Another Reason to Want a Tesla

When someone asks me what my dream car is,  I will almost exclusively tell  them that if I could  have any  car in the world, it would be a Tesla Model  S, but the  new  Model X is catching up on my  list. For people who are not familiar with Tesla, they are a California based automotive company that produces exclusively electric cars. This company’s electric cars blow most other electric cars out of the water. While most other electric cars sport a range of forty to sixty miles per charge, Tesla batteries will take you roughly 200 miles before you need to plug in again. Also, these cars tend to have much more than other electric cars. Tesla’s totally ditch the “hybrid” feel that many electric cars provide. In addition to the electric motor and sports car performance, these cars also provide a luxurious interior and more on board electronics than even the geekiest of drivers would know what to do with.  Well, yesterday, Tesla announced a new feature for the model X.  I know this sounds like a joke, but I promise it isn’t. The new Tesla will have a Bio-Weapon Defense Mode. Yes, you read that correctly.  Allow me to explain.

Tesla's New Model X

In the Tesla Model X, when this new feature is activated, the air filters in the car go into a high power mode where they apparently filter out even the most harmful of particles in the air. Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla and Space X, describes the effect as giving you “hospital quality air”. At the event, they explained that while testing the feature, they were having trouble getting their sensors to detect anything in the air in the car at all, meaning that the feature works EXTREMELY well.

I know bio weapons seem like something that most people need not worry about, but this feature might be very nice to have in cities with air that is less than ideal, or if you are driving behind a garbage truck. I personally, would love to have this is my car. If this is the direction that cars are headed in, which I think it is, I am all for it. Tesla is certainly on the cutting edge of the auto industry, and one can only hope that the technology they use becomes cheaper and more widely available so that more people can drive electric cars. So, if you were on the fence about getting a Tesla, now you should decide to get one because if there is a bio weapon attack, you can rest assured that you will have clean air in your fancy new car as long as you can find power stations to keep it charged up. 

Here is the article 

The Effects and Defects of Virtual Reality

               With video games and movies reaching new levels of immersion with increasing graphics and sensation feedback we are not far from having a world that is true immersion. Virtual Reality how we imagine it as a fantasy will soon become an everyday experience. Of course because we are humans we intend to use Virtual Reality for education and business purposes first then followed by entertainment purposes. What is going to be the real effect of Virtual Reality though? Do we not spend enough hours in front of the computer and TV, playing countless hours of video games? With Virtual Reality that would just increase, like it was not high enough.

The average user spends approximately 7 hours a week playing video games, but we know that it spikes for each user when a title that appeals to them is released. Most users go through this stage where they play when a particular game catches their attention, which is why half of my high school was absent when Black Ops II was release (Shocking). On top of that about 6 hours a day are spent on some sort of tech connected to the internet and about a third of that for social networking. The worst part about this high rate of wasted time is that it is only increasing. So why does it increase? They increase because it becomes; it is convenient, there is so much content, the peer pressure of everyone using it, and because it is so integrated into our culture.

Now if we were to introduce Virtual Reality the rate of use would sky rocket, the science behind Movies and Games is that they transport us to a fantasy world, they are able to introduce us to the imagination of someone else’s mind. At one point that is what books did for us. We have already seen with the invention of Computers that entertainment technology has the ability to completely integrate into our lives, and with that we log so many hours almost every waking moment into them. With a device where you would actually have to log your mind into is no different than not existing (as far as the real world goes versus online chat). We dive into the internet because it is a chance to escape our boring lives and honestly if you could all of a sudden change lives to any fantasy you want why would you not? Again at least it feels like it.

This level of entertainment and entrapment far surpasses the hypnotizing effect of anything we have today. When we use technology today we are to an extent pulled into the experience but limited to what sensations we can feel which is why to some extent we are able to pull away from it. Hours of video games eventually get boring and repetitive, we leave as soon as it’s not exciting, but any real thrill takes much longer for the stimulus to diminish. Would you rather watch someone riding a roller coaster or ride it for yourself, or at least feel like you really are.

Put on the helmet, strap on the goggles, and sign the terms and conditions in order to feel such an experience, at least it’s coming soon to a corporate firm near you. We see what the effect of tech is but how fast can it grow. Since there is profit to be made by whoever can make the best and most immersive experience (The video game industry has about $20 billion in revenue every year), there will be a large amount of competition in order to set the top holding firms and with that comes enhancement, evolvement, advertisement, and affordability. It will be around us everywhere and being pressured on us. At some point we’ll all try it and be hooked on it, and whoever controls the helm controls us, possibly.

Simon Head: The Influence Fredrick Winslow Taylor (Blog/Extra Credit)

 Simon Head considers Fredrick Winslow Taylor to be an extraordinary influence on modern civilization that should be mentioned along with the rest of the minds in history that have shaped the world as we know it.  However, many people have never even heard of Fredrick Winslow Taylor.  I am someone who knew of Fredrick Winslow Taylor and briefly of his work, but I never really grasped the true impact he had and how his ideas are still referenced and in use today. 

