Scratch

I really enjoyed our work in scratch over the past week and thought it was very nifty. I found some of the commands rather basic and limiting for what I wanted to do but as I learned the program more and more I learned that some of the things I wanted to do could be done. I understand that the program is just a basic for animation but still it was a cool expansion on the gif work that we had done earlier. I also even got a comment on my .gif from a friend in Oklahoma who happened to stumble across my page and said "So that's how you draw Mona Lisa". It was mindblowing that the day I had put it up my friend and somehow found it and viewed it when only hours earlier I had just made it for fun in class.

Web page

Making the webpage for the class was very interesting and I enjoyed learning the little bit about coding and the basics on uploading to the web. I actually got to the level where I was helping my classmates upload and fix their coding issues which really surprised me. I don't know if I will use it in the future but it is definitely a good skill to have and many marketing jobs require "basic coding" so I think I am starting to cover that requirement for the future job market. I also thought it was cool that our professors asked us what we wanted to learn in the subject instead of what they were in the mood to teach!

Guest Speaker

I missed the speaker we had, Mr. Berry due to travel obligations but I heard all about him form my class mates and they filled me in on his discussions and presentation. It was interesting to hear from them exactly what they got out of the presentation as well as the vicious cycle of computer viruses versus computer protection. It was also cool to finally get a break from school with thanksgiving. It has been insanely busy in all of my classes and I'm glad I got some time off to do work on my annotated bibliography and spend some time with my family.

Discussion on Internet for Social Change

I am really enjoying our discussions on the internet and how it is affecting different social areas across the globe. I was given the internet in Russia, and my article and research was all about how the Russian government is starting to police their internet and take out content that they deem "undesirable". The concept to me is very Eastern and would not work in America as well. We pride ourselves on the concept that all information should be available to us, that is part of what free speech is all about. Some of the other concepts that we discussed were very interesting and I enjoyed the video between Westboro Baptist and Anonymous. I can't wait for more discussion!

Cloud Computing

This week start with Dr. Wilkes giving a great lecture on cloud computing, its advantages, its disadvantages and how it really is the thing of the future. Mr. Greer of Easyfish marketing even discussed with me how his company is entirely cloud based and how he has employees all over the U.S. and that they work together on local projects but very few people work entirely out of his main office in history. I think that this will be how more and more business work in the future. The process will continue to become more and more efficient and it will benefit the American family because parents will be home with their kids more often. The only issue that I can see with this is that possibly people would be more distracted by how comfortable and easy their home is to relax, creating a less professional work environment. It was also cool to see how many companies that I know were using cloud computing for things that I do daily without me even thinking about it.

Crowdsourcing and its uses.

I really enjoyed this week because of all of the discussions about Crowdsourcing. I had never actually heard of the concept of crowdsourcing but it is brilliant. I enjoyed seeing all of the different uses at Carnegie Mellon and how it was being used as a free concept to solve what would have cost millions and millions of dollars. Also, it was neat to see how the games were actually quite fun. I threw my name in the pot to be chosen for the duolingo.com private beta in a few weeks. The activity I made with Zoe and the rest of our group also worked out surprisingly well.

Marketing Visitor and end of presentations.

I got to present our book and that seemed to go over very well! Even Dee Parks was getting in on the conversation, and we had some really great discussions! Overall I did not really like our book but the concepts were good. Also, we had a digital marketing visitor who presented his company and how they worked. I LOVED THIS. He discussed all of the different things he did and all of the different companies that his company works for. This is right up my alley since I am a marketing visitor. I emailed Mr. Greer later that day and he said that they might be able to set me up with a internship!!

Presentations

The beginning of the presentations is making me realize that maybe some of these authors have a decent point with their work. It is possible that our generation is being conditioned and changed to think differently, read differently, and just be entirely different than the generation before us. I still believe that the previous generation does not fully understand how our brains are being conditioned and instead of investigating, then they automatically reject and assume that this new conditioning is "bad". I think that it is actually preparing us for the current job market. That's just my opinion. Maybe my opinion will change with the upcoming presentations.

Encoding

I thought the lesson on codes was rather interesting! Albeit, I found that most of the information provided seemed to be a little bit below the learning level of our class. Having Honors kids coming to visit in the future sounds fun too! It'll be interesting to have some fresh blood in the class and have a greater discussion in class especially with our book reports coming up. My book is interesting but not written for casual reading so it is a bit of a laborious effort. Fall break was nice as well.

Facebook

Our discussion on Thursday about Facebook as well as my research really opened up my eyes about Facebook's privacy policy. Am I entirely worried about it? No not really, my facebook is very clean and I don't have anything in my life that I need to keep hidden so I am not at all worried about it. I was a bit unhappy with some of the choices that Facebook has made as a business. It makes sense though that they had to be ruthless to get to the top though. Also, it isn't as if Zuckerburg had an extremely positive portrayal in "The Social Network". I think I'll continue to use facebook, just be more careful I suppose

Privacy

Thursday's class really opened my eyes. I went back to some of the social media that I used to be a part of and deleted my accounts. I cleaned up a lot of things that I used in middle school and such. I completely forgot that they were in existence but now they seemed so incredibly juvenile and ridiculous that I was a bit embarrassed. The class itself was very interesting and all the talk about the Krispy Kreme Challenge made me want to run it again next year.

Replacement for my first Blog Post

I realized today that in my grades I am missing the very first blog post so I thought I'd go ahead and make one. The first week of class I was in a different seminar and was incredibly disappointed in it and found the professor very off putting. I love this class so much more and am finding it enjoyable as well as interesting. 

Internet programs

I'm finding this whole conversation of internet programs and technology to help track your health and well being to be very interesting. Rescue time in my opinion failed a decent bit but I think it helped me realize a bit that technology can serve as more than just a convenience to my life. It is a way for me to help track my life in sort of a self check manner to help me keep my life in check. Over the past week, I've been increasing the use of my online calendar, keeping detailed lists about my "to-do's". I also started a weight journal which in turn has helped me watch what I eat and I have actually lost a little bit of weight and feel a bit healthier which is a great benefit. I wish there was a great program that would help with different subjects and the best ways to study for them based on your personality. That would be incredible. It would present a study plan for you based on the material that you need to learn as well as the best way that you can learn it. Then it would take into account when and how you best study and then suggest when you could study based on the schedule that you import. That program would be really incredible and I think could be entirely profitable especially in the university setting. Anyways, I'm enjoying incorporating technological programs into my life more and more.

I rather enjoyed the speaker for Convocation. He told a very amusing story to convey his point but then brought it back in manner that seemed much more like an organization instead of him tying in a tangent. It reminded me very much of his writing style. I wished that he would have had more time to speak. I had the assumption coming in that the convocation was more about him and less about medals and formal congratulations of staff of the university. I believe that recognition is quite important but it could have been done at a separate event or it should be condensed. I was unable to attend our guest speaker's night question and answer due to prior commitments to clubs, so I was quite frustrated when he stepped back from the podium around ten minutes after he was introduced. I also received my book for the book report for class late last night so I can start reading it!

Our session at the library was very informative. I greatly appreciated the amount of time he spent going over the different journal search engines as well as techniques that will be helpful when we have to write our paper. His presentation seemed a chaotic at times where he didn't know where to go next with it, but the spontaneous feel didn't hinder the actual lecture so it didn't bother me. Looking forward to our next class tomorrow!

Test Post

This is just a little test post. That's all.