Making a presentation to teach the class about Twitter by solely using Twitter was a task to say the least. Not that creating tweets is difficult, but being able to post them in a way that was organized and had all the information took more time. In our presentation, I think it was helpful that we each made separate Twitter accounts rather than trying to put all of the information onto one timeline. Because Twitter does not allow you to make edits, it would have been a tedious task to make sure 100+ tweets were in the correct order and were error free. It was also beneficial for us to pull up other links and hashtags in a separate browser or use links that took us to a separate browser so that we did not lose our place. Things that did not work so well were using threads to make our tweets and not posting on the timeline so that the last tweet was the beginning of our presentation. Though it did not cause problems in the actual presentation part, it took some time to figure out what order the tweets were in, and this likely made it close to impossible for someone to follow along. I think this was solely on our part, and if we were to do it again, I would suggest that we each make a timeline with individual tweets that start at the top of the account and work our way down rather than using threads. Finding information that we wanted to add in after the initial creation also did not happen because it would have required us to delete everything and start from that point, which was not option. Ensuring that all the information is there before starting also could have been easily fixed by us, as well. I do not think Twitter hindered our usage of it to teach, and it was actually beneficial for us because Twitter is rather simplistic in its usage. Overall, I think the presentation went well, but it was a learning curve and these improvements definitely would have enhanced its quality.

The Internet and social media are two things that I never really thought of as being addictive. I figure this is mostly because I never thought that I needed to be on either, or that I was having withdraws whenever I could not be on it for an extended period of time. However, I think I am completely lying to myself because, as I have said before, I constantly feel an urge to check my phone and wonder what others are doing and posting on social media. I have also been guilty of playing different game apps for hours at a time because I needed to beat a high score. I can imagine that this behavior gets much worse for others, though, and I feel like more resources need to be out there for these people to get help. It is likely that these people have antisocial antics, even they were not there already, and their isolation from the rest of the real world would only further this behavior. Though I do not believe I could ever get to this extent, I have limited my phone usage throughout this semester and plan to continue to spend my time more effectively.

Despite all the negatives mentioned about social media, there is much good that can from it when people learn to use it for the right reasons and take advantage of the ways it can amplify good deeds. Make-A-Wish does an incredible job of making sick children's dreams come true, and in the case of the Batkid, the help of a tremendous amount of strangers also helped to make this little's day. The organization of this event was planned on social media, and I think it is amazing that, for one, this was even possible and also that so many people were willing to make this happen without any form of reward as they just did it out of the goodness of their hearts. The money used to coordinate a child's wish is a perfect use of this money because we really ought to be making the most of their time. Beyond that, we should make a point to try and brighten everyone's day in the best way we know how. For the longest time, my mom would post statuses on Facebook every morning with inspirational quotes or just a miniature pep talk, and as little as this seems, this possibly could have been the motivation someone needed to make it through that particular day. Another way social media tries to do good is through the sharing of GoFundMe pages. Although I do not agree with them removing a portion of the money raised for themselves, I still think it is a good resource to make a fundraiser happen that would otherwise be impossible. Recently, someone from home that was a year older than me passed away in a car accident, and a few people from his graduating class set up a GoFundMe to help his family raise money for his arrangements. I saw it shared on both Facebook and Twitter multiple times and even saw where they had raised well over their goal. It is things like this that restores my faith in humanity, that not everyone is bad and some people simply want to do what is right and what is good. We should all try to implement these behaviors in our daily lives, and putting on social media for a larger audience might just make it contagious.

