Dear Class,
Please review this article found in last weeks Cord before you read this blog.
I have met dozens of Communication Studies students, including myself who have been appalled by this piece featured in the Cord. I'm going to offer my highly opinionated critique of this highly opinionated "news article". I'm not normally this openly critical about other peoples opinions but this article struck the wrong cord (pardon the pun), in me.
Firstly, this article is not "news" as it is referred to, it is a subjective account of a highly cynical student who apparently has had an isolated, negative experience with the program she has chosen.
Secondly, if the writer wants her "more aloof'" peers to act more critically in class, perhaps she should critically addresses her distaste with the department and offer some concrete solutions to the problem rather than placing the blame on part-time professors and the fact that classes are only 12 weeks in duration. (Although I like her idea of adopting full time, in-depth, year long classes).
Thirdly, what kind of "news article" features hasty, sweeping generalizations such as this piece. One prime generalization is that categorizes Communication studies students as "many glazed-over faces [that] mindlessly attend lectures and do not engage in class". We (communication students) apparently are "dedicated to continuing the Laurier reputation of [the]party-goer extraordinaire". Last time i checked we also contributed to Laurier's reputation of having one of the highest educational experience ratings in Canada according to Macleans magazine, 5th overall in fact. What's wrong with working hard and playing hard...?
I'm not undermining her opinion or saying that she hasn't experienced what she has written, but the fact that she has generalized hard-working, participating students that DO care about their education and subject matter with the aloof and uncritical members of our school (and they do exist), doesn't sit well with me. I feel that there needs to be a critical rebuttle to these highly generalized claims because it is a far too shallow depiction of what goes on in the depatrment (for the most part), in my opinion.
I do agree with her that some reform could be used to improve the quality of education within the department however, what department couldn't...
Maybe the reason I'm so critical is because this is one of the best classes I've been enrolled in, in terms of participation, critical thinking and engaging subject matter; I couldn't allow this course, Dr. Boutros and the student in our class be generalized in this manner.
I invite the author of this article to attend one of our seminars and see the potential and critical thinking our department is capable of....
Saturday, March 28, 2009
Thursday, March 12, 2009
The Dangers of Citezen Media: an Experiment
One long boring day in first year, a high school friend of mine and I had discovered one of the most useful tools on the Internet, Wikipedia.
Wikipedia as you are probably familiar with is a citizen media site where people can edit and add content to entries much like an Encyclopedia however, it can be updated instantly and constantly as events occur.
Of course there are monitors on these type of sites which read content and delete untrue or unsourced information for major articles. But what about the smaller articles that people don't typically read?
My friend and I edited three topics on Wikipedia. One to say that I "Wade Halicki" created Islam, that I dated Katie Holmes (before Tom Cruise, obviously) and that I was writting songs for my favourite band, Thrice. Consequently, we received several messages on Wikipedia that edits from our IP would not be accepted any longer, the Katie Holmes and Islam pages were quickly edited back and locked for several weeks.
The Thrice page with the information that I co-wrote a song still exists till this day, three years after the fact, as seen on song two.
This is not the problem however. Shortly after we edited Wikipedia other lyric sites began to get their information about songs and albums from wikipedia. Consequently, if you search my name on google, you get 3500 hits, a majority of which state that I wrote this song, which of course I did not.
So, the dangers of citezen media are quite apparent. If one source is wrong or edited improperly and a nother source uses the same information as well as a nother and so on, this information becomes a truth on the internet. The non-fact that I wrote a song for Thrice is featured in over 3000 websites in the duration of three years, how could it not be true???
Wikipedia as you are probably familiar with is a citizen media site where people can edit and add content to entries much like an Encyclopedia however, it can be updated instantly and constantly as events occur.
Of course there are monitors on these type of sites which read content and delete untrue or unsourced information for major articles. But what about the smaller articles that people don't typically read?
My friend and I edited three topics on Wikipedia. One to say that I "Wade Halicki" created Islam, that I dated Katie Holmes (before Tom Cruise, obviously) and that I was writting songs for my favourite band, Thrice. Consequently, we received several messages on Wikipedia that edits from our IP would not be accepted any longer, the Katie Holmes and Islam pages were quickly edited back and locked for several weeks.
The Thrice page with the information that I co-wrote a song still exists till this day, three years after the fact, as seen on song two.
This is not the problem however. Shortly after we edited Wikipedia other lyric sites began to get their information about songs and albums from wikipedia. Consequently, if you search my name on google, you get 3500 hits, a majority of which state that I wrote this song, which of course I did not.
So, the dangers of citezen media are quite apparent. If one source is wrong or edited improperly and a nother source uses the same information as well as a nother and so on, this information becomes a truth on the internet. The non-fact that I wrote a song for Thrice is featured in over 3000 websites in the duration of three years, how could it not be true???
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