Views from the Far Left

2007-04-11T14:04:00.001-07:00

Sorry for the late blog post guys, i had papers to write and i had to go do a radioshow, but to be fair none of you are going to read this until 5 minutes before class anyway.

Todays topic: SOCIAL LINGUISTICS AND L33T SPEAK

OMGZZZZLOLLERZPWNDEDFTW!!!!!!!1111111

Talking of the study of social linguistics in and of itself, is really, really boring. I am sure you all either only read half of, fell asleep during or just ignored the required class reading, I am here to remind you to go at least skim those because I will reference some of the background information in this blog and my presentation tomorrow, but my main focus will be on how this relates to technology. More specifically online vernacular and/or L33t speak.

For the uninitiated here are some handy guides that explain how to read and write in this strange online language, and for those of you who already know it reading such professionally written analysis should provide a laugh:

http://www.microsoft.com/athome/security/children/leetspeak.mspx
http://www.wikihow.com/Read-and-Write-in-1337

L33t speak (or 1337) is an online text based languaged that has its origins in the begining of online communication. It stated on the early message boards of the 1980s more as a status symbol. To gain the level of "elite" or "leet" was to gain access to games, private chats, message boards, and information unavailable to the common user. Access to discussions on illegal drug manufacturing and other topics not considered appropriate for the mass use were available to these users. The term is also derived from hacker culture and was used as a sign of respect for someones skills.

The language itself has now leaked into the mainstream just as the internet has drifted away from being a niche thing. Leet speak is common all over, in IM conversations, chat room, message boards, and most prevalently in online video games. The language is constantly evolving and adding new words made up of symbols instead of letters, or mispelled words that dont get corrected (teh suxxxxorz). It creates a sense of community amongst its speakers and also creates a language that is unintelligble to much of the world, including the older population which adds a level of secrecy,

The downside to the emergence of this type of online speak is that it is devestating to online culture, with the prevalent use of leet speak, hip hop culture and just general apathy amongst the youth many feel our language is in decline. We are loosing nuances and the overall beauty of language, and i myself believe this. I will admitly freely that i cant count how many times i've been writing papers and find myself typing internet shorthand, occasionally i wont catch myself and it ends up in the final project.

Thats all for now, brush up on your Leet speak and maybe youll win some candy tomorrow.

Online Book Browsing

2007-03-04T20:47:00.000-08:00

http://www.cnn.com/2007/TECH/internet/02/28/book.browsing.reut/index.html

As you can see in that story, two major book publishing houses have decided to allow people to browse through their catalog of books online. Users can then take pages of books and embed them into their myspace pages and such much in like the way people do with music and video.

What does this mean for the book industry? Perhaps this is the begining of the end of the paper format of books? When is the last time you went to the library and researched instead of using the databases while lounging in your bed?

I find the whole concept rather creepy. Print has been one of the most long standing human forms of expression and to see it all move to electronic mediums would definitely be a blow to me. Naturally if it does happen it wont happen anytime soon.

On the other hand this will make researching easier and it would be lovely to have access to so many great books at simply the click of a button. However I dont see many people using this service, much like how ebooks have failed to sell beyond a niche audience.

Personal Privacy: Last Great Barrier for Technology

2007-02-27T23:28:00.000-08:00

The other day I was pondering technological advancement and where it goes from here. After a massive boom in the 90s we have yet to see any real huge leaps in technology, no real new breakthroughs just improvements on old tech. I had come to the conclusion the reason is Personal Privacy. Any new advancements in technology would bring with it compromises in personal security.

Think about it, I will give several examples:

Self Driving Cars: The self driving car has long been a dream of what hte future holds. Cars that drive you to your destination while you sit back and relax. While great in theory this would only work if everyone had one, that way the position of your vehicle could be relayed to a satellite that would track your position and ensure you dont hit other cars and get to the proper destination. This will never happen, the information on your location would be available at all times, there would be no private or descrete way to go about your business, the information would be logged and available to any who could get their hands on it.

Credit/Debit Cards read by finger print:
No, just no there is so much wrong with this. While it would be insanely easy and convienient it just wont happen. To be able to tie purchases directly to your person would mean data archives full of personal information to be given away to the highest bidder, not to mention add a disturbing level to identity left.

im sure you can think of more but im going to avoid making this a huge entry. So what do you think? is the matter of personal privacy the last great hurdle for technology? Can we find ways around it?

Boring Rant

2007-02-20T13:19:00.000-08:00

I am rather bored, and don't know what to write about so I will go on to tell a little of video game history since its what I know, since it used to be my job.

Take your minds back to the early 90s, genesis and SNES were the big machines on the block and we all were happily playing our marios and sonics. New technology came about that brought the concept of moving from cartridges to cd's for the gaming medium to fruitition. Wanting to compete with both Sega's Sega CD and up-coming saturn, as well as the pc drive in japan, nintendo looked into creating a CD-Drive add-on for it's SNES (super nintendo in case you havent caught on). Who do they start talks with? None other than sony. Sony approached Nintendo with the idea and the factories to produce the product together and all was going fine and dandy for a while.

Then the issue of liscencing came up, and thanks to some loop holes in the CD-format, nintendo would loose the rights and have many other liscencing problems with its games if it went through the deal with sony. So just before release, the deal was scrapped and Nintendo teamed up with Philips to make the obscure crappy Philips CD-i gaming platform, Sony went on to make the Playstation, the rest is history.

