Hannah’s Blog

After looking at all of the information about the different aspects of technology that I should master in order to get a nice paying job, it made me think to myself, “Why didn’t I learn all of these things at a younger age?”  It dawned on me that I can remember being in the third grade and my family getting our first computer, which I thought was the coolest thing in the world.  I vaguely remember going to computer classes when I was younger to learn the basics and how to type without looking at the keyboard, but I never learned how to accurately navigate through the internet or how to use certain types of software.  Maybe it is because I grew up when the computer was just being introduced as something that everyone had in their household, but in a way I feel cheated.

There are children out there, take for example the children that I nanny, that know how to make their way around the internet.  At the age of six, the boy can get on the internet on his own and get from place to place.  Needless to say, I was shocked when I learned he could do this, remembering being ten years old and having to ask permission to get on the internet and having to get my parents help to even get on the home page.  It seems that children in today’s world are required to learn how to work with computers and how to navigate around them.  In a way this is good, but what kinds of lessons are our children learning if all they do is communicate with each other through the internet.  What happened to the good days of playing outside with the neighbors and having a conversation instead of playing with each other in some kind of chat room thing?  The following article talks about the impact of technology on children at an early age, primarily ages three to eight.  Click here to read it! 

While participating in this whole job search thing lately, I have come to the realization that a variety of skills are needed to perform adequately at any job.  Some jobs require a certain skills set, while others require something completely different.  In today’s fast-paced world, many jobs now require that the person be skilled in different aspects of technology.  I find it hard to believe that employers are looking for a person who is able to do so many things and be good at all of them.  However, I have never really been in the workforce, so what do I truly know.  I do know that despite what many employers are looking for, it is almost next to impossible to have all of the skill sets needed to complete a certain job.  In fact, many employees are constantly having to take classes in order to better themselves and increase the breadth of their skills.

Upon reading a recent article, I found that employers often will put many different requirements they wish job candidates to have in order to see what kind of people they can attract, but also they do it to weed out people that don’t qualify at all.  This statement both encourages and discourages me in that it is so difficult to match up exactly to a company and what they want, especially if you are just fresh out of college.  On the other hand, it is encouraging to me because it tells me that employers are looking for just the right person to fill the position and they will search high and low to find the perfect candidate.  Check out this link to read more about those over the top job requirements!

Recently I have been desperately searching for a job and wondering if my college degree is actually going to get me anywhere.  From the way I see it, a college degree is supposed to be like the key that opens the gates to the world.  Well, I’m holding the key, but it doesn’t seem to want work and open any of those gates.  This really got me to wondering, if I’m not having any luck then how many others are in the same boat as I am and why have I broken my back to earn a degree that seems to be pretty much useless.  I feel like I’m just not getting anywhere and all of my leads of run to a dead end.

I found an interesting article about the top twenty jobs that don’t require a degree and surprisingly some of them actually pay pretty well.  They pay anywhere from $52, 840 to $102,030 and some of the jobs would surprise you, as they did me.  For most of these jobs, I can see how they wouldn’t require a college degree, but they must require some sort of training, either vocational or on the job.  Maybe there is hope for me after all.  Worst come to worst, I could always be an Air traffic controller and make $102,030 a year.  Not too bad for not having a degree!  Check out this site to read about the jobs you could have without having a degree.

    With all the changes in today’s world, I am finding it harder and harder to stay abreast on all of the changes that are occurring.  The one thing I am having the hardest time doing is keeping up with the newest and best technology that comes available.  Call me old fashioned, but to me a cell phone is to be used specifically for calling people.  It was not originally designed to type messages to people or to take pictures of things and send them to our friends.  I thought I was really on top of technology when the Razor came out and I had one within the first couple of months.  Now I’m looking at that same out-of-date phone that I still use to call people and I’m thinking to myself, anything more complicated than this and I’m going to have problems.

A friend of mine recently got an Ipod Touch and with this she is able to access the internet anywhere there is WiFi and can download and watch movies anywhere she wants.  To me this is incredible.  I can’t imagine being able to do this without having to lug my bulky laptop around.  I recently found a pretty cool sight that talks about all the new inventions that are coming out, how they work, and the pros and cons of them.  Check out this website to see all about the new stuff that is coming out.  I hope you can keep up with it all because I sure am struggling just to put new phone numbers in my phone.

Click here to check out Popular Science! 

I recently tried something I had never tried before, chatting in a chat room.  I had heard lots about them, but had never felt any need to try them out.  Finally, I decided that I was old enough to be able to tell if I was getting into danger in a chat room so I ventured into one.  I must admit throughout the whole thing I was a very weary of anyone that I talked to and I have decided that chat rooms are just way too risky.  While in a college chat room I was befriended by someone who claimed to be a male that lived in Ghana.  Now whether or not this person really lives in Ghana is a different story, but after only ten minutes of talking to this person they already knew that they loved me and wanted my phone number and email address.  Sorry to say, but I was not about to give out my personal information to some complete stranger on the Internet.

This got me thinking, if it was easy enough for me, a twenty-one year old adult to sign on to a college chat room and have a conversation with someone I had never met before, then what about children and teenagers who are younger than me conversing in chat rooms.  From my one experience alone, I found the whole chat room business to be a bit hazardous and frankly very scary.  It amazes me that someone who only knew me for ten minutes would start giving me information and want my own and had I not known better, I would have probably given it out.  Because of global communication through the Internet and chat rooms, it has become even easier for younger children to be stalked by sexual predators.  In my advice, stay away from creeps that fall in love with you in ten minutes in chat rooms!!! Click on this link for tips on how to stay safe in a chat room!

In today’s world of fast-paced communication, it is hard for people to realize that they still must be able to communicate with others face-to-face. The use of cell phones and other PDAs make it almost impossible for people to sit down and have a conversation. Some ask themselves, my self included, why would I take time out of my day to sit down and have a conversation when I could just as easily email a quick question to a person or call them.
A new source of problems in this every changing world is the development and hype of networking resources such as Facebook and Myspace. With these two interfaces, users can communicate in ways they had only dreamed. Amazingly enough it is not just teens and college students who are into communicating in one of these two ways. It has been found that employees are now using Facebook and Myspace to ‘snoop’ on their coworkers. In a way, I could see how it would be tempting to use these interfaces to check up on coworkers because even as a college student, I do the same thing now to check up on friends who I haven’t heard from in a while. Check out the link to read an article about employees using Facebook for productive purposes while at work!