If you are like my father, then your search for science fiction novels can never be quenched. I have to admit, when I do read fiction, I like the science stuff the best too.
This week in class we talked a lot about the future of journalism. Where it’s going, what jobs will look like, what skills we will need etc. It’s hard for anyone to really know what is going to happen. It excites me to be honest. I think, more than ever, I want to focus my time at Columbia on New Media journalism, which will provide me with a new set of base skills (this website will get better, I promise) and perhaps some insight into the future, which is looking more and more like a science fiction novel.
We had a talk from Sreenath Sreenivasan, who would most likely be my New Media guru at Columbia. I was both embarrassed and pleased to be the person in class who knew the most about blogs, RSS feeds, the many different tools google can provide you and other geek things. In fact, my professor has asked me to give him a tutorial next week. This whole “Wired” thing has paid off. This is stuff I’ve been studying every day, but now I feel validated that for some in the journalism world it is important.
The real highlight of the class was a video called Epic 2014. It was a fake history up until the year 2014 when Google causes the New York Times to fold. “On August 4th, The New York Times becomes a newsletter for the elite and the elderly,” according to the future history.
It’s a scary video because in all honesty, I could see something like EPIC actually happening. But there are some flaws to the video. For example, they highlighted Friendster as an important moment in Internet history. Way off there. Perhaps their future history has a few mistakes as well.
