Article: Recognizing Gestures by Roberrt Cravotta, Techinal Editor
According to this article, the most basic and simplest method of gesturing a computer is pointing. We do this currently with either a mouse or stylus, however what changes in this procedure are to come?
With devices such as the IPod and the Wii video game system we have already begun broading our horizons to expand across just the single or double-click feature of the mouse. The IPod uses the human touch to control every aspect of the device and the Wii system has introduced our generations to new interactive controls also. Do not think for a moment that this new technology is limited to the mobile devices we use in every day life either. This technology is also being presented and used for surgical practices. A machine does the surgery on the patient while the doctor sits beside and watches.
As this "gesture" technology developes and presents itself into our lives, there are many advantages. One of those advantages is the lower cost of end systems and software. Also, especially with systems such as the Wii, where the movement of the game depends on the movement of the user, it encourages a more interactive interface. Another important advantage of using gestures to communicate with our electronic devices it that it will cause the user(s) to open the minds and find new and innovative ways of communication.
Instead of sitting down at your computer or just picking up the phone, imagine what our systems can accomplish if our actions determined the performance.
Source: EDN, August 16, 2007
Is paper writing becoming obsolete
I read an article by a writer that was writing his last article for a business column in which he wrote for 37 years. He is now moving over to write for a web site. I think this is happening and going to happen more and more in the future. The same goes for magazines a few days ago I subscribed to business week online. I think almost everything is going to turn electronic in a few years.
The same goes for how we are communicating in this class and doing homework. It is all electronic. I look forward to it when I actual write things on paper. Even at work I communicate all through text messaging and email.
It is going to be interesting to see what turn the world takes with electronics in the future.
The same goes for how we are communicating in this class and doing homework. It is all electronic. I look forward to it when I actual write things on paper. Even at work I communicate all through text messaging and email.
It is going to be interesting to see what turn the world takes with electronics in the future.
Giving up Reading and Writing
Hello, I am Joslin. I am a very outgoing person and love to be surrounded by those that make me laugh. I work full time and decided to pursue furthering my education by taking a variety of classes.
Article: Voice-In/Voice-Out computers and the Postliterate Era
By: William Crossman
One interesting fact that was surprising while researching voice communication with computers is that the technology headed our way may infact change our education system and force the ability to read and write obsolete.
The author of this article states, "VIVOs will allow the world's millions of functionally nonliterate people to access all information via the Internet and Web without having to learn to read and write."
Computer are moving in the direction of also allowing everyone, regardless of language, to communicate together and breaking down the foreign language barriers.
One last interesting statement in this article is that "by 2050, there will be no reason to require young people to learn to read and write because writing - as we know it today - will have become an obsolete technology."
My question is: Should reading and writing become obsolete just because we will be able to "speak" to our electronic devices?
Source: The Futurist, March-April 2007, www.wfs.org
Article: Voice-In/Voice-Out computers and the Postliterate Era
By: William Crossman
One interesting fact that was surprising while researching voice communication with computers is that the technology headed our way may infact change our education system and force the ability to read and write obsolete.
The author of this article states, "VIVOs will allow the world's millions of functionally nonliterate people to access all information via the Internet and Web without having to learn to read and write."
Computer are moving in the direction of also allowing everyone, regardless of language, to communicate together and breaking down the foreign language barriers.
One last interesting statement in this article is that "by 2050, there will be no reason to require young people to learn to read and write because writing - as we know it today - will have become an obsolete technology."
My question is: Should reading and writing become obsolete just because we will be able to "speak" to our electronic devices?
Source: The Futurist, March-April 2007, www.wfs.org
What Goes Around Comes Around
In 1997 Professor Jim Carey of the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism traced the history of American journalism: “For most of the 300 year history of journalism in North America [journalism] has been primarily an activity of polemics and ideology...Journalism was subsidized by political parties, and journalists who felt themselves to be fully respectable and responsible spoke for the interests and the outlooks and the values of such parties. That started to change late in the 19th Century...for a very good reason...The principal political issue of the late 19th Century was the suffrage of black Americans...Republicans needed such votes; Democrats didn't want them. Journalists started to break loose...to declare themselves the journalistic equivalent of independent voters...Free of partisan commitments. With outlooks and understandings that were aimed more at a common interest or a public interest”(Committee of Concerned Journalists).
