Rock Climbing Forum

This assignment was a hard one for me to complete. I am taking a full load of classes at Oregon State, then taking some additional classes at my local community college, and I work as a chemist full time. This means that I have very little free time to do much of anything. One of the requirements that I made for myself when it came to choosing a community to join, was that it had to be one I could participate and log onto while I was at work. Many community sites are blocked at worked for various reasons like “mature content” or “dating website” even though they have nothing to do with dating or adult content.

I thought it would be fun to join a community that I was interested in and could learn something from. When I do have free time I love to be outdoors running, road biking, or rock climbing. I did some searches on these topics and I found rockclimbing.com. This is a very large website which has a lot of different features. There are sections devoted to informational articles about new products or new climbing areas, and sections set up for discussion forums. There is also a section in which you can create a profile and list out all of your climbing accomplishments and then use this to search for climbing partners in your area.
Over the past two weeks I read and contributed to the various discussion boards on the website. Some of the discussions were very interesting and educational, where others were being used as a place to complain and gripe. I believe that I was accepted into this community because of the responses I received when I posted responses. I approached these discussion boards in the same way I would have approached any conversation with people in real life. I do not like to start arguments, nor do I react to peoples insulting words.

There is quite a lot of rudeness and unkindness on this website. There are lots of discussion posts where people use language which I do not think is appropriate for a general use forum. There are also many cases of people using all capital letters, and just being flat out rude to other people. In other cases people would ask questions and would get sarcastic responses from others. An example of this was a guy asking for advice on popping or not popping a blister on his foot. Many responses were very good, but a few were similar to this one, “Pop it and have your dog lick it. You'll be amazed how fast it will heal. Dog saliva is like magic on wounds. Don't ask how I know this.” In my opinion, I do not understand why a person would even respond like this to a stranger they may not really know.
I think that our society has become accustomed to websites and forums where you can interact with others behind a computer screen. It makes people say and respond in ways that may not in a face to face conversation. I think that not many people would have the nerve to jump into a strangers’ conversation and say something completely rude or even yell at them.

In Woods and Smith they say that “Despite the distances that can separate them, people have an intrinsic need for community” (122). This was exactly true on rockclimbing.com. People who participated in this community live in places throughout the world, which shows that everyone wants to belong and be a part of the group. Like Woods and Smith said, this self created community does have rules and will “regulate members through sanctions” (139). In the forum I belonged to, this was the case and there were moderators who would read through posts giving warnings to participants who were getting out of line.

I think that this was a good experience, and although I do not participate regularly in forums like this, it is nice to see that large groups of people can get together and have constructive conversations and disagreements with each other.

snail mail vs. mail

I wrote a letter by hand to my grandmother who lives in England. The usual way that we communicate is via snail mail or by phone. Because she is a widow and lives alone, her favorite thing is to receive a letter in the mail. It does not matter if the letter is short or long or has nothing important written in it, it is the highlight of her week. I get a letter back in the mail from her in less than a week thanking me for the letter I sent.

I start the letter with:

Dear Nanny,
I hope things are going well for you. I recently moved to Truckee California, about 50 miles north of where I was living before. I like it here a lot. The weather is always perfect, it’s not too hot or too cold.
I just wanted to send you this letter with a few pictures to thank you for being there for me….

I continue on with a few more paragraphs and then close the letter by saying “I hope to hear from you soon, Love Katie”

I then typed an email to my Mom. It started out with:

Hi,

It’s been a while since I talked to you last. I’ve been busy with work and school and I also just moved. Sierra and I like our new place a lot.
I was just thinking about you and wanted to thank you for everything you help me with. It really means a lot to me, and I appreciate everything you have done.

I just did the death ride this past weekend with a friend from work….deathride.com. You should look at the website.

Katie

In comparison to the letter, the e-mail was a lot less personal, and a lot more brief. There were a lot less emotions in it, and reading it again now, it was very short.

Email has changed our society a lot. Instead of writing letters it seems like we all send emails. We can send digital pictures and even video as attachments in our e-mails. As much as I love technology and the ability to type an email and know that the recipient has it less than fifteen seconds later, there is something nice about a handwritten letter. It shows that more time and effort was taken. The sender had to write the letter, find and address an envelope, buy a stamp, and take the letter to the post office.

Much like the way Postman talks about the fact that technology does not necessarily mean better medicine, technology does not mean better communication. Although technology has made communication easier and faster, it has removed the personal aspects from it. There is no longer an envelope to open and a handwritten letter to read. All we are left looking at is a computer screen.

