Internet fuels quacks and fools so should it be restricted?

Internet

In the age of the Internet one of the greatest problems is the fact misinformation spreads, even as science and knowledge increases. Should it therefore be restricted?

Some folks say it should because lies can hurt the community. In this case the community is more than a town or a block or two. It's all of us who can find ourselves at the center of conflicts we did not create but must live with because of quacks and fools. At least that is what some people say, but does that mean the Internet needs monitoring by the governments of the world?

Get on board the hottest trends in applying for a job

Networking


Leanne Jenkins---If you are one of those sending out typed resumes to companies, you might want to read about the latest and most popular trend that allows employers to actually see and hear individuals applying for jobs.  While some of the old ways might work in small towns where people know each other, and through personal contacts, this newest trend is going to put those in the know with technology at the front of the line for jobs.

Video job applications are becoming one of the hottest trends in 2014.  Employers like having applicants they can actually observe and interact with, when there is a follow up teleconference over the web.  The process is first to submit the video job application, and then potential employers call and ask questions through live Internet interaction.

So if you are one of those presenting yourself as sophisticated with the computer and modern technology, it's important to have this in your front pocket when looking for a job.  Whereas some employers are still doing the tried and true print job applications, still others want to see how you appear and present yourself before committing to a personal, in-house interview.

This also accents the issue concerning the haves and have nots, the difference between those with the knowledge, skills and equipment to get in line with the trends and at the place where employers have the best opportunity to interact and evaluate candidates.  It means those who lack these skills not only fall further and further behind when it comes to specific job skills, but further behind as well in the process of actually applying for a job.  And those state employment offices have computers to use, but these often don't have the interactive equipment and know how to be up with the hottest employment trends.

Experts tell us that the way to be one of those up front, at least in the game, is to read about what's happening in job search and find the tools through contact with friends, relatives, libraries and places that might have some of the equipment to borrow or rent that can allow the job applicant to learn some of these new ways of contacting and following up with employers.  There are different ways to apply for a job these days, and it pays to keep up with them, job counselors tell us.

Whatever the direction an individual might take, vocational counselors remind potential job applicants to stay informed, be diversified and creative and be persistent, as it is in those ways one is more likely to find a job.

Living In a global village - How the Internet has changed the face ofinteraction

[caption id="attachment_21973" align="alignleft" width="300"] Booth volunteer represents the handicrafts of the global village.[/caption]

Rob Chernish---Have you ever wondered how Earth has become smaller in some ways?  For example, how does someone in a tiny town get toys from China, pasta from France, coffee from Columbia, sausage from Spain, and who knows what, from somewhere else?   In days gone by, going to the market was a weekly or monthly affair, and the trip usually involved bringing some supplies to trade with your neighbors and others in the village.  There were games played and the interaction and social activities were vast, and it is with this concept in mind, that the global village has been introduced via social networking and the worldwide web.   

No longer are the people of the same race or from the same tribe, nor are the products at the market in the village all from the same producers, instead, what we are seeing now is a total global world where instead of having multiple small villages isolated from each other, we have a global village.

The concept of the “global village” was first coined by Marshall McLuhan, a popular contemporary media theorist who studied the impacts of globalization and wrote many books during the 1960s, illustrating the future potential of this concept.  McLuhan has since passed, but his predictions have fulfilled themselves in our modern world.  No longer are people isolated from other cultures and races, but are intertwined among a network both physically in our modern societies, as well as digitally across the internet and social networking.

How is this village evolving?  The answer has yet to be given on how our world will continue to evolve, but given the increased connectedness of international and national trade agreements and greater population migrations, it looks like it is going to continue to mesh and mingle.  Consider the currency of the Euro, and how it has impacted the countries of Europe by bridging them through their common currency.  This is how villages of the past also became united.

Other examples are most prevalent in the marketplace, where if you stop to take a step back, you can see the global movement of products and supplies much like the caravans of old.  However, the most obvious examples have been introduced by the internet and social media following  McLuhan’s prediction where he envisioned how the global population would be connected through time and space by electric technology to add:

• Instant Communication


• Removes Space / Regional Barriers


• Audio - Video Interaction With Anyone - Anywhere - Anytime


• Extension Of Consciousness


• Increased Social Functions


• Revolutionary Social Structure


• Realtime Interconnectedness 

Many of the traits of the traditional village, especially those relating to communication and interaction have presented themselves in a global village through the advent of the internet and information communications technology.

What other ways can you think of that make our world like a traditional village?   Do you think it is safe to say it is a global village?  Do you think McLuhan was right in his predictions?   Many people are still wondering whether technology will bring us together or push us apart, but the growing consensus, especially among the younger generations who openly embrace the aspects of social networking that technology offers say that is gives them much more freedom to interact with their friends across space and time in ways they never dreamed of.  Moving forward with new technology that continues to make communication even easier than our current models is breaking down many of the traditional barriers that prevented communication outside of closed groups and communities.  Even the Khan in the hills in Mongolia has a cell phone now, albeit no service, but one day our local village will become the global village we live in….if Mcluhan’s predictions were correct.

