User talk:Emiliarosselli

Wiki Exercise #1: Online Visibility and Footprint
As an active user of every popular social media network nowadays, I entirely believe and according to a new research made by Martin Obschonka in 2017, what you share may be revealing more about yourself than you even realize. And our style of attachment, meaning the pattern we take to connect to others, affects everything from our selection of friends to how well the relationship progresses or ends.

I have been using social networks for almost 10 years and I can say the way people see them has been changing over time. Personally, I use Facebook, Snapchat and Twitter for people who are close to me, such as family and friends from school or friends who I have known for a long time. Therefore, those accounts are private, and only they can see what I publish and the things I share daily. On the other hand, my Instagram account is in public mode since I use it to share photos that I have been taking since I started my exchange program in Scotland. Apart from that, I have a personal blog where I upload healthy recipes and experiences from my trips to other countries and the link is attached to my Instagram so that everyone can see it and have more visits.

However, we upload photos to our profiles on social networks and then, if we regret about it, we delete them, believing that they have disappeared. But the search engines that are dedicated to registering everything that appears on the internet have already copied them, thus being recoverable. We enter the network thinking that nobody sees us, but our navigation leaves an indelible trace. "There is no system that guarantees one hundred percent the elimination of a file on a digital medium," says Daniel Creus and Mikel Gastesi, computer security experts and authors of the book Online Fraud: open 24 hours. And it gets to a point where it starts to get a little bit scary. Most social media networks are connected, if you like a sportswear store page on Facebook, in five minutes you will have sportswear advertisements on Instagram from the same stores or rivals. And if you hide your location on Snapchat, Facebook already knows it from a check-in you made at a restaurant the last week. As Boyd (2012) mentions, we are Always-on.

All this information is widely related to Web 2.0 because it alludes to the revolution that blogs, social networks, Wikis and other tools related to technology had. Where the pages offer a considerable level of interaction and are updated with the contributions of users and allows greater accessibility to communication.

Overall, every time we use Chrome, YouTube, Gmail or the search engine, Google takes note of our tastes, schedules, geographic location and personal interests. This company offers great services, but they are not free, as we naively believe. We pay with our privacy. People are not yet aware, but they are on the way to be, that everything we publish on the web is public, and remains forever. Emiliarosselli (discuss • contribs) 17:52, 14 March 2019 (UTC)

Wiki Exercise #2: To what extent are my online and offline identities aligned?
In communication, representations and social identities of what we are, are really important. We know that Computer-mediated communication is based on text, images, videos, colors, etc. While face to face communication involves vibration of the voice tone, breathing, smell, possibility of touching, etc. These elements are beyond representations because they transmit unconscious information that affects us in a much more subtle and direct way than the text or concrete words. Sherry Turkle (2011) states that “When part of your life is lived in virtual places – it can be a Second life, a computer game, a social networking site – a vexed relationship develops between what is true and what is “true here”, true in simulation.” (p.153) This means that online is a completely different thing than offline.

Personally, as a user of social media I can say that my personality is not always the same as what I post or how I respond to people’s comments. I can respond to a message with a single word, but in person if somebody asks me the same question, I could give a 10 min answer because I feel like it. And this has been changing as the years go by. When I was younger appearances were really important to me, I shared what everybody shared, posted trendy pictures or even dressed up like the singers of the moment even though I didn’t like it. Now, that doesn’t matter to me anymore, but it’s not always the same for everybody.

Maskenfreiheit. Is a term used by the author Rosie Leizrowice (2018) to explain that we are a mix of online and offline identity. We do not have a single personality, but several, and some personalities are better than others depending on the context. In social networks we can be more disinterested or violent depending on what we share, or how we respond to others, but at the same time empathic in the real world. Because our empathy emerges when we can see, hear or even smell how our actions can change the way something is, something that is not within our reach when we interact with others through a screen and a keyboard. This is because the context also defines and molds us.

