Final Post

     When I think about my relationship with technology, I mostly think about on how it started for me at a young age. I was born in an age where technology was slowly blooming. There were televisions and cellphones and radios, but they were not nearly as advanced as they are today. The iPhone was not a product that existed, social media was not even heard of, and the only thing I knew about television was that it had fun things for me to watch and learn from. My relationship with technology started to really expand when my dad brought home the Nintendo Wii from a business trip. I fell in love instantly and started playing it all the time. I will admit I did not have the healthiest relationship with technology as I was very obsessed with it and it very much dominated my life up until about my teen years. I did not really have a concept of time management and a healthy balance, all I knew was that if something made me happy in life, I should keep doing it no matter what. While not the best way to look at life (it is pretty unhealthy and I do not recommend it), it did end up teaching me how to have a healthy relationship with technology and not obsess about it all the time. While I still live a very tech heavy life, I have gotten much better about balancing and integrating it into my life, instead of just letting it consume me day in and day out. I strive to have actual face-to-face conversations with real people instead of just hiding away in my phone and talking to people on Discord.

    A lot of this has to do with me being a lot more aware of technology and the impact it can have on society. I have seen many good things come from the breakthrough of technology like how it has made human lives much easier. We are now able to have longer distance and more effective communication through the evolution of cellphones, and televisions are now able to display much more beautiful pictures than ever before. Technology has also allowed me to pursue a career I want in being a YouTuber instead of being stuck in a job I do not like because it is a "steady career" and not some "short-lived dream". It also has impacted my dad, as technology has allowed him to grow his business even further. Technology has impacted us as a society in ways we could not have even imagined as well, from medicine, to transportation, and so much more.

My online footprint is not something I consciously think about all the time. I do not sit up late at night, thinking about what I posted on Instagram the other day. I do know the biggest rule about online footprints however, and it is that anything you put out on the Internet, is permanent. I do not look at this as some sort of fear factor, but I do use it to regulate how much of myself I put out on the Internet and what exactly I am putting out. I am confident in my digital footprint because I do not really have much to hide about what I post. I do not really use profanity, or encourage anything that would be frowned upon in a corporate setting, such as my political views. Since I am not scared of my online footprint, I continue to forge a path for my online footprint for the world to see me as I am. I may not be incredibly personal with it, but I do intend to have my online footprint represent the good and honest values that I strive for everyday.

AntiWar

     After reading from both AntiWar.com and The American Conservative, I was surprised to see the very adamant takes of what is going on in the world of politics. A lot of the biased information being covered between both websites is meant to support the conservative side of the political spectrum, which can give an idea as to why this information is not exactly covered by mainstream media. When it comes to large scale issues and topics, especially politics, the goal for mainstream media is to stay as neutral as possible. If the media is accused of taking sides, it would make them biased to one side, which really does not go over well with the public. While it is more understandable that information like this is not covered by the mainstream media on places such as television and radio, it does also interest me as to why the websites themselves are not public knowledge like a CNN or NBC News outlet. This could likely be because of the aforementioned bias towards the conservative demographic. Trustworthy and reliable news sources like CNN will not have a bias towards conservatives or liberals, and will tell whatever news story they are covering as neutral and as unbiased as possible. CNN knows that public opinion is very important, and that leading too much towards one political spectrum will cause them to lose the non conservatives in their audience that trust the news from CNN. From a non business standpoint, public opinion also makes it so that the most trustworthy news sites are sites that are not biased towards one side. If you are biased towards one political side, how will you know the full truth of the story without discovering the other half of the political side? Bias towards a side on the political spectrum could withhold important details that are not being shared because of the danger of it not supporting the political side that they want. I think you have to seek out antiwar websites like these because you would have to make an effort to have your view on current topics be biased in favor of one political side. It is easier to find sites like CNN because many people's first thoughts would not be to search out for information that is purposely biased and withholds information that could hurt that bias. I think the important thing to takeaway from reading both of these websites is that it is important to have non biased information in order to consider yourself a well-known and trustworthy source.

