amy.markel’s Neighborhood

• Physorg weather modelling article

    This device helps track storms and weather. The National Supercomputer Center has already started to kick ahead in this race to compute weather changes. Its very important for us to fully understand what weather can do and how we can prevent hard-core damage towards our fragile ecosystem as well as our lives. Thats just what Blixt does. it helps in forcasting weather from the land and sea weather. But is it enough?

Summary: This article, straight from the Indian Times web site, explains that India's government is working to expand its current success of satellite education in remote places of the country. The Indian government has established 250 centers to provide education to Indian children in remote locations, and that can be used to teach large groups of children in remote areas that perhaps only have a telephone line for communication. Because of its success so far, the Indian government is working on plans to expand this already positively-impacting school system.

Relative SEI Issues:

• Reliability: Think being snowed in is the only way for school to get out unexpectedly? How about if your satellite goes down? Many of India's children could go without school for weeks at a time, if the technology had enough problems.
  
• Integrity: Using this system, it is possible that the government or some other entity could corrupt the information that is being disseminated to the students as a sort of super-propaganda tool.
  
• Intellectual Property: When all this information is being spread around India, who is getting paid for writing and creating all the curriculum and stuff? The Indian government would need to make sure to pay the right people the right amount (although this is about the same for history books, etc, so it probably is not a very important issue).
  
• Equality of Access: This satellite school system is improving the equality of access to education for people all across India. But what about those kids who don't have a telephone connection?
  
• Control: Is the Indian government the only entity that is going to distribute and filter the curriculum that gets around to the youth of India? Should they have the control? If they are corrupted, who is going to keep them in check?
  
• Globalization and Cultural Diversity: What kind of information is being disseminated to the children of India? Is it American culture, or Indian culture? If all of the children of the world get onto this satellite system, what will that do to the cultural diversity of the world?
  
• Policies and Standards: What kind of rules should be put in place for the curriculum these children are getting?  If this system were used in a theocratic society, would the curriculum be tailored to suit that religion, or something else? Would all the students in India be subjected to a standard level of education, or will that be tailored to the student as well?
  
• People and Machines: What happens to teachers if everyone switches over to the satellite school? It would put a lot of educators into the unemployment line, but it could boost those people who will regulate and help teach the students (via live chatting, telecommunication, etc).
  

ORIGINAL ARTICLE:
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/India/ISRO_to_help_MP_in_promoting_satellite_education/articleshow/2571589.cms

Article, summary, and SEI ratings submitted by Annie Pasquinelli

This Article was talking about the equality of Education. How it is set up unfair that not all people can join AP classes. Even if schools allow everybody to take AP classes they still discourage the kids that aren't as smart. Because the kids will fail or get a really low grade.

1. Reliability- It wouldn't be reliable for the average kids to pass the AP classes.
2. Integrity- This might not have integrity because if they had a lot of average students in AP classes than they might not grade the same. If they didn't want to end up failing the average people than they might lower their standards on the grades. And that would loose the integrity in the AP classes.
3. Security –   There is no security.
4. Privacy and Anonymity- There would be just as much privacy and anonymity in the AP classes as every other class.
5. Authenticity- There wouldn't be Authenticity. If everybody was allowed in to AP classes than there would be nothing Authetic about the class.
6. Intellectual Property- The intellectual property wouldn't be the same if everybody was in the class.
7. Equality of Access- There a lot of equality of access because everybody would be allowed to be in the classes.
8. Control- They don't have control over who is in the classes.
9. Globalization and Cultural Diversity- It doesn't make you as diverse if the smart people are in the smart people classes with the dumb people.
10. Policies and Standards- The policies and standards would change because there wouldn't be any standards that you would have to have to get into the AP classes.
11. People and Machines- It would change the peoples look on education. AP classes wouldn't look as good on transcripts if everybody had an AP class on their transcripts. And that would slitely effect their jobs. So they would just get smart machines to take over their jobs.

