velvet robes go digital

members only! but what does it take to be a member? I was doing some research online about the internet and trying to find a journal article to relate to my final essay and stumbled across one about elite social networking sites like Myspace and Facebook but improved. There is now a digital A-List and your not on it. Some of these sites are: Reuters Space, In Mobile, and Diamond Lounge.I did a little research, and signed in to the Diamond Lounge. This website actually requires credentials. i guess it was only a matter of time before every other person wasn't allowed to talk to those that are important. It must be impossible for celebrities to even be a part of the online social networking scene. These sites however aren't just for the social celebs, they are for networking for actual business purposes. The Diamond Lounge is an invitation-only social and business network which relies on a selection committee to pick and choose its members. "The committee has already chosen 100 members out of more than 7,000 applications that came in before Diamond Lounge [diamondlounge.com] went live" (MacMillan and Lehman). This elite membership doesn't come free either - members are required to pay a monthy fee of $600! Members can also exchange gifts to one another as in Facebook where people can buy gifts like teddy bears, hearts and other strange things, but in the Diamond Lounge members can actually buy real items for people and send them like Gucci bags, or offer admission to different business events.

It will be interesting to see where people will take the velvet-rope next.


Source:
Social Networking with the Elite. By: MacMillan, Douglas, Lehman, Paula, Business Week Online, 00077135, 11/16/2007

web spies.

spokeo... this was a simple typeo from my boyfriend one day, and i didnt know what he was talking about, after 10 curious minutes passed, I Googled the damn word. Interesting enough, Spokeo actually is something, something very interesting indeed. Spokeo is an online spy. The website allows you to enter your email information and any contacts that you have saved in your account, the website finds any website those addresses are signed up to and gives you an update on everything they do! There is no hiding anymore. This technology is oh too dangerous, and I refuse to know everything everyone is doing, the truth is I'm afraid of what I will find out about people. The website advertises this fact: Learn something new about your friends....Guaranteed! The site has links to all of the popular sites: myspace, flickr, hi5, facebook, and any other weird porno site your linked to. It appears that the creators of this site don't seem any harm in this, quotes at the bottom say things like "Spokeo finds information about your friends-long-lost or not." or Newsweeks says: “I could have found this information using a search engine like Google, but I would have had to know what I was looking for, and would probably have had to sift through dozens of Web pages.”Lets not sugar coat things here people...this is spying and there is no way you need that much information about your friends. I'm sorry but if some random from my high school found me through this site, I would be a little concerned to say the least. This website is for crazies and psycho jealous girlfriends or boyfriends (which are crazies). I just hope this stupid fad doesn't catch on or ill be changing all my account emails.

www.spokeo.com (a.k.a. the devil)

Compute this!

I am going to complete these blogs, even though there not as important as my many other things to do... how did things ever get accomplished without computers? Without my computer I would fail, thats a no-brainer. Everything that is required of me, requires me to have access to a computer. This machine has transformed everything, and its hard to believe that in my short life time, they have evolved from nothing! Wikipedia describes computers as "a machine that manipulates data according to a list of instructions"... In my previous blog I discussed the programing language that allows us to do the things we do. Getting back to the main point, computers are everywhere. They are in grocery stores, in our cars, airplanes, calculators, digital cameras and even in some children's toys. Its strange to think that the very computer that I am working on to write about computers is capable of computing millions of instructions for anything from word processors to websites. Wikipedia also states that a typical modern computer can execute billions of instructions every second and nearly never make a mistake over years of operation. So why are we all so surprised when our computer freezes or the hard drive crashes. It seems that as dogs have dog years, computers have computer years, and a life span of one computer is at most 8-10 years! In government offices, they incorporate into the budget new computers every 4-5 years. So it seems every human year means 15 computer years...sad really, but how worn would you be with so much use?
The dependence on computers has done nothing but increase over the years since they have been implemented. Computers are where we rent and watch movies, where we stream television shows, were we download (and sometimes buy) our music. We complete homework assignments, and every business is now run by the computer. Our files are now stored electronically, instead of alphabetically in the filing cabinet, mail is almost extinct with the invention of electron mail (e-mail). Pictures are stored within the computer, no one uses real film anymore, and then we post all of our best photos online for the world to see and save until deleted. We used to have to write things by hand! Now, my hand is sore after a long exam. So much has changed, but we are still busy busy. I cant compare really, because I was never in college before computers, but I do see previous posters on display in some spots in the college, obviously people didn't have access to Illustrator, images are literally cut and pasted. The questions then exist, what will we make easier next? and what happens when there is no energy to feed computers, and what happens when Y2K hits?