EOTO 2 Reaction

     I found Johnathan Reeves's presentation on the effects of echo chambers was really fascinating to learn about. It was really interesting to find out how rumors can spread very quickly through the effects of the echo chamber. The echo chamber effect really gets a hold of people who do not have a very diverse way of thinking and are very close minded. Echo chambers really take a hold of a specific rumor initially started from within the echo chamber, which later then gets outsourced to the public with it being the only known information. Like I had stated earlier, the people within these echo chambers who are really close minded and have a very rigid way of thinking are really easy prey for these echo chamber rumors. These are the people most likely to believe these rumors since they will not divert away from the one piece or very few pieces of information relayed to them. This allows the information to be more amplified, heavily fueled by the distortion of close minded people within the echo chamber. The most interesting part about echo chambers is that they are not just exclusive to online platforms. Echo chambers can take place anywhere where information is exchanged, expanding the chances that close minded people can fall to these rumors. The Internet also has a special mechanic implemented called "filter bubbles", which are algorithms that keep track of what type of content you are viewing. They filter content that is similar to content you have previously expressed interest in, and then use that information to recommend more content based on the content you had just viewed. Echo chambers can be really dangerous if you have a very limited and close minded way of thinking, but if you educate yourself on current events and have a more diverse and open minded way of thinking, you can escape the echo chamber and made your voice more heard.

EOTO: Total Information Awareness

     If I told you that someone is always watching you, would you believe me? It sounds sort of ridiculous to think about, especially in the land of the free, home of the brave that is America. But what if I told you that there was a system in place in the government designed around "detecting terrorists"? Would you still think that you are safe in your home country? Would you not trust the government? What would you do?

Total Information Awareness was created in November 2002 by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) as a way to detect terrorists through analyzation of information. But the government was really using terrorist detection as an excuse to spy on people's personal data and information without their consent. This is already a not cool plan from the government, but it gets even worse. Total Information Awareness would constantly spy on an individual, grabbing tons and tons of important and personal data, all just to see how likely they would be a criminal. This was a horrible plan by the United States government, but nobody knew this was even going on back then. The government had free reign to do whatever they wanted with people's personal and even private information, just to benefit them. In September 2003, Congress stopped funding the Total Information Awareness program, which brought the end to Total Information Awareness... or did it?

    

    This gentleman here is Edward Snowden, a famous whistleblower that has been behind many leaks of government documents and programs. Snowden worked for the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) from 2006 to 2009, before taking his talents to the National Security Agency (NSA). He then later became an intelligence contractor from 2009 until 2013, where he requested a medical leave of absence in order to go to Hong Kong. During his time at the NSA, he gathered data on many NSA activities, more importantly, secret service programs. So when Snowden flew to Hong Kong, he leaked all of these governmental secrets, a notable one being a court order to popular telecommunications company Verizon, which stated that they surrender all metadata (such as the numbers dialed and the length of the calls made) of millions of its subscribers. Edward Snowden really opened a lot of people's eyes as what the government was doing to them behind closed doors, and questioned how much power the government should really have.

Even though Edward Snowden successfully leaked governmental secrets, total information awareness still became prevalent, even after its apparent demise in 2003. While it may not be known to the public as total information awareness anymore, there still have been multiple projects similar to the original plan of total information awareness. Some of these projects include Genoa, Genysis, Communicator, and many others. These all harness the same potential as processing outside data, and turning into valuable information for the government to store. This makes it really unnerving for us living in the world today, as well as future generations because it does not feel like our information is safe, or that even we as people are safe. If the government is constantly watching over us, can the United States of America really be considered "land of the free?" Or is it really the "home of the unsafe?"

In The Age of AI Reflection

     We are now ever close to the dominating age of AI. It is approaching rapidly and at times, we begin to worry if robots might actually take over the world one day.

    Well luckily, our future metal overlords have not cracked the code on world domination yet. However, they are getting smarter and smarter by picking up on human habits, and the rapid evolution of technology allowing them to keep up with the future. AI getting smarter and smarter is actually a good thing for us because it can allow many current jobs to become way easier through the hands (well I guess they would not be hands sometimes) of AI. AI and machine learning allow for tasks that would take longer for a human to accomplish, if ever, to become possible. When Google's Deep Mind AI challenged the world's top ranked player of the game Go, it began the prideful battle of man versus machine, with the winner really changing how we think about AI. In a shocking turn of events, Deep Mind was able to take home the victory, outsmarting the world's former best Go player in a series of strategies humans could not even fathom.

    So how is AI able to make these incredibly complex decisions? Well they have to learn from somewhere, and the source to all of this learning comes from us humans. In machine learning, humans teach AI an assortment of different situations and responses to those situations. The more situations you give it, the more situations it can respond to, which is why the more higher level AI's are so smart. They quite literally know everything because they have been taught everything they need to know. That's what begins to worry me about the future of AI, that the will start to become these "all-knowing" beings that can outsmart anyone. If that ever happens, how will we ever know if something is entirely real or is made up of AI?

