1. I definitely agree that TV programs and advertisements with a more amateurish/"homegrown" feel and appearance are on the rise in America. I think that, in large part, this has to do with the fact that Americans these days are interested in shows that lend themselves to amateurish production. Take any reality show that is popular on television--Jersey Shore, Teen Mom, and the dozens of other shows that are similar to them; These shows entice viewers because we as a culture enjoy reality television and witnessing how insane others peoples' lives are compared to our own. Luckily for networks, it is significantly less expensive to film these programs, so much so that they do appear "homegrown"--like any of us in possession of a video camera could just as easily produce such a show. However, I don't think that the existence of these shows means a decrease in professional production values. I think that these shows will continue to grow in number and gain more and more popularity, but I think they will eventually loose their appeal, and professional programs--dramas, sitcoms, etc.--will come back out on top. Professional production will never disappear completely--it may just get thrown on the back burner until people realize that amateurish, reality television programs will only go so far.
2. The social media sites that I find myself using the most frequently are Facebook and Twitter. I check my facebook multiple times a day when I am in my house on campus, and tweet on a pretty regular basis from my phone and computer. I use facebook because it's a whole world within itself. With facebook, we can keep in touch with friends, post pictures, and update our statuses while simultaneously seeing what everyone else in the facebook world is up to. Although I am very much opposed to the idea of facebook and sometimes wish I could deactivate mine, I think it's really hard to exist in this world without a facebook. If I didn't have one, I'd feel like I was missing out on so much. But I like that facebook enables you to quickly contact someone in a way that is less formal than texting or calling, and that we can write different emotions, quotes, lyrics, and thoughts on statuses, just to let others know we're feeling a certain way. I also like twitter because when I have a quick thought in my head and a quick free moment, it's nice to be able to have an outlet to pour that thought into, and for me that outlet is twitter. I also like twitter because it serves as a sort of virtual diary that I often have fun looking back on months after I tweet specific things.
I think that facebook is more successful than myspace because it's a lot more private and intimate than myspace ever was. With myspace, I feel like friending people you didn't even know was a lot more commonplace, and I think there were a lot of cases where that became dangerous. Myspace also became corrupt in that people tended to exploit themselves on it, posting provocative pictures and images. Facebook is more sophisticated. It started out as a college thing, and then gradually grew to a social networking site for high schoolers and young professionals. Unfortunately, I think that facebook, in the last few years, has fallen victim to the same corruption myspace did a few years ago. The younger the children who create facebooks are, the more junk they post on their profiles--applications, pictures, games, etc., and I think that stuff goes against what facebook originally stood for. Despite this, I don't think that facebook is going anywhere for a while. No site combines professional information, social networking, sharing, and pure entertainment the way that facebook does, so for now, I think it's here to stay.
3. The concept of transparency is important in the online world because the Internet is our primary medium for obtaining information these days. More people, myself included, find out news from a site like twitter than we do from reading the newspaper, as sad as that is. Therefore, it is important that we are able to trust these sites and know that they're not scamming us, but giving full, truthful, honest information. If not, then everything we know from what we read is a lie, and our discussions and views in the offline world become skewed and inaccurate. I think that, despite the fact that the online world accounts for so much of our information these days, transparency is more important in the offline world. Honesty, openness, and truthfulness will always be more important in the offline world because the most real, concrete relationships in our lives are the ones in our offline lives.
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