User talk:Susannamhawes

Hello, this is the user talk page for susannamhawes.

This will be used for a second year module I am doing at Stirling University. The module is Digital Media and Culture.

I will use this page as an educational forum for a wiki project that is worth 60% of my coursework.

Susanna Hawes Susannamhawes (discuss • contribs) 13:18, 7 February 2017 (UTC)

Wiki Exercise #1 - What Makes a Good Wiki?
The main difference between social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter compared to Wikipedia is the what the content consists of. Facebook and Twitter are based on biased opinions from one users point of view, using informal, texting language. Whereas Wikipedia is based on a wide range of ideas and opinions that overall creates a non-biased, and factual forum. It can be suggested that social media users tend to force their opinions upon viewers, which is not the case in Wikipedia and Wikibooks. There is “no collective vision” (P. Levy) on Wikipedia pages as they are edited by multiple users and do not portray just one side of an argument.

Facebook and Twitter provide you with a quick, almost instant response about anything, whereas Wikipedia needs a lot more patience when dealing with it. The platform is hard to navigate, set up and use. Whereas the other social media platforms speak for themselves and allow easy use for all audiences. All of these platforms target different audiences to use them and sites such as Facebook and Twitter appeal more to the younger generation, compared to Wikipedia. Maybe this is why younger users are drawn towards the easier more straight forward platform. It seems as as a society we seem to cut corners and always go for the easier options.

Once you have posted something on a social media account, it can never be removed, even if you do delete it from your page. People use screenshots as ways of saving posts from social media accounts, so it can never be said if your ‘deleted’ post will be gone forever. It will always have been seen by someone and remain a memory in their mind. Wikipedia works on the base of editing, so everything can be changed and updated and is not criticised nearly as closely as most social media platforms are.

Despite the biased and informal discussions, people trust and use Facebook more as a forum for information. It is easier to interact with people via the Facebook apps on phones and computers. Alongside social media profiles, users have pictures which allow the viewer to put a ‘name to the face’ whereas Wikipedia is very much ‘anonymous’. You cannot specify who can and cannot see you Wikipedia pages, which draws on the question, how much privacy do we have in todays society? At least on Twitter and Facebook we have the option to use the privacy settings.

Overall, it can be seen that Wikipedia and other social media platforms are used in very different ways, educationally and socially and by completely different audiences. Wikipedia allows for a professional space of opinions and is used in a respectful, mature way, most of the time this cannot be said about Twitter and Facebook. This is why I will use this Wikibook to create a forum for my opinions and peers comments on my work throughout this Digital Media and Culture Module. Susannamhawes (discuss • contribs) 03:11, 8 February 2017 (UTC)

Marker’s Feedback on Wiki Exercise #1
Posts and comments on other people’s work, of this standard, roughly corresponds to the following grade descriptor. Depending on where your actual mark is in relation to Understanding and Engagement elements, it should give you an idea of strengths and weaknesses within the achieved grade band overall.

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.

This post is at the lower end of this grade band, so there’s clearly room for improvement here. I think in order to engage with the wiki exercises a bit more, it might be useful for you to look at the Grade Descriptors and (especially for this, perhaps, the Understanding) criteria in the module handbook to get more of an idea of how to hit those targets. Less instrumentally, and more in relation to your posts so far, you mention the impersonal nature of the wiki. Ok, so.... how does that feed into its specific qualities? for example, the commitment to neutrality... Also, you have noted a really interesting qualitative difference in terms of social media's empahsis on image, and its relationship to trust - but this goes noweher. I think this is really interesting, and is something that you could explore very productively in your project work.

Re: responses to other people’s posts – these are fairly good, if a little brief. Remember that the comments are "worth" as much as posts themselves. The reason for this is not only to help encourage discussion (a key element of wiki collaboration!) but also to get you to reflect upon your own work. This can all, of course be used to fuel ideas that might form part of your project work. I like that you have framed some of your responses as questions to solicit discussion (this is, arguably, what discussion pages are all about!) and also that you are beginning to discuss 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).

