0.1
- Dopamine is a ‘happy chemical’ released during certain activities we find pleasurable
- Issues with dopamine often correspond with addiction (Ex: Anthony Rosner, WoW player)
- Phone trees are meant to help customers get help more quickly, but do they really work? Right now most people just find them frustrating, so although the prospect they present is promising there is still a lot of development to be done
Actions
- Benefit of computing: find other people who share similar interests/hobbies. Detriment: can also invade privacy by tracking people across platforms, use information wrongly
- Benefit of computing: Access information in many different forms (websites, videos, etc.). Detriment: There is also an abundance of misinformation that gets past content regulations and can mislead people
- Benefit of computing: Machine learning algorithms improve life and make tasks easier. Detriment: human bias in data pools remains and is reinforced, not broken.
0.2
- Some people may have limited access to technology. Different countries may block access to certain sites or even block certain content.
- Other factors include religion, money, location, education, race, nationality, etc.
- Schools such as Del Norte try to bridge the gap by providing Chromebooks for students.
Actions
- How to digitally empower yourself? Take a CS class or do your own research to learn about the full scope of programming and technology, and how you can use it to better your life.
- How to empower others? Volunteer to teach digital literacy classes for the elderly and anyone in need. At Del Norte, start a campaign to have the firewall’s blacklisted sites reviewed and/or hardware updated.
- The school firewall and slow wifi prevent students from accessing certain sites, which is why the Computer Science classes require students to bring their own computers. In this sense, the school’s digital media policies do not help bridge the digital divide because although they provide Chromebooks for school use, they cannot be used for classes about computing.