A New Form of National Security: Operation Drone

This may not directly relate to things we've talked about in class, but I'm always interested in seeing how technology is used for national security purposes, etc. This article in particular stood out because it shows just how willing and desperate the governments of latin america have become to stop the horrible drug trade. The drone technology they use is suppose to aid the government in pinpointing paticular locations that are hard to reach and may not be as easily accessible by foot. I think it has a little bit of a "big Brother" feel to it, but I think that is what it's going to take in order to stop a lot of the drug crime going on there. The drones are snuffing labs, but then two more pop up. The extent to which this technology will bring change is still unknown.




Article found at: http://motherboard.vice.com/2012/6/28/drug-sniffing-drones-are-flying-over-bolivia-the-new-cocaine-underdog

A History Forgotten?

In class we discussed the history of the Internet and technology that aided the improvement of the Internet and computers we have today. However, we discussed little about the world wide reception of the Internet and even technology that had been developing abroad to enable this transfer of data. This article sheds some light on how advanced the French were in their understanding of the Internet and the software that could enable this. Minitel allowed for the french to pay bills and book trips online. This was happening way before the personal computer even came into households. The article comments on how this could have been a great technological advancement and Minitel could have profited from this first-movers advantage. Unfortunately, it never went anywhere. It's interesting to read about these dying technologies, and to think that the international arena might have been much more advanced than we want to remember.


Article found at :http://www.engadget.com/2012/06/29/minitel-to-be-shut-down-tomorow-france-bids-adieu-to-the-intern/

Phase Changer Memory

How important is is? Well its had some issues changing the memory industry, but they might have just had a breakthrough that could make memory that stores 10x faster than the current technology does. The article doesn't seem to think Micron, phase changer producers, will be pushing for the technology that essentially allows the chemical process to occur at a faster speed and thus allowing the processor to store memory at a quicker rate. This article directly relates to our discussions in class about RAM and memory processors, how its stored and how a microprocessor stores the code. I find this interesting, and am eager to see if this phase changer discovery really takes off.


Article found @ http://www.engadget.com/2012/06/23/phase-change-memory-breakthrough-could-lead-to-gigahertz-plus-data/

What is an App?

Gizmodo had a great article discussing what we know as apps and what today is actually an app. The article considers the phone, and how there is a Application Launcher that launches other apps. This app for apps basically allows the user even more freedom and quckier access to apps on their mobile phone.  It was interesting because it reminds you how much software is involved in creating the interactions we have with our computer. It a great example of  abstraction, and application launchers do that to hid the process of opening apps and having to locate them within the computer. I like that the website noticed this, and feels its important to its reading audience to understand it.

Found Article @ http://gizmodo.com/5920312/what-is-an-app-launcher?tag=What-Is

Consumer Marketing

Acxiom, a very inconspicuous sounding name, is one of the leading companies of consumer marketing information. They hold hundreds of thousands of very crucial information from what kind of printer type you like, to what kind of ads appeal to the average middle-age person. The article suggested there is an increasingly fine line between stalking someone's internet activity, to simply obtaining information about a certain websites activity. I found this article extremely interesting, because the internet seems to increasingly know more and more about me, and what i do even if I don't explicitly say it. It's disturbing. The article relates to the scope of  the internet's influence in our daily life. I'm sure when BBN, Cerf and Khan were making the first inventions, like packet-switching, they did not think they would be aiding the eventual formation of the information marketing company Acxion's take-over of the internet.  


Article Found @: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/17/technology/acxiom-the-quiet-giant-of-consumer-database-marketing.html?src=me&ref=technology

Snuff: At what point are videos illegal?

Wow. Recently The Verge published a special article on gore sites published on the internet where users can upload videos about people doing violent things, or witnessing murder, accidents, and other "gory" incidents that happen around the world. Lessley Anderson, the writer, discussed how the video of Magnotta, a Canadian blogger who posted a video of a murdering of a Chinese student. This is only the beginning of what the site had to offer. The article begs the questions, "who watches this stuff?". Anderson never really answers this question, but discusses how some of the users are regular people who wander onto the site for various reasons. The article is intriguing, and may not have a direct connection to what we have discussed in class, but it does seem to make one wonder if the internet should restrict somethings or should everything be okay to look at? 

article found @: http://www.theverge.com/2012/6/13/3076557/snuff-murder-torture-internet-people-who-watch-it

Retina Display Advancement

Soon after Apple announced its new Retina-optimized display Macbook, software companies began jumping on board to optimize their software for this new and improved display. Some software companies are taking longer to improve their software, however Google just announced that it will be coming out with Chrome Canary to be used for the new technology. It shows the response of many software companies to the hardware companies innovation and and technological advancements. This article discusses both the affects of display screens and the issue with pixelation and the loss of quality, but it also reintroduces the topic of software and hardware issues we discussed earlier in class. I think it's an exciting article that holds a lot of promise, however it will depend if enough software companies decided to jump on board and optimize their products, otherwise it might not really make a huge difference.


Article found at :http://techcrunch.com/2012/06/13/google-will-update-chrome-for-apples-new-retina-displays-already-available-in-canary-build/

TV Display Screen New Technology

As pictures get bigger, the quality of display screens has not improved as fast. New technology though is repalcing LCD lights with something called "quantum dots".  These quantum dots allow for a bigger gamut of color by producing a clearer red and green in a more efficient way than LED and LCD lights do. The company manufacturing it, 3M , claims that they it is much more cost efficient and they are still able to us LED lights in the manufacturing process. It's interesting to me that the quality of film (i.e. how many frames/sec) is so important, however the technology displaying the film is also as important. If the two are not growing at the same speed the quality will always be less than what it could be. I enjoyed this article since it relates to our recent discussion about image compression, and color depths based on the RGB color set.



Article found at: http://spectrum.ieee.org/consumer-electronics/audiovideo/quantum-dots-are-behind-new-displays/?utm_source=techalert&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=061412

I found this video intriguing because of our discussion of digital film, and how making the film is simply a series of samples. However, in in the video they add affects and do advanced film editing. It made me wonder how it is done. I know how picture editing is done, but do you have to add those affects to every single frame? Besides the process, I also am very impressed by the visual affects and how advanced everything has become. Even watching movies these days you see a significant improvement in the quality of the picture and the film makers ability to manipulate the image in a very realistic way. It's impressive and this film acts as a clear evolution of the advancement of digital film.


Article Found: http://techcrunch.com/2012/06/14/this-homemade-portal-video-is-pretty-darn-amazing/?grcc=88888Z0ZwdgtZ0Z0Z0Z0Z0

Code Made Easier

Recently, Google released its new Google Blocky which teaches you to write code and do it in a visually simulating way. Blocky is now taking over Google's former code instructor Inventor. They expect it to be even more engaging and easy for users to understand. I find it relates to class in that new programs for teaching code and teaching people to program is becoming increasingly marketable. Users want to know what they are doing more and more. This will be very helpful for someone who may not really know code, or students who are learning it. But I find it cool how Google is expanding even to code, and they are making it friendly for beginners and for advanced programmers.




Article found at: http://www.theverge.com/2012/6/12/3081248/google-blockly-visual-coding

Changing Times

Firefox is partnering with Google to allow it to be the number one search engine operated on Firefox in Russia. It seems to be an interesting move on Firefox's part because the number one search engine in Russia  is Yandex. This article reminded me of the discussion we had in class about the some websites wanting priority when their users request its IP address. it makes me wonder if the companies with the most money will be controlling a lot more of the market share just because they have the power to do so. it should be interesting to see what congress decides.





Article Found @ http://www.theverge.com/2012/6/9/3073851/google-default-search-option-firefox-russia

A 3-D World

The article explains how an imaging company called Artec Group has recently come out with a 3-D imaging  machine for the use of doctors (mostly orthopedics) and for auto companies. They explain that instead of a regular scanner that takes pictures with a laser, this takes pictures digitally on grid system. Since we were discussing digital imaging, I found it interesting how advanced the digitizing process is becoming. The article stated that, "200,000 color pixels every fifteenth of a second. Besides rendering the look of the object, that provides information about shape, since the shading can change with depth". The traditional understanding of color and color coding is becoming changed to a mathematical grid system with each grid being slightly different. With the increasing demand for 3-D, I wouldn't be surprised if something like this really took off, and impacted the traditional form of digitizing. 

Article Found @ http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/06/08/home-3-d-scans-made-cheap/

.Google, .Sex, .Music...?!?

I know we've talked about IP addresses and expanding the available IP addresses, but i found this article on CNN interesting. Apparently, they are expanding the internet domain system. The article gave the examples of soon to be ".google, .sex, .music"....It's very interesting. They said it is happening because the ICCAN has been preparing this for nearly a decade, and it was finally approved last June. However the article doubts that it will be coming to websites anytime soon. The company is handling a major glitch right now, and continues to update its deadline date. This will really have an interesting effect on what is to come for the history of the internet. I wonder if it will be harder to remember Internet address or not, and if Internet consumers will really like it, or if this is just another way for companies like Google to advertise their websites with a internet domain ending in ".google". It seems like the have way too much legal work to actually get this done quickly though. 