GregXenon01 (discuss • contribs) 13:43, 13 February 2017 (UTC)

Comments on Wiki Exercise #1
I liked what you said about Facebook and twitter providing people with a quick and instant response. This is true and perhaps why social media has become so addictive to its users as there is instant gratification gained in the form of notifications.

The younger generation are drawn towards the easier choice which makes social media far more appealing. Most of us are also constantly hooked up to our devices and connected to social media from when we wake up until we go to sleep. So the way we view social media differs so greatly to Wikipedia as social media seems to be an ongoing platform which is always turned on. Although I do think that social media can be used in an educational sense. I think it is a good thing that people can share their views easily and be heard, even when it is biased and not factually accurate. Discussion and debate will challenge peoples beliefs allowing us to hopefully gain better understanding and come to a better conclusion, especially today with all that's going on in politics in the UK and America! Jackhand1 (discuss • contribs) 14:00, 9 February 2017 (UTC)

Hi, thanks for your comment. I agree with what you are saying and how everyone is addicted to being on social media 24/7. It has become part of our culture, and if you are not involved in it then it is hard to be part of a conversation, as everything seems to revolve around what has been seen on social media earlier that day. I think you point about allowing us to gain a perspective and understanding on issues all over the world is very true, but I don't know if we always get a fair and balanced opinion. We tend to follow users and accounts that we agree with so we might be getting biased opinions on situations without even realising. Opinions are so easily shaped by social media these days, people believe everything they read. We need to start reading between the lines and "question everything". susannamhawes Susannamhawes (discuss • contribs) 00:42, 10 February 2017 (UTC)

Wiki Exercise #2: Visibility and Data Trails
It’s hard to see how visible you are online as you cannot see yourself from the outside. It is hard to picture yourself from someone else’s perspective online as you know the exact context of each piece of content that you have posted online. You have first hand knowledge as to what situation each picture and post was taken and written in. Visibility can take different forms. You can be very visible online and only post pictures and interact with close friends and family and one have a 100 friends, or you can be friends with 1,000 people and rarely post anything. Technically the person with 1,000 friends is more visible, as there is more access to their profile but actually the person with 100 friends is posting more and is posting more visible content. It is confusing to decipher each of these, there is a fine line and it is hard to put these into two distinct categories.

I would say I am visible online as I post pictures and share content with lots of people. But this is only on Facebook and Instagram. I have a Twitter account, but I am very much a ghost follower on this site. I do not post, I just look at other peoples content and on this social media platform I would say I am invisible.

I am probably not as protected as I should be online, I feel there is a lot of content online that people could look at and figure out where I live, go to university, who are my friends are and what my hobbies are. Despite this, I am only friends with people I have met in person and don’t share personal information online that I would only share with my family. Despite feeling my content is only viewed by my close friends and family, I am blind to the figures that Facebook users increase by 3% every week. Bilge. There are a lot of people online, and a lot of these are smart people who are able to get pass the privacy settings and see anything and everything you have posted.

I am very naive with internet content because I feel it easy to forget, that once you put it online it can never be unseen. It can be screen shotted and past on to people I do not know, and this is how personal information can easily get out of hand. In the past few years, there have been thousands upon thousands of cases of identity theft. It can be from as little as taking a few pictures and creating a social media account attract attention from the opposite sex or even taking bank details and personal information and hacking into bank accounts. Social media accounts are seen as “hunting grounds”, the number of identify theft victims increased to 148,000 in 2015 from 94,500 in 2014. BBC.

Despite all of these figures, people still post content on social media as todays society is pressured by the phrase “pics or it didn’t happen”. People are more likely to post personal information, to prove they are having fun than care about their own safety. Fear of missing out, or FOMO is also a phrase that people cling to when talking about social media. Telegraph. They believe if they aren’t always connected to the internet they will miss something important. People get to the point where they don’t even enjoy their event or date as they are wondering if other people are having more fun elsewhere. In doing this though, they are letting life just pass them by.