I think that it was convenient to send my Mom and e-mail because it was very quick, but also it was a lot less personal. I imagined her sitting at her computer desk reading it along with all of the other junk mail in her inbox. I think the letter was a lot less valued than the physical one I sent to my grandmother. I can imagine her sitting around her kitchen table reading it, and then talking about it with all of her friends for the next few days.

Facebook page

Prior to this class I already had a facebook page. The main reason I created the page was so that I would be able to keep in touch with friends from college, high school, and from the various places I have traveled. In today’s society, it is a lot easier to send and email than to make a phone call. My facebook page allows me to keep in contact with those I meet, without having to use a phone or to keep track of changing phone numbers.

The Info tab on my facebook account is rather bare, and actually incorrect. It is broken down into several subsections; Basic information, Personal information, Contact information, Education and work, and Groups. Although I have been a member of this website for over three years, the information on my website has not changed since. None of my contact information is correct, and all the basic information reveals about myself is that I was born on August 8th, am female, and that I am an alumni of University of Micigan and UC Davis. For me, I do not want a lot of my personal information on a website, especially as more and more employers are starting to check personal websites prior to hiring people.

The only use for the site that I have is to keep in touch with friends I have across the country, and make plans with people whom I do not see frequently. An example of this is that I recently went home to Pennsylvania for my brothers wedding. Before I left, I used facebook to send messages to some of the people I went to high school with to make plans to get together with them while I was in town.

I have my account set up so that people actually need to know me in order to add me as a friend. I do not want a lot of random people contacting me through the internet because honestly, if I do not know a person, I do not want to meet them online. I also do not use the site as a way of letting people know what I am doing every week. It seems like some people use facebook to provide their friends and others with constant updates on their life, which is fine, but I just choose not to do this. I just logged on to this site for the first time in a month or so, and the first things I see and comments like, “Corinne; Russ’ work phone work me up this morning. Not much sleep” and “Lauren: is pregnant”. To me, this just feels like a mass complaining, bragging, whining, and gossiping site.

In Wood and Smith, they say, “Most of us are aware that costuming is an important aspect of the parts we play and the self we choose to resent at one time or another” (58). This applies with facebook in that people choose to post pictures that make themselves or others look good – you rarely see someone’s profile picture where they are having a bad day or at a time when they are sad. Facebook allows people to pick and choose what they decide to reveal to other people and thus, people usually have a motivation to post the things they do. They are either looking for sympathy, congratulations, or simply attention.

So Much Cooler Online

It seems very evident to us, and as pointed out by Woods and Smith, that communication via the internet is an interactive process. Instead of being a passive viewer, the internet with chat rooms, blogs, and other features, allows us to be interactive with one another. It allows us the opportunity to have communications with others via e-mail, blogs, or chat rooms. In Brad Paisleys video, he is making fun of the fact that many people use the internet as a way of creating an alternate, “cooler” self. By setting up profiles in chat rooms, people are able to create false identities, and become “so much cooler online” than they are in real life.

George Costanza created an identity for himself online in which he was taller, had a nice car, and was able to interact calmly with multiple women. However, in reality, he lived in his parent’s basement, was short, and played with star wars toys. He was also too nervous to interact with the girl who lived across the street from him, whereas online he was able to “chat with three women at one time”. The internet allowed George to become a different person online. Postman talks about the changes in morals that technologies brings, and I believe that applies to the way we use the internet too. With or without realizing it, I think that chat rooms, blogs, and other interactions on the internet are changing our moral values as a society. Is it a lie to reveal parts of ourselves online, but leave other crucial things out, or distort the facts?

This video shows us that people are not the same when they communicate online versus online. Using the internet allows people to have the ability to create identities for themselves. A shy person can be very outgoing online because no one sees their face. A person only has to reveal certain things online and can keep secrets or make up lies with very little chance of being caught. It is good that a person can use the internet to become whoever they want online, but it also teaches us that we need to caution who we meet online. If we are telling lies, or only revealing certain parts of our personalities online, it is likely that the people we are talking to are doing the same thing.

Even while we are taking this course and completing our blog assignments, we only reveal the things about ourselves that we want others to know. We do not ever have to show our true identities, post our real pictures, or write anything that would embarrass us. Also, as a shy person, I think that an online class actually allows me to communicate and interact more with my peers than I would in a normal classroom situation. I am a person who likes to have time to formulate responses, and thus, in a classroom, am rather quiet. This is an advantage to me, but it also shows that I am a different person online than I am in real life.