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WWW.GUILFORDlAN.COM
Occupy the elections,
occupy the future
Tent
cities.
>tS5fe
ȴS
Altercations with the
fuzz. And that one
guy on the soapbox.
The Occupy Wall
Street movement has
momentum that could
rival the Tea Party, if
only they could get
their best soapboxers to run for office.
The Tea Party movement made its presence known and
rapidly became the face of conservative American politics.
Their interests now dominate the presidential race.
The Occupy movement is a more recent development,
and while it has dominated the media in recent weeks, it
may not have the same influence the Tea Party has had.
Occupy Wall Street could act as a balancing force against
the Tea Party, but first they would have to demonstrate the
same lasting political clout.
While the Occupy protesters are clearly devoted to their
cause, spending weeks demonstrating across the nation,
their long-term potential is less clear. Popular hashtags
come and go every day on Twitter. A new meme dominates
the Internet every week. What makes OccupyWallStreet
more than a flash in the pan?
That the Occupy movement has spread across the world
is impressive, but perhaps it .is a sign that the movement
is short-lived. The energy the Occupy movement has
expended by going global may mean it lacks the energy
to sustain itself — the bigger the blaze, the faster it bums.
This raises a question: What does the Occupy movement
need to do to sustain itself and carry its message through to
actual political action?
The answer is simple: They need to run for office.
"I don't think Occupy Wall Street will have the influence
they want unless they do what the Tea Party did and take
over the nominating process," said PBS host Bill Moyers
in an interview with the Houston Chronicle. "Unless they
do, they will never have the satisfaction that they want and
that the civil rights movement, say, had back in the 1950s
and '60s.
"These people are not going to have long-ranging
effect unless they have a party to act on their interests,"
said Moyers. "They need to become a political movement
instead of a grievance committee."
While creating a political party may be a radical move, it
is still possible for the Occupy movement to influence the
elections. If they were to identify a candidate to put their
energy into supporting, the Occupy protesters could secure
a position of lasting political influence.
An Occupy Party could occupy Congress if the
many individual movements around the country began
supporting candidates for the upcoming Senate and House
races.
Somewhere at every Occupy protest, there must be a
person with a megaphone making the most nqise, sharing
the most opinions, handing out the most flyersiand getting
the most attention. If each smaller movement copld identify
who that person is, they would have their candidates.
If each Occupy movement produced a congressperson,^
the power:of the Tea Party would be rivaled, and —t: more
importantly — the Occupy protesters would be able to find
the lasting solution they are looking for.
So here is hoping that in the next few weeks Occupy
Wall Str^t disappears from Twitter, and that Occupy
Congress and Occupy Oval Office start to trend. Perhaps
we could finally find the change we were looking for.
FORUM
Get interested in The Gniif erd Bnzz
By Victor Lopez
Staff Writer
Guil ford is a college of students and
professors who value transparency
and open communication, and the
college delivers this in part through
the Buzz.
But as it stands right now it
seems that the Buzz is ineffective
because of our lack of concern for
the information within.
Essentially the Buzz replaced
rampant mass emails and mass
voicemails and has served the
purpose of eliminating the clutter of
those processes.
In 2003, President and Professor
of Political Science Kent Chabotar
brought the idea of Guilford's Buzz
with him when he became president,
according to Vice President of
Marketing Ty Buckner. This is
a measure that would be more
effective if more students actually
read the Buzz.
"It has also drawn attention to
the emergency nature of a mass
email or voicemail message from the
College," said Buckner. "All in all, a
success in my opinion."
Recently in a private conversation,
a CCE SGA board member stated
that CCE students were hard to reach
because they simply did not read
their email, the Buzz, or even The
Guilfordian. It was as if some simply
did not care, were uninterested, or
were too busy.
User Services Manager Teresa
Sanford told The Guilfordian that
some people scoff at the idea of
having to read the Buzz.
"It's sad actually to hear someone
be so proud of the fact that they
don't read the only sanctioned form
of mass communication on campus,
but also hear them be the first to
complain when they don't know
something," said Sanford.
