Assignment 9 DMCA

The DMCA has led to intrusive acts by congress that has had a negative impact on consumers by putting a damper on free expression and scientific research, impeding competition, and interfering with computer intrusion laws.

The DMCA should be changed now because the Internet has changed since its inception. The laws need to be tweaked to adhere to what the Internet is not capable of. Too much taxpayer money is spent on archaic regulation that has no business being enforced in the ways that they are.

Final Project - Spoken Wikipedia Project

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bemidji_State_University





http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Bemidjistateuniversity.ogg

Google Reader - Assignment 10

Superfriends. assignment 7.

Assignment 5

Submit the answer to this assignment on your blog.

 Spend some time looking at wolfram|alpha. Check out the examples to get an idea of what it can do.



Use both wolfram|alpha and Google to try and determine the answer to the following questions.

For each one, state the answer, and say which tool was the most useful or fastest in finding the answer.



Remember: List either your alpha query or your Google search query that resulted in the answer. The answer itself is only part of the assignment.



1. All English words containing the letters "eue"


For Google I typed in “words, letters "eue”” and received:
feued

queue
queued

queueing

queuer
queuers

queues

http://www.morewords.com/contains/eue/

For WolframAlpha I typed in, “What words contain eue?” and received:
queue
queued
queues

http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=What+words+contain+eue%3F

Although Google came back with more, I would have to say that the wolramAlpha was easiest because all I had to do was form a simple question and it automatically defaulted to only English words.

2. How much potassium in 4.7 oz of banana?

Google’s results were too ambiguous and unrelated. In WolframAlpha I typed in the question as it is presented and I received immediate results. WolframAlpha broke down the question into these parts: banana, amount, 4.7 oz, and potassium.

The answer is 477 mg.



3. How old was Barack Obama on the day you were born?


WolframAlfpha was again the most efficient and fastest in finding this answer. I asked, ”Age of Barack Obama on August 28, 1985?” in the search field and received the answer: 24 years, 24 days. Simple.
Google was a mess.

4. Date and time of the next total solar eclipse in Eugene?


Well I have to say, WolframAlpha is the best option if you want specific answers. I simplified the question right off the bat into this: solar eclipse in Eugene Oregon.

WolframAlpha broke it down into these parts: next, solar eclipse, after [today], from Eugene, Oregon.

Wow.

And the answer is Sunday, May 20, 2012 at 4:52 p.m. PDT, 2.277 years from now.

Google sucked.

5. What is the minimum and maximum price of Google stock since it went public?


This one was a little tricky to find. Both found the answer eventually but I wanted it to be found via one simple entry. Finally, WolframAlpha came through. I typed in, “Google minimum stock 2004-2010,” into the search query. The results were this: in August 19, 2004 (year Google went public) the stock was sold for $95 (its lowest), on November 6, 2007 the stock was at its highest selling for $725.

6. Link an image of the barcode for UPC 01234567890




Both Google and WolframAlpha found this easily. For both I typed in, “barcode, 01234567890
.” Google’s results were found in Google Images. The image above is Google’s. WolframAlpha gave me the actual source codes for the UPC structure in two different formats.


7. How many vertices does an icosahedron have?


I typed in, ”icosahedron vertices,” in WolframAlpha and,”How many vertices does an icosahedron have” in Google. Both gave me the immediate result of 12 vertices.

8. Distance from Eugene to Tokyo?


WolframAlpha wins again. I wrote, “Distance Eugene, OR to Tokyo, Japan,” and received the result of 4886 miles. I also got results in Kilometers, nautical miles, and time (by plane, sound, light in fiber, and light in a vaccum). Google gave me links to pages to find the results.

9. Average Oregon income per capita?


I typed in, “Average Oregon income per capita,” and received $31,930 per year per capita (2007 estimate) from WolframAlpha and $32,274.52 per capita via a Google search (http://www.statemaster.com/graph/eco_per_inc_percap-economy-personal-income-per-capita). I would have to say that WolframAlpha was easier just because of its immediacy.

10. What is the Morse code for your first name?

Both pulled through. I typed in, “Morse code, Bill,” in both. WolframAlpha showed it to me via an image. Google wins though. It directed me to the Morse Code Translator (http://morsecode.scphillips.com/jtranslator.html) where I could see it and hear it.

-... .. .-.. .-..

Search Engines. Assignment 4.

Assignment:

Internet censorship is a major issue. We're going to explore it a bit in the context of search engines.


Enter the following search terms into:
google.com,
bing.com,
baidu.com (major Chinese search engine) and
google.cn (google's Chinese website).

In your blog, comment on any differences in search results you see. I don't expect you to be able to read Chinese, but the actual URLs will be in english and often will have english summaries.



1. uss yorktown nt



Bing.com, Google.cn, and Google.com had all much the same search results. However, the only thing the same in Baidu.com was the first result. Everything else was completely different.







2. google china censorship

The results returned from each engine were a lot alike in that they provide much the same information about the topic. However, I have noticed that Baidu's results are mainly Chinese sites without much international influence.

3. Tiananmen Square



Wow. There were some huge differences here. Bing and Google.com resulted in, again, much the same results. However, Google.cn and Baidu's whole first page of results were all Chinese sites! Chinese censorship has completely resulted in a biased return of information.

4. Taiwan independence

This result again resulted in biased feedback from both Google.cn and Baidu. I find it interesting that any time a search is entered on a Chinese engine that pertains to any type of negative viewpoints about the Republic of China, censorship kicks in.

Televangelist.

What has happened in Haiti is unimaginable. However, in spite of all of this we get some televangelist basically saying that they deserved it. Can you believe this guy? Where exactly is this coming from? Let's ask a Haitian: http://www.blackandchristian.com/articles/academy/gelin-10-05.shtml

Douglas Rushkoff

I read Douglas Rushkoff's Coercion in a Philosophy course a couple of years ago. He writes about the mechanisms that contribute to our current societal condition. If you have never heard of him, look him up.
Rushkoff.com

Test number 2.

Test post from cell.

Sealions.

Sealions in Newport, OR.

Story of Stuff

This video must be heard.

First Post.

Does anyone else notice how hard it is to find a vacant URL to use when setting up these things?

Here are some of the URL's that I tried:

1) areflection.blogspot.com

This blog is dated Wednesday, December 11, 2002. It is mostly about some "Crisis in the Catholic Church" and the differences between the teachings of older and younger clergymen. The author, Father Shane Tharp, gives us a theological lesson in the ways of Catholicism. This seems to be his only post.

2) reflection.blogspot.com

This person (Christen) posted for a good five months before her blog was abandoned. It is mostly about her multiple relationships and what her days were composed of. She claims she's in college, however, standard punctuation and grammar is be just beyond her reach. If you absolutely love elipsis this blog is for you.

Here is an example of her work:

i'm home...and i'm ok. i have to admit, everything reminds me of brent. we had fun tonight...i'm kinda wondering howi actually felt about brent...yes, i know i lvoed him..love him...a lot...i dunno.

i'm watching the elections..go gore!..

danny left me a bunch of messages... he calls all the time...why?

i'm wondering if tony has a thing for me? he walked me to my door and kissed my cheek....he kinda held my hand too....hm?

maybe more later..

3) reflektion.blogspot.com

It's Swedish.

4) reflectshun.blogspot.com

Another one-poster. Only this time without any text.