Americans have come to believe that their sources of news always report the facts of a story impartially, without any underlying biases that would affect what or how something was being reported. Particularly in wartime, Americans have grown dependent on the unbiased reporting of news as being essential to the well-being of our democratic republic, as the purpose of the news reporting is to provide a complete basis for individual political decision making.
But--in today’s cyber-reporting world where anyone with a word processor and an internet connection can report, or blog, their way to prominence without any filtering or vetting by editors or fact checkers, in real-time to boot—are these standards of fairness, impartiality and completeness still honored and practiced?
Introduction: War in Cyberspace tries to answer this question. The answer is not pretty, and neither are the implications it brings.
This abstract of a study on this subject compares the increased importance of digital news reporting and dissemination via the internet that became apparent during the 2003 Iraq War compared to the 1991 Iraq war. The evolution of news gathering and distribution in the 12 year interval was profound as the internet and digital technology (each distinct and yet inexorably intertwined) played a major role in how news was gathered, prepared and presented to its consumers, who then used it to form opinions and communicate thoughts and ideas based on the news with others.
The study points out several fundamental differences and concerns when comparing traditional news product with cyber news product. One is the observation that in the cyber news world a news consumer can no longer believe what they see. The ubiquitousness of inexpensive photo editing software, and the ease of sophisticated video image editing and manipulation, means that it is impossible for an end user to determine the authenticity of an image. In addition, there are reports that some cyber news providers deliberately mismatch photos with captions to serve one agenda or another, and also sometimes use photos obtained unethically in order to deceive.
Another change that cyber news brings is in the shear number of news outlets available for consumers to read. Some people have observed that the massive choices now available provides news consumers as much of a problem on one extreme—that is, too much information to digest—as the utter lack of information does on the other extreme. One way consumers deal with this problem is through the selective filtering (or “selective perception”) of news providers in favor of sources that support and reinforce an individual’s existing preconceptions, biases, ideologies and core beliefs. Information that does not match an individual’s pre-existing beliefs is dubbed “cognitive dissonance.” These concepts of selective perception and cognitive dissonance were used to explain how Americans reacted to the 2003 Iraq war. People who favored the war at the beginning tended to continue to favor the war, while those who opposed the war from the start also maintained their opposition. Neither side was apparently open to the ideas of the other-even intellectually. More recently, the 2005 flap over the Danish political cartoon that portrayed the Prophet Muhammad was electronically redistributed by countless Muslim groups as a way to perpetuate and increase the outrage within the Muslim global community.
The study identifies six characteristics of Cyber or “New” media in times of war. All fundamentally change the way in which people receive news, what it contains, and how people react to the news they receive. The characteristics are convergence, ubiquity, agenda setting, credibility, interactivity, and transferability.
Convergence refers to the blending within one web site of news offerings that formerly would have been distributed in distinct ways by distinct organizations. A modern web site contains text articles, photo spreads, video reports, podcasts, and opinion that formerly would have been the province of newspapers, magazines, TV networks, radio networks, and op-ed pages, respectively. Ubiquity refers simply to the reality that the internet makes the information available to a virtually unlimited number of people at any time.
Traditional media saw themselves as being providers of information that the new consumer would use in order to form an opinion. Today, through agenda setting, cyber media actively try to influence how their users think about an issue or issues. This carries an even greater influence when one considers how much attention mainstream media pays now to the new media. Additionally, the concept of credibility has morphed in its accepted definition. Many new media have achieved an instant credibility even though they lack professional or academic credentials. Prior journalistic standards such as accuracy, fairness, lack of bias, completeness, depth and trustworthiness have lost their cachet in the new firmament.
