How Social am I?

Honestly, today in class when everyone was naming these websites that I have never heard of, I realized that I wasn't taking full advantage of the social media that is easily available to me. In class I could barely think of a social media website that I go on, but now I realize that every time I go online I check at least three social media websites periodically throughout the day. They play a big role in my life, maybe too big.

My favorite social media website (and I'm sure it's probably yours too) is Facebook. Of course it is, isn't it every college students'? In all seriousness, is there anything better than opening up your Facebook to a number of notifications and friend requests? I think not, well at least for me I get awkwardly excited. I get the feeling that someone loves me...weird. It goes away fast once I realize that all the notifications are just people commenting on some picture I'm in from forever ago. Whatever, those few seconds of curiosity as to what your notifications are about still makes me anxious and excited, even after a year of usage.

Mostly I use Facebook as a way of keeping connected with people that I graduated high school with. Since graduation I still see my close friends, but Facebook is my way of staying in contact with the girl in my Latin class since 8th grade or the guy that I played basketball with for three years. It is a great tool for that, but it also sometimes gives TMI-too much information. I don't need my news feed to be overtaken with what my high school English teacher did with her boyfriend last night...that's not alright. But that's neither here nor there. Overall, Facebook does a great job of connecting people, but it does cause many to become obsessed. I check about three times a day, which I don't think is too bad. My friend has to incorporate "Facebook Time" into how long it will take her to do a random task because she can not go an hour without updating her status, looking at pictures, etc. I hope I never get to that place, no offense to anyone who is already like that...

My next most visited social media site is Twitter. Now although I don't actually "tweet," I do have an account that I check periodically throughout the day where I follow about 70 people--celebrities, news outlets, athletes. Basically friends in my head that I feel the need to know what's going on with them throughout their day. It's sad because in reality I will never know any of these people on a friend-to-friend basis, yet I know where and what they ate for lunch. I constantly ask myself, "Why do I care?" I can never answer that question, but the truth is I don't care why I care because I'm going to continue following them anyway.


The last social media website that I use regularly is YouTube. I don't post videos, but I view many a day. I love talk shows and I do this thing called college which makes me miss my favorite shows. If there is an interview that I missed and really wanted to see, I just go onto YouTube at night or on the weekends and nine times out of ten they have the video. It is such a great resource, I don't know how I could live without it. Eventually I would like to begin posting videos and share it because I think its amazing that one post to website can be seen all around the world. I'm just getting caught up with one of my favorite talk shows, Live! with Regis and Kelly. They just had an interview with Jane Krakowski, whose on one of my favorite shows, 30 Rock. Check it out, they even talk about Twitter!



Of course these three sites aren't the limit to my social media activity, just the most visited. I also use Wikipedia, because even if it's not an academic source, it has information on everything. I also follow a number of blogs that I leave comments on, so I think that counts for social media. After thinking about it, the world would be so different without social media because I feel like we depend on it so much now for news, keeping in touch, being creative, and many other things. I don't think it's a bad thing, just something to think about.

Final Draft of Our Video Project :)

Rough Draft of Our Video Project!

Drum roll please...well it's not finished yet, but so far so good, right? Lauren did a great job with the editing, it far exceeded my expectations. Now we just need to add pictures, add Lauren's and Jess' "why we came" pieces and then all of our "why we stayed" clips. We're going to change the music in the beginning, as well. Enjoy!

Our Xtra Normal Video!

Progress Feels Good!

So after meeting with my group, I feel a lot better than I did before. I was really intimidated with this project. The only video I've made was in my friend's backyard in tenth grade for a Latin project...we reenacted the Aeneid. It turned out looking nothing like the Aeneid, so I knew this project would be a lot of work for me. Plus, I've never used a Mac, so I'm glad I have a group who is a little more proficient than me. We've changed topics a couple times already, but I think we have a good one now.

Today my group and I met in the Communications lab (aka our classroom). We already had our topic and a basic storyboard. On Tuesday our "homework" was to outline our answers to our dramatic question and pick some pictures that visualized our answers. Today, I think we got a lot done. We decided, for the most part, what would happen in every scene in the movie--words, pictures, videos, and sounds. The only thing I'm worried about is the time and if we'll be able to incorporate all of our creative and good ideas within the time constraint.

We also decided that next Tuesday we'll begin filming. Overall, I feel a lot more confident about this project. I'm actually excited to start filming, and can't wait to see the final product!