I think I need to check all my privacy settings and really think before I post content online. Sometimes it is nice to keep things to yourself and have memories between you and your close family and friends without it being plastered all over the internet.

Comments on Wiki Exercise #2
I found your post very interesting to read. I hadn't even thought about the visibility in terms of how many friends we have online, it's interesting to think that perhaps the more friends you have means the more visible you are but at the same time the less friends you have but the more you post can mean you're more visible too. Also the figures you've included really help to put across your point that there are more and more people online these days which means that our information could be reaching people that we might not even consider it to. The shocking increase in identity theft in just that one year alone shows how much more careful we all need to be online. Do you think that this is just a case of people posting important details they shouldn't or do you think that maybe the identity thieves are getting this information elsewhere? Did you hear about the Yahoo hacking which has been happening for a while now? I am a Yahoo email user and when I received an email from Yahoo urging me to change all my passwords and settings it caused me a lot of panic because what if that hacker already has all my details? It's a scary world, the internet, do you think it's up to us alone to protect our information or do you think that the sites we use also need to take responsibility for the things we share? After all, especially in cases like the Yahoo incident, we are trusting in them to ensure the information we are providing them doesn't fall into the wrong hands. --Tinytalia (discuss • contribs) 19:57, 15 February 2017 (UTC)

Hi Talia, thanks very much for your comment. I hadn't heard about the Yahoo hacking, as I use gmail and outlook. I looked into it and it seemed to be a very scary process. I found this on a BBC article - "believes an unauthorised third party, in August 2013, stole data associated with more than one billion user accounts" This really shocked me. I always put my details into different places online and say 'yes' to third parties having my account details. I should probably start reading the fine print in more depth and be a little more cautious. 1 billion people is a lot of people who are affected, it really makes you think about who to trust online. Not just people, but companies as well. susannamhawes Susannamhawes (discuss • contribs) 12:37, 1 March 2017 (UTC)

Hi Susanna, I was very intrigued by your view on how you cannot see your online profile as someone else sees it and if I am honest I had never really thought of that before but I can see where you are coming from. The thought of outsiders not knowing the context of each post makes complete sense to me now that I have been pointed towards that notion and I feel that this is a very good way of looking at online identity for the Wiki Project and could be developed further. Also when you talk about the dependancy on how many friends you have correlates to how visible you are is an important point possibly when looking at Facebook and such whereas for me personally my Twitter and Instagram accounts are completely public and everyday I get likes and comments from people I don't know from all over the world which for me is quite exciting but I know it increases my online visibility rapidly which is my aim in terms of gaining blog views but I know could lead to possible security issues. However, I like to tackle this by never posting where I am at a certain time, for example if I was to take a picture of me at a cafe I wouldn't post it till the next day and geotag it at the cafe but at that time I am not there anymore. I do think about my online safety most of the time however I feel that I am increasingly getting more visible the more I post online due to increasing followers and increasing post likes. Is there anything that you consciously try to do to increase your online safety or have you only became aware of the dangers of online visibility? Justgabrielle (discuss • contribs) 10:31, 17 February 2017 (UTC)

Hi Gabrielle, thanks very much for your comment. I like how you don't post where you are at the exact time, it means that you have really thought about the safety of yourself when using your blog / social media accounts. Some people are so unaware of these things and can get themselves in dangerous situations, there really are some people out there that we need to stay clear off and by doing this with your blog you are protecting yourselves. Many people find love online and try and use there whereabouts to find people they could be interested in. I like the concept of this, but it could be really dangerous. Have you heard about Kayleigh's love story? This happened last year but they have just recently made a video to raise awareness about how visible you should be online. Kayleigh's Love Story It's a very sad video, as it is based on a real story, but it makes you very aware of the real dangers online. susannamhawes Susannamhawes (discuss • contribs) 12:37, 1 March 2017 (UTC)