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Author Bio: Rob Chernish is a media theorist and alumni from the University of Lethbridge who is currently studying the effects of mass media on local village populations.

The best advice for good health: Lose yourself in the service of others

[caption id="attachment_21704" align="alignleft" width="300"] PT Rehab kitchen[/caption]

 

 

Carol Forsloff---“You can't help everyone.” How many times have we heard someone say that as someone struggles to assist another individual. But is that a virtually true statement or a general statement that allows people simply to absolve themselves of responsibility by a verbal shield of sorts? And are there personal benefits in helping others?

Literally the statement is true. It would be virtually impossible for a single person to help everyone else with anything. On the other hand, inventors develop products that can help nearly everyone. The Gutenberg Press  was an example of that, for it facilitated the development of reading. And the Internet allows for the transference of information that includes life-saving ideas across the world that can aid millions.

Recently the Journal received a notice from an individual that simply said that humanitarian articles are a bother and asked to be excluded from any notices, as the individual “is happy” and wants to remain that way, being unable to help anyone else. Surely the human response to a massive undertaking, “You can't help everyone,” makes sense when an individual needs emotional distance. Is it, however, an emotional or physically healthy belief?

Science tells us that humanitarian work and volunteering not only provide a level of necessary activity and community involvement but also physical health benefits. Studies have found that those who volunteer receive physical, mental and social support in return for their service. By staying in contact with others, they avoid the isolation that can facilitate and prolong depression. Mentally volunteering and doing humanitarian service also supports thinking and communication skills. It has also been found that those who volunteer live longer than others.

Psychologists also tell us that helping others serves to prevent or alleviate depression. When our minds are on something other than our problems and ourselves, there is a tendency for that cloud over our heads to dissipate.

And with the passing of Nelson Mandela, the great humanitarian servant of South Africa, it is clear that service brings gratitude and change, sometimes a change that affects the whole world, when the character of a man is revealed as being one reflected by service.

As Mahatma Gandhi once said: “The best way to find yourself is to lose yourself in the service of others.”

Internet speeds expected to grow 100 times from Google's new network

[caption id="attachment_11461" align="alignleft" width="300"] Google[/caption]

Carol Forsloff — For those of you struggling with the growing traffic on the Internet, the stops and starts of a highway that gets clogged, help is on the way that is 100 times faster than we have today. Here's what is in your immediate future.

Google is beginning a fiber network with its first installment of a piece that is due to take off in other cities fairly soon. Kansas City is the site of the first of this fiber network.

Folks in the tech world remind us that Internet speed has hardly grown much in the past 16 years since the outset of broadband, but things are about to change, according to Google.

This is what Google has to say on its official blog:

With that in mind, we embarked on a journey to bring ultra-high speeds to Kansas City, Kan. and Kansas City, Mo. And today, we’re excited to announce Google Fiber. Google Fiber is 100 times faster than today’s average broadband. No more buffering. No more loading. No more waiting. Gigabit speeds will get rid of these pesky, archaic problems and open up new opportunities for the web. Imagine: instantaneous sharing; truly global education; medical appointments with 3D imaging; even new industries that we haven’t even dreamed of, powered by a gig.

In the meantime, folks in the outlying areas of Portland struggle to get Internet speeds that will allow transfer of data that is fast enough to get the job done with videos and pictures. Comcast, or "Infinity" as it is now called, does not have the infinite speeds touted, as it seems is occurring in other areas as well.

But Kansas City is the first to be cutting edge in the technology of Internet future. Let's hope the rest of the world benefits soon.

The change may make a difference, so that the wonderful story, picture or moving picture might be at your Internet door in seconds, virtually as it happens, which could be the communication that will be necessary to keep up with the instant happenings throughout the world.

Poor corporate customer service creating economic, social and personalstress

[caption id="attachment_15619" align="alignleft" width="225"] This child wandering through Target is used as the image of how lost a consumer can become in the corporate maze, without proper customer service, and is not identified as a problem only by Target.[/caption]

Carol Forsloff - If you spent seven or eight hours this past month correcting bills and mistakes made by various corporations relative to your accounts, even at the grocery store, then you are among the many Americans likely frustrated and suffering either economic, personal or social problems as a result.

More than a decade ago, the television news magazine 60 minutes had a program in which they discussed the errors made by corporations, finding that approximately 1/3 of all transactions in the United States have errors not in the customer's favor. Although this journalist has seen no research of late about this, it is likely that with the recession, and the cutbacks of employees made by various corporations coupled with the tendency to digitize virtually everything, creating more distance between customer and Corporation, that problems have increased.

