User talk:Banddcole

This is the User Discussion page for Banddcole; I will be using this as a resource for building a discourse with other users on varied topics, with the intent of creating a collaborative Wikibooks Project with fellow students.

Banddcole (discuss • contribs) 15:49, 16 February 2016 (UTC)

About (Popcorn)Time
We've been told by movie distributors that piracy is harming the film industry, yet it continues to make more money every year? Give people what they want at a price that they can afford and through a service that is contemporary and accessible to the everyday person, and the money will come. I went from pirating almost all of my music to nothing at all, because Spotify offered me a way to pay for my music in an affordable way, and through a medium that reflects the technology of today. People aren't going to continue to pay £10 for a cinema ticket of which they have no idea whether they will enjoy the film or not, only to have to buy it on technology that is near 10 years outdated if they want to see it again. Netflix and Amazon are showing the way forward for a consistent, modern and accessible platform for watching films and television, and Hollywood need to do the same.

Illegal torrent and streaming sites such as The Pirate Bay and the recently closed Popcorn Time exist not to extort the Hollywood industry or to backhandedly take the film away from its creators, but as a sharing platform. An interesting interview with the creator of Popcorn Time exposes not a man interested in the theft of property, but in the sharing of something he loves. He and his small team created a way to share new films in a timely manner, with an accessible user interface and little fuss. Granted, the project had to be closed down when the user base grew too large to manage without causing serious legal problems, but the success of Popcorn Time does not mean that it's users are greedy, or unwilling to pay for content. In the absence of an affordable service that uses technology in line with that of today, consumers are forced to create and share their own equivalent, regardless of the subsequent penalty.

As the catalogues of online streaming services become larger and more diverse - with more in-house, award winning productions and recent AAA titles - it is going to become increasingly difficult for the Hollywood industry to carry incentive in buying a cinema ticket. Popcorn Time may have been only a small experiment, but it led the way in showing consumers what was possible with the technology at hand, and it's comparative price and ease of use. Spotify and Netflix started their lives in illegal hot water, with lawsuits and copyright claims abound - but as distributors saw such great promise in the services they were transformed into streamlined, content-filled platforms with heavy support from industry leaders and artists. As these services grow and expand, and become more synonymous with the everyday user, it will become difficult for Hollywood to ignore that the empty seats aren't caused by what people aren't paying for with Popcorn Time, but what they are paying for popcorn.

Online Mob Mentality, and the Retraction of SOPA
Illegal online streaming websites such as Megavideo and Putlocker - as well as peer-to-peer torrent couterparts like the aforementioned The Pirate Bay - paved the way for the US Government to propose a bill known most commonly as SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act) in March of 2012. The Bill was proposed in response to increased pressure from film distributors and record labels to clamp down on online piracy. The act would effectively allow any intellectual property owner to take control of a site and/or its content provided they have a copyright claim against it. This power would be granted without court proceedings or lawsuits, and gave the intellectual property owner complete control over the defendant. For example, if a small independently run website were to illegally stream a copy of Toy Story 3 on its homepage, Disney would have the power to not only remove the content without judicial sign-off, but also blacklist the site from American ISPs (Internet Service Providers) as well as search engines like Google, and force payment processors like Paypal to blacklist the site also. This act would encompass not only outlying foreign piracy sites, but video sharing and social media platforms. One infringement of this new act could potentially give a movie distributor or record label the power to force platforms like Facebook, YouTube and Wikipedia to remove a user's entire online footprint.

The act was met with great opposition, and internet users began to pressure the social media platforms they actively used to oppose the bill. Sites like Wikipedia and Reddit had synchronised "blackouts" in protest of the Bill, in which they shut down their sites for a number of days. Although no single entity was pivotal in the retraction of the bill, the synchronised voices of millions of previously unheard online users, relaying the same message on the same social media platforms and outlets sent a strong message to those that supported it. A Forbes article surrounding this topic highlights how an online community synonymous with the creation of memes and meta-humour was actually instrumental in the retraction of SOPA. Reddit users collectively boycotted the domain hosting site GoDaddy due to its supportive stance on the bill, effectively losing them thousands of clients and eventually forcing them to recant their statements on the bill and denounce their support of it.

