Now you have your Facebook page, twitter account and devices to view, download, upload, capture and share images, blog, Skype and discuss your every thought, how will you behave? For some the apparent anonymity allows them to take on a digital persona of someone completely different from their “hardcopy” selves. In many ways the internet is replacing your memories; why clutter your memory-bank when you can store it virtually? But this also has led to the phenomena of people learning and developing online. So your online behaviour reflects your actual development as a citizen.
With immediate access we can very nearly capture our every thought in this “stream of consciousness” world. But would you allow anyone access to all your petty, lustful, spiteful, bitchy, silly, shameful, and wonderfully human ideas? Your anonymity can be illusionary. If someone wanted to access your thoughts badly enough they can. Ask yourself a simple question about your online self. If you were going for a job interview, would you be happy to allow your prospective employer access to your Facebook and twitter account or and to all of the websites you ever viewed? (Some employers in the US have begun to ask job applicants for their social media passwords!)
But the main point of social responsibility on the web is that with any communications comes responsibility, and with the ability to reach large numbers comes increased responsibility on us the users. The democratisation of how people can interact with each other can have a hugely positive spin off with people holding people in power accountable. People power on the web has now become a factor in how large corporations and governmental power is wielded. It also has had a transformative effect on many old consumerist strangleholds. Young people have “liberated” their music, films, games, and telecommunications and used uploaded videos to highlights human rights abuses in totalitarian regimes, and piano playing cats!
In many ways the internet is this generation’s voice, its beat poetry, avant-garde cinema and rock and roll all blended together. So it’s your responsibility what you leave behind, your record of what you are. Maybe it would be good if you decided to “use it wisely”. Well just a little!
Wednesday 24 April 2013
Wednesday 10 April 2013
Step back in time with DkIT Library Archives
Ever wondered what DkIT was like in the early days? …Take a step back in time to the opening of the new Regional Technical College Dundalk on Monday, 3rd May 1971.
Did you know that this was not the original site chosen for the College? The council originally planned to locate the College in the old Louth Hospital on the Ardee Road, which is now part of the Grammar School at the top of Stapleton Place.
Some of the courses on offer in the first 1971-1972 prospectus were:
Electronics, civil & mechanical engineering, £25 per annum
Business studies diploma course, £25 per annum
Secretarial studies course, £10 per annum
Others included telecommunications, diploma in banking and motor engineering.
Some of the activities on offer from College Societies in 1974/75 were archaeology, music, pottery, French film session, and canoe building.
Where have all the canoe builders gone, I wonder?
Here’s a brief piece from the college newsletter ("Pulvis Tauri") of February 1972: “MID-WEEK DANCES – Following numerous requests for mid-week dances the Services Committee are holding a dance in the canteen on Thursday 24th. Dancing will be from ten o’clock until one and everything else will be from one o’clock onwards. The Trolls will be playing for you and they are reputed to be a very versatile group, so it should be pretty good. Admission is 25p and is open to students, staff and their friends.”
This is only a small snap shot of what the RTC had to offer in the early years. DkIT Library College Archives is, as the name indicates, an archive of documents, photographs and more relating to the college from its foundation right up to the present day. We rely on donations, so there may be gaps in the collection. DkIT Library College Archives is a work in progress which we hope to have online and ready for viewing in the near future.
Did you know that this was not the original site chosen for the College? The council originally planned to locate the College in the old Louth Hospital on the Ardee Road, which is now part of the Grammar School at the top of Stapleton Place.
Some of the courses on offer in the first 1971-1972 prospectus were:
Electronics, civil & mechanical engineering, £25 per annum
Business studies diploma course, £25 per annum
Secretarial studies course, £10 per annum
Others included telecommunications, diploma in banking and motor engineering.
Some of the activities on offer from College Societies in 1974/75 were archaeology, music, pottery, French film session, and canoe building.
Where have all the canoe builders gone, I wonder?
Here’s a brief piece from the college newsletter ("Pulvis Tauri") of February 1972: “MID-WEEK DANCES – Following numerous requests for mid-week dances the Services Committee are holding a dance in the canteen on Thursday 24th. Dancing will be from ten o’clock until one and everything else will be from one o’clock onwards. The Trolls will be playing for you and they are reputed to be a very versatile group, so it should be pretty good. Admission is 25p and is open to students, staff and their friends.”
This is only a small snap shot of what the RTC had to offer in the early years. DkIT Library College Archives is, as the name indicates, an archive of documents, photographs and more relating to the college from its foundation right up to the present day. We rely on donations, so there may be gaps in the collection. DkIT Library College Archives is a work in progress which we hope to have online and ready for viewing in the near future.
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