Yeah. A Daria allusion to Hamlet and a Youtube video opened up. That's my Desktop.
And a wonderful desktop it is. A bit bright and colorful, but entertaining nonetheless. I really love that cartoon (though I don't think I'm anything like her, contrary to what people tell me or may believe). The color on the desktop does make it harder to see images sometimes, but it also means that it's harder for
other people to see my images and things, if they choose to do so without my permission. It also kind of forces me to maximize whatever screen I'm using, which seems more organized and neat. Firefox has tabs, and that allows me to organize my email, Facebook, and school research into one internet box, all while having my assignment in another box of Microsoft Word. My background takes getting used to, but also grows on you and helps increase concentration in a way.
But I do think we have tons of distractions as modern day teenagers. The days of going to the local diner with all the cool cats and doing the hop are over. Who needs people when we have computers? In all honesty, these things have become our best friends. Everyone's busy Saturday night? Hey, log onto the internet, I'm sure there will be something you can do. Computers have not only increased technology, they've taken it over. Our computers are now our television sets, our music players, our "phones" (yes, you can do voice chat), and even our in person talks (if you choose to use a webcam). I think that technology is amazing and that items like Facebook can be useful to us in terms of keeping in touch with people we love, or those we really don't care enough to keep in touch with through other mediums. But as wonderful as these new mediums are, they have their downsides. I haven't seen my closest friends in months because of school and different schedules. But I have talked to them on Facebook, and once in awhile on the phone. The problem? If we are all on Facebook or on the phone, what forbid us from making plans to see each other instead? In the two and a half hours we reminisce on my wall, we could've reminisced over ice cream and Subway (where most of those memories happened anyway). Or, instead of even talking on the phone for four hours on Saturday, making up stupid raps about people, we could've seen each other in person (..and possibly taped them for Youtube). But then, we wouldn't have been doing our "homework".
Yes, homework. Although, Facebook isn't the only distraction. Type in any word into Google, and beheld with at least 5,000 results. Great for vaster research and knowledge. Horrible if most of it is inaccurate, outdated, or just plain unnecessary. In the "olden" days, when you had an assignment, you went to the library. And then you thanked old Melvil Dewey for his idea to decimalize those cards so you didn't have to look through books, like before. Then asked the librarian where to find it. Now you just type in what you need and it's found. And there are 9 million printed out signs pointing you in the direction of where it is. If you go to the library, that is. Either way, there were about five books you would find, and then skim through to get your research. Now, the are 56,734,790 results for any given "narrowed down" search, half of which don't relate, seventy-five percent of which have ads, etc. Happy searching.
The internet is great for times when you feel like staying in, remote times who need shopping done when the closest place is 30 miles away, finding rare finds on eBay, and keeping in touch with people in far places. But it also rids of cultural distinction, boundaries, and good old plain, real in person friendships. It is a great tool to be used...in moderation and with careful technique.
happy children as a comparison and look up statistics and etc. to add to a PowerPoint so we have information, and not just video. If I have trouble with this, I may make a PowerPoint on a video I previously made, either on Hurricane Katrina (while adding pictures of the new hurricanes), on how advertising for a product can often times make musicians famous and on how the world and music industry are changing due to technology (which relates to both this class and my job), or on how philosophy and meditation influence health and/or ideologies, using Robert Pirsig's Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance as my reference. Not quite sure yet, but I have all the concepts pretty well mapped out in my head.
