The first news I heard about him was that he was in a car crash. My reaction was “…Ok. Well, he’s alright…why is this such a big deal?”

Then he starts apologizing… and I get even more confused.

Was he drunk driving? Was he on drugs while driving? Maybe he was texting and driving.

No, he has mistresses. What the…?! What the hell does that have to do with a car accident? Was the mistress in the car? Was the wife in the car? What is going on here?!

Then we hear about Rachel Uchitel, some random socialite. So, apparently Elin Nordegren, Tiger’s wife, WHO IS A MODEL, BY THE WAY (What is with men??????) was chasing Tiger with a golf club after the tabloids came out about the alleged affair. Hell, I would be swinging golf clubs too, and Tiger had to flee (ha! What an interesting joke) and then he smashed into a fire hydrant.

Okay. So then some time goes by… Jaimee Grubbs comes forward and says she had a 31 month affair with Tiger. What? And she was on Tool Academy? Should that not say something about her character? Tiger, you are a tool, my friend.

The Australian article also states that Tiger had up to six mistresses.

So Tiger has not revealed any of his “shortcomings.” Yet, he has apologized. So how many mistresses does this guy have? Why so many? Which tabloids are right? Which are wrong? Should we believe anything? Is Tiger in the clear? Should we judge him without knowing him? Maybe his wife was having affairs. Who knows.

Should we thank real-time search for keeping us up to date on Tiger’s sex life?

I am on team Elin on this one. Shame on you, Tiger. You have kids and a beautiful wife! It just proves that some people can never be happy with what they have.

Smells like Jon Gosselin in here…

Google real-time search updates as stuff is happening around the Web — for example, live tweets, Yahoo Answers, news articles and Web pages now stream in on the actual result pages for your query. It works on mobile too (at leastiPhone and Android for now).

As I have previously discussed, real-time collaboration is the newest, big deal trend. Google’s working on Wave, Twitter has more real-time features and Facebook has live feed, amongst others. Therefore, it should come as no surprise that Google has introduced real-time search. As I am writing this, I have not seen any real-time results on my search page, and I am still trying to figure it out!

The company has signed deals with Twitter, Facebook and Myspace (although, I am not quite sure why they would sign a deal with Myspace when it is not doing very well). This is a good move on Google’s part, especially since Bing already has real-time search.

The question is…. is it too late? Will the fact that Bing has already had real-time search for quite some time push it forward? Or is Google so big and so well known that it does not matter that it released real-time search a little late?

Even one commenter here stated that he or she did not need Facebook statuses indexed in his search, which brings up a valid point. Is it even necessary to see these statuses? Will they be useful? I do admit that I get a lot of breaking news from Twitter. As soon as people tweet about it, it is a great way to know things quickly. However, if I am looking for serious research, it probably will not be necessary. BUT, on the other hand, as shown in the demo video, Tweets do come up and they are handy, especially when looking for traffic information.

Bottom line: I feel like since Google has so much of the market share, it is not too little too late for them. Also, will some of the statuses and social networking information be frivolous? Probably, but I could see it as being convenient as well.

For your final blog post, please predict, based on what you’ve learned and what your *imagination* says, what you think will be key to winning the 2012 election online.

From what I have seen in this class and around the Web, the key is: collaboration.

Right now, the most talked about collaborative tool is Wave…which involves real time collaboration. Granted, by 2012, I am sure Google Wave will be old news, but I feel that the idea will still be relevant.

The presidential nominees could collaborate in real-time with the voters, allowing them to ask questions or post their concerns. The real-time collaboration could also work with presidential supporters. It would allow them to more easily contact individuals to get them out to vote, they could work on flyers and pamphlets together, and it enable more convenient conferencing. (Between both political staffers and their supporters).

Another trend that we have seen recently is the increased use of mobile Web. This article states that there will be 975 million mobile Web users by 2012, which means that politics will need to involve mobile social media more than ever. Their Web sites will HAVE to be mobile ready, no large fonts and crazy graphics. (Although by 2012, mobile Web will probably also be much more advanced, so perhaps fancy graphics will be allowed). Mobile  e-mail and Web will be much faster at this point, so it will allow for better communication. Plus, it will be much easier to rally people to get out and vote.

There will be much more on-the-go action in 2012.

Finally, I think that Facebook will still be around, but I think it will be completely different. It will focus more on live feeds, and real-time collaboration. I do not see it heading back to its roots as a place for college kids to hang out, rather, I see it as being used by businesses and politicians even more.

