Friday, April 26, 2024

Diffusions of Innovation: The Electric Car

 The invention of electric cars was huge for the world.  For decades all people knew was gas powered cars.  With the invention of electric cars, it saved many people money and claimed it was better for the environment.  There are several reasons why electric cars caught on.  Electric cars have multiple advantages over gas cars. They have lower operating costs due to electricity being cheaper than gas, they are better for the environment, and they have a better speed advance.  Electric cars also have technology built into them which could be a big plus for some people.  Since the release of electric cars, the amount seen of them being bought and on the road has drastically increased.  Distributors have made more models that could be seen on the road.  Company launches from companies like Tesla, placing more charging stations across the world is also very huge. As more people see electric cars coming up in the car world, the more positive view of them becomes aware.  This could be highly encouraging to people further adopting them. 

 Early adopters of the electric car were often mainly buyers who were conscious and aware of the environment.  Another early adopter of the electric car were people who are in touch with technology.  The other group of early adopters were those with higher incomes who could afford the cost of electric vehicles when they first came out. Overtime, as the technology of the vehicles improved and costs decreased, more models were made at a cheaper cost that were ava

ilable to the public, as well as the number of charging stations grew and expanded, making electric cars more appealing to buy in the early group of people.


Late adopters might still be waiting for more improvements of the vehicle, as well as lower prices, or more charging places. Though there is a possibility that many people may not adopt electric cars at all.  This is due to a long traditional mindset for gas powered vehicles.   It could also be because they live in areas where electric cars are not as popular causing there to be less charging stations and demand.  

The evolution of the electric has helped the government.  It has helped cost efficient things that the government handles.  In terms of negative consequences, the production of electric cars could be quite detrimental due to the electricity used to charge them.   

Overall, electric cars have spread due to their advantages and compatibility with the modern world and time.  


Thursday, April 25, 2024

Final Post

 I don't have a huge online footprint, or a personal website but I'm on social media.  For most of my day I probably spend it on these apps when I'm on my phone.  I use apps and platforms like TikTok, Instagram, and Snapchat.  On TikTok I post videos of me or me and my friends hanging out and just posting funny videos.  On Instagram I post pictures of what I'm doing in life and of me and my friends.  On Snapchat I post mainly what I'm doing during the day there.  I also use Snapchat to communicate with my friends.  A visitor could probably assume I love the beach, and that I travel a lot.  They could also assume I love hanging out with my friends.  I’ve given out my email and phone number to these apps and that was to just sign up.  I wish that there were apps being used like Myspace and Vine.  My older brother and cousins grew up on those and I hope they make a comeback.  I don't think social media makes people directly depressed or isolated unless the®re is a circumstance.  Social media is about expressing yourself and being who you are.  

The Videos portray a modern day picture of technology used, however the videos should not be taken as literally due to the relevance of technology in the modern era.  The role of technology is important due to everything including education and jobs to provide us with easy to access information and applications.  

AI has played a major role since the start of Covid-19 and has caused schools to implement their own AI detection systems.  However there are many practical uses for AI as it can be much more efficient than Google.  Some of these practices can include resume building, quick information, and assisted essay writing like grammar checks.  Although some may view AI to be harmful there are many useful ways for AI to be used.  


Sunday, April 21, 2024

the progressive era

 “Why do you think you have to seek out obscure websites in order to hear strong antiwar voices?” It is kind of an interesting question that I would like to unpack. Well why do I think we have to seek this out? If I'm being honest I sat here and I tried to think of a normal explanation and for a while I couldn’t, then it hit me.  The answer is censorship.  We all know Google, and we also know how easy it is to find information.  However, it is also extremely easy to censor information on Google.  Schools, Places of work, organizations, and even families can censor  what they want people to look at.  The reality of it is that as easy as it is to find information it's just as easy to hide information.  

I would like to delve deeper into an example of censorship that I’ve seen with Google.  In high school, the students in my school found a video of Pete Davidson talking badly about our high school principal.  Coincidently, Pete Davidson went to my high school and during the time he attended my alma mater, there was a huge controversy that our principal, who is a priest, was doing illegal things that go against the Archdiocese’s rules and values.  The video spread like wildfire around the school and just as fast as everyone found it and heard about it, it was blocked by the school even faster.  My high school was technology based and used Ipads for everything.  The school censored the video through the school wifi network so no one could see it.  The school couldn’t do anything about seeing it at home but the administration went the extra mile to block it from students while they were at school.  I remember one of my teachers explaining that it is extremely easy for the school to censor and monitor what we look up.  Even certain words like (kill, death, guns, porn, slurs, curse words, teachers names, and anything that is negative) could be flagged, meaning the media department at my high school would get a notification and the student would get called to the office.  Though to the students, we may have not understood how easy it was to censor, after four years we started to understand and found ways around it.  We started using hotspots, instead of Google we used websites like DuckDuckGo and Yandex. So yes, there are ways

around censorship and connecting it back to Anti-War we can find information that isn’t censored. 