Article found @http://money.cnn.com/2012/06/08/technology/ICANN-domain-expansion/index.htm

Google At It Again

Knowledge graph on Google

Google is taking it a step further with its new search system that brings relevant webpages to you. It helps you cut back on all the information floating around and gives you quick easy answers so you don't have to go searching. In some ways this is great for google, but the webpages that actually provide the information, like Wikipedia might not be so thrilled about the idea because they could lose the traffic to their page. Dosens of  like websites like Wikipedia, Freebase and other open source information page are being used for Google's new venture. However it seems as if they are using the individuals that usually provide data for these websites and using htem for the Knowledge graph. This remeinded me of the concern with the first form of Internet, the ARPAnet, when people were not so willing to give out information to the WWW.  It seems like we are really entering an age of free information. 

Article Found @ http://www.theverge.com/2012/6/8/3071190/google-knowledge-graph-star-trek-computer-john-giannandrea-interview

Explaining the Modem Sound

Photo Courtesy of www.theatlantic.com


In Alexis Madriga article for the Atlantic, he describes the history of the modem sound that meant so much to an earlier generation. It's funny the way he describes it as something archaic whose sound is now being preserved in an online library for "Endangered Sounds". He goes on to describe what every part of the noise represents as it connects to the internet. He also describe how the different pitches of the modems sound often times represent the speed of the modem and the way it will be operate. It's an interesting read for explaining how a modem operated on a telephone system and the technological explanation for the sounds a modem would make.


Article Found at: http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2012/06/the-mechanics-and-meaning-of-that-ol-dial-up-modem-sound/257816/

Processor Reviews

Photo Courtesy of www.tomshardware.com



The article reviews the current processors released by Intel recently. We didn't discuss processors in depth in class, but they are very interesting to me because of another class I took and we discussed the business monopoly Intel has over processors. I would assume that Intel must be very sensitive to innovation and the quickly changing nature of it's industry. However the review suggests that their new processor released contains 4 models and you can choose between more speed and lower power or more power an slower speed. But the review has its doubts about whether or not the new "optimized" chips are actually very efficient in the end. They are currently running tests to see if the processing chips actually accomplished anything new.

Article Found at: http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/core-i5-3570-low-power,3204.html

Hardware vs. Software

The article identifies a new problem emerging in the mobile world as consumers realize they can apply their software onto any hardware. Phone companies for years made this seem like an difficult and illegal activity for consumers to do, however consumers are quickly learning they can control what they put on their hardware, and which hardware they want their software to operate on. This article relates to our early class lecture about differentiating between a computers software and hardware, and that mobile software is becoming more and more "programmable" and allows more freedom for its users. This is a concern to phone companies because it means reduced profits.

Article Found: http://www.theverge.com/2012/6/1/3056660/mobile-hardware-software-editorial

Robots and Humans

Photo Credit: www.newscientist.com

The article discusses a new robot that is being tested to see if it can maintain the attention span of the students like a real human teacher could. The results indicate that if the robot mimics what a real teacher does to keep the class’s attention, it actually proves to keep the students attention longer. This article reminded me of the discussion we had in class about computers taking over the role of humans. The article would seem to suggest that they are, but there are several drawbacks to having a computer teacher, like the cost for the school, but also the lack of human instincts that most computers are unable to pick up on.

Found at:  http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg21428665.500-mindreading-robot-teachers-keep-students-focused.html

Cool "Geeks"

Photo Courtesy of geeksugar.com.

Article Found at: http://www.geeksugar.com/World-Warcraft-Helps-Find-Dates-22328000

First I would like to comment on the website: I found it very comical to see how people are attempting to make "geeky-ness" hip. The website advertises celebrities and then adds word "geeky" in the title to make it relate to geeks. However it's important to note that there is a consumer base for this kind of media and news.

The article itself also touches on an important phenomenon developing in today's tech world. This idea of less face-to-face interactions. And that people can now have relationships with computers, reveals a new dependance on computers. However I think that this isn't something to be too concerned about, because I think most people realize that a computer cannot replace everything a human can provide. I would not be too concerned about this development. 

GizModo-How to Destroy the Internet

Where I found: http://gizmodo.com/5912383/how-to-destroy-the-internet

I immediately noticed the article because we just had a lecture on the internet and it seemed interesting that someone would think they could destroy it. The article goes on the describe how one might destroy the entire internet by focusing on the software and that it works in more of an old fashion way than one thinks. I find it interesting that in the end it comes down to the physical structures. The post seems very unrealistic, and reading the comments below, many people seem to think he oversimplified a lot. But I think the key takeaway is that people are thinking about it, and our internet system is indeed very complex!