Social Media: Collaborative and Distance Communication Tools
12:17 PM | Posted by
ZachBosch
I am amazed that something like Second Life even exists…the first little bit of this post will be a rant of sorts, I’ll be discussing how stupid I think massively multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPG’s) are…then I’ll get to the articles I’ve read.
The author of my article, Lana Cook, quotes game designer Jane Mcgonigal (not to be confused with the real Professor Mcgonigal) from her book “Reality is Broken” as saying, “playing games increases our creativity and motivation, makes us feel more engaged and connected with others and our work. The instantaneous feedback of games gives us encouragement often missing in many of our real-life workplaces and schools.” All I can say is, this is absurd…where are we as a society if we have to retreat to a ‘make-believe’ world where we find validation and motivation not present in real-life? Ok, ok, I know there are some people who honestly have boring, uneventful, even depressing lives, but I don’t think that allowing yourself to be sucked in to an artificial world is the answer to life’s boredom/sorrow/whatever. In fact, I would argue MMORPG’s or anything of the sort/helps you escape ‘reality’ (even reading a book for some people) keeps a person from actually facing what’s really going on in life, it only exacerbates the problem/disconnect…MMORPG’s are just weird…
I swear, if my mom were to read this, she would tell me that I’m waaay to opinionated and should keep my thoughts to myself…but…eh…
So, MMORPG’s are a good way for someone to escape life for a while…like drinking (sorry, I couldn’t help myself). Second-Life, a world within our world where you can do the same things you can do in real life, only in pretend-ville, with an Avatar (doesn’t necessarily have to be blue) (though, you can determine every physical characteristic of your digital-personage if you’d like). Lana Cook even mentioned that she went to ‘London’, whatever that means…
Ok, bored with Second-Life, on to Skype.
Skype has some very real/legitimate/worthy applications in life. With Skype, you can connect with other people online via video chat…for free. Businesses, families, classmates, others, etc. use Skype to handle a multitude of dealings. The big news with Skype right now is its recent purchase by Microsoft. The author I just read comments that it may not’ve been a good move for Microsoft because Skype isn’t really much of a cash-cow, in fact, it’s always had issues monetizing its services…Microsoft is dumb.
But, Skype does have legitimate uses and as long as we have it, unadulterated by Microsoft, we should be happy.
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2 comments:
I agree with most of what you said. Nice.
Zena
you are to opinionated... just kidding good article with lots of good info