Is Video Still The King Of Media Formats?

     Is video the killer app, no, but perhaps a better name is required. I think video is not the killer app but it should be considered the “App That May Never Die.”  I think that there will always be a special place for video and video sharing websites, pictures are worth a thousand words and videos worth millions, as long this model stays the same video will be too valuable to die and will in fact thrive.  Video sharing websites will stay around because they allow us to share video content relatively anonymously and outside of our social circle.  As more and more of our lives become online, there will remain value in being able to share video content outside of our increasingly involved online lives, however small the need may well be.


      Another reason that video is the app that will never dies is its value to the news industry.  As a journalist I have seen how much the world of journalism has been impacted by the use of video, especially user-generated videos.  Think about the Arab Spring – would we have been able to effectively seen what was going on in those country without ordinary people capturing video of the happenings?  Sites like YouTube are often at the center of this axis between people capturing raw images and platforms that give them a voice. 

     

Because of the power of YouTube to freely allow the exchange and posting of videos, without framing or editing them, gives it a powerful platform to hear voices and opinions of the many and the few.  Also, because of this news sometimes happens first on YouTube.  A somewhat sad example of this is that we recently had some sicko shoot up the university downtown area here in Santa Barbara.  The twisted killer didn’t send his sick manifesto to the media – he posted it on YouTube.


      YouTube and other video sharing sites provide a place where people can interact about the videos, exchange ideas and culture and represent their respective opinions or views in a form of social discourse, (Burgess & Green, 2009).  This adds to the power of video and its ability to persist.


      One of my favorite new websites that has continued to carry the torch for video and also fit it into the new social paradigm is the website Vine.com.  Vine is “a mobile service that lets you capture and share short looping videos. Like Tweets, the brevity of videos on Vine (6 seconds or less) inspires creativity,” (Sippey, 2013).  Sites like this show the flexibility of video and video sharing sites to be flexible and bend to current trends without going away.


References:

Burgess, J., & Green, J. (2009). YouTube:  Online video and participatory culture. Cambridge, MA: Polity Press

Sippey, M. (2013, January 24). Vine: A new way to share video | Twitter Blogs [Web log post]. Retrieved from https://blog.twitter.com/2013/vine-a-new-way-to-share-video


Video journalism and digital storytelling | Guardian Masterclasses | theguardian.com. (n.d.). Retrieved July 10, 2014, from http://www.theguardian.com/guardian-masterclasses/video-journalism

What Are The Limitations Of Decision-making And The Brain?

Describe a recent purchase you have made and analyze the extent to which you use system 1 and system 2 modes of decision

            Recently I purchased supplies for my daughter – diapers, formula and wipes as she is still very young.  Before I went to the store I already knew what kind of diapers I was going to buy based on previous research on quality and price.  Same process for the wipes and formula as well.  Since these primary items constitute a sizable sum each month I have found it to be helpful to be aware of how much I am paying for these items.  I would say I was definitely using way more of my system 2 decision making.  As Zurawicki discusses, system 2 decisions are based on slow, deliberate and logical thought processes versus the more emotional and impulsive system 1 thought processes (Zurawicki, L., 2009).

What are the limitations of decision-making and the brain?

            The authors of Neural Predictors of Purchases, Knutson et al., (2007) were certainly decisive in determining that the brain primarily uses a cost versus benefit type of analysis when making decisions about purchases.  However, the major limitation of the research is that it does not explain how the brain rationalizes a decision when there is no apparent way to determine the cost to benefit ratio – like when buying life insurance for example.  So while the research paper is intriguing it is narrow in its ability to describe a fully cohesive picture of how the brain makes decisions, especially related to purchasing products (Knutson et al., 2007).

What is the specific role of the amygdala and to which extent does activation of the amygdala informs the process by which we make decisions?

The amygdala’s role is to interpret signals from multiple sensory systems within the brain like the thalamus and the visual cortex in order to decide and direct the body how to respond to stimulus.   The amygdala then informs the autonomic, behavioral, and endocrine systems how to respond to a stimulus.  The amygdala also sends information to prefrontal cortex where it is processed into higher reasoning (Gazzaniga, M. et al, 2009).  Primarily the amygdala role in decision making process is using its communication pathways (high and low roads) from the cortex to match memories off visual information and associate an emotional response to it. 

References

Gazzaniga M. S., I. R. B., Mangun G. R. (2009). Cognitive neuroscience: the biology of the mind (Third Edition ed.). New York, NY: W. W. Norton & Company.

Knutson, B., Rick, S., Wimmer, G. E., Prelec, D., & Loewenstein, G. (2007). Neural Predictors of Purchases. Neuron. doi:10.1016/j.neuron.2006.11.010

Zurawicki, L. (2010). Neuromarketing: Exploring the Brain of the Consumer (1 ed.). Boston, MA, USA: Springer.

Augmented Reality and Education - A Fit?

     My wife is an Autism Behavioral Therapist and I was curious to find out if there was an application for AR in helping children with Autism or other special needs.  I found a cool resource website called Do2Learn.  The website is basically a resource website for parents who have children who have Autism or other disorders and provides them with educational tools and research resources on the topic.  

I was surprised to find several peer-reviewed articles that relate specifically to the application of AR in helping children with Autism learn everything from safety skills to learning games to social skills.  Here are the links to some of the articles and resources I found that were interesting.  

1      An Evolution of Virtual Reality Training Designs for Children with Autism and Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders http://www.do2learn.com/aboutus/final%20language%20disorders%20paper.pdf

2     Video Enhanced VR for Teaching Restaurant Social Skills to Children with Autism (PowerPoint) http://www.do2learn.com/aboutus/team.htm

3    Developing Virtual Reality Instruction for Autism Report  http://www.do2learn.com/aboutus/research/phase1.htm

4      Overcoming Phobias by Virtual Exposure http://www.do2learn.com/aboutus/research/phobia.htm

    

The applications of AR in this specific field seems to be a great fit, I actually didn’t think I would find much as the application of AR technology to this demographic may be difficult, or at least that is what I thought, apparently I was wrong.