    10 years ago, this was not entirely an issue. For instance, AI voices used to be highly recognizable if the voice being used was from an AI program. Now, AI has gotten so smart at picking up voices through speech impediments and vocal patterns that it is extremely hard to tell what is real and what is fake. This could have dire consequences today as AI could just easily impersonate a figure to say something false, outlandish, or even worse, offensive. In something like our national security, if we hand over those duties to an AI program, it is now completely out of our control if the AI does not do its job among other means. 

The idea of AI is now a more pressing idea thanks to its quick evolution in the last decade. It can be a good thing with how smart an AI becomes because it can now help us solve problems humans would not be able to think of. But what would happen if that thinking were to suddenly turn on us? Would robots rule the world? Would humans become extinct? It is hard to tell but if the world closely monitors AI, its rise to power might not be as nerve racking as it sounds.

EOTO 1 Reaction

    I learned a lot from Elizabeth's presentation on the history of the motion picture. I had known that the history of movies started around the early 1920s, but what I was unaware of was the fact that the history of the motion picture had started as early as 1888, with the first motion picture being only about three seconds long. One of the very interesting facts I had learned was that Louis Le Prince was also a huge innovator for the early history of the motion picture. He was responsible for the first motion picture clip, and the Kinetoscope, which was one of the earliest inventions to view a motion picture. The motion picture industry also had a very slow, albeit, productive development when it came to making movies. They slowly started with sound, moved up to 3D films, computer generated animation, and now, have worked all the way up to today. 

    Considering the extremely fast paced evolution of communication technologies, it interested me that the evolution of motion pictures was so slow. However, the evolution of the motion picture had the same huge strides that other communication technologies often experience in their respective evolutions. They started of small in 1888 with the first motion picture. Then, in 1927, The Jazz Singer was the first motion picture to have synchronized sound. 55 years later in 1982, TRON became the first motion picture film to use computer graphic imagery or CGI, having a full fifteen minutes of the movie be entirely computer generated. Then finally in 1995, Toy Story became the first motion picture film to be entirely computer animated. With all of these achievements in motion picture history, it is no wonder that they evolved into a juggernaut in the entertainment industry and have had a positive impact on people everywhere.

EOTO Research Project

     The history of video games is a long and complicated one. There is not one direct inventor of video games but rather, multiple as the origin of video games can be traced back as early as the 1950s and 1960s. During that timeframe, computer scientists began designing simple games on minicomputers, which would later translate to the first video game, SpaceWar! in 1962. Created by MIT student hobbyists, this was the first video game to use a video display. After Pong was created in 1970, many video game companies wanted to capitalize on its fame, causing the industry to go through several boom or bust cycles due to lack of innovation.

    Around the 1980s, video games were going through a really tough time. The 1983 video game crash hit the United States really hard from too many games to cheap knockoffs. This prompted Japan to take charge of the video game industry, as the crash did not seem to hit them as hard, if at all. In 1985, Nintendo released the Nintendo Entertainment System, reviving the video game industry and brimming it full of life for many years to come. Nintendo's original ideas bundled with its very easy to understand game mechanics allowed for people of all ages to enjoy video games once again

Since then, video games have changed the world, becoming a dominant branch of the entertainment industry, being present in many families homes, and a common hobby among children and adults alike. Video games have brought forth a positive impact on the world by helping strengthen problem solving and social skills in children. This can be explained by video games constant engagement with players and how they utilize puzzles, strategy, and problem solving to encourage critical thinking skills. With the recent introduction of online multiplayer gaming, communication has evolved in video games with people now able to communicate across very long distances with friends and online opponents alike.

However, it has gotten quite the negative impact in recent years. Contrast to its improvement of social skills in children, video games also teach children to be antisocial if they are not playing and interacting with other people. Video games have also brought on unhealthy habits such as obesity and carpal tunnel, two very important diseases that are heavily linked to obsessive play of video games. Gaming is also very addicting, as it is officially labeled as "internet gaming disorder" (IGD) and can suffer dire consequences such as loss of appetite, loss of sleep, and even losing relationships and interests in other activities.

    Despite the negative criticism towards video games, video games have changed the world for the better, and in some cases, for the worst. They help communication while also hindering it. They evolved the world while also setting back. It is a very give or take subject that as humans, we are still figuring out. Gaming has evolved into a very popular branch of the entertainment industry and thanks to its communication benefits, will stay around for many years to come.