Final Blog Post

Relationship with Technology

As a 20-year-old who was born in a period when technology was starting to play a big role in our everyday lives, I feel like my relationship with technology is healthier than my other people may have with technology. For the early days of elementary school, I was thought everything the "old-fashioned way" with pen and paper but since I had learning disabilities I was introduced to technology a lot earlier than my peers were.

As technology has become more prominent in everyone's life it has played a big part in mine. I use technology for everything. I use it to enhance my life. all or most of my documents are stored somewhere that I can access with technology, I use the calendar on my phone and computer to keep track of important dates, communicate through text messages, and rarely do I ever pick up the phone anymore. If I can use technology instead of doing something "old-fashioned" heck yes I am going to do it. I do not consider technology revolving around my daily life as an aspect of which I need to judge whether it is healthy or not because it personal preference of how I want to keep my life organized and I choose to use technology to help.

Where I see the unhealthy relationship with technology is when social media started to gain popularity among teenagers. My parents always told me to stay off of social media which at the time they referred to social media as Facebook. I joined Instagram in 2012 because my friends were joining it and I didn't want to miss out on all the excitement. I also joined Snapchat for a short time also because my friends started to use it but then I quickly deleted the app after my dad told me about an incident with Snapchat in the neighboring town. Since then I thought about redownloading Snapchat because it's the new way of dating as the kids of this generation would say. Instagram throughout the years has left a somewhat nasty feeling inside of me ever since people started making finsta's. Every time I go onto Instagram I get overwhelmed and my brain automatically thinks of sexual thoughts (there are actually quite a few studies on this but I choose to include a link to an article) because I spend long random periods of time alone by myself scrolling through Instagram like I'm a loser with no life. I felt like deleting Instagram a couple of times knowing it's owned by Facebook Which I do not and will not ever use but I can't justify all the useful information I would lose if I deleted the app.

If it wasn't for social media coming into my life I would have a healthy relationship with technology but as technology improves my relationship may get better or worse depending on how I go about the situation currently. Do I want to be cool and take part in the latest tech trends or do I want to limit myself due to the negative social effects it may cause me?

Technology in My Life

I can definitely say that over the years my time on technology can be thought of as a bell curve. Technology didn't start coming into the picture until around 2012 and at that time I mostly used it at home for games and when I was out I would use it as a mobile communications device to contact people. From 2015 to 2018 I was at the peak with technology spending way too much time on it but not as much as my brother did playing video games. from 2018 on I started to change my habits and focus on how technology can benefit my everyday life and play a more active role and I've started to limit myself to the average time spent a day on certain apps. My goal as of now is to try and spend under 5 hours of my time on technology on things that can be addicting (social Media, Youtube, etc.).

Informing or Misleading

While I do think technology is informing me there have been statistics that show technology has caused a decline in the smarts (OK, the first link shows the complete opposite). Personally, I do not like the word smart because smart can be used out of context. You can be smart by getting an A in the class or you can be smart and find a way to get out of completing assignments as seen in Ferris Bueller's Day Off. I like to use the word genius to compare myself. While I may not be a genius according to the dictionary definition I am utilizing technology in ways I could not previously to enhance my geniusfication (to be more like a genius (not sure if that's a word or not.)).

Do I think the technology might be misleading or giving me unreliable information? In aspects yes like how Apple plagues my devices with the Apple Plague in order to convince me to upgrade when I don't want to. If we are talking more so about the news I receive from technology I think that the person who clicks public or sends to alert me is the one who is allowing me to see the unreliable or misleading information on technology which is a human error. I've only seen a few times in my daily life when I use technology that it has become unreliable like when my Mac was acting funny the day macOS Big Sur was released. Also when sites go down that I desperately need or annoying bugs/glitches appear when I just want everything to work.

As the nature of who I am, I worry about these things but I try not to let them bother me. Not as much as others do. I don't cry over what I see on social media like people may do or obsess overusing technology as people may do. I'm the person who gets frustrated when technology does not work or they are seeming trying to get me to upgrade behind the scenes when I AM NOT WILLING TO UPGRADE APPLE!!! At the end of the day, I've accepted all of this into my life because I have to and some days will be better than others. Like my dad says "you're too young to not learn about new and upcoming technology because it is and will be part of your world whereas I am already halfway through my years and don't have the time nor do I care about this stuff anymore as I am too old for it."

Friends and Family

As I mentioned my family has a completely different take on technology than I do with my enthusiasm for it. My parents feel like they are too darn old to know how to use technology but are still in the loop and stay up to date as much as they can be as my grandparents are so out of it because they've been retired for so many years that they have started to become outdated. When COVID hit and people moved to Zoom my grandpa could not go to his monthly complex meeting where he lives because he did not know how to use Zoom or even know what Zoom was. All he can really do is pick up the phone and do telehealth. On the other side of things, my brother is very lazy and will not speak up unless he is telling you something. When we all updated our phones and he did not he insisted his phone did not work as expected and demanded a new phone. He didn't care if he had to switch to Samsung or keep with the Apple phone but he just wanted a new phone and he got one. He is quick to complain a lot about technology when it does not work. My sister who is the first girl in the family ever was born into technology. She's your average girl who likes to do TikTok while she is not allowed on any other social media. It's hard to believe but she is should be the most tech-savvy out of all of us since she is the youngest but she either knows more than you think or knows not much. She didn't even know how to work Gmail to download images and print them out which I had to help her with.

