Taking A Look Back...

Since the beginning of this course, for the past four months we have learned and discussed various principles of professional communication. More specifically, we have explored the concept of social media, which turns communication into interactive dialogue through web-based and mobile technologies. In this course we have have explored social networking through the use of Facebook and LinkedIn. We have explored blogs through the use of Blogger, and we have explored micro-blogging through the use of Twitter. I learned about several websites that I had no idea about, such as Audioboo which was a quick way to record audio.I learned what podcasts were. I learned what LinkedIn was and also came to find that several of my friends from high school use it too. I learned how to properly email my professors and contacts. I learned how to re-do my resume properly, edit Wikipedia stub, and how to make a power presentation that would be effective and efficient. I have learned many things from this course, both educational and personal. This course has exceeded my expectations.


Matt Hamm (Creator). (2008). Jump on the social media bandwagon [Image], Retrieved April, 12, 2012, from http://www.flickr.com/photos/matthamm/2945559128/in/pool-46198829@N00/


At the beginning of the course, I had to miss the first week of school because I was attending a funeral in Singapore. While I was away, my boyfriend offered to go to some of my classes and take notes for me. When I came back, I asked him where the notes for my class were, he told me he didn't bother to take any. He also expressed how easy he thought this course was based on the syllabus and he told me thought I would get an easy A. With that, I had low expectations for this class, and for the first month I thought of this course as a waste of time. However, as the semester went on I found myself enjoying the laboratory sections where my assignments were based on designing pages, and creating presentations. I started to enjoy meeting new people and interacting with them. I found the assignments harder than I thought. I began to take in on the information I was given, and I began to learn from this course. I honestly didn't expect much from the course, however I unexpectedly found myself enjoying this course. This course was definitely not what I expected. I never expected Facebook and Twitter to be considered a professional form of communication. My fellow classmate also learned a lot from this course like me:

Jenna Patterson Blog

Some of my classmates were found to have believed that Social Media was a trend that would replace all human interactions. I can understand why they believe that, as I have some friends who prefer online role-playing game as opposed to hanging out. However, I believe that social media can not replace the so called, 'real human interactions'. This course has made me realize that Social Media goes beyond just Facebook and Twitter, but instead it is a whole new future. A new way of interacting, and if done moderately, it can be progressive for society. Trends are changing, and communication follows those trends in order to reach their target audience. By understanding and utilizing this new form of communication, messages, thoughts, and opinions can be more easily communicated. Social can be utilized in the future not only as a powerful form of advertising but it can also be implemented as a safety measure. In this article, they used social networking as a warning system for tsunamis.

Link to the news article

As demonstrated, the future of social media communication is boundless. It goes beyond what we typically think, and it is always changing and progressing. As the years pass, it becomes more advanced, and more user friendly. It makes a difference in our daily lives, and in some cases, it can make the difference between life and death. It is quick, it is efficient, it is the future.I have learned how to better communicate with others, and interact with them. This can be shown through my five comments on their blog posts below. This course has helped me realize that social media goes beyond it's believed capabilities. I had a great semester, thank you ALES204!

Here are the five comments on the blog posts written by my fellow students in this class:
Shannon Wilson, Hannah O., Lynda Forsyth, Sydney Killoh, Samantha Stevens

Tumblr

Throughout this course we have explored the concept of social media, which turns communication into interactive dialogue through web-based and mobile technologies. I haven't really thought much about how significant of a role that social media had in my life. Since high school, I have been a consistent user of Facebook and once I started university I started to explore blogger.com and Twitter, all of which have been discussed in this course. However, there is one form of social media that I would like to discuss in my blog post as my topic of my choice. I would like to discuss Tumblr, in which, over the past couple of years I have heard about it through my friends using it. But I have never really jumped onto the bandwagon and joined in. However, I was told it was very similar to Twitter and blogger.com. As of recently, I have begun to see Tumblr in a new light, a light that has made me want to look into possible integrating it into my daily life.

Tumblr was first launched on April 27, 2007 by David Carp, the founder and CEO of Tumblr. Like Twitter, it is a micro-blogging platform that is also a social networking website. It is website that allows users to post multimedia and other content in a short-form blog which differs from blogger.com. You can easily share different types of multimedia such as pictures, audio, videos, and music. Tumblr is like a blog, but it is way faster, more upbeat and modern, and unlike Twitter there is no character limit. It allows you to express yourself through your passion and interest, and also connect with others who also share the same interest. You can connect with millions of Tumblr users by reading other user's blogs and browsing the webpages. You can choose from various of communities to connect with as they are listed according to their genres. Making it simple to explore what you are interested in. There is no question about the easiness of Tumblr and why so many users are addicted to it.

Link to my Tumblr Page

Screencapture of my Tumblr Page
(Image retrieved on April 11th,2012 from http://mi-chelle-le.tumblr.com/)

As an experiment, I decided to create my own Tumblr page and explore if the claims I stated above about Tumblr on the internet were true. I definitely enjoyed choosing the template of my blog, as Tumblr provides various ones to choose from, both paid and free. I also researched on the internet that there are several graphic designers who offer their own designed templates on the world wide web. Making me realize that Tumblr is not only a blog, but a display of one's talent, kind of like an online portfolio. In which graphic designers can display their designs, bakers can post pictures of their creations, fashion designers can demonstrate their style, and artists can show their abilities. Tumblr has capabilities beyond Facebook and Twitter, in which you can connect and share with other individuals who share the same interest and passion as you. For me, I decided to look at pages that followed the theme of fashion, beauty, books, cute, fitness, funny, and design. I definitely enjoy just browsing through the hundreds of tumblr pages and just looking and admiring photos and quotes. A fellow classmate of mine also chose to write about Tumblr too, and it was found that we shared the same opinion about Tumblr and it's greatness with creativity.

Samantha Steven's Blog

However, although Tumblr is a great way to express yourself, it should also be recognized that it is a great way to waste time and procrastinate too as the time spent browsing other pages can be time consuming. I can definitely say that my experiment with Tumblr was successful, as I can definitely see myself spending my free time just browsing around various pages. Perhaps not as frequently as Facebook and Twitter, but I find it amazing how I can connect my Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr accounts all together and just make a single post. I encourage others to experiment with Tumblr, as I would recommend this social media to anyone who enjoys Facebook and Twitter.