Norm+Chapter+Discussion

Norm Ch 1-16


 * 1) What would you do if you came across your Facebook page from the future as Emma did? Would you think it was a hoax or legitimate? Would you try to alter the future or leave well enough alone?
 * 2) The novel describes some outdated technologies such as America Online and their promotional CD-ROMs. What technologies have become outdated in your lifetime? What has replaced these technologies? What do you think will replace the new technology? What do you think will people in the future think of our “old and outdated” technology?
 * 3) The authors describe dial-up as the only way to access the Internet. Have you always had broadband/DSL or did you have dial-up at one point? If you never had dial-up, what would it be like to not have access to the Internet and phone service at the same time? (Remember, this was before affordable cell phones). If you had dial-up, what was it like to only be able to access one or the other?
 * 4) At this point, do you think Josh and Emma have a future, or is their relationship merely platonic? Who do you think Jordan Jones Jr. is? Speculate how Emma meets him and why they fall in love.


 * Discussion:**
 * 1) If I came across Facebook from the future, I would think it’s a hoax especially if none of my friends heard of it and I saw my “future” because who really knows what the future holds. If I found out it was a legitimate site, I would leave it alone because I’d be too scared to change things. What happens happens and there is nothing I can do about it. Now if I mistakenly altered my future by saying something or doing something and not even realizing it, then that is one thing but I wouldn’t do it purposefully.
 * 2) I remember I first owned a cassette player. I had all the 90s bands on cassette such as NSYNC, Backstreet Boys, and Britney Spears (yes I’m that lame). Then I got a CD player and upgraded everything to a CD and then my freshman year of high school, I got an I-pod. Now I have an I-phone with everything on it. It’s weird to see how much technology has changed and it certainly makes me feel old. I think future technologies are going to be devices where we can get everything done on one thing (we can call, text, email, surf the web, write papers, order things online, pay bills online, etc). Granted, we can do most things online anyways but rather than having a computer AND a phone AND a television AND other devices, it’ll all be wrapped in one. I have a feeling our children and grandchildren are going to look back at our technology—cellphones, computers, etc. and laugh. Oh those were the days is what we’ll be thinking.
 * 3) Oh yes, I remember having dial-up. It was a pain in the butt. I remember my mom got wireless at one point but it took my dad forever to get it so I would use the computer as little as possible when I was at his house cause I hated waiting for it to connect. I certainly don’t miss the annoying noise it made. It was also a pain that you couldn’t use the phone at the same time. My friends couldn’t reach me if they wanted to and I couldn’t reach my parents if I needed to. What if it was an emergency? Good thing they got rid of it. I like having access to both the phone and the internet.
 * 4) I do think Josh and Emma have a future because I feel like it’s the typical story line we see in every romantic comedy and such. Boy and girl are friends, they become jealous when they start dating other people, one tells the other how they feel and that person doesn’t realize they have the same feelings until the end. But the friends always end up together in the end. I think Jordan Jones Jr. is a nice guy who deserved a chance. Emma doesn’t know the real reason why she is unhappy with him—it doesn’t say on Facebook. I think they meet at college, probably in a class and first they start hanging out but then it leads to something more. Emma falls in love with his charm, smarts, good looks, and sense of humor. He’s a great guy with a big heart and is loving and caring. He’s her Prince Charming minus the singing (though who knows, maybe he can sing). I feel bad that she didn’t give him a chance. It seems wrong to break up with a guy you haven’t even met. Emma should have given him a chance. Then she would have known whether to marry him or not.