This is a very insightful read Susanna, you have brought up a lot of interesting points in regards to online visibility. You talk about a very interesting contrast between the nature of content shared versus the amount of people that the content will be shared to. This is a really powerful point that you have brought up and lead me to think about the concept of visibility. I find a lot of the issues you talk about in your post incredibly interesting but at the same time really disturbing because we often do not think of the internet in such ways. We typically consider social networks and the internet in general as a tool to utilise our communication with our friends and family, in a positive manner. However the sort of ideas regarding security and visibility should possibly be alarming considering the kind of discussion points you bring forward. I would typically not think twice about posting to Facebook about a certain life event, or Instagraming a photo, or Tweeting a stupid little tweet, but in your article you touch on the notion that once something has been uploaded, it can very rarely be unseen. It would be interesting to research more into this as it has got me thinking about how the way social networking sites user interfaces are constructed, they almost have conditioned people to not think twice about who is going to see the content they share and it is honestly quite scary. I wonder what other people think about this conditioning of individuals by SNS that promotes a system of values that praises over-sharing.Aidancc (discuss • contribs) 11:35, 17 February 2017 (UTC)

Hi Aidan, thanks very much for your comment. Have you seen what wrote above? It's very alarming to think that a company like Yahoo could of been hacked. You do not think that this would happen to large successful companies, and it really questions about who you should trust online. When I use my email I send private messages to my family, and I would hate for these to be hacked and my pictures I've sent them from holidays to be stolen and used for other things. I think the process of over sharing is starting to come into my thoughts when I am on social media, but only because of this module, before I would of tweeted, instagramed etc. anything that I wanted. All this knowledge I have gained from this module has really put social media and the world wide web into a different light. susannamhawes Susannamhawes (discuss • contribs) 12:37, 1 March 2017 (UTC)

Hi Susanna! I found your post really interesting And I think you made some really important observations about the fear of missing out culture! Our society is a very connected and switched on world. Sometimes I find that overwhelming so a I consciously try to switch off sometimes and enjoy the moment. As you said, some people don't enjoy the activities they are undertaking because they are so concerned with documenting it for the benefit of others! I feel there is a growing issue of people living through social media and withdrawing from life in the real world? For example, I have known people who would rather message me on Facebook and tag me in a funny video even though we are in the same room than start a physical conversation? Some people seem to grow to dependent on social media as their method of communication? I'd be interested to know your thoughts! Caroline WikiHacker (discuss • contribs) 11:59, 17 February 2017 (UTC)

Hi Caroline, thanks very much for your comment. I couldn't agree more with your point about people tagging you in pictures on Facebook, than rather talking online. This is what people refer to as a 'keyboard gangster' they are all chat online and won't even look at you in the eyes in person. This is when people start of create different personas online and make the divide between online and offline even bigger. I think that online is a great way of communicating with people, but it should not be the only way. Face to face communication is still so important and is a key part of our everyday lives. susannamhawes Susannamhawes (discuss • contribs) 12:37, 1 March 2017 (UTC)

Hey Susanna, I found your post and some of the points quite interesting. The social media culture we seem to have and which you picked up on, the ‘pics or it didn’t happen’ phrase, is very alarming as I, myself, am very aware that I too partake in this without thinking about the outcome in terms of safety. The Fear of Missing out culture is very much a factor in the danger of the internet, people tag themselves and check in to literally anywhere including hotels and such which if we think about it is extremely dangerous. We make ourselves easy access. I know that the privacy setting on my accounts are kept as private as possible for this reason and I rarely ‘check in’ somewhere, like you say people only need to know what is necessary, some things should stay between those who are close to us. Courtney 1994 (discuss • contribs) 20:20, 18 February 2017 (UTC)

Hi Courtney, thanks very much for your comment. You sound very similar to, she does not check in online or post pictures of where she is at that exact time. I think you both are very aware of the world as it can be a dangerous place. I don't think you need to check in online all the time as it portrays the idea that you cannot live a life offline. This is where I draw the line with social media. If I feel like I cannot go somewhere without having to update my accounts then I think I would need to re-think my priorities. Thankfully this has not been the case, and this module has kept me a lot more grounded when thinking and dealing with my social media accounts. susannamhawes Susannamhawes (discuss • contribs) 12:37, 1 March 2017 (UTC)

