Week 2

SOCIAL MEDIA

The three people I decided to follow were: Donald Trump (@realDonaldTrump), Fox News (@FoxNews), and Mike Pence (@VP), all on Twitter. I decided to follow these three accounts on Twitter since it is the social media platform I use the most and I believe I am more likely to see their tweets since I am on it so often. I have been following Donald Trump for a while, I think his tweets are humorous and ridiculous at times - they give me a good laugh. Despite his tweets being humorous, he tweets quite often, and shares a lot about his decision making which I think is important to know and follow to be able to gain my own opinion on the subject and understand what is going on decision wise in the white house. I also followed Mike Pence, the vise president for this same reason. He posts many videos and photos as well as what he is doing to contribute. 

Lastly, I followed Fox News. I thought it was important to follow a news page since I like to know what is going on in the world but I don’t really watch the news. Since I am on twitter much more often than I am urged to turn on the news, I thought it would be a good idea to keep up by following Fox. 

I never really tweet/retweet/like anything news related unless I think it is extremely important for others to see. Since my account itself isn’t something people follow FOR news shenanigans, I usually stay away from involving myself or stating my opinion on social media about news related things. Going through my retweets and likes, one of my most recent likes is a tweet by @wildcardnaai saying this: 

I thought this tweet was interesting and it was something that I didn’t personally know. I haven’t done any further research on the topic and didn’t know the full accuracy of the tweet, which is why I didn’t re-tweet it. This is a super touchy and scary subject, especially for me being a woman. The United States has always been seen as a safe place to be, but it seems as if things have changed a little bit. 

Like I touched on a little before, I try to not get involved in government, news or democracy situations on social media. I do read what others have to say and if I agree I might like a certain post or tweet, but I never share my own opinion. I think certain subjects like that are very touchy for people and some people get very angry and opinionated if someone doesn’t have the same views as them. I don’t like upsetting a certain audience on social media or causing any kind of drama under my name. I don’t have any problem stating my opinions on certain things in person, but you will never see me talk about a government issue online. 

THE INTERNET

In Sherry Turkle’s TED Talk, she explains how much the world of texting and technology has changed over the years and how “we're letting it take us places that we don’t want to go.” It has changed so much that being on your phone 24/7, even in the middle of class, important meetings and even funerals has just become the norm, whereas a few years ago it would’ve been rude and strictly off limits. I agree with Turkle, we are only involving ourselves in real life conversations when it is important to us while the other half of us is on our phone. She said something that stood out to me being "I'll tell you what's wrong with having a conversation. It takes place in real time and you can't control what you're going to say.” I think this generation can relate very well to that sentence and it is the mindset that many people have nowadays, and it isn’t just the younger generation anymore. People are so consumed by their phones and even in texting someone instead of just calling them. The use of technology and texting is making everyone very anti-social to the point where some people can't even have a real face to face conversation anymore. Technology and texting are great but there are a time and place and a time to hold back a little. 

I am an only child and have lived with just my mom until I turned 18. I got my first phone when I was 7 (I know, really young), but I never used it and pretty much lost it for months on end. When I started getting older and all my friends started getting phones as well as when I really started getting into technology and texting. I usually knew the time and place it was right to use my phone at home. I had to turn my phone into my mom during times I needed to finish my homework but that was about it. 

I do love my phone, but personally, I would rather call someone. I have always been labeled as “the bad texter” by my friends, only texting things like “ya”, “ok”, and “nice”. I love in-person communication and would choose that over texting any day. 

I’ve never been into phone games. I remember in middle school and high school when all my friends were obsessed with games on their phone and I could never understand why. I currently have no games on my phone. Since I would never play them, it would just take up storage. I use my phone for strictly communication only, which is what it was made for in the first place. 

Bellow, I have attached the battery usage and hours on screen I have been on each of the apps I use for the past 3 days. As you can see, here are the numbers:

Instagram: 1.4 hours 

Twitter: 1.1 hours 

Snapchat: 30 minutes 

Messages: 50 minutes 

And the rest are apps like music and the app store, which I never really look at, they just run in the background. 

To figure out how much I use each of these I decided them by 3 and then multiplied that number by 7

Instagram: 3.27 hours

Twitter: 2.56 hours 

Snapchat: 1.16 hours 

Messages 1.94 hours 

Altogether, I spend about 8.93 hours on my phone per week, using the numbers my phone has listed for me. 

For a person, my age (20) I deffinitly don't spend much time on my phone compared to others. I don't feel as if I am in an online community due to the fact that out of 168 hours in a week, I am only on my phone about 18% of that. I definitely am a "stop to smell the flowers" type of person. I would rather go out and see the world instead of search pictures of it on my phone. I think technology is great but I encourage everyone to take a step back from their phones and enjoy real life instead of vurtual life.