For example, in a study of the Virtual Human Interaction Lab made in 2007 at Stanford University, various avatars were assigned (raging from the most common to more attractive looking ones) to a group of volunteers, and how they interacted with other avatars was studied. Attractive avatars maintained a lower interpersonal distance and, in general, showed a greater degree of confidence than the common avatars. The interesting thing is that, after the experience, the users displayed greater confidence in themselves after leaving the game. And that effect took place regardless of the attractiveness in real life of the users. This very rapid change in behavior as a function of the perception of our appearance was baptized as the “Proteus effect”, in honor of the god of Greek mythology who could voluntarily change his appearance.

In my opinion our personality is: changing, malleable, adaptive and multiple. The romantic and simplistic ideas of the “I am like this, and I will never change” are left behind. Our true gift is that we are like social chameleons, which allows us to make new relationships with our fellow human being while prospering in new environments. Emiliarosselli (discuss • contribs) 11:01, 15 March 2019 (UTC)

Comments Area
Please feel free to leave any comment or feedback about the exercise. Emiliarosselli (discuss • contribs) 11:20, 14 March 2019 (UTC)

Wiki Exercise #3: Annotated Bibliography, Entry Part B
'''Anderson, P. (2007) What is Web 2.0? Ideas, technologies and implications for education. Available at: http://www.ictliteracy.info/rf.pdf/Web2.0_research.pdf   p.7-12 [Accessed 20 March, 2019]'''

In this chapter of the article Anderson reviews six different services or applications that demonstrate the foundations of the Web 2.0. These include blogs, wikis, multimedia sharing services, content syndication, podcasting and content tagging services. They enable users to share, create, communicate and collaborate their work with others, without the need of any design or publishing skills. The aim of this chapter is to present the definition, all the benefits and characteristics of these services. The arguments show a big image of academic research and provide real web page examples. Indeed, the research focuses on the attempt to understand the significance, explore the composition and interplay of the social software of the Web 2.0, and state that they are direct or indirect reflections of the power of the network. The text will be useful to my research topic about how these emerging services are shaping the way we act on the Web and its implications for the control of public and private data. The main limitation of the chapter is that it was written in 2007 and the information may be outdated. Thus, more research needs to be undertaken to develop more in depth the study of these new technology platforms; nonetheless it will be useful supplementary information for my academic analysis.

Wiki Exercise #4: Collaborative Essay Critical Evaluation - What ARE Wikis?
Wikipedia represents an opportunity, since it was created, to help students and anyone involved to develop skills in learning and using different methods of sharing new ideas and connect with other people at the same time. This platform has come to change the way in which data is given and received, brake the barriers of the common use of social media, and to establish a new way of collaboration between people from anywhere in the world.

The information shared in this platform could be anonymous or not, and contributed by anyone who has an account username and is allowed access, as well has could be of any topic. As stated by the authors Esther Weltevrede and Erick Borra “Wikipedia aims at “encyclopedianess,” the state or quality of being an encyclopedia” (Weltevrede & Borra, 2016). This means that the online resource contains articles covering different topics and subjects. It is about media literacy, that is why is important to know what to look for, how to understand and contextualize resources.

Starting from my own experience Wikibooks is a space derived from Wikipedia for annotated texts, manuals, sort of copies of pre-existing works, and a place to discuss about them. And unlike other services or applications, these wikis “have a history function, which allows previous versions to be examined, and a rollback function, which restores previous versions. They have an extreme flexibility and open access for group working” (Ebersbach et at., 2006). There have been many forms in which collective intelligence developed even before the Internet was created, but the way of collecting and viewing this information is what has opened new possibilities in the Web. Tim O'Reilly argues “each article is maintained by a large group of people and the result is an encyclopedia far larger than any single coordinated group has been able to create” (O’Reilly, 2007). Thus, visibility in this way is wide, anything posted can be seen by any other (non)member.

