I'd have to profess that it has been an absolute pleasure attending the webinars that have been made availible to myself on TakingItGlobal. Though I initially had my reservations about the actual impact that webinars could have on audiences, I soon began to realize how marvelously efficient the whole idea of an "online class" was.

The change of heart was ushered in when I was in the process of presenting my bit on Journalism & Democracy in the "How to write like a Journalist" webinar and in the "Web 2.0" webinar that was presented by Liam.

Truth be told,I only had a vague idea of journalistic formatting on the blog platform prior to the "How to write like a Journalist" webinar. But with the aid of two lovely summer interns, I was able to grasp a more refined sense of how citizen journalism was drastically changing the nature of old media reporting with it's no-holds-barred style.

Naturally this got me thinking about how modern technology (Stuff like the internet, satellite devices, cell phones)has truly changed everything. And I mean EVERYTHING.

Then Liam said something in his webinar about the internet mirroring nature, and it put me in a epistemological rut all day. He was right. I mean, the internet is man-made after all, So it would make sense for man to imitate his environment, consciously or not. Hackers and viruses for example are like the criminals and natural disasters we have in reality.

Thinking about it in a broader sense, I came to the conclusion that the internet actually behaves like an organic system or a living entity have you will. To be healthy it needs to be cleaned, scanned for viruses and updated on a regular basis. For us, I guess you could say that regular updates are like regular exercise, and the cleaning and scanning is like maintaining a healthy diet.

In summation, this internship month has definitely awakened my inner Socrates. :) Can't wait to see what the next month has in store.

-Raisa

(Originally posted on July 31, 2009 | 4:06 PM)>/b>

Cheers!