[Week 3] Weekly Reflection September 25th, 2026

Yesterday’s class focused on the idea that “data is the new oil,”and that data, much like oil, is highly valuable in today’s economy, but raw data has no use unless it is turned into something greater. At first, this quote was something we took in, but it was not until our teacher, Collin, had us look at three different links with no context that we finally realized the complexity of this quote. The first stop was Click, Click, Click, a browser game centered around online profiling. Before you even click on the green button, it has already counted your clicks as well as movement and has been watching your behaviour this entire time. This was an eye opening experience for me as it made me think about all the times where websites have asked if I can accept cookies in order to move forward through the website, but I have now realized that the website already has all of my data, and my hesitation to click on the accept button is pointless as it already knows everything before I give them consent. 

The second site we looked at was called Since You Arrived, which has a sole purpose of pushing this concept even further to a more personal level. For example, the moment you are brought to the page, it tells you that your browser has already given them everything they need to know before you even clicked on anything. This includes your battery percentage, approximate location based on your IP address, your screen time, fonts you have used recently, your time zone and the language you speak. What really stuck out to me on this website was the idea that no password, no cookies, or permission needs to be granted in order for all your personal information to be given out. This video was where everything started to become unsettling and quite a bit eerie as I had no knowledge of what is going on behind the scenes, and it made me question if I have posted things that have given away personal information such as where I live, where my frequent location visits are, and who I am around all the time. 

The last site we explored was Privacy.net which ran a very similar exposure test, but focused more on your account detection. This included which internet provider you use, my IP address, where I am located, what type my laptop is, which browser I am using and which edition, and lastly my battery percentage which is similar to the second site, Since You Arrived. This further proved the perspective that any website’s attempts to ask you for consent to use your data does not mean anything and you just showing up on that site is the only thing they truly need. 

At first glance, the activity seemed playful as you were taken to a screen where there was just a big green button in front of you, but then it slowly became eerie and made me feel uneasy. A lot of my classmates felt very uncomfortable and slightly frightened with their own experience with this activity as well. The mood of the class afterwards was quite off and very low energy as the impact from this activity really took a toll on every single one of us. Despite this experience being uncomfortable, we do appreciate Collin’s objective with this activity. 

In the first part of class Collin asked us to think about, “what challenges do you bring to this gathering? What do you hope to get out of this class?” Before he split us into breakout rooms, he gave us time to carefully think about our answers and even suggested doing a spiral drawing. Once we were in our breakout room, we only had 3 minutes to share our thoughts which I thought was too short of a time, but then he put us in a different breakout room two more times after the first one. After visiting all three different breakout rooms, almost every person said their biggest challenge right now is the WordPress website. I can definitely agree that is my biggest challenge right now as well given I am not a very high-tech person and have struggled to figure out where everything is. We also talked about how it is somewhat difficult to move to a different website after spending the last year navigating Brightspace where every module, due date, and information is clearly laid out for you and is easily accessible. On top of that, this course which is somewhat self paced with no set due dates and reminders has made people including myself feel rather lost and overwhelmed. 

On the more positive side, we talked about what we hoped to get out of this course, which resulted in a lot of people including myself saying we wanted to learn how to better navigate our WordPress websites and expectations for this course. We also talked about how it is reassuring to know that we are not the only ones who are struggling right now and it is a shared feeling. Something that I took away from yesterday’s class was that sometimes you need to say things outloud and see things in front of you to have a different perspective. For instance, once everyone shared their thoughts on how they are feeling, our hidden feelings were no longer something to be ashamed of, because we realized we were sharing a similar experience. Further, being made aware of how easily accessible our information is was rather horrifying and impacted all of our perspectives. I thought that yesterday’s class was very valuable and important, and it really grabbed my attention.