In preparation for the last two weeks of class, all students are required to post a link to an article or project that focuses on some aspect of social media that they would like to present to the class for debate.
The article or project can address or use any of the technologies we have spoken about (twitter, facebook, YouTube, etc) but needs to foreground an issue that is up for debate (such as privacy, intellectual property, etc).
Please paste the link to the article as a comment and include a statement of why you posted this article and what you think the key issues are for debate. You will be responsible for presenting the article and issues in class.
Tuesday, May 24, 2011
Friday, May 13, 2011
Meet the co-founder of twitter on Monday!
Meet Biz Stone, co-founder of Twitter
Monday, May 16, 2011 at 8PM
Moore 100
RSVP ON MYUCLA under "Event Reservations"
The UCLA Campus Events Commission is proud to present Twitter co-founder and creative director Biz Stone! In addition to revolutionizing modern communication, Biz has worked at Xanga and Blogger, and has published several books on all things blogging and viral networking. In his talk "A Little Birdie Told Me," Biz will share his story of the development of one of the world's most influential social media platforms, and the experiences he has learned as an entrepreneur. Professor Steve Peterson of the UCLA Department of Communication Studies will moderate.
This event is free and open to all UCLA students, staff and faculty with valid BruinCard. Register on myucla to ensure your space. Reservations will be valid until 7:45PM on Monday. After 7:45, all other available seats will be filled.
Click here for more info (you must first login).
Steps:
1. sign-in to my.ucla.edu
2. click on event registration from left-side menu
3. hover over "twitter" event -- Monday, May 16th.
4. Click register.
Monday, May 16, 2011 at 8PM
Moore 100
RSVP ON MYUCLA under "Event Reservations"
The UCLA Campus Events Commission is proud to present Twitter co-founder and creative director Biz Stone! In addition to revolutionizing modern communication, Biz has worked at Xanga and Blogger, and has published several books on all things blogging and viral networking. In his talk "A Little Birdie Told Me," Biz will share his story of the development of one of the world's most influential social media platforms, and the experiences he has learned as an entrepreneur. Professor Steve Peterson of the UCLA Department of Communication Studies will moderate.
This event is free and open to all UCLA students, staff and faculty with valid BruinCard. Register on myucla to ensure your space. Reservations will be valid until 7:45PM on Monday. After 7:45, all other available seats will be filled.
Click here for more info (you must first login).
Steps:
1. sign-in to my.ucla.edu
2. click on event registration from left-side menu
3. hover over "twitter" event -- Monday, May 16th.
4. Click register.
Monday, May 2, 2011
May 4 -- Debrief and Preparation for Discussion #2 with John Scott Railton
We will debrief about the "voices" projects and prepare for our next meeting with John (May 11). In preparation for class on Wednesday, I would like for you to read an article called "Documenting Conflict in Misurata, Libya Using High-Resolution Satellite Imagery," which utilizes geo-spatial technologies and social media feeds, particularly the twitter Feb17Voices project. How does this scholarly article use the tweets and audio interviews with people on the ground as evidence, documentation, and primary source material?
Also: I would like you to read as many tweets as possible from the Feb17voices project. Please post and comment on several tweets that you find particularly significant in documenting part of the history of the violence in Libya.
Also: I would like you to read as many tweets as possible from the Feb17voices project. Please post and comment on several tweets that you find particularly significant in documenting part of the history of the violence in Libya.
Sunday, April 24, 2011
April 27th -- Discussion 1 with John Scott Railton
In preparation for Wednesday's class, please review the press coverage around the "Voices of Jan 25th" project (see posts below).
Also, go through the tweets that John posted for the Jan25voices (especially the early ones when the Internet was "turned off" in Egypt (Jan. 28-Feb. 1) and also the tweets for the Libya project, Feb17voices.
Everyone in the class should post a question and a comment about the twitter project for John (who will be visiting us in class this week). Please think about questions that will open up the discussion and debate the central issues around social media and the political revolutions in the Middle East.
Also, go through the tweets that John posted for the Jan25voices (especially the early ones when the Internet was "turned off" in Egypt (Jan. 28-Feb. 1) and also the tweets for the Libya project, Feb17voices.
Everyone in the class should post a question and a comment about the twitter project for John (who will be visiting us in class this week). Please think about questions that will open up the discussion and debate the central issues around social media and the political revolutions in the Middle East.
Wednesday, April 20, 2011
Map of Facebook, Internet, and Cell Phone Penetration in Middle East
This interactive CNN map shows the percentage of the population of each country that uses Facebook, the Internet, and cell phones.
Monday, April 18, 2011
April 20th -- Tweeting the Revolution in Egypt and Libya
Over the next three sessions, we will be looking at the specific role played by social media technologies in disseminating information about the Egyptian and Libyan revolutions. To this end, we will have a special guest in class (starting April 27th): John Scott Railton, founder of the "Jan25Voices" project. The site documents the revolution in Egypt through blogs, photos, video, audio, and twitter feeds. It gives voice to those people who were denied voices when Egypt decided to "shut down" the Internet.
In preparation for class, please read the following articles about John's work:
1. Time Magazine article: "Meet the Man Tweeting Egypt's Voices to the World"
2. Watch this video about John's work:
3. Listen to phone calls with young activists from the Jan25Voices site, look at the pictures and video.
Questions: What is the "new" public sphere? How has social media expanded the public sphere? Are there ways that the public sphere has also been constricted?
