Hirra Zafar's Blog

A type of new media that doesn't currently exist is a physically virtual world. Unlike plain virtual worlds that currently exist such as Second Life, these would be different because it wouldn't just be people sitting on a computer and playing a game, they would actually be able to physically move in this virtual world. It's kind of like what you see in sci-fi, futuristic, dystopian movies; people lie down, put on a headset and they're transported into a virtual world. While something like that doesn't sound realistic yet, a step back from it could be having people use virtual reality headsets and have remote controls that allow them to move around and perform actions. This could be handy for social media allowing people to connect in a virtual world where they can hang out. It would allow for people that have friends or family that live far away to be able to spend time with one another while feeling as if they are close. It can also workout for business purposes s...

I have not contributed to class Wiki so far, but I do have some content in mind that I would like to add to. I have been looking through our Wiki to see where I want to contribute and I found two categories that I would really like to add to. The first category is in Entertainment; in the Entertainment abroad I saw that there was a section talking about K-Pop which I am a fan of and have quite a bit of knowledge of. I saw someone had written about the Korean music group BTS and there is a lot more information about how they have become so popular all over the world and have even achieved success in the U.S. so I would like to add on to that section and discuss how they became even more successful with their new album and music video; I also think it's important to mention how their use of social media platforms helped them along the way. The other category that I would like to add to is Beauty and Cosmetics under Fashion; I saw that there were a lot of beauty brands that were missi...

According to the article "P2P File Sharing", file sharing is the "sharing and transmitting of computer data in a network or internet with various access levels." It's pretty much exactly what it sounds like; to put it more simply, it allows you to share your information with others. Now P2P is a little more specific, it stands for peer to peer file sharing; it is facilitated by a software program through which people can access files that have been made available on another computer. The software programs will search and locate a file that an individual is looking for. Gnutella is an example of a popular P2P file sharing network; it allows users to request a file and then download it. Another example is Napster, which used to let people share music files with one another through their website. Reference: “P2p File Sharing.” Margomin , 13 Apr. 2016, margomin.wordpress.com/2016/04/13/p2p-file-sharing/.

While new media has brought about some really great things, it has also created a lot issues as well relating to privacy and confidentiality. With so much content being digitized  it's become easier for people to gain information about others. Apps like Facebook had become very controversial because of all the privacy concerns. I remember being very concerned myself when I realized that Facebook's Messenger app was getting access to so much information about me that I wasn't even aware of. By simply downloading the app, I was giving it access to all the information on my phone, such as contacts, photos, videos, etc; it even had access to my microphone and camera at all times. The worst part is that most people don't even realize how much information they are giving up when they download and use certain apps. Even by going through your settings and trying to make everything as private as you want, there is no way to completely keep things private. On Facebook, it's n...

I know that Baruch College does have a presence in social media to reach students and new applicants, but their content is not very interesting. It's not something that would really appeal to students. There are lots of pictures of the college and a group of students where you know it's staged; I feel like it would be more beneficial for them to post more real content of what college life is like at Baruch. Not just officially taken pictures, but pictures taken by actual students while they're in college. There could be a lot more content promoting student life and club events. There are so many different clubs at Baruch that students are not even aware of; they could take time to feature each one of them on their pages or if a certain club is having a really cool event, they can talk about that. I think that is something that students would be more interested in seeing, rather than looking at facts about the college and its ranking; while you can post information like that...

A way that I use new media to foster my creativity is by posting pictures on Instagram. I am really into makeup and my cousin had convinced me to start posting my looks on Instagram since so many people had begun to do that and I also enjoyed doing makeup. I started it just for fun as a hobby; I do my makeup and then post pictures of it on my page to share it with my followers. By using hashtags, I can reach a lot of people that are looking for posts like mine. With Instagram you can share images with lots of people. A lot of people use it as a personal blog as well and I had started doing that too. Along with pictures of makeup looks, I would also post pictures of myself at places I had been to. In addition to pictures, Instagram also has Instagram stories where you can post more content that you might not want on your actual page. Here's a few examples of my posts from my page:          

The article "The New Math of Mashups" discusses one way that new media fosters creativity. With sites where people can share music such as YouTube and Sound Cloud, it allows for people to get more creative with music and then share it. Musical artists can take parts of different songs and pieces, or add in parts they've created to make something completely new. Whereas before only professionals might have been able to do this, with the open accessibility through the internet and these music sharing sites, any kind of person whether an amateur, a professional, or just an average person would be able to do this. Some amateurs had been able to gain popularity by posting their mashups on YouTube such as a guy named Alex Aiono. He started posting videos of him singing to mashups of popular songs that he created and edited himself and he was able to get a really good response from people and made a career out of it. The article "Twitter Serves Up Ideas From Its Followers...