Experience of this journalist is similar to many people who spend many hours trying to get service or correct errors on accounts. Some of these will be detailed here, simply to illustrate the consequences of ongoing problems that impact lives.

A scheduled medical procedure recently had to be canceled because of lack of insurance. The lack of insurance came as a result of clerical errors that continued from Blue Cross Blue Shield, and still continue, month after month after service representatives and supervisors promise they will not continue. But they do continue in the same form and with the same consequences.   The company applies premium payments made monthly to a single account as opposed to both accounts which are clearly identified on the checks and statements. Despite these clear,  identifying materials, premium payments are documented only on one account, resulting in an overpayment on one and no payment on the other. Representatives see the error, once the customer has described it, and promise to correct it. The following month, however, brings the same ever again. What are the social and personal problems that arise from these errors?

Corporate errors of various kinds certainly impact the customer but multiplied many times, they impact all of us as a larger group. In fact, errors like this are so pervasive that one might suggest they are purposeful, a method of creating distance between customer and corporation in a fashion that reduces the power of that customer to complain or even to discover the errors or to have them corrected. The number of errors also might indicate that the corporation recognizes that many people will give up when they encounter consistent difficulties they are unable to resolve. It becomes a personal problem when the issue is a service the customer depends upon. It results in frustration, the type of frustration that can bring strong feelings that can impact others. The service representative hears these frustrations, then must go home with the additional stress.

So as technology has on the surface provided an avenue for multiple types of communication, the absolute reliance on that technology has risks. Another example is this publication, which is an online magazine  for three years. During those three years, however, Internet service has not always been reliable. In addition, hosting services have not always been reliable as well. The details of these are numerous, but suffice to say they exemplify the problem that impacts the consumer multiplied many times that results in wasted time, frustration, stress and all sorts of issues that can affect health and the community.

Contaminated foods entering the food supply has concerned many consumer groups. It is one of those errors made within corporations that can impact many people and create major health problems.

Medical bill errors are rampant, so much so that there are businesses that have been created simply to handle the errors.

There are also media groups that focus attention on corporate corruption, specifically the numerous errors that create serious problems for the public, costing millions of dollars.

So what is the solution to an ongoing problem that impacts everyone? One of these is for folks to enlist others in applying protest, a kind of protest that multiplied many times can impact a corporation's bottom line. This means that protest groups are not always the ragtag group they are identified as by the same corporate executives or politicians supported by them. Many of them are you and me.  And taking back the "government" may simply mean restoring the American dream of the customer first, which means that reducing regulation for businesses who make these errors may not be the right avenue, given the multiplication of mistakes made from the lack of internal regulation creating the problems in the first place.

News, people, money, and the Internet

[caption id="attachment_4107" align="alignleft" width="275" caption="People argue their opinions on news"][/caption]

by Michael Cosgrove - What do a 24-hour detox diet, soldiers whooping with delight when they kill the enemy in battle, and Internet news sites have in common? Answer – they all teach us a lot about human behavior and self-preservation.

Many people who decide not to eat for 24 hours in order to ‘purge the system’ will tell you that they do so because their bodies ‘know’ when they contain too many impurities for their own good, impurities which slowly accumulate over time as a result of what they eat. They say that they periodically feel a visceral need to eliminate the various chemicals and other artificial elements that are used in a lot of mass-produced food. It is an instinctive human reaction which kicks in when people realize that their bodies need to be looked after.

The same kind of instinctive reaction can be observed in soldiers. They are acutely aware that they may lose their lives from one instant to the next when they come under fire and suddenly find themselves in an extremely stressful kill-or-be-killed situation. When they manage to kill the enemy and the firing stops they often let out shouts of delight. This may sound like a cruel thing to do, but they are not celebrating like happy kids who won the relay race. They are eliminating the extraordinarily high levels of tension and adrenaline they were pumped up with when they were under mortal threat. This too is a reflexive, natural and necessary human phenomenon.

There is an element of automatic self-preservation to be observed in both of these situations. All living beings have a strong and innate sense of survival and humans are no exception.

Which leads us to the Internet. A new development – it’s a one-second old newborn baby with an as-yet uncut umbilical cord if you compare its relative age to the length of time humans have existed on Earth – the Internet is at the equivalent of a Paleolithic stage of development. Yet it has already become such a crucially interwoven part of our existence and social fabric that the consequences of having to do without it starting tomorrow morning would be incalculable.

The things that happen on the Internet and the uses it is put to vary from uplifting, to harmlessly innocuous, and to downright bad. That isn’t surprising because when all’s said and done it is only a mirror held up to the behavior of those who use it.

Internet sites can be uplifting (arts and culture sites for example), harmless and banal (your local transport authority’s site), and downright bad (neo-fascist sites), but news sites contain the whole gamut of human reaction and intentions, from the best to the worst.

