Snow Crash

As I continue to read Snow Crash it gets more and more intersting, and I anticpate what is to come. Now that the drug Snow Crash has come into play and Raven the book is complicated. Some parts of the book is confusing at parts, pt overall I understand it. It has many references to religion and the Bible, which I found interesting. I liked the fact that Stephenson brings history and actual information into the book and work it in, because it seems to be more real. The characters in the book make it interesting as well. At this point I just finished chapter 32 in the book when Y.T. gets the sample of Snow Crash. This is a very important part of the book because it lets them have the access to examine the virus and determine ways to come up with a possible anti-virus., which could end up helping Da5id. The fact that Da5id is in the hospital from the drug Snow Crash is weird because he got it through the Metraverse. Overall, I am halfway through the book and the climax is coming soon with everthing coming together. I am excited to see what happens with the rest of the book.

NeoVox Article

For the NeoVox article I am choosing social networking as professor reid listed on Web-CT. I think that the websites such as myspace and facebook bring all different types of people together. As for facebook it is more of a college oriented website, but it is expanding. I like this because it helps me keep in touch with friends I might of not talked to and even leave small messages for people I see evryday in college. I have a myspace account as well, but this site is different because it can be used by anyone over the age of 13 and there are many potential stalkers on this site and poeple can easily lie about many things. I think that this would be a good topic because it relates to students like us and I'm sure many if not all college students between the ages of 17-23ish have facebook and a good amount would have mysoace as well.

Snow Crash

Before I started reading this book I knew I was going to like it from the small summary on the back of the book. It is a very interesting book of a futuristic world where technology seems almost boundless. I like the concept of the Metraverse where people just sign into it and can see and talk to people. It's AIM on a whole new and advanced level. The only problem with somthing like this program is that it could consume a person's life and when it comes down to it, it is only virtual reality and not real life. I like the concept of the book so far and I currently just finished chapter 15 where Hiro meet Raven who gave Da5id Snow Crash. I look foward to reading and finishing the book.

Reading Assignment #5

Rheingold talks about the potential threats of smart mobs on page 185 in Chapter 8. He lists three main ones which are: 1) Threats to liberty - government snooping on citizens. 2) Threats to quality of life - deteriorate communities. And 3) Threats to human dignity - the more we use machines to run our lives, the less humane we become. These are serious problems that we must face in order to make sure that they do not occur or our lives might end up becoming worse of then it is. This new technology could end up ruining us in the long run. One thing that could be done to fix some of these problems could be "safety nets" where people would monitor, warn, and aid each other by using wearing computers. "Surveillance will become a threat to liberty and dignity" as Rheingold states on page 188. If all of our movements are watched then there will be no such thing as privacy anymore and people rights of freedom will be taken away.

The book also points out that humans pay attention to other peoples facial expressions and tone of voice. With this information that we gather from other people "we make social decisions and life and death decisions" from page 192. With artificial intelligence it could be hard to determine these things and they would skew our judgements of people. On the following page the book refers to peoples time. It has been studied taht people have more leisure time in their day, but people say that they are busier, because it must be filled by something so that there is no lost time. Smart mobs have to compete with peoples time so that the people will use the new technology.

In the "posthuman era" artificial intellingence would lead to the abondonment of the human body. This would not be good because if we go to a world a AI and forget about the biological body it will effect us negativly.

Reading Assignment #4

Chapter 7 in Smart Mobs discusses "Generation Txt." Texting was a way that President Joseph Estrada of the Philippines was impeached. t was a peaceful way to do it and it was very effective. All that people did was take their cell phones out of their pockets and text other people to coordinate a peaceful demonstration. Over a million people showed up over four days and the President was toppled. This is not the only demonstration of smart mobs at work. It states on page 158 four more examples.

Netwars have emerged from this new technology. It has been used by a wide variety of people " "from terrorists and criminal organizations to militant social activists" quoting from page 162. On one side of this it is helpful to our military and would benefit us from many different threats and aid us in wartime, but on the other if terrorists were using new technology against us it could be very harmful tot he country.

