Wang Signing Off

We have two and a half weeks left of school and I can just feel the break right around the corner. As you all know, I had to make this blog because it was required for my class. As it is deemed "required"obviously I had to write on this blog throughout the semester so I was able to pass this class. But even though it was required, I really did not mind coming on here and writing my thoughts and feelings about things that I am interested. I really enjoyed reading my classmates comments and what they had to say about my feelings and thoughts. It was nice to get a mixture of criticism, interest, and connection from all my readers. It was also intriguing to read my classmates blogs, there are so many interesting fascinating people in my class that some of there topics that they wrote about I would never thought of. It was nice to see different views on a variety of concepts. This blog also  helped me learn a lot of concepts in class, this was a great way of being able to put a concept in my own words and actually remember it! I mean besides that the goal of the blog was to let you see my interests and my views on class while I tried to connect class concepts to Supreme and my other interests. I hope that you were able to feel connected to me and hopefully maybe learned something. I have really enjoyed posting on my blog and I hope you guys enjoyed reading it.

Relationship Development

In class yesterday we learned about theories of relationship development. Relationship development is a change over time, "development" implies a direction but not all change takes that form. Change can encompass: emotional (attraction, liking, love), cognitive (knowledge, ability to predict, confidence in prediction), and behavioral (interdependence, influence). So we talked about a two different types of theories; one was the social penetration theory and the uncertainty reduction theory.  The social penetration theory is where a relationships development is smooth and has a steady progression. Daena put it simply as the onion metaphor  development is orderly. Don't jump around, and don't go to the center before there outer layers. Basically from knowing very little, to knowing a lot about that person just by one peel at a time. Uncertainty reduction theory is where rewards are important, but its global and distant. Uncertainty can directly motivate the desire to communicate as in the other will try to predict what the other will do, and think they know what they should do. Even after all the uncertainty you still experience uncertainty about the relationship. I know for a fact I am an onion. You have to really get to know me first before I open up to you. In some cases though I have experienced the uncertainty theory, for example I had broken up with a long a time girlfriend and immediately met another girl. For some time there I was uncertain that I made the right decision, and long story short we have been dating for 3 and a half years now. Some times you just have to go with your gut and believe that you made the right decision.

Online Dating

I wouldn't call it "online dating" due to the fact that I am not literally online having a dinner date with someone. I would call it "searching for a date" because you are using a platform to scroll through people online, to see whether or not they would be a good date in real life. You are also basing this on what they have in their "bio" and a profile picture, not the ideal way of trying to find a date. I have never personally used any online dating apps or websites, but I have known people that have used them in the past and they say it is awesome! Now these people that I am talking about are older than the age of 30 and wanted a long lasting relationship. Not like tinder which seems to be more of a "hooking up" platform, and is used by people who are 30 and younger. My family friends used a dating website called eHarmony.com, and ever since they matched on eHarmony they haven't left each others sides. 

eHarmony has been around since the year 2000 and they say on average 438 single people will marry someone they matched with on eHarmony. That is very impressive, considering that no other dating website comes close to it. eHarmony's matching is based on using its 29 DIMENSIONS® model to match couples based on features of compatibility found in thousands of successful relationships. They have you answer very basic questions to get a feel of who you are and what you want. Then you complete questionnaire to get quality connections based on key areas of personality. Once that is all completed you, they save you the time of searching and narrow all the possible matches that you could build a successful quality relationship with. If you are not looking for a long lasting relationship this website is not for you, but if you are I would highly recommend checking it out.

Second Life?

Yesterday in class, we got to play this game called second life. Second life reminded me of a game called World of War Craft, not the action of it but the concept. Basically all you are doing is picking a character that would suit you, picking upgrades to make your self look cooler, and exploring the infinite virtual world. In this game you are able to do anything; flying, fishing, boating, gambling, the actions are endless. Same with the worlds/islands you can visit; gaming island, Michael Jackson Island, stripper island, etc. I can definitely see how people would get pulled into this game and play for hours. I can see how people can find an alternate online identity, but is it healthy for them?

Now in my years of gaming, I was never ever able to play these types of games for multiple reasons. First of all, I strongly do not like computer games, I have tried them, but they don't bring the same gaming experience like consoles do. Second of all, games like these can really pull you in for hours even days of working on a perfect online identity that'll never exist. Which wouldn't you rather try to help your own identity first? Third of all, these computer games always try to make you spend money, just like in this game you needed some sort of currency to be able to do whatever you wanted. At the end of the day people will argue with me that computers are a better gaming system, and that building an online identity is not a bad thing. In some cases yes you are right, some computers do have better software which means better graphics but I don't have thousands of dollars to spend on a desktop. I spent days building my online identity on consoles playing in Call of Duty/Halo 3 tournaments, joining clans, meeting new people etc. But I don't think I ever spent time in a virtual reality wishing that I looked or acted like my avatar. I know some people that do play these games wish they were like there virtual selves and that isn't healthy. There is a great balance between the virtual/real world and people need to find that balance.