Wiki Exercise #3: Information Overload
It is very hard to deal with all the information out there on the internet. Especially when you are searching for one specific topic, then ten different options come up and you have to search through all of these and decide what is relevant to what you are discussing and revising. This is when you easily become distracted and side tracked, as you can find something more interesting and then forget about what you were originally looking for. This can happen on all platforms of social media, not just when you type something into google.

I always have those moments when I open up a social media app, and instantly forget why I did it because the first thing I see on the screen is more interesting and has distracted me. Obviously there are positives to having the ability to access all the information out there, it makes the ability to learn a lot easier. It makes you more curious and willing to learn, but most of the time it is me procrastinating from the task at hand. I try to deal with the sheer volume of information available and the distractions in many different ways. The easiest way is to put your phone away for an hour, or however long you need to focus for. I then start to ask myself “what if someone needs to contact me if they have an emergency”. This was covered in the lecture, and I couldn't agree more. I would feel more focused, having my phone next to me seeing that nothing important was happening than having it in a different room and letting my mind wonder about who was contacting me than actually focusing on the task I had to do.

I’m sure we can all agree that out wikipedia posts could take around twenty to thirty minutes if we had no distractions but with technology now a days things seem to take double the amount of time.

I do not think there is one solution to cutting out all distractions from the internet. I have a few that I switch between. The common ones are to listen to classical music with no lyrics, but I like using the ‘Forest’ app. It is a ‘game’ where you leave your phone on this app and over time it starts to develop and grow a forest. If you leave the app you ‘fail’ and you try and beat your growth time from before. It means you cannot use your phone, answer texts, phone calls and stops all distractions.

Since the wiki project my work load has increased but, the reading I have been doing every week is to going towards something so even though there is more to do, it is more rewarding, as the work I’ve done is being contributed.

Myself and my colleagues are planning on using the discussion page to bounce our ideas off of each other and use the space to decide what topics and readings that everyone will cover within the chapter. Although it was hard to navigate the wikipedia pages at the start it has now become the easiest place for the group to communicate and agree on which different tasks need to be done. I think as a group we have been able to balance out the work load well. In a large group it is hard to not get distracted as there are so many opinions and ideas that everyone wants to share, that will be a challenge. Hopefully we can all agree the system we have works well, as we all have the same end goal, to work hard on this wiki, hand it in on time and get a good grade.

Comments on Wiki Exercise #3
Hi Susannamhawes, I completely agree with your point about having to search threw everything to find something specific you need. I also find I do the same thing on social media, getting distracted, I even find myself close facebook and then reopen it straight away without realising, or even having it open on both my laptop and my phone. Procrastination is also a very big problem I have, I find to beat this I have to start work when I wake up, Stay off social media and netflix. Once I have these open I find it so hard to stop to do work. Do you think that could work for you? I like the sound of that app you mentioned I have heard other people talk about it but I think that I would probably not be very good at it, my brain goes on auto and just closes apps and opens then without me really even realising! I think my brain has just been trained to jump from app to app.BethIrish (discuss • contribs) 18:17, 1 March 2017 (UTC)

Hi Beth, thanks very much for your comment! I agree if you are strict from the start of your studying process then it follows through the rest of the day. I feel very productive when I get fully dressed and sit at my desk, compared to when I work in bed as I find this is an easy way to be distracted. My brain jumps from app to app too as I think I want there something to be distracted by, or something more important tan the task at hand, so I don't feel guilty for getting distracted. susannamhawes Susannamhawes (discuss • contribs) 13:25, 6 March 2017 (UTC)

