Assignment 14: Kindles

For the last blog I have decided to write about Amazon Kindle. According to Wikipedia, the Kindle “is an e-book reader—an embedded system for reading electronic books… It uses an electronic paper display, reads the proprietary Kindle (AZW) format, and downloads content over Amazon Whispernet, which uses the Sprint EVDO network” (Wikipedia, 2008). The Kindle can hold up to 200 books or magazines or articles. No computer is needed to operate the Kindle which makes it fairly convenient. The Kindle is a good idea because if you want to read you don’t have to lung around books, newspapers, or magazines, the only catch is that it has to be on a wireless network. Also the text is bigger as well, and it is not exactly hand-held, but by looking at the picture above, it looks like the size of a thin paperback book. On Amazon.com under the Kindle page, a video is posted explaining the Kindle’s qualities. According to an article on cnn.com, the Kindle is currently sold out due to heavy demand and the article claims that the reason is got so popular is because of the marketing (Ponz, 2008).
“This is the future of book reading. It will be everywhere." Michael Lewis, author of Moneyball and Liar's Poker.
“Blockbuster writers such as J.K. Rowling, author of the "Harry Potter" series, have said they'll never allow their books to appear on the market in electronic form” and other writers such as James Patterson have embraced the Kindle (Ponz, 2008). Another set back to the Kindle is that the price is $359 (Amazon.com, 2008). Also many people will still find it more enjoyable to actually hold the book or article in their hand to read as stated in the cnn.com article (Ponz, 2008).
The Kindle brings up controversy in that fact that it may make print go even further out of our lifestyles by bringing books into the matter and not just magazine or news articles. Going back in the semester to look at copyright, how many authors do you think are going to let people download their books onto their Kindles? I’m guessing not a lot unless they are going to be compensated for their work, and some may just be totally against the idea even if compensation was offered. Currently 10% of Amazon’s books/articles are available for the Kindle, which is around 200,000 (Ponz, 2008). How well can we supervise the internet and make sure people are not downloading these books/ articles illegally in a few months or years time? What type of copyright laws will be made to deal with this?
This whole thing seems very logical to me as to why it would be popular. People have gotten used to reading text messages on their phones and their blackberry’s and of course surfing the net on their i-phones so people attaching themselves to the Kindle doesn’t seem all that strange to me. People like having technology shape their lives. However for me, I like to hold a book in my hand to read and having to lug around textbooks to my classes is not a problem for me either. If the information is in a book or in the Amazon Kindle both are just as accessible to me. The only difference would be on how you want to access the information.

References:

Amazon Kindle. Video. Retrieved from: http://www.amazon.com/Kindle%20Amazons-Wireless-Reading-Device/dp/B000FI73MA.

Ponz, Jason. A year later, Amazon’s Kindle finds a niche. 3 Dec. 2008. Retrieved from: http://www.cnn.com/2008/TECH/12/03/kindle.electronic.reader/index.html.

Amazon Kindle. 2008. Retrieved December 3, 2008 from STS Wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amazon_Kindle.

Assignment 13: Government 2.0

To address the question in Slashdot, “how do you think government (either in the United States or elsewhere) can best utilize technology to engage the public and make government more transparent and accessible?” I find that this is a difficult question to answer. I do view the government as some inaccessible object but I know it will always affect us directly. Obama posting his weekly addresses on YouTube is a great idea to come in contact with more people and it makes governmental information more available for the people. Also the information presented has not been embellished by the media so people are able to form their own honest opinions on Obama’s issues and topics this way. I think it’s great that he wants to utilize the internet for his broadcasts because he is giving the impression that he cares and he is just one of us. I also think that it is a step in the right direction that he wants to utilize the other technological resources available. The internet is a huge resourceful tool and if the government would use it more I think it would engage the public to view our government as accessible and transparent. If the government would get more involved with the technology I think the people of this country would become more involved with the government because a connection could be formed between them.
A way to make the government more accessible and transparent would be have people comment on his addresses (it does not necessarily have to be in blog form it could be done in polls an so on). If the government would look over the comments being made, they could gage people’s opinions better. During the election, weekly polls and new information kept being updated and it was easy to find out what was happening with the government and become involved. If the government could continue to be as involved as they were during the election they could get more citizens involved. I think the government has temporarily forgotten that the opinions of the US citizens should be looked at and measured instead of just their own. I think that people get really frustrated with the government because their opinions and views simply get tossed aside most of the time. Take the bailout for instance (the first one). They took poll and most Americans were against the bailout; mainly because the companies will just continue what they are doing and come back for more…they wont fix anything…its almost as if they have to fail in order to rebuild a better company. The government went ahead with the bailout and what have the companies done so far? Ask for more money. Because people are frustrated with the government I think they may feel a bit defeated and therefore they don’t involve themselves because voices are not being heard. If the government used the internet as a form of communication that is a two way street instead of one, I think they would get farther ahead. Also if technology is getting used for the government higher standards and rules may be imposed on the technology companies so they will produce a better, long lasting product.
In any way I really hope this country has what it takes to fix things. The fact that Obama wants to get involved is a good sign and hopefully he can change some things for the better. I hope he utilizes technologies made available to him to help him along the way because I think the road is going to be really rocky. If the government becomes more involved with its citizens, it may smooth things over a little.