Interactivity--the ability of new media to utilize the immediacy and two-way communication inherent in digital communication is another new distinguishing feature. New media have the space and resources to present virtually unlimited communication from users, instead of traditional media’s need to limit the space and content of user communication for logistical and budgetary reasons. Transferability is another characteristic of new media that was brought about through digital communication. The ability to “cut and paste” information with ease means that much information--no matter if it is fact, rumor or opinion—can be instantly captured, and used as is, or modified for one reason or another with no accountability as to the origin of the information.
This is all very interesting from an intellectual perspective. But, it is very alarming from a societal viewpoint.
The purpose of news is for ordinary citizens to gain the information they need in order to lead their lives. Nowhere in American life is this information more important than in our political and governmental affairs. In our participatory republic, it is absolutely vital for citizens to have continual access to unbiased impartial information with which to make judgments about national affairs of all sorts--including the waging of war. Yet, it seems that the trend is moving away from impartial information in favor of partisan information. This is worrisome because partisan news can lead to the manipulation of news in favor of the personal gain of some group or person over others. Carried further, this can lead to a short-circuiting of our established procedures of participatory governing, which can undermine our entire constitutional republic.
A free press is fundamentally vital to our well being. A free press is not just one that is allowed to report as it sees fit, but actually does so, without partisan influence on the part of its proprietors. History shows that we did not reach our pinnacle as a nation until the press freed itself in the 19th century. The concern now is that we are trending away from a free press and towards a press with an agenda.
That can keep me up at nights.
References:
Committee of Concerned Journalists. Can Journalism Be Impartial? Session 1: Can Interpretive Journalism Still Be Impartial? Transcript of a meeting held at the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism in New York, NY on December 4, 1997. Downloaded on February 17, 2008 from http://concernedjournalists.org/can-journalism-be-impartial-session-1-can-interpretive-journalism-still-be-impartial.
Berenger, R. D. (2006). Introduction: War in cyberspace. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, 12(1), article 9. http://jcmc.indiana.edu/vol12/issue1/berenger.html
Americans have come to believe that their sources of news always report the facts of a story impartially, without any underlying biases that would affect what or how something was being reported. Particularly in wartime, Americans have grown dependent on the unbiased reporting of news as being essential to the well-being of our democratic republic, as the purpose of the news reporting is to provide a complete basis for individual political decision making.
But--in today’s cyber-reporting world where anyone with a word processor and an internet connection can report, or blog, their way to prominence without any filtering or vetting by editors or fact checkers, in real-time to boot—are these standards of fairness, impartiality and completeness still honored and practiced?
Introduction: War in Cyberspace tries to answer this question. The answer is not pretty, and neither are the implications it brings.
This abstract of a study on this subject compares the increased importance of digital news reporting and dissemination via the internet that became apparent during the 2003 Iraq War compared to the 1991 Iraq war. The evolution of news gathering and distribution in the 12 year interval was profound as the internet and digital technology (each distinct and yet inexorably intertwined) played a major role in how news was gathered, prepared and presented to its consumers, who then used it to form opinions and communicate thoughts and ideas based on the news with others.
The study points out several fundamental differences and concerns when comparing traditional news product with cyber news product. One is the observation that in the cyber news world a news consumer can no longer believe what they see. The ubiquitousness of inexpensive photo editing software, and the ease of sophisticated video image editing and manipulation, means that it is impossible for an end user to determine the authenticity of an image. In addition, there are reports that some cyber news providers deliberately mismatch photos with captions to serve one agenda or another, and also sometimes use photos obtained unethically in order to deceive.
Another change that cyber news brings is in the shear number of news outlets available for consumers to read. Some people have observed that the massive choices now available provides news consumers as much of a problem on one extreme—that is, too much information to digest—as the utter lack of information does on the other extreme. One way consumers deal with this problem is through the selective filtering (or “selective perception”) of news providers in favor of sources that support and reinforce an individual’s existing preconceptions, biases, ideologies and core beliefs. Information that does not match an individual’s pre-existing beliefs is dubbed “cognitive dissonance.” These concepts of selective perception and cognitive dissonance were used to explain how Americans reacted to the 2003 Iraq war. People who favored the war at the beginning tended to continue to favor the war, while those who opposed the war from the start also maintained their opposition. Neither side was apparently open to the ideas of the other-even intellectually. More recently, the 2005 flap over the Danish political cartoon that portrayed the Prophet Muhammad was electronically redistributed by countless Muslim groups as a way to perpetuate and increase the outrage within the Muslim global community.