Later on in the chapter Rheingold talks about "Lovegety and p2p Journalism"on page 164. On this page and the following page he has different bullet points of the many ways that people can now talk and contact each other using new technology. An example that he shows is the Lovegetty which was put out by the Japanese. It is a keychain device that singnals the wearer when a person, that also has a Lovegetty, of the opposite sex and a compatible profile is within fifteen feet of you. It is a new way to meet people you might have never of gone up to before. They also have a version for people of the same sex "Gaygar" that was introduced in North America. One concern in which all of this technology brings is privacy. There has to be some form of protection that would have to be made so people's profiles and personal information will not be leeked out into the public.

Reading Assingment #3

Chapter 6 discusses the concept of wireless technologies. On page 135 Rheingold discusses that this technology is "a cost effective way to bring high speed to the connection to people" This is productive since it is a way to reduce the price. Also on page 135 and onto 136 it has bullet points that discuss the ways that wireless networks will disrupt existing social arrangements. It goes into the new things that will emerge to wireless technology.

The book also goes on to talk about the electromagnetic spectrum, which at first may sound boring, but in reality is important. Since the military owns most of the spectrum only a little amount is left open to the public in which they would have to but this unlicensed use. Thsi is mostly used by telephone companies and wirelss networks.

One concept that is a problem which is mention later on in this chapter is "war driving" which is people who roam areas for wireless networks that are put out by companies. Not only are people getting free internet access but the unauthorized users will be able to obtain information that is confidential for that company. This is a problem that would have to be discussed and more secure ways would have to be made to fic this.

Reading Assignment #2

In Chapter 5 Rheingold talk about the free-rider This is people who use programs and take things from them such as dowloading music or videos from a certain program, but do not contribute to the program in any way. This is not good because if a big percentage of the the users are free-riders then the program will eventually be shut down due to lack of material being put into the program. There is also the flip side of the problem which Rheingold discusses as "hordes of compulsive contributors" on page 119, where there are too many users that contribute material.

Later on in the chapter, reputation is discussed. Rheingold says that good reputation must be built over time, and good reputation is needed for a program to be succesful. People build reputation by being honest sellers on sites such as e-bay and other buy/sell sites. When a persons reputation grows more and more people would be inclined to do buisness with that person. On page 127, cheating reputation is discussed. The main ways to cheat reputation are "ballot stuffing" which is to have people give unfairly high ratings, "shilling" which is conspiring to boost each others reputation, and "bad Mouthing", which is giving unfairly low ratings. A defense against this is to drop the highest and lowest and most frequently show ratings. I think that this is a good idea of how to run a site as long as cheaters are minimized.

Reading Assingment #1

Chapter 4 brings many new technologies into the world that would change a lot of things. In this chapter smart Rooms are discussed which would be an amzing advancement in technology. The smart rooms make me think of the Holo Decks in Star Trek and the possibilties could be endless of what people can achieve with technology. One thing that also come up with the mention of all this new technology is privacy. This is also discussed in the book, and I feel that our privacy should be somthing that should be protected first. I know I would not want people to know where I am from a chip that could be on my shirt and I would not want anyone to know what I am doing. It would be an invasion of my privacy, and I would feel as if I would not be able to do anything I don not want others to knbow about. It would kind of keep a lease on people and make them hold back some of the things they might want to do.
Also with more and more technology coming there would be less of a need more actual people to do work because a computer or something else more sophisticated would take that job. This would first make people lose jobs making it harder for some poorer families to survive, and it could also make poeple lazier. If there was some form of technology that did everything that a regular person does on a day to day basis that person might just end up doing nothing at all. I do not belive this to be a good thing.
When the book started talking about virtual reality and artifical intelligence, it made me think about the movie I Robot with Will Smith. Now I know this is a far stretch, but i suppose it could possibly happen. With VR technology coming there could be endless possiblities with what could occur. I am excited about what this book has to offer for the future, with the many ideas and new invetions that it has, but I am also a little bit wary of what will be in store for us way farther in the future.