Virtual reality has many different uses. One of the main uses of it is for the purpose of education. Teachers can create lesson plans that use virtual worlds or reality to make things a little more interesting. In the article "The virtual world moves into the classroom", they mention that students can take virtual field trips to different parts of the world; for example, if they're learning about the country of India, not only do they have just their textbooks and images, but they can put on their goggles and actually experience visiting India through this technology. Virtual reality can help enhance students' experience with learning which is a big pro; however, if it's not manipulated correctly, then it could possibly just be distracting, it's up to how the teacher chooses to use it.  Another use of virtual reality is in the medical field. In the article "Avatar II: The Hospital", they discuss how nurses and medical students take advantage of th...

Compared to a Blackboard discussion, I feel like a Twitter discussion is more direct and to the point. Since Twitter does have a character limit it would be more like a back and forth conversation since you can't type long sentences. In Blackboard discussions, you can write as much as you want to get your point across. I also think on Twitter discussions can move faster since there is not as much writing and if all the people are online at the same time, it can be faster since you get updates in real time, compared to Blackboard where you would have to log on and look for replies yourself; Twitter gives you notifications every time someone interacts with your tweet. I think if it's the case that everyone is online at once, a Twitter discussion can very much be like an in-class discussion. It can get a little messy and confusing compared to an in-class discussion, however, if many people are posting at once; it may be difficult to keep up with every response. If you're in a ...

Besides Facebook and Twitter, the other 2 social networking sites I chose to discuss are YouTube and Instagram. From all 4 of these the one I am least familiar with is Twitter because I'm not an avid user; for some reason it's just not appealing to me. I find it a little bit annoying that there is a maximum character limit for tweets, so if you want to share more information , you would have to create a thread. I can understand the reason behind it since Twitter was meant for quick news or updates. Also, most people don't really want to read too many words so it makes sense. I like that you're able to search twitter for whatever topic you're interested and that it allows for some fun interactions between people. Personally for me, it's still a little bit confusing and messy; it can be a little bit difficult to follow a conversation or discussion through replies and retweets since they can be all over the place. On the other hand with Facebook, each post has a ...

Social networking sites can be used for many things. The very first thing that comes to mind is personal use. You can connect with friends and family that are close and the ones that are far away as well. Sites like Facebook are really beneficial when it comes to keeping in touch with people in your life that don't live near you; it allows to share news, pictures, and videos immediately with someone that lives 5000 miles away from you, so there is that convenience. Another use is job recruitment/search; as mentioned in the podcast, "Social Networking Technology Boosts Job Recruiting", LinkedIn is a really popular social networking site for that purpose. It's very easy for companies to look at individuals' skills and background and then contact them with a job offer. On the other hand, it also makes it easy for individuals to connect with all these executives and companies; they are also able to search for jobs that they would be interested in and apply directly fr...

Blogs and wikis have many differences, but share some similarities as well. For instance, they both allow users to post information/news to share with others. They both also allow for collaboration between people, even though they do that in different ways. When it comes to blogs, the main thing that sets them apart from wikis is that blogs are usually run by an individual and only that individual has access to post content to their blog. On the other hand, with wikis, multiple users can have access to it and each of them can contribute or edit content. While this seems like a positive feature, it can also have a negative effect; since a nyone can acce ss it and make changes to the content, there's less credibility because anyone can write anything. Blogs can also be used for collaboration between people; even though blogs don't allow everyone access to change the content, they do allow others to comment on posts and that lets them communicate with the creator of the blog. For ...

For my term paper, I chose to write about the impact that new media has had on the beauty industry. I have been using makeup for about twelve years now and I myself have seen such a shift in how makeup used to be back then and how it is now. In my paper, I would like to talk about the different changes that have occurred in this industry due to the introduction of new media. For example, before people would kind of be on their own going into stores and having to look at makeup and take a chance to see if it would work for them; however, now so many people use new medias such as Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube to share their experiences with makeup and review them to give others insight about the products, so people go into stores having a good amount of information about the makeup they will be encountering. Another change is how the use of new medias have turned many ordinary people into somewhat of celebrities because of their beauty related content and how that has affected marketi...