Wang's Typical Thursday

Once again it's Thursday, and if you have read my blog before Supreme dropped this morning. The drop this morning was not up to par, there were a couple pieces that I did like the orange and camo rain jacket. I have seen a lot of this yellow, black, and grey camo this season and it has seem to catch everyones attention considering that jacket sold out in five seconds (Supreme sell out times). But this week I wanted to talk about the Nike collaboration with Supreme. This week goes to show how influence of a "higher power/brand" will make people by the ugliest clothes just because of a hype. People just want to say that they own Supreme x Nike because when those brand get together its hypebeast nation! Obviously everyone has their own opinion on this, but people are buying things now a days to say they have it, and then resell it at a crazy mark up. Which is what will happen this week and every week ahead of us, of course can we stop it? Of course not! People are going to buy the ugliest things from this drop and make them look cool.

This is the worst Nike collaboration yet, I do not like how anything looked this week from them especially their track suit. I would have expected something with a little more design like past collaborations, where it has a large mix of Supreme and Nike branding on the clothes and shoes. This week was very simple, very bright colors, with the simple Supreme logo, in 3m (flash photo makes it reflective), hidden behind a mesh of some sorts. It just does not look to appealing to me, the shoes are a different story. The shoes were not defiantly not what I was expecting either.  I know I define myself as a sneaker head, and all shoes are welcome in my book, but damn these things are pretty ugly. It just doesn't look like they put a lot of effort into this collaboration, and just because it is Nike x Supreme it sold out in seconds. If this was just a Supreme drop they would be getting bashed on by people for such an unappealing drop, but its Nike... 

Gotta love my games.

I’m going to go a little off topic this week, and talk about video games. We watched a Ted Talk this week by Jane McGonigal about how video games might be able to change the world. Games like World of Warcraft give players the means to save worlds, and incentive to learn the habits of heroes. What if we could harness this gamer power to solve real-world problems? Now I do believe that if the world was a video game, every single world problem would be fixed. Just because in a video game we can fail and not get harmed by it, besides maybe our pride, but thats the reality thing about the real world. People do not want to fail in this world and that’s that. People seem to view failure as a misconception, because you failed you are a total loser and no one wants to be seen with you. I see a failure as a lesson for many more failures to come, and eventually a successful event will happen. Now as a individual who has played video games for years, I have failed many times in the virtual world and the real world, but I have wondered if failing so many times in a virtual world has helped me cope with my failures in the real world? 

Wow I got really side tracked, anyways I think that video games are crucial for a children's learning experience. I know through experiences I learned some valuable lessons playing video games playing solo, with friends, or online. I have met people from all over the world and still keep in touch with a few of them. You hear so many good and bad stories, good and bad language, good and bad events, etc. It is really interesting to listen to what someone else has to say on the other side of the world, even if its just a video game! Video games have impacted my life so much that I do not think I will ever stop playing them the way that I do. Video games help me stay sane and its nice to take a break from reality once and a while!

Yes or No?

Stone Island x Supreme dropped today and obviously everything sold out in a matter of minutes. Now this week is a big week for Supreme because this is their first collaboration of the season, and it is a very anticipated drop. So anticipated that I heard about this drop in May. While I was scrolling through instagram earlier this week, and I noticed that there was a new tag/social mechanism that were on people's stories, which is the yes or no button. I like this tag a lot because it really engages your followers into what you are talking about. Which I like how people are able to give their simple opinion on if they like it or not. This new “tag” can really help resellers find out what people want this week from Supreme, and could potentially help the company for future drops. On the flip side of that, resellers will be able to spend all their money on the most popular items and not just the ones resellers think people will like. This will make a huge impact for all supreme or “hype beast” buyers because this only makes resale value more expensive, and it is harder to get things on release date especially the things that I want! I am not complaining about how it sells out fast, but this new “tag” is not helping my situation or anyone else’s. Besides that I really liked the drop today, even though I didn't get anything. My favorite pieces have to be that lock box and the Stone Island puffy jacket, I like the colors that they used for this drop, and the simple details in the clothes. Considering that this season has had great drops already like this one, I anticipate that next week will be even better with the Scarface collaboration!