At first, I was very sceptical about the use of this technology because the thought of posting something and then someone else changing it, either to improve or make it worse, didn’t sound very good. In some way could be a form of emancipation, which is disturbing or messing up with others’ work because anyone is free to do it. Also, the fact that more than ten people were going to work on the same topic was going to be a mess of information dragged all together. But as the Debate project went by and did more research, I came to the conclusion that this platform has strict regulations and moderators that prevent this to happen. Likewise, as Jeremy Bentham advises “the more constantly the persons to be inspected are under the eyes of the persons who should inspect them, the more perfectly will the purpose X of the establishment have been attained” (Bentham, 2007). Knowing that you are being seen by others makes you communicate in a more ethical and moral way, and that is what happened in my discussion team. However, even after our group finished the collaborative essay, anyone else can still change the information, but that data is still going to be recorded.

Overall, Wikis has an array of advantages that if used in the correct way can lead to an engaged and collaborative community of writers. Emiliarosselli (discuss • contribs) 23:26, 4 April 2019 (UTC)

Comments area
Hi  I think that your reflection on the subject highlights very interesting points on the nature of Wikis and their implications in collaborative work. The aims of creating a website like Wikipedia as a form of encyclopedic content materialised Tim Berner-Lee’s ideas of the World Wide Web (See in Gauntlett, 2018: 21; Allen, 2012). His visions for the future of the Web promoted an active engagement of the users in the global creation and editing of content that relates to this collective intelligence that Wikipedia and Wikibooks seem to contain. In this regard, I believe that with the innovations of Web 2.0, websites such as the Wikis successfully fulfill the combination of creation and collaboration that was very much pursued in the early years of the invention of the internet.

The publication of these public good online is, as you stated in your exercise, carefully followed in the design of the platform allowing a clear vision of the updates, editions, and contributions of each of the members of the community. I think this accessibility and visibility facilitates the work of the users making the platform look like “an ongoing conversation” (Lister et al. 2009; 207). In her Tedtalk, Devouard (2013) talks about the importance of the ‘Edit button’ which is a feature, and not a bug. However, it is true that this can have both positive and negative impacts on the building of knowledge.

As you mentioned, I also had my concerns when I first started adding on content to the Wikibooks project. The negative sides of Wikis are explained in Lanier’s (2006) essay which I highly recommend reading. His main concerns regard the acceptance of Wikipedia without a further study of its possible outcomes. Lanier (2006) describes it as a possible source of “foolish collectivism” due to the fact that the aggregators can “include all sorts of material without committing to anything” which can lead the inaccuracy of the shared information. There is also a chance of ‘editing battles’ that enhance the sometimes chaotic structure of the platform.

I managed to find other arguments on the matter. According to Lanon (2014), the main problem with Wikis is not the inaccuracy, but the ‘systematic bias’ that makes some pages lack a lot of information compared to other subjects. In this case, she explains how most editors are white educated men and emphasises the need to encourage the use of Wikipedia by more users in order to obtain a wider variety of articles and information.

I think that this relates to your mention of how visibility affects us. Our visibility in websites like Wikis makes us more careful with what we write which definitely reminds me of the topic of ‘Impression Management’ that we discussed in the workshops. This ‘Impression Management’ rules both off- and online, demonstrating how Wikis are a social construction, an online community that somehow reflect our actual social lives.

All in all, I agree with your conclusion about the collaborative nature of Wikis and I think you pointed out many of the main issues that this topic has. I recommend you to watch the TedTalks if you have any free time since they show the potentiality of Wikis in a much more positive way than I am used to. In fact, Lannon’s (2014) states how for other countries Wikipedia is the main way to access free information which definitely makes Wikis incredibly important for global education. I will leave you the links to the video somewhere in the comment. --Lucia.notifications5 (discuss • contribs) 22:37, 9 April 2019 (UTC)

INSTRUCTOR FEEDBACK: ENGAGEMENT ON DISCUSSION PAGES & CONTRIBS
Grade descriptors for Engagement: Engagement on discussion pages, and contribs of this standard attain the following grade descriptor. Whereas not all of the elements here will be directly relevant to your particular response to the brief, this descriptor will give you a clearer idea of how the grade you have been given relates to the standards and quality expected of work at this level:
 * Very Poor. Often, contributions of this standard are quite brief, are structured poorly and are not spell-checked. They are often irrelevant, and offer little engagement with the concerns of the module or the assignment brief. Contributions of this grade may have been subject to admin warnings or take-down notices for copyright infringement. The wiki markup formatting will be of a very poor standard and as a result it will be difficult for the reader or fellow collaborators to engage with the discussion.