The study identifies six characteristics of Cyber or “New” media in times of war. All fundamentally change the way in which people receive news, what it contains, and how people react to the news they receive. The characteristics are convergence, ubiquity, agenda setting, credibility, interactivity, and transferability.
Convergence refers to the blending within one web site of news offerings that formerly would have been distributed in distinct ways by distinct organizations. A modern web site contains text articles, photo spreads, video reports, podcasts, and opinion that formerly would have been the province of newspapers, magazines, TV networks, radio networks, and op-ed pages, respectively. Ubiquity refers simply to the reality that the internet makes the information available to a virtually unlimited number of people at any time.
Traditional media saw themselves as being providers of information that the new consumer would use in order to form an opinion. Today, through agenda setting, cyber media actively try to influence how their users think about an issue or issues. This carries an even greater influence when one considers how much attention mainstream media pays now to the new media. Additionally, the concept of credibility has morphed in its accepted definition. Many new media have achieved an instant credibility even though they lack professional or academic credentials. Prior journalistic standards such as accuracy, fairness, lack of bias, completeness, depth and trustworthiness have lost their cachet in the new firmament.
Interactivity--the ability of new media to utilize the immediacy and two-way communication inherent in digital communication is another new distinguishing feature. New media have the space and resources to present virtually unlimited communication from users, instead of traditional media’s need to limit the space and content of user communication for logistical and budgetary reasons. Transferability is another characteristic of new media that was brought about through digital communication. The ability to “cut and paste” information with ease means that much information--no matter if it is fact, rumor or opinion—can be instantly captured, and used as is, or modified for one reason or another with no accountability as to the origin of the information.
This is all very interesting from an intellectual perspective. But, it is very alarming from a societal viewpoint.
The purpose of news is for ordinary citizens to gain the information they need in order to lead their lives. Nowhere in American life is this information more important than in our political and governmental affairs. In our participatory republic, it is absolutely vital for citizens to have continual access to unbiased impartial information with which to make judgments about national affairs of all sorts--including the waging of war. Yet, it seems that the trend is moving away from impartial information in favor of partisan information. This is worrisome because partisan news can lead to the manipulation of news in favor of the personal gain of some group or person over others. Carried further, this can lead to a short-circuiting of our established procedures of participatory governing, which can undermine our entire constitutional republic.
A free press is fundamentally vital to our well being. A free press is not just one that is allowed to report as it sees fit, but actually does so, without partisan influence on the part of its proprietors. History shows that we did not reach our pinnacle as a nation until the press freed itself in the 19th century. The concern now is that we are trending away from a free press and towards a press with an agenda.
That can keep me up at nights.
References:
Committee of Concerned Journalists. Can Journalism Be Impartial? Session 1: Can Interpretive Journalism Still Be Impartial? Transcript of a meeting held at the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism in New York, NY on December 4, 1997. Downloaded on February 17, 2008 from http://concernedjournalists.org/can-journalism-be-impartial-session-1-can-interpretive-journalism-still-be-impartial.
Berenger, R. D. (2006). Introduction: War in cyberspace. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, 12(1), article 9. http://jcmc.indiana.edu/vol12/issue1/berenger.html
Are BLOGS good business?
While researching blogs as a learning and organizational tool I read an article by Tony Karrer titled “Learning and Networking With a Blog”.
This article has a good overview of how blogs can be a positive influence for individuals, groups, and organizations. Until just recently, I had always looked at blog as a way for an individual to convey themselves. Never before had I thought about how a business or organization could implement a blog.
