Week 5 Tutorial Task!

Well this task we were asked to Discuss what the differences between MSN and a 3D Chat form are. Clearly i am using MSN as my first and www.habbohotel.com.au as my example of a 3D chat form. Apart from the 3D graphics that HabboHotel has that MSN doesn't, There are lost of other qualative differences between the 2 forms of online chat.

Firstly HabboHotel and MSN are forms of online chats,anyone can sign up to use them however, MSN is between you and contacts you have aproved, HabboHotel is an open chat between you and everyone else in the little virtual rooms, everyone in that room can view the conversations you are having and the people within these rooms could be just anyone from anywhere in the world. I prefer MSN type chats to things like HabboHotel, although HabboHOtel offers the 3D virtual world aspect of chat which can make it more interesting, MSN is safer and you can control you and who can't talk to you.

When you sign up for HabboHotel, You get taken to the character generator. You can create your little Habbo Person to look like anything you want. Hair colour , skin colour and clothing.It is intended for you to create the character to resemble yourself. However this is almost never the case, there is no way to know if the person you're chatting to is even the same gender as their online character. Similarily, MSN has display pictures, again intended to display a photo of yourself, and again this is not always the case. Its not hard to put up a fake photo. However at least on MSN you can accept people you know and decline those you don't on HabboHotel it is an open chat to anyone.

HabboHotel seems to be more for entertainment value than actual serious conversations and meeting people( this would be a very unsafe way to do so anyway!)

Another thing, HabboHotel you can play for free, it is a chat but also a game, where you can pay real money to buy HabboHotel Credits to furnish your house, buy new clothes, do certain activities within the hotel virtual world. MSN is 100% free for anyone and there is no game aspect to it, aside from the little games you can play within conversationg, checkers, chess cards etc.

With HabboHotel your email can also be banned from use of the site, if say your character was reported for acting and or speaking inappropriately within the Chat world. MSN does not to my knowledge block users emails from using it.

Looking at the Pro's and Con's of HabboHotel and MSN, I have found that MSN a more private personal means of communication which provides that safe feeling when using it. As MSN gives you the option to choose who you can and can not talk to on its program. Although MSN display pictures can be unreliable, MSN also incorporates the use of web cameras,( if they have one installed) so you can view live who you are chatting to. The conversations are private between you can the person you're chatting to,Unlike HabboHotel which the entire room views your conversations. HabboHotel can be fun if you're into the game aspect of it, but in the sense of creating lasting relationships it comes in second to MSN because of the publicness of the chat and as well as the fact the other people playing can be whoever they wany through the virtual characters on the screen.

The photo on this blog is MY HabboHotel character. as well as a photo of me.. pretty similar i would say.

weeeeeeeek 5!

This weeks lecture was pretty darn informing and hilarious( i realised after the types of people i was laughing at in the lecture was actually people like me) we talked about A new era of internet is called Web 2.0. Web 2.0 is web that is about people. The difference between the old web and Web 2.0 is folksomy which categorises and organises knowledge. This is a user generated content. There are also open API'S which are web pages that you can share information openly. And don't forget the social media websites,web blogs social network services and context sharing communities which are new kinds of communities. The economy of accumulation is someone who can have information about you

We watched a funny video on twitter and how its just undeeded updates on what people do every second of the day. I realised that most of society are exhibitionists now, its like we seem to have to and need to let everyone know what they are doing and what they thinking every day!

I personally, don't see the harm in it. I think its given people a new confidence in expressing themselves. And sure you'll get some nut cases who think facebook and twitter is everything, but generally i think people on a whole are smarter than that, and that all these social networking sites will die out just like every other fad that sweeps the internet.( remember yahoo chat rooms? yeah.. they were the bomb.. now they're barely used.)

Week 4 Lecture and Tutorial Task

The videos in today's lecture were so funny! I thought it was equally funny when he asked if anyone downloaded movies, and everyone hesitated, looked around and kept their hands down! AS IF! everyone does it! Just no one will openly admit to it!

It was so weird to see what videos online were like back in the day, bad quality, tiny pixilated.. Boy did those video's bring me back to my childhood! ooooh reminiscing in a lecture how lovely!

We learnt about search engines, the different types. The forgotten ones.. google reigns supreme these days over every other search engine.

yahoo was the first search engine I was ever shown and I at some point made the switch to Google.

During the tutorial i learnt words like b00lean, and how to search for specific things using little symbols in your searchers around certain words...( I have this all written down, but it is late, and im tucked up in bed with my laptop and dont want to go get my uni books thank you!) i will update this some other time!) During the tutorial we were also asked to complete for our blogs a list of questions, finding the answers with other means to google. This seemed easy enough. And i made a good attempt using yahoo and bing ... i did not like these search engines at all, i had to constantly narrow down my searches with the aformentions symbols before i found anything of any use. Then i just got frustrtaed and went to google, which had the information i needed first search! Cheers Google! ( ohhh does that mean i failed the tutorial task :S I got most with yahoo and bing!)