 * 1. If I came across my future facebook page, I am not entirely sure what I would do, but I don't think I would do what she did. I would snoop around, but I have too much of a guilty conscious to be able to change anything major. I would probably think it was a hoax anyways and not trust it. **
 * 2. Some technologies that have become outdated in my lifetime were my walkman that played cassette tapes, which was replaced with a cd player, then the mp3 player, my trackphone, which was replaced with a touch screen cell phone that didn't require buying minutes, and my computer, which was replaced with wireless and broadband internet. I have no clue what will replace today's technology (if I did I'd be the next Steve Jobs!), but I do know it will exceed what I expect. I think people in the future will laugh at our technology, just like we laugh at the days where technology didn't even exist. It's a never ending cycle. **
 * 3. I had dial-up before I had broadband and it is a huge difference. It was a pain in the neck to only be allowed on line 30 minutes at a time because my mom didn't want me tying up the phone lines. I also had to take shifts with my sister and we would count down the seconds until it was the other person's turn to be online. That was not fun. Also always getting kicked off because of a disconnection was horrible because it took 10 minutes for the internet to start up again! **

**1. I would not at all consider the page to be legitimate-- at least not until I looked into it a little more. That was one thing that aggravated me about the novel; Emma barely thought twice about believing in the fact that she could change her future. It would seem more realistic if she questioned the Facebook page and the access to her future life, but no-- she just goes right along with it like it's something that happens everyday. Perhaps this fact shows the difference technology has made on our perception of things from 1996 to today. Now we are well aware that many scams exist online, and we must be cautious. Back then, when all you could really access was email and maybe some primitive websites, the harm was less likely.** **2. There's so much technology that has become practically obsolete within the past decade. No more VCR players; hardly any CD-ROMs anymore; CD players/radios (remember the ones that people would attach to their kitchen counters?) are being replaced by iHomes and other MP3 device-players; pen and paper have become less and less used thanks to word processing and laptops; even the use of printed books/newspapers/magazines has noticed a rapid decline with the introduction of ebooks and ereaders. I'm wondering if DVD players will eventually become outdated as Blue-Ray becomes more and more popular. Also, it seems as if regular 2-D movies are being replaced by 3-D? (god, I hope not). I cannot even imagine the other technologies that will seem out-dated and old as time goes by. I imagine that one day all of our prime-time, high-tech, totally awesome technologies will seem lame and uncool in a decade or so.** **3. I did have dial-up until junior high, and I remember vividly the day when my family switched to DSL. I was SO happy! I used to love ICQ and couldn't wait until I could post an "away message" and leave it posted while I was about the house doing other things. I felt so cool. Looking back, I barely remember life without being constantly connected to the internet. I got a taste of it, though, a few years back when I attempted to get onto the internet using my grandmother's old-school MacIntosh computer. She had dial-up, and I literally got so frustrated waiting for it to connect that I left and walked home to use my own computer.** **4. I think there are definitely feelings between Emma and Josh (ones that Emma is trying to avoid). I had an inkling while reading that Emma would choose Josh in the end. (That's just the way the book is, though-- totally predictable). As for Jordan Jones JR. I'm thinking he's a guy she meets in college and marries too young. She probably still has subconscious feelings for Josh when she meets Jordan and suppresses them, which ultimately leads to part of her unhappiness.**


 * 1) If I was in High school and discovered my own Facebook page from the future, I’d probably think it was a hoax because I was really against Facebook and all social networking in my younger days. I would probably mistakenly alter the future by interacting with it because I thought it was just a joke page.
 * 2) The technologies discussed in this book, CD-ROMs and dial-up have been replaced by DVD-ROMs and broadband/DSL Internet. DVD-ROMs are beginning to be phased out by digital distribution platforms such as Mac’s App Store, and I’m sure broadband Internet will be replaced by an even faster totally wireless way to access the Internet (3/4G perhaps). I think people will laugh at how it took an entire two minutes to wait for a Netflix movie to load or how we paid upwards of $50 for a shiny piece of plastic with data on it.
 * 3) I didn’t get high speed Internet until after I had graduated High School, and I remember spending all day on a slow Internet connection and tying up my parents’ phone line. My mom liked it, because she wasn’t able to get annoying phone calls from relatives. I used to get mad because I couldn’t watch YouTube or play online games because my connection was too slow. Because of the inability to access the phone line, AIM became my kind of cell phone at the time- I was always logged on and talking with friends.

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