Is anyone interested in living a "second life."

I am not sure whether i completely grasp the concept of second life even after reading more than two articles. I however know that it is basically creating a virtual life for yourself so that you are constantly in contact with the rest of the world. Now do I personally think that's a good idea, "No."I say no because i like to have my space and therefore have no interest in a "Second Life."

Second Life seems like a great tool that allows people to be more of themselves and to carry themselves better than they would in public. Cooper's portrait of Jason Rowe, for instance, stops you dead. He stares straight at you out of startled blue eyes. But what takes you aback is his frail body, his clenched hands, and the ominous ventilator strapped to his face.
"My condition is called Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy," Rowe told Spaight. "It pretty much affects all the muscles in the body. They don't function." Jason, a disabled man, lives his life vicariously through his avatar which seems extremely fulfilling and encouraging for him. Second Life also helps businesses in reaching out to their consumer's directly. Having an alter ego is exciting for everyone but when that alter ego cannot have a one on one conversation with it's audience that's when we start questioning the efficiency of the tool.

I had never heard of Second Life until I read this article therefore i guess as one of the articles puts it best that i am late to the party."If this is news to you, consider yourself extravagantly late to the costume party that is online role-playing."

Does The Internet Really Make Us Dumb?

Does the internet really make us dumb? This a good question to ask and I am sure most people would probably answer it without really thinking about it. Before I read the Nobel winner's article, i did what most people would do. Answer the question without taking the time to think about it. My answer was there is not way that the internet makes people dumb. If anything, it makes the smarter but then I had a slightly different reaction after I read the Nobel winner's speech was inspiring in more ways than one. As much as I still don't agree entirely with her remarks on the internet making us dumb, her speech made me appreciate how she was feeling and where she was coming from when she made that statement. We are a jaded lot, we in our world - our threatened world. We are good for irony and even cynicism. Some words and ideas we hardly use, so worn out have they become. But we may want to restore some words that have lost their potency.

In a lot of ways the internet has taught the world, things that we would have never known. We have visited countries and met people that we would have never met because of social media. We have also gained access to incredible knowledge.For all those dumb people reading this who might never had read anything of substance before, may I suggest Wikipedia, it’s apparently a place where you can read interesting things, but it isn’t on paper, so it might not count. On the other hand the internet has corrupted our society, it has been the source of crimes, murders, suicides etc. Both children and adults have had access to information that they might never have had when it comes to the internet and that has either shortened their lives by helping them commit suicide for example or made them worse off.

Whether or not one approves of wikis, blogs, and the other digital tools of social media, they are becoming the key ways in which all of us—Harvard professors and adolescents alike—distribute and acquire our information. So leaders of associations that pursue the counter-revolutionary Updikian option and completely reject the social media revolution are likely to be remembered as Canute 2.0 or Custer 2.0. I completely agree with Andrew Keen's article on the social media making us worse of than better off. Social media has given us a platform to choose our destiny, to educate ourselves on the good, bad and the ugly and make a choice for ourselves. The challenge is to pick the 'good' has been the issue with most people and this is why these two authors we are reading about disagree with the internet wave.

My personal thought on these two articles overall is that we need to stick to the basics and what we know which is the real knowledge of books and professionals and use the internet to enhance what we already know and not take away from it.

Connecting With People The Old Way

As much as social networking has taken over our society and helped us connect to the rest of the world, it has also hindered and changed our effectiveness when it comes to networking. Most people now rely solely on networking online and searching for jobs online instead of trying to meet people face to face which is the old school and most effective way to gain favor from people.
I"’m getting a LOT of chats from people who have been laid off. Most of the time I find that they just aren’t presenting a good face to me for me to help them find a new job. If you are laid off, here’s what you need to do." Robert Scoble


During my second year in undergraduate school I started applying for internships online and applied to quite a number of internships online. I got some responses to some and went for interviews. Others never called back. One of the companies that turned me down gave me an offer after I went to a networking event, met some of their representatives, interacted with them and called them back after i got back. A couple of days later, I got a call back from the same company that I had applied to several times before and the difference was because I had actually met some of their representatives face to face and made an impression.