The author suggests that using a blog for communication within a group can be very effective. E-mail can be hard to keep up with as employees have to make sure it keeps getting sent to the right people. A blog is a good way of simplifying this by allowing multiple users to post and comment on information at one common location. It could also be opened up to the public to allow other interested parties the ability to comment and contribute.
The author also talks about how many people who blog find it to be a good learning tool as bloggers are always looking for new information to post. He also sees them as a new way to interact. Bloggers often start conversations through comments on each other’s posts and blogs. This in turn can lead to the formation of new relations and continued interaction.
I agree with the author that blogs can be a very useful tool for both workplace communication and individual expression and learning. I also agree with the author that forced blogging will not work. I think blogging should be encouraged, but if it were forced it would lead to many useless blog entries where the information would probably be less than relevant due to a blogger that is just trying to fulfill a requirement instead of offer useful information.
Source: Karrer, T. (2007). Learning and Networking With a BLOG. T+D, Vol. 61 Issue 9, p20-22
This article has a good overview of how blogs can be a positive influence for individuals, groups, and organizations. Until just recently, I had always looked at blog as a way for an individual to convey themselves. Never before had I thought about how a business or organization could implement a blog.
The author suggests that using a blog for communication within a group can be very effective. E-mail can be hard to keep up with as employees have to make sure it keeps getting sent to the right people. A blog is a good way of simplifying this by allowing multiple users to post and comment on information at one common location. It could also be opened up to the public to allow other interested parties the ability to comment and contribute.
The author also talks about how many people who blog find it to be a good learning tool as bloggers are always looking for new information to post. He also sees them as a new way to interact. Bloggers often start conversations through comments on each other’s posts and blogs. This in turn can lead to the formation of new relations and continued interaction.
I agree with the author that blogs can be a very useful tool for both workplace communication and individual expression and learning. I also agree with the author that forced blogging will not work. I think blogging should be encouraged, but if it were forced it would lead to many useless blog entries where the information would probably be less than relevant due to a blogger that is just trying to fulfill a requirement instead of offer useful information.
Source: Karrer, T. (2007). Learning and Networking With a BLOG. T+D, Vol. 61 Issue 9, p20-22
Is change always good?
John Morton. Facing the Future. American Journalism Review, April/May, 2007, p. 68.
The Internet has rocked the newspaper industry in many ways, and in the process, has triggered a reevaluation of everything newspapers do-from gathering and reporting news to the reduction of print circulation, to increasing local news coverage, reducing staff, merging departments and increasing interaction with readers. Yet, a concern remains about how national and international news will be gathered and distributed-not to mention relevant.
The author presents a double-barreled argument of concerns. As examples, he looks to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution and the Gannett chain of newspapers that he shows are moving on similar paths. One feature of the metamorphosis is in the emergence of “hyperlocal” coverage- the over-serving of “very, very” local news coverage. Along with this new style of coverage is an interactive communication with readers that results in major portions of content becoming blogs, reader polls and message boards that are not news in the traditional sense at all. Going further, there is now encouragement for readers to become news-gatherers by sending in photos and observations of breaking events.
Coupled with the change in news coverage is the deliberate lessening of print circulation, with a resulting loss of professional news staff. This leads to a concern that there are not enough professional journalists for comprehensive news-gathering. Most galling to the author is his perception of how journalistic standards and quality have declined. Overall, he concludes that while change is inevitable, the change newspapers have experienced is not good.
Here’s what I think: the author quotes all the right facts and comes to all the wrong conclusions.
Newspapers have been under siege for over a generation and the strongest have survived. Looking back to the 1950s, most metropolitan areas had at least two daily papers-and many had more than two. By the 1980s, competition from television, coupled with the emergence of two-income households that limited the time available to read more than one daily paper started the decline in circulation, which lead to the demise of some papers and the combination of others (at least from a business, or “back-office” perspective). The 90s brought fresh competition at the beginning of the decade from the newly respectable cable news outlets, and the resulting emergence of the 24 hour news cycle. Newspapers were technologically incapable of keeping up. Late in the decade the quick public acceptance of the World Wide Web with its virtually unlimited supply of information made newspapers look like an anachronism.