Simon Head took us through the “Three Centuries” of Fredrick Winslow Taylor’s life, work, and influence on our world.  Head described Taylor’s work as being part of the “River of Industrialism” from him bringing about his ideas of scientific management, to his ideas influencing the rise of Japanese production methods, to eventually the fusion of scientific management with information technology in today’s world.  Scientific management is a method that has been very influential throughout history as Head explains its use in applications such as the flexible mass production of General Motors, its use in aircraft production, and in Japanese production where it was implemented by companies such as Toyota. 

Through all of this great influence of scientific management and the ideas of Taylor, what was most interesting to me was to hear the actual motives of Taylor and his scientific management was to deskill our work force.  His main intention according to Head was to transform processes and make machinists and labors less skilled to the point where a process could just be memorized and require little to no skill.  The Japanese took these ideas and put them to use in taking the process of micro production and deskilling it entirely.  Simon Head went on to explain how we have ultimately transformed from a manufacturing to a service economy referencing this “Digital Age” we live in where powerful service companies such as Walmart and Amazon are coming about.  An interesting example Head used was his description of Xerox and how they applies scientific management to complex processes and utilized computers in call centers to help customers which in hand deskilled call center workers and managers. 

This idea of workers becoming deskilled is something that I agree with to an extent.  In today’s world everything is becoming computerized and virtualized and individuals are less likely to think for themselves and debate ideas when they have powerful tools such as Google at their fingertips to give them answers to every problem they may face.  Therefore, it is easy to see the bright side and dark sides that came along with scientific management and Fredrick Winslow Taylor’s ideas.  While Taylor and his ideas were widely influential his ideas also resulted in criticism because of the exploitation of workers and the pressures it put on them and managers as well as the fact that Taylor had a strong mechanical approach to ideas to get this done faster and more efficient, but he never considered the human element and looked at humans as machines.

YouTube, The new media giant

               YouTube has changed the way that not only the American people view media, but how the entire world views it. Before YouTube was the giant it is today, in order to indulge in media, you had to watch television or rent movies. Then YouTube was introduced, changing the game entirely. The media scene was transformed from news studios and production companies providing your media, to the creation of an entirely new form of user driven content. With the introduction of video uploading, you were now able to view content that was uploaded from another individual from anywhere on the globe. This change was a major paradigm shift for media as a whole.  This has opened a deluge of new media, from first person accounts of warzones and major events, reviews on games and moves, and also a way to learn without having to purchase books on subject matter.   The limits are endless when it comes to the content that can be uploaded to YouTube. No longer was media hindered to whatever the news studio wanted you to see. A great example of this was the example of the Arab Spring. Since broadcasting from the countries in the Middle East was blocked, individuals took it upon themselves to upload first person accounts of what was going on. This allowed the world to see what was actually going on behind the veil. This also allowed individuals that shared the same beliefs and values to have a means of keeping up to date with the cause.  

                Although YouTube is a great tool for users, companies have moved in on it as well. Advertising is the largest way that YouTube makes a profit. Whether it is advertisements before the video you would like to watch plays, or suggested videos from the advertiser, a quick browse of the website shows a clear influence from advertising. Although this does bring profit to the website, I believe that it is influencing the original goal of the website, to share information to others around the world through video accounts. By bringing video advertisements, you no longer have the pleasure of just enjoying what another individual has posted. In some ways, YouTube has gone the route of the media giants of the past, bringing in tons of commercials to plague the media pieces originally intended to be watched. Although I do think it is a good way for YouTube to make money, I feel that it takes away from the intended goal. At the end of the day, YouTube is a newcomer in the media industry, but is making strides that the giants of the past could only dream of achieving.

Positive View of Drone Surveillance

Drones use an automatic surveillance system which can be applied in indoors places such as large warehouses and factories or outdoors fields like military areas. The real time feedback give all over supervision of a whole area. Sometimes when people see the word "drone" it is related to a killer robot but we could change our mind about it due some positive views of the drones.

Recently drones have been viewed as violating our privacy because it could be used to invading people's privacy, for the paparazzi, for  fun flying toys or even for possible terrorist attack but there are some positive views about drones. Drones can be use for the police to capture possible thieves, kidnapper, or terrorist in order to give a live surveillance also it can be used to rescue survivors from disasters like hurricanes where the human access is not possible.

Last year in North Dakota a cattle rancher was sentence three years in prison for terrorizing the law enforcement officers. The sheriff of the county accepted to use live surveillance since this case drew national attention order to save peoples' lives. At the time the accused told to US News that he felt the use of a drone in the arrest was illegal however the US District Judge remarked the there wasn't improper use of the drone. Drones can be use in disaster zone to have a fast access and find possible survivors. It will save lives in short time and give the exact location of it.

People are starting to change its mind about drones since they could be able to help in crisis situations in the coming years.

