Final Post: My Relationship with Technology

Society's Relationship With Technology

I dare to make the generalization that technology has been beneficial for society. Because truly, it has. Without the immense technological advancements of the past decades, our world would look completely different from what it is today. 

It was fascinating to watch the FUTURAMA Ride at the 1964/65 NY World's Fair. The event illustrated the hopes that people in this decade had for the future, some of which have been attained, some of which have not. Chronologically ordered from the ride itself, we as a society, have walked on the moon, monitor space through satellites and stations, study ice cores, forecast weather months in advance and all across the world, deep sea exploration, mineral mining, extensive highway systems, residents in the mountains.

 There is a long list of hope from this era that we have built, and then expanded upon even more, to be where we are today. We have improved many technologies to increase our country's quality of life and grasp on our world. 

And now I offer a rebuttal.

This ride focused on how we will utilize our environment to create these incredible technological inventions and this futuristic life. We have achieved space exploration, extensive sea exploration as well as studying ice cores. However, what the FUTURAMA ride did not predict was the consequences of this environmental exploration. In the past decades, issues like deforestation, pollution, and global warming have overshadowed the advancement of the technology used to wreak such havoc on our environment. It was a good intention, and arguably necessary, for our society to complete the goals of the 60s. Good intentions lead to unintended consequences, and our world today is filled with the unintended consequences of rapid technological development. 

I noticed that the internet was not on the FUTURAMA's list of future endeavors, nor was technology like laptops or iPhones. It is ironic that our everyday devices were not even fathomable inventions 60 years ago. And now, these inventions have become one of the most controversial aspects of modern society. The internet has completely revolutionized our work force and education world. Communication today looks completely different than it did during the World Fair, in both negative and positive ways. Our phones have both united our world, and further polarized it.

The Mad World video demonstrates the devastatingly negative aspects of the internet and social media. Over the past decade, society has become addicted to social media. Our generation is especially unable to survive without a screen in hand. 
To me, it feels as though we have lost the simplicity of good intention-based technology progress, and turned it into an unstoppable force of a completely digitalized world.

My Relationship With Technology

My relationship with technology reflects the themes of the last paragraph. I consult a variety of technology forms on a daily basis. All of my schoolwork revolves around a screen and the internet. This pattern continues with my professional and social lives. I am constantly checking social media, texting with friends, updating assignments on Google Docs and Blackboard, and trying to get over 500 LinkedIn connections. Safe to say, I would not have a life without the technology I use.

Unfortunately, this means that I spend a lot of time on the internet and social media. I went ahead and checked my daily screen time within the last week, which was almost abysmal. I had spent about 3 hours daily on social media, whether that be TikTok, Instagram, Snapchat, Pinterest, etc. My total daily usage with 8 hours, which feels like I spend the entire day glued to my phone or computer. Many of these hours are spent doing productive things for classes and work, but many of them are also spent scrolling through social media posts.

This is both disheartening, and enlightening because of the necessity of an extensive online presence. I feel that sometimes I worry more about my social media reputation than I do my in person reputation, because the latter seems to matter less and less in today's society. 

EOTO2 Reaction: Propaganda

While watching the second round of EOTO presentations in this class, I was most fascinated by the topic of propaganda. Defined as the "information, especially of a biased or misleading nature, used to promote or publicize a particular political cause or point of view," by the Oxford dictionary. Propaganda comes in all different shapes and sizes, and can be posters, videos, radio broadcasts, movies, live speakers, etc. It was used heavily during World War II on both sides, but negatively used for the Nazi Party to further their political agenda during the 1930s and 1940s. The Nazis utilized this form of persuasion to manipulate Germany into an anti-Semitic climate. 

The Reich Ministriy of Public Enlightenment and Propaganda was established by Hitler in 1933. This institution was founded with the purpose of pushing a multitude of propaganda, portraying Jewish people in a negative light and thereby persuading the German population to stand behind the Nazis. Many posters were produced with the intent of showing Jewish people as conspiracists, like the one below. 