This is because news stories and events can be extremely polarizing. Before the Internet came along papers would just print the news as they saw it and people would buy and read their preferred version of the news and get mad at it or be pleased at it. But rare were those who would walk into a bar to pick a violent argument with someone they’d never met who didn’t share the same opinions on, say, the Mideast or the financial crisis. Those hotheads would either get their noses put out of joint by someone bigger than them or get arrested for threatening behavior or a breach of the peace or something.

But now that we have the Internet along with its increasing numbers of comment threads and forums, some rabid Bin Laden apologist in New Jersey or somewhere can easily, by using a series of digital zeros and ones to turn his thoughts into ‘speech’, tell some gentle young female student in Manila who believes Bin Laden was a terrorist killer that she is “a fascist western boot-licker who deserves to die!” Better still, and even more angrily, he can PUT IT ALL IN CAPS!!! In the same way, a pro-Obama or Palin comment may attract a scathing “Are you for real? I mean, are you?!” And on it goes, these exchanges being conducted from from behind computer screens and avatars such as ‘FreedomCome’ or ‘World’sEndUnite.’ All of this and worse can be read every day on major mainstream press sites.

Unfortunately, the mainstream press has recognized the money-making potential of this phenomena and the fact that more hits, readers and comments translate directly into advertising revenue. That’s why more and more of them offer comment threads on more and more articles, not only articles on art and, say, gardening, but particularly on articles concerning sensitive subjects such as politics, conflict and religion. Reader interaction on this kind of article can become very nasty and attract large amounts of traffic. This is why there are more and more opinion, comment, and op-ed articles on their sites – because that kind of article automatically results in a for-or-against reader reaction.

The mainstream press encourages this reality via the use of a falsely democratic rationale based on ‘reader participation’ and ‘giving the public their say.’ This sounds wonderful in theory, but it has resulted in more and more deleterious debate and provocative article writing, because they can’t resist the temptation to make money.

So much for the mainstream, but what about the alternatives? The blogs and the citizen journalism sites? After all, they proclaim themselves to be at the vanguard of a press revolution which aims to give news back to people without thinking about corporate profit.  But they resort even more to shock tactics and doubtful practices than the mainstream, and the result, far from giving lessons to the mainstream on how a news outlet should be run, takes the worst examples of mainstream practices and exploits them to hitherto unseen levels of unscrupulous conduct.

Citizen journalism and news blogs are to be found in a murky and dangerous sector of the Internet news spectrum, the sector where trolls, flamers, shills and conspiracy theorists congregate, like shoals of piranha fish. These sites mimic the mainstream in appearance, but the content can be much more toxic. Comment threads full of spite, vituperation, recrimination and revenge pullulate like bacteria on so-called ‘opinion’ or ‘op-ed’ articles which are no more than a platform for blatant propaganda. Not only that, even the ‘news’ articles are too often heavily laced with bias using subterfuges such as numerous links to one-sided interpretations of events. All this demonstrates lax editing of articles, their intention, and their factual content too. And it is done this way to attract hits, subscribers and advertising.

One particularly worrying tendency of citizen journalism from the beginning has been its tendency to publish work which announces or supports conspiracy theories or which uses them as part of what purports to be reasoned analysis based on the facts. That it is being accepted is just another part of the shock-horror effort to attract readers. Citizen journalism is becoming cynical before its time, and this phenomenon is, in turn, attracting cynics.

So what does all this have to do with diets, soldiers, self-preservation and human behavior?

I contribute articles to the mainstream press and, until recently, I contributed news and opinion/op-ed to some of the larger citizen journalist sites. And I, as a human being just like anyone else, have been exposed to all I have described above for a long while. I have thus on occasion fallen prey to the temptation to respond in aggressive terms to provocation, I too have harangued certain agenda merchants who pose as analysis writers, and far too many a time have I switched off my computer at the end of an evening feeling angry and wired.

But I've had enough of the violent sentiments and dishonest writing.

This means that although I still write for the mainstream press, I have abandoned its opinion articles and comment threads. It’s all too vexing. I have also stopped contributing to major citizen journalism sites. My mind is telling me that those things are not good for me. My intellect is telling me that the fundamental principles of good journalism are being neglected in the headlong rush to make a profit. My heart tells me I should be somewhere where people who have never met can exchange points of view in a civilized manner, somewhere where writers have a sense of what ethical writing is, somewhere I am glad to log on to, somewhere I can try to forge potentially long-lasting intellectual dialogue with people.

There are many kinds of human behavior, and self-preservation is an instinct. And it is precisely because the nastier of the former have polluted the press that - as is the case of people who want to feel better or soldiers who want to stay alive - the latter has kicked in. Viscerally, and instinctively.