School and Technology

2007-02-12T09:23:00.000-08:00

Can you imagine attending this university 20-30 years ago?

Can you imagine writing all your long ass essays by hand?

Can you imagine having to do all your research in person at the library?

Can you imagine not being in almost imediate contact with your friends through cell phones, facebook, Aim?

Can you imagine having to call your professors from a landline instead of emailing them?

Can you imagine having to go outside to check the weather instead of not leaving your bed?

Try to think of other things that we use technology for in everyday life here at AU and what it would be like without it.

Innovation

2007-02-12T09:10:00.000-08:00

While contemplating technology, and other things, I realize in this capitalistic competitive society, we see so litle true innovation from the major corporations. Obvious suspects: Microsoft and Sony. These two companies have provided their respective fields of work with very little innovation over the past decade or more.

Microsoft, what more can i really say other than all their ideas are ideas Apple used 5 years ago. Thats why as i mentioned as a comment to someone elses blog, bill gates bought a ton of non-voting stock in Apple when they were about to go bankrupt, to keep them a float so he could continue to harvest their ideas, only make them crappier and less efficient.

Sony on the other hand, a company who used to be known for its customer service and quality, is no pretty much utter crap. Example, their sad excuse for a handheld, the PSP. The thing is made cheaper than Bertha on the corner of 2nd and I street, but costs about 100x as much. No good games, no good support, and when a batch came out with the defect in the circle button that made it get stuck inside the machine and unusable it was called a product feature. Not only that they also managed to steal every major innovation Nintendo ever created.

Nintendo creates the D-pad for the NES system
Sony steals it and incorporates it into the PS1
Nintendo creates the analog stick and rumble pack for N64
Sony steals it and creates the Dual Shock Controller (a design they were later sued for for also stealing it form some basement corporation)
Nintendo creates full 3d motion based controller for Wii,
Sony attempts to create one but just ends up stealing 10 year old nintendo technology from Kirby tilt and tumble on the gameboy color.

so yes, Sony and Microsoft
two companies that leech ideas as their own and just pretty much are crap.

Living in the MUD

2007-01-29T11:12:00.000-08:00

Our readings and discussion in class promoted a lot of thought about the online entities known as MUDs. Some people called the users "freaks" and had a very negative mind set towards the users of these MUDs. However, I believe that they are just an extension of escapism that has been occurring thoughout history.

While not all users of these MUDs are not the stereotypical nerd, many are. We can judge these people, but why do we? There will always be people who don't possess many necessary social skills that are useful for living a normal life. Even many of us have these traits, how many times have you had a difficult conversation with a friend online because the topic would be too awkward to have in person?

Certain people will always be drawn to living in a fantasy world then the real one. They used to use books or movies, now in the information age we use video games and other online outlets. While in extreme cases it only makes users person problems even worse, by encouraging them to live in fantasy worlds where they feel welcome and choose to never leave. These people need help and have problems beyond playing in MUDs, but many people play in moderation and use it for mild enjoyment, who are we to say that they are wrong?

Everything that is bad for you is good for you.

2007-01-24T12:57:00.000-08:00

During last class we wrote about the best/worst innovations in technology over the past 15 or so years. Someone said that video games were the worst, and to these people I feel they need to enlighten themselves and stop buying into sensationalist media hype.

By now everyone knows the name Grand Theft Auto and use it as a scapegoat for problems with today's youth. Certainly violent tendencies amongst the youth must be the fault of some stimuli in their surroundings and not due to anything the parents are doing. First off I would like to point out the rating system on video games. They range from Everyone up to Mature. Much like the rating system on movies, parents should take an active role in their kids lives and make sure they aren't playing mature video games, much like they wont let them watch R rated cinema.

While it is easy to point to games like GTA and say that video games are evil, you would be taking a very ignorant stance and denying the good things that go along with them. The game Brain Age for Nintendo DS was developed in conjuncture with doctors at the University of Koyoto and is a video game that presents the player with exercises that "work out" your frontal cortex and other areas of the brain. It was one of the top selling games worldwide for 2006 and is being used in retirement homes, schools, and other areas to help enhance learning and fight off the effects of aging on the brain. The new system Nintendo Wii, which is known for its motion sensing controller and being the coolest thing ever made, is being already worked into low impact workouts for physical rehabilitation. Even your traditional video games, such as Zelda and Final Fantasy, present the user with pages upon pages of text and not only help increase reading skills and vocabulary, but force players to have keen strategic thinking skills and quick reaction times. Even games as basic as Pong are known to greatly increase eye-hand coordination.

To even further debunk the myth that video games cause violence I simply present several studies from psychologists in this very area:
http://www.physorg.com/news5758.html
http://games.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=04/02/07/1431222

A simple search in Google will present you with even more studies backing up the same thing. Just as TV and Movies were once demonized for causing violence, video games are now taking the heat. Why do we not stop trying to make scapegoats for our youth's problems and look at our society, family situations and issues within the kids themselves to find and work on the root of the problem instead of meaningless finger pointing? Video Games are slowly rising the the point of an art form, much as books and movies before them, they can tell stories, engross you in an experience in a way a movie never could, or even be used for simple fun or education. It is time for us to stop this sensationalist scapegoating of video games and to start looking for the real problem.

2007-01-22T11:17:00.001-08:00

Things and stuff