The "freedom" of the Internet

I like to think of my generation (Generation Y) as the "oversharing" generation. We like to post EVERYTHING we do online to our peers and family.  On social media, we post pictures of our dogs, of what we eat, short videos of hanging with our friends or vacation trips, opinionated self posts, selfies, articles we relate to, funny pictures from other sites, etc. We don't think twice of how long that stuff stays on the internet, nor who has seen it or who has saved it to use it against us at some point in the future. Aside from paying for an overpriced internet provider, our access to the internet as a whole, is free. However, with privacy being so minimal across social media sites and other sites we visit, can we really consider the internet free? In Episode 3 of The Virtual Revolution, Aleks Krotoski poses the thesis that there is a "cost of free", where the Internet has redefined privacy, personal space, and who we are. On this episodes topic, I completely agree with Kortoski.

 credit to xkcd

Everyone search dozens of things a day on online search engines, whether it be a phrase, a product, a definition, or an image that made us laugh last week. As the episode explained, a majority of users don't know (or don't care) that these search engines gather the stuff we look up, and strategically come up with ads for products and services that relate to our web searches. This can be seen as a "cost" for using the internet, because it conveniently places products we may have wanted on the side of our web searches, effectively interesting us in purchasing said product on the same day, or some day soon. Google is the biggest contender to this type of marketing method, earning money from small or big business to get their products on search engine ads everyday. With it's acquisition of YouTube, Google is becoming a global force on personalized advertising, and that could become a big problem for the privacy of users someday.

Alongside unwanted personal advertising, the internet archives our searches, which can be tracked by our internet providers to find out more about us in either an investigation or beginnings of an investigation. It could be useful against terrorist and drug busts, but it could also be bad for people who have personal reasons to search unusual things. Our searching methods may not be too closely monitored right now, but if stricter internet laws are passed in the future, this could lead to having more and more of our information and data in the hands of the government, who would not hesitate to use it against us. We need to be careful about what we post on the internet guys, it can lead to so many negative things (blackmail, bullying, lose of job, etc). Hopefully things start looking up soon, but until then, be cautious, and thanks for reading!

InternetPrivacy @GaryMarkstein

How the internet can change the tide of politics.

In November of last year, I began to pay attention to American politics a lot more than ever before. I heard about our chosen presidential candidates for both parties and how the rest of the world was calling our current election cycle a "circus." I looked into the platforms of Trump, Bernie, Hillary, and chose the one I wish to be President accordingly. However, through my research I realized something incredible about the internet and how it affected politics. It dawned on me that the internet is an archive of each of these candidates lives, and contained all of their poor political choices only a google search away. In Episode 2 of The Virtual Revolution, Aleks Krotoski discusses how the internet can connect and divide humanity in a political context, and I completely agree with her.

Birdie comic by  DrewToonz

As I previously stated, the world of American politics is new to me. However, thanks to Reddit, I've caught up to stories that revolve around our presidential candidates. The internet has benefited both Trump and Bernie, whether it be through internet memes, or articles that explain their platforms. Unfortunately for Hillary, the internet is not too kind to her. Having such a long and sketchy history in politics, the internet has managed to dig up reports, articles, and video evidence of Hillary flip-flopping on issues every other month. While Bernie and Trump have a decent understanding on how social media works, Hillary seems to believe that it's not as effective as everyone is led to believe. But it is. 

The entire political narrative has begun to shift because of scandals being spread across the internet to uninformed voters. This has led Hillary from pandering to her followers and banking on name recognition for presidency to not holding press conferences and using scripted interviews as damage control. As Krotoski's video showed, multiple governments and government officials have been exposed thanks to whistle-blowers and citizens using twitter to spread information about the injustices that are occurring in their country. This kind of thing happens on a daily basis, and I think it's building up to something big in the near future. Events like the Panama Papers  and Clinton's email hack  will eventually lead to a political revolution in our county. The reason one hasn't happened yet is because there are still millions in America who are uniformed and collectively unorganized. In the near future we will see an uprising from American citizens, but as of now, we're too busy with the latest Game of Thrones episodes and celebrity gossip. We'll get there....eventually....when it's convenient.

"Bernie" by Extra Fabulous Comics