Commentary & Analysis: Smartphone Stockholm Syndrome

Taken from skotgat.com

Have you ever sat down to lunch with a couple of friends, hoping to have a conversation, only to be greeted with stony silence by zombies with illuminated faces, whose heads are tilted downwards at a 45 degree angle?

For those of you who have, I feel your pain. If you have not noticed this, then you are probably guilty of inflicting the pain. The pain of what I call “Smartphone Stockholm Syndrome”. This may sound a little over the top, but I assure you, it is a very serious condition.

Smartphone Stockholm Syndrome put simply is when you have been made captive by the Smartphone, but love it because it treats you well, not dissimilar to the actual Stockholm Syndrome. This condition affects several youth in Singapore, and is spreading like wildfire to other age groups (I know this from personal experience, even my mother has it). Those who have not been made captive by a Smartphone are indirectly affected by the condition, because like me, they have been neglected because of the Smartphones.

As someone whose phone is affectionately labelled ‘the brick’, you may say I am a technological fuddy-duddy. What I look for in a handphone is the ability to call, text, and store some basic media such as music and pictures. I do not like using the Internet on my handphone, the same way I do not like drying the clothes in the microwave.

Buying smartphones has become a domino effect. A couple of your friends buy them, then more and more until you are peer pressured into buying one because all your friends are on What’s App. To the brave ones who have resisted, I salute you, as I know this is not an easy task.

My main issue with Smartphones is not the device itself, but what it does to us. Face-to-face communication is something that bonds us and keeps us sane with all the stress around us. Being able to rant to your friends about all the homework you have or debate about insignificant movie trivia is what help us form relationships.

But when you are met with silence or when your debate is cut short with a quick Google search from your opposer’s smartphone, our ability to communicate with each other and form relationships is impeded.

It is ironic that one of our greatest strengths has become one of our greatest weaknesses. The human thirst for knowledge has gotten us this far, made us able to advance so fast technologically, making it easy for us to access information. But this has also made us dependant on the Internet, and we have become impatient.

I am not totally against Smartphones. They can be rather useful. There are a wealth of apps that can help guide you when you are lost or let you make long-distance phone calls for free. But everything is good in moderation.

So to those who are suffering from Smartphone Stockholm Syndrome I beseech you to put down that phone and have a conversation with those around you. Humans are very influenced by the community around them, and it would be a shame to lose our desire to communicate with one another face to face. It would make us robotic, and we still have time to change. 

Group Blog Critique

Blog being critiqued: newsqueeze.wordpress.com

The blog mostly uses their own first hand stories, which has plus and minus points. On the positive, you can see the editorial style of the writers, but on the minus side, 'big' news is not covered.

It is constantly updated, the last article being posted only a couple of days ago, which is a good thing. The presentation is very clean, suitable for the internet. Most article lengths are also internet appropriate, however there are some that are too long.

Navigation around the blog is easy and simple, and the loading speed is rather fast. However, there is a lot of scrolling required, which might put off online readers. The blog is clearly youth-centric.

There is a good use of online features, especially in the area of social media. There is a facebook widget and a twitter prompt, and is strategically placed. However, the multimedia page has articles which are unrelated to multimedia. There should be just videos rather than the article with the video. Also, the comment box requires a lot of scrolling, which readers may miss.

It would be good if the 'About Us' section has the roles of the group, as it is currently empty. But the blog seems to be running well and would be easy to take over.

Overall, the blog is well presented, and has a good professional look. However, some features require tweaking to make it more suitable for online audiences.

Poly students have mixed reactions to results of annual polytechnic graduate survey

There has been an article recently in the Straits Times about Polytechnic graduates earning more money than previous years. Over the Coffee Mug hits the streets of Temasek Polytechnic to find out how the current students react to this piece of news.

The annual polytechnic graduate survey last year revealed that polytechnic graduates earn $2007 per month on average. However, about 65.4 per cent of graduates landed full-time jobs, down from 67 per cent in 2011. So how do polytechnic students feel about this?

Au Wei Shan, an 18-year-old second year student studying the Diploma in Food Science and Nutrition at TP, was unaware of the results of the graduate survey, but believed that the increase in salary was a “very good thing” because “it’s difficult for us to cope with expenses”.

When asked what her plans after graduation are, she said: “I will try to work with my SIP company for 3-5 years, and then further my studies outside Singapore.” Despite the fact that there is an expected downturn in the employment market, Wei Shan does not think that this will affect her industry, since it is about food, something that is needed everyday.

