Video Games and Their Effects on the World Today

In today’s society, video games are, unless being judged by those who appreciate and participate gaming, usually tainted with a bad reputation.  Time and time again, the term violence is brought up, and when something violent happens, video games are thrown into the metaphorical hot-seat.  While violence is a major aspect of gaming in today’s society, there are also many passive and peaceful games which can positively affect a person.  Video games can affect many areas of a person’s life, and what are some of those effects?  Are violent video games as harmful or mentally altering as they are advertised to be?  And what really happens with violent video games and the mind?  If there is an incident that occurs, is it really the game's fault?  There are many positives and negatives that are results of video games, but there is more going on in the mind than just your brain “turning to mush,” as many parents would say.

Effects of Modern Technology

For my final essay, I decided to focus my research on the effects on modern technology has on people in our society today. My main focus of this assignment was how violent video games may cause aggression towards individuals, the usage of personalized avatars, video game aggression v. movie aggression, and the difference between long-term and short-term aggression.

Final Essay
For my final essay, I decided to do the preservation of electronic literature. For my paper, the main focus is on the start of electronic literature, how it lost popularity, why it is beneficial and should be preserved. The next part I focused on is who is trying to preserve it and what the are doing to preserve it and if there is a chance that electronic literature will have a future. 

Final Essay

For my final essay, I decided to change my topic and focus on video games and if they really are harmful to the development of children.  For my main points, I'm focusing on the actions of parents when it comes to purchasing games for their children, the pros and cons of playing video games, and the addiction that can occur and how it comes about. I hope to provide critical points and facts that make my opinion on the subject clear and concise.

Final Essay

For my final essay I'm choosing to do my research on Virtual Reality. I believe that it is slowly becoming a major part of life and eventually has the possibility to take over gaming systems like the the Xbox One for example. A lot of people may think that the idea of virtual reality is new but it actually is not. The idea has been around since the 1800's. In this essay i will be discussing the various ways VR could be used in the upcoming years and also some health issues that come with using it.

Blog #10 Convergence

To my understanding “convergence” is pretty self-explanatory, it is the process of converging from one thing to another. It doesn’t matter. For example, in the introduction of Convergence Culture by Henry Jenkins, he speaks about a time he was trying to buy a cell phone. Not a smart phone like most people would do in this day and age but just a regular CELL PHONE. Where you make a phone call and there might a camera featured on it and that’s all. Well he couldn’t find any phone like that at all anywhere that he went. And what stood out to me during the scenario is when the sales associate had said “they don’t make single-function phones anymore. Nobody wants them”. This is pretty obvious how accustom that we have come with iPhones, androids, or any sort of tablets. The transaction was so fast it’s kind of unbelievable. I remember there was a phase where the Motorola RAZR was the thing to brag about and then next thing you know, touch screen devices came around and society converted to it so fast without even knowing. The author also mentions the “effective economics” and how it is hard for people to even watch 30 second commercials so they have to think of other ways for their information to get across. For example, now you see tons of advertisements on your phones while playing games or even watching a short clip on YouTube. Convergence is happening and it’s happening now. Some people don’t mind it and some do. We have to learn how to live with it and adjust to it.

Secret Heroes

It all started in the year 2006 when my life would change forever. Growing up with a small family in a small town was nothing extraordinary, and keeping myself busy was always something I never had to worry about. The reasoning behind that was because I was the only one of my kind, so I thought. It all started at the age of 10, when my family and I took a trip to South Africa for a mission trip through our local church. For me the trip was very exciting, I always loved to travel and I had always dreamed of seeing the world for myself. The day we landed we were told to unpack and head out to the local village where we would be helping out, however that changed when a massive storm hit. So far my new adventure was lame, but I decided to go venture off and take a look around, which would later turn out to be one of the best decisions of my life. As I started walking along the path near our camp, I decided to take an alternate route that I made myself which took me 3 miles away from camp. While walking on my new path I came across the most interesting object that I have ever seen. It was a gold necklace with weird markings all over it. Being a 10 year old boy I picked it up and put it on, but while trying on my new necklace a group of men with guns started to come at me. At that moment I had no clue what to do, I started to panic and then I started running. The men were shouting at me and it caused me to run even further away from camp, and since I did not know the area, I ended up staring straight down a cliff. At first I thought to just get caught and face the consequences, but then I thought I could hide from them by trying to climb down using the rocks as a guide. As you can tell that didn’t work out so well considering the massive storm that was going on. I ended up slipping and started to plunge to my death, but that all changed when I realized that I was floating in the air. I couldn’t believe it, I was shocked and confused at the same time, and had no idea what to do. All I could do was wish for myself to me set on the ground, and that's exactly what happened. I figured out right away that the necklace I was wearing had some sort of powers that gave me the ability to fly, all I had to do was imagine me flying and it would do it for me. Ever since that day I was able to practice using the necklace, developing my skills and being able to go where I wanted, when I wanted. To this day it has been hard keeping such a big secret for my family and friends, but I knew if I wanted to keep the necklace then I had to be careful using it. Fast forward to the present, I’m now a 20 year old college student attending the University of Pittsburgh at Johnstown, and for the past two years I thought I was all alone when it came to superhuman abilities, but that all changed when I met my college roommate Grant. Grant was a shy kid who never really spoke much, until the day he saw me flying. I thought that my life was going to be over, I was thinking to myself “how are you going to explain what just happened” but there was no need for that. Grant admitted to me that he had the ability of telekinesis. He never really told me how it happened, something to do with experimental drugs his family was working on, but ever since that day we have been best friends. We decided to use our powers for good and to help the locals, however there was another group of three who had abilities of their own. This made things awkward for us, until the three asked us to join their team. Ever since that day college has been different for me, it wasn’t just about getting good grades and having fun, it was about keeping the people we cared about safe from whatever came our way, and that’s how our group started. To some were just normal college students, but between ourselves we were known as the Secret Heroes.