The Nazi party also used other media categories than just print to further their agenda, like film. In 1944, Germans at home had begun to wonder why vulnerable people like Jewish veterans, the elderly, and children were being moved for labor. A film depicting the Theresienstadt camp was released from the Nazis, showing the public what the Jewish campus were like. This may have been one of the most influential pieces of propaganda created by the Nazis, which came out during a period of "international awareness" as the world came to realize the atrocities that were being committed. In the video, we see a Jewish audience watching an orchestral performance. The video was also published right after the Red Cross was permitted to view the Theresienstadt camp, where the actual camp was hidden and fake niceties were on display. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=No5771-C7ws

While these are extreme detrimental examples of propaganda, the media also has a positive history. Uncle Sam's poster quote "I want you for U.S. Army" and Rosie the Riveter's "We Can Do It!" are both very famous cases of uplifting propaganda, used to increase patriotism during WWII and aid in the war effort. 

The Rosie poster has transformed from propaganda to a popular feminist image. Originally, the Rosie the Riveter movement was created to encourage women of the 1930s and 40s to enter the workforce while their husbands and sons were off at war. These women stepped into roles as factory workers, army office clerks, nurses, mechanics, and some were even on the frontlines. Rosie's poster was revived in the 1980s to promote feminism and female empowerment. 

Propaganda still has heavy influence today, and is used by countries like Russia to further political agendas and promote tolerance within those nations. Latin countries who have fought against communist regimes in the past, like Cuba, also used propaganda, on both sides. We may even see an increase in propagandistic advertisements with the new age of AI. 

Artificial Intelligence

"In The Age of AI"

"In the Age of AI" by Frontline is a video that focuses upon both the positives and negatives of AI use in our time. One of the covered topics that I found most interesting was AI and automation in working class, blue collar America. According economist Mike Hicks, offshoring accounts for only about 20% of job loss in America, whereas the increase of automation takes a much higher percentage of American jobs. Hicks also correlated the 15% drop in standard of living over the last decade with the increasing automation of jobs.

Automation is when robots take over a human's job, and the use of robotic labor has increased drastically, especially with advancing AI technology. I was surprised, and saddened, to learn that children of parents who have lost their jobs due to automation have higher rates of skipping class, dropping out of school, lower literacy rates, and mental health issues. This highlights the idea that AI is not only taking opportunities away from working class America, but their children as well.

In the video, robots were not only completing factory assembly line jobs, but even packing online grocery orders with the ability to recognize and learn patterns. The video showed both sides to this nation-wide dilemma. The "higher-ups" in large companies will say that automation actually increases job opportunities for Americans because higher production rates create more need for jobs like transportation of product. Those who work and oversee factory production wholeheartedly disagree with this sentiment, and say that the rate of robots replacing jobs is much higher than increased production creating more jobs. 

Previous Harvard professor and author Shoshana Zuboff speaks in the video about the shift in consumerism paired with technology, and the evolution of Google. The popular internet browser began with two Stanford alumni, who both vowed that "advertising would distort the internet." However, when the founders received pressure from investors to build a higher profit, the company turned towards user's data to create personalized ads. These advertisements were based upon Google user's searches, clicks, shares, etc., and therefore created the perfect algorithm to advertise what the consumer needed and wanted most. 

We see this in almost every bit of the internet today. I can trace almost every advertisement I see on social media back to a like, share or search that I have made to create a formula for those specific products. It is both frustrating and alluring because I know that everything I do on the internet leaves a digital footprint for companies like Google to make more money. This strategy completely diminishes any area of privacy offered from internet and online use. 

Molly Kinder, a previous Georgetown University professor who taught a course on AI, says in "In the Age of AI" that "women disproportionately hold the jobs that are at highest risk of automation." She goes on to explain that when we think of AI replacing jobs, the first image that comes to mind is men working on factory assembly lines. In reality, AI has replaced more clerical positions such as cashiers, HR departments, fast food workers, etc., which are held by more women than men. It is frightening to me that AI has reach into many different sections of the workforce, not just factory-based jobs. 

