A Word of Wisdom

My last post was somewhat lengthy so I'll keep today's brief with just a word of wisdom.

If you haven't seen a person in at least a year, if not longer then don't go around talking about them negatively because of a negative experience you had with them 3 years ago. People change over long periods of time, sometimes in positive ways, so you don't know if that person is still the same or not. So don't speak about them in the present tense like they are still that way.

Thats all for today.
If you're confused, don't worry about it.

Facebook Will Not Die

Recently a friend of mine, John Underdown, wrote a facebook note titled "The Death of Facebook" in which he basically says that facebook is on its death-bed, and that soon it will die. He then outlines some reasons for this happening. Actually to save you some time, just go read the note and then come back and read the rest of this post.

As soon as I read this note I immediately disagreed with it. I held myself back from commenting on it on facebook because I knew my comment would be way too long. I knew that what I had to say would be most appropriate in the form of a blog post. So I waited a few days and then I read a blog post from my friend Joseph Dickens in which he agreed with John in some ways.

So let me just take this time to disagree with both of you. LOL. (Don't worry, I'm friends with both of them so they shouldn't take offense to that). And let me just preface this post by saying that I am very biased towards facebook, as you will see soon enough.

One of the big reasons that they both gave for the near death of facebook is all of the annoying fan pages that people have created, and dumb surveys that you can take. Consequently all of this stuff shows up in your newsfeed. I agree, this is annoying, but its not near enough to kill facebook. O, and by the way, if one of those dumb surveys shows up in your newsfeed all you have to do is click that little hide button, and it won't show that certain survey anymore. That is the nice thing about facebook, is that it has filters, so you don't have to see things that you don't want to see.

Also, it is not like anyone is forcing you to become a fan of "sleeping in" or any of those other ridiculous fan pages that have been created. If you don't want to become a fan, then don't. Its as simple as that.

Another reason that was mentioned was that facebook is always changing their "look" or UI (User Interface) or "design" to put it in laymen terms. And I'll agree that people have complained, and actually facebook has listened to some of those complaints and given the users what they want. And people might turn away from facebook for a couple days, or a week, or maybe even a month, but facebook has over 200 million users. Let me just say that again, 200 million users. Or maybe if I actually put in the real number form 200,000,000 users. I mean, maybe if a couple million stopped using facebook completely for good, that might put a dent in their user base, but even still, they're not too worried about it. They know that there is nothing else out there that can even come close to competing with them in the social networking world, so they know that those people will eventually come back to facebook. Why?
Because everyone they know is on facebook, and again, nothing can compete.

So I hardly think that the change of the design will contribute to facebook's death. After all, as the internet evolves people want information faster and faster, and they are just adapting to that change. And let's not forget about friendfeed that probably has the most real-time interface of all social networks right now. For those of you who don't know, it is a twitter-like service that actually updates real-time in your browser. Somewhat like the new real-time update in facebook except you don't have to click the "show 3 more posts" button, it just does it automatically. So that is the way that the internet world is headed and facebook is just adapting to that.

John also gives the reason of facebook having a constitution, or more properly a "Terms of Service" and people getting upset over the changing of those, therefore leading to people leaving facebook. And my response to that is basically what I just said about people leaving facebook. They will leave, but they will come back. And facebook has to have those Terms of Service, and people were rightly getting upset over the changing of those because I don't want facebook to have the right to do whatever they want with my photos or information...do you? I think that might be something worth getting upset about.

So those are the reasons that John gives that facebook is dying. He says, "We are killing facebook." And John, we most definitely have the ability to kill facebook, but to say that we are, I believe is false, and to say that we are going to is probably even false.

Why?

Because there is nothing out there that can compete with facebook. Myspace has its place in social networking but it will not kill facebook, Twitter has its place, but I believe even that will not kill facebook. Until something comes along that is...(I'm sitting here trying to think of a word that could describe a facebook killer)...amazingly awesome, facebook will not die, after all, there is too much investment in facebook as a company for Mark Zuckerberg (founder of facebook) to just let it die.

