There are ongoing debates about the advantages and disadvantages of social network sites (Facebook, MySpace, Hi5 and all the others). This is not a post about that. It is, however, the starting point for my finding of the day, because from a friend of a friend from Facebook who wrote about a blog, I managed to stumble across this humorous short movie about the attempts of two non-media savvy parents to connect on Messenger with their son who is living in the US.
This short movie has both made me laugh and think nostalgically about the moments when simply creating a new folder on the computer was a group activity. I had the chance of living the experience of PCs entering the family life and also witness the “birth” of digital natives and digital immigrants, as Prensky puts it.
I feel at ease with using new media technology and I find it natural to be such a present part of our lives, whilst I can also still remember the times when we used “boring” landline phones or merely shouting in front of the window, instead of instant messaging or video calling to contact our friends to go out, simply because these applications did not exist back then. I feel suspended between my parents who, for example, need to read all the instructions in order to run a new application and my younger sister who acts around new media technologies as if she was born with one in her hands…
Also, as an abroad student myself, the short movie made me think of the things parents go through just to talk for two minutes with their children. And so I am grateful that I live in an era where we can instantly connect with others, regardless of the physical distance. I am grateful that I have supporting parents who not only encourage me to try my best, but also work on improving themselves for our sake.
So here is the movie for today:
on new media, activism and edutainment... and all in between 