Parents on facebook

Facebook is a privately owned and opperated and was started by a man named Mark Zuckerberg and a few of his friends at Harvard University and soon grew to include other Ivy League schools. Since then it has seen several stages of development in how user friendly it is as well as the exclusiveness of its members. After being a success in the Ivy League schools, it expended its boundaries to include all universities, then high schools, and eventually to today where anyone above the age of 13 can have a profile.

I understand how one would want to expand the reaches of the company because of the obvious monetary value it could rake in. But there was something about the exclusivity of being a member. It was one thing to open the boundaries to high school kids because of all the social networking opportunities university and high school kids have but it is entirely different to one day get a friend request from you parents. Or perhaps the kid down the hall from you gets a call from his pissed off parents telling him he can't go on spring break because they saw pictures of him drinking beer year last year as a freshman, on a school night, no less! So the ultimate question is one of privacy. I realize one can edit and customize privacy settings on facebook but for some parents, that rule doesn't apply. Parents most often ultimately have the control because even though they may be hundreds of miles away, most kids still heavily rely on parents especially for financial stability.

Another question arrises form the issue; are parents really adequately technology literate to utilize facebook properly and with discretion and good taste? Allow me to provide an example...

After major investors like Microsoft and google affiliates, things have changed. Major amounts of money are invested into advertising and listings and other network links that clutter up what the real point of the site is... to stay connected. Now there are more adverts for oldspice and local "adult friend" seeking websites than there is real information. It has become as much of a perverse dating site as it is a way of keeping in contact with friends and family. In a way, it seems as if the owners and operators have lost site of the original purpose.

Pop Sci's Future Of...

Anyone who doesn't have a TV package including the ever popular History Channel and it's affiliates, Discovery Channel and it's affiliates, Science, Military, Travel, Planet Green and National Geographic, is at a loss for informative, educational, interesting and relevant TV programming. Each of these networks are filled with programs that give us an insight to some of the latest technologies being created and how they influence our daily lives, communities, governments, as well as our earth's environment as a whole.

One particular program titled, "Pop Sci's Future Of..." accomplishes said tasks tastefully and with a humorous twist . Each episode examines how one important characteristic of human life will fundamentally change within our lifetimes. The show is hosted by a man named Baratunde Thurston although perhaps somewhat feminine, does well reinforcing the concepts described and demonstrating the new technologies expected to become every-day gadgets. As an author, comedian and writer Baratunde is anything but lacking on his credentials and resume.

Currently, Thurston serves as the web editor for The Onion, but also writes for The Huffington Post and his own website baratunde.com. He is also the co-founder of one of the top 10 black blogs, called Jack and Jill Politics. As for his other accomplishments, he has written three books, was nominated for the Bill Hicks Award for Thought Provoking Comedy, declared a Champion of the First Amendment by Iowa State University, and described by Barack Obama as "someone I need to know." Baratunde graduated Harvard University with a degree in Philosophy and spent eight years offering strategic advice to Fortune 100 companies on the future of communications and media.

Thurston interviews radical noncomformist scientists about their advancements, performs hands-on experiements, critiques the developments, and educates viewers how within a matter decades scientific breakthroughs will continue to shape nearly every aspect of every day life as our technologies evolve.

Granted that TV production, editing, and network coordination results in a significant delay, the show explores different advancements that are still relatively new, unique and have yet to hit consumer markets.

Daily Blogs?

As a fifth year senior, I have successfully accomplished 4 years worth of schooling here at Purdue University without the aid of my own computer. Especially with newer and emerging technologies one would think that it is nearly impossible to accomplish such a feat. For whatever reason, I was unwilling to spend my own savings on a computer when I knew so little about the requirements and maintenance of owning a computer. Now that I finally broke down and purchased one for myself, I'm desperately trying to catch up with the times.