Linda's High Tech Blog

Neil Postman\'s Critique

2006-04-03T11:38:00.000-07:00

1. In this quote, Postman claims that "technological change always results in winners and losers." He points to the printing press as an example. How does Postman think society changed as a result of the printing press? Who are the winners and who are the losers according to Postman? What changed as a result?
According to Postman the winners included scientists and free thinking individuals and the losers are the bladder's and the catholic church . What happened was that instead of people learning the news and things second hand they learn it direct. Like for instant the bible in the old days the priest was the person who would talk about the bible, but when the printing press came up they wrote the bible so then people were able to read it and come up with their own interpretations.

2. According to Postman, what is the relationship between technology and education? Does Postman think technology is a threat to education? How? Can education be used to stem the rapid advance of technology? How?
Postman does think that the television will make the teacher obsolete. He thinks that because he feels like people will be taking their classes at home from their television Postman does think that technology is a threat to education because then people wont even take their classes seriously. They would just turn on the television and sit there like if it were the same as a show. People would choose not to learn. Education can be used to stem the rapid advance of technology because people would learn more about technology and be able to improve it.

3. Do you think the rapid advance of the internet has resulted in winners and losers? Explain how you think it has changed, or will change, the nature of human interactions.
I think that the internet rapid advance has resulted in winners because then people who search online are able to search faster and get their information in a good amount of speed. It will changet the interactions of humans because know people who are shy or arnt good with having friends can make themselfes seem popular to other people. People lie online to others so people can like them. People would never really go out side to talk or play. People will talk and play online with other people. The world will be a lazy place. Thats not a good thing because people need excersice.

NYC is Blog City!

2006-03-17T11:32:00.000-08:00

Using the AM New York article entitled “Blog City,” create a post that does the following…

1) According to the author, why has New York become such a popular city for Blogging? Use at least one quote from the article to support your claims.

New York is becoming popular with blogging because its a way of communicating with others and reading others opinion through their computers.

"There are so many New Yorkers out there who write really well and tell
stories really well," says Chris Hampton, who blogs at uffish.com. "More and
more they are realizing that blogging is a good way to communicate
with their audience"

2) What motivates people to keep their own blogs? Use at least one quote from the article to provide an example. (use the Blockquote tool in your toolbar to indent the quote.

The motivation is to exprece themselves through a piece of writting so that people can read and get a sence on who that person is.

Whatever their motivation, there are bloggers in this town
catering to every interest, written by every canceivable kind of person, and
collective workingto create a 21st-centrury New York that is the country's
foremost Blog City.

3) Choose one New York-based blog from the article that you find interesting, and give a paragraph summary of what the blog is about. Who is the author? How long have they been blogging? Why do they blog? Inside your paragraph, provide your readers a link to the blog.

I choose Tan's blog. His blog is about himself and what he does on a day to day basis. Its also about his opinion and what he thinks and wants other people to think.

Optional fun stuff:

a) Register your blog at nycbloggers.com This will probably result in visitors and comments on your blog.

b) Go to amNY.com and send them your favorite blog Humans Technology and Experience (htehome.blogspot.com).

Conductors and Insulators...

2006-03-09T11:15:00.001-08:00

Assignment: Last class we experimented with batteries, bulbs, wires, and a number of different materials (foil, cardboard, wax paper, etc..) to try to better understand the basic principles at work in most electrical technology...
1. Your assignment is to post web definitions for the following words:

electric circuit- An electrical circuit is a network that has a closed loop, giving a return path for the current. A network is a connection of two or more simple circuit elements, and may not necessarily be a circuit. (resource http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electric_circuit)

electrical conductor- Electrical conduction is the movement of electrically charged particles through a transmission medium. The movement can form an electric current in response to an electric field. The underlying mechanism for this movement depends on the material.
Conduction is well-described by Ohm's Law, which states that the current is proportional to the applied electric field. The ease with which current density (current per area) j appears in a material is measured by the conductivity σ, defined as:
j = σ E
or its reciprocal resistivity ρ:
j = E / ρ
In linear anisotropic materials, σ and ρ are tensors. (resource http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electrical_conductor)

electrical insulator- An insulator is a material or object that resists the flow of electric charge. (resource http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electrical_insulator)

Make sure to include your sources.

2. How can YOU define these in your own words based on our experiment with batteries, bulbs, wires, and different materials? How can you test to determine whether a material is a conductor or an insulator? How do you know when a circuit is a CLOSED circuit? As long as the light turns on then its a conductor. Basically when its anything of metal. When its a conductor the light will turn on. When its an insulator then the light wont turn on.

3. How do these concepts apply to your object? What parts are made of conductors? Insulators? How did you know? Are any circuits are present? How can you tell? Use pictures to explain, if you want. In the CRT there are a lot of conductors in it. Almost everything in there is a conductor. Theres a lot of those copper wires. The copper wires are conductors. I also have a lot of little capacitors in the CRT. The capacitors are also conductors. But inside the capacitor there are two sheets of wax paper. The wax paper is an insulator.

