Snopes.Com...Problematic or Not?

I have heard of snopes.com before and I do tend to use it. Not for urban legends (though I have seen those there before) but I have used for fact checking articles or when I feel I want a story verified before posting. Snopes has actually been there for quite some time on the internet and thus I feel I can give it a certain level of trust—meaning it has never been wrong for me. I can’t say if it’s been wrong for other people. The layout for Snopes is kind of in two things. Urban Legends and Conspiracies or things like what they call “Fact Checks” and that is usually a news story or something political has come out that needs to be fact checked. The ratings run from “True, Mostly True, Mostly False, and False”.  Much like political fact checking websites when it is a fact check they seem to have everything together and it seems to be correct. They also fact check news stories that come out and gather steam—especially hot button issues such as the Syrian refugee crisis. As far as coming under fire I’m not sure how they have come under fire because I’ve never seen any bias they have. However, I did notice some articles from conservatives….I’ll politely say whining that they have a liberal bias because supposedly since it is a 2 person husband/wife team doing research they can’t possibly be right and that in general they have a liberal bias in their Snopes articles when this is simply not true. The two people aren’t even politically involved in anything.  

In general I don’t find anything wrong with using Snopes to fact check an urban legend, a conspiracy theory or a current event and would trust their site for information. 

Assessing The Sentinel and the concerns of students at KSU

I looked today at the archives of The Sentinel which is the KSU Newspaper. Every issue has listings about events and some features like Opinions, Sports, and Arts & Living etc.  Some concerns or articles I saw right away weren’t exactly linked to campus concerns. One article for example was about the various political debates and who students liked and supported. Unsurprisingly, Bernie Sanders has a lot of support because of his support for free public college for all. It also stated he has support among Republicans because of the behavior of the Republican candidates. I also saw an opinion piece featuring a discussion of Planned Parenthood and the government funding it receives. (Though honestly it shouldn’t have been published being that it was just the same garbage opinion being bantered about by two people that PP are supposedly selling parts which isn’t true but I’m not here to get into an argument. It should be two opposing opinion---but that’s just my feelings on the matter.)

Other stories in those particular issues where contrasting opinions on college life—and in that I mean should students be focus on “living life” or the “carpe diem” approach or “focusing on career and grades”.  Both are important to students—especially young students who are just starting their lives. I read some more opinion articles focused things like the lack of acknowledgement from the KSU administration about Hispanic History Month which honestly is pretty bad not to acknowledge. I expect better since my small technical school even acknowledged it. Another important story was the concerns about consolidation. This is something that affects me because had it not happened I would be an SPSU student—not KSU and I feel like the consolidation has kind of bungled things for many SPSU students and potential SPSU students. I also know there is parking issues on campus and I saw this mentioned a couple of times in little comments. They are called Owl Yaks and there are lots of little things said. It’s kind of cute.

An article I read about which seemed to be a big deal was the recent shooting near campus. Many students discussed that while they felt they still were safe on campus the police on campus and emergency notification department on campus did a bad job of notifying people about what had happened. Unfortunately, this effected some off campus housing nearby and the students were inconvenienced so while they may have been scared by the shooting they don’t like how they’ve changed the hours for some amenities.

Overall, I would say that still parking, safety, how to balance college life, and their future are the concerns of this campus and population. 

Looking at Letters to the Editor

Recently in the city in which I near, Augusta, GA there has been a new storm water fee enacted and they are trying to pass an additional SPLOST to pay for different projects. This storm water fee has come up against quite a bit of controversy and anger from people locally because it is supposedly one of the highest in Georgia at $6.40 per household.  Now, in addition to this fee the city wants to take $100,000 of this money and divert it to another fund that is not used for the intended purposes that people would like (which is infrastructure) but rather beautification of some areas in Augusta—including downtown intersections that already have plenty of beautification done to them.  The people on the committees feel that beautifying all parts of the city is A PART of infrastructure for the city and that the city needs these changes to happen.

http://chronicle.augusta.com/news/government/2015-10-12/augusta-storm-fee-funds-eyed-beautfication

