Experience with New Media

I have had extensive experience with the Microsoft Office platform. I am very proficient with Word, Access, Excel, PowerPoint, and have some experience with Publisher and SharePoint. I have basic knowledge of code writing with Visual Basic and with C, and have had training in In Design. With the military I work a great deal with Acrobat and Lotus Forms to fill out the ungodly amount of forms that we work with in our quaint bureaucratic system.

When it comes to Social Media, I tend to keep things as simple as possible. I do have a Facebook account just like the rest of the planet, but I do not use Twitter, Pinterest, or any other Social Media sites because I find it redundant. I am a member of two different forums. I am on the Grateful Dead forum on Dead.net, so I can discuss all things Grateful Dead with like minded Deadheads. I also belong to a forum called S1net that deals with military personnel issues, like questions of how to complete certain paperwork, or discussing new policies that have recently been implemented. I do have a YouTube account and am kind of a junky when it comes to watching stupid videos. One other form of media that I use quite extensively is Sugar Megs and Archive.org to download live shows from many different groups. I actually have an App on my IPhone where I can stream almost every Grateful Dead show that was ever recorded. I like this App a lot!

Some of my favorite sites for the convergence of English and New Media are the interactive sites found on many of the news organization websites, like New York Times, CNN, and believe it or not, even Fox News. Another site that I have played around with is an interactive site put out for Benjamin Franklin's 300th birthday at www.benfranklin300.org/timeline, where anyone can go in, browse through, and read about his many different accomplishments. I am also being introduced to various sites in my Informatics class that deal with word clouds and analyzing different texts. I find it very interesting that I can analyze and break down texts or websites with just the click of a mouse. I think in the long run, these sites will be useful in analyzing and improving my own writing.     

I used to use MySpace before I joined Facebook. I'm sure the website is still there, but since no one really uses it anymore, I don't use it either. I don't really think I've tried to open up that account in probably three years. Maybe it's still there, who knows. One site that I used to use extensively was called armytoolbag.com. This was an stupendous site where you could upload, or look at, examples of how certain military paperwork was supposed to be filled out. This site saved my hind quarters on many an occasion. Unfortunately I think some idiot put classified information on there, and the site was shut down, which still really ticks me off to this day.  

I guess I am not totally old fashioned after all...