thanks for reading.

OTM: The Little Pink Pill with Big Implications

Lately a new drug has came up to be put on the market that is very controversial in the public eye. That drug is Flibanserin aka Addyi, a FDA approved pill to help combat the effects of sexual dysfunction in women. The drug's purpose is to help women who feel like they have a disorder. This drug sits in the same category as Viagra (a male sexual dysfunction drug) however these two drugs are no where near the same thing let alone work the same way. I am not here to contemplate this drug's impact on a scientific level, instead I will look at its cultural, social, physical, and psychological effects on our society here in the United States.

Cultural: Here in the USA we have had as a nation, a very conservative view on female sexuality through most of our history, but this drug coming to market creates a turning point in our beliefs and cultural norms. From my point of view looking at female sexuality is a topic that was considered to be taboo or highly frowned upon whether it be in the media or talked about in conversation until within the last twenty years with pop music glamorizing it. From there on it has become more and more of the media’s agenda. I for one can only look at this from a male biased simply because I am a straight male without any female siblings to give me any knowledge of the thought processes or the what, how, or why of female sexuality. There has been quite a bit of coverage of equal rights toward the LGBT community and now considered to be a cultural norm since the supreme court has legalised gay marriage for the the entire nation. Will this drug aid in women's rights or could it be seen as hurtful? This could just be another drug for older people with health disorders, however I strongly believe that it could go 180 degrees the opposite direction and be all over the press and social media as a drug that creates heated arguments over its potential outcomes.

Social: We see advertisements everywhere for male sexual performance drugs; they’re on websites, news outlets, tv commercials, radio broadcasts, gas station bathrooms of all places. These performance enhancers are all about male sexuality. It has become part of the culture here in the US. From high school sports teams to working in places of high male demographic job areas the topic of male sexuality is commonplace. To see how big it has of an impact on our society look at any recent music video and it's easy to see who the video is aimed at. Now there is female sexuality commonly discussed but it's out of most of the media’s eye. One can find it on websites solely dedicated to female users such as pinterest for example. With this new drug supposedly already nicknamed “the female viagra” will it bring out significant focus about female sexuailty into our modern day agendas in the media and other social impacts?

Physical: We as a people label drugs as bad things except when prescribed by a medical doctor. There is a huge market for food and other goods that are “organic” or made without drugs. This little pink pill is no different than any other drug created, it has the possibility to be misused and abused. In the OTM report they said one of the ways this drug works is by upping dopamine levels in the brain. For those of you that don't know dopamine is a chemical used by the brain to control emotions of happiness and so on. Essentially this drug works kinda like an antidepressant but for female sexuailty. We could see this drug become very addictive and used by people who don't have a medical condition in the first place. The is already a huge problem with “date rape drugs” and this could become a tool for those who want to take advantage of women.

Psychological: Female sexuality isn't an exact science, and this pill might not be a pill to fix everyone or everything; however it is a step in the right direction of total equality. The psychological impacts of this new drug could range from happier marriages to horrible addictive substances only found in back alleys and black markets. I think it is more of a matter of time to truly see how this will affect people and our society. In the end this is still a drug which by definition is a substance that has an effect on the human body and brain.   

My first Blog post....EVER!

Hello my name is Johnny Lindquist and here is a little about me.
I am a junior at Dixie State University. This blog is for a class i'm in called Comm3480 New Social Media, but you probably already knew that. I am from a small town in south eastern Utah that you've never heard of. I am a communication major and one day I want to produce movies in the film industry. This class seams very enlightening to me so far, and I'm excited to learn more about its subject as the course progresses.