ORIGINAL ARTICLE:
http://www.helium.com/tm/205937/think-order-possible-schools

Article, summary, and SEI ratings submitted by Shelby Murphy. 

a project offered by HumanWare called BrailleNote, helps blind individuals to communicate over the use of a keyboard
that includes the use of browsing the internet, downloading, word processor also allowing the blind to communicate with anyone using the palm pilot.

ORIGINAL ARTICLE:

Welcome, ITGS students (and the omnipresent Mr. Ball), to the Table 3A Education blog. This forum is to discuss the educational impact of IT developments. Articles will be added to this site; feel free to read about them and blog about them in constructive, rational sentences and paragraphs. Several rules are in place, however, and they are as follows:

    -Nothing over Rated PG. Sorry, people, but for the safety of everyone involved, there will be no foul language,
    no nudity, etc, or the comment will be deleted IMMEDIATELY. This includes personal harassment.

    -Bash ideas, not people. Yes, this is a very important aspect of a well-argued debate: There's no name-calling
    or other such degrading nonsense if someone's opinion is different than yours ("ur a ******* idiot!!!" comments will         result in immediate exclusion from the blog debate). Please use logical sentences and paragraphs, express your         opinion fully and equitably, and show flaws in the opposition's points in a way that does nothing to belittle them         personally.

    -This is an open debate: No personal information. Sure, maybe no one knows your address, but it doesn't
    take much to know how to find you on the Internet. Please do not include impertinent personal information, e.g.
    phone numbers, identification numbers, etc. Nothing is private on the Web (as Mr. Ball is sure to have pointed
    out to you already). Protect us. Protect yourself.

By posting a comment on this blog, you are adding yourself to this online debate and are eligible to be removed from any more inclusion in this educational discussion. However, as long as you abide by the rules stated above and prove yourself to have a valuable opinion to us, please feel free to express yourself as fully as you can! This is meant to be a learning experience, so have fun, and welcome to the blog!

-Management, Table 3A
  

By Ryan Pearson
Summary by Rochelle O'Bryant

Summary: Marvel Entertainment Inc., a major comic book company, has started uploading their comics to the internet, in an attempt to reach out to more kids. They say kids aren't leaving the house to go pick up comics anymore, so if they can reach them in "kids lifestyle space," they'll have a bigger fanbase. The biggest idea behind this is to post teasers in hopes of driving kids to buy the comics. The hope is to advertise in their everyday space, get them hooked with previews, and then reel them in to buy. They're also uploading them to everyday social networks, such as myspace, so they're readily available to almost every kid online.

Social/ethical issues: Equality of access. Not everyone has the internet, so not everyone can view the comics. The biggest problem with this, is what if the stores stop carrying the comics (or they become hard to find) then kids who don't have internet can't read comic books at all! Or collectors who buy every issue for their collections, and now, they're all digital. The collector won't want to print out every page...so how do you buy comics online, when you don't have internet?

To Find this article, go to: the Register Guard.

ABUSE FIGHT TARGETS SOCIAL SITES.
Article by Rory Cellan-Jones, BBC
Summary by Evan Thomsen

The Child Exploitation and Online Protection Center (CEOP) have found that sex offenders and other criminals are using social network sites like MySpace, Facebook to find people, especially children to take advantage of. So what is the solution? Some sites including MSN Messenger, have installed a "button" on their sites that connects directly to the police whenever someone feels violated enough to press the alarm. Also, social networks like MySpace have included a ban on any person who is 14 or younger. New algorithms and search engines look for and flag words and characteristics on people's accounts to prove that they are lying about their age. The account is then deleted. In Britain CEOP is conducting conversations and negotiations with social network creators to integrate more safety for their users.

