Friday, February 28, 2014

"The Medium is the Message"

Mobile devices are great for when you're on the go so you can have the freedom to go about your day but still feel connected to friends and family, knowing that they are just a few clicks away from a text message.
Smartphones are even better. The entire world is at the palm of your hand, but if smartphones were so great then why are laptops and desktops still as popular today as they were when they first came out, even more really.
It's the medium, what the medium says. People don't want to read a huge article on their phones, not if they don't want a hand cramp from scrolling through and enlarging the text. It's great for quick messages, messages that inform you but still allow you to be on the go rather than being that person clogging the aisle because you so kindly decided you needed to read an article, or a book, while grocery shopping in Walmart.
This is why Twitter was invented. Short and precise messages that inform you on what's going on, depending on who you're following of course, and it allows you to continue about your day and you only had to sacrifice maybe a minute of your shopping experience to catch up on local news or world news, or whatever it is the tweet was about.
Messages on a mobile device should be short and precise, like Twitter, which was what Twitter was made for, because you're mobile, on the go, you've got better things to do right now than read a five page article. Mobile devices keep you in contact with the people and the world around you, but only for a minute or two at a time. If you want to do heavier work then that's why people save it for their computers where they can go into further detail, or have the time to watch that 15 minute YouTube video.
The message continues to change with the introduction to Nooks, Kindles, and tablets. It's lightweight technology, might not always be on the go when you use them, but you certainly have more time to read something larger, like a book, without getting a hand cramp.

These are different platforms to read, and it really changes our time and what we want to read on them. One device says we have a little bit of time to look at something, while the other might say that we have hours to look at something. The differences force people to think more creatively, to make the message worth the device that the app was made for.

Those are positives to the technology, and the positives should be kept in mind. But cellphones have ruined face-to-face communication, even voice-to-voice communication. No one wants to verbally talk to anyone anymore, they just want to send people a text because it's quicker.
My phone hardly rings a day and when it does, it's probably a notification from one of my social media outlets. I'm not much for communicating via text because I love long, large conversations, as can be seen by this huge tangent bucket I am typing up for you here today. A person is more likely to get a hold of me through Skype or Facebook, where it's easier to type more, and Skype even gives the opportunity to call someone for the conversations that text just can't cover, and there is still so much that text can't do. Text cannot properly convey emotion, not without adding a million emoticons to show just how sad or happy/excited you are. Text will never be able to do that, that's why IM developers are creating face-to-face communication for our mobile devices, apps like FaceTime and Skype. We just need to pull ourselves out of our little socially awkward bubble to see our friends again instead of seeing a black on white screen that supposedly represents our friends.

Wednesday, February 12, 2014

Stop Motion Video

This is my first time creating a stop motion video and it proved itself challenging, but I don't think it was a total failure.

Wednesday, February 5, 2014

Kandee Johnson

Kandee Johnson has been an inspiration to not only myself, but by many, as you can read in the comment section of her blog or in her numerous vlogs or makeup tutorials. She blogs about her life as a mother and a makeup artist. Kandee writes on two blogs, the one previously linked is where she keeps readers up to date on her make-up tutorial videos, while her other blog she talks more about her life as a mother. Now I'm not sure if her blogs are as successful as her videos, but I know that she has made a huge impact on her readers/viewers because she doesn't hesitate to put herself out there and help others. She has a huge heart and that might be why she holds a place in people's hearts, people who haven't even met her. To me that's a real success story, to inspire and love others you don't even know.