I do not know if Twitter will still be around, but if it is, I think it will also be different. It is starting to get in to real-time updates, but in order for it to be even more powerful, I think changes need to be made.

I think that Google will have more to do with the elections. As previously mentioned, Google Wave, or the next update to it, will be a major player in the election. Perhaps the company will have more collaborative software, or maybe it will get more into the mobile Web market. Either way, I think that Google will be big.

Of course, this is all speculation, since it is always hard to say what will be the next trend in social media. Approximately two years is a long time. We may be to Web 3.0 or 4.0 by then!

One entry was from November 11, 2009 and it discussed Lebanon and its government.  The country has a government for the first time in five months, after the parliamentary elections.  It was interesting to read the article, because not only did it discuss the events, but it also shared different quotes from bloggers and how they reacted after the news spread. The best part was that the author said that bloggers took to their spaces as soon as the news was made official. This reminded me of our early discussions in class and how blogging is now one of the fastest ways of spreading information now.

Another entry discussed a recent event that took place discussing the dangers of smoking. The entry states that bloggers claimed the event was a failure because most pubs did not become smoke-free. It was interesting to see Lebanon’s views on the issue compared to ours in the United States. Perhaps one day Lebanon’s bars will be non-smoking like ours, since our country used to also allow smoking.

One fun article stated that there was a contest in Lebanon to see if 300 chefs could make the biggest plate of hummus. The purpose of the contest was to showcase Lebanese dishes that are being created in Israel. What an interesting way to protest, or even inform people that these dishes are Lebanese. Once again, the author gives posts from different blogs about the food.

I started out not knowing anything about Lebanon, and now have different pieces of information. The blogs were so different in their entries, but I was able to gain a wide spread of knowledge, which is more helpful than just knowing about one subject.

All of the blogs were serious in their material. Even the hummus contest was intertwined with politics. I thought this assignment was very interesting because of the variety of information provided.

For your blog entry this week, write a little bit about the experience of editing Wikipedia. What did you learn? Was it easier or harder than you thought it would be? How does seeing the guts of Wikipedia change your perspective on the project?

I had a hard time deciding what to edit on Wikipedia. I do not particularly consider myself to be an expert on any subject, so I knew that the toughest part about editing the site would be determining what to edit.

I then thought to check out my college’s Wiki. Gettysburg College recently built a new recreation center, and I noticed that the Wiki made no mention of it, so I decided to write about it. The building is the newest and probably now the most expansive on campus, so I thought it was definitely worth mentioning.

I began by reading the tutorial. It was simple enough, in my opinion. But I was unsure of whether I was required to say what I wanted to include in the talk page and then wait until I received a confirmation, or if I could say what I wanted to write about and then go ahead and put it on the page with the hopes that it would not be taken down. The semi-unfortunate issue is that my college’s Wiki talk page is not active. However, I got the go ahead from Garrett to add my part about the new Center and moved on.

I then looked up the information that I needed. It was easy to figure out what I needed to include, but the hardest part was following Wikipedia’s tags. It was almost like trying to follow HTML. I wish they made it easier to edit things, because when I was creating my footnotes I had to go back and correct them at least three times before they showed up on the page and the reference list. (Interestingly enough, this did not become a problem until I wanted to use the same reference in multiple places).

Overall, I found that creating the Wikipedia page was not as difficult as I thought it would be. My edits are still up (maybe because the community is not active, but maybe not!) and hopefully I will be able to attract some potential students to Gettysburg through my thorough description of the new athletic center. The project made me see that while it may be difficult for some people to edit Wiki pages, it was not hard for me. I also learned that it is not that simple to create a page, but it can be reverted very easily, as was discussed in class.

Mashable featured an article about IKEA’s newest marketing strategy using Facebook.

Essentially, the furniture superstore opened up a new center in Sweden and instead of simply putting up banners advertising the opening, or sending out advertisements in the mail, the company created a Facebook account for the store manager and had him upload photographs of the showrooms to his Facebook account and whoever tagged themselves as a piece of furniture, won that item. The link quickly spread to thousands, and Mashable dubbed it as a genius use of photo tagging.

A genius idea, indeed. IKEA was able to create a campaign out of a technology that already exists. It was most likely inexpensive for them to create, seeing as signing up for a Facebook account is free and the furniture they gave away probably did not cost that much to them. The store also had a limited budget, so their advertising firm had to be creative. They were also able to use one of the best marketing and public relations strategies: word of mouth.

