Zing of Authenticity

When it comes to knowing news, I LOVE to be the first one to know about happenings in the world. For example; in my apartment, no one knew about the Bunkerville situation with the Bundy's farms and everything happening down there. I walked in from my class and sat down next to my roommate who was on the couch looking at Facebook. He was scrolling through his news feed and he saw something that said something about the shooter who was positioned on the highway facing the police.









It was this photo made into a meme. It said something about the police and how shooters have the right to shoot, blah, blah "insert something funny." He was confused when I mentioned to him how crazy the situation was getting. This was on a Wednesday by the way. He looked and me and asked what I was talking about and I replied, "you haven't heard about this?" I felt awesome. I felt the "zing" Brooke Gladstone was talking about. In that small moment I knew exactly what I was going to say in this article.

I felt awesome knowing something that my buddy didn't know. He felt cool learning about it from a trusted source. I jumped on the twitter bandwagon and kept learning about the whole situation happening in Bunkerville.

When doing research for this assignment, I typed in on googlesearch, "breakingnews twitter" and looked at what came up. The zing of authenticity came to me immediately again. There is a twitter page specifically for breaking news. I felt awesome knowing that I can get news faster than anyone else on this planet, besides everyone who looks at this twitter feed.


I am framed by this context unfortunately. I immediately believe what I read and if I delve deeper into the subject, I tend to not believe what I read if it disagrees with what I read first and foremost. I have the problem that I believe what I hear or read first and don't stray from the point I got first. It is a problem of mine, but with today's twitter friendly world, every one is on a mobile device and reports news immediately, not always true, but the immediacy of the news gets me.


Frank Viola of "Beyond Evangelical" writes this on his blog "Rule of thumb: If you read something negative about another person, especially a fellow Christian, take it with a grain of salt. Tilt toward not believing it. Just as you would want others to do if it were you being smeared (Matthew 7:12)." I see this as how we all should look at the news we read first. Even though if feels awesome to know you are the first people to learn about the news, you need to read it with a "grain of salt." The fact people believe anything from the first news source they read it from is a human fault that can't be changed without much research and without being lazy. 

People believe the first things they read and hear about because they are FREAKING lazy.  I am on this bandwagon unfortunately. I see something and most of the time, I am just somewhat lazy and don't want to research the fact I heard about and take it at face value.

When it comes to personal reporting of news, I love to read up-to-date updates on mainly sports.  I follow sports pages that report news about a certain team immediately as it happens.  ESPN's app "sportscenter" is one of the most widely downloaded sports apps on apple's app market.  With over 200,000 ratings, this has many more than other sports reporting news apps. According to stateofmedia.org "the most common way that people get news is by going directly to a news organization’s website or app. About a third of desktop/laptop news consumers and smartphone news consumers get news this way “very often.” Even more tablet news users, 38%, follow this path." This doesn't have to immediately do with sports but I imagine the numbers relate to sports as well.

With these numbers in play, the "zing" is there.  I can say I sit in class and, at least once a class period, check to see how the scores of games are going and how the sports teams I follow are doing.  I love knowing immediately how my team is doing.  I can't speak for everyone, but I sit in class in the back, usually the athletes, are sitting on sports apps and are looking at how their team is doing in certain events.  I know I see the "zing" by just watching people that are keeping up-to-date with the teams they follow.  For example, I was sitting in the back of one of my classes and there was a football player keeping up with the March Madness.  There was a game being played at the same time as class, and in actuality, we stopped class and started to talk about the game.  We all felt the "zing" because we were first to know on the entire campus, excluding the people who were watching it on TV in the cafe.

In conclusion, the "zing" just feels good.  It feels good to know about something that is happening in another part of the world the moment it happens.  My father always wants to know how a sports game is going if he is at work, and it somewhat gets annoying.  I would be sitting in class and he texts me saying "whats the score?" He feels the zing through me which, in reality, signifies how everyone wants to feel it no matter where they are.

These are all in my opinion of course.

48 hours....jeez :(

Well, that was literally one of the hardest things I have done in my life.  After doing this assignment, I have come to the conclusion that I am completely addicted to my technology devices.  I am addicted to my cell phone, my iPod, my laptop and pretty much anything else that has technology in it.