Kickstarter Is Re-Starting

The widely known crowdfunding corporation Kickstarter is changing the way that it works. Instead of being a for-profit company, Kickstarter is now a Public Benefit Corporation. Straight from the source, "Until recently, the idea of a for-profit company pursuing social good at the expense of shareholder value had no clear protection under U.S. corporate law." Kickstarter used to be in this ambiguous situation, but now they are not. A PBC is a for-profit company that is legally obligated to keep in mind how their decisions affect society. In this case, Kickstarter can finally do what they set out to do from the start. They are, first and foremost, a company that works to serve artists and creators in the pursuit of their creative dreams.

Kickstarter has joined a small list of companies that are now considered Benefit Corporations, and they hope that this will be a growing trend. Maybe this is what we need, as a society. More companies with the purpose of helping society embedded in their legal being. Instead of putting profit above everything else, it’s important to keep the well-being of society in mind.

Let’s look at some of the goals that Kickstarter has defined in their new charter. This carter is broken up into 5 major categories which are more specifically described in sub-categories. These 5 major goals are as follows:

1.     Kickstarter’s mission is to help bring creative projects to life

2.     Kickstarter’s operations will reflect its values

3.     Kickstarter supports a more creative and equitable world

4.     Kickstarter is committed to  the arts

5.     Kickstarter is committed to fighting inequality

The first mission is very straightforward, but Kickstarter has taken it a step further than this simple statement. They want to try to go beyond this and take part in greater issues that affect the people that they will be giving their service to.

The second mission is more of a pledge than a mission. This reminds me of the Codes of Ethics of ACM or IEEE. This also states that Kickstarter will not sell any user data and defend the privacy of their users. It also states that they will have clear terms of use and that they will not lobby for public policies unless they align with Kickstarter’s values. They pledge not to use any legal loopholes. They also seek to limit environmental impact.

The third mission states that Kickstarter will donate 5% of its after-tax profits to organizations that support the arts.

The fourth mission is like a continuation of the third. It states that Kickstarter will support the arts, especially in less commercial areas. They will also support the creative adventures of their employees.

The fifth and final mission is a just one; stating that Kickstarter will allow employees to provide professional mentorship to underrepresented groups around the world. This is to combat inequality. They also pledge to report on information such as leadership demographics and executive par ratios

They promise to release a benefit statement every year to measure their results, and the first one will be released in February of 2017.

Why Texting and IMing are Ruining English

“I thought so Lol and when your busy we can talk longer BC wer not gonna text as much anymore threw out the day BC im working now”

“Are you there i past out”

“Witch is y you should meet me”

“Maybe ill here from you then”

“Guess your to busy”

“’Getting in the shower can you message me at this thing’ 

‘Intermittently’ 

‘What you mean’ 

‘adjective. stopping or ceasing for a time; alternately ceasing and beginning again: an intermittent pain’”

“I actually stopped someone an talked to him an I realized that he was a bumb an he said hey go into this building it's a soup kitchen an ask this dude an sit down have a cup of coffee so I did an there was a bunch of bumbs an they one of the guys came over an gave me this number an I called it an the dude said definitely he needs worker's an that he'll b calling me at like 5 today an now how have a friend for a bumb as well lmao I sat down an had lunch with him J there pretty cool people when you get to know them”

“Wow she is fucking siko”

    All of the above are texts or instant messages that I have received within the past month or so. If this does not make you stop and think about what the shorthand of instant messaging has done to young  people’s communication skills, then you must be one of the many illiterate young people out there who wouldn’t be able to write a professional sentence to save their life.

    Now, there is an argument for students who know the difference between writing a text or IM and writing a professional email or essay, but most students don’t. This is coming from someone who knows people first hand that think it’s okay to text their boss with gargled nonsense and lack of punctuation. I’ve received texts that are so far off from actual English that I’ve had to read and reread them several times to get a clear understanding of the message.

    I understand that the occasional typo or misuse of a word is forgivable in day to day text conversations, but when someone doesn’t even put forth the effort to try and sound intelligent is when it becomes a problem. We have spell checkers and autocorrect for a reason. Often the reason we use instant messages or texts is because we want the messages to come and go quickly. When you’re typing that fast without thinking, chances are you’re going to hit the wrong keys once in a while. But spell check can’t save you from misusing words like homophones that have their own meanings already. I can’t tell you the countless number of people I know who don’t differentiate between the words “your” and “you’re” or “there,” “their,” and “they’re.” Some people misuse these words so often that they don’t even see the difference anymore! When I see someone use the wrong homophone, my brain automatically stops and realizes the sentence doesn’t make sense, but some people can just read through without even cringing.

    There was a time when my friends and I joined this site where you get to chat with random people in your area. It was incredible how many people showed their terrible grammar within the first few messages. Are you not trying to make a good impression? I just ignored the people who couldn’t construct proper sentences.

    

    Communication is one of the most important skills you can learn. If you don’t know how to build an argument clearly and convincingly on paper, you are not going to be considered a trustworthy source. Given two people, one a very literate, convincing individual, the other a kind-hearted individual with little to no linguistic skill, you are going to side with the more convincing argument. Even if the first guy’s argument was for a bad cause and the other guy’s was for a good one. There is a reason so many bad people come into power or change the opinions of thousands of people. They know how to command an audience. If you don’t know how to make a simple grammatically correct sentence let alone pose an argument, you are going to be discredited almost immediately. You may have good points, but if I can’t read through your paper or article without wanting to shoot myself, then I’m not going to be on your side.