Additionally, Facebook is probably the best platform to use, since most of IKEA’s furniture is cheap and bought by younger people (who are mostly using Facebook). Plus, instead of just announcing on Facebook that some event is occurring, the Swedish company was able to utilize one of the most popular Facebook features and create a cheap contest, which got people to move the message.

However, while in theory Facebook may have been the best platform…one commenter on Mashable points out that IKEA’s contest was actually against the social network’s TOS. Facebook requires official representation, third party apps, etc. and so it has yet to be seen whether Facebook has taken action against IKEA, and whether it will tarnish the campaign.

It is also unclear whether the campaign actually got any more people into the store, but it is still an innovative way to use social media and photo tagging to advertise an event. While other companies may not use the Facebook platform to do something like this in the future because of the guidelines, it has still presented a new way of thinking.

In college, if I needed to know something for a class or a paper, I turned to the site. However, this is not to say that I used it exclusively for my assignments. As discussed in class, Wikipedia is an excellent tool for general knowledge and for topics that need to be known quickly. And contributors do need to cite their information. But it has been seen that the online encyclopedia contains mistakes, sometimes deliberate. (As seen in this article that states that pranksters said David Beckham was a Chinese goalkeeper in the 18th century, or that Tony Blair’s middle name is “Whoop-de Do.”) And who is to say that these people out in the online world, masking themselves behind computer screens, are actually experts?

Granted, users do need to go through a discussion page and follow the tutorial before submitting changes or new topics, but I feel that there must be a better way to guarantee that what is on Wikipedia is truthful. Could Wikipedia work so that after a certain number of entries and changes, a person received points, or some type of grade that allowed them to become an “expert?” Could there be some sort of ranking system that moved from “newbie” to “expert,” so users that look up information on Wikipedia could know that some people are more legitimate, or more of an expert? Although, this raises the question of just because someone has not posted as much does not mean that they are not an expert in different fields.

Also, as pointed out in class, there have been errors in more traditional encyclopedias as well. Wikipedia even has a list of topics and facts that it has corrected. The Encyclopedia Britannica was written by 100 full-time editors and over 4,000 contributors (interestingly enough, I found this out on Wikipedia because when I googled “Who wrote the encyclopedia britannica I did not come up with an obvious answer). After a little more digging, I found this. The staff is made up of surgeons, Nobel Laureates, economists, computer scientists, authors, etc.

While you could argue that Wikipedia probably has contributors that are doctors, economists, computer scientists, novelists, etc., the Encyclopedia Britannica has an Editorial Board of Advisors which monitors the Encyclopedia. AGAIN, you could probably argue that the discussion board acts as a board of advisors, but I feel like the Encyclopedia Britannica is more formal. However, maybe the Encyclopedia Britannica is a thing of the past…a lot of the advisors have since died… and maybe the publication is fading.

The Internet is bringing people together more easily than ever before, and perhaps Wikipedia will someday not be criticized or watched (What is that site, anyway? It is weird). However, I still feel more comfortable using Wikipedia as a source for quick and general knowledge, and tend to use the library and more scholarly works for details on various topics, especially for school.

My family always had cats growing up.

First there was Hershey, a Seal Point Siamese kitty, who was so friendly and loved to eat ice cream. We got her when I was in second grade. She was my first real pet, you know, besides the hamsters, one goldfish, and random other small critters that lived in our house.

Hershey also liked to go outside. She loved the outdoors. She was hit by a car when I was in 5th grade. I was devastated. I cried for days and went out in the neighborhood searching for her, because a family friend had called and said she thought she saw Hershey on the side of the road near our house.

I never found her.

Our house was lonely for awhile–no meowing or cleaning litter boxes. That’s when Reese came along.

We got Reese, a Chocolate Point Siamese, from a breeder. We knew right away he was not Hershey. First of all, he was supposed to be pure bred, but he had especially long fur and a few suspect markings. He was also a terrible kitten. He scratched our leather couches, forcing my parents to put large comforters on them. Reese’s claws came out as soon as he was old enough.

Reese was supposed to be my cat again, but my mom was the one who really took care of him. Reese and my mom were inseperable. I went off to college, and being an only child, Reese was the lone kid in the house. He had been growing older, he was 11 and still living a good life outdoors. My parents vowed to not let another cat outside after Hershey died, but he escaped once and just loved the backyard. During the summer of 2008, he was attacked by an animal and had to be taken to the ER. My parents were a wreck..even my dad who claims to not like cats. Reese survived and recovered.

This past summer, I had a tough time dealing with some personal problems, and eventually started to get past them. I decided that I wanted a kitten of my own.