When it comes to 48 hours without technology, I had no idea if I was going to complete this without losing my self-motivation and using my phone or iPod.  With the help of distraction, I completed this task.  During my fast my girlfriend and I decided to roam around Saint George and the gorge between Saint George and Mesquite.  We looked up places to visit on Friday before my fast started and planned out what our weekend would consist of.  We decided to go to a place called "Little Jamaica" in Littlefield, AZ.

Since I knew I couldn't be around technology and cellular devices, my Friday night consisted of us sitting in a hot tub and talking to the random people that showed up. They asked if they could play some music on their iPods through a wireless speaker they brought, and in the spirit of this assignment I asked them if they wouldn't do this.  They looked at me like a was a freak and started to anyways.  I turned towards my girlfriend and we decided to go inside and relax.  After a change in clothes and some relaxation periods, the only way I saw fit to pass time on was to drink a little bit.  We opened up a bottle and started drinking the night away at a buddy's of mine.  Things moved a lot faster while intoxicated, I think...

The next morning, I decided to sleep in and waste the day basically.  Since I wasn't allowed on computers or anything, I couldn't do any homework so we decided to go to "Little Jamaica."  It was a perfect get-a-way.  We relaxed, literally, all day.  The water was warm and just an awesome time in general.  We couldn't take pictures in spirit of this assignment, so I don't have anything to post on Facebook or instagram so I just have to remember the good time in my own head, which is how things should be remembered anyways.  Without my iPod we chose to listen to her crappy country CD's.  I really dislike country after listening to it for 45 minutes non-stop.

I enjoyed doing this assignment.  I knew going into it I was going to have trouble, but coming out of it, I realized its actually a lot better without phones and technological devices.  I paid a lot more attention to my girlfriend and my friends more than my phone and really will be thinking about loosening my addiction on my phone and my iPod.  Skating was literally the hardest part.  No music while skating really sucked.

Best Device

When I went home for Spring Break, I went to my buddies house and immediately noticed something shiny on his wrist that wasn't on there before.  I was curious to see what it was and noticed it was a watch, thought nothing of it.  Later on in the night, we were drinking a little bit, he started to talk to his watch.  I was FREAKING out, a little bit due to the alcohol but mainly because of the fact he was talking to his wrist. I questioned him on it and his answer was shocking.He said it was a freaking smart-watch. First off, what the hell is a smart-watch and how the hell would a watch be able to text and call people.

He told me to go look it up and research it, so I took to my phone, not on my wrist, and looked it up.  The device is called the Martian Smart Watch.  The smart watch works basically as an extension of the phone.  It receives and sends texts, snapchats, calls and other phone related data. It is literally an extension of your phone onto your wrist. I don't really like these type of things, but when it comes to my phone, I would do anything for this...besides pay money when I desperately need to save.

When it comes to the values talked about in the assignment, the Martian Smart Watch is great for them.
Access to the watch, which I am assuming means how easy someone can use it, is grand.  When I stumbled upon it on my friend's wrist I was shocked and wanted to use it as soon as I saw it.  I asked my buddy if I could use it with his phone and he said it isn't that simple, which I assumed he thought I didn't know how to use it.  I used it and I was shocked.  It was so simple to figure out and with just a few buttons and some talking to, I was calling my mom, my sister, my friends, and a lot of people and talking to them from my wrist.. It was an odd feeling.  Utility also falls under this category.  It was very easy to use and easy to pick up for any normal person.  My favorite part of this watch, when it comes to usage, is the camera control. You can zoom, pan, and other things all from the watch. Fair value, the price is good.  Coming in at $300 the watch is an okay price.  It is a good device for the price.

I talked to my buddy who had the watch and asked him why he chose this watch over the other watches.  First, he works at Best Buy and got a good deal on it, but he liked all the specs it came with.  He liked all the controls on the watch and chose this as the best device for his lifestyle, which is very similar to mine.  He goes to school, works, and skates just like I do so a device that is perfect for his lifestyle would be perfect for mine!  He loves the watch because of all the things he can do with it and the simplicity of the LED screen.

I would recommend this device because of the ease of usage when it comes to smart watches.  I like this watch because it is just the best Smart Watch on the market.

http://www.martianwatches.com/

Reponse to Money Can't Buy You Love: Why Some Apps Work and Some Don’t

When asked the question "what is happiness," a couple of my good friends look at me, stunned, with a stupid look on their face that said "How the hell should I know?"  I felt bad for these people.  When someone asks me what happiness is I know my answer immediately.  Happiness isn't something that can be defined.  It is like love, it just needs to be felt for yourself.  I define happiness as a state of being that happens when the emotions of being sad completely are wiped away by the emotions of having fun or enjoying oneself.