In commerce, like life, there is a basic mechanism of nature called survival of the fittest. This was seen to a degree after the introduction of television, and it is being seen even more clearly today. The idea is not providing news and advertising printed on broadsheets. The idea is providing news and advertising that meets the needs of the news consumer. That means providing the information the consumer wants, in the detail, form, and fashion the consumer wants it, when the consumer wants it. The problem is that no-one has yet figured out what this means. Certainly, no one has developed a model that achieves the holy grail of attracting both consumers and paying advertisers.
That could change soon. For some reason (there are lots of speculations as to why), interest in the presidential campaign is higher than it has been for many election cycles. It may be that this renewed interest in news will attract more advertising to the new on-line offerings, which will allow them to afford more people to do more things to improve the product, thus beginning a new cycle of news-gathering and innovation.
There is one thing that author Morton and I agree on. The web will rule the future of newspapers. Succeeding at their web offerings is critical to their future.
Reference:
Morton, John. Facing the Future. American Journalism Review, April/May, 2007, p. 68.
The Internet has rocked the newspaper industry in many ways, and in the process, has triggered a reevaluation of everything newspapers do-from gathering and reporting news to the reduction of print circulation, to increasing local news coverage, reducing staff, merging departments and increasing interaction with readers. Yet, a concern remains about how national and international news will be gathered and distributed-not to mention relevant.
The author presents a double-barreled argument of concerns. As examples, he looks to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution and the Gannett chain of newspapers that he shows are moving on similar paths. One feature of the metamorphosis is in the emergence of “hyperlocal” coverage- the over-serving of “very, very” local news coverage. Along with this new style of coverage is an interactive communication with readers that results in major portions of content becoming blogs, reader polls and message boards that are not news in the traditional sense at all. Going further, there is now encouragement for readers to become news-gatherers by sending in photos and observations of breaking events.
Coupled with the change in news coverage is the deliberate lessening of print circulation, with a resulting loss of professional news staff. This leads to a concern that there are not enough professional journalists for comprehensive news-gathering. Most galling to the author is his perception of how journalistic standards and quality have declined. Overall, he concludes that while change is inevitable, the change newspapers have experienced is not good.
Here’s what I think: the author quotes all the right facts and comes to all the wrong conclusions.
Newspapers have been under siege for over a generation and the strongest have survived. Looking back to the 1950s, most metropolitan areas had at least two daily papers-and many had more than two. By the 1980s, competition from television, coupled with the emergence of two-income households that limited the time available to read more than one daily paper started the decline in circulation, which lead to the demise of some papers and the combination of others (at least from a business, or “back-office” perspective). The 90s brought fresh competition at the beginning of the decade from the newly respectable cable news outlets, and the resulting emergence of the 24 hour news cycle. Newspapers were technologically incapable of keeping up. Late in the decade the quick public acceptance of the World Wide Web with its virtually unlimited supply of information made newspapers look like an anachronism.
In commerce, like life, there is a basic mechanism of nature called survival of the fittest. This was seen to a degree after the introduction of television, and it is being seen even more clearly today. The idea is not providing news and advertising printed on broadsheets. The idea is providing news and advertising that meets the needs of the news consumer. That means providing the information the consumer wants, in the detail, form, and fashion the consumer wants it, when the consumer wants it. The problem is that no-one has yet figured out what this means. Certainly, no one has developed a model that achieves the holy grail of attracting both consumers and paying advertisers.
That could change soon. For some reason (there are lots of speculations as to why), interest in the presidential campaign is higher than it has been for many election cycles. It may be that this renewed interest in news will attract more advertising to the new on-line offerings, which will allow them to afford more people to do more things to improve the product, thus beginning a new cycle of news-gathering and innovation.
There is one thing that author Morton and I agree on. The web will rule the future of newspapers. Succeeding at their web offerings is critical to their future.
Reference:
Morton, John. Facing the Future. American Journalism Review, April/May, 2007, p. 68.
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