A short essay on the rise of ChatGPT and its influence on education.

ChatGPT is a revolutionary technology that has gained attention in recent years for its ability to generate coherent text responses through natural language processing. This AI language model has been programmed to respond to a variety of prompts with seemingly human-like responses, and its potential applications range from chatbots to virtual assistants. However, with its advanced capabilities, ChatGPT has also raised concerns about its impact on academic integrity. Some individuals worry that students may use ChatGPT to produce essays or other academic works, thereby undermining the validity of their assessments. Furthermore, there is controversy surrounding ChatGPT’s ability to generate biased or inaccurate information, which could have far-reaching consequences. As such, this essay will examine the potential effects of ChatGPT on academic integrity, as well as the ongoing debates surrounding its use (OpenAI, 2023).

Spoken straight out of the computer’s mouth, the introduction to this essay was produced not by an undergraduate student slaving away at their laptop, but rather by ChatGPT, an artificial intelligence that – by prime example in the introduction to this essay – has the power to uproot the Internet. Written with the following prompt, it was only a matter of seconds before a fully fleshed-out 150-word essay introduction appeared on the screen.

“Write me a 150-word introduction to an essay about ChatGPT – address what ChatGPT is, its potential effects on academic integrity, and the controversy surrounding it” 

In a digital revolution, ChatGPT and its associates are taking the reins and toying with what we once knew about artificial intelligence, offering instruments of image generation, music production, essay writing, and code solving – the list is truly endless. Despite the revolutionary nature of this technology, ethical considerations of these tools in an academic context is a conversation surrounded by fiery debate and controversial opinions. As such, this essay will touch on the pros and cons of AI/ChatGPT for students, as well as re-evaluate academic integrity and honesty in an educational setting.

At the dawn of ChatGPT’s breakthrough, it all seemed too good to be true. As OpenAI even addresses in their introduction of ChatGPT, their technology is imperfect and still full of limitations (OpenAI, 2022). Nonetheless, artificial intelligence capable of creating just about anything with a simple prompt is the work of both dreams and nightmares. It is fast, efficient, intelligent (Hoyos, 2023), and best of all, easy. For students, when the deadline is cutting close and finishing (or just starting) an assignment seems impossible, ChatGPT can, with the click of a button, provide a quick, realistic, and simple solution – whether it be a short paragraph, completed essay, or even just a skeleton of an academic paper. As discussed in a study performed by Tlili et. al (2023), the discourse around implementing ChatGPT in an educational setting is generally positive. This recent qualitative study demonstrated results of “safe and responsible” (Tlili et al., 2023, p.1) integration of ChatGPT in an academic context, encouraging “embracing the technology rather than banning it” (Tlili et al., 2023, p.18). That being said, the concerns with the accuracy of these sorts of chatbots are not to be ignored. As Thorp (2023) states, “ChatGPT is fun, but it is not an author” (p.1).  Despite ChatGPT’s extensive access to all of the internet’s knowledge, it still struggles to produce high-quality academic writing (Thorp, 2023) and creates work that may be nonsensical, misleading, incorrect, or containing bias (Hoyos, 2023; OpenAI, 2023). Irigaray & Stocker (2023) also unpack the ways in which the wide-scale set of text data that builds up ChatGPT leaves it susceptible to the “prejudices and stereotypes” (p.1)  found in these texts, creating a final product that may be “discriminatory or offensive” (p.1). 

At the summit of the mountain of limitations presented by ChatGPT, is its speculated ability to compromise academic honesty, as well as put a damper on students’ creativity. The use of ChatGPT presents an ethically grey area, with the potential to inaugurate the downfall of academic integrity, independent problem-solving, and critical thinking. Being able to simply type a question into ChatGPT and receive a fully developed response will prevent students from developing skills in critical thinking and problem-solving (Irigaray & Stocker, 2023). In addition, students can easily copy or steal answers from the AI and quickly build a dependency on the software (Hoyos, 2023) while raising issues of plagiarism (Irigaray & Stocker, 2023). 

With this in mind, students have been finding ways to cheat long before the internet, and certainly long before artificial intelligence. With ChatGPT on the line, students are simply offered a new, innovative method of doing what has always been done.
Artificial intelligence appears boundless even at its early developing stages and is undoubtedly only going to grow in its capabilities and accuracy. Some public schools in Queensland, New York, and Los Angeles have started banning ChatGPT or creating harsh, strict guidelines around it, according to The Guardian and Global News. As they have always been in the education system, loopholes are inevitable. Therefore, what if banning ChatGPT is the incorrect course of action and if instead it were integrated as an educational asset? According to Global News, Canadian Universities are looking for ways to allow this technology in schools without placing a ban, ensuring a way that students are being “fairly and genuinely evaluated on meaningful exercises aimed at maximizing learning” (Mann, 2023). In the ever-growing technology era, working with AI rather than against it may be the only way to stay afloat. How, with ChatGPT joining the conversation, can educational institutions implement it as a resource, while simultaneously re-evaluating academic honesty, all without sacrificing the quality of students’ education? How can critical thinking and problem-solving skills continue to be tested and preserved with the implementation of such an advanced and limitless tool? How can it be regulated?

With ChatGPT in its baby stages and the marginal amounts of research in its department, these questions are being lived in rather than answered. Certainly, ChatGPT as a productivity tool offers clear advantages, being easy to use and incredibly advanced. Yet even with such impressive features, they act only as a silver lining around an otherwise looming dark cloud, potentially jeopardizing students’ education and blurring the lines of academic integrity.

References

Cassidy, C. (2023, January 22). Queensland public schools to join NSW in banning students from chatgpt. The Guardian. Retrieved March 14, 2023, from https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2023/jan/23/queensland-public-schools-to-join-nsw-in-banning-students-from-chatgpt

D’Andrea, A. (2023, February 1). Canadian universities crafting CHATGPT policies as French school bans AI program – national. Global News. Retrieved March 14, 2023, from https://globalnews.ca/news/9451143/chatgpt-education-canadian-universities/

Hoyos, A. A. (2023, February 9). Unpacking chatgpt: The Pros and cons of AI’s hottest language model. IE Insights. Retrieved March 14, 2023, from https://www.ie.edu/insights/articles/unpacking-chatgpt-the-pros-and-cons-of-ais-hottest-language-model/

Irigaray, H. A. R., & Stocker, F. (2023). ChatGPT: a museum of great novelties. Cadernos EBAPE.BR, 21(1), 1–5. https://doi.org/10.1590/1679-395188776x

OpenAI. (2022, November 30). Introducing chatgpt. Introducing ChatGPT. Retrieved March 14, 2023, from https://openai.com/blog/chatgpt

OpenAI. (2023, March 14). ChatGPT, personal communication. https://chat-gpt.org/chat

Thorp, H. H. (2023). ChatGPT is fun, but not an author. Science (American
Association for the Advancement of Science), 379(6630), 313–313. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.adg7879

Tlili, A., Shehata, B., Adarkwah, M. A., Bozkurt, A., Hickey, D. T., Huang, R., & Agyemang, B. (2023). What if the devil is my guardian angel: ChatGPT as a case study of using chatbots in education. Smart Learning Environments, 10(1). https://doi.org/10.1186/s40561-023-00237-x

This is probably the worst thing I have ever created.

I present to you, the Jellylift remix of all your favourite Jellycats, the Frankenjelly:

My original idea was to take some old stuffies, undo the stitching, and then stitch them back together all mixed up. But I couldn’t bring myself to do it, it seemed like it would hurt them, and I love them all too much. So I performed the Worlds Worst Photoshop job and created a Frankenjelly digital prototype. With a Bartholomew Bear body, Peanut Penguin wings, Amusable boots, Fabulous Fruit Strawberry head and Fuddlewuddle cat ears, this creature is sure to pay you a visit in your nightmares <3

A brief discussion of children and their harmful access to the internet.

This post is in response to James Bridle’s “Something is Wrong on the Internet” (2017).

With topics of digital literacy and misinformation, I’ll sort take the reigns in a slightly different direction to build off of Bridle’s conversation of the can of worms called the Internet that we are opening up to children.

As an older cousin of a 6 year old and 4 year old, I’ve always been extremely puzzled by the types of content that my cousins watch. Occasionally I will catch them on YouTube watching play throughs of Super Mario Bros. that have no music or voiceover, and is just the game sound effects. These are typically 30 to 40 minutes long, and they will literally just sit there and watch it all the way through. As well as videos such as how to draw a cat but with no intention of getting out a piece of paper to actually follow the tutorial, and even unboxing videos of the most arbitrary things, similar to Bridle’s (2017) discussion of the incredibly weird popularity of opening Kinder Surprise Eggs. Despite the bizarre nature of these videos, there is nothing really wrong with them. But that isn’t the issue.
One time, I set up a coloring video for them on my laptop so we could draw together, and when I stepped away for 5 minutes to get them a snack, they had smothered their grimy, sweaty little child fingers all over my screen and managed to land on a video of Marvel superhero figurines beating the literal sh*t out of each other. Like, how did we get here?!? Not to mention the strange amount of videos filmed of Barbie dolls engaging in weirdly sexual activity? What the actual f**k is up with that.

In addition to the peculiarity of what children are seeing, it’s a matter of them seeing it all the time. Over the past few years, the term “iPad Kid” has made its mark, the stereotype of a child who is constantly glued to their iPad. The iPad Kid is often depicted as a toddler with horrendous posture, holding the screen way too close to their face and carrying it with them to the dinner table, to family events, and just about anywhere they can. It’s wild to think that while my generation grew up with street hockey in the cul-de-sac and water balloon fights and getting up at 6am to watch Pokémon, this new generation born in the Technology Era is getting anything and everything they could possibly think of shoved down their throats in digital form. I know for a fact that there is absolutely nothing that will get my little cousins to shut up better than putting ANYTHING on the television. Crying? Television. Hungry? Television. Tired? Television. Bored? Television. Being a goddamn menace because that’s what kids do and it’s a crucial step in how they grow and learn and become emotionally self-aware? Television.

After talking to a few of my peers, I was able to reflect on some very refreshing opinions of future parents having absolutely no desire for their children to even touch a smartphone until their early teen years. As a collective group, I think we can all see simply from an observational standpoint the irreversible damage of raising an iPad Kid.

Bridle (2017) puts it perfectly, referring to on-demand video as “catnip for both parents and to children.” Simply put, it’s a cop-out. Growing up, these kids aren’t going to know how to function independently, and will constantly rely on some sort of stimulation to feel whole or at peace. To reflect back on the start of this course, these kids have had their attention stolen before they even had it (Mod, 2017), born with an iPhone camera in their newborn faces. Before we can even discuss the implications of a screen addiction at the ripe age of 0, Bridle (2017) highlights the inevitable danger of simply exposing children to the Internet.

How on earth do we teach children to be digitally literate? How do you explain to a five-year-old how to use RADCAB or CRAAP (Caulfield, 2016) and use critical thinking to assess the video of Peppa Pig eating her father? If a busy parent doesn’t take the extra second to ensure that the videos they’re showing their child is indeed the official YouTube page, there’s nothing convincing us that a kid will. And with that, how do you even regulate a child being able to view a coloring video to, within a few clicks, watching Iron Man rip Spiderman to pieces? Most times out of a ten, a kid has absolutely no clue what they’re looking at and are thoughtlessly consuming videos that look cool and sound cool. As Bridle (2017) puts it in regards to the creation of these videos, “most of them are not trying to mess kids up, not really, even though they are,” and there is a system in place that is frightening and traumatizing children – whether it be intentional or not.

Bridle, James.  November, 2017. “Something is Wrong on the Internet”
Caulfield, Mike. December 19, 2016. Yes, Digital Literacy. But which one?
Mod, Craig. 2017. “How I Got My Attention Back.”

An in-depth review of the design features of wrappedinablanket – a peer’s blog!

click here to visit wrappedinablanket

For consistency’s sake, I’ll begin this peer review once again with a shout out to the blog admin, Veronika. Hey Veronika! I know you’re just itching to read my review of wrappedinablanket… So stay tuned!

the first impression

The very first thing I thought of as I opened Veronika’s blog in a fresh new tab, was Gertz’s (2015) article on the current state of web design across the internet. I couldn’t help but giggle the moment I viewed Veronika’s home page: a darkened semi-transparent overlay, with a sans-serif font in white as the main header. This style of webpage was the opener to Gertz’s critique of web design, using this example to illustrate the ‘copycat culture’ and lack of originality of the internet. There was something rather comical about having come fresh off Gertz’s article directly into wrappedinablanket. The irony was killing me.

That being said, I’m not here to drone on with some self-righteous elitist bullshit about right and wrong web design as a means of establishing individuality in your online persona. I’m here to give an design review of a peer’s website!

veronika know’s her sh*t

First and foremost, I feel underqualified doing a design review of Veronika’s blog, as she is a SIAT student in graphic design, who specializes in photography and visual content design. I think her blog perfectly reflects her areas of expertise, and as they say to write what you know, it’s clear that Veronika designs what she knows. And she knows her sh*t.

Veronika’s blog looks clean and professional, and has more attention to detail than 90% of the PUB101 blogs. Before I even started reading the about page, I instantly knew that Veronika had some experience with digital design, and just design in general. It is very aesthetically pleasing to look at and
While I will admit that I agree with Gertz in that the overall theme of this blog lacks some originality, that isn’t to say that it doesn’t work.
I enjoy the way that the content of the blog – exiting one’s comfort zone – is something which is inherently uncomfortable, and is paired with a contrasting design aesthetic. I do not know if it was intentional, but it is definitely something that stuck out to me. I would’ve opted for crunchy and harsh visual design, but I definitely like how Veronika has laid out her blog. It is visually pleasing, the colours are gentle on the eyes and give off a soft, cozy and welcoming vibe that Veronika executes very well. She has created a space that makes you feel safe and welcomed in the process of trying new things and getting out of your comfort zone.

The layout follows a standard web page layout, with clear internal links to wherever you want to go, whether it be the about page, the blog, POSIEL, or contacting Veronika. She has also attached links to her social media, implemented within the menu as icons. It’s not in your face or impossible to find, it’s precisely where you want and expect it to be. As you scroll down on the homepage, the website has a fun sort of dynamic feel to it. The page scrolls with you, rather than you scrolling the page. It’s not a website feature I haven’t seen before, but is one of those things that brings it up a notch making the viewer feel more engaged with the page.
Usability certainly passes the test. The blog isn’t so loaded that every page takes a century to render, and the site is easy to navigate. Developing proficiency in using wrappedinablanket seems perfectly attainable, and after a good thirty minutes of exploring, I feel like I’ve already got most of it down pat. When observing Veronika’s website in contrast to many of my peers’ sites, it’s clear that she has put real heart and soul into the design aspect, and has put time and thought into creating a digital space with rhythm, unity and balance. On the topic of unity though, there was one little piece of the homepage that detached me from the overall vibe of her site.

The title “Welcome to wrappedinablanket” breaks form. Nowhere else is there scriptio continua on the website, and it feels a little unnatural and out of place from the typography throughout the rest of the blog. In addition, ‘wrappedinablanket’ does not have any other typographic emphasis on it to differentiate it from the other text, which in turn emphasizes that out-of-place feeling. To be fair, I am still yet to establish consistency in using the jellylift title across my blog, so I’ll cut Veronika some slack. 

wrappedinablanket all wrapped up

If I were to wrap up Veronika’s blog in one word, I would use the word predictable.
Now hold your horses! I know that the word predictable has a lot of negative connotations so let’s unpack this for a quick second.

The predictability of Veronika’s website is not a bad thing. It’s precisely what puts a viewer at ease, and invites them into her little corner of the internet. It has that sort of “clean Pinterest girl” aesthetic that appeals to many demographics and gives some insight into who Veronika is beyond wrappedinablanket. It checks all the boxes for usability, efficient layout and site structure. Veronika makes use of “intuitive everyday design” (Kaptelinen, 2014), a concept discussed in “Affordances” by Victor Kaptelinen. Kaptelinen (2014) offers that these affordances are what make users capable of new learning. We search for these affordances, based off prior knowledge and cultural influence, in the unknown. Veronika makes use of these affordances and intuitive everyday designs with features such as a recognizable website menu and familiar icons. This, among others, makes her site very user friendly. You know where to go, and you know what to expect.

If I’m getting picky, I encourage Veronika to crawl out of her cozy wrapped blanket and do just what her blog says, and get out of her comfort zone with her blog design. It’s clear she knows what she’s doing, and just by looking at the site anyone can tell she has a more professional eye than the rest of us. And I’m not saying to start from scratch. Wrappedinablanket looks and feels great, but wouldn’t suffer from a little bit of experimentation.

The design template is a great place to start, but what makes it yours? 

but idk tho ur def more qualified than me idk anything u do u bbg

Victor Kaptelinin. (2014). “Affordances.” The Encyclopedia of Human-Computer Interaction, Chapter 44. Interaction Design Foundation

Trevor Gertz. (2015). “Design Machines. How to survive in the digital apocalypse”

Virginia to Vegas. Official Website. GO!

When thinking about a website who’s design elements I was to critique, the first thing that came to mind was the Virginia to Vegas Official Website. Virginia to Vegas (Derik John Baker) is a Canadian indie-pop music artist who, over the course of his career, has shaped and molded himself to fit a certain aesthetic. His color palette is mostly neutral and earthy tones, and feels very dreamy with a touch of melancholy. Most of his music is upbeat-sad breakup shit that all sounds the same, exempt from “Malibu” and maybe “betterman,” but my Virginia to Vegas music critique can be saved for another time. 

Visiting his site feels like stepping into a room where the walls and ceiling and floor are all painted white, and someone tells you to “GO.” Where am I going? What am I doing? What is my purpose? SOMEONE GIVE ME A SIGN?

See for yourself if you haven’t already: Virginia to Vegas Official Website

overall visuals

In terms of design, Virginia to Vegas doesn’t miss. It’s clear that his objective is that minimalist, quirky and artsy style. Very simple, nothing busy, all very balanced, using very basic symmetry to appeal to the eye. In terms of other design elements such as rhythm and unity, I think that opting for the simple minimalist style helps to check these boxes. The colors all go nicely together, and help to emphasize his sort of modern-indie aesthetic as an artist. That being said, I don’t think having such a small header was the best design choice in terms of proportion. Having it stand out more, or even in a different color could help to balance the page out some more as well as add some clarity to the site.
Scrolling down, you find multiple wide-set tabs that display a photo of Derik with links to his new album and newest lyric video. I think the way that these tabs don’t take up the whole screen and keep the homepage in the background is very visually satisfying. I’ve not seen anything quite like this done before, and reminded me a touch of the formatting in the Gertz (2015) reading. In which Gertz (2015) offers that “everything looks the same,” something I think Virginia to Vegas’ website managed to escape at least a little bit, while still keeping that standard simple modern look. That being said, I find that the way the image for the home page was shot having the guitar head out of the frame sort of cuts the balanced feel, but that’s if I’m being picky. It feels as though you should be able to scroll down and see the full image, or watch it morph into something new. On that note, that’s my main design issue.

to he** with the scroll

Initially, when you arrive at the site, you’re presented with Derik! You quite honestly can’t miss him. Right there, smack center of the page. But then what? There’s side widgets with small social media icons, suggesting links to all his social platforms, as well as a small chunky header on the top of the page. To begin with, this header is a light gray, which doesn’t contrast nicely against the light background, making it a little difficult to identify the images beneath the “Virginia to Vegas” title header. Eventually you realize that’s part of his brand logo and site icon, but that doesn’t really get you anywhere. Click the header? It’s not a link. Click Derik? He’s not a link. Click the widgets? Oh no! Suddenly you’re on his Instagram! You don’t want to be there, you’re trying to see things on his website.

Do you see where I’m going with this? The whole nature of the homepage image makes it feel as though you’re waiting for something to load, and it takes a moment before realizing what you need to do is scroll. Yet even when you do scroll, it doesn’t take you far. There’s only two external links on the wide-tabs, and a column of links to his social media. What about tour dates? Merch? A mailing list? Just general news and information about Virginia to Vegas? You’ve walked into a white room and been told “Go.” 

I’m inclined to believe that Derik’s own design could be his digital demise. But on the flip side…

is it all so bad?

With this critique in mind, I wouldn’t be surprised if there was a method to his madness. The slight lack of clarity is just enough to make you want to explore the site, and do some digging. It’s like a little adventure. In doing so, he also beats the very typical website layout, such as that of The Weeknd’s Official Website, which has your standard horizontal menu sitting atop an array of images and videos you can scroll through.
In comparison, I think the Bleachers Official Website does an excellent job of presenting a unique and fun page, while still ensuring clarity and interest. In fact, the Bleachers site has quite a funky homepage, that feels sort of busy and chaotic while still maintaining symmetry and balance, as well as a clear point of focus.

sorry for being so harsh, Derik

Overall, I think Virginia to Vegas’ website has great design aesthetics, but is slightly lacking on design functionality. From my experience, most times out of ten when I visit an artist’s page, I care to find tour dates and news – something which isn’t clearly expressed on Virginia to Vegas’ page. But! Perhaps his modern, minimalist, quirky, neutral-toned, modern hippie-esque, indie fanbase knows exactly where to go and what to find, and that is Derik’s public, and his dreamy design may not be his digital downfall, but rather his upswing.

Gertz, Travis. 2015. “Design Machines. How to survive in the digital Apocalypse.”

Fixing up the form of jellylift, and my struggles with keeping my people happy

As I continue to develop jellylift, as much as I am bursting with ideas, my site is bursting with problems. 

