Diffusion of Innovations: Facebook

Facebook

Facebook was created on February 4, 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg, Dustin Moskovitz, Chris Hughes, Eduardo Saverin. Zuckerberg wanted to create an application and website where people could post pictures and messages that their friends could see and eventually like. Within the first 10 months Facebook had already reached one million active users. With the rollout of new features and more accessibility through the mobile app along with other applications such as Instagram and Whatsapp. User numbers continued to grow with over two billion people people using Facebook every month in June, 2017. Whatsapp reached over one billion users in July, 2017. Instagram had over one billion users per month in June, 2018.

Why did Facebook take off so quick? I believe Facebook has been doing really well is the product that they have created and the accessibility and features that they have make it a valuable product. I think many people became early adapters to the application because of what they can do with it. It was another way to share photos, videos, and post with friends and the public. It was another way of marketing to individuals and talk about events that are taking place near a specific person. With every upside however, there must be a down. Facebook currently has been under much fire for privacy concerns, censoring specific political media and pages for the 2016 and 2020 Presidential elections, along with the most recent concerns about Facebook's planned Cryptocurrency, Libra. As far as negative consequences go just like every big corporation there are always going to be individuals who are always questioning what you are doing and how you are doing it. I think Facebook has put out a great product that has allowed billions of people to now be connected to one another even on opposite sides of the world. Sure it has somethings that it can surely fix especially when it comes to privacy and the potential breaches of such.

The Check on Governmental Power

The Check on Governmental Power and the First Amendment

Vincent Blasi is a theorist and First Amendment scholar who is a professor at Columbia Law School in New York, New York. He is best known for his "Check Value" theory of free speech and free press clauses of the First Amendment.

His theory suggest that the power of the press has the ability to "check the abuse of power by public officials." This states that journalist and news organizations have an obligation to research and criticize public officials if they are in the process of abusing the power that they were elected to do. Most common cases have been with U.S. Presidents, such as Nixon within Watergate and Clinton with Clintongate.

Currently, we are dealing with the same issue with President Trump on if he abused the powers of the Presidency. This is all following a July, 2019 phone conversation with the Ukrainian President, which then lead to an impeachment proceeding by House Democrats into the President. This all got started allegedly when the President threatened to withhold financial aid to Ukraine.

I feel a check on Governmental power is big when it comes to elected officials who hold high level jobs. If any one officials is doing something that is illegal or in clear violation of any law then they should be reprimanded for their actions. In relation to the First Amendment, it should be journalist and news organizations to determine what potential crime such official has committed and investigate the possible wrongdoing without being punished for it.

The most meaningful idea that I have taken away from this would be that the main operation of free press is to develop and investigate information of the electorate that the public can understand.

Drones

Drones

Drones. The newest form of aerial videography and survey. Drones have been in use by governmental purposes since the early 2000s, but have not gotten to be available to consumers since the mid 2010s. Today's drones are being used in a variety of different professions such as, government, agriculture, motion pictures, construction, and recreational use. Drones are playing now key roles in how we live. They are making our lives easier everyday whether it is through drone shipping, surveying a disaster area, spreading pesticides for crops, or getting that really cool shot that no device could have gotten before.

Drones have gotten smarter since the first drone was released in 2010. Now they come with obstacle avoidance systems and intelligent tracking, along with airspace warning notices.

Drones are paving the way for new aerial filming and surveying. Cannot wait to see what comes next!

Mad World Remix Video

Mad World

Mad World Remix to Moby Video

The 21st Century. A century where nearly 5.13 billion people out of roughly 7.7 billion total on Earth have some form of technological device in the palm of their hand. That is about 66.62% or roughly 2/3 of the population has some form of smart device on them. We today are so reliant on our mobile devices than we are communicating with others face to face.

This video is a terrific representation of what we are becoming as a society. I see kids as young as one-years-old using these tablets and phones. Either to keep the quiet or for educational purposes. Is this what we want our society to turn into? A society that would rather text message the person sitting across from them than having a civil conversation with one another? One where we do not even know how to communicate properly because we are so invested within our phones? Those are the questions that we need to begin to ask ourselves.

These upcoming generations are going to be interesting to see how they grow up. Their thought processes, social skills, etc.

The 2020 Election Is One To Look At

2020 Voting Demographics

The 2020 Election Is One To Look At

The upcoming 2020 Presidential Election. An election that will be one for the history books. What are we to expect?

Currently, we do not know what to expect from this 2020 election. Both parties are continuing to build up there platforms and agendas on which they will run on. Along with a fan base to help them get to or stay in the White House. With 19 Democrats and 4 Republicans running for President, this will be an election that every US Citizen needs to participate in.

In Texas, nearly 600,000 new Hispanic citizens will have the ability to vote in the 2020 election from the current 5,200,000 who were able to vote in 2016. For North Carolina, a state that went blue for Former President Obama back in 2008. Democrats would like to repeat that in this upcoming election. Especially with an average of 228,000 new residents each year since 2010, 32% of them has achieved at least a Bachelor's degree allowing NC as a state to be more educated than before. Each citizen and state will have a key role on the direction that this country makes and how it will function as a whole.

This election is going to be playing an instrumental role in how the United States runs politically and economically. We will all play a role in how this election pans out either for the best or worst.

Facebook and Fake News

Facebook and Fake News

Fake News. A term that has been used by the President since taking office, but what exactly is it? Fake News is the use of journalism and advertising that consist of disinformation and falsified truths. Facebook on the other hand has tried to combat this use of misinformation to its public. Even though Facebook has made some way to get the spread of falsified information off of its platform they still have a lot of work to do.

In recent years, Facebook has been under fire about the spread of misinformation on their site. Examples include the 2016 Presidential Election, foreign entities, and UN stating that Facebook played a role in the Genocide of Muslims in Myanmar.

We face great distrust when big social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Google, post or censor specific information that may either be false or misinterpreted. Studies have shown that most people in the digital age do not read past the headlines of stories and that by modifying the headline to a mislead article the aftermath could be disastrous.

The Supreme Court, What is its Role?

The Supreme Court. The third branch within our governmental system, But how well do we really know what our Supreme Court does. Within recent months and past year, there has been much conflict within our judicial system with Associate Justice of the Supreme Court Brett Kavanaugh.

Within the early years of America. The United States of America had a court system that really did not mean much to the public. However, when John Marshall became Chief Justice to the Supreme Court and the case of Marbury v. Madison came to be in 1803. The court slowly became into public existence and started to play key roles within our government and how the judicial system operates. Currently the Supreme Court of the United States or SCOTUS is now one of the most powerful court systems in the world.

One of the most harmful decision that the Supreme Court has made was in the case between Dred Scott v Sandford in 1857. It stated that the US Constitution did not include citizenship to African-Americans. This decision lowered the power of the Court and lead to the Civil War in 1861.

The Supreme Court holds currently nine justices to uphold the Constitution of the United States. Such individuals receives packets of court rulings from all levels and each justice decides a ruling before being presented before the individual's who is requesting the case to the Supreme Court.


Image shows current Justices of the United States Supreme Court.












In all, the Supreme Court holds a very important role in how the government of the United States operates. We hold much faith within our Supreme Court to uphold the Constitution and what it stands for. To make accurate rulings against all cases and deme such case either Constitutional or unconstitutional within the court.