wait, I’ll Google it

When it comes to search engines, Google pops up on top of everything else in our minds. Seemingly harmless, people google everything, anything – anyone, everyone. It has become a default to include the Google search bar in browsers these days. It has become the default thing to do when faced with any problem or queries on anything or anyone.

Truth is, we’re so dependent on internet search that just one day without a search would kill (in my case, that is). But then comes the question: Is Google making us stupid? Before anything, I think its really a matter of perception. Always two sides to a coin, I’d like to see Google as a positive tool to help widen our knowledge. How would it turn you dumber if you’re getting answers(and more) to your burning questions/searches?

fashion manifesto!

Talk about inspiring fashion blogs and usually you get fashion bloggers from the western domains – where are the Asian fashionistas?! (sure, there are Asian fash bloggers living in the western lands but I digress.) In the local context, not any?

I came upon fashion nation (fashionation.wordpress.com) a few months back on Chictopia and its pretty awesome. Founded by two Singaporean girls, fashion nation is a fashion blog based in the local context and in my opinion on par with those big names in blogging fashion. One of the co-writers of the blog, Stephie Tan, spoke to us about her experiences and her take on social media as a guest lecturer one wednesday. Working between her online boutique,  blog and fashion nation, Stephie also travels to different places to source and attend fashion events. Having published the first issue of the online fashion magazine Manifesto, I applaud Stephie for her hard work and the courage to pursue her passion over a stable job in the finance industry she was in.

p.s. I think the mag’s really awesome, can’t wait for the next issue!

the crowd has spoken

A crowd, faced with a question or a problem, or an idea, is made up of a wide range of different diverse people with as many perspectives as there are people.  Yet there often seems to be a wisdom, a coalescing of sense, that can be deduced or extracted, or “consensed” from the crowd using a range of known processes.  In a given process, the crowd takes on a consciousness, and adopts a perspective or a position on an issue, which represents its ‘wisdom”.

More often than not, we seek and heed advice for anything, everything. For example, getting a new laptop would mean online research and that usually includes opinions from hardware forums; checking out online reviews for “stars” awarded for a new book or movie that you’re thinking of getting or watching but you want the green light from the reviewers online anyway.

By taking into account the collective opinion of a group of individuals, this process, while not new to the information age, has also been pushed into the spotlight by social information sites such as Wikipedia and Yahoo! Answers, and other web resources that rely on human opinion. Check out how Google puts this amazing theory to work!

http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2005/09/putting-crowd-wisdom-to-work.html

references: google and The Wisdom of Crowds by James Surowiecki

The Communications Revolution

We’ve experienced a change of seismic proportions in our daily communicative needs. Technologies have revolutionlized our lives – like it or not, we’re all slaves to the digitalisation age.

We use it  to get by our day-to-day communicative needs. Increasingly gaining its popularity is the world wide web – it is also through this technology that started the virtual reality. Friendships, relationships are forged on the basis on what is perceived online on social networks.

Addiction to these social platforms is heightened with the increased amount of time spent online. In the U.S. alone, total minutes spent on social networking sites has increased 83 percent year-over-year. In fact, total minutes spent on Facebook increased nearly 700 percent year-over-year, growing from 1.7 billion minutes in April 2008 to 13.9 billion in April 2009. http://blog.nielsen.com/nielsenwire/online_mobile/time-spent-on-facebook-up-700-but-myspace-still-tops-for-video/

With increased exposure, social media has since grown to be a platform for social interaction, information and even a business strategy for many budding and big names alike. http://www.socialmedia.biz/

It’s a lot of fun observing and learning with these new communication platforms but I think the need to practice self-constrain still applies, we don’t want to be excessively reliant on technology just yet!