Alistair Mactaggart wanted to put the power that online companies had over personal information back into the hands of their users' through a California ballot initiative that was combatted by Comcast, Google, Facebook and AT&T (shall I mention that AT&T and Comcast own the majority of today's mainstream media). The privacy law was unanimously voted in by the California Senate. It includes both the "right to know" and the "right to say no," meaning that consumers are able to ask companies to reveal what data has been collected on them, and tell the company to not sell the consumer's information. Since this law, 15 other states have adopted their own data privacy laws. This number negatively surprised me, as I would have thought that almost all of the 50 states should have something in place for consumer data protection.

EOTO: Mainstream Media

The Power of Few

The umbrella topic of Mainstream Media (MS) deserves both marvel and incredulousness. Today, we see mainstream media everywhere. It is the giant corporations that own news channels such as CNN, Fox News, and NBC, other news outlets, as well as entertainment companies and print media. The three powerhouses of today's media are Disney, Comcast, and Paramount Global. Each of these monster conglomerations are worth billions upon billions of dollars. 

Apple: $2.74T

Comcast: $213.79B

Disney: $204.71B

Paramount Global: $23.49B

Fox: $21.06B

Research into the tangled web of MSM will uncover the idea that the companies listed above, and other top media companies own almost every other broadcasting, newscasting, advertising and entertainment company. These consolidations and buyouts have fed the media giants until they have teeth sunk directly into the country's, and world's, media. Apple, its net worth reaching the trillions over the past couple years, bought out Beats and Beats by Dre, as well as owning Apple TV, Apple Books, Apple Music, and the list goes on. Disney has acquired Hulu, ESPN, Disney+, ABC, 20th Century Fox, etc. Comcast own all of NBC as well as Sky, which is strange considering Comcast is a cable company. AT&T followed the same path, and now owns Warner Bros., CNN, HBO, and Cartoon Network. Fox News Media is owned by Fox Corporation, and one of the only popular news channels that is not owned by a different monopolizing company. 

How did we get here?

The timeline of Mainstream Media begins in the 15th century with Gutenberg's invention of the printing press. The press allowed quicker and wider distribution of print media, acting as the gateway to newspapers, pamphlets, magazines, etc. The newspaper originated in the 19th century, with The Times as the first mass-produced and published paper. The Industrial Revolution, hand-in-hand with media, allowed America to revolutionize the way that they distribute news. The early 20th century radio came next, and with it, the first opportunity to spread forms of media that are not printed. The radio provided both information and entertainment for a larger audience. According to the University of Minnesota's "The Evolution of Media," the invention of the radio also brought an increase in America's consumeristic qualities, in ways of fashion, music, products, materials, etc. Media was just one of the many trends becoming "mainstream." 

The first television sets were sold to the public in the late 1930s. After World War II, television's audience skyrocketed, and by the mid 50s, "two-thirds of American households owned at least one [TV] set." This new form of media communication combined both print and the radio to encompass both news and entertainment for the country. TV was originally solely broadcasting and ran by three major channels: NBC, CBS, and ABC. These three networks controlled more than 90% of television airtime. TV consisted of news broadcasts, daytime talk shows, movies and programs. It was not until the rise of cable TV in the 1980s that television became a huge umbrella for many versions of media. Now, America could choose from a large variety of channels to fit their media needs. News, sports, movies, shows, documentaries, nature, music, pop culture, and more categories now fell under television. 

Although television has become a modern gateway for companies to swallow others, and create monopolies over mainstream media, the government has *attempted* to enforce regulations. The Telecommunications Act of 1996 was signed into place by President Clinton with the goal of decreasing conglomerate hold over television, by increasing competition between networks and channels. The act opened the telecommunications market by making it much easier for new companies to enter the market and compete with incumbent companies. In an attempt to regulate, this act deregulated stipulations on servicing and pricing for telecommunication companies, making it easier to stay afloat within the market. Interestingly enough, part of the act was ruled as a violation of 1st Amendment rights by the SC as it was trying to ban indecency and obscenities from media. Unfortunately, the Telecommunications Act (1996) actually worked opposite of its goal, and allowed the television industry to fall into the hands of a small number of major companies, again. Part of the Act was focused on decreasing the power of overarching media corporations, but by eliminating regulation of these companies, the government made it easier for channels like ABC and CBS to take over.