When it comes to Apps and Apps giving happiness, a couple come to mind immediately.  One of which was said in the article, Spotify.  Spotify brings me more happiness than any other App for one simple reason, music makes me happy.  I get a feeling of joy and satisfaction that out weighs the fact that I am stressed and behind due to all my school work when I listen to music which is what Spotify offers.  I can not get another feeling like this from anything else.

To say money doesn't buy happiness is true, but with the idea of this article, money does buy a nice App that does make happiness occur.  In my case, Spotify, which costs money, makes me happy and I had to buy it so...it somewhat makes sense to say money will buy happiness.

The reasons some Apps work and some do not is one simple thing, happiness.  If Spotify didn't make me happy I wouldnt' have bought it, but due to the fact it does make me happy I will spend money on it and the App completely works for me.

The Chive - Probably The Best App in the World

The Chive is a photo entertainment website maintained in Texas.  The website was created in August 2007 and maintained by two brothers Leo Resig and John Resig. The site launched in 2008 and is now one of the most widely used photo entertainment websites on the internet.



According to worthofweb.com theChive is worth an estimated $91,500,000.

Bill Murray is, for some random reason, the focus of many Chive jokes, shirts, and overall everything.

He helps the Chivers set up donations and coordinate charitable events.

The Chive is also a charity-based website.  For example, 6-year-old Faith Ruiz was driving in her mother's car and started to lose breath and started gasping for air.  Her mother then laid her down on the roadway to perform CPR on her and saved her life.



Through ChiveCharities, Chivers donated over $25,000 dollars to Faith's family to help her medical bills.






Chivers, Chivettes and people that use the Chive tend to be on the more polite side of things.  For example, a real life example, I was serving at my job the other day and a man wearing a "Keep Calm Chive On"  shirt sat at my table. We started to talk and he ended up leaving me a $20 tip all because of our mutual love of the Chive.

This is just an example of the many things Chivers do for one another.



The logo adopted by Chivers and Chivettes.




Chivers having their random get-togethers at different colleges.




Chivettes on the website.



The Chive also endorses their own beer called "KCCO Black Lager"

I love the Chive.  It helps me get through everyday.  I log onto it at least 10 times a day.  Whenever I need a pick me up, a self esteem boost, or any type of help, I log onto theChive and KCCO.

Keep Calm Chive On was adopted from the old British slogan Keep Calm and Carry On.

Technology Determinism

Is technology running our lives? Is our society ran by technology and ruled by technology?  Well to answer this question, all we have to do is look at the screen we are typing on.  I can almost guarantee that everyone reading this blog, responding to the questions above, or even reading anything on a computer has their cell phone within arms length and will look at it before the end of this sentence.  I know I did. I have received two text messages while writing this blog and have to completely resist the urge to look at my phone.  I can say, with full assertion, that we are being ran by the technology of our time.

We are being changed by technology more than we are being rulled in my opinion.  We can not focus on one thing at a time because of all the different technological advances that have happened within the last 5 years. With all the advances, we have answers right at our fingertips.  For example, if someone asks us a question such as, "Who is the lead singer for Alice in Chains?" we don't wait until we get home to answer the question, but hop on our cell phone and ask Siri "Who is the lead singer of Alice in Chains?" and in her highly computerized voice she replies " Let me check that.. Layne Staley, was." I think technology is completely changing our ability to critically think and live with the ability to problem solve.  Instead of failing at things, we have to get the correct answer or correct way within 20 seconds or we end up getting bummed out because of the fact we didn't get the correct answer.  Its pretty disgusting in my opinion.  I say this, but how did I find the answer for the above question? I asked Siri on my new iPhone 5c.

That is to say, we don't NEED to be ran by these technological advances.  We use our iPhones daily, we use our computers daily, but..we do not need these items to function normally.  I, for example, do not need my cell phone to enjoy a day.  I am physically active and rollerblade daily.  I don't use any technology while skating and am perfectly happy with what I am doing.  There are no cell phones involved and I am happier than when I am browsing Instagram watching people skate, which is also what I do daily.