"blabosphere" or "egosphere"

Here goes another blog post that focuses on the topic of a "blogosphere." Which I literally had no idea what was. Before this assignment I had no idea how to even write a blog let alone what a blogosphere entailed.

But then I came across a very interesting website while doing my research, which helped to define the blogosphere as a community made up of blogs and their connections. It is said to have been coined in 1999 by Brad. L Graham and then recoined by William Quick in 2002.

But, what was most interesting was the notions of the "layers of a blogosphere." These layers include:
1. Geekosphere
2. Servosphere
3. Bizosphere
4. Newsophere
5. Blabosphere
6. Egosphere
7. Searchosphere

My personal favourites include "blabosphere" which is the layer made up of personal blogs that are "highly charged of buzz, advice, stories and lots of echo" and also the "egosphere" which is the "lair of celebrity blogging." All these layers make up the different aspects of online blogging.

The blogosphere creates an online community in which every individual can be involved whether it be through current affairs, personal anecdotes or even the technology that is shared. They can comment, and post, and blog on their ideas, and thoughts, and opinions. Both the blogosphere and the public sphere unite in the common thread of sharing personal opinions and spreading public discourse.
A huge example of this, which spread like wildfire through the uses of social media was the subject Kony 2012 campaign that got over 86 million views on their youtube film within months of its release. This indicates the strong influence that social media and the blogosphere has on public opinion and discourse.

References:
Starr, J, 2007, "What are the different layers of the blogosphere"
http://perishablepress.com/what-are-the-different-layers-of-the-blogosphere/

Verrrrry nice!

This week I begin by considering, whether the Olympic games really are a global event? Automatically, I think yes, as there are so many countries are involved. But recently I have become more attuned to the notion of globalisation and whether it is evenly distrubuted. This made me think of the digital divide, which refers to the gap between the low socioeconomic countries such as Ethiopia and Kenya. These countries have limited accessiblity to technology such as; televisions (news) and computers (internet) compared to the countries of America, England and Australia. Craig Warren Smith, the founder of the Digital Divide Insititue defines it as " gap between those who can benefit from digital technology and those who cannot."

It is interesting to note that Kazakhstan (I had to google how to spell it) still has more gold medals than Australia in these Olympics, yet before the movie Borat was produced, hardly anyone even knew about the country. Even now Borat is quoted constantly - "Very nice!!!" all over the world, which links to my previous blog concerning Americanisation.  This issue of the digital divide will become more prominent in future years as we are yet to fully acknowledge and implement any strategies to reduce the significant and devastating inequalities both economically and culturally.

Reference:
http://www.free-extras.com/search/1/borat.htm
http://mooreslore.corante.com/archives/digital_divide/
Smith, CW, (2010), 'Digital Divide Defined', Retrieval Date: 7/8/12, http://www.digitaldivide.org/digital-divide/digitaldividedefined/digitaldivide/