Week 6 – News & Politics

Answers to the tutorial questions – 

What are/were the Australian Government’s plans to censor the internet (the so-called “Clean Feed”)?
The Australian Government is attempting to block or censor websites that may contain explicit content, which is harmful to children, e.g. child pornography sites. The proposed filter has been the subject of enormous criticism in Australia. IT experts have dismissed it as “technically impossible”. The results of initial tests suggest that it may result in the speed of the Internet being slowed by 87 percent and “will accidentally block huge numbers of legitimate sites”.

 

What place does censorship have in a democracy?
Censorship has no place in a democracy because it limits the foundations of freedom of speech. Censorship allows bad ideas and bad politics to go unchallenged and unexamined by the general public. Sensorship also blocks the free circulation of information, news and opinion on the web. The free flow of this data is the lifeblood of a healthy public sphere.

 

What are the benefits of NBN?

 

  1. Telehealth
    Nurses and doctors will use the NBN to conduct natural video consults with remote patients monitor life-sustaining medical equipment in patients’ homes and run live therapy and exercise sessions with rural patients who will no longer have to travel hundreds of kilometres to capital-city specialists.
  2. Remote learning
    The NBN will speed overall school performance and let students participate in faraway classes using interactive whiteboarding and videoconferencing from their homes.
  3. Videoconferencing
    On the NBN increased bandwidth and guaranteed quality of service will ensure a better-quality result all around whether you’re running Skype or using videoconferencing as part of other services.
  4. Gaming
    It may seem like a frivolous application for the NBN but around 1 million Australian households are signed up to the PlayStation Network alone. With gaming a multi billion-dollar market improved ping times speed and reliability will give your gaming a new lease of life. Ditto in-game voice and video chats which the NBN will handle without flinching.
  5. Smart Homes
    They won’t be here overnight but smart meters those much-discussed expensive boxes that will track your energy usage in real time will also be permanent links to the outside world.
  6. Working from Home
    Whether you’re staying home to look after a sick child or just can’t be bothered getting out of your PJs the NBN will let you be at work even when you can’t be at work.
  7. Media & Entertainment
    Say goodbye to video stores: on-demand movie services will let you stream HD movies to your TV in real time. Bandwidth will simply no longer be an obstacle.
  8. Faster two-way internet
    The NBN of course will make your internet services more reliable and in most cases faster than what you are already using.
  9. Interactive shopping
    Online merchants may have a long way to go still but as Second Life showed so well creating virtual worlds and shopping in them is more than possible when you have heaps and heaps of bandwidth.
  10. Reach Out & Touch Someone
    Researchers are adding new dimensions to these experiences by building ‘haptic’ systems that transmit touch and movement over the NBN. Squeeze a haptic controller for example and your physiotherapist on the other end of the session will feel your grip from far away.

Members of Parliament;
Local MP – Stuart Roberts
State MP – Verity Barton
Federal MP – Joe Ludwig (Senator for QLD)

Stuart Roberts’ last speech in parliament;
Military Rehabilitation and Compensation Amendment Bill 2014

What do I think?
I did not fully understand how the bill affected the local area of Labrador, in fact I don’t see any relevant information about the community in the bill. It is off topic for the community.

 

References;

Greg McLaughlin & Stephen Baker. (2014). Censorship is an assault on democracy, not terrorism. Available: http://cmr.ulster.ac.uk/censorship-is-an-assault-on-democracy-not-on-terrorism/. Last accessed 4th Sept 2014.

Julian Ensby. (2009). The Australian government’s new Internet filter program sets a worrying precedent for the democratic world.Available: http://www.thecommentfactory.com/the-australian-governments-new-internet-filter-program-is-a-worrying-precedent-for-the-democratic-world-1915/. Last accessed 4th Sept 2014.

World News & Media Sources. (2014). Breaking News. Available: http://www.breakingnews.com/topic/barack-obama/. Last accessed 4th Sept 2014.

ACP. (2011). The top 10 benefits of the NBN. Available: http://apcmag.com/life-in-the-nbns-world.htm. Last accessed 4th Sept 2014.

Gold Coast City Council. (2014). Role In Government. Available: http://www.goldcoast.qld.gov.au/council/role-in-government-206.html#federal. Last accessed 4th Sept 2014.

Hansard. (2014). Federation Chamber. Available: http://parlinfo.aph.gov.au/parlInfo/search/display/display.w3p;query=Id%3A%22chamber%2Fhansardr%2F8fd8920a-0076-4086-896a-7402223f6f5d%2F0351%22. Last accessed 4th Sept 2014.

 

 

 

 

 

Week 3 – Referencing & Other Activities

Stephen Stockwell References:
(1) Political campaign strategy: doing democracy in the 21st century 2005, Australian Scholarly Publishing, Melbourne.
(2) The secret history of democracy 2011, Basingstoke, New York.

Alphaville References:
(1) Burmester, David. (1985). Science Fiction on Film. English Journal. 74 (4), 90. (AVAILABLE ONLINE)
(2) Vera, H. (1999). Black film/white money. Journal of American ethnic history. 18 (3), 158 – 160. (AVAILABLE ONLINE)
(3) Bergdoll, B. (1994). Brick Buildings in Paris. Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians. 53 (1), 104 – 106. (AVAILABLE ONLINE)

Social Media Research Method Reference:
(1)Wang, John (2002). Data Mining: Opportunities and Challenges. USA: IGI Global.

(Data Bases Next Week…)

Social Media and Personal Privacy – Week 2

Personal privacy.  Does it really exist on social media?
Facebook is my preference of communication platform when it comes to social media.
Messaging, emails and searching the web are high on my list of communication outlets, but how many of these online sites are actually safe?  Do we give away our personal data to readily?
Facebook, for example has a ‘data collection’ policy instead of a privacy policy, therefore allowing certain companies to ‘data mine’ and collect your personal information for use in marketing and advertising campaigns.  Most of us don’t even realise when our most personal information is being tracked online by major corporations and sold to other companies for a profit.  Not all of this is bad news for example, if Facebook didn’t track or retain the information about which pages you’ve ‘liked’ you page would have irrelevant advertisements displayed all over your feed.  I for one would rather see pretty dresses and new model TV’s or news about my favourite TV show rather than advertisements about white goods and furniture.  All in all, data collection can be a two way street where we happily give away our information in exchange for helpful advertisements.  As long as we don’t display excessive amounts of information about ourselves for internet thugs to steal our identities, I’d vote for pro data collection.  

Reference:
Paul Rubell. (2013). Facebook’s Data Collection Policy: Giving Away Your Private Information. Available: http://socialmediaassoc.com/facebooks-data-collection-policy-giving-away-private-information/. Last accessed 6 Aug 2014.

 

Introduction – Week 1

Hi my name’s Kayci-Rae Lee and I’m studying a Bachelor of Communications at Griffith University.
My double major is in Public Relations and Marketing.
Over the next few weeks I will be blogging about my experiences in a New Communications Technology Course.
I hope you all enjoy the content.

 

Kindest Regards,
Kayci