By Matthew Boyle | mboyle@flagler.edu
The Federal Communications Commission Chairman is working at implementing a policy to help close the digital divide within the United States, or the social divide.
The FCC’s proposed plan is due on March 17 and, according to a Computerworld story by Matt Hamblen on Feb. 23, it is expected to include a detailed “strategy for connecting the U.S. to affordable broadband to help create jobs and economic growth.”
Hamblen reported that the FCC released a survey on Feb. 23 showing “that cost and lack of digital skills are the main reasons a third of Americans do not get high-speed Internet connections at home.”
This FCC survey is a waste of government employee time and taxpayer money. Did the FCC have to conduct a survey to document what media professionals already know?
The FCC needs to stop wasting time and money on surveys and propose a plan. Then put the plan to work. I certainly do not think anyone out there knows exactly how to fix the social digital divide in America, but conducting useless studies is not helping.
At the end of the Computerworld article, Hamblen cites John Horrigan, the author of the 51-page report accompanying the survey results, saying that multiple solutions will be required to fix the social digital divide in the United States. Hamblen said Horrigan recommends lowering costs for service and for hardware, helping people develop web skills and informing them of the Internet’s benefits.
Maybe I am a little bit facetious with these statements, but still, come on, people. The FCC just spent all this time and money conducting this survey and paid this Horrigan character to write a 51-page report to tell decision-makers what they already know.
Also, according to Hamblen’s Computerworld article on Feb. 23, the FCC survey did not even delve into connect speeds. The survey assumed people that had cable modems, DSL services, fixed wireless connections, T-1 connections, satellite fiber optic connection or mobile broadband wireless connections were all the same. It considered each one of those connections a “home broadband user.”
“No specific throughput, or speed, was specified,” Hamblen wrote in the story.
The survey also found that 6 percent of Americans still use dial-up from home.
As for how the FCC plans to fix these issues, I guess we’ll have to wait until it comes out with another generic and ambiguous waste of credibility in its March 17 report.
Tuesday, March 9, 2010
Monday, March 1, 2010
Monday, February 1, 2010
Blog Post #1
By Matthew Boyle | mboyle@flagler.edu
Since the inception of social media services such as MySpace, Twitter and Facebook, users had not been able to easily, if at all, erase their presence on the Web sites until Moddr, a new media lab in Rotterdam, developed the “Web 2.0 Suicide Machine.”
According to TechCrunch’s Erick Schonfeld, social media users will, with the help of the Web 2.0 Suicide Machine, actually be able to erase their web presence by just typing in their credentials for Facebook, MySpace, Twitter or LinkedIn and it will delete all your friends and messages, and change your username, password, and photo so that you cannot log back in.
TechCrunch said the Web 2.0 Suicide Machine eliminates or changes any and all identifying user characteristics and is irreparable. It permanently gets rid of your stuff.
Social media relate to the issue of “Online Identity” in the sense that users willingly disclose their private information on a regular basis. Users often are ignorant to the fact that they are publicly disclosing private information. Also, they usually don’t even face their actions’ consequences until it’s too late.
Users tell Facebook what they like to eat, what movies they watch, what books they read, where they go to school, what sports they like, what political beliefs they have, etc.
You give Facebook gold. You line Mark Zuckerberg’s pockets and, even if you try to close out your account, he’s still going to make money off your information.
An advertiser can come to Facebook and say, “I want my ad to show up only on the pages of people who like Zombie movies,” and that’s what they get.
If Facebook and other social media site users start committing “Web 2.0 Suicide,” expect those social media giants to hit lulls in revenue streams. Expect them to start losing money because their niche audiences get smaller. The Web 2.0 Suicide Machine deletes any and all information that could be used for social media moguls to make money.
From Facebook, the Web 2.0 Suicide Machine deletes what you like to eat, what movies you watch, where you go to school, etc. You get the point.
What I expect to happen, which has already started, is for social media Web sites to block the Web 2.0 Suicide Machine’s IP address because the identifying characteristics users willingly and ignorantly provide social media giants with are advertisers’ dreams. Facebook blocked it and the other major social media Web sites should follow soon.
Since the inception of social media services such as MySpace, Twitter and Facebook, users had not been able to easily, if at all, erase their presence on the Web sites until Moddr, a new media lab in Rotterdam, developed the “Web 2.0 Suicide Machine.”
According to TechCrunch’s Erick Schonfeld, social media users will, with the help of the Web 2.0 Suicide Machine, actually be able to erase their web presence by just typing in their credentials for Facebook, MySpace, Twitter or LinkedIn and it will delete all your friends and messages, and change your username, password, and photo so that you cannot log back in.
TechCrunch said the Web 2.0 Suicide Machine eliminates or changes any and all identifying user characteristics and is irreparable. It permanently gets rid of your stuff.
Social media relate to the issue of “Online Identity” in the sense that users willingly disclose their private information on a regular basis. Users often are ignorant to the fact that they are publicly disclosing private information. Also, they usually don’t even face their actions’ consequences until it’s too late.
Users tell Facebook what they like to eat, what movies they watch, what books they read, where they go to school, what sports they like, what political beliefs they have, etc.
You give Facebook gold. You line Mark Zuckerberg’s pockets and, even if you try to close out your account, he’s still going to make money off your information.
An advertiser can come to Facebook and say, “I want my ad to show up only on the pages of people who like Zombie movies,” and that’s what they get.
If Facebook and other social media site users start committing “Web 2.0 Suicide,” expect those social media giants to hit lulls in revenue streams. Expect them to start losing money because their niche audiences get smaller. The Web 2.0 Suicide Machine deletes any and all information that could be used for social media moguls to make money.
From Facebook, the Web 2.0 Suicide Machine deletes what you like to eat, what movies you watch, where you go to school, etc. You get the point.
What I expect to happen, which has already started, is for social media Web sites to block the Web 2.0 Suicide Machine’s IP address because the identifying characteristics users willingly and ignorantly provide social media giants with are advertisers’ dreams. Facebook blocked it and the other major social media Web sites should follow soon.
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