Assignment 12: Network Neutrality

There are many definitions of network neutrality, and it is almost hard to pinpoint what the true definition actually is. However, it is almost better to make up your own definition for it just as long as you understand the concept of it. I defined network neutrality as: A network that is free of restrictions and that allows the express of all forms of communication. I also found this video on Youtube very helpful in explaining network neutrality. The current debate on network neutrality is whether or not restrictions on internet networks should be enabled. There are two sides to every story. To enable restrictions on network neutrality would mean that information provided by the internet may be censored. An example would be like censoring pornography. Your internet provider would be in charge of all the restrictions. Another way your internet service provider may enable restrictions is to direct internet “traffic flow” and to block certain content like spam or viruses. On the flip side of things, the internet service providers may abuse the restrictions and according to the Jones article from Information Newsweek, “without some type of anti-discrimination law or standards, cable and telecommunications companies could control users' access by blocking content from competitors, favoring certain applications, charging higher rates to deliver information into people's homes and offices and failing to inform people of their capacity” (Jones, 2007).
Many interests are at steak here, the peoples for one, the government for another and the internet service providers. Many people feel that certain rights and privileges would be taken away if network neutrality were taken away. The government would have the responsibility of regulating it if restrictions were placed, and the internet service providers I believe would abuse the privileges if restrictions were placed and they were in charge. First of all the internet service providers are a business first and foremost and they are here to make money. If they are getting paid to direct internet flow to a certain search engine, it is in their best interest to take the money that say, Google is offering. This would greatly dissatisfy the internet users because they don’t want to be subjected to those kinds of restrictions; its unfair and it may make less people use the internet or make others switch their internet service providers. However the problem is that switching service providers is not a way to solve this. Also I believe that people would just find a way around the internet restrictions like they do now. If laws or standards are enabled and are influenced by the government this again limits people’s privileges on the internet. The government may want to collect some sort or revenue along with the service providers.
I feel very torn about this debate because I think both arguments present good points. However if I had to choose one I would go with not emplacing restrictions on network neutrality. I agree with the article above, serious precautions would have to be made in order to place restrictions on the internet. I don’t feel that the companies would be responsible to emplace the restrictions themselves and I feel the same about the government as well and there is no saying that the government would strike a deal with the providers as well to taking in any more income if the providers require more money. Obviously I feel that many things should be censored on the internet like child pornography and so on but I think at this stage of the game the ball is already rolling and its hard to stop it once people have already experience something they like, which is network neutrality. Also I feel that gate keeping is not the way to go with the internet because it is not successful in the media why would it be successful with the internet?

References:

Jones, K.C. Net Neutrality Debate Remains Contentious. InformationNewsweek. 16 Mar.2007. Retrieved from: < http://www.informationweek.com/story/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=198001557 >.

Youtube. Save the internet! 8 Dec. 2006. Retrieved from: .

Assignment 11: Virtual Worlds

I am not familiar with virtual games online so it came as quite a shock to me what is exactly entailed in these games. It’s an interesting concept being able to play different characters like in World of Warcraft and you have different tasks/goals that must be accomplished and gold to earn or as in Second Life, create a life the way you really want it that can possess similar qualities to “real life.” Neither of these two things really interest me and finding out that people spend 8 hours a day doing these things sounds pretty ridiculous. I think that some people lose the relationships and connections that they once had if they play in these virtual worlds. In the assigned reading titled: The Unreal Estate Boom one man lost his wife and child to these virtual worlds. It makes me conclude that people have lost where the drawn line is from life to virtual and they are not able to decipher the two. I for one go by the expression, “If I can see it and touch it then its real,” and in these virtual worlds, nothing is felt or can be touched.
I think that there are huge issues with putting real money into virtual worlds. When one spends money you generally get a materialistic object back and that is not the case in these virtual worlds. Wikipedia defines Second Life as “Second Life Viewer enables its users, called "Residents", to interact with each other through motional avatars, providing an advanced level of a social network service combined with general aspects of a metaverse. Residents can explore, meet other residents, socialize, participate in individual and group activities, and create and trade items (virtual property) and services with one another”(Wikipedia, 2008). Second Life allows a person to freely be a person that they want to be and in that case it may be worth it to use real money because they have a problem interacting socially in real life. Then again, many people may need to feel that this virtual game needs to be connected to their real life because they want to believe that it is real (again I think they have lost the defining line between real life and virtual). World of Warcraft on the other had doesn’t encourage the exchange of virtual reality “property” and “goods” for real money. World of Warcraft is more along the lines of fantasy terms with tasks and levels that need to be passed and accomplished. According to Newsweek, what makes World of Warcraft so popular is its social dynamics; it is an alternate world with a “medieval Matrix” twist (Levy, 2008). This is more of a game to me rather than Second Life because I find that it can be less easier to loose the definition of real life to virtual.
Comparing the open system (Second Life) to the closed system (World of Warcraft) I find it odd that people want to spend money on this that they cant physically touch. I can see why World of Warcraft doesn’t condone the spending of real money on its goods because certain lawsuits can arise and I don’t think any rules or regulations on this sort of thing have been addressed. This is why I think real life and virtual needs to be kept separate because people have the ability to get to involved and if they try to apply virtual things in real life it probably won’t add up correctly the way they think it should.

