WRT 235: Writing in Electronic Environments
Technology and digital writing have advanced tremendously in society. Various topics discussed involves itself in some kind of rhetorical situation that can be persuasive and effective. Individuals are exposed to this everyday with advertisements, visuals, and especially social media. The media serves a powerful in expressing your own ideas and creativity. However, we tend to only utilize what we are accustomed to and comfortable with that we neglect other sources of media to benefit important discussions. Communication can become impactful when using digital writing and media. According to Create to Learn, “The ability to use effective strategies for interacting and sharing information and ideas with others requires continual awareness of how, when, why, and what to communicate. This includes creating digital and multimedia documents, using language, image, sound, and interactive media effectively to express and share ideas.” Social media is a great opportunity to interact with others in different parts of the world including sharing impactful ideas and connecting relating to one another. As a digital writer, communication is key especially when collaborating. By expressing feelings into the group early, nothing is misconstrued and left out. There's a connotation that a group or a partnership needs to have a leader however, some of the best work happens to be a collaborative leadership where everyone gets an opportunity to be responsible for their actions and different ideas are able to be combined together, altering it to a beautiful message. Throughout my experience in WRT 235, digital environment, I was able to showcase my abilities and gain knowledge within digital writing.
Everything is a rhetorical situation in a sense that opinions are changed constantly and interpretations varies from person to person. With these situations, it is important to know your target audience and the message you’re trying to accomplish. “The most important decisions a digital author must make concern the strategic communication objectives of intent to communicate a message. Who is your target audience? What do you want your audience to think, feel, or do as a result of your actions? Although you might think you can create messages for a wide target audience “everybody” in reality, messages are most effective when they are designed for a particular, targeted group (Create to Learn, Renee Hobbs).” This leads to the appropriate rhetorical choice a writer must take in a certain situation. Before developing a message, the essential note is to know why are you composing your message as a digital writer and your possible results.
Throughout this Spring 2018 semester of digital environment, I have realized that social media is a powerful platform to discuss your thoughts and explain different rhetorical situations. I have utilized YouTube as a tool in presenting concepts that tests my creativity as a writer. With YouTube, the influence it has with visuals and speech along with amazing edits can persuade an audience and discuss your ideas. It’s a type of blogging that can be essential in discovering new movements and elaborating on your own. Twitter has been a great way to test digital writing. By having a limit of 280 characters per tweet, users will have to cleverly use their words within that to get their points across and hopefully start a conversation. Deciding a specific type of media to express a rhetorical situation is difficult which I came to a consensus that using multiple types of media rather than one will make your voice more heard and passionate. Morten Rand- Henderiksen developed ten ethical principles when becoming a digital writer. With the media so accessible to everyone, many content can become harmful rather than beneficial. Morten’s ten insights are:
Voice your opinion. Freedom of speech, information, publication, and expression are basic elements of a democracy. As a digital author, it is your obligation to use and protect these rights at all times.
Be critical of everything, even your self. As a digital author, you are part of the creation of free knowledge creation and discussion. It is your obligation to shed critical light on what goes on in society as well as how other digital authors, including yourself, are presenting these events.
Use your power for good. As a digital author, you can shine a light on injustices and neglect perpetrated on individuals and groups. Use this power wisely.
Tell the truth. Words and images are powerful tools that should be used with the utmost care. When publishing content, present the facts as they are, even if you disagree with them.
Your opinion is your opinion. Your opinion and interpretation of events is important and should be shared. When voicing your own or someone else’s opinion or interpretation, always state it as such. Never present opinion, interpretation, or conjecture as fact.
Be transparent about your allegiances. To preserve your own trustworthiness and integrity as a digital author, always state any financial, personal, or political relationship to the subject or topic you are presenting. Bias, even if it is only perceived as such, immediately discredits your account unless you warn of it first. In simple terms; if you have a political affiliation that colors your judgment, say so; if you are employed by or received money from the subject you are covering, say so; if you were given gifts or preferential treatment in return for a positive review or commentary, say so. By stating these facts of allegiance your opinions gain informational value that would otherwise be lost in suspicion of bias.
Reveal your sources. In ensuring transparency you lend credibility to your own content as well as provide others to further pursue the facts of the matter. Be critical of your sources and seek independent verification. Before presenting information as fact, always check your source’s credibility. If none can be found, state so clearly.
Give credit where credit is due. Give proper attribution when using, quoting or basing your content on the work of others. In other words, present quotes as quotes and use hyperlinks to original content that you are referencing or re-purposing.
Preserve intended meaning. When quoting or paraphrasing a statement, always ensure that the intended meaning is communicated. Never edit or change a statement in such a way that the intended meaning is changed.
Admit and correct your mistakes immediately. When an inaccuracy or error in your content is discovered by you or someone else, correct it immediately and announce that you have done so to ensure that those who base their opinions and other content creation on the incorrect information have a chance to make corrections as well. It is your duty to uphold the truth and present fact even if that means admitting you were wrong.
In becoming a digital writer and media user, it is important to be passionate about the topics you discussed. If you put out information that you simply do not care, it is easily captured by your audience and it tests your authenticity and truth value.
As I continue the rest of my life as a author of my own digital age, I need to work on becoming consistent with
my content and constantly challenge my creativity. Digital environment and the media has been an opportunity for others including myself to express my individuality and thoughts into the internet. It provides a voice that can be taken as an advantage. In the future, I wish to advance my Youtube channel and create content that I enjoy and love. After taking this class, my appreciation for the media has increased and I value myself more as a digital writer. Explore the content I created throughout WRT 235 and let’s start a discussion.
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