Hw: 6 Interest Statement for Semester-Long Project

For the pre-writing phase of my semester-long research and writing project there are various topics that interest me. The three main social computing technologies which I am most interested in right now are e-mail and e-mail lists, instant messaging, and social networking services. I am interested in e-mailing primarily because it seems that not many people tend to use e-mail as they had before. It almost has taken a back seat to some of the other ways of communicating on the web. Instant messaging is one of my personal favorites to learn more about, because I myself am always on the computer chatting with friends and I find it such an easy way to communicate. I am also very interested in social networking services such as facebook and myspace, because a lot of younger teens are starting to access these services and with all of the recent developments and circumstances of these that occur on the news it seems extremely dangerous for them to be on these types of sites, at such a young age. As for the marginalized groups that I am interested in, they include overcoming religious, overcoming inequities in access to education, rights and empowerment of poor or working- class people. I am a very religious person, and I find that religion does seem to be one of the biggest strifes or issues of differences among many people. Education is also something that I feel very strongly about and it hurts to know that some people are not able to receive the same education I do. I hope to learn more about the reasons why and see what I can do to help. Lastly, I am interested in rights and empowerment of poor or working-class people because I also feel that these people are treated differently because of the lifestyle they live. I’m thinking that some of the best geographical areas that I should start looking at are areas that I’m familiar with here in North America as well as far-off places located in Africa.