 

Many social media platforms often have to balance out their content with broader audiences.  Along with these audiences expectations and preferences. Also private companies can choose what content they want to put out and show.  This is because they are not bound by the First Amendment laws. If something about Antiwar is seen as controversial or not in line with social media or apps policies or terms, it might get hidden by the platform causing viewers to not likely see it. That's why those voices might be seen more on alternative sites.


EOTO Terms and Concepts DeepFake



The History of Deep Fakes all started in the 1990’s. Though many think that AI (Artificial Intelligence) is a new thing, after some research I found that it started as early as the 1990’s. The original purpose for Deep Fakes was to use AI for image processing. Eventually, Deep Fakes started being recognized by 2010. The creation of Deep Fakes was credited to a man named Ian Goodfellow in 2014. Ian was a Ph.D. student at the University of Montréal during his prime as a Deep Fake creator. Currently, Ian is a research scientist at a highly prestigious company in an AI research lab run by Google. Deep Fakes are not only fake images but can also affect audio by using people's voices. Once Deep Fakes started to be recognized, this caused concern amongst social media users, and their parents. Though it was originally planned to be used for jokes, pranks, and parodies, the use of Deep Fakes grew and it started to get out of hand. With scammers starting to pick up the ability to Deep Fake, it caused concern and the fun and playful original use of Deep Fakes lost its purpose. Instead of the humor and fun Deep Fakes used to give, they turned dark and malicious. “The creation of deepfakes is rooted in deep learning, a subset of AI that mimics the neural networks of the human brain. By ingesting vast amounts of data – images, video clips, or voice recordings – these algorithms learn to recreate and alter human likenesses with startling accuracy. This technology has progressed rapidly, thanks to advancements in AI and the increasing availability of data and computational power.” (“Rise of DeepFake Technology”) Deep Fakes spread incorrect information and are still around due to how extreme social media has grown.
8 steps to verify Deep Fake videos | by Konrad Weber | Medium
The Impact of Deep Fakes is highly important but also highly negative. Though their original value was to be positive and funny, through the years it has deteriorated to something far worse. Deep Fakes have highly impacted our privacy. Where one thinks that their personal livelihood is safe, Deep fakes breach one’s privacy. They could do this by faking photos or audio of a person and get them into a bad situation. These bad situations can affect a person's career, reputation, and family. “This form of digital violation not only invades privacy but also has the potential to cause severe emotional distress and reputational damage. Victims of such deep fakes often find themselves powerless, their images manipulated and shared across the internet.” (“Rise of DeepFake Technology”) Another way Deep Fakes highly impact people is by using it for scams. Many scammers will use Deep Fake phone calls to scam families. They will do this by using family members' voices or hacking social media to get photos and edit them as if the family member was in an accident. They request money and many scared families send them money and end up scammed. Deep Fakes impact society very negatively and have strayed from the original fun purpose of them. What could have been a fun thing turned bad overtime.

Take action on deepfakes: MeitY sends advisory to social media firms

Works Cited

Crisara, Matt. “How to Spot Deepfakes: AI-Generated Media, Explained.” Popular Mechanics, 8 December 2023, https://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/security/a45920918/what-are-deepfakes/. Accessed 22 April 2024.

“Rise of DeepFake Technology.” Legamart, https://legamart.com/articles/deepfake-technology/. Accessed 21 April 2024.

week 3 Privacy

 How Private is everything in your life?  A question that I would like to start this blog post with.  Many people think that their information and personal needs are kept private online unless they speak about it, but that is far from the truth.  The reality of it is that none of our personal information is protected.  When you buy an app or sign up for something, there is a legal binding contract that we usually have to agree to called Term’s and Services or policies/agreements.  It is that long list that no one actually reads.  However in that long list, it states many things about how the app owns the majority of the stuff we post or write. Legally meaning that what we do is not private.  

  These issues affect me and my friends and family greatly.  It is scary to know that many of them aren’t aware of the invasion of privacy or what is stated in the Terms and Agreements.  I have elderly grandparents who don’t understand certain aspects of social media, or even technology itself.  Being in this class has opened my eyes to all of this craziness and is going to help me when I explain these things to my friends and family.  