Here they are!
1.) What did Alan Turing wear while riding his bicycle around Bletchley Park?
-- A gas mask!

2.) On what date did two computers first communicate with each other? Where were they?
-- 1969 in UCLA

3.) What is Bill Gates' birthday and what age was he when he sold his first software?
-- 28th. October 1955. At the age of 19, he sold the software of a basic computer

4.) Where was the World Wide Web invented?
-- In Switzerland

5.) How does the power of the computer you are working on now compare with the power of a personal computer from 30 years ago?
-- 3000 times faster (wow)

6.) What is the weight of the largest parsnip ever grown?
-- no idea ..

7.) When did Queensland become a state and why is the Tweed River in New South Wales?
-- June of 1859

8.) What was the weather like in south-east Queensland on 17 November 1954?
-- Heavy October rains which led to flooding.

9.) Why is Lord Byron still remembered in Venice?
-- no idea ..

10.) What band did Sirhan Chapman play in and what is his real name?
-- The band was called "Black Assassins" and his real name is "Steven Stockwell".


~*~*~*~*~*~*~

How do search engines rank the stuff they find on the internet?

They're ranked by relevance and the keywords that you search.

Who, or what, makes one page (that you might get in your search results) more useful than another one, so that it is put at the top of your search results?

If what you searched matches any exact parts of the text, matching keywords through out the relevant page/ in the title of the page

What are some of your favourite search engines? Why do you like one more than others?

Google! it has a larger data base, fast searches and almost 100% of the time will bring up usefull results for your specific search.

Week 3 tutorial task!

Here is my week 3 tutorial task!
I'll admit, i was lazy and just searched " new communication technologies" in google...however i got this hilarious video about the advancments in communication technologies and how we keep making everything even more compact than the last!

* How long have you been using these communication technologies?

As long as I can remember, before grade 1. Computers were and still are a huge part of my family

*What influenced you to start using these particular technologies? How did you find out about them?
My Dad had a real passion for computers and any sort of new technology( he had a masters in IT from UQ), we would all have the best computers and hardware available at the moment they came out! My uncle is an IT technician, and my older brother is studying IT. I'm a big gamer and so is most of my family and friends.

*Is privacy an issue for you when using new technologies? What do you think of companies like Facebook and Google who collect information about their users? (How do you deal with issues around privacy?)

I was well aware of privacy issues with the internet and terms and service agreements before this course. The internet is a safe place if you're not stupid when using it. i.e clicking on spam advertisments, downloading unknown files, giving out personal information on public servers etc! I don't have a problem with facebook collecting information about its users, it could be used to help in legal matters and they're only using the information for their needs( just dont tell them your exact street adress :P)


* Do you have friends whom you know only from the internet and have never met in person? Is this different to people that you know in person? Describe the difference.
Yes i have friends online that i have never met in person, and i also have friends i met online that i have met in person. The difference with an online friend you've never met i think would be trust. You would never 100% know that the thing they say, what they look like, their gender, what they look like etc are true. On the internet its easy as 1-2-3 to make a false identity. So you always have to be aware of this.

Week 3 Blog!

This lecture was about...from what i gathered off the notes as this was the EKKA show holiday!.. the language of the cinema...

We were showed a list of different camera shots used in cinematography, and here it is!
VLS/WS: Very LS/Wide
Shot
LS: Long Shot
MLS: Medium LS
MS: Mid Shot
MCU: Medium CU
CU: Close Up
BCU: Big CU
ECU: Extreme CU
We were told how different shots were used to help show emotion....and how other shots can answer certain questions about and extenuate what is being shown.

Close up of character= WHO?
Mid shot of character= WHAT?( the character is doing)
Close up of clock= WHEN?
Close up of something on a character= WHY?
Variety of shots= HOW?

Head room is also discussed in this ( i am a professional at taking photos, I have a vain mum and step dad who love having their photo's taken and if the space above their heads and to the sides and below isn't correct, you have to take the photo again... you learn fast.)

A person being show without proper head room and proper talking room can detract from the films quality(i.e looks shoddily made)

Peace Out

Week 2 Lecture!

From this weeks lecture, I would like to start off by giving a BIG thank you to my man Charles Babbage, if it wasn't for this wonderful man i wouldn't have the little thing i couldn't live without called the computer! ( and i wouldn't be able to write this blog ) Its nice to know who it was that brought so much joy into my childhood! I feel sorry for anyone who grew up without a computer! ( no offence to your mum) The history in this weeks lecture was quite interesting, all about the history behind computers and how they were being commercially sold by the 1950's and the history behind all the people that made it happen .Looking at how it started, who back then would have even imagined that it would be as wireless and wonderful as it is now!