Joseph also wrote some other good points on his blog post about texting and twitter and such, but I won't address those right now. If you all have made it this far in the post then I should probably be paying you to read this because the length was enormous, but here's something just as good, whoever goes through and tells me how many times I mentioned the word "facebook" in this post will win a special prize, but you must follow me on twitter @jburno and then @reply me the answer. And if this wasn't the most biased post that you've ever read than I don't what is, because I'm very biased towards facebook, but only because there is nothing else out there that can compete.

So with that, hey, if you want to delete your facebook account for any sort of reason, go right ahead, I could care less, but don't give yourself enough credit to think that you are gonna "kill" the social networking giant we know as facebook.

To those who I have referenced in this post, I love you deeply even if I disagree with you.

What do you think?
I really do want to know. And I'm glad that John wrote that note because it initiates great discussion.

The Internet's Influence on Education Part 2

In the first part of this post series I talked about the large influence that I think the internet is having and is going to have on education. I talked specifically about the area of graphic/web design because that is what a couple of my friends have alot of experience in. My friends have had no formal education and training in this area and yet they have jobs in the "real world" in these areas.

Where did they learn everything?

The internet!

So what does this mean for us?

Well when I say "us" I'm referring to myself as a student who has 1 more year in college and then is going to be released into the "real world." So I guess I could better phrase that question, what does this mean for me? But you could apply the question to yourself.

For me I think it means that I must use the internet as a resource. Notice I said, resource, not the ultimate source. The internet offers a multitude of great things to be learned but sometimes it doesn't cut it. Sometimes a book is a great resource. But either way, I cannot ignore the fact that the internet is one of the biggest sources of information available.

Also, I think it means that I must remember the old adage "all things in moderation." The internet is a great thing, and I'll be the first to tell you that social media and social networking are very great things. But I have learned in the past year that social networking cannot and hopefully never will be a substitute for face2face interaction. I'm a huge advocate of facebook, twitter, blogging, etc. but it will always come down to getting away from your computer and meeting those people in person and sharing your passions and goals with them. (Sorry that was a bit of a social media tangent, but I think it applies here).

So I think for students in college or even high school and lower ages I would say this, learn everything you can from the internet. Figure out what your passions in life are and study whatever that is in college. If you have an opportunity to get a job that could be a career then go for it. Notice I'm not telling you to not go to college and not get a degree but sometimes or maybe alot of times you can learn more from researching the internet than you can from sitting in a classroom using outdated methods and outdated equipment. (I mean that last paragraph in the most positive way possible).

What does this mean for those who are teachers or professors?

Use the internet to your advantage. Use it for all the reasons that I just talked about. It is a great, FREE resource. And in many times there are people out there that know more than you might know about a certain subject or can give a different view on a subject that will help your students understand the subject better. I think this can be applied to every grade, every subject, every age. Our kids need to learn how to use the internet the right way because if we don't teach them they're gonna try to learn on their own and sometimes that may not be the best thing.

So I'm gonna go ahead and say it...

If you are planning on studying some type of graphic design, video editing, web design, photography or any other type of media then I'm gonna assume you already know alot about these things. So if you just wanna get your degree just for the sake of getting a job that you could already have then go to a small school because its gonna be easy for you but you're not gonna learn much. But if you want to learn more and really get good training then you should probably spend the money and go to a top-of-the-line school that uses good equipment, and up-to-date methods. This way you are learning alot and getting a degree.

This post was obviously focused around students, but also I hope that it helped out those who are teachers as well. There may be more posts to come in this series, I haven't quite decided yet, but I think this will do for now.

Also, a reader commented on my last post and said that the content of the post was more biased toward the internet rather than education, and I'll admit that yes I am very biased toward the internet, but I hope this post was a little more balanced.

What do you think?

Should we be teaching our kids how to use the internet?

Do we even need to teach them how to use the internet...?

...or should we just let them figure it out on their own?

The Unity of Sports

Well yesterday was a day filled with sports. Literally, every activity I participated in yesterday was centered around some type of sport. And yesterday I was reminded of why sports is such an important factor in our culture.