This notion of an online mob harks back to the notion of a whole being greater than the some of its parts. Much like a public protest against a political agenda or a mass celebration of art or culture, if a message is broadcast by a large representative group, then it is heard much clearer than a solitary voice. Online mob mentality is often linked to online activist groups like Anonymous, or in reference to controversies like Gamergate and online trolling. However, the strength of an online community and its ability to send a positive message is often overlooked. This idea of a collective intelligence is synonymous with the ideas of Howard Rheingold, most notably the notion of smart mobs. Smart mobs encompass the idea that in conjunction with communications and computing technology, the power of human cooperation can be amplified exponentially. The notion of a smart mob is a daunting concept; to give that much power to such a large uncoordinated group of people, but when the message is strong enough and the cause worthy, it is possible to make positive change on an unprecedented scale.

Banddcole (discuss • contribs) 10:53, 17 February 2016 (UTC)

Marker’s Comment

 * this is a good topic to base a post on. What I would suggest, however, is that you need to adhere more closely to the brief, which asks that you try to make connections to the themes and concerns of the module. This topic would seem to be ripe for drawing down from sources on tech determinism, convergent media (of which, more later in the module) and a number of other aspects relating to phenomena such as lock-in.

Hello, I'm not sure if you noticed due to the fact that the user who commented on my post placed it halfway through, but there is actually a substantial piece below that is part of the same exercise, and relates much more closely to the module and its themes. Banddcole (discuss • contribs) 11:34, 2 March 2016 (UTC)

Moved comments from the middle to the bottom of the piece for better structure Banddcole (discuss • contribs) 18:01, 6 March 2016 (UTC)

RE: Comments on others’ work

 * These are absent. You have not adhered to the brief. Remember that your comments on other people's work is weighted as heavily as your own post when it comes to grades. Not completing this part of the exercise means that, effectively you are halving your mark. GregXenon01 (discuss • contribs) 16:34, 29 February 2016 (UTC)

Comments
Interesting read and very accurate. Last time I went to the cinema was to see the new Star Wars and it cost me £28 for two tickets. There is no doubt in my mind that the cinema was he best place to watch it. They had just put a new sound system in and it was immense, but that experience will never be worth £14 a ticket, and I know I could have downloaded it from Pirate Bay and been just as happy with the finished product. Highest grossing film of all time as well, just to top it off. Ted 95 (discuss • contribs) 16:49, 18 February 2016 (UTC)

Wiki Exercise #2: Visibility and Online Footprint
Social media applications and tools have become ubiquitous in modern-day society. As technological progression increases exponentially - and is becoming increasingly easier to access at a much younger age - the human race has become heavily dependent. With this increased connectivity and widespread access to the Internet, much of ones personal life can be broadcast to millions of potential viewers. However, by posting on social media platforms like Facebook or Instagram, we facilitate this culture, and allow our personal information to be so readily available; but if someone were to ask us on the street for all this information, would we gladly hand it over?

Facebook has become synonymous with the everyday internet user, and has garnered a title not dissimilar to any household name or brand. In the western world, its presence knows no bounds, as nearly every business, charity, fanbase, event and campaign in the country will have a subsequent Facebook page. This all-encompassing social network has embedded itself in the everyday lives of the user; by connecting various networks, be it friends, colleagues or those of similar interests, Facebook has made networking so intuitive and simple that its omnipresence has moulded itself into the fabric of society. We have become so unashamedly reliant on its services, that we would struggle without it.

