Extra Credit - The Media Equation & Why We Make Mistakes

The Media Equation

This chapter was about politeness and the aspect of introducing that concept with the digital world. Humans and humans often have issues being honest between each other and politeness plays a big part in social interactions. Computers on the other hand are stoic and do not have feelings. When the aspect of emotions are placed on a non human device, can the same respect be given to these devices? A few experiments regarding computers and their ability to spark polite and/or truthful responses from human interactions were performed. A look into the placement of computers, who programmed them, and the type of survey conducted were all recognized as important aspects in humans being polite about computers.

What I found interesting is that although some people may argue that computers don't have feelings and don't warrant polite responses otherwise, they were programmed by a real human counter-part. Me personally, I would take into consideration the programmer's feelings even though the computer may not be real. This was talked about a bit and I found it interesting that something I normally do was conversed about.

One of the most important things I got out of this was that the author argued that quality, quantity, relevance, and clarity are four important principles that help with polite interaction. Quality pertains to accuracy or a degree of truth in something being said. Quantity pertains to partaking in response to only what the conversation asks. Relevance is along the same idea but should clearly relate to the purpose of the conversation. Clarity shouldn't obscure and should be precise in what it intends to convey.

Why We Make Mistakes

This chapter was part of an overall larger book and was authored by Joseph Hallinan. The chapter talks about mistakes, humans, and gives a few examples and reasons for why mistakes might commonly occur. It started out talking about a pilot who crashed his plane due to his inability to perform his duties. He was concerned about a burnt out light and failed to maintain proper plane control. Mistakes do happen in life and no one is exempt from this.

A big reason the author gives for the cause of mistakes are distractions from a primary task. He talks a bit more about this when going into the subject of multi-tasking. As the digital world evolves, it's becoming easier and easier to focus on one thing, put it aside, and then focus on another. Doing this causes a lack of focus on other areas, possibly resulting in some sort of mistake. A lack of efficiency seems to be a direct result from distractions and a low efficiency eating then causes mistakes.

The chapter then talks about and gives an example of this multi-tasking issue. A bus driver crashed his bus into a wall because he was doing other things instead of driving.

Relating this to computer science, this makes me realize the important of delegating tasks efficiently and making sure the right things get done in the right order. Priority is an aspect that I believe should be inherent and always exist no matter which task is switched to. Losing focus of what's important can be really harmful to important and primary tasks.

The author then went on to give a few more examples that resulted in automobile accidents and a few deaths. Overall , I believe this chapter is important in that it touches on what I talked about earlier. Maintaining focus and efficiency is key when evolving to a multi-tasked digital world.