As instructed in the labs, and outlined in the assessment brief documentation, students should be engaging at least once a day, for the duration of the project. The following points illustrate how this engagement is evaluated.

Evidence from contribs to both editing and discussion of content (i.e. volume and breadth of editorial activity as evidenced through ‘contribs’). These are primarily considered for quality rather than quantity, but as a broad guideline:
 * Each item on a contribs list that are 3000+ characters are deemed “considerable”
 * Each item on a contribs list that are 2000+ characters are deemed “significant”
 * Each item on a contribs list that are 1000+ characters are deemed “substantial”
 * Items on a contribs list that are <1000 characters are important, and are considered in the round when evaluating contribs as a whole because of their aggregate value

Overall:
 * The two substantial contribs saved you here. Otherwise, there is a very inconsistent pattern (and very low volume) of contributions during the project period. Certainly not the level one would expect at this level of a degree programme.

Engagement with and learning from the community on Discussion Pages
 * Evidence of peer-assisted learning and collaboration
 * Very Poor
 * Evidence of reading, sharing, and application of research to the essay
 * Very Poor
 * Evidence of peer-review of others’ work
 * Poor

Reflexive, creative and well-managed use of Discussion Pages
 * Clear delegation of tasks
 * Poor
 * Clearly labelled sections and subsections
 * Satisfactory
 * Contributions are all signed
 * Satisfactory

Civility. Your conduct is a key component of any collaboration, especially in the context of an online knowledge-building community. Please respect others, as well as observe the rules for civility on wiki projects. All contribs are moderated.
 * Satisfactory

GregXenon01 (discuss • contribs) 16:01, 1 May 2019 (UTC)

Instructor Feedback on Wiki Exercise Portfolio
Posts and comments on other people’s work, of this standard, roughly correspond to the following grade descriptor. Depending on where your actual mark is in relation to the making criteria as outlined in the relevant documentation, it should give you an idea of strengths and weaknesses within the achieved grade band overall:


 * Excellent. Among other things, these entries will probably demonstrate a complex, critical understanding of the themes of the module. They will communicate very effectively, making excellent and creative use of the possibilities of the form (including links, as well as perhaps copyright-free videos and images, linked to from Wiki Commons), and may be written with some skill and flair. They will address the assignment tasks in a thoughtful way. They will make insightful connections between original examples and relevant concepts. They will be informed by serious reading and reflection, are likely to demonstrate originality of thought, and will probably be rewarding and informative for the reader. The wiki markup formatting will be impeccable.


 * This work is very well written, exceptionally well organised, and well researched. You make excellent use of the wiki functionality and markup goes a long way to improving fluidity and functionality of posts. I suspect that, if you become more familiar and proficient with the platform, that this would make an even bigger difference.


 * Re: responses to other people’s posts – these are especially good, very well written, and very generous in terms of ideas and exchanges. I like that you have framed some of your responses to attempt to solicit discussion (this is, arguably, what discussion pages are all about!). Also, you have engaged in discussion in an open and critical way (that is to say, you've responded to what other people are saying and are contributing meaningfully to discussion - arguably the civic element of wiki that you ought to be thinking about, which you clearly are). This is a really solid portfolio.

General:
 * Reading and research: evidence of critical engagement with set materials; evidence of independent reading of appropriate academic and peer-reviewed material – all excellent.


 * Argument and analysis: well-articulated and well-supported argument; evidence of critical thinking (through taking a position in relation to key ideas from the module, and supporting this position); evidence of relational thinking (through making connections between key ideas from the module and wider literature, and supporting these connections); evidence of independent critical ability – all excellent.


 * Presentation: excellent use of wiki markup and organisational skills.

GregXenon01 (discuss • contribs) 16:50, 1 May 2019 (UTC)