The future seems promising, but who knows what giant bug lurks on the next hyper link, ready to destroy your life in a fancy 1000 dollar box of wires and microprocessors. Because, thats what it is, your life, your taxes, music, movies, assignments, data...Where would you be without it?

me dot close

I hate programing, and here is why:

Dim outPixelType As rstPixelType
Select Case pInRasProps.PixelType
Case PT_CHAR
outPixelType = PT_LONG
Case PT_COMPLEX
MsgBox "Operation not supported on complex data", vbOKOnly, "Neighborhood Notation"
Exit Sub

All these things mean something, Im just not sure what. Programing has been described as its own language many times and thats because thats what it is. In order to understand this code above you must know the terms and the understand the program that is being coded. There are actually people who can jump into a code fix it, rework it, or break it. We have spent over 4 courses trying to learn the language and its like french to me, i kind of get it. I just feel bad for those people who code all the time. Programming can be one of the most frustrating jobs out there! Such a simple mistake like spelling a code name wrong can screw it up and cause errors. Some of these codes are hundreds of pages long, image something going wrong there.

do you have a second piece?

your identity can be stolen, and its a scary violating thing. The fact that someone is pretending to be you to do something that they dont want to do themselves, is not something Im comfortable with. So how do you loose your identity and can it be lost forever?
The most popular way people go about identity theft is by stealing your credit card information. With just that information, someone could put you in debt and as much as you limit lets them. In most cases these things are traceable and credit card companies have ways to protect their customers from getting screwed over in this case. Aside from getting your credit cards stolen, there are many other important documents that prove you are you. I have never gotten my wallet stolen (knock on wood) but, i do understand it is quite a pain to get all your information back, especially if you have no more to prove you are you. What is the point that you can not prove your identity? We have enough technological advancements that if need we could prove ourselves Im sure we could. Even if we do have identification, it is still not good enough. Bars often ask for more then one piece of ID and airports and other countries expect you to prove you identity with a passport. Even with this information some people are still questioned, its still all up to the person who is in charge, if they don't think you are you, then you will have some serious problems and might miss your flight or have your vehicle searched at a border crossing.
So who are you with out proof?

Google: me

I just "googled" myself just like celebrities do, and i gotta say, I wasn't sure what I would find...
The most surprising thing was that I actually found something! Not much was related to me, a few things about some Amber Paxton on the deans list at the University of Florida and one in Phoenix who had their resume online. I however found something good, something from 2005! I was in a High class Art Exhibition in grade 12 and the pamphlet they gave out with my name on it came out... I tried googling my email address as well, and found a few more cases of what i have done. In way i feel like big brother is watching, but its really just the world wide web. We have lost any privacy we once had and anything can be posted online! With more and more blogs people are writing, you could be a topic and anything someone else says can in most cases not be censored because you dont like it. Has it just not clicked in with us that someday ALL of this stuff will be viewed and will not easily go away? Possible sex tapes and incriminating pictures(100s them) on Facebook, blog posts...where does it end? My next question is about when will it go? How long after Facebook is old will it take for the website to start deleting you crap?If someday the world has a major devastating thing happen to it, will there still be a facebook, what needs to remain the intact in order for websites to still work? I just confused myself...

Im completing a "googling" experiment and seeing what i can dig up...
I found out that Nick Hill is a furniture designer, very interesting indeed.
Nothing on my parents or brother, which isnt surprising because none of them use the internet...
i found brittany's webpage thing from myspace tv... I can also see her list of friends.
Blair spitters from london has an id number of 793 on a website called grenade army list?
Rudy once purchased a Mr. Sandbag Footbag and commented on how fast it got to him.
Martin Healy is well exactly what he is a GIS specialist..boring
Ron Koudys our millionare professor, has a lot to look at (journals, projects completed etc.)

Well Ive never thought about it before but most of us can be found, so just try and hide.

i am so smrt

when i was four years old the most complicated thing that i did was zipping up my own coat. I am so surprise at what kids are capable of these days... my boyfriends niece who just turned four knows how to spell some words like mom and cat, knows how to count to at least 30, ties her own shoes and plays on the computer. This past Christmas she got a computer of her own to hook up to the television, which she does on her own! In the past 15 years, child development has advanced an enormous amount. Spelling, math and other languages are being taught earlier and earlier every year. After nine years of French class my neighbors five year old girl can speak fluently and he parents are English! This little girl also received a guitar for Christmas, and is probably better then me at that too, she has my old piano and I know shes better then I am at that. Another family friend has a four year old boy who has his own four wheeler and can play Playstation like a pro...Another way pop culture is letting us know exactly how stupid we are is with Are You Smarter Then a Fifth Grader? By the way, not many people win this game.
I wonder if kids are getting smarter, we were dumb, or is it because the infinite possibilities children have for development now? I think its somewhere in between. So my next question is why were we so stupid and what is changing? well the reality is that school curriculums are becoming harder and harder and teachers have greater expectations then before. I did a little research into some current curriculums in Ontario schools, and what I found is quite interesting indeed.
Kindergarten:

• Supporting English Language Learners in Kindergarten: A practical guide for Ontario educators, 2007
• Boys' Literacy
• Early Reading Strategy, The Report of the Expert Panel on Early Reading in Ontario, 2003
• Early Math Strategy, The Report of the Expert Panel on Early Math in Ontario, 2003

Since when did we have expectations in KINDERGARTEN and learn math strategies?
Aside from increased demand in the school curriculums, children have been given many more opportunities to learn then generations before them. Thinking as far back to when my parents grew up in the 60s, the only learning tools they had we trolls, Candy Lane and Dominoes. Please tell me how any child can learn from trolls. The 70s had etch-a-sketch and hotwheels and nothing much to stimulate the mind other then the smell of glue and markers. Going back to my childhood Polly Pocket and Barbie taught me nothing other then how to pretend to be a good wife i guess, and I once had laptop that allowed me to type in words and do simple math...very high tech, must of cast a fortune at the time. And now, we have anything your little angel might need, including baby's first video on how to pronounce dada and moma. Im interested to see what happens next, the next thing a four year old will correct me on.