PARK(ing) Day : Parking Garage

Listen. Enjoy. Music.

For me, what is important about a park is just getting out of the house and enjoying nature. When outside, we can enjoy the sounds of birds, trees moving, and people enjoying themselves outside, too. A park is a place where people can just take a breath and enjoy a nice walk or sit in the grass and get away from the world.

During my summer trip in NYC, a group had

put out

pianos all

over the city for people to just sit

down and play. It didn't matter that there was a random piano out in the open, people came up to it and either played the piano or listened to someone playing along.

Along with playing, just getting to use the resources in parks to play around is nice. There was this park in the Chinatown in Manhattan where, not only were there swings, but the open grass area was where a lot of people went out to play badminton.

My Google Map

View My SF in a larger map
This was my first experience at using Google Maps for something other than looking up directions or finding the location of certain buildings. I never knew that one could actually create their own map of their life on here. It's quite interesting to know that it's possible, but I can see how something like a map of information can lead to stalkers if used for personal interests and telling people where exactly you are on what days, etc. What I did not like about making this map was that when filling out descriptions, the box was not large enough for photos sometimes. I saw that the photo shrunk itself and the box adjusted itself when being viewed but as I am editing, it took up a lot of space in the box. I wish you could also change colors for the pins to create a more colorful image. Perhaps I could and I just was not aware of it.
I enjoyed creating a timeline more than this because I was able to speak of my adventures of a nonexistent world on the timeline. As for this, I felt a bit scared of knowing if I gave out too much information to creepers out in the world. I also liked how the timeline could be viewed in different ways as this map is ... just a map.

Dipity Dooooo!

Flo Y. on Dipity.

Oh Dipity. I found out that Dipity is a pretty useful and/or fun tool! The only part that made me dislike it was the fact that my internet is slow and the pop ups to edit my entries was a bit of a bore. Like I used the timeline for, it shows that this timeline application can be used for fun and to let other users keep track of how another person is doing in a game. It's quite fun and I bet if someone famous were to use it for their upcoming tour dates and release dates for music or the next event they're attending to, fans could know more of what's going on, yet be a bit stalkerish.

For research papers, knowing when events in time happened can really give an idea to how to help the future or see what went wrong in the past to help make a better future. Timelines can be fun and others can helpful. It all depends on how the user uses it.

For me, the design aspect seemed very simple and it made sense. It was straight to the point and it placed all my events in an organized way. The bubbles went around each other instead of on top of each other, which I was really hoping for. And I really liked how you can look at different views of the timeline. Not only was it a typical timeline, you could look at it like a map or a list.

The Future

I feel like sites like Facebook will have quite a run in the future. There’s something about its simplicity and fun applications that draw users in and help to socialize from far distances. E-mail is not the front-runner in doing such a thing anymore. It’s all about being able to post videos and photos to share with everyone and everybody you know. Maybe, one day, Facebook will actually take a fall and become the past, but a new site will be built on why Facebook met its defeat. Maybe that new site will allow users to call and video chat to one another while leaving comments, gaming, and posting images up. A new social network to do it all. Perhaps even all websites will merge into one mega super duper website! But, that will likely not happen due to every business wanting to be able to stand on their own. Every new social networking website will be working hard to create a sleek clean look that will please all audiences. I believe simplicity is best, but others may not. And there’s the issue right there: how are you suppose to please everyone at once? That’s the most difficult task in created a networking site, I believe. Just like all the social networking sites we have now, the site runs numerous tests to create the site they have now. I just hope that the next best thing doesn’t allow immature teenagers to join and think they’re the best things since a bag of chips. It’ll time will show us the next best thing.

My First Tumblr Experience

This site seems to join together people who love to say short things and show pictures to one another. Almost anyone is who the community is for this site. The first thing I was told to do when I joined was to add a photo of myself. I just inserted a drawing I used for anther website I’m a part of. The site went on and on about how to use it and promoted ways of promoting itself, such as using the Facebook app which could show Facebook users that you’re using Tumblr. The goals of the users is to search upon each others site and share what someone had just posted or post your own to show to others. Interactions are simple, you can follow someone and see what they’re up to. The key thing that Tumblr wants users to do is follow other people so you can be a part of the community. Social status is measured by how many people are following you. To be socially successful is to have great things posted on your account and to be known by following others so they follow you and see what you have up. In a way this site reminds me a lot like Twitter, but … better. You can post photos and videos and your words can be more than just one hundred and forty-five characters. What I do like about the site is that it’s extremely easy to use. But maybe that’s just because I’m a bit tech-savy so sites like this come naturally to me.

