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Freewrite blog

Is Iran the next Iraq?

Why is it that Americans can’t see what’s in front of our noses, why must we wait until we are involved in yet another inexcusable war, and have killed thousand while we have sustained thousands of dead soldiers. I just find it amazing how we continue to be dormant for the most part, I wonder what would happened if president Bush decided tomorrow to invade Iran. Would anyone try to do anything, would we go to the streets to protest in masses? This I feel is what is going to happen; Bush will once again order the invasion of another country and later claim that he did it on “faulty intelligence.”

Doesn’t this sound familiar; middle eastern country, WMD’s, Axis of evil, Tyrannical dictator, oppressed people, threats to world peace, ballistic missiles which can reach Europe, and many other things. You might think I am just talking about the rhetoric before the Iraq invasion, which turned out to be false. However if you play the minimal attention to the right-wing media, this is what is being said about Iran.

Does multinational profit margins increasing, seem as a more viable excuse for the invasion of these oil rich countries. If Bush claims to be concerned with human rights, oppressive governments, welfare of the people, and other things he has mentioned when making his case for Iraq, why doesn’t he try to justify invasions of African countries where these issues occur on a day to day basis.

Hopefully the future will hold the key to us being able to speak out against the actions of our governments. Maybe the blogosphere will be the source which allows us in the future keep a truly short leash on government. Or am I just being delirious.

Freewrite blog

Is Iran the next Iraq?

Why is it that Americans can’t see what’s in front of our noses, why must we wait until we are involved in yet another inexcusable war, and have killed thousand while we have sustained thousands of dead soldiers. I just find it amazing how we continue to be dormant for the most part, I wonder what would happened if president Bush decided tomorrow to invade Iran. Would anyone try to do anything, would we go to the streets to protest in masses? This I feel is what is going to happen; Bush will once again order the invasion of another country and later claim that he did it on “faulty intelligence.”

Doesn’t this sound familiar; middle eastern country, WMD’s, Axis of evil, Tyrannical dictator, oppressed people, threats to world peace, ballistic missiles which can reach Europe, and many other things. You might think I am just talking about the rhetoric before the Iraq invasion, which turned out to be false. However if you play the minimal attention to the right-wing media, this is what is being said about Iran.

Does multinational profit margins increasing, seem as a more viable excuse for the invasion of these oil rich countries. If Bush claims to be concerned with human rights, oppressive governments, welfare of the people, and other things he has mentioned when making his case for Iraq, why doesn’t he try to justify invasions of African countries where these issues occur on a day to day basis.

Hopefully the future will hold the key to us being able to speak out against the actions of our governments. Maybe the blogosphere will be the source which allows us in the future keep a truly short leash on government. Or am I just being delirious.

Blog 4-27

                                  The InternetRevolution

How the internet might bring us a new world.

 

The internet has changed our world, it has changed our lives in every way, I personally think that if we were to wake up tomorrow and the internet was not there; the world would freeze at least for some time. The internet has become an integral part of our ‘developed’ world; it is constantly interacting with our daily lives from something as simple as making grocery purchases to pumping gas.

 

The blogosphere, which was brought to us and made possible by the internet is just one o the many tools which the internet provides to make our lives easier and also makes our world a smaller one by allowing us the ability to communicate immediately. Everyday the internet keeps getting better and better, I remember the days when I still had to wait for my old phone modem to connect to the internet which took ages comparing it to now. Now I have my ‘phone’ connected through the internet, through a service called Vonage and the cost of that is considerably less than what it used to cost.

 

Our world has just gotten smaller and faster, globalization and world wide integration is becoming everyday more and more likely or better said, possible.

 

For the future I envision a world which is smaller due to the ease of communication thanks to the internet and other sources of communication, technology and even more importantly, information will reach to the furthest corners of the earth and we will all truly become, One World. In the even more distant future, if we don’t destroy ourselves right now, I foresee a world with no wars. This I think can be achieved because we will have instant access to video depicting the cruelty of war and the public will be able to pull in the rein on their respective governments.

 

Some might say that I am being unrealistic, and I will be the first one to back that counter claim, but its good to dream of a peaceful world. However, I must clarify what it is that I am saying, or what I mean when I say that communication will bring us peace. Let me talk about the war that some have called the first televised war, the Vietnam War. It is believed by many in the political science that public opinion against the war was achieved because of television images arriving from
Vietnam which depicted the true nature of war, it brought a message; War is not romantic like most thought. This same thing will happened with the spread of technology which promotes immediacy like is the internet. I am not saying that it will be a perfect world, but at least a little bit better.