References:

Second Life. 2008. Retrieved November 7, 2008 from STS Wiki: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Life>.

Levy, Steven. World of Warcraft: Is it a Game?. 2008. Retrieved from MSNBC.com: < tab_id="_2_1&url="%2fwebapps%2fblackboard%2fexecute%2flauncher%3ftype%3dCourse%26id%3d_61661_1%26url%3d">.

Assignment 10: Journalism

A topic that has recently had decent media coverage is the fatal hit and run on South Park avenue where a 19-year-old was killed. The print source of this article was called “Lawyer Pleads Guilty to fatal hit-and-run” from the Buffalo News (Gryta, Buffalo News). The article concentrated on the lawyer mainly, John P. Duffy, having no quotes from the victim’s friends or family. It showed as unbiased as possible what Duffy’s experience had been and what he had to say about the incident. The article was presented professionally and very factual with appropriate quotes from Duffy and his lawyer as well as the judge who has Duffy’s case. In the online news article that I found on the same incident; both were written on the same day as well, October 30, 2008, on msnbc.msn.com and the article was titled: “Fatal Hit and Run Victim Remembered”(2008, Borsa). This article took a depressing but fairly professional outlook on the incident. It focused more on the victim with a few facts about Duffy and a quote from his lawyer. As I read the article I felt so bad about what happened to this girl as it described how the incident took place and the article from the Buffalo News did not, it just claimed what Duffy thought he had hit. Both of these articles I noticed contained some bias but it was just enough to influence the reader to give them Duffy’s perspective vs. the victim’s perspective.
I found that reading both of these sources I was amazed on how bias things can be written now. I took a Journalism course and they kept pushing that everything you write has to be objective and not biased because you can get into serious trouble. Now everything you read seems to be biased in a way whether it is low key bias or not. I think it also depends on what source you receive information from. Its amazing that looking at how far we have gone with the internet and a lot of people have changed from print to online articles. In an article online titled “Web vs. Print: Online success at one Newspaper Raise More Questions Than They Answer” stated that from the Washington Post print source, they lost 3% of their prescribers, 4% of their ad revenue, and 14% of their recruitment revenue . Also the Washington Posts online subsidiary gained revenue of 28% and online visitors went up 11% (2007, http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article.cfm?articleid=1699). I think that even now online sources have become much more prominent and according to the article “Online vs. Print Media” being online allows for more promotions and more options for people(2008, Pandy). What I took this to mean is that if a person wants to get a different perspective on the same news article it is much easier to do it online instead of with print. With print you have to go and buy another newspaper and they may not have the one you want. It may be quite difficult to find a Washington Post newspaper here in Buffalo.
Both print and online sources are very different and can offer the same things but structurally I don’t find them that different. I find that how much information that you want to know is the difference between them.

References:

Web vs. Print: Online success at one Newspaper Raise More Questions Than They Answer. 2007. 4 Apr. Received from: http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article.cfm?articleid=1699.

Pandey, Sandeev. 2008. 29 Aug. Online vs. Print Media. Received from: http://www.articlesbase.com/online-business-articles/online-vs-print-media-540885.html.

Borsa, John. 2008. 30 Oct. Received from: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/27415446/.

Gryta, Matt. Lawyer pleads guilty in fatal hit-and-run. 2008. 30 Oct. The Buffalo News.