MySpace to Facebook

The first social media I ever used had to be the social network: MySpace. During high school, Internet was becoming a larger craze than it had been before, in my eyes, and all the students were into this MySpace thing. I joined and befriended almost everyone I knew in school and other schools. In a way, it was just a feeling of being “connected” that brought me to become a user. I do not use it anymore because MySpace is infested with immature high schoolers trying to look “sexy” and the pages that allow users to customize look a mess. Now I am a current member of Facebook. It started at the end of my high school years because Facebook had opened itself to the high school audience. It seemed a lot more mature and had a simple interface that was used for everyone’s profile. Slowly I began my merge from MySpace to Facebook. Up to now, I still use Facebook, and I do enjoy it, except I do wish Facebook had kept to college students only.

Design Questions

1. Just like any other virtual world out there, players must be able to chat in some way with other players. In the image is where users can type in a message and send to people who are currently present where the player's avatar is. When beginning the game, the screen has pop ups that appear explaining how to do specific tasks, like send gifts to other users. Also, the game asks if you would like to post your doings on your facebook wall and users are allowed to accept or decline the offer.

2. When you click on another user's avatar, this menu (shown on the right) pops up. It gives you options through images of what you can do with this players. You can kiss them, fight them, dance, random doings. When fixing your house to your liking, you can drag and drop pictures of furniture into your room and move them wherever you would like. When changing outfits, the users can click on what clothes they'd like to wear.

3. Color is everything in YoVille. It helps to give a distinct difference to characters. For example, I know my character has green eyes and black hair, as for my friend has blue eyes and brown hair. Color lets the user be an individual in this virtual world. Depending on where the mouse is makes the user face a certain way to specify who or what the character is looking at. Also, music plays in the background fitting whatever scene the user is brought into which puts a certain mood with the image.

4. Throughout the game, multiple pop ups (like the one on the right) come up and suggest to you things that you may want to do. Getting involved in such activity makes your character grow with experience to give you more things to your account and have a higher status. Many of these pop ups are to interact with fellow users. Other than joining a fight, players can give gifts to one another.

5. For some reason, purchasing things in the game really make me feel like I am there. Perhaps its the natural want for materialistic things that drags me in, although the things I purchase are not real. I guess one could say it is a sad obsession to have anything I want even when I do not need it.

6. Whenever I saw other avatars, I would give a simple "hi there," or "hello." I would either get a reply or get shunned. Talks never went so far as a greeting and a how are you. Unfortunately, my character, Banana J, isn't much of a talker unless someone engages. I guess people were not really interested in my little man. What was terrible about trying to socialize was that some people were away from the computers and I would not know unless it specifically said the user was offline, which only is seen in homes.

7. In this world, a way to earn money is by going in daily to the Yo Factory and clicking on a machine to work. By doing that you instantly earn at least 250 coins. Just like real life, you need to work for your money. Other ways to earn money is by participating in activities with friends, such as fighting them or dancing with them. Just being active can help to gain items and/or money.

8. My favorite in-world activity would have to be just buying things for my character. I become a beast when it comes to creating a character. I like making them look fantastic, or at least what I believe is fantastic. I like looking at what the creators of the game have made for characters to wear. Sometimes the creativity is lacking a bit, but I still enjoy browsing none-the-less.

9. Just like the image for questions 7, pop ups are all around to tell you how and what to do. Everything is mainly based on a click type usage. All you need to do is click this or that and you can get whatever it is that you are trying to get.

10. In the Agency Chapter, the writer explains how character begin with nothing and they end up with a lot. Although it is true, the beginning starts out rough and it takes a while to begin earning the big bucks. It's all about being involved in the game and continuously doing random tasks to get money. A bit of a forceful socializing and gameplay time.