Rawesome's Radically Cool Blog

Texting has impacted my life.  For the better?  I don't know.  I do know that I enjoy and appreciate the way it helps me communicate.  It allows me to send quick comments and info to friends like meeting times or a quick hi.  Text messages can be answered and read anywhere without annoying your nearest neighbor.  Texting is quicker and easier.

 I wouldn't say it is all for the better, though.  Sometimes I know I should give voice time to my family or friends and instead just text them.  Texting allows me to avoid others and often causes misinterpretation.  Texting is considered rude by some even though it is fairly quiet.  Texting is also an extra expence incurred on my phone bill.

Overall, however, I would say that texting isn't going anywhere for me.  I will continue to text and I believe those who resist now will eventually be converted.  The pressure to use social networking, texting are greater and broader than one might say at first glance.  Everyone is pursuing those venues today for all kinds of reasons whether it be personal or for business.  I believe in texting and so should u.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=the-everything-tv

 It seems logical that television and the internet will eventually come closer together.  Who wouldn't want to have both tv and the internet easily accessible and adaptable on the same device.  Imagine surfing the internet and then watching the NC State football game live on your television (without it being illegal of course).  Those of us who aren't technogeeks able to hook up any two electronic devices to one another have never thought much of this to be possible.  The future changes the present, however.  We have to be willing to shift our paradigms and accept and enjoy what is new.  Technology forward!

"I guarantee that five years from now TV as we know it is gone"  We always assume that the really rapid changes won't happen in our lifetimes and to US.  However, this seems like a completely logical assumption based on the article.  TV is coming to include more and more functions.  Maybe one day children won't go to school, but instead all of them will watch interactive educational programs (hollographic maybe?) on television.  The present changes into the future changes faster than we realize.  Prepare for change and adapt!

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=a-path-to-sustainable-energy-by-2030

This article seems unreasonable at first.  But is it?  The article calls for a huge amount of money and land to be dedicated to wind turbines and solar plants.  It seems reasonable that such a large amount of those could supply the energy we need.  Then again, the true problem arises.  Such a huge endeavor would require a great majority of people.  This would require massive paradigm shifting.  Right now, most  of us are happy with oil and coal; we have not yet been affected by shortages or anything that quickly gains our attention.

 This is a good idea, but ineffective because we as a society are lazy and not as forward-thinking as we might like.  We tend no to change until change is demanded.  Perhaps, the world will eventually turn to sustainable energy, but probably not until the other energy sources have been depleted.  Then again, at the rate they are being used up, maybe that is very soon in the future.

Often we assume that we all are born on an equal mental level, and that smarts are not natural but developed.  However, some research on brain structure might suggest otherwise, http://www.technologyreview.com/biomedicine/23695/.  Many scientists are researching whether someone's IQ can be discovered by scanning their brain.  Many believe that someone's intelligence can be read from one of these scans by looking at the neural wiring in one's brain.  This is dangerous and exciting at the same time.  It is dangerous because it can be used in the wrong situations for discrimination and prejudice.  It is exciting because it can lead to other discoveries that can help us understand how the brain works.

"When they began to look more closely for variables that correlated with brain structure, they found that intelligence seemed to be among the most significant. "IQ came in as a key factor that determines how the brain looks," Thompson says. "  In a way, it makes sense to me that the brain of someone with greater cognitive abilities would look different than another brain.  After all, we do not think alike for a reason; our brains are different.  Overall, this is still a developing technology, but it makes one wonder.  What does my brain look like?  For those with small brains (i.e. small heads), we might not have to worry too much.  "Studies of Albert Einstein's brain, for example, have found that it was typical in size, or even a bit on the small side."

Student government is a technology.  It has been set up to speak for the students and let the administration know what we want so that we can be properly served.  We are not being properly served of the moment, though.  Student Government as of this week has directly opposed the Student Referendum to vote down the Talley Fee.  Believing they know the students' interests better than the students themselves, Student Government has supported the Talley Fee and recommended it to the Fee Committee.

What do we do when a technology does not fulfill its function?  We have to fix it.  Senators in Student Government need to be less concerned about their personal resumes and futures and more concerned about what State Student currently want and need.  Student Government attempted to push through Rally 4 Talley and brainwash students into supporting it too.  Students opposed it and now Student Government have come up with all kinds of reasons why.  The truth is that students just do not want to pay more.

The sly actions of Student Government demand action by the students.  Impeach! Impeach! haha!

As many NC State students know, WebAssign, one of the main online homework providers, has been a miserable failure of late.  For me, personally, pages often do not load correctly and sometimes the system is so bogged down, it is impossible to run at all.  For State students already swamped with all kinds of work, WebAssign is an unnecessary frustration.

WebAssign has an opportunity to learn from this, however.  They naively assumed that student traffic would basically stay the same as previous years.  However, as homework has become more and more of an online task, the demand has greatly increased.  We all should never assume that the status quo will be just fine.  We have to expect and anticipate failure, and if we are unable to anticipate it, we must learn from it and not make the same mistakes again.

WebAssign claims that it has "fixed" the problem by adding extra servers during peak hours.  However, for me, the problem has only become slightly better.  If WebAssign is unable to adapt and become better suited to the situation, it will have to be dumped.  You'd better learn from this failure, WebAssign!!

Technician - October 7, 2009 - Article (WebAssign adds new servers to accommodate traffic)

In an ever expanding global economy, companies must adapt and change to survive and succeed.  Xerox has done such a thing recently. 

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/29/technology/companies/29xerox.html?_r=1&hp

"They recognized that to compete in an increasingly competitive global marketplace, companies needed to move up into higher-value services, which are less susceptible than product businesses to being undercut by low-cost manufacturers abroad."

Both companies in this case benefited from this interaction.  Xerox's earnings and stocks are expected to benefit.  A.C.S.  is happy, too.   "Lynn R. Blodgett, A.C.S.’s chief executive, said in the statement that the deal was necessary “to expand globally and differentiate our offerings through technology.”"

Globalization and cooperation are necessary and effective in this case.

http://www.linux-magazine.com/Online/News/IBM-Throws-Out-Microsoft-Office

IBM has made an enormous statement by throwing their support behind Linux for a large portion of their employees.  Microsoft may control the largest portion of software on the market, but that does not mean theirs is the best to choose from.  IBM are definitely practicing what they preach.   Staying with Microsoft might be a safe and easy choice, but what is there to be gained?  One definitely takes a risk by changing paradigms, but the point of shifting is that a better way can often be found.

I personally have never dabbled in Linux, but a movement like this from IBM makes me curious and want to investigate.   Risks like these have to be taken for society to move forward.  The technology is there available for society to use, but society has to choose to use it.  This is a great example of how society affects technology.  Linux may be vastly better than Microsoft, but right now people are mostly comfortable with Microsoft.  Movements like these can affect a change in society and a shift in paradigms.

Right on, IBM.

This is my first blog ever.  haha