Talking about public shaming this week in class, my views did a complete 180. When I first watched videos of parents disciplining their children that they had posted online, I did not think much of it. I found humor in some, and even though others were a bit off-colored, I could see where the punishment fit the crime. However, through reading many articles about this kind of humiliation, I realized that I saw no wrong because I am also a product of this authoritative approach to discipline. When I was in the sixth grade, my dad smashed my cell phone with a hammer because I had been texting people that he did not approve of. I wasn't allowed to have a phone for another year, and I honestly feel like I learned my lesson and how to use my technology more appropriately. Although I feel like I turned out okay and didn't suffer from my punishments, my parents also never posted them online. I was honest with my close friends about what happened to my phone, but I lied to most others saying that I had dropped it in water. I think them knowing the truth and actually seeing the ruthlessness of my dad would have embarrassed me to no end. Posting punishments online is uncalled for, and the child's feelings and sense of trust and faith in their parents should be considered in the process. The cost the child has to pay certainly would not be worth it.

With knowledge that future employers or admissions boards would possibly take a look at my social media accounts, I have always been mindful of what I post, even though there is nothing I could post that would potentially cost me a position. I believe many people, or at least I hope that many people, have this mindset and steer clear of controversial and inappropriate postings. What social media users don't realize, however, is that all of their followers and friends are going to judge what they post just the same as their superiors. I would venture to say most people don't worry about this given all of the posts that state, "This is my page, so you can delete me if you don't like what I have to say." Although I agree that you should have this freedom, there is a fine line between your opinion and just being downright rude. People often forget, too, that things like sarcasm and the joking tone you use in your head when typing a post are not conveyed in the words on the screen. It is for these reasons that several people have been highly criticized for their posts and placed under scrutiny by a large group of people on social media. For this reason, I will continue to stay cautious and consider my posts before mindlessly submitting them for the world to see. If others were smart, I believe they would take this advice as well. Regardless of whether your intentions are good in nature or not, it is not worth the risk of your entire reputation.

As someone who is constantly paranoid, I do not play around with my privacy when it comes to social media. I also do not think it's smart for others to leave their accounts open for anyone on their to look at and gain information. In the past week, I have learned that I still not have been putting up as large of a guard as I first thought, though. All of my accounts are protected by password, as is my cellphone, and my accounts have been set with all of the privacy settings that only allow friends of mine to see them, and I am quite choosy with who I allow to "follow" or "become friends" with me. I also do not save my card information to anything or click on random links to suspicious websites. I have even been to the point where I had a serious talk with my grandma so that she would not tag herself in my posts on Facebook anymore because she is prone to hacks as she does not deny any of her friend requests and naively believes everyone is good. As for me, I am suspicious of every person I don't immediately recognize on the Internet. In the last few days, I have taken even further measures and gotten creative with my passwords, ensuring that each is unique from any other site that I am signed up on. I feel like everyone needs to take these measures to protect themselves, even though most of these things do provide quicker access and can be beneficial. Personally, having to memorize a few extra passwords and take out my debit card when I want to make a purchase are definitely worth not taking the risk of getting hacked and having all of my information stolen. In this day and age, people are capable of things that some of us could never imagine, and although it is sad, we, as a society, need to be more leery and less trusting of people we don't know.

In class, we have mentioned that many people do not take the time out of their day to let people know about major life events that have occurred. In a way, I feel like this is a huge pitfall in our society because it's very unfortunate that people cannot share big news with the people we are closest to. On the other hand, though, major news isn't always good news, and I feel that social media is incredibly useful when sharing information without having to repeat it over and over to everyone you know. I have recently experienced the first as one of my best friends from high school got engaged to one of my cousins, actually, and I did not find out until I saw a Facebook post about it close to a week after it happened. I would be lying if I said that I didn't hurt my feelings because it really makes you wonder if you weren't important enough to be personally contacted or told in person. However, another relative of mine had a daughter two years ago today, and unfortunately it was known before she was born that she was going to suffer from a birth defect, CDH. Because she moved away, she has kept up with family on updates of her condition and progress through a Facebook group. I am tremendously grateful for this because with a notification, I never missed anything that was going, especially when things were unpredictable in the beginning. I think it would be awesome if Facebook and other social media accounts would add an easier way to send these out without having to be tagged in a post or always being notified of a particular person's posts. Maybe one day the algorithms will have a better way of showing us these posts that we want to see.