Interestingly, this process of ubiquity is prevalent in the concepts of lock-in technology. Essentially, lock-in technology refers to pieces of softwware or firmware, that due to their ubiquitous nature and the way in which they are heavily embedded in the foundations of a particular platform or network, it is now impossible to remove them. Facebook conquered social media by enabling itself to be used in every network of communication that we have, doing so over an extended period of time and through various updates. Now, Facebook is so deeply engraved into the frameworks of how we communicate, that regardless of how more intuitive or intelligent a competitor may be, the difficulty in transferring all this information (statuses, photos, events, groups etc) would be phenomenal. Similarly, SMS technology, despite its now decades old technology and costly pricing system, smartphone users have been "locked-in" to an outdated form of communication.

Personally, although I own a Smartphone I do not have a network-based contract, nor do I ever "top-up" my phone with credit. After years of paying obscene amounts of money for what is essentially the transmission of data, I decided that I would instead simply use Wi-Fi technology in order to communicate with people. My SIM card is still active in case of emergencies, but I speak to both friends and family through Facebook and its subsequent Messenger application. Because of this, I have now become "locked-in" to Facebook, and although I would prefer to have no social media applications at all, without Facebook and the networks I have created within it, I would be unable to contact anyone. Because of this, any platform that I use, be it Playstation Network or Instagram, all are linked through Facebook in order to give the people I contact the best opportunity in contacting me or vice versa. Even though I do not use cellular data anywhere, my online presence is great, and my daily life can be fairly easily tracked through Facebook's embedded connection in every online platform I use. If a social network were to be released that improved on the services that Facebook offered, and used more simplified and intuitive methods, I would be forced to either continue using the platforms I use today, or to sever all connections with friends and family online, in the hope that they too will change.

With over 1.4 Billion active Facebook users, an audience of which that grew 12% between 2014 and 2015, it is impossible not to recognise the power of Facebook and its all-encompassing nature. In this age, where technology surrounds us so intimidatingly, and a growing number of people are attempting to remove themselves from this lifestyle of broadcasting ones information for the world to see; is there still time or has social media become so synonymous with the workings of everyday life that its removal would create real world problems in regards to the way we communicate around the world? Banddcole (discuss • contribs) 09:38, 2 March 2016 (UTC)

Wiki Exercise #3: Information Overload
In John Carpenter's They Live, an unnamed hero discovers that the ruling class are in fact an alien race who have pacified mankind through subliminal messages hidden in the media. A pair of truth-seeing sunglasses allow the man to see the world for how it really is. Advertisements, billboards, magazines and even money are emblazened with slogans such as "OBEY" and "DO NOT QUESTION AUTHORITY". Society's mindless consumption and materialistic views have meant that the human race has become passive and subordinate; controlled by the messages in the media and men's unquenchable desire for wealth. Despite the science fiction label, there is a clear real-world warning to the dangers of over-indulgence and mass consumerism in today's society, and the impacts of allowing ourselves to be controlled by the messages of the media. As you begin to take the fictional elements of They Live's narrative away, and to see the alien oppressors as the ruling elite of today - Governments, TV Networks, Banks, Religions, multi-billion dollar corporations who control every household name or brand under the sun - the message that the film conveys rings very clear indeed. We live in a world where information is printed, broadcast and uploaded on an unprecedented scale; and it can be nigh-on impossible to sort fact from fiction. Journalistic integrity has been overshadowed by click-bait articles and wishy-washy cover stories that subvert rather than engage, all fueled by us - a generation of mindlessly scrolling consumers who think that this kind of knowledge is power, when in fact it makes us powerless. More of us everyday yearn to be freed from the over encumbering shackles of mass media reliance - however its ability to seep into every construct of our waking lives makes this seem impossible. Modern day society needs an awakening - it needs a pair of truth-seeing sunglasses.

