Hey there! I'm Ilona Kovacs, like 'e-low-nuh ko-vatch.' As a student at the University of Denver, I find passion in my Emergent Digital Practices major partnered with a Marketing minor. What's Emergent Digital Practices? I'm part of the dissolving line between critical thinkers and artists, having profound skills in both areas. I otherwise enjoy the Rocky Mountains, soft and fuzzy fabrics, chocolate sprinkles, and collecting chicken statues.

My first introduction to the internet had to be when I was around 3 or 4 years old (2003-2004) when my parents introduced ~the computer room~ which was a desk that had been repainted and drawn on, stacked with a monitor and tons of CD-ROM games, a separate actual computer box under the desk that changed monthly each time the viruses caught up to it, and an abyss of a floor for anything that might not have a home someplace else in the house. It was ultimately the junk room, but my parents and three older sisters all swear some of their deepest memories of me growing up was the sound of Elmo welcoming me on another safari train ride so I could draw the animals from that mess of a room. I continued my love ofplaying on the computer when we got dial up internet, playing any internet game that might run fast enough to actually enjoy.

Shortly after, our speed continuously increased, and my older siblings caught the bug and started surfing the web, so I usually got to watch them lead their social lives through our shared screen and help them choose the cutest MySpace layout. When Facebook became popular around my 5th grade year in about 2009, I was too young for my own internet presence, so I would share my mom's account just to post photos that I had edited on some new and trending website, especially with Picnik. She was eventually sick of my horrible editing skills always being her latest posts, so she finally started up my own personal account where I could post all the cringe I wanted.

I still keep all of the embarrassing things that I thought would make my internet presence the absolute greatest thing ever as a 10-year- old up and public for the world, it shows me lot of my own personal growth and change for both my emotional response in the level of what I shared on the world wide web and with my technical skill levels in creating all things digital as well.

I now find myself using the internet as the ultimate tool for creating, learning, discovering, expanding, and connecting. As things have changed in the past 21 years, it is amazing to me that this central technology of the internet has been growing and changing around my life too.