 

Prior to the use of color, and live images from areas of conflict, many countries took advantage and went all over the world causing havoc without their citizens knowing exactly what was going on. The people didn’t know exactly what the reason was for their country to invade another, I am not saying that has changed now, or at least to a great extent, but if people are able to see the reality of war in a more graphic way, they will be more driven to ask their government why.

 

I believe that if Mr. Chavez was doing what he is doing right now only 50 years ago, the
US would have already invaded claiming that
Venezuela was a threat to the
US. But because we have immediate access to information, we can determine or at least the better part of the
US population that the claims being made by the government are lies.

Hopefully the internet will be put to good use although I must admit, it does have its downsides and it is not perfect. But I think we should keep a positive attitude and continue looking to making the future a better one for all of us and generations to come, enjoy.  

Paper 4 Draft

Privacy and new media 

New media holds privacy in limbo, it is not completely private but yet not completely public, new media will give people more room to express themselves while at the same time keeping a certain sense of privacy.

Blog april 20

Our Language is Neologisms

How our language will continue to expand cause of technology

                                                             

Language, like life is not static, languages all over the world have evolved in order to accommodate for new things which need naming. Humans had to come up with new words every time they discovered something new, this is what got us the languages we use today. Human creativity has made us the civilization we are today, the same civilization which has gone to the moon. Language is just another part of our resourcefulness.

The arrival of the personal computer opened us to a whole new world of words, words we need and have created to describe new technology. We got words like CPU(Central Processing Unit), RAM (Random Access Memory), Internet (International Network), FTP (File Transfer Protocol), and many others. The constant development of these new words is essential to our language.

We will continue to see new words for a long time to come, just go online to a forum, ‘chatroom’, or even a videogame with multiple players; new words are being invented as we ‘speak’. I’ve found ROFL (Rolling On Floor Laughing), JK (Just Kidding), WTF (What The F**K), and many others all new due to the internet and new media in general.

New words have up to now and will continue to be necessary for new technology especially since technology is constantly being perfected. In today’s world technology becomes obsolete the day after you buy it. What is a cheap laptop today, could have been a super-room sized computer ten or fifteen years ago. With the use of evermore efficient technology we don’t know what tomorrow will bring.

Our ability to come up with new words to describe new things is and will be beneficial, our flexibility to accept them and use them, essential.   

april 13 blog

 

 

Survival of the Fittest

Only copy and paste will survive

 

Blogs’ ability to change will strengthen their possibilities to survive for years to come, even after the author is gone. I have always been a strong believer that everything humans do in life is aimed at attaining immortality, not living forever but to be remembered. Writing something on a medium which by its nature is able to adapt to changing technology will guarantee this.

 

Because blogs consist of text, text which can be easily transformed from one form to another meaning flexibility they will be with us for a very long time. Even with the fast paced development of software (thanks to Mr. Gates)  things like blogs will always be able to adapt, they are just text in most cases. The internet will always be there, the internet will outlive all of us. The internet not having a central base but rather existing in the infirnity of cyberspace is not something that can be shutdown (although Mr. Bush would like to) it doesn’t have an on/off switch.

 

If someone wanted to leave their ideas written down for future generations to read long after he/she is gone can do it very easily. He/she can just create a personal website or blog write what ever he/she wanted to write about, especially in blog’s because they are free and just leave it there without having to look back at it or think twice about it.

 

I would recommend to anyone who wants to write their ideas for others to read, to do it on a personal blog. As I said, they are free, don’t expire, and require no maintenance.  

 

 

april 6 blog

i lost my flash drive!

technology and me or should i say US!

 

i lost my flash drive and i felt my life was over, i didn’t just lose an electrical device i lost my whole collegiate work. everything was in that thing, research papers, essays, pictures, and even some songs. i was shocked when i started thinking about how vulnerable i was to technology. i mean, its not just some documents, it documents that can decide my future, papers i had to turn in like one for this class.

 

is this the future, a future in which we are so vulnerable to technology that it is going to control our lives. i was thinking, what is that flash drive had a paper i only had saved on that particular device, what would have happened if i had not backed up data on another device like i had. thankfully i always backup my data when ever i get the chance.