Hiya Susanna, I agree with your points made here as well as relating to quote on the subject you included in your comment on my discussions page. I also have the “what if someone needs to contact me if they have an emergency?” mentality whenever I turn my phone off. Whilst it would also comfort me to have it at hand, whenever I do so I am always distracted by my friends messaging me, snapchatting me and tagging me in memes, or I'll see some art online that inspires me to spend the entire night drawing in my sketchbook. The best method I've found for making sure I won't be distracted when working on assignments is to make social plans around the deadline date - whilst this may seem counterproductive, if I know I have plans the night before an essay I'm writing is due then I'll have the motivation to start and finish it ahead of time so I won't have to cancel on my friends. I look forward to working on our Wikibooks project together and agree that the size of our groups is more manageable to split topics evenly and ensure we put in an equal amount of work as that will be a benefit for all of us. Mmmorgaine (discuss • contribs) 19:17, 1 March 2017 (UTC)

Hi Morgaine, thanks very much for your comment! Yes I agree, I make plans regarding my work load. It is easier to have deadlines at the same time as your friends because you are all in the same situation and it is easier to plan things. Unfortunately, I do not study any of the same modules as my flat mates, so it seems that we all have deadlines all the time as we are studying different courses. It's a shame that creative forms of recreation hinder you ability to concentrate, like artwork. I have recently started colouring each day before I start or finish work to make my concentration span last longer, and I think it seems to be working. It's a different form of procrastination that is not on the internet so it takes my mind of being online 24/7. I agree, we are lucky to have the size of group we do as it has been a lot easier to manage. susannamhawes Susannamhawes (discuss • contribs) 13:25, 6 March 2017 (UTC)

Hey Susanamhawes, I love your points about social media. I often find myself forgetting why I logged in when i see all these posts. Do you the information to be repetitive? I find that people generally repost the same thing that others are discussing to be a part of the group. Especially when something significant happens. The information never really changes its just repeated over and over again. This makes it easier for me to just forget about it for awhile because I know people will still be talking about it. Your idea about putting the phone away is something that I have heard a lot of people try. Parents do it with their kids and now that we are adults we have to monitor ourselves. But I have ADD so procrastination is something I do often and no matter what i'm probably going to get distracted by something, so it probably wouldn't work for me. I always give my self time to go on social media before I work on a project. Just to get it out of my system for a while. Then I break down the work into timetable to make it more manageable. Does that seem like a good idea? Going on social media first? Mpurcell22 (discuss • contribs) 10:40, 3 March 2017 (UTC)

Hi Mary, thanks very much for your comment! I do find the information on social media sites very repetitive, but at the same time I cannot help but be distracted by it. It links in with FOMO, if people don't post the same as others then they feel like they are left out of the conversation and trend that is happening that day. I think it is a good point about being able to forget it for a while, I should start using that when I feel I've been on my phone for a while. It's hard not being at school and being told to put out phones away, because at university we could be physically be present in a lecture but actually be emotionally present on our phones. It's really interesting that you have ADD, have you been given ways to try and focus on one task at a time? Or is a lot of experimental methods? I like to break my work in time periods, I find it helps with motivation and scheduling. I feel it would be a good way to go on social media first, to get it out of the system, but as I said earlier to I need to be strict with myself from the start. Once I start reading I cannot stop, it is as if it is an addictive drug... susannamhawes Susannamhawes (discuss • contribs) 13:25, 6 March 2017 (UTC)

Wiki Exercise #4: Wikibook Project Reflective Account
Whilst completing the wikiproject, I realised that there was many positives and negatives through out the process. At the start of the process I thought that wikibooks was a clumsy, disorganised, confusing website to use as a way to present my academic work. I was overwhelmed by the layout formats and overall access to the page, but with everything, after time and research I was able to discover my abilities on wiki pages. Through the help of my classmates, the tea room and discussion pages I was able to figure out the skills that were needed to make my wikibooks as ‘professional’ as possible. I felt we were very much left in the dark when creating our wikibooks, although this was frustrating when I was not sure about how to work the website, it was very rewarding in the end when I had completed the process with lots of new knowledge that I had taught myself.

