Final Blog Post

Pixabay under CC0 Creative Commons

Going into this class, I would’ve never expected to have come out liking it as much as I do now. To be completely honest, the idea of having to make a weekly blog was one that I found very intimidating after I was first introduced to it. I have never considered myself to be too much of an open person, so having to consistently share my own writing publicly was definitely a new experience for me. However, throughout the semester I found myself pleasantly surprised by how much progressively easier it became to produce these weekly blogs. Two of my favorite blogs that I made were “Reddit - Community and Collaboration” and “Fair Use Should NOT be Ignored,” as they both revolved around topics that I felt I had the most personal connection towards based on my interests outside of class. One of my favorite replies that I made was on Josh’s Blog which revolved around Reddit where I discussed a differing opinion that I held in regards to his take on the topic. Another reply that I liked was the one that I left on Khalil’s Blog, as I felt I was able to provide a good answer to one of the questions that he brought up.

Not only was I able to step out of my comfort zone through my own writing process, but also through the many collaborative efforts that I was required to make during my time in this course. It was honestly fun to hear out others ideas and contribute alongside them, something that I would usually tend to avoid in the past. Two of my classmate's that I felt influenced me this semester were Hannah and Ryan. Not only did I find collaborating with them as a group to be enjoyable, but I also genuinely believe that they both did a terrific job at writing concisely and in a way that made me feel interested in what they were saying. Being a fan of movies, I can say that I also appreciated how Ryan was able to cleverly relate so many of our class topics to different films that I'm familiar with. Overall though, I would have to give my vote to Hannah for the best blog, as her’s were consistently structured in a professional manner with written content that was able to convey a deep understanding towards the topics she discussed.

Thanks to all who took the time to read this post and my other blogs throughout this semester. I hope you were able to enjoy them as much as I enjoyed reading yours!

My First Wikipedia Edit

Last week, I was able to contribute to a Wikipedia page for the first time through one of our in-class assignments. The particular page that my group and I contributed to was Teenage Suicide in the United States. Like the rest of the class, our edits consisted of approximately 500 words worth of information that was relevant to the article’s topic. Our added content was comprised of statistics and general information that was not previously stated within the article prior to our edit. Though I felt that our work was competent enough in terms of what we included and how we structured it, I was still sure that it was going to be removed, as I was under the impression that Wikipedia was fairly strict towards their articles’ content. This is due to me having witnessed pages get completely removed in the past, despite consistent efforts made by multiple users who attempted to keep the information accurate, cited, and professionally written. Because of this, I had little to no hope that our edits would remain intact, especially due to the heavy subject matter that’s inherent to the article’s topic. However, much to my surprise, I found that the information is still up and mostly unchanged, with only a few minor edits made to improve upon our structure. I’m honestly not sure what made our case different from the others that I’ve seen, but it’s at least nice to know that our work was found suitable and can be used to potentially inform future readers.

By English: Redrawn in SVG by Otourly (concept by Paullusmagnus) Deutsch: Nachgezeichnet als Vektorgrafik von Otourly (Konezpt von Paullusmagnus). (Original image Image:Wikipedia-logo.png) [CC BY-SA 3.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

Meme Saturation

In this day and age, I often find myself wondering when the next big meme is going to arise. For better or for worse, internet memes are constantly evolving, leading to some absurd results that can prove to be entertaining to myself and countless others. However, as our media becomes increasingly spreadable, I can’t help but notice that the rate of meme growth is seemingly at its highest. It feels like every other day a new meme will be introduced, whether it be about a cringy advertisement or the unfortunate demise of an innocent zoo animal. In a sense, there seems to be a limitless supply in terms of what can be poked fun at through the simple utilization of social media. This has ultimately, in my opinion, been what’s led to such a highly saturated supply of current memes that doesn't seem to be declining anytime soon. But, is that necessarily a bad thing though? After all, some people nowadays will never have enough memes to satisfy their hunger for entertainment.

By Carine06 from UK (Silverback) [CC BY-SA 2.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons