Pillow Talk

I liked the idea of pillow talk, but it does seem to be incomplete. The app would not help with women who are passed out due to alcohol or drugs (roofies), but it would help with women that knew they were in danger. The app's name pillow talk is supposed to keep the scent off potential predators, but it seems like the app would be found out pretty quickly by some kind of NowThis video.

Cultural Misappropriation

At first, I didn't like their idea for the app because culture is meant to be shared and spread. Culture is something to be enjoyed by everyone, but while culture is meant to be shared, it is not meant to be stolen. I can agree with their presentation to an extent, but I do disagree with Miley's twerking being sexy. I agree that people can take things to far, such as wearing headdresses, and that the cure for disrespect is often the same as the cure for ignorance. Actually learning about the cultural significance of something before just straight up either doing it or wearing it.

Tanquesha, Carrington, and Dena's (sorry if any misspelled names) culture appropriation app was interesting.  The app was created to help prevent cultural misappropriation, which means associating certain aspects of another's culture wrongly and offensively.  The app would be created to help keep people aware of others' culture, especially with how one dresses.  For example, if a person of white ethnicity decides they want to wear a bindi one day, they can tell the app what race they are and what they want to wear that is a part of another ethnicity, and the app will tell them if that is appropriate to do or not.  I think this app has good intentions because preventing cultural misappropriation and the potential "making fun" of other ethnicities is a good act.  However, I do not think that people would actually put forth the effort to download this app or use it.  Usually people just google what is okay and what is not okay to do when it comes to wearing things of other culture.  I liked the idea though because it was interesting and unique.

Hunger Watch

Jacob Armando and Sebastian came up with the idea of Hunger Watch. I really like this idea because of the issue of world hunger today and the issue with homelessness. The way this works is through a beeper where a homeless person has one and a business has another. The business sends out a message to any beeper with in a 2 mile radius of the business. I think it will definitely help with hunger issues but we can't get around the fact that this is illegal.

Culture Appropriation

Carington Dena and Tanquesha (I'm sorry if I misspelled any names) made an app for culture appropriation. Their app explains their aims and what culture appropriation is. I think the idea was good but I'm not quite sure if it will be affective. The way this app works is you type in your ethnicity and then what you plan to wear and the app tells you if it is appropriate or not. I like the idea being from a Choctaw decent and knowing the sacredness behind a headress. I just don't think this will be very affective with the stubbornness of our society.

"Hunger Watch"

The Hunger Watch is essentially a beeper that is connected to a program that allows businesses to donate their wasted food to homeless people. The way that the program is supposed to work is that various restaurants donate food that they would have otherwise thrown away to the homeless. The Hunger Watch will beep when their food is ready. The businesses would have to sign up and log all of the food that they are giving away, and in return, the Hunger Watch organization will allow them to get a tax break. The people who are receiving this service will also register some type of way to ensure that no one is taking advantage of the system. While this is a good idea, I think that restaurants would be much more willing to give away their wasted food if the organization was marketed as a charity. There would be no question of whether or not the food was really going where it should be or not because the creators of the Hunger Watch would be the ones facilitating the process. Many businesses would be more open to donating to a charity than directly to people. If the organization had its own facility, they could take the food back to their own facility and distribute it themselves. That way restaurants wouldn't have to use much of their own labor to contribute to a cause that doesn't necessarily benefit them that much.

"Pillow Talk"

     “Pillow Talk” is a neat app that users can download on iOS or android. The concept of the app was developed by my fellow classmates: Ashely Childs, Daniel Ashcraft, and Mollie Wadsworth. The app is designed specifically for rape and molested victims and potential victims. The app is free and allows users to alert the authorities if the users feel victimized. However, the police department will not respond immediately, to satisfy the conditions, the app is sent a message of “are you okay?” If the user does not respond within the time span of two minutes, then the police department will dispatch and arrive at the scene. The app also has a nifty feature to allow the users to scan their immediate areas for potential sexual predators, letting the user dictate whether their immediate area is safe or not and if they are comfortable with it. The app is currently under development by my classmates and a small group of engineers. My classmate is currently attempting to bring awareness to the city of Memphis for making the community we live and study in a better place. I personally think that they should maybe start small with the app. Maybe they could get the app developed first and use the school as a Guinea pig and test it. Have the CBU community test the app first, then slowly spread the word of the app’s effectiveness. How well the app is effective in practice will increase the probability of having their voices heard, because apparently, no one of importance wants to listen to hard working young people who just want to better their community. I think with the slow and steady method they will succeed in their noble endeavor to better our community with a fast, free, response for women and men who feel threatened and victimized.  I’m cheering them on with spirit, I wish them luck!