Fast times at Business U.

Should the ivy-covered halls of learning focus more on the liberal arts -- and less on making a living?

According to Margaret Heffernan, a writer with the magazine “Fast Company” 22 percent – a majority – of American undergraduates will major in business studies. Heffernan bemoans this as a meaning that “a large swath of the population…believes(s) the most important thing for them to do is learn how to earn money.”

I’m of two minds about Heffernan’s depression. Yes, as a liberal arts major, I would like to see the liberal arts get more respect. I believe my skills and talents have been honed by my liberal arts education, and I can only wish for others’ lives to be similarly enriched. But I recognize that, however much the works of D.H. Lawrence or Beethoven mean to me, there is an inherent beauty and value in the writings and accomplishments of economists and business masterminds as well. And I find Heffernan’s assertion that people who major in business “tell me they want to consume, never what they want to contribute,” to be flawed. Is business not central to any society, even a non-capitalist one (which America most certainly isn’t)? Is creating a business, employing people, offering a service to the community, not a contribution just as worthy of those of Kant or Camus?

I also know, from my own experience working in academia, that there is a trend in America for kids that might not historically go to college to go these days. As the shift toward college attendance has become more all-inclusive, today’s college experience is less about learning how to think and more about job preparation. Is it a shame that philosophy is not the cornerstone of academia? Yes. But it’s hard to argue that it’s not a good thing for more students to have the opportunity to explore higher education where -- whatever their major -- they might just decide to dabble in the liberal arts. And who knows where that will take them?

Feeling Foxy

Crazy like a fox, indeed

Watching “Outfoxed” has made me wonder anew how Bill O’Reilly ever got a job in media, much less kept a job in media.

And then I remember, it’s Fox – and that’s not really media.

I’ve never been a fan of the network – through my in-laws watch it 24 hours a day – but watching a film about the ins and outs of the network’s inner-workings had me so angry I could hardly watch it. And every time a clip of O’Reilley came on, I found my jaw dropping and my blood pressure rising.

And when he told Jeremy Glick, the son of a World Trade Center victim, that Glick’s father would be disappointed in his son’s views that America should not have invaded Afghanistan, I almost cried.

How does this man verbally abuse his guests, sexually harass his employees, and still remain on the air? Who supports this? How on earth does this man have a podium?

According to “Outfoxed,” O’Reilley, Limbaugh, Hannity, Coulter etc. have a venue because of one man: Rupert Murdoch, a billionaire media mogul with a conservative agenda. As a member of the media, I’m savvy enough to recognize that this so-called documentary was not entirely objective. But I care enough about the future of the media and the country to recognize the inherent dangers of a propaganda machine that bills itself as a part of the free media.

I'm just reporting -- you can decide -- that I chose to put ol' Bill's photo on the righthand side of my blog. I hope it makes him all warm and fuzzy inside.

Running with Blades

We watched the cult hit "Bladerunner" in class last week, looking at in context of the way technology advances our society and scares us at the same time.

It was my first time to see the movie, set in a futuristic urban setting where Replicants -- human-like robots -- are a threat to the humans who remain on earth. Most humans, it appears, have left the smoldering remains of the earth to live in space colonies. Harrison Ford plays a bladerunner, a specially trained cop who is on the hunt for some recently escaped replicants.

The whole time I was watching the film, I was wondering if Ford himself was a replicant: his obsession with old photos, his efficiency, the way the other officers seemed to be in on some secret. I Googled it later that week, and found I was not alone in this theory.

The underlying message of this bit of chicanery? No matter how little we trust the technology we create ... we're still the ones pulling the strings.

1984 Apple's Macintosh Commercial

Ads people want to see ...

The 'ad' advantage

So the online models of business are changing.

The New York Times has shut down its member-based, pay-only sections, looking to ad revenue to generate that income instead of online readers. Meanwhile, Spiral Frog is giving away music if you'll watch a 60-second advertisement.

What does this mean for online media? My money is on this being a trend. Advertising already underwrites television content and many publications. I've always been told, in fact, that newspapers and magazines make all of their money on advertising; that subscriptions merely pay for the paper they're printed on.

However, there is a new, competing trend in TV: premium content, ad-free, for an upcharge. And looking at the success of things like TiVo, HBO, and TV shows on DVD, I'd say (anecdotally, at least) that people are willing to pay for the convenience of being ad-free. So why this discrepancy, i.e., TV moving away from the ad-based model and online media moving toward it?

