Media Law and Literacy

 Julian Assange of Australia is now fifty one years of age and is one step away from extradition to the United States to face spying charges. Assange is the founder of the underground news platform, WikiLeaks, which had previously exposed all of the American lies related to the Vietnam War. In 2010, the website became internationally recognized and Assange was first arrested on April 11, 2019 for failing to appear in court after being charged with conspiracy to commit computer intrusion, which would result in a maximum of five years in prison. Now, Assange does not consent to extradition to the US and would rather stay in the United Kingdom to avoid additional charges initiated by the United States government. Julian Assange's story is very different from that of other "criminals." Assange is now facing one hundred seventy five years in prison due to charges under the Espionage Act. Supporters of Assange say that he was just doing what every professional journalist does; ...

 We have been using forms of A.I. (Artificial Intelligence) for several years, but it has not become a major issue quite yet. In the film by Frontline, "In the Age of AI" focuses on both the pros and cons of the future of artificial intelligence across the globe. China is a nation that is very advanced in the world of AI; they have a "super-app" on their smartphones that is the equivalent of America's PayPal, Facebook, and text messages all in one app. Since China's userbase is three to four times the size of America's, they have access to more and higher quality information. Another work in progress not only in China, but also in the United States, is facial recognition on smartphones. In the video, they use a smartphone to determine the name and age of their head director, and it accurately got the full name and the age was only off by a few months. "We are the ones to really take facial recognition to commercial quality." How AI could affect...

 Today's society is heavily relied on by social media to do several everyday activities, such as check the local weather, learn about daily news, read and respond to text messages, or watch your favorite videos on YouTube. However, you must be careful when using any form of social media because all of them could have either misinformation or disinformation. Some people might not understand the difference between these two terms, so let me clear that out of the way. Misinformation is information that is inaccurate but was not intended to be inaccurate; it was an accident. Examples of misinformation could include incorrect weather predictions or source citation that could lead to a different source. Misinformation is done by accident, but, if you are not careful, might not recognize this misinformation in everyday activities and believe it to be true right away. Disinformation is information released to the public that is intended to be inaccurate. However, this is less common, but n...

 Our world today thrives on the reliability of modern technology. For example, we use our phones to get directions to a location, we talk to Siri to send a text message while we are driving on the road, and we use online websites to access all of our assignments and grades for college. However, we are not the only ones that know what we use our technology for; the government and company administrators also do. Since most of us have iPhones, I believe it is safe to say that our phones were designed first for surveillance. This surveillance comes from either our government or another nation's, company administrators, and, quite frankly, the rest of the world. One of the ways the United States government knows what we do on our phones is because of cell phone towers. Whenever we are not connected to the internet, we use cellular service. But where does that service come from? Cell phone towers supply cellular internet to connecting devices, which could be upwards of one hundred thousa...

 No one wants war to break out. Wars do nothing to help our society except result in: several lives lost, increasing tensions between nations, and they're extremely expensive. Some authors and writers represent the antiwar supporters and reveal valuable information to the public that no one seems to hear about on the mainstream news. This news includes true information about recent conflicts in Ukraine and Russia, current status on Americans held hostage in foreign nations, and possible future events related to conflict between nations. These websites that no one hears about are a direct reflection of the First Amendment, which allows anyone and everyone to state their opinions about our government and foreign conflict. In today's world, media sources, such as news channels on television, social media, and newspapers and magazines seem to only focus on what will attract new and lasting viewers to their channel, rather than news that help people. These websites, antiwar.com and ...

 One of the greatest innovations of the century is the introduction of the smartphone to the public; more specifically, the Apple iPhone. Several major technology companies have created some version of the smartphone, but how has Apple been able to become, by far, the largest? It started on June 29, 2007 when the first iPhone was available for customer purchase. Similar to the iPod Touch of the last blog, no one really knew what was so special about the newly released iPhone. One of the main reasons why the iPhone blew up faster than its competitors was because it was released before any other company released theirs. No one had ever heard of a device that can fit in your pocket and was able to text, watch movies, play games, check social media, and browse the internet. However, the small group of people, called "innovators," are the reason why everyone has an iPhone today. These innovators served as the test subjects for the rest of the world, and once they appreciate the ne...