It's a phrase we hear every day from Mr. John, yet we never really hear it. Yes you hear the words, but are you actually listening to what he is saying? Make good choices. Make good choices everyday, everywhere, with everyone. Today in class we were discussing a young teenage girl who posted explicit photographs on her MySpace page. I took interest in the topic looked it up on Google.
A 14 year old girl, in New Jersey, posted explicit photographs of herself on her MySpace page. She was arrested and charged with possession and distribution of child pornography. She was forced to register in her state as a sex offender under Megan's Law. Maureen Kanka, whose daughter, Megan, became the law's namesake after she was raped and killed at age 7 in 1994 by a twice-convicted sex offender, blasted authorities for charging the 14-year-old girl. "The teen needs help, not legal trouble", she said. Investigators are now looking into further cases of this matter and are trying to decide what to do.
Billy: "Hey mom, how was your day?"
Mom: "Good, we sold the house and are moving to Africa."
Billy: "WHAT?!"
Mom: "April Fool's! "
Conficker is a worm that is coming out on April Fool's Day 2009. Once Conficker infiltrates a machine, it tries to crack administrators' passwords, hijack security software, disable commercial antivirus software, and opens the PCs to further infections. Internet security experts were so struck by the authors' skills that they formed the "Conficker Cabal" to fight back against the worm. Many people are frightened by this, but others are staying positive thinking that it is going to be an April Fool's Day joke.
Can you believe that a man has payed $100,000 for a piece of property from a virtual world? Jon Jacobs, the man who purchased this expensive non-realistic property, believes that he can bring in over $1.6 million dollars per year by using his purchase to his advantage. He wants to build resorts, nightclubs, and fertile hunting grounds on his property. He then could use those businesses to make money, to help compensate for his own purchase. All of this has been done on the virtual world called Second Life.
Personally, I think this is one of the stupidest things ever done and one of the brightest all together. I believe it is stupid because I would not want to have all my money tied up in some virtual world, I would rather live in the real world and use my money for the good of myself and others. On the other hand, it is a very bright act considering that everybody enjoys different activities and makes a living out of millions of different occupations.
There are some people in this world whose job is making up virtual worlds like these. There are also other people who enjoy their virtual world, whereas you or I would enjoy spending time with family and friends. So by reaching out to those people in the world, Jon Jacobs is actually making a very logical decision. Although it is something I would never consider, I cannot speak for everyone else.
NASA was honored Wednesday for its efforts to inform the public through the popular social-networking Web site Twitter.
More than 38,000 people followed NASA's "tweets" of the Mars Phoenix Lander mission.
NASA received the "Shorty Award" for documenting the mission of the Mars Phoenix Lander. The Mars Phoenix Lander spent nearly five months in 2008 on the red planet conducting research.
Twitter allows users to post updates or "tweets" in 140 characters or less. NASA said it delivered more than 600 updates during the 152 days the Phoenix was operating in the north polar region of Mars.
By the end of the mission in early November, more than 38,000 people were following its tweets, NASA said.
NASA beat out several science bloggers and was honored at the award show in New YorkWe have just recently learned about Twitter in class, and this is an example of
how popular it has gotten over the past few months. Technology in this
day and time is far beyond my comprehension level. It amazes me that I can log
onto my computer and know what is going on in Mars, by refreshing my Twitter account. The entire universe can be up to speed with what is happening on other planets at the click of a button. Think back some years to when people could only communicate by sending brief telegrams. Look how far we have come today. We are now able to know almost anything
with a click.
Doctors are treating patients in Second Life. This is a virtual hospital with patients where students in med school can get a "hands-on" experience. The students go through certain steps while treating their patients. One important step is that they must always wash their hands before seeing a patient. This is a new way for students to learn, aside from the normal reading in textbooks or by watching. Through this virtual world the students are doing it all themselves, but without the risk of endangering real life patients. I believe this is a new step for the technological world. This may lead to more discoveries, as far as the virtual world goes. Next there will be virtual worlds to help teach students for numerous occupations. I think this is one of the most interesting articles that I have read in a while, that is for the technology section.
"Like to read?"
Library Thing is a great website to see how regular people rate the books on your reading list. I for one love to read, and this is a neat way to see what people really think of all the books out there. Most of the time I would just google a certain book and go through website after website to see what different stores rated the book, but now I can just go to one website and have everything I need at my convienence. I think this is a website for those students who would like to keep track of all the books they have read and what they thought of them, so that for future reference they can either recommend or not recommend the book to others. Also, this helps them be more knowledgable of all the books they have read, and/or are reading.
RSS and newsreaders are much more helpful when a student is doing a research project or just needs to find a piece of information fast. They cut out all of the ads that nobody really cares to see. I especially like Bloglines because I can subscribe to certain posts like the iTunes Top 25 song charts, or celebrity gossip posts, such as Perez Hilton. Also, aside from just entertainment purposes I can subscribe to posts about what is in the news, the weather, and many other important topics. Whatever I need at the moment I can find within a few minutes, rather than a few hours. I enjoy being able to click the link and be given the exact information I asked for; nothing more and nothing less. I find this very helpful as a student.I believe this is the link to my blogline account.. http://beta.bloglines.com/b/view?mode=addsubs&siteId=215897#view-playlistid.160945-viewDisplay.startpage-displayModel.startpage%26t%3D1236796102637
