Korey Woodington Media Law & Literacy Blog

The idea of Diffusion of Innovation is a theory that tries to explain why some innovations catch on and why some other don't. Originally theorized by Everett Rogers, the proposal is that 5 elements influence the spread of an idea or innovation: the innovation itself, adopters, communication channels, time, and a social system. Here, I will explain one recent major innovation and look at it through the lens of Diffusion of Innovation. ChatGPT is a recent innovation that has taken the internet by storm. According to OpenAI , it is an artificial intelligence service that is programmed to respond to prompts and answer questions in a conversational manner. The idea of AI isn't new, but ChatGPT is one of the major breakthroughs in the industry, with its boundaries being so vast, that OpenAI has to physically limit it to prevent uncalled for behavior. Now, it can be used to answer any question someone may have, continue a conversation, even complete papers for students with great accu

In our 2nd EOTO session for Media Law + Lit class, we learned a lot about types of information, and one that caught my attention was alternative media, and how it relates to mainstream media. To begin, lets define mainstream media. Mainstream media is information obtained through typical news outlets, such as Fox News, The New York Times, CNN, MSNBC, The Washington Post, and many more similar outlets. These are sources that many turn their eyes to when looking for the most recent news story. One important thing to note is that these sources can absolutely still be biased. Take Fox News for example. They are typically more conservative sided, making Republicans appear better than Democrats, while MSNBC is known to have a more liberal public appearance. Alternative media is easy to understand in definition, but the line between it and mainstream isn't that clear. It usually spawns in direct contrast to mainstream media, and has oftentimes been described as pulling back the curtain of

In our first EOTO session for our Media Law & Lit class, we took a deep dive into the development of communication technologies. While my topic was the Cassette Tape, there was another presentation that tackled the history and importance of television. This is what was talked about and what I learned. Originally brought to light in 1884 as what would be a failed project, Paul Nipkow attempted using spinning disks to transmit images. It laid the ground work as a future successful successor of the telegraph and telephone.  There is a debate on who is the true inventor of the television. Two main names pop up in the great debate: Russian inventor Vladimir Zworykin and American inventor Philo Farnsworth. They would eventually hook into a legal battle, but ultimately, Philo Farnsworth was credited as the one who had preliminary drawings, granting him the patent for the television. The television has gone on to become one of the most influential inventions of the past century, as it has

I recently watched a YouTube documentary video titled In The Age of AI , and they tackled the idea of automation and employment trends in the United States. They stated that the standard of living has dropped 10-15%, due to the silent killer of automation of people losing their job due to automation. This includes file reading and reporting, self checkouts, transferring data, etc. There is a large risk looming over the future, and the results could be astounding. One eye opening facet they mentioned was the fact that students of those who lost their job to automation are more likely to struggle in school, and/or repeat a grade. Another fact they mentioned was how many of the jobs at risk to being automated, are primarily held by women. The economy specifically at risk. An unstable economy is a big target for automation, eventually forcing out those people who work in the industry.  Inequality has risen in America over the last 40 years. The wealthy are getting wealthier and the poor ar

Something that you hardly see on the internet these days centralizes around anti war posts. Why might that be?  When taking a look at one of these websites , you see one common theme: it all involves the United States in one way or another. They give you straight facts, and a lot of times it ends up painting a bad picture on the United States. The other website does a very similar thing, except its not just about war, and it has a conservative article for just about any topic you can find. There's nothing inherently wrong with these websites, they're just another opinion on a vast web of opinions. So why aren't they that popular? One possible reason is because of the United States' history of acting upon those who speak negatively during war time. It was very prevalent during both world wars, and you can find it with just about every war the United States has been a part of, especially over the almost 100 years. Those who voiced their opinions during war time were pers

The Cassette Tape was a very important invention/innovation back in the 1960's. Back when vinyl was very popular, there wasn't exactly an easy way to play your music on the go, as vinyl was very large and quite immobile. But thanks to a man who worked for Philips Company named Lou Ottens , that problem was solved in 1963. I will not only talk about its impacts, but its positives and negatives as well. The Cassette Tape was a revelational object that would inspire many inventions, innovations, and practices (both good and bad) that would follow over the next half century. Small spools of magnetic film would store information inside a Cassette Tape, allowing for storage of audio. People could record their own audio, save it, and play it back, allowing for mobile music functionality. The Cassette Tapes eventually found their way into vehicles as a radio system, which is something all cars today come with, even if you don't notice it at first (cd's, bluetooth, etc.). Casse