 The letter to the editor however I want to talk about is speaking about how now some of this money is going to be taken and not used for certain projects in areas of Augusta that need better sewer, storm drainage, and infrastructure and about how that is wrong. The lady in question asks why Augusta needs more trees and strategically placed plants and things when things like sewers, storm drains are supposedly so vitally needed.  She believes this a “slap in the face” to all the taxpayers. She also says that she wishes she could move and that previous attempts at beautifying the city in this matter have met with the plants and things being neglected and thus the money was wasted.

http://chronicle.augusta.com/opinion/letters/2015-10-19/scrap-intersection-plan

My relationship with Literature

My relationship with literature has I think been an interesting one—at one time I wrote lots of poetry and different short stories. Though since I’ve gotten married to a librarian (and all my in-laws are librarians) I think my relationship with books and literature has certainly taken a different turn. But in my past I was always attracted to literature that was against the grain or things other people just were not reading. Either because for some people it was “too long” like Treasure Island or some people at some point deemed it subversive like “Fahrenheit 451”.  I would read Poe stories or Stephen King. I had read ‘A Rose For Emily’ as a part of a collection of short stories long before I came here to Kennesaw State. I suppose in literature I’ve either had a taste for things that were “gothic” or were going to get you talking.

Unfortunately, I can’t remember much of school and literature. I remember not liking a lot of assignments because they just seemed to be boring. At least in Middle School there were boring.  I wrote poetry and stories on my own. I didn’t like having to do it because someone told me to.  High School brought some relief with the venture into World Literature, American Literature, and then British Literature. One thing I remember specifically about Senior British Literature was we were studying the time period that involved ‘The Canterbury Tales’ and we each had to write a story that was in the same kind of vain. Basically a morality tale or play told by someone else or from the point of view of someone else. Well—as usual—being the person to read or write things that bucked the status quo I wrote about a female knight who went around performing good deeds who was eventually highly honored and rewarded. My instructor was very impressed and suggested I should seek out a publisher to have it publisher. I never did but that made me feel very good.

I don’t write very much now as I don’t simply have the time but I do try to still write poetry now and again. I recently submitted to a literary magazine and even though I was turned down I hope I’ll find another magazine and can be published that way. 

Why I Chose My Major--Information Technology Kennesaw State

If I were to go into the subject of why I selected my major we would need to go back all the way to when I started my Associates program in August of 2013. I was a licensed Cosmetologist having trouble getting a job in a market that is flooded with other Cosmetologists (we have at least 8 programs in the area that teach this program) and it’s very competitive. In addition, I had some health problems that were already making it hard for me to work in that environment for long.

I had done some fiddling around with computers before and a bit of coding here and there and figured it would be something good to go into because I could also do freelance without the State Board breathing down my neck. There are also many options to do in Information Technology. You can do Hardware, Software or App Development, Security or Web Development. So, I chose Computer Programming and I graduated from Augusta Technical College with honors. To me it seemed like a no-brainer to go get my bachelors program. I chose Kennesaw State because at the time Southern Polytechnic University had a poster up at my school about a completely online program for Information Technology which said your technical classes from your Associates of Applied Science would come through as a block. This meant you could do this from home AND finish earlier! I thought if I could work in some way here in Augusta, I could easily get my bachelor degree which was a very important personal goal. I did apply to other colleges for other similar programs but I also applied to KSU.  I was accepted and began this fall.

Right now I’m taking an Advanced Application Development class and two core requirement classes. I’m hoping I can get more of my upper level major classes next semester. There are different classes like App Development, Hardware, and Web Development classes that the catalog offers (and that I have to take). It also offers things like IT and Law and or Ethical Hacking as a line of defense.  I must admit however I have not had an easy time with some of the administration here so I may be at a different school next semester. I hope things can get straightened out because I really would rather not transfer.

I’m not sure I’m going to do graduate school. It would be nice but I’m just not sure it’s needed to do freelance work in IT. I can make apps and do web development. On the other hand it would mean I could gain more money from having this degree. I really haven’t decided yet. This is why I chose to go into Information Technology. 