Positive or Negative

I want to say that technology is a positive part of their lives but from the aspects, I see it doesn't seem like it is. It is only making their lives harder as they have to try and learn it on their own.

Technology in Relationships

Technology plays a big role in my relationships. More of it is bad. People often use text messaging and social media like Snapchat to communicate and have changed the way relationships have traditionally been. I myself find it really hard to find someone to be in a relationship with and while technology and social media have made it easier to see into people's lives It has also limited me by the apps I choose and refuse to use.

Online Footprint

In the last 3 or 4 years, I have reduced my digital footprint with all the privacy allegations. I've decided to take a more private approach to my digital footprint as I do not want it publically out there or sold on the dark web. I praise Apple for the privacy measure they have implemented as it has made lessened my digital footprint but also made it harder to navigate the web. You have to choose between being more private or having access to more information that may exploit your privacy on the web.

What I am hoping is that everything that once was on the internet (which I took off or down) is no longer visible to them. I try to freely express myself as the person who I am under my name and when I do not feel like it is appropriate to share under my name I will go under a pseudonym If I can not go anonymous.

Online Presents

I am pretty surprised after Googling myself what I saw. I saw much less than I hoped I'd see. What surprised me the most is that the first link that showed up was Ethan Menzel - Stephen F. Austin State University - LinkedIn which is not me as I go to High Point University (obviously I'm in your class). I'm the second sub-link under the first one which is actually me. You get an Instagram page for @ethan_menz which is two letters off from mine. Still, on that first page, you get some Facebook accounts trying to be me which isn't (I get those a lot), and my youtube which I do not post to, and then my all trails at the bottom. On Google Images you get my LinkedIn profile picture and banner and then a photo someone took of me during my Eagle Scout Ceremony. The Eagle Scout Ceremony is interesting because I do not have control over it being posted except for giving content to it being posted to certain locations which I'm fine with. Other images aren't directly of me but link to sites that use my name which is actually me like my local Boy Scout's site that showcases me a lot. There's a Boy Scout camp I went to that took a random picture of me I remember when it happened but do not remember them taking the picture and every time you google the camp you will end up coming across a picture of me. I understand that every time I sign up for a site I am giving content for them to share my info but I do not like that real people are able to take or use a picture with me in it and upload it to the internet without specifically using my name. Wish they'd ask permission. I'd say yes 99.9% of the time. I also do not like people taking pictures of me because they then have pictures of me and they can do whatever they want with them and some of them will delete the pictures after they are done with them or will just store them. It's creepy because my friends act very childish sometimes and take pictures of me and turn them into mean memes without my content which I will say no to.

I tried to make a personal website a few times using Wix for my digital art and photography but I ended up deleting it because I didn't like it. I try to delete my traces if I am certain I am no longer going to use the site anymore so they do not send me junk emails and I am not sold. The downside of the digital age is that when you no longer utilize a service, site, or platform they will delete it after days of inactivity. It's also stored on servers you have no access to.

Social Media Presents

You pervert I am not going to give you my social media but I use some of the big ones and then some smaller and even unknown by a majority of people. I can tell you I do not use Facebook because my Grandpa uses it and it's more for old people. One day my grandpa inquired about Instagram and tried to learn about it and said "one day I will get into it". If he ever uses Instagram and I'm still on it I'm leaving because old people have now landed foot on Instagram.

My LinkedIn is pretty self-explanatory if they are able to access it (not sure how LinkedIn works). On most of my other social media, you can tell that I'm an avid tech enthusiast and maybe the school abbreviation such as HPU and then the expected year I graduate because many of my friends are doing it so I do it too to be cool. Sometimes I'll add I'm an Eagle scout where I feel necessary and will advocate on behalf of it any day because it's my life achievement. Without it, I'm not the person I am today.

Private Information

I forgot if you said this or If I read it online but spam calls have been growing since people are giving their cell phone numbers away instead of using a landline which not many people use. My parents still have one but I rarely use it and I prefer texting to calling in general because you are actually talking to a human whereas with texting you are hidden behind a screen and don't see or hear the person face to face. I also hate picking up calls I do not know so If it's not in my contacts I'm probably not going to pick it up and block it. Emails, I've had a Verizon email address my dad created for our family since I was born, and recently they have moved their email service to AOL which made my email go downhill ever since. I read you should never use emails that come from your service providers as they are often shitty. Ever since Apple came out with the hide my email feature I started using it. Wish they offered to hide my phone. I've always felt that filling in. all the boxes makes me feel more complete but too much can be bad. I started giving away my approximate location when It asks for it as many sites do not even need your precise location anyway.

How Does Social Media Make People Feel

There are two different ways to look at this. Scrolling through content on social media and posting to social media. Scrolling through social media can make people depressed as people see what their peers post and often feel jealous. Posting on social media is a fabrication of their reality that is one-sided and only shows their most happy times. Posting to social media can be either stressful or rewarding to some people depending on who you ask. If and when I post to social media It's more just to get it out there so I will sometimes post something instantly and then feel regret.