    Now that I’ve ranted about that, back to how texting is ruining our communication skills. There are two main sides to this argument. On one side, students these days are far more illiterate than they were before instant messaging technology existed. Because of the widespread use of texting and whatnot, grammar and spelling have become far less important to us. If we misspell a word or a word autocorrects to something that doesn’t make any sense, it’s easy to just follow-up with another quick text or IM with the correction or clarification. Whereas back then, if you mailed someone a letter but didn’t know how to write, chances are the person on the receiving end would have no idea what you were saying, and they would need to go through much greater lengths for clarification. Not only that, but it makes learning our language tremendously harder for foreigners. I’ve talked with many people from India online who use the number eight to make the ‘ate’ sound when they type to me. Not to mention the many other mistakes they make that seem to originate from talking to other Americans online who do not know how to communicate in their own native language.

    On the other side, some linguists claim that “language is not a static thing…and the changing sounds and phrases of a language are merely reflections of the changes in a particular society.” However, this is not merely a change in phrases or the way we say words. This is a change in what we consider the very basis of a language. We are assigning meanings to words or phrases that do not make any sense. Using “your” instead of “you’re” isn’t a language naturally adapting to societal changes, it’s just simply incorrect grammar. While texting and professional writing are clearly different, I do not believe that fact is clear among many young people. Even if you do know the difference between “through” and “threw,” there is no excuse not to type the correct one in a text or IM. They both take the same amount of effort to type. Schools need to put a larger emphasis on the importance of writing. Not just for the sake of writing persuasive essays and research papers, but just for the basic need for communication. Otherwise the English language—or any language—as we know it is doomed.

Samsung and Oculus announce media streaming capabilities of Gear VR

Samsung announced the Gear VR, a new $99 version of the Oculus Rift virtual reality headset, at Oculus Connect on Thursday. The headset will be available to consumers who own one of Samsung’s flagship phones in November, and at $99, it’s the cheapest version of the headset we’ve seen so far. This is because the Gear VR is designed as an accessory for one’s phone, with a slot that holds it up to the user’s face, rather than a device with its own screen. While that does mean it won’t have as much power to run graphically-intense games, it will also be a far more accessible version of the device than past iterations, opening it up to a much wider market of consumers.

Aesthetically, the Gear VR doesn’t stray far from the looks of previous versions of the Rift. Samsung has added some design-conscious hardware tweaks however, such as depressions for d-pad buttons on the side and a raised bump in the middle for a button. They’ve also replaced the foam pads that sit between a user’s face and the device with softer fabric, and made the head strap lighter.

Oculus also announced some new media partnerships at their Connect conference that extend the usage scope of the device beyond gaming. Netflix, Hulu, Twitch, and more streaming services are available on the Gear VR platform right now, and will be accessible to everyone upon the release of the headset. While Hulu has gone above and beyond to tailor their app to the platform, with promised "original virtual reality short-form" content and "unique viewing environments created for VR devices,” (which will support 2D and 3D programming), Netflix’s offering is a much less robust viewing environment that will have users in a room alongside their friends, watching a virtual TV. It’s still cool, just not as cool.

Oculus' new media partnerships are a clear gambit from the company to be the next go-to destination for average consumers' media streaming needs, as well as gaming. Imagine being able to pop on a VR headset to use with your phone at any time or location, like during your lunch break, while using public transit systems, or in bed. The design of the headset should allow for an immersive experience while gaming or watching TV, independent of the user's external conditions, making it the ideal viewing condition for media streaming far more often than not.

Though the Gear VR has a lot going for it in terms of accessibility and affordability, there are a few caveats that prevent it from being the virtual reality experience of our dreams. It lacks positional tracking, meaning users must remain seated (or standing still, presumably) for the duration of their usage time with the device. Of course, it would be a completely different problem to have people walking around blindly while they use the device, but positional tracking would certainly go a long way in adding to the immersion, if only so people could tilt their head back and not break the Netflix app.

Though the lack of positional tracking is a hindrance for total immersion, we do have to remember that this is Oculus' first attempt at consumer-facing hardware, and it will see improvements over time. This holiday season will mark the first serious effort by Oculus to make a splash in the gaming and entertainment industries, which is why it's good that they have Samsung's marketing and Facebook's capital on their side.

What is the moral implications of seeing the future?

Back track 2 weeks ago.  I'm bored on a Saturday night and decide to Netflix and chill with myself.  I do the usual browse through and finally end up on a movie that looked intriguing.  Time Lapse.  I had never heard of the movie and it sounded like something that interested me.  I am big fan of movies, especially sci-fi, specifically ones about time (I have like 3 clocks tattooed on me please don't judge <3).  Anyways the synopsis on Netflix says: "Three friends conspire to use a mysterious machine that takes a photo 24 hours into the future for personal gain, until dangerous images develop".

