Category: John Hartley

1. In his book, Lanier discusses trolling (p. 60), which refers to an anonymous person that is abusive in an online environment. My question surrounding the phenomenon of trolling is, what is it about the internet that gives us a feeling of safety and anonymity? Why is the common thought to not worry about what we post or say? Is it because we feel there are no consequences?

2. Is technology really taking us toward a world of “telegigging,” ” songles,” and “formal financial expression?” With telegigging, holographic projectors that immerse you inside the action seems almost like a pipe dream. Do we really have the want or need for something like that? And, going back to the previous question, how would they be effected by trolls?

3. Is Lanier suggesting toward the end of the book that the internet has become a deterrence from using a large vocabulary? He talks about the bouba, kiki, Juliet, sun metaphor, and how we would have to choose those words much more carefully, but what is the point he is making? Does he think our vocabulary has become minimal already?

1. Would “Mickey”s be monopolizers? Or can there be no monopoly in intellectual property?

There isn’t really an option to have a monopoly on intellectual property. Even if it is sold to the Mickey’s there will still be a surplus of other properties not owned by said Mickey. Take for example anything having to do with Disney. For every one piece of material that is the intellectual property of Disney, there are five or six spinoffs that are different enough to prevent infringement. An example would be the Animaniacs, owned by Warner Bros. If you take the clothes off of these characters and make their ears round, they look remarkably like Mickey Mouse, but because they are different enough, there is no issue with copying Disney’s intellectual property.

2. From Chapter 2: As we progress further into the digital age, is our human communicative capacity decreasing or increasing, with all of the advertisements we see daily?

Human communicative capacity in general will skyrocket. Maybe not physically, but digitally we are more connected than ever. We have a large number of social networks and the number is growing daily. There are endless ways to communicate with one another and advertisements are another way that we can interact. With viral marketing, companies are going to YouTube to create ads that will generate more views than regular commercials. The thing companies might not understand is that viral videos don’t just happen. There is a certain flow to how they get into the mainstream. Through pushing these videos on Twitter, Facebook, Digg, and other sites, we are improving the chances for the company to push their product. In this way our communicative capacity is increasing as we spread pretty much everything around on the internet.

3. Will we start to see more companies doing stuff like the NASA Clickworkers experiment? If so, why? And will all knowledge eventually be created by the common collective?

Earlier this month we saw something similar with Diaspora, a newer social networking site, who released their code to let potential users look through to make changes or improvements. Keeping this as an example, the internet is somewhat becoming a gigantic focus group, allowing companies and businesses to figure out what the common user likes about a program or website, fixing it, then releasing it later. These are the types of sites that release a “beta” version and sometimes only release it to a select number of people. A large enough group will show a good sample of the overall population. Through open source programs and communities, such as Ubuntu and slashdot, the common collective is slowly making it’s way into mainstream mediums. Freeware and free torrent sites are showing a trend toward a more widely accessible range of programs. This again lends to the idea that in the next few years we will see an increase in programs and software that people can either get for very little or nothing.

1. Would “Mickey”s be monopolizers? Or can there be no monopoly in intellectual property?

2. From Chapter 2: As we progress further into the digital age, is our human communicative capacity decreasing or increasing, with all of the advertisements we see daily?

3. Will we start to see more companies doing stuff like the NASA Clickworkers experiment? If so, why? And will all knowledge eventually be created by the common collective?

Online Gaming Addiction: Is online gaming the drug of the future?

Proposal by John Hartley

This research paper will discuss and dissect one of the most prevalent Internet problems of the day. That problem is addiction to online gaming. Since the Internet was introduced, even before online gaming, signs of addiction were prevalent throughout the United States with some studies dating back into the 1990s. The following research will show how, over time, this addiction has consumed massive amounts of users, from Massive Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games such as World of Warcraft, to smaller browser-based games like FarmVille. This research is important to the future of the Internet and society as identifying the problem before it becomes too serious means a cure can be found. Many researchers have looked at past statistics of addiction and past technology surrounding online gaming, but few have hypothesized about the future and direction these online games are going.

The researcher will show how online gaming is and has become an addiction to many through past research on the topic and will make comparisons to drug addiction statistics (most closely marijuana). A definition of “addiction” will be set, followed by an outline of how each stage of addiction can be found in gamers and how addiction effects gamers’ lives. One article of study will show “The Effect of Computer Gaming on Subsequent Time Perception” (Luthman, Bliesener, Staude-Muller), which will solidify a major effect of online gaming addiction.

Through statistics, comparisons will be drawn and will then be applied to the main statement: Online gaming is becoming the next major addiction of the future. By looking at studies dealing with endorphin release and general brain function while playing video games, the research will again show a deep comparison to drug addiction. Along with the study of endorphin release, the researcher will also call on information from the psychological and medical communities for studies on the adverse effects this condition can have on addicts. In the second half of the paper, the study will point to why online gaming has the potential to be the “drug” of choice in the future. By analyzing virtual reality platforms and accessibility with widely popular games like “FarmVille” the researcher will build his case.

Through this study, new information is expected to be found showing that there is a pattern in the online gaming culture that is leading to more addicts every year. A correlation will most likely be found between online gaming usage and drug abuse. Statistical analysis may be gathered with simple ANOVA tables, which will prove or disprove any correlation between the two. If a correlation cannot be disproved the researcher will hypothesize on the future of online gaming addiction using the studies and research already used for the backing of the study. A survey may also lend to this research, contrasting drug use and online gaming use and reasons for each.

With this research, online gaming addiction could be better understood, leading to a possible “cure” for gamers worldwide. The research also has potential to have an interactive format, which would help it spread across many mediums.

With how quickly we are able to get our knowledge through the internet and with social media sites, how relevant and timely is the research that is being done? I feel like the more in-depth research gets, the less timely the research becomes. How do we then create research that will be both current and in depth?

Surveys were discussed as a way to gather data. Would the outcome of an online survey give you different results than a survey that was done with paper and pen? If so, how much would that skew the data that you are trying to obtain?

If you were to do an analysis of generational television watching, how do you determine what age a generation begins and where the parameter ends?