Computers were slowing advancing at first, the first personal computer was released in 1975. A man called Bill Gates set up his own business in his garage called microsoft. It was clear then that when computers started becoming more advanced and more available that there would be massive boom in the market for them. And companies (IBM for example) that decided to get into the PC business were right on the money.( ahem Bill Gates=Worlds richest man)


Definitions!!

The Internet= a network of networks' which contain servers, mainframes and personal computers. The internet can be connected by; the telephone system, broad-band cable and satellite.

A Fact:

- The idea of the internet came about in the 1960's by the RAND corporation.

The RAND corporation teamed up with other researchers and their idea called packet switching and started working on a networking program.

Fact:
-From the 1960's to the 1990's the worldwide web was born.
-The web is not the same as the internet

The Web brings together both internetworking and hypertext to make an easy to use global system

Definitions!!

Cyberspace= the interconnection of reality and imagination

Karl Popper he wrote about the nature of reality and how it is divided into three worlds.

1st: the objective material world of natural things and their physical properties.

2nd: subjective consciousness: intentions, calculations, feelings, thoughts, dreams, memories, etc in individual minds.

3rd: the public structures produced by living minds interacting with each other and the real world.

I hope that was understandable!

Week 1 Lecture Overview

In the very first lecture i had in New Communication Technologies the lecturer introduced and explained what new communication technologies actually are. To give us all a more theoretical devates of the things we use in every day life. He went on to explain the types of things we would be looking at in this course such as the internet, wireless, social networking sitesand youtube.

Definitions!!!

Communication= a process that transfers, transmits or makes information known to other people

Technology= the scientific study of mechanical arts and their application to the world

The most basic type of communication is this : person a (speaker) produces a message that is heard by person b (listener). however this is to slow a form of communication and there is now the growing need to communicate internationally and faster thus the continuing advancement in communication technologies.

regarding technology, there are 2 different types; digital and analog. Digital technology relies on storing bits of binary information that allows the precise modification of forces. Where as analog is a technology that functions by representing continuously variable forces through roughly proportional signs.



And thats what i leanrt this week folks!

New Comm And Me <3

My name is Portia,

"hi Portia"

I have a obsession with communication technology

* all clap in support*

I am one of the biggest internet whores ( oops naughty word ). Started at a young age by my father ( well this just started sounding VERY wrong) who had a masters in IT, so it was natural that we would have every piece of new computer, new software, new hardware. As quickly as technology was advancing we seemed to be getting it within an instant of it being released.

I haven't known a life without communication technology,( computers, mobiles, telephones, the internet) and quite frankly I don't want to! Its been a part of my life for as long as i can remember and i don't know what i would do without it! I would die without my mobile phone, which i seem to replace and update quite regularly!

I'm an avid user/ tryer-out-er of any new internet anything! Games, social networking sites, chat rooms, forums, video sharing... ( all aformentioned yet not limited to)

I have acocunt on facebook, myspace, twitter, hotmail, yahoo, google, msn, skype,bebo, myyearbook,WAYN, runscape, WoW, blogger and probably countless other sites i signed up for to have a sticky beak at!

without the use of these communication technologies I wouldn't be able to, as easily, keep in contact with friends and family that live far away from me! I lived overseas during alot of my childhood and can still stay in close contact with the friends I grew up with in those countries. Its not the same as if i was to see them every so often, but it helps to stay connected.
I would also not have been able to meet some of the wonderful friends i now have! ( on that, be careful who you meet off the internet, they could be anyone, identity change via the internet is the easiest thing to do!)

I have always been aware of sites terms and conditions and privacy issues. So learning this in the course was not new to me ( although some people in the lecture were incredibly shocked at this!)

I am always careful to ensure all my pages are on private and that i keep personal informations( where i live, where i work, address, phone numbers, where i went to school, where i go to uni) completely private and only available to those i have approved to view it.

In short, i love the internet, i love my phone, but they should be used wisely(i.e dont google while driving, dont text while driving) so you dont end up being stalked, or spammed or putting yourself in any sort of personal danger because of the information you have put up on there!

TTFN
Ta Ta For Now!

First Blog!

Well so it seem's that for this course I am required to keep a weekly blog... Gee new communication technologies....I'm not...Wonder Woman...

So this is my first blog! Welcome! I'm Portia and I'm a happy-go-lucky scamp! I'm beauty and the geek all in one package! Apart from being everyone's favourite cracker I'm a bit of a n00b ( if you're internet and game savvy you'll understand that one or probably would if you were a teeny bopper who hangs out in huge groups in the cities being plain annoying). Some words to describe me....

-Vain
-Sexy mofo
- Egotistical
- Narcississtic
- nOOb
-Eccentric
-Self centered
-Not a REAL woman( apparently?)
-Masoginist
-Geek

(maybe i should stop before i give a bad impression!)


I am studying a BA of communications!And am hoping it will get me into some PR work when i have my degree! This blog as you may have guessed from above is for my class new communication technologies!

Until next time,
Live long and prosper