Week 9 - Cameras both still and video
 
This weeks class was sadly the last in theVirtual Revolution series.  I have loved watching this series as it has given me so much of a better understanding of the way social media works in the world and the people behind these.  Their orignal ideas and reasons for coming up with these various forms of media such as You Tube, Amazon, Google, Facebook, Ebay etc. all seem to stem from genuine interest in technology, to push it's limits further in the way it can make everything accessible and easy for people around the world to use. And of course, they also get to make a huge pile of money out of it at the same time - bonus! 

All of this is still only in it's infancy.  There are so many teething problems still - some, in the case of Facebook, are really big ones!  Most forms of anything in the world have rules that need to be set and abided by for things to run smoothly, safely and fairly for everyone.  Facebook seems to  have exempted itself of any sort of responsiblities and hides behind the "freedom of speech" cry for just about everything that happens.  Even journalists have rules to abide by.  Humans use this form of media, humans are really fallible, humans will always make human like mistakes and do and say stupid things.  They need some sort of rules, guidelines and protection in place to follow instead of flailing about on there doing damage to themselves and to each other.  Once the world gets the hang of it all, rebels and has a change in attitude to the ways in which it is being used (and I believe this WILL happen) social media can be a powerful tool for doing a lot of GOOD in the world.

On to the topic of cameras, I'm looking forward to this area.  I love using Animoto and want to know more about using and making all this photo/video stuff.  I have not used Window Movie Maker yet but can't wait to have a go.  I love those little flip cameras, small and convenient. But choice comes down to what you want to use a video camera for when considering buying, which now I know about Animoto and Movie Maker, I would really like to do.  This course is not healthy for my bank balance.
This is a good topic to cover, especially for work in a school library situation as I see the students borrowing the cameras from Beaconhills library quite often for various projects and they really enjoying using them.