Lecture &Tutorial 7: Video games and File sharing

Video and File sharing and Peer-to-peer (P2P) was the topic for today’s lecture. We discussed the Video games that we use like arcade games, consoles, computer games, MUD’s and MMOG’s. We were asked questions like why do we play games and what are video games. I have dabbled in a few video games and will only really give a time of day to racing games as well as shooting games, nothing with too much thinking required. The academic viewpoint on video games is what do video games do to people? Does playing a violent game alter the way a person thinks after playing it? Is the persistence affect valid? An example of this would be playing need for speed and then getting into your car and wanting to race on the road. An interesting concept which I personally think is valid and does have an effect on people. Video games have now become a cultural activity; they are in every household in every form.

Narratology is the study of Narratives in a video game. Some video games tell a story and this is what is studied as literary works. The alternative of this is Ludology which says there are no stories to video games.

We watched a video called Steal this film which can be found at Google. This film was interesting because it highlighted the viewpoints of copyright laws and pirating. Copying is the reason for our existence like babies copying their parents to learn how to speak and people in life copy each other. That is what makes up how people communicate. Suspending copying would only encourage new technologies to be developed to over come current suppression and so it continues.

The task for the tutorial was to make a short movie using photographs we have taken ourselves and post it onto YouTube. I have not ever done something like this so it was exciting and I’m interested to see what the end product will be.

Lecture 6: Free and Open software

Free and Open source software was the topic covered today. We first identified the common programs we use daily on our home computers such as; Internet Explorer, McAfee, Microsoft Office, Adobe Photoshop, MSN messenger, iTunes, Windows etc. These programs are routinely used for what ever it is we are doing on the computer at the time. They are all examples of non-Free software. Source codes are instructions for the computer to be able to make the programs work. Software used to be free and was open to anyone who wanted to use it. It was available to be shared amongst the community and open to be contributed to. This enabled people to share code and programs freely with each other and not worry about the legal issues. This was likened to a ‘recipe’ shared amongst friends where you could change an ingredient in the recipe to best suit your taste. This soon changed when software became commercialised, which meant that it was now illegal to alter, change or share software to suit yourself. Microsoft started the train of commercialising their software and soon saw a following of other companies doing the same.

This move is what encouraged the founding of the Free Software Foundation in 1981 by Richard Stallman. His aim was to create and develop a Unix-like free operating system from software that was already free therefore GNU (Gnu Not Unix) was made. This is known as the Free Software Movement. Richard Stallman developed the concept of the 4 Freedoms: Freedom Zero (Help us: Run program for any use), Freedom One (Help self: Study how programs work), Freedom Two (Help neighbour: Redistribution of copies), Freedom Three (Help community: Improve program and release it to the public). Freedom Three is only valid if you have studies the software and understand how it works as the soft ware is still licensed but is free.

The word ‘Open’ has now replaced ‘Free’ in describing the way in which is it used. Open is not always free. Open source is also used by businesses: they buy the software and are then able to customize it for their business therefore it is open but not free. FOSS is Free/Open source software. This is where the two types of software can be differentiated. Proprietary software is closed software such as Windows Vista, source code is confidential, development made by company employees, finished software product sold, traditional software production. Open source software like Linux and Fire Fox is free and available to everyone, under limited-rights licence, development by community, produsage software, money made from providing a service for software like training on how to use it.

Tutorial 6: 3D worlds

Today's tutorial was an introduction to Second Life. We had to dive in and create an avatar. It was interesting but I personally would not make a 3D world become apart of my world. The graphics aren't even that good, the functions look annoying and there is too much to do when signing up as well as when trying to get your avatar to do something. Not a fan and wont be a fan anytime soon. But it was very interesting never the less that there is a world within a world that consumes so many people.

Lecture 5: MyFace

A guest speaker came in to visit us for today’s lecture just to discuss what type of Social networks we used. We also watched a movie called “MyFace” from the abc website from that featured on the Triple J’s The Hack Half Hour. People sit and have a discussion on the relevant topics at hand and MySpace was the hot topic. Everyone in the discussion was involved in some sort of online social networking or activities and all came with their views and experiences. The key issue was privacy and what we as users of these online communities post and are willing to expose about ourselves. Hackers are always online and in the sites that are most common for people to open a portal into their lives for the hackers to devour them. A very interesting topic because it is very relevant to everyone. Most of us are very consumed by these online networks and do not pay much attention to what could be happening behind the scenes in the 'cyber' world where all our personal information is floating and could be captured by anyone. My eyes are open and I am nowe going to pay more attention.

