Month: September 2019

On a sunny, yet cool day I was given the task to stalk my Professors…thankfully not physically (not trying to pose for that mugshot). But they asked me for my DCI 180 class to stalk their digital footprint.  

In class, we have been discussing how much information on you or about you is online. Every click on Facebook. Every retweet. Every photo posted on your Insta. Every pin you keep for Pinterest. Everything.  

It seems very 1984 that “Big Brother” is always watching you, but in this case “BIg Brother” doesn’t end with the Government. Big Brother has become the whole world when talking about your digital presence. Freaky…I know.  

When I searched up my Professor’s names, I immediately saw their photos and W&L. My first observation was how different both Professors dealt with their online presence. I found more information about Professor Teaff than Professor Abdoney.  

I discovered Professor’s Teaff personal website that listed her education, jobs, portfolio, and her skills and abilities. I learned she went to a Fulton-Montgomery Community College and got her Associates degree in Visual Fine Arts. Then she went to Potsdam (also in New York) where she graduated with a BA in Studio Arts and Politics. Then she ventured out to Virginia Commonwealth University to get her Masters in Museum Studies/Art History. Immediately after receiving her Masters she worked at Virginia Military Institute as a Government Documents Assistant. Her last year at Virginia Military Institute (2001) she also began her second job at Rockbridge Regional Library this time as a Cataloger/Technical Services Assistant. She stayed in this position for a year and then Professor Teaff went back to school. She got another Masters degree at University of South Carolina in Library and Information Technology. While getting her second Masters degree, she was working at W&L as an Interlibrary Loan Coordinator. To this day, Professor Teaff still works at Washington and Lee as a Professor for DCI and as a University Service Access Service Manager.  

Professor Teaff’s Facebook was public, which helped me stalk her better…Oh My Goodness! I found out we liked a lot of the same things, minus I did not publicly like those Facebook pages. She seems to like a lot of punk music (The Velvet Underground) and overall very 80s music (Duran Duran). Either way, fantastic music! She also seems to like a lot of Feminist clothing brands and unique little boutiques. She also liked Stacey Abrams, which tells me she leans left. She seems to really support respecting everyone’s dignity and seems to support organizations like Planned Parenthood, Wounded Warrior Projects, and LGBTQ+ 🏳️‍🌈 rights.  

Professor Abdoney was a lot more private. I found pictures of her son, who should be around 3 or 4 now. I also found pictures of her husband with her. But I could not find a lot of stuff that she liked on Facebook. I know she supports Planned Parenthood, but that’s from hearing her say that. Some of the tweets she retweeted and some of the photos she used for her Facebook background point to her being a feminist and most likely 3rd Wave to maybe even 4th Wave. Other than that, a lot of the information I got from her was from Facebook and other past DCI 180 blogs. Ironically, I discovered a fake account about her or at least some of it was not updated. It said she was 49 years old and her birthday was 6/19/1976 and she lives in another part of Florida (not Tampa). I could not find Voter Registrations or Campaign Donations on her name, which made me just guess her political affiliations through what she posted. In retrospect, although it’s safe to say she is Democractic, it is a little misleading, because there’s a spectrum to being on the left and right.  

On this cool, yet sunny day I really learned that nothing is invisible. Big Brother as a concept does not end with the Government nor will your digital audience ever stop expanding.

 

 

It wasn’t until I went phoneless for a couple days that I fully comprehended how much I depended on technology.  

Here are all the apps I use: 

• Snapchat (communication and personal use) 
• GroupMe (academics, and communication) 
• Word (academics)  
• Spotify (personal use) 
• Youtube (academics and personal use) 
• IMessage (communication) 
• Outlook and Gmail (academics and communication) 
• Google (academics and personal use) 
• IDLE 3 and Python 3 (academics and personal use) 
• pearsons (academics) 
• Padlet (academics) 
• Canvas (academics) 
• Sakai (academics) 
• Ancestry.com (personal use) 
• Notes (academics and personal use) 
• App store (academics and personal use) 
• Livesafe (personal use) 
• Shopping websites (personal use)  
• Calendar app (academics and personal use) 

 

I’ll admit those couple of days, I was phoneless, I was not completely “off the grid.” I still had my iPad and my laptop. I found that being phoneless I missed being able to communicate with people easily. Every time I made plans with people, I had to email them and either hope they responded immediately or hope I did not miss their response. Before and after every class, I was obsessively scrolling through my emails and refreshing. I just hated how I could not be walking around and checking my texts. I needed to be sitting down in a place where my wifi was working.  

I was not suffering any form of withdrawal from not being able to access 90% of the apps I often used. But, I started to understand how inconvenient being “off the grid” is for many people. In retrospect, it made me realize how people and families who do not have access to technology, whether it is because of geography or money or numerous other factors, are put in a huge disadvantage in our new digitalized world where there is an app for everything. 

I had a conversation with a girl a couple years ago, about how we wish we went back to our flip phones (shout out to my old blue flip phone!), but a smart phone is much easier. We both questioned how “connected” we truly could be when the majority of our communications with people involved fillers or superficialities. Obviously, we did not mean every couple texting each other texts worthy of a Shakespearean tragedy did not mean it. I’m sure they did. But can you really say you’re friends with someone if you mostly text them and not talk to them? 

It is hard to feel a huge sense of community until you step foot in a place that technology does not rule the world.  

The apps I mentioned above all make my life easier. I can text someone dinner plans, while checking my calendar and searching up articles about the Israeli elections. If I did not have some sort of smart phone, I would not be able to do this so conveniently anywhere I wished. I admit this simple truth. Dare I say I NEED technology.  

Although, I depend on technology, I acknowledge that technology has not always helped me. Instead of sitting down and writing essays, I type them without feeling any connection to most of what I write. Instead of reading a physical book, I spend most of my time reading and skimming online resources. In our class we learned that online reading does not equal physically reading a book or article. Meaning that when we skim all those wikipedia pages we never fully understand them. Physically reading a book is always much better.  

Despite the tradeoffs of technology and the list goes on…we all need it. Even if it is not always a symbiotic relationship.  

 

Probably not…but you’re welcome to browse.