November 2019

Linking Assignment

Linking Assignment Leave a comment

Connecting with peers through our personal blogs was a much more meaningful experience than the traditional readings-and-discussion on Canvas. Here are some of the connections I made…

 

Link 1: Yi’s What’s In Your Bag

Yi chose to build her content in UBC blogs as well. She chose to stick with the original theme of the blog, which is great for how simple and organized it appears. I like that she adds text and images in her posts- sometimes more can be said through images that text cannot convey. For example, her beautiful photos from Bali could not be done justice through words. I appreciated that I was able to comment on her post and that she replied (we both have the same key chain!). The only difficulty in navigating her page was having to scroll all the way to the bottom to access older posts. My blog is set up this way as well- but maybe we could have created tabs for each task so the users can minimize the time looking for posts. Overall, the simplicity of Yi’s blog really allows her thoughts and ideas to communicate with its readers without distractions.

 

Link 2: Alix’s Voice to Text

Alix’s voice to text task caught my eye because I could relate with some of the things she mentioned. If we could script our story, we both agree that we would’ve made it much more interesting. Telling an unscripted story was really hard to do in a voice to text app, because we also had to keep grammar in mind. Alix shared her thoughts on a Weebly blog. Oh my goodness, is her blog beautiful! She has photos of students, their work, quotes, activities, and even one of her wearing a unicorn costume. Alix has also included a bio of herself in one of the tabs. The personalization is something that is definitely lacking on my page. Through sharing parts of herself, it almost made me feel more invested in her thoughts and ideas because I felt like I knew the author on a more personal level. Alix has given her words a a face, name and personality, which allows users to feel more connected to the text.

 

Link 3: Allan’s Voice to Text

I am drawn to Allan’s Weebly blog because it is so minimalist. And the layout of his blog addresses the inconvenient scrolling problem I addressed about my blog layout. The drop down menu shows a separate page for every task and assignment. It is convenient for the user to access any one of these pages using the menu, without having to scroll and search. I also really appreciated what he shared about his experience with the task, having a Scottish accent. Accents are something that are not conveyed through written text, but in real life, can add insight into the background an individual. In text, this aspect is unfortunately lost. There is so much information that text can provide to users, but it is limited in a sense that it loses that personal voice.

 

Link 4: Inhee’s Emoji Story

Inhee has also chosen to show her learning in a Weebly blog. It is so organized and I like how she laid out her weekly tasks in little boxes. These boxes show the title of each post and a small preview of its contents. The dates and number of comments are also clearly shown. I also appreciate how organized the comments section is under each post. Each response is indented to clearly show threads of conversations. It was fun trying to guess Inhee’s movie of choice! I think she did a great job of conveying the plot of the movie through emojis, better than mine. I was very skeptical on how to communicate the plot of my movie (Joker), as much of the story is based on interpreting emotions and internal struggles of the protagonist.

 

Link 5: Julia’s Blog

Julia’s tasks are posted in a Wix blog. This is a platform that I haven’t had any experience using. I have to admit- when I first got to Julia’s blog I was a little confused where to navigate. I was expecting the usual headings, such as “Tasks” or “Assignments”. However, Julia has set up her blog through her own interpretations of the main idea of the tasks. For example, she has named the page for Linking Assignment as “Connecting Blogs” instead. Once I caught onto how she had organized her blog, I thought it was quite refreshing that she had chosen to do this. She has put more personal meaning into the headings of her posts and pages. I appreciate all the images she used to support these meanings as well.

 

Link 6: Katie’s Speculative Futures

Katie’s tasks are posted on her UBC blogs. She has organized her tasks and assignments into their own headings. She has grouped 3 tasks together into the same page, which also allows the user to find posts easily without having to scroll too far down. I was a little disappointed that I could’t find a comment section for her Task 12, as I wanted to leave some positive feedback. Katie uses a combination of text and images to portray her ideas. I like that her narratives are concise and makes you wonder if we are truly headed in this “future” direction. I came across the word “nomophobia” recently, and her speculative futures reminded me of this word. Nomophobia is the fear of being without one’s cellphone or device. It’s a reality for many people today and Katie’s speculations are based on this reality.