First was at 2:30pm the Champions League Final took place. Barcelona took on the powerhouse Manchester United. I watched this game with Jason Tucker at his house because we both love soccer and he has an awesome TV. Everyone was picking Manchester to win, but I was pulling for Barcelona, and Barcelona took everyone by surprise by winning the Championship 2-0. They scored a goal early in the game and then Manchester never really got into a rhythm.

While I was in the process of watching this game I got a call from my aunt who had 3 tickets to a Cincinnati Reds baseball game that was giving away. So I got those tickets and me, Jason, and Joseph Dickens went to that game after watching the Champions League Final. The Reds game was fun. We had great seats and we won 6-1, and Jay Bruce tore it up with 2 homeruns, and a triple to right field.

Then immediately following the game we went back to Jason's house and joined some other friends and watched the NBA Western Conference Finals in which the LA Lakers are playing against the Denver Nuggets. The Lakers won last night to put them ahead in the series 3-2. This was a great time to hang out with friends, friends who I haven't spent alot of time with lately due to being away at school.

So yesterday I was very much reminded of how much of a socializing tool sports can be.
I am reminded of how sports can bring a group of people together whether they have many common interests or not. It can foster relationships in the most diverse groups of people.
I am reminded of why I have devoted the past 3 years and the next year of my life to studying "sports ministry" and different ways to minister to people through sports.

Because sports unites people. People of different color, race, culture, ethnicity.

What experiences have you had with sports unifying those around you?

I Feel Sorry for the Cavaliers

So recently I have gotten interested in the NBA playoffs. In fact probably more interested than ever in past years.

Why?

Well probably because every time a new game is played I am just watching and waiting to see what amazing feat Lebron James or Kobe Bryant is going to do. What ridiculous amount of points each of them are going to score. I think it is this that has attracted me to the NBA playoffs this year. And I'll be honest, I'm not a fan of any team that is in the playoffs this year, but I will say that I would like to see a Laker vs. Cavaliers Final Series. I could care less who wins but I just think it would be a good series.

But what has caught my interest more than the playoffs in general has been how much the media has been talking about Lebron James. At first I was just hearing them talk alot about him during pre and post-game but then when I was watching a game I couldn't believe how much the commentators were talking about Lebron during the actual game. It was almost as if the rest of the team didn't exist.

And of course anyone who has watched TV in the past couple days has seen the amazing last second shot by Lebron to win the game by 1 point. This just sent it over the top. Ever since then I have not heard one name of another player on the Cav's talked about except for Lebron James. Granted he has led his team this far in the playoffs but without the rest of that team they would never be where they are right now, and it could be argued that without Lebron they would never be where they are right now. So I guess it is a two-sided coin.

But nonetheless, if I were a player on the Cav's I think I would be pretty angry for never getting any credit. But maybe the Cav's are just a team full of awesome sportsman-like guys who all understand that it is not about credit but about the team winning. Maybe...but I know deep-down those guys have to be wanting some of that spotlight.

I do know one thing, that team is gonna need alot more than just Lebron to win the game tonight against the Magic, and that was proven two days ago when they lost by 10 points. So I'm hoping the whole Cav's team shows up tonight and just blows the Magic out, but we shall see.

Is it just me here, or is there someone else out there that shares the same view, and feels sorry for the rest of the Cav's team?

Never Forget

I was reminded yesterday of how important it is to remember those loved ones who have passed away. I went with my dad and sister to put a small American flag next to my grandpa's grave because he had served in them military. It had been at least a year or more since I'd been to his gravesite. As we got out of the car I started trying to remember the person that my grandpa was. It turns out it had been a while since I had actually given that much thought to remembering who he was. All of a sudden I started to remember all the things that he used to do, the interactions that I had with him before he died when I was 12 years old. It was amazing to me that I really had forgotten about those interactions, just because I had not intentionally tried to remember.

If you have a loved one that has passed away either a long time ago, or recently I would charge you to always remember who they were as a person. Remember the interactions that you had with them. Remember the quirky things they used to do that made you laugh or put a smile on your face. Never get caught up in the busyness of life that you forget about those who have come before you.