 

the reason i started thinking about this is because i didn’t have the data available right away, i had to call my brother at home to email me my data. but for a couple minutes i had nothing, no papers, no essays, no photos…nothing. i miss my flash drive.

 

it is amazing however how little attention i give to technology, nowadays, but it really controls our lives. we NEED cell phones, computers, mp3 players, and other devices which simplify our lives. i couldn’t imagine life without technology, i cant walk out of my house with out my cell and my laptop is a handy companion.   

Paper 3 Final

Jose L. VazquezO. Quimby Melton

English 206

March 23, 2006

Hard Time for a Song

File sharing, according to the RIAA (Recording Industry Association of
America), has had devastating consequences to CD sales and they compare it to a crime such as stealing a car or another more serious felony. However, research clearly indicates that although the trading of music through the internet or other means has proliferated, CD sales continue to be high. Research conducted by
Harvard
University and the

University of
North Carolina indicates that file sharing has minimal to no affect on CD sales. Furthermore, the slowdown of sales in CD’s that the RIAA claims, may be attributed to the lack of spending during the recession and the increase competition from other sources of entertainment like are DVD’s and videogames of which sales have grown during the same timeframe in which CD sales slumped, according to an article by John Borland on Cnetnews.com.

The claim by Harvard and
North Carolina universities can be easily corroborated. The economy has a lot to do with CD sales. According to information provided on the RIAA website, CD sales saw a downturn between 2001 and 2003 the years recession hit the
US economy. The same information indicates growth in CD sales in 2004. According to the chart; CD sales in 2001 went down -6.4%, in 2002 -8.9%, and in 2003 -7.1%. The same chart clearly indicates a growth in sales of 2.8% in 2004. Another chart on the same website clearly shows continued growth in CD sales for 2005. This information can be easily accessible to anyone at the IRAA website.

In a recent CBSnews video report by reporter Vince Gonzalez, the RIAA wants to portray file sharing as a crime equal to stealing a car. This I find hard to believe, you can’t make the claim that stealing a car which can dramatically affect a person’s life be the same as sharing a song, having your car stolen can lead to severe consequences like losing your job for not being to work on time amongst many others. According to the report, there has been a recent court order by a federal judge ordering an internet service provider this time being Verizon, to turn over information on any customer who is said to be sharing pirated material, Verizon says they will appeal. File sharing might help CD sales say some people, I agree, people want to hear music before they buy it.

According to information provided also by the RIAA website, “perhaps the most [affected are], the creative artists…Musicians, singers, songwriters, and producers don’t get the royalties and fee’s they’ve earned.” The internet however has also benefited the recording industry, including the artists. A recent article on Clicks.com, and online marketing solutions firm, claims that digital music sales will be high. According to their research, the European online music market was expected to “quadruple” from $13.17 million at the end of 2003 to $57.5 million the year after; and eventually go up to “$1.03” billion by 2009 in
Europe alone. In the
US the 2004 figures were expected to be at $270 million by the end of the year, and eventually reach $1.7 billion by 2009. CD sales are, of course predicted to remain the top medium of choice in both the US and
Europe.

Another factor that can be claimed to affect CD sales is MP3 player sales and the portability of these devices; do you remember when you were walking around carrying that bulky personal CD player, wasn’t that annoying? Well do you see that now? Of course not, according to and article on twice.com by Joseph Palencher, data from Consumer Electronics Association says that; MP3 sales in 2005 reached the all time high of close to $5 billion dollars compared to just over a billion sold in 2004 and even less in previous years (see table below). These portable MP3 player devices obviously do not need CDs to function, this is what has kept the sale of online music sales up and will eventually continue to do so.

MP3 Players
Units	24,811,852		7,126,182	248%
Dollar value	$4,228,554,530	$1,288,557,324		228%

 

Eric S. Boorstin claims in his thesis that other factors which affected CD sales during this time are; Album prices, the RIAA claims that CD sales are hurting because prices are too high, because of file sharing this Boorstin claims is false, the RIAA is basing its argument on “nominal instead of real prices” (p. 22). Real prices according to him have remained nearly constant over the last several years. So far to a certain extent we have clarified and discredited the claim that CD sales are hurt by file sharing. This is a complete falsehood and being utilized by the IRAA as a marketing tool, they want to make the consumer feel bad for  them in order for CD sales to soar.

