Week Five: War: Huh, What Is It Good For? (hint: absolutely nothing)

Wars have been fought since the dawn of mankind. No matter what we do, what measures we take, it feels as if
warfare will always be a part of who we are. Interspecies conflicts are normal in the animal kingdom. Species of
ants tear each other apart for territory, lions fight for the right to mate, and wolves face off to see who gets to be
the alpha. Evolution calls for the survival of the fittest,

so conflict must be ingrained into our DNA. 

But why is this? Why do we feel the need to physically dominate others in order to prove our strength?
It seems that war might’ve been necessary during times of chaos, but is it still necessary in the modern
age? I do not believe so. Warfare leaves death, suffering, and pain for all involved. At this stage
in humanity’s existence, I believe we could be at a turning point for warfare. There has not been a
war with major superpowers on each side in a long time, and hopefully, this is a sign that warfare
is dying out. But I believe there is a more sinister answer for why fighting seems to be less frequent:
nuclearization. The Cold War inspired an arms race to see who could produce the most nuclear
weapons between The USSR and America. North Korea now has nukes, and it seems Middle
Eastern countries like Iran are not far behind. Countries are now afraid of war because everyone
either has nukes or has an ally with them. But during this race to the top, did anyone think about
what would happen if even one of those nukes were dropped? A bomb goes off, and the next thing
we know everyone is firing their missiles like there is no tomorrow, probably because there wouldn’t be
one. Nuclear war would destroy much of humanity in the process. It’s called “mutually assured destruction”,
and its acronym makes perfect sense: MAD. If we are thinking in our best interests, we should avoid war,
especiallynuclear war, at all costs. 

This piqued my interest in what the strategy should be for humanity when it comes to war. To be
frank, I do not know what the answer is, and I don’t think anybody does. I see one of two
scenarios playing out, we either decide that everyone should get rid of all of our nukes, or we
keep them until someone decides to set one off, inciting the sixth mass extinction event. In a
perfect world, all nations would come together and deactivate every one of their nuclear weapons.
There would still be wars, but we’d remove the threat of annihilation. But my strategy seems a
little bit too unrealistic. After we got rid of all nukes, would everyone hold hands and sing
Kumbaya? I am doubtful that everyone would have the trust in others to get rid of our greatest
weapon, but it would work to our benefit. Without nukes, we could have trust in other countries.
I believe nukes serve no purpose other than to provide us with the ability to wipe out humankind
overnight. Seeing this type of power resides in the hands of impulsive leaders like Vladimir Putin,
Kim Jong Un and Donald Trump keeps me up at night. The fact that these men, who seem
to only act out of their own self-interest, can wipe out a large portion of the population with the
push of a button, does not bode well for the advancement of humanity. I remain optimistic
that we will find a solution, but I am petrified of the outcome if we can not.

https://www.cnn.com/2013/11/07/world/meast/irans-nuclear-capabilities-fast-facts/index.html

https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/1991-09-01/nuclear-weapons-after-cold-war

Week Thirteen: Online Audit: Maintaining Privacy in an Age Where It No Longer Exists

The first thing I wanted to do was an online audit. I searched my name on Google to see what came up. In order to raise the stakes, I played the role of a stalker, trying to figure out how much creepy information on me was online. What I found was mostly unsurprising to me. Because I played a big role in my successful high school football team, tons of articles about high school sports came up, including highlights and stories about my team. Someone could easily figure out where I lived and what school I went to. The next thing that comes up is my Twitter account. Because my account is set to public, anyone can see what I post on the site. While I do not tweet very often, the things I retweet tell a lot about the person I am. Anyone can easily figure out that I go to HPU and uncover my political affiliation, which is not ideal. Further research takes me to my very public LinkedIn, and in the case of keeping things private online, this is the biggest offender by far. LinkedIn offers to anyone with a computer my work history, interests, what skills I have, and who my friends or "connections" are. It is difficult to try to balance privacy on this site when the entire purpose of it is to market yourself to employers. In order to get on their radar, I need to have as much relevant information out there. Otherwise, your account will be lost in the sea of other competitions. If anything, putting out more personal information is better on the site, which makes it a bit scary. But for me, the information I market to employers is not information I am ashamed of, otherwise, it wouldn’t be posted. For the most part, all of the things I found online are items I don’t feel bad about sharing. Goofy films I made with friends in high school, my Bar Mitzvah video and middle school projects are not the worst things in the world for me to share. This information tells the story of who I am and allows me to share my past with friends. If I am being honest, when it comes to my privacy I would rather stand out from the crowd than blend in anonymously. I do not share too much of what I do on a daily basis online. For the most part, I like to think of myself as more of an observer rather than an interactor on the internet. I do not comment on things on FaceBook or Youtube for strangers to see. On Instagram, I strictly leave comments on my friend's accounts, and accounts of businesses I follow, mostly just the Baltimore Ravens. This information I am comfortable disclosing. 

In the age of isolation and quarantine, one of the best ways to retain your sanity is to stay connected
to the outside world. Fortunately, we live in the most connected societies in history, so staying in
contact is relatively easy. All you have to do is tap a few icons on your smartphone, then boom!
You're instantly online on one of several different social media sites which can put you in contact
with essentially anyone in the world. When I was researching the topic of online privacy for my
Media Law and Literacy course, the prospect crossed my mind that this may not be all that good.
At this age, it is very difficult to be completely anonymous. The concept of privacy is nearly
completely gone, and it made me want to do some research on my own.

