The Google Generation

In class we learned that we, our generation, is commonly known in the tech world as the “Google Generation”. I found this interesting as I had never heard this term before but as an avid “Googler” myself I absolutely believed the title. I did some research as to what the Google Generation actually is because identifying it from a subjective view is difficult. For as much of my life as I can remember Google has been such a prominent, staple of daily life, but I never thought of it as a way to label an entire generation.

A journalist named Nate Anderson had some particularly interesting things to say about our Google Generation and the attributes that are included in it. He interestingly noted, “It’s true that young people prefer interactive systems to passive ones and that they are generally competent with technology, but it’s not true that students today are “expert searchers.” In fact, the report calls this “a dangerous myth.” Knowing how to use Facebook doesn’t make one an Internet search god, and the report concludes that a literature review shows no movement (either good or bad) in young people’s information skills over the last several decades. Choosing good search terms is a special problem for younger users.” I agree entirely with this. When Pipo was teaching us ways to search on Google I felt a somewhat disgrace to my generation that I’d been searching incorrectly for all these years. I felt unworthy of being deemed a part of the Google Generation but knew my friends, too, definitely did not know how to search in such an efficient manner.

So what exactly is true about the Google generation?

The British Library had a few characteristics noted such as…

• They like to cut-and-paste. “There is a lot of anecdotal evidence and plagiarism is a serious issue.”
• They prefer visual information over text. “But text is still important… For library interfaces, there is evidence that multimedia can quickly lose its appeal, providing short-term novelty.”
• They multitask all the time. “It is likely that being exposed to online media early in life may help to develop good parallel processing skills.”

I, personally, believe all those to be true. Whether or not they are necessarily good or bad things I can’t really say. Being brought up in this internet age society has made me somewhat biased or unclear as to it’s positives and negatives because it is so inherent in our growing up.

Street Art in Paris

Do we reserve the right of free speech? Does our native country defend that right against all odds? What is freedom of speech, of press? How far is too far?

All of the questions above, among millions of others were put to the test when an act of terrorism occurred in Paris last month. From January 7-9th, gun-men (later discovered to be affiliated with Islamist militant groups) opened fire near the offices of the satirical weekly magazine Charlie Hebdo. The gunmen killed a total of 12 people in the attacks and were noted yelling “We have avenged the Prophet Muhammad” and “God is Great” in Arabic while shouting the individual names of the journalists working for the magazine. It is said that the magazine’s satirical cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad enraged and provoked the attackers that day.

Nearly every country has some limits on freedom of speech and it is still one of the most contested subjects in every single society. Yet, recently after, Paris president Francois Hollande and leaders from Germany, Italy, Turkey, Britain as well as Israel and the Palestinian territories marched among French and other flags defending the honor of entitled freedom of expression and against terrorism.

“No person, no human being should be subjected to violence, still less death for anything that they have said, written or drawn,” Respect MP George Galloway said regarding the attacks.

There is a “fundamental difference”, declared the French prime minister, Manuel Valls, in a speech to parliament on January 13th, between the “freedom of impertinence” and “anti-Semitism, racism, apology for terrorism, Holocaust denial”.

Journalism, among other forms of expression, was the main target in this act of terrorism. Needless to say this posed and continues to pose a tremendous amount of questions such as, How far is too far? Can we really, as journalists, as bloggers, freely and safely express ourselves without serious, even fatal risk?

I had the opportunity to visit Paris two weeks ago and what I saw was completely opposite of what I’d imagined I would find after such a tragedy. Street performers flooded each street we passed, murals of street art, some relating to the recent attacks framed the city. It was as if these attacks only revived the culture rather than hindered it. It was incredible to witness such retaliation in a peaceful, passive way and showed what a profound impact self expression, including street art messages can have on an entire city and culture of people.