The government should be speaking out about these binding agreements and making people aware of what they are getting themselves into.  It is the government's job to be making everyone aware and making them feel safe about their privacy.  When it comes to one's private information, the individual should be respected and so should their thoughts and property.

  

There is not much we can do to stop this from going on.  Unfortunately, the government has been using contracts like this for years and it would be very hard to just revoke them.  The only way that we could possibly put a stop to this, is if we stop using these apps and forms of media.  


EOTO technology-what i learned

 All of the EOTO presentations were great, but one that stuck out to me was Grace Ann’s.  Her EOTO was based on the motion picture.  The motion picture is one of the biggest things in the world today.  It is not only television, but movies, shows, blogs, commercials, and so many other things that are important in the world today.  Without the motion picture, we wouldn't have live news.  Grace Ann went deeply into how it was invented, the inventors, how motion pictures developed over time, and the impact of it.  


Thursday, April 11, 2024

EOTO; Week 3 The History of the Pencil!!

     The History of the pencil is quite interesting.  According to Pencils.com, it all started in England in 1564.  Graphite was wrapped in string and that was the first Graphite pencil.  We all know pencils started being made with lead and that caused many people to get poisoned and die.  Interestingly enough, in some countries they continued to use lead up until the 20th century.  “But, you certainly wouldn't want to suck on a "lead" pencil if it really had lead in it. In fact, lead pencils became extinct only in the early 20th century.”  (Kruszelnicki, 2004)  The history of the pencil stems from there.  Later, the graphite was inserted into hollowed-out wooden sticks without paint and that was where pencils began.  Pencils were first mass produced in Nuremberg, Germany in 1662.  During the war, settlers from England relied on the pencil, until England cut them off.  In the United States, Concord, Massachusetts, a man named William Monroe was credited for making the first wood pencil in America in 1812.  The first pencil factory in the United States which is still around today is the Joseph Dixon Crucible Company, now known as Dixon Ticonderoga. 

    As we entered the 19th century many other pencil companies came about and it's all been history since then.  The top state contributors being New York and New Jersey, with several companies and factories like Faber-Castell, Eberhard Faber, Eagle Pencil Company (later Berol) and General Pencil Company.  The first pencil’s that were mass produced didn't look like the yellow pencil we know today.  They were actually just wood casings.  “Yet the pencil need be no cliché” (Petroski, n.d.) In the 1890’s that is when factories and producers started to add color coatings to the pencil and that is the yellow pencil we know today.  “While a lump of lead or charcoal could certainly be serviceable as a primitive pencil, it could also be easily criticized.” (Petroski, n.d.)  This quote shows how pencils improved upon a flaw that writing tools at the time failed to meet. 

    
    
        The Pencil has impacted society greatly, and positively. It has provided people with a way to write, communicate, and a way to express themselves.  The pencil is not only just for writing, it is one of the most used instruments in art and design.  Using the pencil with art and design, an artist can draw, sketch, trace, shade, etc.   The pencil has also impacted our youth by it being one of the first writing tools introduced in adolescence.  In my opinion the history of the pencil is not only interesting but is an extremely important addition to the writing tools we have today.  It is not only an essential writing tool but one of the first tools that were introduced to humanity.  The pencil allows an individual to make mistakes and be able to fix it, that is why it is one of the most marketed and popular writing tools on the market for multiple centuries.  All in All, the pencil is an essential writing tool and should be recognized for its success.   



References

Funk, T. (n.d.). Wikipedia. Retrieved March 27, 2024, from https://flowvella.com/s/16lh/8A55A061-BF62-4D9B-B9F4-0F9DA5FD3DD0

The History of the Pencil – Pencils.com. (n.d.). Pencils.com. Retrieved March 26, 2024, from https://pencils.com/pages/the-history-of-the-pencil

Kruszelnicki, K. S. (2004, September 9). Lead in Your Pencil › News in Science. ABC. Retrieved March 27, 2024, from https://www.abc.net.au/science/articles/2004/09/09/1195234.htm

Petroski, H. (n.d.). The Pencil: A History of Design and Circumstance. Wikipedia. Retrieved March 26, 2024, from https://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=GZ1CuD619GwC&oi=fnd&pg=PR9&dq=pencil+and+history&ots=_nAABeObmt&sig=GOfQYcL-w-AaB5sML3CCcCFyfQM#v=onepage&q=pencil%20and%20history&f=false