Lecture 4 - New media, Internet studies and Cyberculture studies

Today’s lecture started with us matching a movie called EPIC 2014. What happened to the news and what is EPIC? EPIC is the Evolving Personalising Information Consult. The movie focused on what would happen if Google developed more and took over the media and ways for people to get the news other than from the current news mediums. It was interesting in that it gave us an insight to just what the Internet is capable of accomplishing. Would Google look to customize news stories for each individual user by taking snippets of news from various sources and compiling them in a ‘news article’ personalised for that user. The question of Copyright law infringements were raised and would be a very big issue if Google were to venture with Amazon and explore such personalised options. This is a short movie to make you think. It made me think.

The main topics in the lecture were new media, Internet studies and cyberculture studies. Popular cyberculture studies started when people started to see the Internet as a magical thing, something that was new and exciting and a privilege, therefore began to call it ‘THE Internet’. General cyberculture studies started when people had been hanging on the net and now began to study it, academics became interested in what the Internet was able to do. Critical cyberculture studies are the current focus and people are now able to engage with other people. It explores and examines stories we engage in using the Internet with Interactive activities and new technologies; for example, the use of our mobile phones. Therefore narratives about our experiences have encouraged other people to explore what we are talking about and therefore enlarging our experiences. It also analyses political, social as well as economic considerations that make access to these activities possible. The way we interact with the Internet has a great impact on what we can do on it and how we can use it to its full potential.

Tutorial 4 - Task 2: Searching the Internet

Search engines sort through the most relevant web pages upon request using a set of rules called algorithms. They also use the location/frequency methods which find the closest keywords and phrases relevant to the search. The most relevant is placed at the top of the list of web pages and the developers of the websites can pay to put their sites at the top of the list so it seems to the viewer to be more relevant and entice more people to their sites. My favourite search engines are Google and Yahoo. I like the extra links they have at the side of the search pages. Sometimes I find what I’m looking for in them rather than the searched websites.

Tutorial 4 - Task 1: Using a search engine other than Google or Wkikipedia

The creator of the Love bug was Onel de Guzman. http://archives.cnn.com/2000/TECH/computing/06/29/philippines.lovebug.02/index.html

The world record of the largest watermelon is 262.6 pounds. http://www.hopechamberofcommerce.com/melon_heritage.htm

The Ebola virus was names after the river in the African country, Zaire called Ebola. http://ebola.emedtv.com/ebola-virus/from-what-place-did-the-ebola-virus-get-its-name.html

The largest recorded earthquake in the world was measured in Chile with a magnitude of 9.5 (Mw) in May 22, 1960. http://www.earthquake.usgs.gov/learning/facts.php

There are 1,073,741,824 KiloBytes in a TeraByte.
http://www.wizbit.net/cd-dvd_production_faqs_what_is_a_terabyte.htm

The ‘Storm Worm’ arrived in Spam email or in the form of e-cards with very interesting subject headings. It was a malicious payload that attacked any windows-based platforms.
http://www.snopes.com/computer/virus/storm.asp
http://www.zdnet.com.au/news/security/soa/Resurgent-Storm-worm-attacks-over-Web/0,130061744,339281298,00.htm

This is the only way to contact the Prime Minister:
The Hon Kevin Rudd MPPrime MinisterParliament HouseCANBERRA ACT 2600
http://www.pm.gov.au/contact/index.cfm

Stephen Stockwell is a member of the Brisbane group Black Assassin.
http://live-wirez.gu.edu.au/Staff/Stephen/default.html

Web 2.0 is a platform for a network providing software continuously getting better with the more people interact with it. It enables people to remix and create data shared from other users. It creates an exciting user experience. Examples of this are Facebook and Twitter.
http://radar.oreilly.com/archives/2005/10/web-20-compact-definition.html