Experiencing SecondLife

At the beginning of the semester when we got the syllabus, I immediately googled SecondLife.  After finding out a little more about the program, I realized that I really wasn't interested. It's nothing about the program, but the idea of being an avatar in an electronic world is something I have no interest in whatsoever.  Before we had our SecondLife assignment, I downloaded the program and tried to used it.  I consider myself a pretty tech savvy person, so when I got into the program and didn't understand anything, I became frustrated.  After about 10 minutes of confusion, I decided not to even open the program until the assignment was due.  Once we got the assignment, I first read some tutorials and messages boards to figure it out how the use the program correctly.  After logging into SecondLife for round two, I found it easier, but still not a 'user-friendly' program.

My use of SecondLife was limited to about two hours.  The first hour and a half were spent on trying to make my character look like me.  The last bit of time was spent meeting ProfessorMaryEmerald and teleporting and flying around SecondLife.  I did not find it difficult to use the navigation controls or gestures.  Overall, I just found the whole thing a little weird. 

I think one of the reasons I find SecondLife is just not for me is due to the idea of multiphrenia.  I like to know exactly who I'm chatting with and in SecondLife, that is far from the case.  I couldn't help but laugh when I heard that another student in class had a car as an avatar.  First of all, it would be strange to me to have a conversation with a car, and secondly, I'd naturally assume that it was a man that I was chatting with.  I also understand the individuals can pose as anything or anyone they would like to be online on other websites and programs.  For example, a man could make a more feminine username or vice versa, and we encounter the same issue.  But in SecondLife, you can give visual characteristics, which, at least for me, gives much more of a gender to a username.

One thing that I do praise SecondLife for is their use of voice, gestures and social cues in the program.  A character is able to do so many different combinations together.  It gives the avatars a much more lifelike sense when you're having conversations and mingling with other SecondLife users. While I was teleporting to different destinations, I met an avatar who was HUGE and was dressed like a missing member from the band KISS. He was dancing up a storm on the dance floor.  It was definitely fun to watch him and also to watch as other people joined in.  I didn't join in though.  My dance skills we're definitely not good enough to dance in 'public'.  Also, from a personal standpoint, I treat the digital world very similar to how I act and participate in reality.  If I know I can't dance, I'm not going to get in front of everyone and dance.

My overall experience with SecondLife was nothing spectacular. Although I think think the program is very interesting, it's just not for me. Like I've previously mentioned, I like the way that SecondLife uses social cues, gestures and voice to create a more realist atmosphere. I'm sure if I became more familiar with the program, I'm sure I'd be able to praise it more than I have in this blog post. But, it's something I would have never tried if it wasn't for the class, so I'm glad to have tried it out.

Inflating the Software Report Card

     Technology in classrooms is something that I've personally grown up with starting in elementary school and all throughout my education.  I think that technology can be a great tool used in the education process, but I do not think it should take place of a teacher or professor.  We've discussed in class how a great portion of a college education isn't necessarily how many papers you write or what you learn, but more so what you experience.
     In the article, Inflating the Software Report Card, it's easy to see that technology is not yet powerful enough or written correctly to have a noticeable influence on the learning process.  Information from the article explains how a student might complete their work on some kind of programmed tutor.  The student never really has to learn anything.  If they hit the "hint" button long enough, they'll get close enough to the correct answer without having to do much work at all.  In real life, if a teacher would give you a "hint", it still requires the student to think for themselves. Also, there would never be an instance that the teacher would give the student so many hints that the answer would appear right in front of him or her, without doing any work.
      I think that technology should be used as a helping hand when it comes to education. It does not belong in the role of a teacher or professor.  Online classes are even a bit difficult depending on the professors involvement.  Also, human to human interaction is best to work with students, not through technological mediums. I personally have an example of this.  Taking an online math course last Fall here at Kutztown, all of our lessons and homework was all through MyMathLab.  Well, MyMathLab is very picky, and it should be, you're learning math, so everything must be exact.  I kept working out a certain problem and was getting the same answer over and over and MyMathLab said it was incorrect.  Here, I used the wrong "slash" to create a fraction.  If I would have been in a classroom or working on this as a regular homework assignment, I would have answered the problem and move onto the next one.  In our class, we were required to show up to a classroom 4 times during the semester to take exams.  That was fine, but everytime we went into that classroom, the professor looked at us like strangers, which we were.  She never knew anybody's name, interests or major, she just administered the tests and collected them at the end.
     As for society, I think that these companies that are bragging about their amazing technologies need to be held responsible for what they really do.  All they're doing right now is charging insane prices for their not-so-great programs. Our society is so focused on the next best thing and latest innovation and doesn't always take the time to better understand exactly what they're dumping up to as much as $2.2 billion a year into.

HTML

HTML is something that I've never used before.  When I was younger, I used color codes to play around with my myspace page, but other than that, HTML is a new language to me.  I really wasn't looking forward to this assignment, but I did find it interesting. I did not find this assignment too difficult, as I worked with the tutorials, but without those, I would have been lost!  After making my page, I was pretty happy with my outcome for the time I spent on it. Although I made a very simple HTML page, I did read into some of the things you can do with coding.

People can personalize and customize with coding so much so that it can be catered to the users needs.  By doing so, the interest of the user can become fixed on the page.  I think HTML helps in the support of the 'long tail' that we've discussed in class.  Not only are these niche markets, but they also can cater to the users needs.  For example, a crafts website may have animated links, cute text and fun colors. And on the other hand, a senior citizens website may have dull colors, simple layouts and plain links. 

Overall, I found the assignment was interesting, although frustrating at times.  I got a little caught up with the coding to change the background color.  I figured out how to highlight individual lines in the process though!  So much patience and time goes into the design of pages and after this assignment, I appreciate coders a bit more.