Furthermore, according to oberholzer and Strumpf file sharing allows people to; learn about music they would not have been exposed to and chat rooms permit people to discuss new music which can in turn create more music sales. They also claim that P2P traded material being in many times so low quality leads consumers to purchase the music they listen to first for free online. I agree with this, the internet has served as a great tool for new artists to get recognition for their work. For many artists the internet and file sharing programs provide them the opportunity they would not have had. It gives them a world wide audience; amongst that audience, recording industry scouts may be found. The RIAA also claims that the artist is severely affected by the trading of music, as I have said earlier this is not true. As a matter of fact, evidence clearly points to the artist not being affected. Artists in many cases do not make the royalties they are supposed to make from their album sales. Many times, this money is kept by the record company who owns the work of the artist.

As stated before, the RIAA is over exaggerating when it claims that the trading of music online should be considered a crime like stealing a car or another form of crime. Information points to the artist in many cases being benefited by this. The internet as a whole is a beneficial tool for any new artist, it opened a whole new world to these people and some of the services available online which streamline the process of putting out an artists work financially benefits the artist directly, instead of the greedy music industry executives. Many services which can be found online offer users the possibility of promoting, selling, and distribution thief music online for a low fee, or at least lower than what the recording labels charge. A Google search for “Online music distribution” returns over 66 million hits.

Online music distribution is the thing of the future and will only serve to benefit the artist and the consumer.   

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Works Cited

Borland, John. “Music Sharing doesn’t kill CD sales, Study says” CNET News.com. March 2006. March 23, 2006. < http://news.com.com/2100-1027_3-5181562.html>.

Gonzalez, Vince. “Music Piracy vs. Record Labels.” CBSnews.com. April 3, 2006. < http://www.cbsnews.com/sections/i_video/yahooVideo_frameset.html>

Greenspan, Robyn. “Online Music Sales to Cresco.” Clicks.com. October 1, 2004. April 5, 2006. < http://www.clickz.com/stats/sectors/retailing/print.php/3416221>

Palenchar, Joseph. “Portable Audio Sales Top Home Units.’ Twice.com. March 27, 2006. April 3, 2006 < http://www.twice.com/article/CA6319031.html>

RIAA. “2004 Yearend Statistics.” 2004. March 24, 2006 <http://www.riaa.com/news/newsletter/pdf/2004yearEndStats.pdf>

RIAA. “Anti-piracy.” RIAA website. April 3, 2006. < http://www.riaa.com/issues/piracy/default.asp>

Boorstin, Eric S. “Music Sales in the Age of File Sharing.” Diss. Princeton U, < http://www.cs.princeton.edu/~felten/boorstin-thesis.pdf>

Oberholzer-gee, Felix and Koleman Strumpf. “The effect of file sharing on Record Sales, An Empirical analysis.”

Missouri
U. June 2005. April 4, 2006. < http://economics.missouri.edu/Seminars/PDF/strumpf.pdf>

Code Poetry and its Future

Code poetry is definitely a change from what I would consider traditional forms of poetry. Most if not all of the sites provided user interaction capabilities. The use of technology for poetry is something I am new to. It is however interesting how some people have managed to express themselves through an electronic source.  

Code poetry incorporates several means of expression like; Voice, Visual, and writing. Some incorporate all of them One I noticed relies heavily on speech to promote its message, this one is A Is Fro Apple, it is an attempt at deciphering hidden messages on songs and other forms of art; it presents it in an artistic way. Many of these I even found to be relaxing, they have musical themes on the background (when it’s not completely a musical poem) which are relaxing. The use of visual aid by many is really interesting; it keeps me guessing on what is coming up next.  

Another one, or the first one I saw seems to be never ending it presents a textual poem with words in the poem which are linked to another part of the poem. This one I mentioned can be found at: http://www.uiowa.edu/%7Eiareview/tirweb/hypermedia/robert_kendall/frame.htm    

Some are so interactive; I see them more like videogames to a certain extent one of them can be found here:  http://www.dreamingmethods.com/waste/. This one has some great visual and interactive effects. It looks a lot like something that can be found in some of today’s horror movies. The sound is also great. I didn’t get it, but still think it is great, check out the building and try to guess the code; if you do it let me know what happens.  

I think that this new form of poetry is the way of the future, in a world where people get bored reading a book this will be a great alternative for artists who want to promote their work. And once more the cost-effectiveness of using the internet and personal websites will make the process easier and quicker.