SOCIAL ETHICAL ISSUES:
    Obviously two of the largest issues are security and privacy. People, for some reason, believe that what they do on the internet is safe, and private. Of course we know that they are sadly mistaken. But this integrated alarm button will at least discourage more people who believe that social sites are easy marks for unsuspecting children.
    The new algorithms and search engines appear to be able to search through any person's account, and delete it based on something as complicated as language. What if the program is wrong? What if the program finds and deletes a site that is being used as a collaborative document for homework by high schoolers, and one of the people's little sibling jumps on the computer and types some immature words. Will the algorithms then delete the account even though the user did nothing wrong? It appears that a lot of mistakes and problems could possible arise from these new programs.

Click below for the link to the whole article:
BBC News

The people that are online gambling they lose there money twice as fast. In 2002 the gamblers were suppose to lose $3.5 billion. Every week two million people go to more then 1,800 of the online sites. The people that are charging up the bills are people underage. That shows that this is already causing a problem. Seventy percent of teen kids ages thirteen through seventeen said they have gamble at least once. Underage kids that gamble are associated with other bad behaviors like smoking cigarettes, doing drugs and alcohol.

Social and Ethical Issues:

People and Machines-

People are becoming addicted to computers and causing serious personal issues and potentially ending their life because they are out of money.

Reliability-

The games could malfunction during game play and causing the player to not be able to participate anymore.

Security-

They have a high level of risk or losing their personal information because they have to submit so much information.

THE ACTUAL ARTICLE::::::::

Online gambling costs teenagers and adults
— Newsweek , 10/28/02; Reuters Health, 10/28/02
Those who try their luck on an online, virtual casino lose money twice as fast as their counterparts in a real-life, physical-world casino, according to the operator of one Internet gambling site.
    In 2002, online gamblers were expected to lose some $3.5 billion. Every week about 2 million people visit any of the more than 1,800 virtual casinos, making it one of the Internet's fastest-growing industries.
    Online gambling is an industry that's virtually unregulated, because unlike real-world casinos in the U.S., virtual casinos are operated offshore. Some credit card companies, under pressure from the government, have begun to reject transactions between customers and online casinos, but their measures aren't foolproof.
    Newsweek used a credit card to test the transaction blocking – and it failed, because the transaction was coded, by the online casino, as being made with a French catalog merchant.
    Even more tragically, according to Newsweek, too many times those who are running up bills at online casinos are underage. That means Internet gambling is already adding to a teen gambling epidemic that is causing numerous problems.
    A recent study found that almost 70% of teens age 13-17 said they had gambled at some point in their lives, despite the fact it is illegal for them. Just as troubling, the study also found that about 4% of them exhibit the psychiatric signs of being pathological gamblers.
    "We need to be aware that adolescents gamble, just as adults do," said Dr. Martin Lazoritz, an associate chair of psychiatry at the University of Florida in Gainesville. "They play cards with their friends; they buy lottery tickets. We also need to be aware that underage gambling is associated with several at-risk behaviors, such as cigarette smoking, and with alcohol and drug use."
    The study examined the behavior of 1,051 teenagers in Florida in December 2001.

By Margaret Robertson
Summary by Rochelle O'Bryant

Summary: It's being more and more commonplace for couples to meet online. We're not talking about eHarmony, or match.com; no, some people are meeting on MMO's (Massively Multiplayer Online Game), such as World of Warcraft, Final Fantasy XI, and Everquest. Meeting online can take away a lot of the initial awkwardness that comes with that 'first date'. You can get to know someone first, without any serious intents, and then if you find you like them, you can choose to meet. However, you don't get to see what someone looks like, and it can be harder to catch traits and smaller idiosyncrasies of someone's personality.

Social/ethical issues:

Integrity: Not everyone is who they say they are. You can claim you're everyone - fake name, gender, and pictures.
Privacy/Anonymity: It can be hard to protect your privacy when someone online is actively courting you.
Also, not everyone is who they say they are, so working the opposite way, someone might be '24, blonde-hair blue-eyes and single' and they could be a predator. So opening yourself to finding love via the web can be physically dangerous, too!

Find this article at: BBC News.