4. What do you think a semiconductor is? Predict the meaning....Then look it up. Are there anny semi-conductors in your object. Where? What parts are made of semi-conductors and what special roles do they play? I think a semiconductor is something that is a conductor and insulator.
(A semiconductor is a material with an electrical conductivity that is intermediate between that of an insulator and a conductor. A semiconductor behaves as an insulator at very low temperature, and has an appreciable electrical conductivity at room temperature although much lower conductivity than a conductor. Commonly used semiconducting materials are silicon, germanium, gallium arsenide and indium phosphide.)
Yeah the capacitors are semiconductors. I think thats the only semiconductor in the CRT.

Reflections on Amish Technology Practices

2006-03-06T11:13:00.000-08:00

Assignment: Post your reflections on the Howard Rheingold article from Friday. Questions to focus your writing:

1) Who are the Amish and why do they avoid certain technologies?
The Amish is a religion/culture that migrated from Europe. They do not believe in certain technologies. They only allow certain things that will help them with their every day chores. But something like the TV, mp3's, game stations, etc. Basically things that when you come home you would just sit down and relax as you use, what people like to call "laziness". So they avoid so that people won't become "lazy".

2) According to Howard Rheingold, how do the Amish go about adopting a new technology? What criteria do they use to decide whether or not to allow it?
They negotiate before they let other/new technologies into their society. Their criteria for different technologies to enter their religion/culture is "Does it bring us together, or draw us apart?".

3) Do you think we should be more careful about which technologies to allow into our lives? Explain your opinion. How should we decide this? Give examples of positive and negative technologies to illustrate your ideas. Yes, because most things that we use today in our society aren't good for us. Like game stations and the TV. Those things aren't really good for us because we use it a lot, basically we abuse it to much. If maybe people were to use it less then there will be no problem. Well there is no deciding to do because once you give someone something you cant take it away. That's just how things are.

The Fuctions Of A CRT (Cathode Ray Tube) And The Fuctions Inside

2006-02-17T11:18:00.000-08:00

Part Name	Picture	Function	Important connections and/or sub-parts
CRT(Cathode Ray Tube)		The cathode ray tube or CRT, invented by Karl Ferdinand Braun, is the display device that was traditionally used in most computer displays, video monitors, televisions and oscilloscopes. The CRT developed from Philo Farnsworth's work was used in all television sets until the late 20th century and the advent of plasma screens, LCDs, DLP, OLED displays, and other technologies. If you want to read more about the functions and how it was made then click on this CRT.	There are parts inside the CRT. If you want to find out what they are and their description and what part they take in the CRT. These are the the hotlinks to click on: 1) Apparatus 2) Other Technologies 3) Magnets 4) Health Danger 5) High Vacuum Saftey 6) See Also 7) External Links
Main Circuit Board		Aprinted circuit board or PCB mechanically supports and electrically connects electronic components using conductive pathways, or traces, etched from copper sheets laminated onto a non-conductive substrate. Alternative names are printed wiring board or PWB or etched wiring board PCBs are rugged, inexpensive, and can be highly reliable. They require much more layout effort and higher initial cost than either wire-wrapped or point-to-point constructed circuits, but are much cheaper, faster, and consistent in high volume production. If you want to read more about the fuctions and history of the circut board just click this Circut Boards.	Physical composition Most PCBs are composed of between one and sixteen conductive layers separated and supported by layers of insulating material (substrates) laminated (glued) together. Layers may be connected together through drilled holes called vias. Either the holes are electroplated or small rivets are inserted. High-density PCBs may have blind vias, which are visible only on one surface, or buried vias, which are visible on neither. Substrates Low-end consumer grade PCB substrates frequently are made of paper impregnated with phenolic resin, sometimes branded "Pertinax". They carry designations such as XXXP, XXXPC, and FR-2. The material is inexpensive, easy to machine by drilling, shearing and cold punching, and causes less tool wear than glass fiber reinforced substrates. The letters "FR" in the designation indicate Flame Resistance. High-end consumer and industrial circuit board substrates are typically made of a material designated FR-4. This consists of a woven fiberglass mat impregnated with a flame resistant epoxy resin. It can be drilled, punched and sheared, but due to its abrasive glass content requires tools made of tungsten carbide for high volume production. Due to the fiberglass reinforcement, it exhibits about five times higher flexural strength and resistance to cracking than paper-p henolic types, albeit at higher cost. PCBs for high power radio frequency (RF) work use plastics with low dielectric constant (permittivity) and dissipation factor, such as Rogers® 4000, Rogers® Duroid, DuPont® Teflon® (types GT and GX), polyimide, polystyrene and cross-linked polystyrene. They typically have poorer mechanical properties, but this is considered an acceptable engineering tradeoff in view of their superior electrical performance. PCBs designed for use in vacuum or in zero gravity, as in spacecraft, being unable to rely on convection cooling, often have thick copper or aluminum cores to dissipate heat from electrical components. Not all circuit boards use rigid core materials. Some are designed to be completely or partially flexible, using DuPont's® Kapton® polyimide film, and others. This class of boards, sometimes called flex circuits, or rigid-flex circuits, respectively, are difficult to create but have many applications. Sometimes they are flexible to save space (PCBs inside cameras and hearing aids are almost always made of flex circuits so they can be folded up to fit into the limited available space). Sometimes, the flexible part of the circuit board is actually being used as a cable or moving connection to another board or device. One example of the latter application is the cable connected to the carriage in an inkjet printer.
Circut Control Boared		Same as above. Just that this circuit board has more things connected on it.	Samething as the item above. But has different parts but moatley the same.
Capacitor	Click here to see pictures of the Capacitor. When you get to the page make sure you go down a little in order to see it. Or you can click here Capacitor.	A capacitor is a device that stores energy in the electric field created between a pair of conductors on which equal but opposite electric charges have been placed. A capacitor is occasionally referred to using the older term condenser. OIf you want to read and see the different capacitors please click here Capacitor.	The capacitors are only connected to the two circuit boards.

