Blog Entry #1 
Facebook on the Big Screen

The new movie, The Social Network, is a drama based on the founding of the popular social networking site, Facebook. The movie chronicles the early struggles of founder Mark Zuckerberg as he and his colleagues were establishing the billion-dollar business that we know today.

We often don't think about how Facebook is a business. Have you ever noticed how the advertising along the sides of your profile page somehow relate to your hobbies, education, or interests? There is sophisticated programming that picks up on personal information and matches it with advertisers. Although Facebook may seem like a playful social networking tool, there are BIG corporate interests in your profile, not for your social calendar and friends' list, but as a consumer to whom to sell! Earlier this year, Facebook instituted new privacy setting which gave uninvited people, including advertisers, privy to personal information and photos. This was worrisome to many users and caused the formation of groups in protest to this breech in personal privacy.

In a 200 to 300 word blog entry, discuss the ways in which you protect your privacy on social networking sites, such as Facebook. Why is it important to protect your information from uninvited eyes and advertisers? Create an image that illustrates your response.

Blogging safety 101

Here is a list of blogging safety tips adapted from Microsoft's Online Safety tips:

- Don't divulge personal information: use your FIRST NAME ONLY, don't give any details with regards to contact information, home address, phone numbers, last names of friends or relatives, instant messaging names, age, or birth date.
- No questionable photos of you or anything else: If you wouldn't show it to your grandma, don't post it on the web! Avoid posting photos of yourself.
- Remember the internet is permanent! Anyone on the Internet can easily print out a blog or save it to a computer.
- Use blogging provider sites with clearly stated terms of use, and make sure they can protect the actual blogs, not just the user accounts, with password protection. (Even so, it's better to assume anyone can see it.)
- Avoid trying to "out-do" or compete with other bloggers.
- Keep it clean and positive: Our blogs are reflective of our Catholic values. Sexist, racist, homophobic, or any type of oppressive and offensive language will not be tolerated!

Welcome Back!

Hello all you media and comm tech students! Welcome back to another wonderful year here at Mary Ward! I am already excited about this upcoming year! I am certain that it is going to be a great one! We have lots of exciting days to look forward to and I am sure that you will be as excited as I am!

As part of your media arts / communcations technology course you will be required to create and maintain your own media arts / communications blog. Blogging has quickly become a very popular form of communication and online journaling.

Through this course your will be required to reply to reply to six different media / technology issues or topics that will be posted here for you to respond to on your own blog. Each response must be no less than 300 words and should have discussions relevant to media arts and communication technology. You will also be required to respond to 6 other people's blogs with thoughtful ideas and comments. The evaluation for this unit is found in your unit guide. Once you have completed all tasks (which will take you several months) you will submit your unit guide, with a list of the six blogs that you responded to, for evaluation.

Happy Blogging!
Mrs. P.