Assignment 9: Internet Politics

The title of the political blog I researched is Bloghillary and the URL is http://blog.hillaryclinton.com/. The blog was written by Kate Sokolov and her picture is presented with all of her posts. She uses no pseudonym and her occupation would be considered a citizen blogger. Kate Sokolov’s blog was created in June of 2008 in reaction to a letter sent by Hillary to all of her supporters. This blog has no technorati rank; there were no comments to the posts I viewed and no links.
Kate Sokolov is clearly a large supporter of Hillary, as to all her posts are a positive liking of Hillary. Unfortunately she is receiving no feedback from outside sources on her posts. The tone of this blog is rather upbeat and Kate Sokolov is completely behind the Democratic Party. She keeps up with her posts to almost every other day about Hillary’s whereabouts, what she is accomplishing, and what she wants to. Even though she supports Hillary and she is no longer on the ballet, most of the posts focus on Hillary in an indirect way through using Hillary’s advice and ideas to help the Democratic Party and Obama. Kate Sokolov also posts several videos and news stories on Hillary to help back up her positive posts. On Kate Sokolovo’s blog, there are links to click on if you want to help contribute to Hillary and join the team.
I think that on a whole blogs do affect local politics, they provide both positive and negative feedback and being able to comment on blogs provide even more insight for many political blogs. According to a study, “46% of Americans have used the internet to get political news and share their thoughts on the campaign…” (Smith & Rainie, 2008). People have a need to find out what they don’t know so they have a tendency to research a topic. The internet makes it easy and it provides a way for people to communicate. If a person reads a blog post they agree or disagree with and would like some feedback they could comment on the post. If a person were to comment on one of the posts from the Hillary site that I researched, because the writer is an involved Hillary supporter a person may be provided feedback that would be quite accurate rather than if it was a Hillary supporter that wasn’t involved in Hillary’s support groups.
However, the article The Internet and Power in One-Party East Asian States, they make an excellent point that allowing people access to information and being involved in platforms for discussion can help politically empower populations but could threaten regimes (Hachigan, 2002). I think the same could be said for local politics here in New York. Having people being able to blog and comment on politics empowers them to a degree and depending on the politicians actions in campaigning the feedback provided by blogs it could influence people’s opinions. I thinks its possible that if many people are influenced it may harm certain politicians campaigns with the information that are provided in blogs.

References:

Smith, Aaron & Rainie, Lee. Pew Internet. 2008. The 2008 Election. Retrieved from: http://www.pewinternet.org.

Hachigan, Nina. 2002. The Internet and Power in One-Party East Asian States. Retrieved from: https://ublearns.buffalo.edu/webapps/portal/frameset.jsp?tab_id=_2_1&url=%2fwebapps%2fblackboard%2fexecute%2flauncher%3ftype%3dCourse%26id%3d_61661_1%26url%3d.

Assignment 8: Web Application Review

I recently explored Google’s Google Calendar, for the web application review assignment. The URL I is: https://www.google.com/accounts/ServiceLogin?service=cl&passive=true&nui=1&continue=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.com%2Fcalendar%2Frender&followup=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.com%2Fcalendar%2Frender.

As I was evaluating it, I had no idea that there was anything like this out there. What it is able to accomplish is really very interesting. The site functionality is “Organize your schedule and share events with friends.” Using the online application you can coordinate your events with friends and family, add events through e-mail, see your friends or family’s schedules next to your own, create invitations, and keep track of RSVP’s. It can also set up automatic event reminders, including mobile phone notifications, and instantly bring up anything on your calendar using the search tool.
The site itself is designed simply with lots of organizartion that provides Google Calendar pictures, bold lettering, and brief and clear descriptions. It’s set up like an instructional manuel; providing easy access and understandable phrases that an 8-year-old could understand. Color is also dispurted systematically throughout the website on each page. However, not so much color is used to take away from the descriptions, but just enough from keeping it called plain. The appearance of the Google Calendar is very fair. I will say that the pictures are a bit too small and blurry. You have to squint to try and decifer what is on the calendar and what the picture is trying to convey. The problem I forsee is that people respond well to pictures and not so much to writing no matter how simple and clear it is written. People like to use both the image and descriptions to formulate ideas in their mind and if one or the other is not clear the ideas won’t be clear and people may pass up the chance to use the Google Calendar. Also if they have set up an account with the Google Calendar and they are confused on how to match events up with the rest of their families, if they go to look back for instructions they may not be able to understand what they need to do using the pictures as help. But all in all, I think most people would be fine being able to use it.
The social aspects of the site is that you can be in contact with your family and friends through events and you can even match them up right next to your own to avoid scheduling conflicts. You can also create invitations and send them out to friends and family as well. In addition, if your mother has e-mailed you about a family reunion coming up you can go into your e-mail and add it to your Google Calender from your e-mail. Google Calenders can be searchable for other users as well. If a professor wants to use the application for class, the class could easily search for it and find it. As a precaution Google Calendar allows you to control who you want to share this information with so there is a privacy factor there.
I think this site can be useful and beneficial in a way that if you have trouble keeping up with family and friend events this would be a good way to keep track of things. I found the site pretty interesting because it wasn’t just a calender. It provided much more small applications and choices to choose from and you could control how you use it. You could see that it also made contact with others and events much easier to access and maintain. It accordingly provided feedback on all the choices you could add to your calandar which in turn I think made it very appealing to a user.