Emotion through texting

Between the texting I’ve done today and the capstone presentations, my mind wandered off on a tangent that has currently made it to this blog post. Today, we all know what texting is and how it has taken over the world of communication, but is it the best way? Sure texting is fast and easy, but what about those texts that either don’t have any emotion or have some type of emotion that you cant figure out.

Where is this going? Well, considering the fact that the process of writing a short story was explained today in the presentations of projects…and the fact that I did text today…I started thinking about emotion through text. I mean, it’s obvious to tell when someone is excited by a “!” at the end of their sentences, or when they are mad by TEXTING IN ALL CAPS, but what about those texts that are not as clear? In our short stories, we use other words to describe how a character says a certain line. For example:

“I have to go now.” She exclaimed hurriedly while turning her back to the man.

The word “hurriedly” paints us a picture of how she said the line as well as how we should read the line. While texting, certain texts that are sent may be read differently than they are meant to be read. For example, the idea of sarcasm doesn’t really work well over text. Personally, my best friend and I have misread many sarcastic texts in our time; sometimes even to the point of a fight. Either way…texting proves to be both fast and efficient. It’s main downfall, though, is that sometimes the emotion that is portrayed in face-to-face interaction and even story, it lost.

The Time Traveler Project...

Just like everyone else, I had the pleasure of watching myself present my time traveler project to the class via Youtube. Needless to say, the only thing I could think about were things that were wrong about the presentation. Interesting enough, however, the same day the videos were up and ready to be viewed, one of my coaches told our team that it was important to not only recognize what we need to improve, but also what we did right whether it be in a game or at practice. Picking out the negative things is always easier than the positive, but in order to keep improving in any area, we must also acknowledge the positive aspects as well.

Using what my coach told me and noticing not only the negative but also the positive, I decided to start off with the things I need to work on and ending with the things I did well while presenting. In terms of things I should work on for the next presentation, editing out words such as “umm” and “like” are my main goal. Also, working on not making faces when I am trying to figure out what Carty was saying (whoops). At any rate, I think that my eye contact and “animation” were pretty good. Although, I could work on looking into the audience rather than at the wall. Also, my voice didn’t sound as terrible as I thought it would…which is also a positive thing.

Steve Jobs's Style

I decided in this blog to go off of the rather massive discussion in class today regarding appropriate dress attire while giving a presentation. As the “motivator” of the discussion, Steve Jobs’s first unveiling of the iPhone was used as an example. In Jobs’s presentation, he is wearing a plain black turtle neck, jeans, and sneakers. With this being said, Jobs’s attire for the event was a topic of controversy. I myself was unsure of the attire at first; however, I changed my mind about halfway through the presentation. Right when Jobs walked out, all I thought was “isn’t this a major event? Where’s his suit?” As I said before, halfway through I couldn’t get over how genius of an outfit choice this was for the event. I mean think about it…

* We already know how much of a genius Jobs is

* His audience is a group of everyday people

* The main focus is the product

* He knows what his audience wants to see

With all of this in mind, why wouldn’t Jobs wear something like he ended up walking out in? Just as he explained in his presentation, the iPhone was made for the average person. This is what made it different from any other smartphone of the time. Where am I going with this you might be asking? The main point of the outfit was to connect to the audience. I believe that Jobs wanted his audience to see him as equal and as an average person. After all, he wants to live and breathe his products. Therefore, if the product is easy for the average person, he wants to show that he is “the average person.” Thus, no suit and tie was needed; the message was conveyed in an extraordinary way that made people want to go out and get the phone.