Progress Report

So a few days ago myself and Gary discussed on Facebook the direction of our presentation project. We both separately wrote a script, Gary sent me his script and I combined the two so that they would flow well and be in order, we then decided to take on half of the presentation each, I will take the first 3 slides and he would take the last. I then did a quick powerpoint presentation summarising each of our sections to display to the class. I feel that we made a good team and were able to communicate easily in regard to the project. I mostly used videos to research my end of the project which I found on YouTube. Videos make things more interesting and are sometimes easier to understand than reading a complicated article. The most difficult thing about organising it was combining the two scripts and sending the files back and forth, especially since I was using a Chromebook to do everything, it was difficult to figure out how to share through Google Docs, also Gary had some images he wanted to add to the slides so I had to send the slides to him to add them and have him send it back so I can upload it. If we had of met up in person and sat there with the computer it may have been slightly easier to do things like that as opposed to sharing files online. I also didn't realize that the slides themselves had to be in jpg format so I had to format all the slides in powerpoint on a different computer so that they were suitable to upload, I couldn't fit some of the images that Gary sourced which was disappointing but thankfully it won't affect the presentation too much hopefully, he was helpful and sent the script on in good time as well as offering to help with the slides.
Gary also asked me to meet him in SL earlier that day to do a run through, we timed the presentation and found that it was working well and went according to plan. All in all it was quite easy to communicate and work together as a team by using Facebook and Google Docs.

Researching for the Presentation

This week I began researching for our virtual environments presentation. I wanted to find out about the future of technology and where it was taking us as a society before looking at how it will effect the workplace and workplace relations. I began by looking into opinions on the positive and negative sides of technological advancements. We live in a world where everyone is constantly connected online through social media and social networking, young children are being given tablets and i-pads to play with, virtual reality is soon to become a readily available household means of entertainment, most people have one or many social media accounts through which they communicate, gather information like news, and even do the majority of their socialising.
There are sure to be some negative implications. What I have found so far is that yes, there are many advantages, for instance people who live in isolated locations can conduct business and socialise through sites like Second Life and other online communities, we can get degrees online, education is more accessible than ever. People have the ability to research any topic they like, yet if we become more dependent on technology, does that mean we could potentially become less human? Can technology be distracting for us by preventing us from focusing on more important things? There are other negative sides of technology such as the fact that it is incredibly difficult for parents to monitor and censor what their children are able to access online which could mean exposure to graphic or unsuitable content. I found an interesting article related to this aspect of my research here: http://www.edudemic.com/the-4-negative-side-effects-of-technology/

This made me think about things like how it is great that children can sit inside and play xbox games with graphics that would have been unfathomable ten years ago, they can play online with other people from all over the world, however when children have access to this kind of technology they may go outside less, socialise less which means less exercise and less development of their interpersonal skills. I wish to elaborate on these ideas for the presentation.

Another issue is the ever expanding world of social media and how it effects our work ehtic. As a student I am constantly searching online for college related information, for instance I had an exam on film criticism this week. After doing my relevant reading (which I accessed online) I then began to explore podcasts and YouTube videos in order to expand my knowledge and gather a variety of perspectives on the topics I was studying. It provided me with far more insight than I would have had years ago when the college library was the only source of information. However, lately while studying I have noticed it is very difficult when connected to disconnect from the more distracting elements of the online world, for instance, the social media apps and websites that are so accessible to me.

I would like to find out more and weigh up some of the pros and cons of technological advancements for us and our day to day lives.

Presentation Progress

Myself and my team mate Gary have been assigned a presentation for our Virtual Environments module. We have used Facebook chat to organise a meeting in Second Life this weekend where we will hopefully figure out how to go about using the Powerpoint style presentation technology available to us in our virtual classroom and discuss in detail which one of us will be discussing what aspects of the presentation. I have offered to organise the sections and create the slides for our presentation while Gary will be taking on providing a rough script which we will then elaborate on in our own time. We will meet up during the week, again in Second Life and do a practice run of the presentation in order to guarantee that things run smoothly. It is incredibly efficient and effective communicating through Facebook as both of us are often online and it sends notifications to my devices when someone contacts me, meaning that having a chat about the project is easily accomplished.