As a college student, I want to be
in tune with what is going on at my
college — even if I am not planning
on taking part in the events. We are
being taught to be critical thinkers
and how to be aware of the local,
national and world events taking
place around us, so it would stand to
reason that we would want to know
what is happening in our back yard.
In a Guilfordian survey of 52
students, both traditional and CCE,
placed on Facebook and the Buzz,
41.7 percent of the students polled
said they felt their peers used the
Buzz, 38.9 percent said their peers
did not and 19.4 percent said they
didn't know. 84.6 percent of those
surveyed said they read the Buzz
daily while 13.5 percent said they
only did once in a while.
On the other end of the spectrum,
traditional students at times have to
deal with a deluge of homework and
reading and do not have time to read
the Buzz.
One of my professors said, "You
know college isn't just about papers.
Get out and be involved."
I wondered if he had forgotten the
homework he had recently assigned
and how impossible, at times, it
makes students' lives.
Still, there is no reason that, as
students, we cannot take the time to
read the Buzz and make ourselves
aware of what is going on around
campus.
"It only takes five >minutes
to browse the Buzz and it can be
uploaded to most mobile devices,"
said Sanford.
For better or worse, the centralized
platform we have for campus wide
communication is the Buzz. Short of
blaring public service announcements
at the start of every class, it is what
we have to work with. Why not give
it a shot?
Google Plus isn’t really a rival
By Natalie Sutton
Staff Writer
Remember when MySpace was cool? How about AIM?
How long will Facebook be the king of online social
networking before it one day fizzles out just like MySpace
and AIM?
Could Google Plus be the next big thing, taking
Facebook's spot on the cyber throne?
My guess is no.
Google Plus, which launched in June 2011, was Google's
biggest attempt to rival Facebook, according to The New
York Times.
The site mimicked many of Facebook's features, such
as picture and video uploads and status updates, but also
added new components that Facebook lacked, such as
friend circles and group video chats.
While in theory Google Plus seems like a great idea, it
has not picked up enough momentum to truly compete
with Facebook yet.
Although Google co-founder Larry Page says that
Google Plus reached 40 million users in Octob^er this year, I
still only know a small handful of people who actually use
Google Plus, while I know only a handful of people who
do not use Facebook.
Sophomore Kelsey Worthy got a Google Plus account in
June but only posted one status and deactivated it shortly
after.
"The whole fun of Facebook is that everyone is already
on it," said Worthy. "Nobody was on Google Plus. I never
did anything on it and I never saw anything on it. It's that
simple."
With how popular Facebook already is, it is easy to
be apathetic about starting over on a different social
networking site. There is a general question of: why
bother starting from scratch while Facebook still exists and
continues to thrive?
Sophomore Stephanie Seligman, who has a Google Plus
account, has not used the service in over a month and does
not think that it will replace Facebook.
"I got one because I thought that everyone would get
one, and it would be the new Facebook," Seligman said.
"I doubt it will (replace Facebook). No one cares anymore.
It was cool for a few weeks and then fizzled out because
it's hard to use."
Facebook has become so embedded in our culture today
that it seems almost impossible that something could
replace it, especially since Facebook is constantly changing
its layout and adding new components to continually
improve the site and keep users from getting bored.
Unfortunately for Google Plus, it seems that the most it
has accomplished has been pressuring Facebook creators
to expand on certain layouts and features that Google Plus
possessed.
While Google Plus offers a competitive motivation for
Facebook to step up its game, it has only made transferring
over to Google Plus less appealing for Facebook users.
Cory Kirkland, a sophomore at North Carolina State
University, enjoys using Google Plus but thinks that
Facebook is still superior.
"Google Plus can't really take over Facebook, since
Facebook already has such a strong hold on the social
networking game," said Kirkland. "It was a good try on
something that has already been perfected. It could take
over if Facebook were to have a falling out due to privacy
issues or if Google came out with something crazy and
innovative in social networking."
Perhaps in the cyber world's future there will be
something even bigger and better than Facebook. Maybe
it will even be some improved version of Google Plus. Our
culture thrives on coming up with the "next big thing," but
I think, for now at least, Facebook is here to stay.