An Average Day of researching.....

When it comes to thinking about researching I kind of chuckle when I think of mine. My researching can come in many forms. You see, I do social media for a local nonprofit in my area. That’s my paid part time position. I also am the social media coordinator for the Unitarian Universalist Church I go to and that is a volunteer position. At the very least I spend an hour finding content. I try to find pictures, video, quotes, or stories of interest. In addition to doing the social media content I need to actually stay on top of trends IN social media so I try to find free eBooks or things that I can try to use to help me.

Besides being in social media I’m also a web developer. So any content that isn’t given directly to me from the client (in this case the same nonprofit and church) I come up with myself. This includes looking up design ideas for slides for one of the sites.

When I’m not looking up things for work than I sometimes have to search for things for school. This usually involves Math because Math and I are simply not friends. If I’m not looking anything for school then I get to look up things that interest me which could be anything to be honest. Sometimes I look up lyrics to songs I’m listening to. If I’m interested in a movie or a new restaurant to go eat I might read reviews online and research that. Then there are the times that someone will tell me about something—usually about history and neat facts and then I will sit on Wikipedia forever researching about whatever was told to me and its related components.

So in short, these are my research habits. 

When I was thinking of what to write about for this blog I decided to expand on what I had written for my Module Discussion which was The Mother 'Hood Official ad from Similac but also expand a tad on what other companies do and do not do for their ads.

Similac is one of the many company that makes baby formula. Others are Enfamil, Nature’s One, Earth’s Best and Parent’s Choice and many store brands.  None of them—even with all their colorful or beautiful ads with happy mothers and children affected me the way this Similac ad did. I was not the only one in thinking this ad was a hit.  According to the website Ad Week this company really scored a hit because the idea of the ad is for mothers to stop the finger-wagging to other mothers was just a really moving ad. http://www.adweek.com/adfreak/similac-has-big-hit-one-most-honest-ads-ever-about-parenting-162541

What do other ads do? Well “organic” brands like Earth’s Best and Nature’s One show lots of pictures of happy little lush farms or with happy babies and children.  This ad was pulled from Google. 

 Or in some cases they have lots of green colors and clean lines in all the ads. They give facts which makes them highly dependable but it doesn’t stir much emotion in those who aren’t concerned about having an organic formula.  Here is the website http://www.naturesone.com/organic-formula.html

for Nature’s One and then a picture pulled again from Google of their products.

Enfamil is probably the closest thing to Similac as far as being well known brand. Do they have hip ads like this? No. Unless you think a can with a rubber ducky is hip.  Most of their ads come in hospital bags when you give birth or when you look Enfamil online. In fact, I don’t think I’ve seen an Enfamil ad and they basically gave the ad market away to Similac with this one ad by Similac.

 In the Similac ad several groups of different kinds of mothers (and stay-at-home dads) are at the park and all seem to clandestinely meetup. Of course the insults start flying about how they are raising their kids. It only stops when a carriage goes rolling down a hill and everyone puts their differences aside because “they are parents first”.

I feel the Pathos and Ethos section of the triangle are definitely represented--probably the most. Similac is supposed to be a trusted big company for formula and they are appealing to the emotions of mothers—many who feel that nothing they do is good enough for other mothers and women in general. I think its creative that they use this fictional story used to influence someone because obviously this would never happen in any park—openly anyway. But since people do this in their heads the story is credible.   It’s a little harder to tell with Logos section of the triangle other that subsequent comments from the company have been consistent in their message—and it has been consistent with their sales pitch that their brand is just as good as breastmilk.

From the Similac Site: “We believe it's time to embrace mothers who choose to embrace motherhood. Time to put down the fingers and the subtle suggestions. Because no two of us are the same, but we're all in this together. The sisterhood has only one rule. Nourish each other the same way we nourish our children. And, just like the sister who's got your back, we're there to help you get through the first few days and months of motherhood with confidence — and zero judgment. The way it should be.”

Given the way the ad is done I feel it it highly effective in the message they portray and is far better than pictures of the earth, happy kids and moms, and baby toys.