So I watched the movie and loved it.  Its not the greatest movie of all time by any means.  However, the concept of seeing one photo 24 hours into the future got me thinking.  There's a lot of morally gray things you could do to help yourself with this type of technology.  Hypothetically speaking you can "promise" yourself to make sure that tomorrow you place the winning lotto numbers in the picture so that present you can go and pick them.  This will insure that you win the lottery the next day and than in order to not mess up the space time continuum you need to place the lotto numbers you won with in the picture afterwards.

Now without getting into a physics lecture about the paradoxes that could happen with looking into the future, lets imagine that there is no harm to the universe's space time continuum no matter what you do with this technology and the only person that knows about this technology is you.  That's the premise of the movie.  Now is it morally acceptable to use it for personal gain?  Are you hurting anyone by improving your life?  Can you help improve the lives of everyone by seeing the future?

I find these questions very enthralling but hard to answer in a way that doesn't make me sound like an asshole.  Maybe I just am?  So basically the problem I have with this technology is that I can make sure I put the lotto tickets into the picture the next day but I cant control the will of other people.  Maybe I have trust issues or maybe I just am confident in my ability to get shit done.  I can tell them that I saw a picture that 9/11 happens and they shouldn't go to work tomorrow or notify the police about it but most people wouldn't believe me.  And then if I bring attention to the machine itself it could potentially cause me or others misfortune by the wrong people finding out.  I kind of don't want to die.  So here is my solution to the morality problem:

So you want to use this technology in a way that benefits all of mankind (the greater good).  Now what if I told you that helping yourself will help the world.  This only applies to you if you WANT to benefit all of mankind.  Now instead of putting a news article of a terrorist attack in the picture, you get yourself filthy rich by winning the lottery.  Many times.  Than you destroy the machine (you will have increased exposure due to winning the lottery and you don't want the machine in the hands of evil).  Now that you have all the money in the world, use that money to gain influence and power in the world.  Than be a good fucking person and help the benefit of mankind by putting that money, influence, power, into good use.  If you want to get things done right, you gotta do it yourself.

The solution does two things: benefit the person using the machine and hope they will use their new found benefits for the good of mankind.  If you were asking yourself if this is morally acceptable or didn't think using it for personal gain was morally okay than you are the type of person who will use their money, influence, and power in a morally acceptable way right? Maybe. Unless the new found power corrupts you absolutely but that's question for another day.

So what do you think?  Let me know in the comments below!

The Mobile Site Takeover

Mobile devices such as smartphones have been taking over the internet, as more and more people are connecting to their favorite websites using their phones rather than their computers. As a result web designers are becoming more responsive to these mobile needs. Websites are creating sites that would be easy to use on a mobile device. For example, rather than having a setup that has multiple columns displayed, companies are opting for a seamless scroll.

These websites are often considering mobile users before they consider their original desktop users. You may have noticed that websites are becoming more simple and clean in design, opting for solid colors and simple shapes. Some desktop sites have become annoyingly interactive. You have probably seen those sites that require you to click through a slideshow to only see one picture and a small caption at a time. Other websites have an interesting looking animation to go through all the content option on their page. Though they look cool and work great on mobile, these pages are aggravating and waste more time when on a desktop or laptop.

On the other hand, you have the straggler websites which never updated their website to mobile, and require the user to scroll in and try to read tiny font or click impossible links while on their phones. These used to be extremely common when people just started to use their mobile devices to use the internet. Nowadays, most websites at LEAST rescale.

This brings up the question: is it better for firms to focus on their mobile site or their desktop site? Especially for smaller sites which cannot afford to spend a large amount of money micromanaging both types of sites. Often one designer is paid to create one site, and the other site comes as second; whether it is mobile or desktop. Larger firms, which spend a lot of money on advertising and customer interests have their websites, both mobile and desktop, micro-managed to produce their intended psychological responses.  However, these are the few market controlling firms.

For most companies determining which to fund, mobile or desktop, is a financial decision. Since most users are turning to more convenient mobile devices, websites are turning to the more economic decision of nurturing the mobile site, and putting the desktop site aside. Companies gain more potential customers by having a perfected mobile site than they lose from the desktop site. It has become a  quick and easy decision to favor the mobile site. The economy often tends to rule company decisions, and the evolution of the web. The preference for mobile sites is no different. As people prefer the mobile site, the desktop will fade, and as a result lose even more support. People will continue to turn to what is expanding and evolving, leaving the old internet behind. That is, until something new comes out that will take over the market, and repeat the endless cycle of consumer and producer; whether it is for the better or worse.

Dangerous Government Spying "Program", or is it?

The sound of computer fans and computations fills the air as computer screens lit up the dark room.  One person is staring at the lines of code flying through the screen, content with the current status of things.  Suddenly one monitor lights up red.  A profile of a person pops onto the screen with his name, confidential information, and an alert that read “Dissenting opinion found! Take action?”.  The man smirks and presses a green “Yes” button located on his armchair and then waits.  Within 5 minutes, a breaking news article appears with yet another victim of a fatal accident, this time by a faulty aerial drone.  The man laughs maniacally as he turned to his White House Staff as he proclaimed, “Too easy. With this, there is no one who can ever stand against us! MWAHAHAHAHAHA!”

                This is the biggest fear of “The Program” designed by the government to spy on the lives of American citizens.  What if corrupt officials got a hold of such a program?  What would stop them from eliminating their political enemies and forever have either democrats or republicans reign supreme?  This could possibly be the most dangerous thing ever created in the world!  You know, besides nuclear warheads capable of erasing cities, silent UAV drones capable of deadly pinpoint strikes, car emissions creating greenhouse gases that will bring about global warning… I believe that there was an unnecessary amount of disdain for “The Program” that is quite frankly hypocritical of many other factors and dangers that exist in this world.

What really are the dangers of a program capable of listening in on your phones and emails?  “They give the government access to our personal conversations so that they can spy on us!” Then again, the government already has our most important information documented such as our Name, DoB, Social Security Number, residency… so what extra information would they actually obtain that will be “dangerous” to normal citizens?  Information on what you ate last Friday? Your rants about your broken relationship?

As far as I can tell, “The Program” would have been a new weapon that our government could utilize to protect its citizens.  It will give them the potential to spot out enemies plotting within American grounds and to stop them before they cause trouble.  It’d be a weapon, just like how street cameras are installed to catch reckless drivers or how our UAV drones are developed to be more efficient in a warzone.  So, if there is a fear the “The Program” will be used to control the American citizens, what about all the other technology in place?  Street cameras already monitor our actual movement throughout cities, especially New York.  Could these not be used to track our everyday actions?  What about drones?  We have seen their effectiveness against ISIS and in an interview in a news article with some citizens that live in those danger zones, they say that they are more afraid of drones than airplanes.  This is because drones can move in silently and drop a payload without anyone noticing.  Could these drones not be a threat to citizens if they were released on American soil?  Moreover, I don’t think I need to explain the dangers of the nuclear weapons that our country owns and the harm they could cause us.

But our government does have these tools and weapons, and that is because we put trust in our government to use these tools and weapons responsibly and for the benefit of our country.  So why should it be any different with “The Program”?  It would be a new tool in the current advancing world of technology to help protect our country from new and unseen threats that could endanger our country.

Spoiler Alert

        2010 was a very different year for technology. On April 19th, Gizmodo published an article about a fully functional iPhone 4, more than 2 months before its official unveiling. They wrote a scathing article siting the phones new industrial design, screen resolution, and unreleased A4 processor. The strangest part of the story was how it was found; left on a bar stool disguised as an iPhone 3GS. Apple had a history for tight security around unreleased hardware, even being refered to as "secret police". That security fell after an iPhone engineer left the phone at a bar. The phone, a few weeks and $5,000 dollars in cash later, Gizmodo had their hands on the phone. Jason Chen, writer of the article, proceeded to take apart the faux case and unveil the new iPhone 4. Not only did this article deflate Apple’s upcoming event, but it also deflated future phone and device announcements.

        Gizmodo’s leak started a new era in tech where leaks are now almost expected. More and more people wait for cellphone pictures from oversea factories or unreleased press pictures rather than the official events. I feel as if the magic of new gadget unveilings is gone. I remember coming home from school and immediately running to my laptop to catch the beginning of WWDC. Now I can just search online weeks before a keynote and expect a clear photo of the new device. I personally don't mind leaks now: it saves me the anticipation of waiting for my favorite devices to come out. Although sometimes I try to stay away from leaks and want to be surprised by the final product but my impatience always gets the better of me. It does draw to light how low security is around unreleased hardware today compared to Apple's "secret police" in the past.

        Even though leaks were present in the past, the Gizmodo leaked started a wildfire of new leaks. As technology advanced and smartphones became exponentially better, so did the leaks as a result. Phone cameras are now surpassing pocket cameras and even rival DSLR cameras. Even as I type this, new rumored new Nexus 5X and 6P are leaking, as fellow Stevens student Marques Brownlee puts it:

2015 Nexus leaks http://t.co/Ib2gqwHPJr

— Marques Brownlee (@MKBHD) September 27, 2015

        

Simon Heard on Frederick Winslow Taylor, and Scientific Management’s Influence on Society (Blog plus Extra Credit)

                In his talk on Frederick Winslow Taylor, Simon Head reviewed the history and development of Taylor’s process of scientific management.  In addition to the history of the technique itself, Head also spoke on its effects on manufacturing and its transition into the age of information technology.  His different points about the effects of scientific management’s implementation exemplify the process of technological determinism, the theory of technology’s profound influence on the developmental direction of society at large.

                According to Head, Taylor’s process further developed into Henry Ford’s automation process, flexible mass production at GM, and into generalized mass production in the civilian economy after the Second World War.  Considering scientific management as a driving technology, it enabled the creation of the consumer culture which dominates our country today.  This culture relies on cheap, mass produced goods which can only be made by increasing efficiency and manufacturing speed far beyond what was possible with methods employed before the implementation of scientific management. In previous models, such as those requiring skilled labor to manufacture goods, the manufacturing process was slow, both to develop and to operate; workers had to be trained to become proficient, and the processes themselves usually involved large volumes of handiwork, with the workers taking time to create individual parts, as in the case of the old style of automobile manufacture before Ford.  Scientific management facilitated the extreme increase in production that enabled the rise of our consumption based societal structure.