I found one on Craigslist. He was a very small, 8 week old kitten. Gray.Tom and I went to go look at him and immediately I fell in love. I took her home that night and to the vet the next day to get checked out.

12 ounces and healthy as can be.

My favorite part of the day was coming home in the afternoon and playing with her. Seeing her come out from under my comforter where she had been sleeping and let out little meows. We were inseperable. Tom thought I was a nut because of how attached to Tucker I was…but there was no denying..she was adorable.

The above photo is her a few days before I got her.

Tucker and I have had a rough start. She had an umbilical hernia, whic sent us to the ER in the middle of the night and cost me a whopping $1,000. Money that I don’t really have, but I took it out of my savings, because what should I have done? Let her die?

We also found out Tucker is a girl, not a boy, but we kept the name because everyone likes it.The way that I go back and forth between “he” and “she” in this post shows how confusing it got at first!

She is now six months old and is still my favorite. I still love coming home to her after work and cuddling with her in bed. She is crazy and still small, probably the runt of the litter, and loves to play. And she REALLY loves to eat.

I found out a month ago that Reese died in May. He went out one night and never came back, and my parents have only assumed the worst. My mother did not want to tell me because of what I was going through at the time, but she assured me that I now have my own kitten to take care of.

She says that when her and my dad retire they will get a Siamese kitten, but until then, the house will  be lonely.

While I may be turning into a cat lady, I never realized how much happiness having your own pet can bring. I know I’m not the only one. Lolcats definitely has some crazy cat owners (who have a sense of humor!!). Meowmail (Although Tucker does not have email, but if she did, she’d get mail because she is popular), Catbook (Reese had one), Catster, and numerous, numerous others.

Urban Dictionary is similar to a small Wikipedia, except that it consists of definitions of words, mostly slang. Anyone can add their own words, or contribute additional definitions to a word that is already in the dictionary.

The words range from silly (like Movember) to dirty or gross (like butt acne).

Not only does Urban Dictionary provide you with definitions, but there are also synonyms and the words are used in a sentence.  Sometimes, there are even pictures to show you the word.

The site also includes a marketplace where you can buy mugs with your favorite saying , a blog, a chatroom , and a link to buy their books.

I think Urban Dictionary is a genius idea and I find it to be useful. I use it mostly when a friend says some slang word that I have never heard of…and instead of sounding ignorant in front of a group of people, I nod my head enthusiastically, fake a laugh, and then hop onto my computer or my phone and go to Urban Dictionary to look up the mysterious word.

I do not ever have to worry whether a word will not be on the site. There are over four million words to look through.

Some consider the Web site to be gross, vile, or plain immature, but even Time considered it one of the top 50 Web sites in 2008.

And if that is not enough for you to take Urban Dictionary seriously, Aaron Peckham, the founder, is a software engineer at Google, and he once had big dreams to create a Thesaurus, which makes him a real go-getter.

Granted, some of the words are just outlandish or plain stupid…  but if you want to stay hip and not look like a fool at a party…you should probably keep Urban Dictionary handy.

The TwitterPeek was originally listed for $200 with lifetime service, or you can purchase it for $100, with six months free service, and then after that time period you will pay $8 a month. . . . to only use Twitter.

You cannot access links in Tweets because…well…the TwitterPeek…which I’ll call TP for short… does not have access to the Internet.

The good news is that it can last up to 3-4 days in between charges (not that that is impressive since the only thing the device does is look at Twitter) and it was designed with the Twitter people…so it is “intuitive to use.” I would hope it is intuitive to use…all it does is use Twitter. I will not even get started on why it would be difficult to type in 140 words and then hit post.

Apparently some people think it is silly to purchase a smart phone and pay a lot of money to use it. (I am not in this category, my iPhone is essentially an extension of my right hand). Ok. That’s fine. I can understand that…but you can do txt updates to Twitter on your Motorola Razr that you are still carting around because you refuse to give in to the trends. If there are people out there who are not texting, I can bet that they are also not tweeting.

Then I read this post that Mashable linked to and I got confused.

Wait, the TwitterPeek checks your email? Maybe this whole post was wrong.

I then realized that the post is referring to the original Peek that has messaging capabilities…and that is it.

Hell, I could make a case for that. I am attached to my email and if the iPhone was not around, I could see myself as possibly being interested in a Peek…but the TwitterPeek does not retrieve your email for you or message your friends. Unless of course you want to communicate via direct message or tweets. But that does not seem practical if you are going to be having a conversation.

Bottom line: I agree with most of the commenters on Mashable… and…mostly everyone else on the Internet.

TwitterPeek is an unnecessary device.