I remember as a kid whenever I would see my grandpa in church he would give me one of those Werther's original butterscotch candies.
I remember when I would stay at my grandma and grandpa's house he would always fix me a snack that always consisted of grape jelly spread over bread.
I remember playing wiffle ball in his front yard (as seen in picture above)
I remember when he had false teeth and he would take them out just to kinda creep me out and make me laugh.

Do you have a loved one that has passed away?
What do you remember about that person?

Never forget about them

The Internet's Influence on Education Pt. 1

Much of the conversation I have been having with a couple of my friends has been centered around

1. the internet

2. education

3. the internet's influence on education.

But I am not just talking about any type of education, although the internet is having a very large influence on all types of education, I am talking specifically about education in the fields of graphic/web design and media. I have had a recent interest in learning more about web design and CSS, because I'm probably going to have to use it somewhere down the road for a future job. So I've been talking to my good friend and graphic/web designer, Josh Puckett, @joshpuckett. He has been helping me greatly in this area, and through this some great conversations have taken place.

I'm quickly realizing that if you don't spend a ridiculous amount of money, and go into serious debt to go to a top-of-the-line "big name" graphic/web design school, then you're not going to learn much in this field. Or at least if you're planning on making this your career then you're going to be very behind in the web design world if you just go to any ol' tech school.

My friend, Matt James has been taking graphic/web design classes from a tech school in South Carolina. He has had no formal training in this area before, and yet he said that his classes have been a breeze and a joke. Everything that he knows has been self-taught up to this point. And not just self-taught by messing around in Photoshop, but he has learned the majority from tutorials on...THE INTERNET.

And this is only one real-life example. I could give the example of myself and how I have never had any formal training in Final Cut Pro but yet, if I wanted to/had the time, I could make a good amount of money from what I know about video and media. In fact let me give an even better example. Josh Puckett has never had any formal training to a large extent in graphic/web design, and yet he has a full-time job as a designer for a fairly large company in Chicago.

I could go on all day with examples, but the point is that the way people are learning is changing. It is changing so much that I think the small design schools will go down drastically, if not go away. The only reason I think they might stay around is 1. because not all people learn the same way, so some might need face2face interaction. 2. Also I think that some people might not have the resources that a school might have. But honestly, for the price that one might pay for a year of school, you could get a decent computer and an internet connection instead. But the biggest reason, 3. is going to be because someone can't give themselves a degree, or a diploma. For some jobs that is all the employer cares about. For some companies it is all about the paper, which is sad, because I'll bet that many people without that diploma could do better work than those with a bachelors in graphic/web design. I hate to say that, but it is true.

So I think it is going to be interesting to see how this affects those schools, actually I'll almost guarantee that it is already affecting them, I just can't see the direct affects because I'm not attending one everyday. But it is very hard for me to think that their enrollment is not being affected by the internet.

So what does this mean?
...for us?
...for our kids?
...for those that we may teach in the future?

Well this post is getting long. So I will give my answers to those questions in the next part of this post series.

What do you think about internet and education?
Agree?
Disagree?

One of the Purposes of Blogging

A couple months ago I was going through a very large time of learning in my life. I was learning alot about myself, and the way I interact with those around me, especially those in the community that I live in at school. As a result, I wrote a blog post about the things I was learning, and it actually turned out to be somewhat of an apology for my past actions.

I did not publish the post immediately. I was very unsure of whether I should post such personal information on the world wide web. I talked to one of my friends about it and this is what she said (paraphrase),

"One of the purposes of a blog is to help others who might be going through the same situation. To give them some insight into your thought process, and how you came out of the situation."

It was great to have this reminder of why I write this blog. I think we (bloggers) need to be reminded of this daily. We are not always blogging for our own personal gain, but we are always blogging so that others will gain some insight or knowledge. We always need to have this in the back of our mind as we are blogging.


picture courtesy of http://www.stonebriar.org/helping-others.html

Old Friend Encounters

It is so great to be able to see friends that you have not seen in literally over a year. And not only is it good to see them, but it is even better to get to catch up with them, and see how they are doing.

I experienced one of these encounters today as one of my friends from high school, Matt James, was back in town for the weekend. He has been down south working for "The Academy of Arts," (sorry I would provide a link but I do not have one). He is also going to school at a technical institute, majoring in Web & Graphic Design.