Echo Chambers

Mainstream media today creates a phenomenon called an echo chamber. This effect occurs when a person only consumes media and information that aligns with their own personal values, beliefs, and biases. It can be compared to party-line voting, which is when a person solely votes for Democrats or Republicans, not caring about the candidate themselves. Mainstream media in the modern worlds has turned extremely political, especially when watching news channels like Fox News and CNN. Because there is so much variety and options in media, people are able to pick and choose specifically what they want to consume within their echo chamber, and block out anything else. 

Mainstream media's takeover on American culture as also led to a steady decrease of media trust within the population. Companies that have little to nothing to do with public media completely run it, like wireless cell provider AT&T. Why are these companies controlling what I see and don't see on the 5 o'clock news? And why has $$ now become a huge influence over anything media-based? These topics are why Americans' trust in mass media has experienced a steady decline over the past decades (according to Pew Research Center). The chart below shows that the number of people who have little to no trust in America's mass media has increased from 1973 to 2023, and the amount of people who have a "great deal/fair amount" of trust has taken a steady decline. 

Privacy In The Digital Age

The constant debate between technology and privacy is both an exciting, and dangerous one. Life today
does not exist without technology, and this melding of two realities has significantly decreased the human right to privacy. To exist within the digital age, we must create a digital footprint. This entails creating accounts, posting, following, pictures, videos, etc. My digital footprint is made mostly of social media posts and academic/professional commitments. However, if you search my name up on the internet, you will find numerous random things from my life over the years. 

A Denver post article from my kindergarten year when my elementary school started archery courses in P.E, when I won a poetry contest for Beaver Creek, CO, the medical device I wore to fix a chest deformity at 10, my LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram posts, quotes from High Point's page, etc. From a quick Google search, I can find my full name, where I live, every school I have attended, the full names of my immediate family, and more. The amount of information that is free to any person with access to the internet is relatively terrifying. 

 Juan Enriquez's TEDTalk, titled "Your Online Life, Permanent as a Tattoo," focuses on the permanency of our online presence. He comparison of digital footprint to an ink tattoo illustrates just how revealing the internet can be. He highlights the ultimate visibility that online presence provides. Enriquez mentions the website face.com, which "had about 18 billion faces" in the portal, and was recently sold to Facebook. 

Face recognition technology is just one of the factors of the internet that causes the phrase "your phone is listening to you," because so much of what we see in advertisements and suggested content stems from our face and our online history. I have been seeing more and more ads for products and shopping websites that I was merely discussing with a friend, not entering into a Google search bar. I especially see suggested, AI generated content from the TikTok algorithm that my phone would have "heard" me talking about, or noted that I was searching something online. If I play my workout playlist on Spotify, my TikTok "for you" page will be full of videos depicting workout routines and programs.

Catherine Crump's TEDTalk highlights another violation of privacy, this time in the hands of the US government. Automatic License Plate Readers are a device that track plates that pass the scanner and organizes the information into an accessible list, so that officers can cross-reference during an investigation to find a certain vehicle's path. However, Crump points out that recently, law enforcement has been using the readers to compile "mass quantities of data" containing every car's plate. The government has databases consisting of millions of dates, times and photos depicting cars that pass these Automatic License Plate Readers. This is unnerving because as we, Americans, go about our daily lives, we are ultimately being tracked by the government. Technology like this is the reason that the idea of personal privacy is becoming obsolete. 

