Assignment 4 - Thoughts

What is privacy? Do we even know what about us is being put into databases? Do we care? For sure there are those of us who do, but how many of them are there? And should we listen to them? Is it a totally bad thing that companies can now target specific advertisements to us? Or is it a scary thing that they know enough about us to target these ads?

Everyone likes customization, it's convenient. But what do you pay for this convenience?

As we are sitting down as a group of four, we realized that discussion we are having is very helpful to share our viewpoints and perceptions. It is almost as it we are putting Andrejevic's points at work in real life. Our discussion is providing us a good starting point for the blog, but finding it difficult at the same time to put all of our words into a single blog post. Initially we did not think about any concerns of trying to compile our viewpoints into one post. This issue however further benefits us to try and hit the key points of assignment four. It allows us to discuss the questions we have on the reading and then translate them into our post. This gives us the opportunity to use our own personal blogs for further expression and commenting.

In terms of interactivity, Mark Andrejevic refuses to outright define what interactivity is. Being interactive is the new wave of technology. By putting an "i" in front of anything it therefore becomes interactive. For example "icentury" is described as "...a period in which the prefix signifying the promise of the interactive revolution became ubiquitous" (pp. 4 Andrejevic).

The NIKE id campaign that was launched has given the opportunity for personal customization of a pair of shoes valuing at a flat rate of $99.