It is great to see how both of us have matured, and we have common interests so it was great to see what he has learned in those areas.

It is also crazy to hear that he is dating a girl that he is planning on marrying in the very near future. But then again, it is crazy to see many of my friends get engaged and married. And yet its kinda ironic because I'm sitting here, single and happy. LOL. O well, thats life, right? We all grow up, mature, get old, married, or stay single, and work. I'm quickly learning that is the way life goes. I'm learning this as people are asking me about school and such, but alas, another post for another day.

Are you running into old friends, or people you haven't seen in a while? Do you enjoy these encounters or loathe them?


A picture of me and my friends as seniors on our high school soccer team. I am second from the right "26" and Matt is fourth from the right "28"

The iWork Suite Saved My Life

The following post is an account of how the Apple iWork Suite saved my life during the preparation and presenting of the presentation I mentioned in my previous post.

The reason I was up until 5:30am preparing this presentation is because I had to create a sport clinic, and present an outline, a budget, a brochure, and prepare a "Powerpoint" or "Keynote" with iWork. So what did I do? I went to the trust iWork suite. I used "Pages" for my outline and brochure. I used "Numbers" for my budget spreadsheet. And I used "Keynote" for my powerpoint presentation.

Let me just say that everything that I created was amazingly easy to do, and looked awesome. The reason it took me so long was because I had to come up with all the content for everything, but when it came to creating everything, it was so simple. So I was glad that I stayed up so late working on this because it was well worth it.

Here's the kicker though. When I handed out my brochures to the class, and then when I started to present my keynote I could audibly hear the "ooo's" and "awe's" from my classmates. Especially in the final slide when I created a pie chart for the budget of the clinic, and the way that I had the chart enter, and then the look of the chart was just awesome, and again I think my classmates were impressed.

So the moral of the story is, if you don't have a Mac, get one. If you have a Mac but don't own the latest iWork 09 suite and you are going to be giving some type presentation anytime soon then you should definitely invest in the iWork 09 suite. Even having "Pages" just writing papers is worth it. I use Pages as my exclusive word processor now, and I have left Microsoft Word in the dust.

Anybody else use Apple iWork? What is your opinion on it? Was your experience as positive as mine?

My Real-Life Twitter Story

This is my real-life twitter story for the week.

So me being the procrastinator that I am, put off this big final presentation until the night before it was due. I started working on this presentation at about 9pm that night. I was working on it on-and-off while being distracted every couple minutes. Then I took a 2 hour break to have a massive dance party (that is another story for later). I came back to my presentation at about 1:15am. I did not complete it until 5:30am.

At this time I proceeded to update my twitter saying, "I'm finally going to bed. Hopefully I can get 2 hours of sleep." (I actually ended up oversleeping and getting about 4, but I cut it real close to presentation time)

So I go to class and my professor asks me if I got much sleep, and he said that he saw my twitter at 5:30am that morning. I completely forgot that he was following me on twitter. I told him that I actually got about 4 hours because I overslept. This actually resulted in him having sympathy for me.

I just thought it was funny that the very professor I was presenting to that morning was the one who was following me on twitter and saw that I was up all night doing the presentation for his class. I don't know my grade yet, but hopefully I did well.

Do you have any real-life twitter stories? I wanna know about them.

Growing Close

Well I am officially done with my Junior year of College, and only 1 more year to go. This post will not be a reflection on what I've learned this year, but rather a reflection on someone who I have grown really close to over the year.

This person has been one of my roommates this year, his name is Nate Nearpass or @natenearpass on twitter. I do have another roommate, his name is Kyle Isabelli, and I love him dearly, but I'd like to talk about Nate right now.

I did not realize it until the day that I was leaving, but I have grown really close to Nate over the past year. And most of this is due to the fact that we roomed together. We have spent measurably much more time together than we have in years past. It is also due in part to both of our break-ups this year, and we have each helped each other majorly through those. But I think the mere fact that we have spent so much time together has made a huge difference.

