Interesting Readings/Concepts

After reviewing some of the readings we were assigned this semester I think that I especially enjoyed/appreciated the readings on facebook and creating your own identities online. So with that said, I found the concepts like uses and gratification, process gratification, and content gratification. These readings stood out from the rest, for me, simply because I use facebook all of the time and consider myself to be Internet savy. I think at the back of my mind, I always knew that I posted certain pictures and comments for particular reasons but to have the reading really point what I was doing out to me and define it was very interesting (I hope that made sense). I guess, it was interesting to see that there was even a communication concept for what I was doing, because I had no idea that it was that big of a deal. These readings also made me become more aware of how I was representing myself on and off line and how others were portraying themselves as well.

What I have learned/Favorite/Least Favorite/Improvement

Like Professor Perez, I am actually a bit sad that this class is coming to an end. Comm 131 New Media/You Media was my first ever online class and I have to say that it has also been one of my favorites. What I like about this class was how easy it was to follow and I really appreciated the interactivity between both the students and classmates and students and professor that was achieved through blogging. Having blogging as your weekly assignment was great! It was actually really fun and easy to use. I also really enjoyed going onto the class blogspot and reading over Professor Perez’s overviews and summaries of each of our readings. Not only were they insightful and straight to the point but they sure beat being stuck in a classroom listening to a lecture for an hour and a 15 minutes. One last thing that I definitely appreciated about the class and about our instructor was how easy to reach Professor Perez was and how quick she was to respond to our questions, concerns, emails, etc. I think my least favorite thing about the class (and I think this could go for any online class or pretty much any class in general) was how it could be so easy for a student to forget a due date or to turn in something on time. I think with online classes you really have to read posts and directions thoroughly or you could potentially miss a very important note or detail. This is something I learned early on this semester. And it was a mistake I definitely tried not to make again. I think one way to improve this, would be to have more reminders posted, but then again what was done in class should have been enough and it really is on the student. Lastly, I really really enjoyed the content of the class. New Media/You Media is something I really enjoyed learning about and a topic that I have found that I am actually pretty interested in. I loved learning about different ways to communicate and interact on line and the affects and results that come along with it. I also found the evolution of media to be interesting and the whole creating/finding your identity online interesting as well. Overall, awesome class! And I would definitely take another online class with Professor Perez again!