One thing, I imagine, is the current perception that online information should be free. It's not seen as entertainment; it's seen as a resource. While people go online to entertain themselves, they regard it as something different than watching a movie or sitcom for relaxation. However, if advertisers get smart -- and start targeting the ads properly -- the line between advertising and entertainment will continue to blur. A quick search on YouTube showed hundreds of advertisments that people actively search for -- and watch. Why do people watch the SuperBowl just for the ads? Because they're enjoyable ads. If Spiral Frog or the NYT can sell and carry ads (video or static) for online media, consumers, media companies, and businesses will have a winning model.

Wiki-Watch Dos

And ... Wikipedia wins!
My fake Diane Keaton entry was changed in less than a week. Score one for the Wikipedia editing system. (And I confess: I feel much better...)

Wiki-watch One

It's Wednesday, 10:36 p.m. So far, Diane Keaton is still a paralegal, per Wikipedia. The watch continues ...

Ch-ch-ch-changes

Our latest assignment for class was to test the reliability of Wikipedia, the online encyclopedia that anyone can edit. Dr. G has asked us to intentionally insert false information into a Wikipedia profile of a Hollywood celebrity or a film. Then, we're to track it and see how long it takes before someone edits out the false information.

The idea is to test how effective the Wikipedia editing system is. We all know to take information there with a grain of salt, but there are people who, in fact, put in false information, either maliciously (as our class is doing) or through a misguided belief in what they're posting. The administration of Wikipedia claims to have editors always checking for incorrect information, and we're out to test how quickly and accurately that happens.

So, while I feel a little guilty about it -- intentionally reporting false information seems very unethical to me -- I added a false item to Diane Keaton's Wikipedia entry.

The original entry was: In addition to acting, she is also a photographer, real estate developer, and occasional singer.
My edit was: In addition to acting, she is also a photographer, real estate developer, paralegal, and occasional singer.

Let's see how long it takes for someone to change it -- or if it gets caught at all.

I am assuaging my guilt over misleading people by comforting myself that I said something nice about her. And if it isn't fixed in a week, I'll change it back myself.

Safe? Of course it's safe -- it's online!

In class tonight, we had two presentations -- one on online dating and one about myspace -- that brought the issue of safety on the Web to the forefront. This also follows Dr. Greenberg's earlier concerns about family photos that were posted on Flickr.

How safe, she asked us, was it to show images of your kids online? Could someone see a photo, determine where the family lived, and target them for a scam or violent crime?

It's certainly possible -- even likely -- I would argue. If someone called me and asked for my name, hometown, zip code, friends' names, hobbies, photos of my family, education level, or workplace, I would immediately suspect either a scam or open identity theft. Yet, people feel perfectly free to post all this information online for the taking -- for anyone to see. Is our society so disconnected we feel this uncontrollable urge to tell everyone out there every little detail about us? Or are we just very trusting?

There's also the issue of predation, which has sparked lawsuits against online dating sites and myspace. MSNBC ran a story about a girl right up the road in Austin. (You can read it here: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/13437619/)

In the meantime, even though we've been asked to put in photos with most of our blog entries, I'm sticking with anonymous-looking images like this one. Guess which one's me!

And so it begins ...

After swearing I would not -- and I meant absolutely not -- jump on the blogging bandwagon, here I am.

It's a class assignment, but I still feel vaguely uncomfortable.

I respect the need to communicate, and I respect the impact bloggers have made in our society, but there's something so incredibly vain about expecting people to want to read my random thoughts on anything from sushi to iPods. Many of my friends are blogging now as a means of communicating with our entire social network without having to go to the effort of actually cultivating relationships one-on-one anymore. I'm fine with that as far as it goes. On occasion, I check their blogs and enjoy their insights. But too often, it seems, I receive a mass e-mail from a friend that reads, "Go check my blog" and a link. It's impersonal, insulting, and (I think) rather pretentious. Where's the gentle give-and-take of friendship? The communal bond of conversation? If I want a lecture, wouldn't I just go to class?

Which brings me to the point of this post -- the explanation of how I got here and why. As a student in a "Writing for Online Media" class, I am one of roughly 20 hardy souls who will venture into the blogosphere for the next 8 weeks or so. The purpose, as I understand it, is to hone our writing skills, make us conversant with current communication technology, and actually have us participate in a cultural phenomenon we might otherwise just be studying. Will it work? Will I become a blog convert, uncontrollably spewing my opinions out for everyone to see? Stay tuned, folks. We're just getting started.

To that end, let me throw this out to my fellow classmate bloggers (or anyone really) what place does blogging hold in your world? Is it simply the modern version of a little girl's diary, sans lock? A way to communicate with far-flung friends and family? Do you ever think about the years ahead -- all those posts! -- and decide it's just too much?