                This ramping up of production capability also influenced the course of World War II.  Through unprecedented production efforts, the United States was able to manufacture an endless stream of war material, evinced by FDR’s so called Arsenal of Democracy.  This was accomplished via an application of GM’s flexible mass production methods, based on Taylor’s designs, to transition civilian manufacturing complexes into factories of war.  The US’s manufacturing capabilities were an essential part of the war effort, and no argument needs to be made that the outcome of the Second World War profoundly and permanently influenced the course of history.

Additionally, by migrating workers’ skill from the low level production jobs up to management, scientific management catalyzed a decrease in the influence held by unions, which had been constituted mainly of highly skilled labor capable of leveraging their importance for better working conditions and higher pay.  The deskilling of labor via Taylorism took the power out of the hands of the employees; management could simply hire more unskilled labor to replace any striking workers.  This has also enabled companies to increase employees’ workload; Head gave the example of Amazon warehouse workers being pushed to exhaustion to speed up the shipping process. 

                Head also discussed the effects of Taylorism abroad; by introducing a methodical approach to manufacturing, his approach allowed Japanese companies such as Toyota to perfect methods to manufacture inexpensive, quality goods to sell to the US; in this instance, scientific management effected not only US society, but also worldwide trade politics.  The US’s transition to a service economy has been precipitated by outsourcing overseas to cheap, unskilled labor, and this, arguably, would not be possible without scientific management enabling the manufacture of complex goods by unskilled workers.  In all of the above ways, the technology of scientific management influenced the path which our society is currently following.

Cookies Yummy but Mischievous

This evening I found myself enjoying a lovely batch of chocolate chip cookies when I thought of the other less delicious type of cookie.  That's right, tracking cookies on your computer.  While extremely useful, cookies also do some things that you don't necessarily want.  Cookies are good for auto filling those tedious boxes when logging into websites, as well as keeping you logged in to those same websites because god forbid anyone have to type in order to view their facebook page.  I know I would break down crying if I had to type in my email and password every time I wanted to see a new picture of someone else's lunch with a filter and #blessed.  However, cookies do so much more than just make sure you can't remember your password that one time you need to.  They also keep track of every single website you go on.  Of course it's not just one website that keeps track of all of your online actions, its basically every website that uses cookies to track what you do.  Most of them use your browsing history in order to specify advertisements to you.  For example, if I were to spend an hour looking for Yankee tickets on their website I would most likely see an ad for Stubhub the next time I went online.  While this is all well and good, the government could also use cookies to track your actions as well and the government isn't trying to sell you baseball tickets.  They're looking for people who are terrorists, but at what point does the government stop following every action you make online?  While cookies do save everyone about twenty seconds by not having to log in to websites along with giving us all super relevant ads, there is a downside to all that chewy chocolaty goodness.  Also, speaking of disappointments I was unable to see the super moon this evening due to the insane amount of clouds above Hoboken.

Is Google really not complying with the EU's "right to be forgotten" law?

One of the easiest ways to find out more information about someone is to Google their name and see what comes up; this is a relatively common thing that people do, and even potential employers usually use this tactic to find out more about prospective applicants.  Unfortunately for some, this can bring up all kinds of past information that may be irrelevant now, but because it may have gotten a lot of attention at one point Google still feeds it at the top of the search results.  Obviously, this is not really done with any malicious intent as it is just the result of Google's web crawling algorithm, but it can still be problematic for people who don't want certain things about themselves so readily available to anyone who wants to search for it.  The EU has a law specifically for this situation that grants all EU citizens "the right to be forgotten"; basically, you can have any result taken down upon request if it is "inaccurate, inadequate, irrelevant, or excessive" (which is determined on a case-by-case basis).

This applies to all search engines hosted in and that have data that is hosted within the EU jurisdiction, and France recently requested that Google comply with it and allow users to request results to be taken down.  This wasn't a problem for Google in terms of the European versions of its site; google.co.uk, google.fr, etc all comply with the law and take down the results.  The problem that arises is that users can still easily circumvent the law by using google.com, which is US-based.  France still believes that Google should apply this law to their US-based site, so that this won't be possible.  There really doesn't seem to be any legitimate legal reasoning behind this, however, because the law only applies within EU jurisdiction, and so this boils down to a discussion on censorship.  Google itself used this argument for justifying its appeal to the request to take the content down on google.com, and they aren't completely unjustified in saying so.  It is unfortunate that people can get around the law so easily, but Google is not at fault for this and they did comply for all Google sites within the EU; technically, those are the only sites that the EU has any say on, so Google has done what they needed to do.