I felt the discussion pages were really helpful when they were used well and were organised. This made is easy to see comments, questions and ideas for the project, but without push notifications it was hard to see when someone was contacting you directly. The use of the { { susannamhawes | ping } } made it easy to send notifications to other members of the module and ask questions and give insights onto their posts. When everyone learned the mark up language, this allowed the discussion pages to become a lot less cluttered and was much easier to follow the flow and development of ideas.

Although we did use the wiki discussion page as our form of contact and idea development, I personally feel there are more effective ways of using social media to contact large groups of people. Facebook and WhatsApp are specifically designed to contact groups, and are much easier to navigate. You automatically get notifications, without having to specially { { ping } } users. Wikipedia is very behind technologically compared to other social media platforms. My wiki group The Hive Mind and Collective Intelligence used Facebook to communicate, and then transferred these comments and messages onto the discussion page, this also helped it stay organised and easy to read.

The unique selling point to Wikipedia is the ability to view and edit work across the world. This made is easy to view our classmates work, comment and give advice. This is not possible on an essay on a word document. This was a positive to the process, I enjoyed receiving comments weekly from my peers on my posts. This allowed me to have a deeper understanding of the topics at hand and also allowed me to see different perspectives on my work.

This project allowed me to create a page where I could express my own feelings and opinions, although this was a positive to the process, it was also daunting thinking that anyone could see theses posts. As danah boyd has suggested, we live in an “always on” culture and this means that there is probably someone looking at my wikipage all the time due to the society we live in today. As a community, we are always online, read and consume the same information. This is where Piere Levy’s theory of Collective Intelligence was created. He suggests "No one knows everything, everyone knows something.” We use technologies such as wikipedia to create our ‘own’ ideas which really, have already been created for us.

Overall, I would suggest to someone using wikipedia to be patient, as it is frustrating at the start, but can easily become a great platform to share ideas, gain new knowledge and create content within large groups.

Content (weighted 20%)
The introductory section could have been expanded to give an overall summary of ideas, connecting those ideas and orienting the reader in such a way as to reinforce the notion of narrative and argument. It would have been nice to use Condorcet’s historical concepts as a way of introducing the themes and issues under the following discussion.

The discussion sections are generally well written, and evidence research, reading and draw from a fairly good range of sources and materials. Some use is made of the platform’s strengths to emphasise aspects of the argument, and evidence links between various concepts. I would have liked to have seen more in the way of interwiki links, however – these are links that would have enabled you to make the link explicit between the materials here in this chapter, and ,materials found elsewhere in the wikibook. This is especially so for those sections, for which little to no evidence of research and cited material appears - i.e. the majority of paragraphs in the Economics section, for example, where links should have been explicitly made to the Digital Labour chapter. This would have made a considerable difference to the authority and engagement aspects of your collaborative writing.

Some very interesting and fairly well written material on politics, aesthetics and aspects of the hive mind (although this last appears in repetition in a number of different places on the chapter – suggesting that delegation and joined-up working could have been better. Some interwiki links joining up the various sections would have made more of the platform’s functionality.)

References section evidences research, reading and sharing of resources. Very good use of wiki commons images. Overall, very well put together, a little more content would have been better, although there are specific considerations which have been taken into account there, especially considering the number of total students working on the chapter.


 * Good. 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.

Wiki Exercise Portfolio (Understanding weighted 30%)
Posts and comments on other people’s work, of this standard, roughly corresponds to the following grade descriptor. Depending on where your actual mark is overall (and particularly in relation to Understanding and Engagement elements), that should give you an idea of strengths and weaknesses within the achieved grade band, relative to the descriptor


 * 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.


 * Reading and research:
 * evidence of critical engagement with set materials, featuring discriminating command of a good range of relevant materials and analyses
 * evidence of independent reading of appropriate academic and peer-reviewed material to a fairly wide degree
 * Argument and analysis:
 * well-articulated and well-supported argument through judgement relating to key issues, concepts or procedures
 * 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);
 * clear evidence of 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