After watching these videos, I feel frustrated in technology and our necessity of online presence. Almost everything I do for school is online. I have applied for every job and internship in my life online, and most have had either an online application or video interview before going in person. I communicate to my friends and family on my phone and through social media. Not having any sort of online presence in this day and age is equivalent to being a nomad or monk. As Generation Z, it is impossible to not have some kind of account, whether it's social media, LinkedIn, Indeed, etc. It is ironic that what is necessary to have a life and succeed is also what is such a danger to us. Activity online is like living in a house without curtains or blinds; the complete lack of privacy from both online conglomerations and the government is not safe, and not regulated effectively. The TikTok ban is one of the first things the US government has done to try and eliminate the detriment of social media, but even this has been met with immense controversy, and may not even be the right step in the direction to protecting privacy. It is unfortunate that "going off the grid" is not more normalized. 

Antiwar: Why Does the US Government Love War?

Russo-Ukrainian War

From the website antiwar.com, I chose to focus on "The Stories You're Not Hearing About the Russo-Ukrainian War..." written by Ted Snider, because we have had multiple in-class discussions regarding this war and its effect US politics, as well as the idea that the media reports just the bare surface of how deeply American policy influences this conflict. The article begins by depicting Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky's recent lies about the war's statistics. In February, the president reported that the soldier death count of the two years (and counting) war was about 31,000. President Zelensky also released to the public a statement that Russia was being stopped and could not take any further of Ukraine's territory, while reporting that the country had already taken about 26% of it.

Snider calls bullsh** on each statement. Both Russian and Ukrainian political figures and government officials have reported dead and wounded counts over 400,000. Following President Zelensky's bold statement proclaiming the Ukrainian Armed Forces have practically stopped Russian armies from seizing more territory, Russia took both Avdiivka and Lastochkyne (Ukrainian villages and territories), resulting each time in fumbling Ukrainian retreat. 

The US government has been funding this war since 2014, and dare I say, is the only reason Ukraine has not completely fallen to the powerhouse of Russia. The most recent funding update occurred on February 13th of this year, when the Senate passed an amendment to Division A of the National Security Act, procuring $60 billion for '"Ukraine-related activities" out of the $95.3 billion in total funding.' 

I would've thought that this recent policy-making would have made national news, considering the amount of debt our country has suck into AND the controversy of the war itself within our own country. However, when I googled subjects like "how much money does the US give to Ukraine" and "US funding of Ukrainian war," corporations like CNN, Fox News and CBS have either not reported on this, or their articles are buried within the second or third pages of Google search results. 

President Biden and President Zelensky

This war is truly a losing battle. Ukraine does not have the resources, wealth, manpower or resistance to continue warding off Russia, and is only afloat from outside funding (ie, America). Without the billions upon billions of taxpayer dollars we send to the country, Russia would have overtaken Ukrainian territory a year ago. 

I believe that the US government and our politicians support Ukraine so heavily in this war for a number

of reasons. The first, so that they are able to use it as advertising for their administration. The Biden administration, specifically, is a great example of this. President Biden mentions Ukraine and his support for the country almost every time he makes an important speech and appearance to the media. He has announced that his support for Ukraine will last "as long as [America] can." That's scary. The administration has also changed their goal for the war, which originally started as forcing Russia completely out of Ukraine, and now are saying that the war can only end in diplomatic negotiation (ironic in that Biden refuses to interact with Putin). Biden uses the media to show his continual support for the country, and the media supports him by reporting more on atrocities that have been committed throughout this war, and less on just how much money America has given, or the bleak outlook of the war at this point. The President gains the emotional support of his voters' through Ukrainian struggles. 

Benefits of War & The Media

Wartime is not a positive space for our country. It is a drain on our resources, economy, and obviously heartbreakingly violent for the people of America. However, wartime and corresponding conflict tends to bring our country together. Levels of patriotism rise in the aftermath of events like Pearl Harbor, 9/11, WWII, etc. The country unites against a common enemy and in turn, has more support for the government and elected officials. There is more trust in our news and media, as well as politicians.

