Response to Danah Boyd and W. Lance Bennett Articles

“Can Social network sites enable political action” by Danah Boyd and “Digital Natives as self-actualizing citizens” by W. Lance Bennett, are two interesting articles that discuss the idea of whether social network sites could be used for political action and speaking truth to power.

Boyd’s article suggests that using SNSes for political action are nothing but mere “daydreams,” particularly when it comes to young people, who are more concerned about engaging with their friends and updating their statuses than they are with participating in a political cause. Boyd also suggested that it is “this lack of motivation that we need to understand and address to improve our democracy and government.” While Boyd sees this as an issue, Bennett sees it as “changing patterns of engagement and opportunities that will reshape the notion of citizenship in this new century. According to Bennett, the reason young people aren’t using SNSes as platforms for political action is because of the contrast between old century “Dutiful Citizens” (DC) and the new century “self-Actualizing Citizens” (AC). DCs (adults) “are unaware or unappreciative of the civic identity shift that has occurred among many young people.”  Bennett suggests that when adult-run institutions do attempt to build media projects, it seems that they “impose limits on what young people can and ‘should’ do,” thus these projects often fail.

Both articles suggest that we need to understand young people’s lack of motivation behind using SNSes for political action. Both discuss that the solution lies in finding a way of reaching all young people, or what Boyd calls the “unmotivated groups;” not just those who are already politically involved. According to Bennett, the DCs need to adopt and correctly utilize online environments as a way of reaching young people and successfully motivating them to get involved in all aspects of our democracy. Boyd makes a strong point that “the infrastructure is available for people to spread information, but the motivation is not there to either share or receive it. That’s the problem we need to solve, and we’ll know we’re successful from the messages that will be written on Facebook and MySpace.” 

Project 3 is Complete!

It’s official! My group and I have finished Project 3. Overall, I think the website redesign was a success. Compared to the original site, the redesign looks professional, clean and organized, and easy to navigate. It took a lot of effort and at times my group and I felt a bit overwhelmed with all that we had to do; however, at the end of the day, we are proud of the final product and it seems that all our hard work paid off in the end. Although this was a challenging project, I feel like I’ve learned a lot about what elements make a website well designed and what makes a poorly designed site. 

Received a Peer Review of Our Redesign

My group and I received a lot of helpful feedback from our peer review for project 3. Some of the things they suggested was to straighten the pictures, rather than have them slanted since it will help make the website more professional. Another helpful suggestion was to put the bar of links (about us, home, links, etc) on top of every page. Their final suggestion was to break up the writing content more so it doesn’t look like a huge paragraph. These are definitely some useful suggestions and I think my group and I will definitely take their advice.

Project 3: Redesigning the Contact Page

While creating the original site map, I’m starting to see clearly what needs work. In addition, one of my responsibilities for the project is to redesign the contact page. What may seem like an easy task for this project is actually quite difficult and complex. A typical contact page for a website contains basic and brief information, such as a phone number, maybe a fax number, an address, an email, etc. The contact page of the website we’re redesigning is anything but brief. In fact, it is more of a lengthy essay, with complicated instructions of how to make an appointment. Moreover, it’s somewhat repetitive with the idea of instructions- just worded differently. First, it says to call a certain number from a landline phone- it cannot be a cell phone that doesn’t have ID information, because they won’t answer. Then it says when you call the number they provide, you will be given another number to call to make the appointment, “so make sure you have a pen and paper handy.” In addition it says you can only call between 9:00am-10:30am if you want an appointment… An 1hr ½ to make an appointment? I’m not sure if it’s typo, but if it’s not, I really don’t know how this place gets any business. The whole contact page is very sketchy and it’s nothing like a well designed website contact page should be like. I am going to have to eliminate most of this, simplify, and clean it up. I will provide the only number they have, even if it’s not the only number they have to call (Clients will figure it out when they call the first number). I will also include their hours, appointment policies, and a helpful tip they give on the original, which is probably the only good thing they have on that page. 

Found a Website in Desperate Need of a Makeover

My group and I decided on a website to redesign for project 3. The website is http://www.serene-naturist.com. This website is absolutely AWFUL- it’s perfect! Everything about this website needs work, such as the tacky graphics, the color scheme, the organizational structure, and the list goes on and on. Clearly, we have a lot of work ahead of us!

Getting Started with Project 3 (redesigning a website)

I think this website redesign project might be the most challenging project we’ve had so far in the course. It’s a pretty lengthy assignment and will involve a lot of hard work. In order to prepare myself for this project, I’ve been exploring the best and worst designed websites on the Internet. I’ve been taking notes on the design elements that make a website well designed. I’ve also been analyzing poorly designed websites and seeing what to avoid when redesigning a site. I’m eager to get going with this project. Although it may be challenging, I think this project will be a great learning experience in the end. 

Where in the World do I Write About?

Picking a location for my Wikitravel project turned out to be more difficult than I thought it would be. I considered the following places.

-Somers, New York (my hometown)

-Providence, Rhode Island

-Narragansett, Rhode Island

Of course I considered Somers, New York because I grew up there and I know that town inside out. However, I decided it wouldn’t be the best location for a Wikitravel article since not many people are looking to travel there. It’s a small town- your average suburbia in Westchester County. This town’s only claim to fame is that it’s the home of the first American circus. There’s not much to do or see, or even places sleep in Somers, but there are some things in nearby towns. In the end, I just didn’t think it was Wikitravel worthy.

My next choice was Providence, Rhode Island. In the past 4 ½ years that I’ve been living in Rhode Island, I’ve become very familiar with its capital, the city of Providence. I go to Providence all the time since I have many friends that live there. My friends who are Providence natives have showed me all around the city. I lived there last summer and learned my away around even more, and I’ve also worked in Providence. In addition, when I was writing for Rhode Island Monthly Magazine, I contributed to the Guest Guide, which is a travel guide the magazine creates for most of the hotels and inns throughout Rhode Island. The guest guide is basically an extended version of a Wikitravel page. It offers places to eat, drink, stay, see, etc. I contributed a lot of information for the Providence section of the guide. Because I’m familiar with Providence and especially its attractions, places to eat and drink, etc., this might be a good location to use for this particular project.

Currently, I live in Narragansett, Rhode Island, which is why it’s my third choice. I saw that someone in my group already chose Narragansett for their Wikitravel location, so I thought I would be better off picking some place different.

I decided to go with Providence, Rhode Island for my Wikitravel project!