Au Wei Shan, an 18-year-old student Diploma in Food Science and Nutrition from TP

Nurul Amalina, 19-year-old junior studying in the Diploma in Financial Business Informatics, feels that the added income is “a great improvement and a source of motivation for us poly grads”.

“Now seeing that the pay for poly grads is approximately $2000, more people may choose to go to work first before continuing their further studies,” she added. Her plans for the future however are dependent on her results, as she has deduced that a diploma is not good enough to sustain a full-time job in the long run.

She believes that her industry, IT and Finance, has great growth potential in Singapore, due to the way the country is progressing. She is concerned that the reduction in percentage of graduates being hired for full-time jobs will affect her, and muses that “you never know what the future holds for you anyway”.

Nurul Amalina, a 19-year-old Diploma in Financial Business Informatics student from TP

Another TP student, Deli Tan, a 21-year-old senior from the Diploma in Hospitality and Tourism, agrees that just having a diploma will be tough to sustain a full-time job because “in Singapore society, there is a lot of looking at paper qualification, so it may be difficult to sustain in the long run”.

When discussing how to deal with the tough job market, he sees the effect on Singapore as inevitable, since “currently in Europe, the market is collapsing”. He deems it sensible to “work smart, rather than just working for the money”.

Deli Tan, 21-year-old Diploma in Hospitality and Tourism student from TP

Commentary & Analysis - Print Journalism vs Digital Journalism

It should come as no surprise that journalism is a field that is time-dependant. News is happening all around us all the time, and whoever gets the most interesting news first and presents it in a pleasing manner gets our attention.

The battle of print journalism vs online journalism is one that has been ongoing ever since news companies started online news portals, and citizens were given a voice through blogs such as this one. So what’s the difference between the two forms? To put it simply, print journalism is viewed in hard copy, while digital journalism is viewed in soft copy. But this is just the tip of the iceberg.

Taken from postnetfarwest.wordpress.com

The print industry has survived the competition posed by magazines, radio and television over the years. But the advent of great volumes of digital journalism, in the form of blogs, is posing a serious threat to their survival. Not just that, but the timeliness of digital journalism in unbeatable. With the widespread use of smartphones, it is easier for a journalist to spot something as it happens and post it onto their blogs. Digital journalism is also markedly more convenient, and cheaper than their print competitors. This is why most print publications have gone digital.

But having print publications is also vital. Newspapers have a certain feel of credibility and a longer shelf life that just cannot be achieved when viewed online. Some people also tend to, excuse my language, digitally defecate all over the internet, making it hard for readers to know what is true and what is false. It is also a great vehicle for advertisements. When reading a publication online, we rarely take notice of the advertisements scattered around the page, but when reading a newspaper, advertisements are more prominent and we tend to take more notice of them.

Taken from www.americandebtproject.com

Fundamentally however, there are similarities. Taken from http://journalism.about.com/od/ethicsprofessionalism/a/printhistory.htm: “The first newspaper in the American colonies - Benjamin Harris's Publick Occurrences both Foreighn and Domestick - was published in 1690 but immediately shut down for not having a required license. Interestingly, Harris' newspaper employed an early form of reader participation. The paper was printed on three sheets of stationery-size paper and the fourth page was left blank so that readers could add their own news, then pass it on to someone else.”

I found this particular extract to be rather interesting as it shows early signs of the citizen journalism attitude within the news industry. The “add your own news, then pass it on to someone else” method is a clear indication that the newspaper was encouraging citizens to pen down their observations and pass them on, albeit in what we now consider to be a primitive fashion. This would in today’s generation, be blogs or comment boxes on news sites.

Personally, I prefer reading print publications. It’s not just for the tangible product that has is neatly divided into sections and presented professionally, but also for the intangible feeling towards it. What are your opinions? Comment below!

Taken from seekersportal.wordpress.com

PBL Reflection 2

My group has been working on our Problem-Based Learning assignment 2, which is to create and post our articles onto our group blog. This has been a major challenge, as it has been difficult to get the site up and running. 
Designing the site took a rather long time, and it was difficult to get all the sections up and running. We have also had to come up with a schedule for people to take charge of writing the articles each week. But after much planning, I think the blog finally looks ready for public viewing, and hope that our concept of "Then & Now" is popular with readers.