The day I was packing up and getting ready to leave, I was telling him goodbye, and I realized that I am going to be talking to him alot more this summer than I have in past summers. I have talked to him practically everyday for the past 2 semesters. We have talked about lives, school, everything. Not to mention our videoblog/internet TV show has taken off, and we have had a blast with that.

So even though he is going to be in Africa and California the whole summer, and I will be traveling coaching and running soccer camps, we will definitely still stay in contact with each other and keep each other update on what is happening in our lives.

I just want to encourage you to cherish those people who are close to you, and who understand you, and will listen to you, and will talk to you. Because they are very few and far between.

To all my other friends out there, I love you all greatly, and I could write a whole blog post about each one of you, but this has risen in my mind recently with leaving school, so I thought I'd write about it.

Love you all

Do you have someone in your life that you are close to, or that you will be leaving soon that you are going to miss extremely?

Also below you will find the latest episode The Wheel Seat, if your interested.

Live Episode Update

Recently I think I've been so busy that either I just haven't taken the time to think about things to write about, or there really has been nothing worth writing about. Maybe a bit of both.

But one thing that is worth writing about is me and my roommate's live talk show "The Wheel Seat" that we hosted tonight. The show is somewhat of a cross between a video blog and a talk show. Usually we record episodes about once a week and post them, but then every month or so we host a live episode where we take people's calls, and give away stuff, and just have alot of fun.

Tonight was probably our most anticipated live show that we have ever hosted. The anticipation surrounding it all had to do with the giving away of an iPod. That was our hook to draw people in. We said that if we reached 75 viewers during the show then we would give away the iPod. I was really excited about the show, and I thought that we could really make it to 75 viewers. Unfortunately though we only achieved half of our goal.

It was still alot of fun, and great to interact with our fans and we did give away a Chipotle gift card, and a mug signed by us, the hosts of the show.

There are a couple things that we still need to work on.
1. The phone system - we have been using Talkshoe which is an online service that allows you to host a show so that people have the ability to call in from their phone or computer. The past 2 times we have used this service, and it works great until about 40 minutes into the show, and then it just randomly locks up for no reason, therefore locking up the phone lines. So we have yet to perfect this system.
2. The phone audio - using the system we have we can only talk to people over my cell phone, which works but even when on speaker phone it is difficult to hear the person on the other end. I need to figure out how to pipe the computer audio through Ustream but I still have yet to do that.

Then there are some other minor things we need to work on. Such as, better content for the show.
But despite these glitches, it is still a blast to produce a show like that, and it leaves me with the desire to produce shows like that all the time.

I have more to write about producing shows, and new media, but I will save that for another post.
Just wanted to write a bit about our live episode tonight.

O, and below you can watch the commercial that we made the day before the show to remind people about it. Its pretty funny.

Weekend Update 5/1

A quick weekend update.

Didn't really do anything Friday, so I'll go ahead and skip to Saturday's excitement.
We had a scrimmage against Wheaton's Club Team on Saturday morning, and we played at Wheaton, so it was a really nice turf field. This was a big game for us because it was our first time playing together in the spring, and last time we played this team they beat us 4-1.

About 20 minutes into the first half I went up for a ball and came down on my left ankle in a very weird way. In fact as soon as I landed I knew that something was wrong. I felt immediate pain. I ended up being taken off the field and sitting out the rest of the game. We did win though! 2-1! This is a big win for us, for the reasons I explained earlier.

So I got driven back to school, and my roommate, Kyle, drove me to the hospital where I had it x-rayed only to find out that it was only sprained, thank God. So I've been hobbling around on crutches since then, and its been great fun. Ha.

Another update is that we released the 14th episode of the Wheel Seat. On this episode we announced our next live show on Thursday 5/7 @ 10:17pm CST, 11:17pm EST. This is going to be a great episode and I'm really excited about it.

We have set the challenge that if we reach 75 viewers during the show then we will give away the ultimate prize. To Be Announced. I think this goal is totally doable, and I'm excited to see what happens. So check it out.

O yeah, and I purchased http://www.thewheelseat.com which currently forwards to our facebook group, but on Thursday it will forward to our live show. So that's pretty exciting.