After surpassing the initial troubles of figuring out how to use WordPress, issues of design flexibility, site clarity, and navigation began presenting themselves to me. I discovered I can’t attach widgets to the sides of my website, forcing everything into one column, and the post categories don’t offer a thumbnail or clip which links to the whole post, but rather displays the entire post while you’re scrolling. And most of all, over this week, I received feedback from four separate sources that my site was difficult to navigate. It was unclear where to find the newest posts, the menu headers didn’t make sense, and the colours blended together too easily, making it difficult to read large bodies of text.
This was a hard pill to swallow, as I had worked especially hard to make my blog very organized and straightforward. Personally, I hate learning how to work a new website where the layout is super scattered and impossible to navigate, which is why I opted for the very minimalist style, with few links to click and spaced out wording that emphasizes the important parts of a text. Yet, despite my efforts to create aesthetically pleasing and easy to follow visuals, my only negative feedback was on just that – the visuals. 

To me, the navigation made perfect sense. I can see where the confusion may have lain in my old menu headers such as “omg hey – the dry part – the fun part”, but only if you don’t explore the blog enough. After not even 20 seconds on each of those pages, I found it to be extremely clear as to what their purposes were. Regardless, I decided to strip jellylift of that unique characteristic, and opted for something more standard: “omg hey – about – all posts.” I didn’t like this change very much, but concluded that it was more user friendly and accessible to first-time visitors. To solve the issue of not being able to find the newest post (which I also thought was clear, but maybe I’m just high up on my horse and terribly unreceptive to criticism) I implemented an internal link that teleports you to the ‘all posts’ page, where the newest post is at the very top of the list. For colours, I darkened the background and lightened the text, which hopefully helps. I never saw an issue with the colours clashing to begin with and am not able to tell whether the slight changes I made helped at all and so, to all my beloved readers who had trouble with the colour contrast… this one’s for you <3.

To add to my troubles, I installed a site-editor plug-in (because I’d had enough with WordPress), tried it, hated it, uninstalled it, and it totally screwed up all my previous work. The font was all wacky, the colour blocking was wrecked, the photos were in weird orders, and the text formatting got all jumbled up. I had to go and reverse it all and even now some pages don’t look the way they used to. I’m inclined to believe that these marginal details go unnoticed by a visitor who isn’t constantly staring at the site and editing it daily, but it’s still driving me nuts. Will jellylift ever be the same again? Or is she forever changed? I suppose we can only wait and find out.

All my struggles with website layout and form brings me to the article “Contents May Have Shifted” by Erin Kissane (2013), in which Kissane discusses how the form of standard content we have always known seems to be shifting and losing its traditional structure. She refers to how our standard digital workbook style webpages and editors are beginning to “turn liquid” (Kissane, 2013) and melt into something less cookie cutter. These platforms are now meant to be flexible, and we can start to see the meshing of forms such as the example she gives of the use of GIFs in newspaper articles. In a physical copy of a newspaper, you could never implement a GIF right smack center of a New York Times print, fresh off the press! Yet here we are, in this liquid form of what once was a newspaper, with short moving pictures planted in the story-telling of politicians saying the wrong things and cats being saved from trees. Even books have not only their digital, but their auditory counterpart, fumbling with the idea we once had of what a ‘book’ was. 

Kissane’s (2013) article along with our class discussion forced me to reflect on how my site might benefit from this amalgamation of form, as “content that can fit into many containers” (Kissane, 2013). How might implementing different forms of content and media enhance or limit jellylift? It seems like a lot to wrap my head around with everything that already needs fixing, to suddenly start worrying about its flexibility in design. I’ve been thinking about what an impact that layout and form has on my audience, and how it is integral in keeping their attention. After looking at jellylift on my phone, I quickly discovered that it does not transfer well onto a mobile device, and left me wondering if maybe jellylift needs a renovation. As previously mentioned, after toying around with the theme I chose I began to uncover all the limitations that this minimalist template offers. This structure puts me in a difficult position as I continue to ponder the future of jellylift.

Do I completely change the template?
Is user-friendliness more important than personal preference?
Do I need to sacrifice the simplicity of jellylift for the sake of flexibility and relatability?
Will packing different forms of media into the site steal from the minimal and straightforward aesthetic I originally intended to achieve? 
Could there possibly be a way to satisfy everyone?

So many questions, so little answers… 

Will jellylift ever reach true perfection? 

Kissane, Erin. 2013. “Contents May Have Shifted” in Contents Magazine 4. Available from: http://contentsmagazine.com/articles/contents-may-have-shifted/