Every day we are fed information through the various media outlets we use - both physically and digitally. However, the encroaching transition to digital as the sole dispensary of news and information means that competition for the dominant share in the industry is fierce. News outlets are not the only companies vying for dominance with their online alternatives, but various institutions over a great number of platforms all now push for the loyal "readership" of its audience. Facebook now promotes and writes popular news stories in order to coerce its audience into using a single site for all their information traffic. However, the lack of a reputable source and the way the story is shared and commented on by other users makes it difficult to authenticate the story and can lead to misinformation and bias. YouTube videos run by popular YouTube personalities often now also promote and discuss current events - some are even independent news networks in their own right. Unfortunately however, the rising prevalence of sponsorship and advertisements deals within online platforms means that content creators will promote products on their channel untruthfully. An article written for site Eurogamer in 2012 by writer Rob Florence discusses an image of games journalist Geoff Keighley, sitting beside a table of Mountain Dew and Doritos. In this article he poses interesting questions about journalistic standards and having the integrity to upset the status quo for something you believe in. As Florence writes in his article, Publishers know that bad review scores upset readers and that in turn upsets reputation. So if they all collaborate to make sure that the information is controlled and the status quo maintained, ad revenue will continue to roll in and readers will continue to follow. If every AAA game that is released scores high, everyone is happy. Bearing this in mind, how as an everyday user can it be possible to find coherent and reputable information from a source that can be trusted?

There is no sure way to ensure that all the information we find online is truthful or informative, and the massive scope of possible outlets in which to find it means that there is simply too much for us to sift through. Vigilance is key in avoiding misleading and false information. Digital platforms do not offer great recognition for journalistic ability, but vigilance in finding stories on current events from reputable sources ensures the truest possible retelling of events. Personally, I use trusted news websites to keep up to date on current events, some of which are online equivalents of national papers. The closed nature of these sites ensures that the story I'm reading is coming from the journalist, whereas following "trending" topics on Facebook can often result in reading the skewed opinion of another user or being redirected to an article from a much less reputable source - namely click-bait sites and tabloid newspapers. However, the abundance of information at hand and the commonality between industries when it comes to being misleading and bias means that everything you read online must be done so with a certain cynicism. All platforms are subject to falsifying or interpreting information and thus, can never be fully trusted. The dangers of this are very prevalent in today's society; fake news stories can circulate at an alarming rate and cause real damage if the right (or in some cases wrong) audience is reached. In essence, this means that we must exercise caution when viewing or reading material online, to ensure that we are engaging with the most accurate and unbiased information available.

As a society we have the ability to begin engaging with texts in the same way we did in the past; reading in-depth, high quality material from a source that can be trusted. Instead of succumbing to online tabloid-style articles that are deemed "trending", search for a piece that offers insight and promotes discourse. If internet users allow themselves to be hypntoised by the allure of click-bait article titles and celebrity culture puff pieces, then the power given to those that control these industries has dangerous potential. As one looks at the powers of the world and the control they have over the pillars of our society, its not so difficult to see the difference between a strange universe where the ruling elite covertly disguise suppressive orders within the mass media for financial gain and greater power - and a film where Rowdy Roddy Piper kills aliens. Banddcole (discuss • contribs) 17:40, 6 March 2016 (UTC)