However, this trend has all but vanished. I would pinpoint the start to the steady decline of both government and media trust to the Pentagon Papers scandal and New York Times Company v. United States during the Vietnam war. Nixon's attempt at prior restraint to prevent the Times from printing the Papers is one of the first clear examples of government conspiracy that negatively effected the public. 

Reporting on the victories of wartime seems to comfort the American people in the billions and billions of dollars that are funneled into the military and foreign aid. 

Now, both media and government trust are at all time lows. The government has its fingers buried within big media conglomerations, and everything revolves around money. We live in an era of two major foreign conflicts, both the Russo-Ukraine war and the Israel-Palestine conflict. There are huge amounts of various media released daily covering these topics, but a lack of strong media focusing on anti-war aspects. If the media focused on the failing war within Ukraine, would they support the amount of money the Biden administration is trying push to them?

Technology Reaction: Motion Picture

 During EOTO presentations, I learned about the history and impact of the motion picture. The journey of the motion picture began in 1888, when the French inventor Louis Le Prince became the first person to shoot a motion picture film. The film was titled the "Roundhay Garden Scene" and depicted people walking within the garden. The clip lasted for a short two seconds, and was silent, as sound did not develop till many years later. However, the first evidence of a "moving picture" began with a toy called the zoetrope. This device was invented during the Civil War to make use of photographs taken during wartime; the "toy," as soldiers called it, allowed viewers to see the images in succession, as if they were moving. In 1878, photographer Eadweard Muybridge captured twelve photographs of a horses' gallop and used a zoetrope to prove to a colleague that all of a horses' hooves left the ground while the animal was in a full run. After both proving a point and creating a motion picture of photographs, Muybridge went on to invent the zoogyroscope in 1879 to show a larger audience the horses' motion picture.

The Kinetophone

The next main event within motion picture's history was in 1891, when American inventor Thomas Edison combined sound with the idea of a motion picture. Edison, working alongside inventor W. K. L. Dickson, created a machine called the Kinetophone. This device allowed viewers to experience sound while watching a film by viewing the motion picture while placing rubber tubes over their ears and listening to the accompanying sounds through a phonograph, almost as if they were using the 19th century version of headphones. In 1913, a newer version of the Kinetophone was marketed to the general public, and ended up producing 19 talking pictures. The presenter mentioned that one of the negative side effects of this piece of technology was that the motion picture with sound was only viewable by one person at a time, as illustrated in the picture below. As technology progressed throughout later years, brilliant minds devised ways for motion pictures to be viewed by the general public, while accompanied by sound. 

In France, during 1895, inventors and brothers Auguste and Louis Lumière create a projector with the ability to display up to sixteen photographs per second. Titled the Cinématographe, the invention allowed for motion pictures to run more smoothly, making them less stop-and-start, and more video-like. 

The Lumière's Cinématographe

The earliest film's displayed to the public were made up of short videos, like animals or children, in clips only a couple seconds long. However, the Lumière brothers managed to film a 50-second long clip of a train arriving in a French station in 1896. The film shows both the train moving and people at the station walking and watching the locomotive. I read online that this feat was so shocking to the public, who had never seen something quite like it, that part of the audience was scared the train would travel through the screen and crash into them. 

Cinematography and the motion picture progress further in the early 1900s, when narrative film making became popularized, and motion pictures began to tell a story. Keeping in mind that these films were still completely void of color and sound, the ability of inventors to produce technology with the purpose of capturing live moments was astounding during this era. 

In 1927, the first motion picture is produced with sound, titled The Jazz Singer. While still in black and

white, the film was created using a sound and disc system under Warner Bros. Pictures. The movie was about an hour and 20 minutes long, including both dialogue and musical numbers, and a detailed plot line. This production marked the era of the rising popularity of the film entertainment industry. Through the 1920s, nearly 100 million people purchased tickets to see movies, on a weekly basis. Ticket prices remained affordable, so almost all economic classes were in attendance. Movies were, and are, arguably the most popular form of entertainment in our media industry.