Also, please spend some time looking at the "Google Transparency Reports" by country (Libya, Egypt, China, etc): Figure out when the Internet was "turned off" and what services were shut down and when.
Links to the audio recordings on "Audioboo" can be found here.
Finally, all of John's tweets can be found here: http://twitter.com/#!/jan25voices
In preparation for class, please read the following articles about John's work:
1. Time Magazine article: "Meet the Man Tweeting Egypt's Voices to the World"
2. Watch this video about John's work:
3. Listen to phone calls with young activists from the Jan25Voices site, look at the pictures and video.
Questions: What is the "new" public sphere? How has social media expanded the public sphere? Are there ways that the public sphere has also been constricted?
Also, please spend some time looking at the "Google Transparency Reports" by country (Libya, Egypt, China, etc): Figure out when the Internet was "turned off" and what services were shut down and when.
Links to the audio recordings on "Audioboo" can be found here.
Finally, all of John's tweets can be found here: http://twitter.com/#!/jan25voices
Impact of Social Media on Revolutions
I felt these articles I read for another class are also pretty relevant here. They're interesting in that they present differing opinions on the ways social media affects the relationships of cultural sects within the population.
Tuesday, April 12, 2011
Thursday, April 7, 2011
April 13th -- Developing Mash-ups using Twitter
This class will delve into the technology behind twitter and applications built using the twitter and Google Maps APIs. An "API" is an "application programming interface," which allows software developers to create new tools and applications using existing programs. These new tools are sometimes called "Mash-ups". For example, the twitter mapping projects (Egypt, Sendai, Libya) are all built on the Google Maps API and Twitter API. You don't need to read through all this information, but I wanted you to begin to understand how someone designs and programs a "social media mash-up."
We will have a special guest visitor on Wed: David Shepard, English PhD student and technical lead of the "HyperCities" digital mapping project. He is also the lead developer for the "HyperCities Now" twitter projects. He will take you through process of creating social media mash-ups.
Preparation for class:
From this list of Twitter mash-ups, examine one or two mash-ups in detail. How do they utilize twitter and extend its capacities? Do they develop a new "interface" for interacting with tweets? Do they develop new ways to visualize tweets? Do they add another social media dimension to twitter? What technologies do you think they use in order to do this?
We will have a special guest visitor on Wed: David Shepard, English PhD student and technical lead of the "HyperCities" digital mapping project. He is also the lead developer for the "HyperCities Now" twitter projects. He will take you through process of creating social media mash-ups.
Preparation for class:
From this list of Twitter mash-ups, examine one or two mash-ups in detail. How do they utilize twitter and extend its capacities? Do they develop a new "interface" for interacting with tweets? Do they develop new ways to visualize tweets? Do they add another social media dimension to twitter? What technologies do you think they use in order to do this?
Wednesday, March 30, 2011
Introduction
Comp Lit 19: "Twitter, Social Media, and Revolution"
Spring 2011, Wed, 12-12:50 PM, in 162 Royce Hall
Professor Todd Presner
Course Description:
In 2009, the Tehran election protests were called the first "twitter revolution" because of the role that social media technologies such as Twitter, Facebook, Youtube, and Flickr played in disseminating information about the protests. Just this past month in Egypt, the world witnessed, first, how the Internet could effectively be "shut off" and, then, how various communication technologies could be harnessed to publish first-hand accounts of the protests throughout the country. Over 18 days, more than 40,000 individuals published more than 400,000 tweets from Egypt, documenting brutalities and the progress of the revolution. The purpose of this seminar is to examine the use, efficacy, and problems of social media and how these technologies are being used in the expanded public sphere. We will also interrogate whether these technologies promote democracy or if they have a violent underbelly.
Syllabus (this is a work-in-progress: I will add readings and links for each week)
March 30: Course introduction: What is Social Media?
April 6th: A New Public Sphere? Thinking about Twitter Revolutions
Spring 2011, Wed, 12-12:50 PM, in 162 Royce Hall
Professor Todd Presner
Course Description:
In 2009, the Tehran election protests were called the first "twitter revolution" because of the role that social media technologies such as Twitter, Facebook, Youtube, and Flickr played in disseminating information about the protests. Just this past month in Egypt, the world witnessed, first, how the Internet could effectively be "shut off" and, then, how various communication technologies could be harnessed to publish first-hand accounts of the protests throughout the country. Over 18 days, more than 40,000 individuals published more than 400,000 tweets from Egypt, documenting brutalities and the progress of the revolution. The purpose of this seminar is to examine the use, efficacy, and problems of social media and how these technologies are being used in the expanded public sphere. We will also interrogate whether these technologies promote democracy or if they have a violent underbelly.
Syllabus (this is a work-in-progress: I will add readings and links for each week)
March 30: Course introduction: What is Social Media?
April 6th: A New Public Sphere? Thinking about Twitter Revolutions
- Spend some time on the live streams and twitter archives from Egypt, Libya, and Sendai, Japan: http://egypt.hypercities.com, http://libya.hypercities.com, http://sendai.hypercities.com
- Questions: What is the "social media" public sphere? How "participatory" is it? What roles do social media play in creating knowledge about an event?
- Reading: Malcolm Gladwell, "Small Change: Why the Revolution will not be tweeted" from The New Yorker (Oct 2010).
- Questions: Is he right? How do you assess his argument?
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