I chose to compare Felton’s earliest report- 2005 (from this specific website) to his 2009 journey. It was neat that in 2009, his most recorded location was a restaurant beating the second closest place, residence, by 80 points/tallies/times? I couldn’t believe he literally wrote down all 9 ice cream flavors he ate within that year. I’m wondering what he means when he says his longest relationship is “forever”?

When reading his 2005 annual report, the first thing I noticed is that I recognized NONE of his music interests (Cat Power, Diplo, 13 and God). I was amazed at how many countries he visited but wondered what he did outside of recording his daily life that he was able to make the money to travel to all these foreign places! It was no surprise that his top referring link was google.com; whose isn’t?!

Although it was very interesting to read about his year through specific data, my main question was why? What was his reasoning for doing so and how were this able to get published? If I write an annual collection of data on my life will I become famous? It looks like a more detailed and extended version of my childhood diary. I think it would be awesome to interact with the public and see in a collection of graphs and data how they perceive you, however, I don’t think it has any right to be published. Who has time to record all of these tiny details of their life anyways? I’m also concerned with the fact that he is okay with his private life being available to the public including where he hangs out, lives, works, enjoys, acts. It’s like he is a celebrity for doing everyday normal activities. If it wasn’t for this class assignment, I would have no interest about reading about one man’s journey as it was not educating, inspiring, or very entertaining.

I found PhilaPlace and Euclid Corridor History Project to both be interesting and explored both of the websites as if I was going to visit these tourism sites. I decided that if I was taking a trip to Philadelphia, I would take the South Philadelphia: Territory of Dreams walking tour.

This picture I found to be the most intriguing because I live in a Civil War town (New Market, VA) and many of the street houses look like these. We are always providing tours around our small town and I think it would be interesting to see another historical town and hear their stories of the late 1800’s. I think that by using ordinary people’s opinions, stories, and images it makes this website unique because there is no bias behind it. Anytime I am researching on places to visit, I always like to read reviews of people that have been there and hear the pros and cons of that specific place.

I found the Cleveland Silverline webpage to be interesting as well, however, seemed to me that there were a few designing quirks that needed to be worked out. Sometimes when I clicked on a certain link it would redirect to me places I didn’t want to be. With that being said, I imagined I was also visiting Cleveland traveling on the Silverline and decided my destination would be Cleveland State University. I always find it so interesting to explore other college life and atmospheres compared to GMU. However, when exploring this website, I wasn’t very impressed by the lack of description. There were also only very few images of the college. I would use this website as a starting point and then continue my research on a website that has more detailed information. It was a useful page to recognize the stops on the Silverline though to plan out a trip that was based on these stops instead of having to hail a cab or walk all around the city.

I had never heard of Google Docs until someone mentioned it in class the other day and when I looked into it, I used it for an assignment for another class and really liked the format of it. Not to mention, it is another place to store a document other than just on one hard drive or on your personal computer. The ability to share your work and let others edit it or collaborate together on it is the most interesting tool about Google Docs. It could be a useful interactional tool for students and teachers or maybe someone looking to have their work corrected, however, I wouldn’t like some of my personal documents to be viewed by any and everyone on the Internet and those documents I am able to keep private and only giving me access to them (unless a hacker gains access). It’s going to be an odd change that will take some getting used to after using Microsoft Office for 19 years, but to me it seems worth it!

Google Chart Wizard and Google Maps are not necessarily of great education importance to me, however, they are extremely interesting to mess around with. As a communications major, I rarely use charts and statistical values but sometimes seeing an visual image of something puts it into perspective rather than just having words. For presentations that include a lot of numbers and values, I plan on using Google Chart Wizard to enhance those numbers and comparisons. Google Maps, on the other hand, is somewhere I spend a lot of my time, however, this time is not dedicated to educational purposes but leisure activities instead. For me, it is easier to just quickly type an address into my GPS programmed into my car and listen to that for every street and turn I need to make to get to my destination. However, when my family and I are looking for a beach house to stay at during the summer, we use Google Maps often to depict the scenery of the exact house were looking into staying. I also show a lot of my friends when we first meet my hometown on Google Maps. It’s hard for people to understand that I literally live in a place with cows, corn fields, and no stop lights, but when they see a visual, they understand! All of these Google features are interesting and useful for many Internet users and I believe they should advertise these tools more. Like I said, I am an adamant Internet user and had never heard of Google Docs or Google Chart Wizard!