Bill to Ban Social Sites in Schools Moves to Senate, by Barry Levine, is basically a press release which title is self explanitory. The bill, which has already passed through the house, calls for the banning of social networking sights which maintain personal profiles of their users as well as allow direct communication between users (i.e. Myspace, Facebook, Yahoo 360.) The Bill would affect those institutions which gain internet access through a lowered rate plan sponsored by the government. This includes all public schools and nearly two thirds of the public libraries, according to the ADA.
The reasoning behind this bill lies in it's official name, "the Deleting of Online Predators." DOPA was built off of Sen. Michael Fitzpatrick's assertion, that networking Web Sites are prime "hunting grounds" for sexual predators. According to the article, "The FBI has reportedly estimated that 20% of all children in the U.S. using the Internet have been sexually approached online, and that there are as many as 50,000 sexual predators online looking for contacts with children." However these statistics are not properly cited.
Once the bill becomes law, the institutions it affects would have to put a filter in place to restrict access to these social sights. However, the bill is unclear in its definition of social networking sights, therefore the institutions would have to rely on the ruling of the FCC as to what fell under the restrictions of the law and what did not.
An analyst for the Yankee group, Jennifer Simpson, believes that this motion by the government will soon be moot however, due to the recent availability of the internet via mobile and remote devices. "Access will become more pervasive," the article quoted, "with students connected anytime, any place."
This bill could concern more than elementary or high schools however. It is mentioned in the Idaho Technology Initiative Status Report, compiled by Robert Barr and Carolyn Thorsen of Boise State University, (http://csi.boisestate.edu/pdffiles/Idaho%20Technology%20Initiative%20Status%20Report%201994-2002.pdf) that many of Idaho's school districts receive the federal e-rate benefits to improve the amount of technology needed in the classroom. This statement does not exclude or include state funded universities, and though I've looked for information on the subject, I've yet to find a definitive yes or no on federal funding for the use of the internet on state university campuses. If our campuses are state funded, the proposed bill could shut down this branch of digital media for many college students, especially those living on campus. Though small in comparison to the entirety of blog society, entire social networks would perish. This Blog we are using for class discussion could be banned because of this new law and FCC regulations.
Though DOPA was created to help stop criminals, the government is on the edge of restricting freedom of speech. The bill was designed with minors in mind (who apparently don't have common civil rights being that they are minors) but is on the brink of overpowering basic civil liberties.
Frankly this article scares me.

"Effective Web Writing" By Crawford Killian

This piece concentrated on shaping textual writing for the digital environment, based on the audience one aims for. Because it seemed to set some guidelines for the medium, I will attempt to follow them.

Killian was firstly concerned with what makes the Web a bad place to read, citing the following as pitfalls of the digital environment:
- Like Pavlov's dogs conditioned for food after bell tones, we are conditioned for "jolts" (sensory and emotional rewards) after online actions, such as the loading of a web page. Killian's article gave me very few jolts.
- Reading off of computer screens is physically exhausting, and terrible resolution rates slow down reading rates by up to 25 percent. Computer screens also make it difficult to proofread accurately.
- Users of other media have carried their bad habits over to the online field, expecting the same visual stimulation, or strict formating they are accustomed to.

The author went on to reference Jefferey Zeldman, who classified Web users into four groups: viewers, users, readers, and listeners. Each group is very much as they would appear: viewers look for visual stimulation, and not much else; users search for data they can apply to their own causes; readers are in it for the long haul, pulling up text documents to actually READ them; listeners are like auditory readers, expecting a computer program to dictate a page to them. Killian posits that each of these groups has their goals in mind before even loading a site, and if they do not find what they need, they will move elsewhere. Using a constructivist communications model, Killian does away with unchangeable media, noting the user of a Web page can say "goodbye forever" to the page if they do not find what they want; it is most productive to be aware of one's audience on this level, and catering exactly to that. Killian describes this as "a relationship of equals" between web author and web user.

Basic Formatting Guidelines & Tips
- Keeping text simple, concise, and short seemed key the Web user is impatient.
- Chunks or blocks of text are more effective visually than one long scrolling page.
- Space between paragraphs helps to organize information.
- Use headlines and sub-headlines to draw attention and classify data.
- Put the needs of the visitor first!

Killian's points were insightful, and she obviously practices what she preaches. The text was easy to read, in a big, clear font, organized in the ways she recommended. Applying her guidelines from the "review yourself" section of the piece, her page accomplished what it was meant to very well. The content was geared towards an audience that really shouldn't care about appearance. The data was accessible and concise. I agree with most of what was said, I just desire to know when this was published--the font makes it seem dated to me. And I'm not sure if a static image or two still is not acceptable to place within a rich text document; a third party example would have been nice. I found her comparison to the printing press most interesting, as the political ramifications of that communications tool were vast: we can only expect to see such influence from the web in the future.