Cyberspace and Society
Week Fourteen:  Final Exam
Fall 2008
The final will be in-class, closed book, much like the midterm.  There will be only one test, there will be no separate writing questions as on the midterm.  It will be on Saturday, December 13, at 1 p.m. in the Student Center lab where we have met before.  Many of the questions will be repeated from the weekly quizzes, others will be simplified to require less recall of detail or new, less detailed, items.  The best way to study is probably to go through the weekly quizzes which are available in SAKAI.


Here are some points to keep in mind in going over the quizzes.  You can also go back to the readings if you are unclear on any of the topics covered in the quizzes, of course.

Week One: 
  1. Parallels between the evolution of the brain and the development of the Internet as a global brain. .
  2. Different business strategies between IBM, Google, Apple and Microsoft
  3. The nature of exponential growth and the implications for the future of the Internet.
Week Two:
  1. The different means of futurist analysis:  trend analysis, cyclical pattern analysis, environmental scanning, scenario writing.
  2. The philosophical questions in The Big Questions
  3. Kurzseil's Epochs
Week Three:
  1. McLuhan's basic thesis about the medium and the message.
  2. McLuhan's theory of "hot" and "cool" media.
  3. Implications of the internet, especially web search, as a medium for the way we think.
Week Four:  This was the midterm which covered the first three weeks.  You can review it in SAKAI.

Week Five:  This was the writing quiz.  There will be no writing questions on the final, but there will be a few multiple choice questions about writing.

Week Six:
  1. Political inspiration and tactics of the "Netroots" - how has the medium effected politics
  2. Generational changes in the American Zeitgeist:  G.I. Generation, Silent Generation, Baby Boomers, Generation X, Generation Y
  3. Types of generations:  Idealist, Reactive, Civic, Adaptive
Week Seven:
  1. Differences between computer games, console games and board games.
  2. Differences between specific games:  Spore, Warhammer, World of Warcraft, etc. 
  3. Effects of being online on youth culture.
Week Eight:  This was the second in-class midterm, Part Two of which is well worth reviewing. 

Week Nine: 
  1. Pew report on the influence of the internet in the campaign.
  2. Differences between the Obama and McCain campaigns in the use of the internet.
Week Ten:
  1. Differences between social networking and related sites:  MySpace, Friendster, Twitter, Facebook, Second Life, etc.
  2. The essay by Theodora Sites is worth rereading.
Week Eleven:
  1. Blogging sites and related sites, concepts and individuals:  Technorati, Shoemoney, Blogosphere, Gawker etc. 
  2. How the A-list emerges out of the chaos of the blogging world:  homeostasis and the power law.
Week Twelve:  There was no quiz this week, but we did work with the structure of futurist analysis. 
  1. Possible, probable, preventable and preferable futures - read an argument and identify which it is.
Week Thirteen:
  1. Strategies of different companies and organizations: IBM, Apple, Microsoft, Google, Twitter, Facebook, etc.
  2. Net neutrality issue.
  3. Zittrain's argument about the risks of the open internet