Be yourself; Everyone else is already taken.

— Oscar Wilde.

This is the first post on my new blog. I’m just getting this new blog going, so stay tuned for more. Subscribe below to get notified when I post new updates. So, I have had a long weekend of thinking about persuasive media influences, and I think the peer-to-peer thing is key. For me, I follow Facebook, and I am a wife, mom, grandma, sister, and friend. I try to turn off the sarcastic mantra in my head when I read posts, look at pictures, because everything is either political in nature, phony, or pandering. I like the instant information and misinformation that I can sift through while I eat a donut in the morning with my Coke (I don’t drink coffee); then I play a game or look at photos of my family or friends. I like that I can hear a new band or see a new grandniece over the miles. The social aspect is what draws me to it. I can be private, public, share, or block; I have some choice in the matter, which is also important to me. I do believe that access to media and information, personal information, is still being sorted out. The hacking of private information is scary…do these companies have our backs? Can it ruin someone’s life? How does this become regulated without stealing our ability to use these formats? How much is this going to cost us? Mark Zuckerberg wants to introduce a new monetary system through Facebook. Is that really necessary? I haven’t looked into it much yet because I am suspicious of cryptocurrency. I just do not trust it since it has been hacked already. It is impossible to talk about social media without acknowledging the political connections. This week, Lebanon started an uprising against its government because it wanted to charge its citizens for using a free app. A free app! People are not about to let a corrupt government dictate whether or not they can use a free app. There are so many ways to capitalize on this. It is not lost on the people, they are sick of the economic scarcity, the global manipulation of their access to information, if you will. I am fascinated by this…and a bit wary since I do not trust my government, either. This is still new territory. This is our newest expansion as a species. Let’s hope we get it right.