Whether or not they should just allow this feature universally anyway, regardless of the law, is an interesting topic though.  I'm sure there are many people who would say that they have at least one search result that they would like to take down for personal reasons.  Of course, one could always argue that taking down these results would be censorship as it could allow people or companies to choose what information people get to see online; this would only really happen if it is not properly enforced on a case-by-case bases.  It may be hard to accurately judge some cases, however, so it might be easier to just keep the results up and not risk letting people take advantage of the system for malicious purposes.  Either way, it is something to consider in a world where it is becoming increasingly harder to keep certain information private.

Do You Know About Frederick Winslow Taylor?

Mark Mirtchouk
I pledge my honor that I have abided by the Stevens Honor System

To my shame I have first learned about Frederick Winslow Taylor only in September of 2015 in my Computers and Society class. After attending the Taylor's World Conference, I have learned so much about this outstanding man! First and foremost, he was one of the most influential people in the field of management. He wrote a book “The Principles of Scientific Management” and his ideas are still valid today.  Back in his time in 1870s, there was no good method for managing workers and he revolutionized the field.

Simon Head, the person leading the conference thought that “if we look at the figures whose ideas and practices have shaped the modern world, we think of Marx, Darwin, Freud, and Einstein, we should add Taylor to this list.” This finding really caught my attention. Who was this Frederick Winslow Taylor that I have truthfully never heard of before last Thursday?

Taylor was a very well-rounded individual.  Aside from his interest in Project Management, he was an inventor with 42 patents, won the equivalent to US Open doubles in tennis, also won 4^th place in the Olympics for golf. He is mostly famous for helping out Gantt who made the Gantt chart that explained the project schedule. He was the founder of the system that made workers in Japan increase their production tenfold. He was fascinated with increasing work efficiency and conducted numerous experiments in various companies to figure out the ideal performance. He was trying to determine the most efficient way to do various job.  He strongly believed that jobs should be given to workers in accordance to their skill and motivation and their progress has to be monitored. Also Taylor suggested that there always should be a dialogue between management and workers to achieve best performance.

At first people in America didn’t believe in his methods, but the people in Japan used them a lot and succeeded. He was focused on the de-skilling of people and de-skilling a hard process into an easier one.  Taylor supposed that if management makes anyone do a task multiple times, eventually the worker will become good at it.  Therefore, management can pay current employees less because there will be more people who wanted the job. Simon Head gave an example of current day retail giants like Amazon and Walmart where the management would time their employees with a stopwatch creating a lot of stress. Eventually everyone got worn out because the stress was too great, but then the management would just hire new workers to replace the ones that were not performing well. Using Taylor’s methods, Xerox wanted to implement help desk call centers where the person having a problem with any Xerox product would talk to a call center specialist. Those “specialists” would listen to the complaint and look up the problem using keywords in their computer database with the most common causes of failure. This method did not work so well. Later in the talk Simon Head communicated how the average German car manufacture has to pay their labor double what the pay in the US because the US used de-skilling and exporting jobs to Mexico while the German cars are so complex that they only highly qualified workers can perform the tasks.

In conclusion I would like to point out that although Taylor had interesting ideas about studying a workplace, we have to take his ideas with a grain of salt.

Aeroscraft

Zeppelins died out for the most part after the Hindenburg disaster.  But there is a company that wants to bring them back.  Aeros is a company who wants to use helium to bring airships back to reality.  The company wants to allow transportation of cargo too hard to reach places and locations without airstrips for planes to land on.  The company has finished their designs of the airship and plans to start production of the full size airship.  The airship will be called the Aeroscraft and will have a larger payload bays than other cargo transport form and is designed to carry more weight than cargo helicopters.  The airship will be able to hover in place with zero speed while fully loaded.  The Aeroscraft is designed to have six vertical jet turbines to assist takeoff and landing eliminating the need for external ballasts or other external assistance for taking off and landing.  

The first Aeroscraft prototype (1/2 scale) was ready to be tested when the hangar it was being built in collapsed and severely damaged the airship.  This was a huge blow to the company as they had spent upwards of $50 million on the project.   The company now is in the process of building two full scale Aeroscrafts. 

Using airships in the future could greatly improve the ability to get supplies to areas that are hard to get to. With the use of airships many things could be better from scientific research to helping get medical supplies to disaster zones.  Because the airships do not require airstrips to land they would be able to bring scientific supplies to much more remote locations so that scientists could explore more extreme parts of the world such as the North Pole or different parts of Antarctica.  For the same reason the airships would allow emergency supplies to be delivered to places that would be inaccessible otherwise.   Countless lives could be saved by using this technology to our advantage.

Despite the fact that the Aeroscraft is beneficial it does have its shortcomings.  It will most likely be much slower than airplanes and would probably take some time to get to the location that it was needed in.  It could easaily be more expensive due to having six vertical jet turbine engines and because of its massive size.  These downfalls take away from the benefits it provides and but the idea definitely still has potential.

In the end the Aeroscraft definitely is a very interesting idea to use for certain things.  Because the concept has not been used before there is definitely going to need to be improvements made in order for the airship to reach its full potential.  The speed is something that can be worked around but the expense is something that definitely needs to be worked on, and like most new technologies the price usually decrease as time goes on.  All in all Aeros airship is a very large move forward as it could allow new places to be explored and new ways of helping people in need.