Who Are You

At the beginning when I changed my major from Optoelectronics to Digital Media, I was always worried about the gap between them and what kind of job I would do in the future. Once I thought that I would be a researcher in Optoelectronics, but now I think maybe I will become a social media person. The conflict between them always confuses me. I always ask myself who am I on earth, an engineer or a media person?

As our first field trip in Media Organization class, we went to the AlleyNYC which is the newest shared workspace for tech in NYC. With the guide of the host, Nsi Obotetukudo, we visited the place they worked and the startups there. Personally, I like the working atmosphere there which seems flexible and free. I believe this is the best place to work for those creative and energetic companies. After that, Nsi asked four startups to communicate with us which are Haystack Learning Studios, RocketHub, NYC Dev Shop and AppSulting..

I don’t want to talk about what Nsi Obotetukudo said or what other members said here, what I want to talk about is my real feeling about their experience and background.

First, Nsi has a various kinds of background, such as data analysis, patents and entrepreneurship. Besides, all the members from the four startups also have integrated background. Gregg Hill from Haystack Learning Studios once was a member of Occupy Wall Street and then joined the Brain Games develop team. Alec Hartman from NYC Dev Shop studied marketing before but now he turns to study the web development and he is also a co-founder of NY Tech Day. Especially the team member from AppSulting, they all have a rich background before they got together. In general, this kind of people all have a totally different background in Finance or Media and Engineering. Thus, it’s easy for me to produce a resonance especially after changing my major. The media or finance background makes them produce creative mind and thought close to life. However, in terms of a media person or a financial person, he or she cannot make their idea come true. At this moment, the engineering background will play a valuable role. Combining these two kinds of background, these people can use technic means to complete their ideas.

When I studied Optoelectronics, I had to do the research and data analysis every day. If I got some inspiration from my daily life, there is no way or no time for me to deal with them. At that time, I totally thought that my mind was bounded and I believed it was not the life what I really wanted. In fact, this is the main reason why I chose to change my major in my graduate study.

On the other hand, I will talk about the style of their companies. The various background of them promotes the forming of their companies. In fact, they not only want their companies full of creative ideas, but also would like their companies to make products based on their ideas. They got together and built their startups to help others to produce product, or something like mobile apps. For example, they get the idea from their customers and help them to finish the idea and finally make products with their engineering background.

However, there is still a problem that even if this kind of people or this kind of company, they still cannot keep a foothold in the society because of the keen competition. Compared with others who are just familiar with a certain area, they have advantage, but the advantage seems not obvious at all. Thus, as a special media person with an engineering background, I must recognize that even I have an integrated background, but I still need hard working. Just like Gregg Hill said, “Plan the work, work the plan”. We have more advantage than others, but we still need to make a detailed plan, and then we have to make full use of our advantage in integrated background to make the plan come true. That is the fundamental way to live for a media person.   

At last, I love engineering, and I love media. Especially, I love the combination of them.