Task 12: Speculative Futures

Tasks Leave a comment

In this task, I’ve decided to portray my two speculative fictions in two different ways; the first, as an advertisement of the “better” self-driven future that has begun, and the second, as a short fictional story.

Speculative Future 1

 

Speculative Future 2
In the second speculative fiction, we enter the world of John Doe. He lives in a world where careers are chosen for individuals based on strengths and weaknesses shown in the first 16 years of their lives. Data from individuals are collected and analyzed in a predictive algorithm. Individuals are unable to dispute the algorithm, and are stuck with these careers for the rest of their lives…

The alarm goes off. 6:30am, like clockwork. Another day at the office, I think, dragging my feet. I look up at the calendar beside my bed. Day 1,825. The same questions run through my mind. Do I really need this job? I wonder if anyone would notice if I called in a sick day today? I push the pointless thoughts aside and get up. “Good morning, John Doe, the architect,” Alexa’s voice greets me in front of the bathroom mirror. “Good morning,” I respond with a mouthful of toothpaste. John Doe, the architect. How did I end up here? Actually, I know exactly how I ended up here. I’ve always been excellent in mathematics and appreciated the beauty in geometry. So it was no surprise when the almighty algorithm concluded that I would be best fit as an architect in this society. It was almost too easy. I rinse my mouth and head to the closet. “Here are your architect clothes for today, John Doe, the architect,” Alexa reminds me as a pair of khaki pants and plaid shirt is pushed in my direction. I take the outfit and stumble into it as I cross off today’s date on the calendar. 12,775 days remaining. I’ve always been excellent in mathematics…

 

Side note: this last task of ETEC 540 was a blast for me to do. I tapped into some creative writing skills that I haven’t really had to use after high school as a scientist… So I am grateful for this task. 🙂

Task 11: Algorithms of Predicative Text

Tasks Leave a comment

 

First of all, the sentences generated using the predicative text on my phone made absolute no sense and was grammatically incorrect. I believe these series of words were stringed together by using my most commonly used vocabulary- not necessarily taking into consideration the meaning of the entire sentence. For example, I must be using the word “way” often after using the word “only”, leading to the suggestion from my phone that I should be using these words one after another. In a way, it reflects my “voice” but the sentences as a whole did not generate a statement that sounded like me.

I see this sort of predicative algorithms in social media sites today, such as Instagram. I’ve recently been searching for a new coffee table for my apartment on Google, Wayfair, IKEA, and other furniture websites. Slowly, the ads on my Instagram feed have begun to show me links to coffee tables from furniture companies that I had not known about. I wondered, where did Instagram get access to this type of data? It is almost scary how accurate predicative algorithms can be with our modern technology. It can be both very convenient but also feel quite intrusive. I think it is always important to question the ethical implications behind using data for predicative purposes, whether it is for simple tasks like buying coffee tables or for more academic purposes using student data for learning analytics.

Task 9: Network Assignment Using Golden Record Curation Quiz Data

Tasks Leave a comment

Using these visualizations as prompts, reflect on the political implications of such groupings considering what data is missing, assumed, or misinterpreted. For example, while you may be able to justify your musical choices in the Quiz, there also may exist reasons why you did not chose other pieces. Can the reasons for these “null” choices ever be reflected/interpreted in the data?

My first impression in looking through these visualizations was that my name seemed to be generally positioned towards the centre of the web. Having this higher degree of connections could reflect that my choices are more “popular” compared to the other nodes. This may indicate that my opinions are either more valued or mainstream, and other students are able to agree with my decisions more easily. There may be danger in representing the opinions of our class this way, as it may imply that the opinions those in the outskirts of the web do not hold as much importance. Everyone is entitled to their own musical opinions and not choosing the most “popular” songs does not necessarily indicate less importance. Also, even for students who chose the most popular songs, their reasons could be completely different. For example, some students may have chosen a song by Bach for its mathematical excellence and some students may have chosen the same song due to the fact that it falls under the category of classical music. The final decision may not be the most important data in this case and it may be necessary to take a look at a new web created from “reasons why” data. This would be especially significant in looking further into why students did not choose certain songs to be included in their top 10. Different students will again have different reasons for these “null” choices, which could be represented in a similar styled web.