I think if someone is going to leave a mark on this world, they are going to have to be okay
with allowing people to know what they do. That is just a part of being a person who makes a
difference, which is above all else what I want to do with my life. The portion about my privacy
that really scares me, are the things that I do not know are being tracked. When Google seemingly
can read my mind and market to me the exact product that I need. How I bring my phone with me
everywhere and that I know it is listening and tracking my location. This information is what
scares me the most. The information that I give to companies like Amazon, Google, and Apple is
probably not smart, yet I do it anyway because of convenience. Credit card info, access to my face,
and fingerprint, and I allow their own personal listening devices like Siri and Alexa into my life. I
constantly wonder how these technologies will progress in the future, and what potential risks they
bring. When it comes to sharing what I do on a daily basis in the privacy of my home with complete
strangers, that is where I draw the line. For now, I will be more careful about what permissions I give
to cites, such as my internet cookies. But it is difficult to monitor all the information that we
unknowingly give to strangers. For now, this information (as far as I know) has only been used to
benefit me, but I fear the day when this knowledge will be used for harm.

https://privacyrights.org/consumer-guides/online-privacy-using-internet-safely

https://www.foxbusiness.com/technology/apples-siri-is-eavesdropping-on-your-conversations-putting-users-at-risk

Week Twelve: Diffusions of Innovation: How LinkedIn Created the First Business Social Media Cite

This week in my Media Law and Literacy course we were learning about the theory of Diffusions of Innovations, which is the discussion of how an innovation gains popularity and becomes a staple of human society. The founder of the theory, Everett Rogers, believes that there are four elements that influence the spread: the idea itself, communication channels, time and a social system. While discussing recent innovations that followed this trend, I wanted to take a look at how LinkedIn became the staple of business connectivity, and how it could affect society in the future. 

LinkedIn was founded in 2002 and officially launched in 2003. The site is one of the oldest
social sites, being founded before YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter. The idea itself came from
Reid Hoffman, who started the company in his living room. Hoffman is a very successful
entrepreneur who was on the board of other successful companies like Google, eBay and
was even close with Elon Musk by helping with PayPal’s construction. 

The idea of a business social media site spread like wildfire. Within two years of its launch,
it already had five million users. With the growing popularity of FaceBook coinciding with
LinkedIn’s release, the site began to really gain traction. One year later in 2007, the site tripled
in user base, with over 17 million accounts. Since then, it has rapidly grown into the monster
that it is now. LinkedIn currently has over half a billion users and essentially has a monopoly on
the business social media market. Time and the rise of social media in our current society has
helped to push the idea to the monster status it has now. I think that LinkedIn is a great example
that helps prove Everett Rogers's theory of Diffusion of Innovations. It truly followed all four of the
elements that influence the spread of an idea.

I now wonder what the future of LinkedIn looks like, and how it will affect society in the future.
I think that LinkedIn is just another testament to how powerful the internet has become and how
helpful it can be. Creating ease for businesses in finding employees, while also making it easier
for people to find a job that is a perfect match is really important. Business efficiency is important
for capitalism and helps our society overall progress. Now companies can spend less time and
money on sifting through thousands of physical resumes and interviewing people who are not good
matches. They can easily find prospects that will fit their needs and find all relevant information that
helps them to make an informed decision. I think that LinkedIn is a fantastic innovation, and I believe
in the future there will be more sites and innovations similar in principle to it. 

https://www.businessofapps.com/data/linkedin-statistics/

https://thelinkedinman.com/history-linkedin/

Week Eleven: Eight Values of Free Expression

This week in my Media Law and Literacy course we discussed the eight values of free
expression. They include the marketplace of ideas, participation in self-government, stable
change, individual self-fulfillment, check on government power, promote tolerance,
promote innovation, and protecting dissent. These are all different ideas from various
philosophers about why free expression is valuable. While I think all of these are great
examples of the benefits of free speech, I believe there are a few that stand out in particular
to me. It came down to a toss-up between individual self-fulfillment and promoting tolerance. 

Of these three ideas, I had a hard time deciding which value meant the most to me.
I believe that the promotion of tolerance is certainly one of the most important because
a society that is tolerant of one another is overall a better society than one that promotes
hate and injustice. When we are tolerant of everyone, we are able to see people for who
they are beyond just what culture they are from. When people from different cultures are
able to share their world view with others, we see the world from new perspectives and
gain a deeper knowledge of the world and the people around us. A society that is tolerant
is more efficient, effective, and achieves greater things. That being said, I feel as if free
expression limits tolerance. Lee Bollinger, the founder of this thought, explained that the
goal is to hear others' hateful comments and grow from them. While this may be the case
sometimes, for the most part, it results in people just being intolerant to hurt others'
feelings, and growth stagnates. When intolerant people express their views, more intolerant
people follow them, creating a cycle of hate and violence. So while in theory, this is a great
idea, in practice I believe it does not always play out that way. In that sense, this value is not
my favorite. 

That led me to choose individual self-fulfillment as my favorite one of the eight values
of free expression. I think one of the best examples of this is my blog for this class.
When I am writing this blog, I am allowed to talk about anything topic I desire and express
my opinion of myself. While doing this, I share the person I am with anyone who is
potentially reading, but I also figure out a lot about myself. I did not realize I had such strong
opinions on topics before I started blogging. This blog has helped me organize my thoughts
and understand what I believe a little bit better. I think I have a stronger connection to who I
am and this would not have been possible without free expression. I think if I were to continue
to blog, it would only help me to deepen the connection I have with myself. I find this to be
the most valuable aspect of free expression to me. I believe that if we were not allowed to
talk freely, we would not have a good understanding of what we believe in. When people are
allowed to share their disagreements with the government or other entities, it allows for ideas
to be generated and overall wellbeing to improve. This helps people reach self-actualization,
which is the highest value on Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, and the last step to becoming happy. 

https://www.mtsu.edu/first-amendment/article/1284/c-edwin-baker