"Old School" Networking is a technique we should not shy away or try to move away from because it has proven to be the most effective way of making your mark and landing the best jobs in the corporate world. It is important that people have that face to face, one on one human connection. "3. Connect with the person directly-Social media has broken down barriers, to a point where you can message someone you aren’t friends with and don’t have contact information for, without any hassles. Before you message a target employee, realize that they receive messages from people asking for jobs all the time and that they might not want to be bothered on Facebook, where their true friends are. As long as you’ve done your homework on the company and them, tailor a message that states who you are and your interest, without asking for a job at first. Get to know them and then by the 3rd or 4th messages, ask if there is an available opportunity.

Talking or Listening which is better?

This weeks reading discusses the importance of helping the customer to understand your product by taking time out to talk about your company and product to them and helping them understand what they are buying or getting themselves into. Social Networking today is for the most part focused on making a connection with the customer by engaging in conversation with him/her but making a connection with your customer goes farther than that. A company needs to pace importance on getting to know it's customer base and vice versa.

People become more effective to a company or a group if they are allowed to get involved with understanding what the company is all about and one sure way to achieve this goal is by allowing the customer to do more of the talking and showing that they understand what the company is about. As easy as this may sound, this has been one of the biggest challenges for companies and networks. It is much easier for them to talk at the customer instead of make it a conversation where both entities are contributing equally. Some companies or people feel it's an abomination to spend time on really educating the customer on what the company is about whiles allowing them to tell you their understanding of what the company is is about. http://www.chrisbrogan.com/shut-up-youre-helping-the-customer/. This link stresses on that fact. An employee who felt that educating the customers about the company was the right way to go is on the verge of losing his job and this stresses a lot on the point that was just made.

"Open Innovation: A Blessing or a Curse?

In Japan, sharing ideas across companies is very much a part of the Japanese culture. The Japanese do believe that there is strength in numbers and I guess the country's innovative ways and products speaks for itself. In Ghana, a small country in West Africa where I come from, once someone starts something different for eg. a new type of business that nobody has every thought of everyone starts to copy that idea so fast that the strength of the purpose of that idea is weakened.
In America and most westernized Cultures, our Culture does not encourage the sharing of ideas and this is because we are selfish when it comes to competition. We want to get ahead of the game but most of the time our ultimate goal is to have control over our product thereby reaping the benefits all by ourselves because we believe that since we created it, then why should we share it?

Big firms here in the U.S should be willing to share ideas in an open setting specifically with people in similar industries and this would open up new doors that they never imagined. I believe that infusing that attitude in our culture will help America get ahead and stay ahead of the rest of the world with regards to industries. This sharing of ideas just like everything else in our lives, should have boundaries. By saying boundaries what do I mean? Corporate "teams" from all similar industries for example the auto industry, should be formed and this way they can share ideas and strengthen their products. What i don't agree with is people pitching their ideas for free, I personally don't think it's fair. Anyone with an innovative idea should be able to pitch it and most importantly reap the benefits from it if the idea becomes successful and this way people will be encouraged to come up with innovative ideas and pitch them knowing well that they will reap the benefits if successful. IBM's "Blue Gene" for example, opened up doors for fantastic things when they decided to put it out there but to encourage other corporations to do the same they should be able to see IBM at least reaping off their benefits.

With regards, to Michael Sampson's article on "collaboration tools," I don't agree that to "implement collaboration tools, no cultural change is needed. There is no way we can implement or infuse new ideas in any society without tweaking or having some sort of effect on the society's culture. Culture is who we are. Culture is the way we think. Culture is what we eat and the way we view life. We are the very definition of culture and for that reason, there cannot be change without affecting our culture. Having said that, America as a country needs to find a way to encourage sharing ideas with ourselves in order to stay ahead of this game called innovation and the only way to do that is not to change our culture but infuse these new way of thinking in our culture.

Trust is Everything

Building trust in relationships will determine the quality of the relationship. Trust can definitely be built through social networking the only negative is the fact that it will take a much longer time to build the trust than to do it through social networking

Physical is better than Virtual

I completely agree with this author that actual physical engagement amongst people is much more effective than virtual. Even though virtual communication is the big thing in the 21st century, I personally feel that it hinders the effectiveness of quality relationships and relationships that also have that potential of being positive.

My First Blog Post

Hiya!

I am excited to be writing my very first blog. I am a first year MBA student and I am blogging for a class.

On my honor, all posts on this blog are my own :)

Looking forward to reading all your blogs.

Bye