Wiki Exercise #4: Wikibook Project Reflective Account
After completion of the Wikibooks project, when all pieces had been submitted and the final product was ready to view - I was dumbfounded by how much content there was. Never before had I worked on a collaborative project on this scale, and subsequently I had never seen what a group this size was capable of achieving. Wikibooks offered a platform that although dated (I will return to this point later) was intuitive and easy to use. Some members who seemed to have prior experience of using the platform - or at least a similar one - began coordinating and structuring the collaborative project, giving people a reference point by putting in the groundwork. Much like real-life corporate and organisational structures, those with the most experience or confidence became leaders of sorts, directing other users and giving advice. Evocative of the work of Henry Jenkins - particularly concerning Participatory Democracy in the Civic Web - the Wikibooks project showed how structures like these are created and often encouraged online. This notion of democratic structure and mutual benefit is one of the key factors and driving forces in making collaborative projects online work - people are often motivated by others under the mutual understanding that the sum of all their work combined is greater than its parts. Arguably, this can create issues - as the democratic structure created within these collaborative communities is informal at best, users can find difficulty in following the workings of more experienced users, in fear of being shut out or having their ideas and creative ability tapered. In this case, face-to-face meet ups can facilitate a much more open discourse and allow people to fully express their ideas and concerns. Part of the problem with online collaborative projects (and online communities in general) is that anonymity online dehumanises user bases, and can encourage negative and ultimately unproductive behaviour. Meeting face-to-face during the Wikibooks project allowed people to connect better with their groups and in turn use that discourse to help better the project overall. However, outside of these meetings communication became difficult - due to the nature of the Wikibooks platform, messages sent and received by users are cumbersome, and notifications of these messages were intermittent at best. Social media sites have revolutionised the way we communicate with each other, and the need for immediacy is ever-growing. Coming to terms with the fact that the Wikibooks platform did not offer the same intuitiveness or immediacy that we take for granted on other sites was time-consuming and often frustrating. This dated mode of communication meant that occasionally conversations would be lost or missed, and this hindered the collaborative process. In collaborative projects like this there is a need for a constant flow of communication between parties, otherwise users will begin to step on one anothers toes and ultimately affect the end product. Working in Wikibooks showed me the power of working collaboratively online, but also the shortfalls of using an outdated platform that does not reflect the speed and immediacy of current technology and software. Banddcole (discuss • contribs) 10:41, 11 April 2016 (UTC)

Marker’s Feedback on Wikibook Project Work
You seem to be the main contributor to the section on the SOPA controversy on the chapter page – this proves quite significant in the development and rounding off of your group's book chapter. It's well written, supported through citation and interwiki/external links, and although fact-based and descriptive, rather than critical and characterised by analysis, it is useful. Comes right at the end of the project period (i.e. 4 edits on the last day), however, indicating that had you produced work earlier, you could have increased both the volume and the quality of work produced significantly. Fairly good on the posts for the exercise portfolio, but some comments appear to be missing, and some posts (aside from those given an extension) are late.

Wiki Exercises


 * Good. Among other things, good entries will make a clear point in a clear way. They will relate concepts to original examples in a straightforward fashion. They will make effective use of the possibilities of the form (including links, as well as perhaps copyright-free videos and images, linked to from Wiki Commons). They may also demonstrate a broader understanding of the module's themes and concerns, and are likely to show evidence of reading and thinking about the subject material. The wiki markup formatting will be very clear.

Content (weighted 20%)

 * Your contribution to the book page gives a good brief overview of the subject under discussion in your chosen themed chapter. There is a good range of concepts associated with your subject, and the effort to deliver critical definitions, drawing from relevant literature and scholarship, and your own critical voice in the building of a robust argument is very much in evidence. The primary and secondary sources you found about the chapter’s themes cover a good range and depth of subject matter.

Understanding (weighted 30%)

 * Reading and research:
 * evidence of critical engagement with set materials, although some ideas and procedures more securely grasped than others
 * evidence of independent reading of somewhat circumscribed range of appropriate academic and peer-reviewed material
 * Argument and analysis:
 * well-articulated and well-supported argument featuring variable depth of understanding
 * satisfactory level of evidence of critical thinking (through taking a position in relation to key ideas from the module, and supporting this position in discussion);
 * satisfactory level of evidence of relational thinking (through making connections between key ideas from the module and wider literature, and supporting these connections in discussion);
 * evidence of variable independent critical ability

Engagement (weighted 50%)

 * Evidence from contributions to both editing and discussion of content to a variable standard (i.e. volume and breadth of activity as evidenced through contribs)
 * Satisfactory engagement with and learning from other Wikipedians about the task of writing/editing content for a Wikibook
 * Reflexive, creative and fairly well-managed use of discussion pages using deployment of somewhat limited judgement relating to key issues, concepts or procedures

Overall Mark % available on Succeed

FMSU9A4marker (discuss • contribs) 15:05, 3 May 2016 (UTC)