(Source wikipedia.org)

History of the Internet

2006-02-09T11:26:00.000-08:00

Research: (2/9/06)

URL: http://www.walthowe.com/navent/history.html (2/9/06)

Author: Walt Howe

Credentials/Credibility: There isn't really much info about the author. But it does say how the internet was brought up. It says that the internet was first tried out in October 29, 1969, by Charley Kline . But the internet crashed as soon as he was logging on.

Content of Intrest: Well this site provides much information for u to learn anout the internet but i will search another web to see if the info matches up. There arn't that many pictures so the web page may seem a little dull.

Cool picture(s) I might want to use later:

Quotes I might use from the exact URL:
Did Al Gore invent the Internet?According to a CNN transcript of an interview with Wolf Blitzer, Al Gore said,"During my service in the United States Congress, I took the initiative in creating the Internet." Al Gore was not yet in Congress in 1969 when ARPANET started or in 1974 when the term Internet first came into use. Gore was elected to Congress in 1976. In fairness, Bob Kahn and Vint Cerf acknowledge in a paper titled Al Gore and the Internet that Gore has probably done more than any other elected official to support the growth and development of the Internet from the 1970's to the present .

Research: 2/10

URL: http://www.netvalley.com/intval/07262/main.htm?sdf=1 (2/10/06)

Author: Gregory Gromov

Credentials/Credibility: This web page gives you info on the year when a cable was made so people can talk to each other trough the internet national wide. I'm not sure if i should believe what their saying, but i will just have to do more research on what year the cable was made.

Content of Interest: I dont think that this web page tolld me much on when and how the internet was made. It just talks about the web cable. But if what your looking for is about the history the web above is much better for that.

Cool picture(s) I might want to use later:

Quotes I might use, with the exact URL: The internet has changed the way we currently communicate... But could the internet have performed the fuction it was originally designed for?

Research: 2/10

URL: http://undergraduate.csse.uwa.edu.au/231.31/internet-history.html (2/10/06)

Author: Bruce Sterling

Credentials/Credibility: This web page is about what made them want to make the internet.

Content of Interest:

Cool picture(s) I might want to use later:

Quotes I might use, with the exact URL:

The Samsung Experience

2006-02-03T11:53:00.000-08:00

This is me (left) and my friend Alexis (right) on our trip during the tour of the Samsung Experience.

1) How is new technology presented to us by the companies that create and sell it?
Its presented in a way that makes us want it when it comes out.

a) Observations: What images, language, textures, colors, shape, size, and other design features
do you observe in this space?

list key images you observe:

Things I saw were buttons, screens, speakers, controls, and ear phones.

list key language you hear or read:

Languages I hears and tried to read were Chinese and Japanese.

describe textures you feel or see:

Everything that I touched was Smooth.

describe colors or color schemes you see:

The colors I saw were blue, red, yellow, green, black, white, and pink.

describe common shapes you see:

The most commonly shapes that I saw were squares and circles.

size it seem to matter, and in which products?

Size did matter in something. Like in a TV the most likely size would be a big TV. In a telephone it would be small.

Other observations:
b) Inferences: What are we being asked to believe about ourselves in relationship to technology? What values are behind the technology? Justify your inferences based on observation. State any prior assumptions you are making:

We as people are asked to believe that these electronics will help make our lives easier.
- Behind the new phones that will be coming out, a belief is that were ever you are you will never misse a game or new show or new video.
- Behind the washer/drier that will be coming out, a belief is that you wont have to transfer your clothes any more. You just let them wash and when their done the machine would go onto drier mode and dry your clothing.
- Behind the home remote control which also will be coming out in a couple of years, the belief is that all you have to do is sit and press a button that will do everything for you. Like raise or lower the curtains, turn the oven on, etc.

2) What is your reaction to the Samsung Experience? Describe any shifts that occurred in your emotional and physical state when you arrived. Try to explain the cause of these feelings.

I dont know about the others but i like the "Samsung Experience", it was fun to see what technology we will be using in the future.

3) Of the different products you have observed, which do you think has/will most change the way humans live in the future? Name it and explain your thinking.

The house control because everyone would buy it. Everyone would use it and become lazy and gain wieght.