Would you like any toast?

So I'll be the first to admit I was pretty impressed and extremely interested in yesterdays lecture. I had never known of the concept of 'The Internet of Things,' and although like many I had always thought that computers might one day take over the world....I never imagined it happening like this. Bleeker in his article Why Things Matter describes the internet of things as 'a nascent conceptual framework for understanding how physical objects, once networked and imbued with informatic capabilities, will occupy space and occupy themselves in a world in which things were once quite passive.' So does that mean that objects will be given a voice in the world and be able to communicate through the internet? Pretty much.

What interested me in particular was Rfid tags. In some cases they look like this:

Now I only just realised that I've seen these plenty of times inside DVD movie cases and on numerous other products, but I had no idea what they were. Now I understand what they are and how they work. For those who don't here is a little diagram.



Basically a radio signal is sent to the RFID Tag, of which specific data on the tag is returned via the signal and goes into a reader and is uploaded to the network and onto a computer. Pretty cool right?? Now imagine if every object was like a RFID Tag and could communicate to a network much like a social media network. Your car, house, fridge, TV, mobile phone etc could upload information and begin communicating on the internet. The Ericcson video showed in the lecture really opens your eyes to the possibilities and although they may be a long way off, it still illustrates what things make be like in the future. On the other hand the short clip from the minority report shows how organisations can use this to advertise and market to certain consumers, showing a rather negative impact on such an interesting concept.

I thought I'd leave you with a short clip from one of my favourite TV shows Red Dwarf. Just a bit of light British humour to finish off my blogs, but it still provides an idea of what objects might be like in the future. Thanks for reading and commenting on my blogs. All the best!!

Sources: Bleecker, J. (2006) 'Why Things Matter: A Manifesto for networked objects'

The Battle fought in the clouds....Who will win??

I always thought clouds were in the sky....but apparently these days they involve computers. The concept is known as cloud computing and according to infoworld.com is best 'described as "sky computing," with many isolated clouds of services which IT customers must plug into individually.' So what exactly does this mean? My good friend Wikipedia helped me out by explaining Cloud Computing as 'the delivery of computing as a service rather than a product, whereby shared resources, software, and information are provided to computers and other devices as a utility over a network.' In layman's terms this basically we means we can access data, content, apps etc without any fundamental knowledge or need of understanding how we get it. Pretty awesome right? 





Now the problem is which cloud do we choose? This is where Apple, Google and too a lesser extent Microsoft come to the party. Each one is trying to predict the future of the internet by tapping into the concept of cloud computing. What is interesting though is that each is doing it in a rather different way. Apple is continuing to utilise the closed system and walled apps, maintaining complete control over their systems and users. Google on the other hand continues to promote the open source and free platform, providing a huge amount of freely designed apps and with no control over users or content. So what does that mean for us as users? 


Basically it comes down to a choice of the user. According to Hiner Google's focus on the cloud is based heavily on the future and that the internet will be highly accessible and extremely fast, thus allowing access to Google's large cloud of apps, content and innovation. In contrast Apple sees the cloud as a train station, ensuring everything runs on efficiently and on time and everything operates as it should. In this way they are continuing their use of synching, so that data can be on all of the users devices. In my view Google's cloud is trying to be a massive toy shop, containing a huge range of cool stuff you can get, but it seems like it would be very chaotic. For some reason seeing images of shoppers rushing into Myers at 6am on the morning of a sale comes to mind. Apple's cloud on the other hand seems to keep the reliance on the device and that seems to be the main idea, not that of the cloud. Which do you think will win??





On a side note I've only just got a smartphone (A hand me down iPhone 3G...yep old school) and I quite like it. It's easy to use, does everything I need, though the battery life is a bit short. My friend who gave the phone recently got a Samsung Galaxy S2, which if you don't know runs Android, and that is it quite an amazing phone. He loves it due to the amount of weird and wonderful apps he can get, the lack of syncing needed especially when transferring music, and the actual quality of the phone. Again, it's all up to personal choice. I think what Apple has done in terms of complete control is a great thing, I also thing the chance for innovation and freedom is a great thing....which is better....you decide!


Sources: 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cloud_computing
http://www.techrepublic.com/blog/hiner/apple-cloud-vs-google-cloud-the-philosophical-differences/8492
http://www.infoworld.com/d/cloud-computing/what-cloud-computing-really-means-031?page=0,2

The Facebook Revolution...or is it just joining the party....

So although this weeks topic focused on the uprisings of the Middle East I couldn't help but draw my attention to the reasoning behind this....ultimately Social Media Networks. Social Media Networks such as Facebook and Twitter have provided a platform for individuals to construct and organise huge events (In extreme cases social revolutions) with relative ease, speed and connectivity. They spread like wild fire amongst the internet grabbing more and more followers and supporters as they move along, finally ending in mass demonstrations such as those in Tunisia and Egypt, amongst other Middle Eastern Countries. As Evgeny Morozov said in his article Facebook and Twitter are just places revolutionaries go 'I argue that these digital tools are simply, well, tools, and social change continues to involve many painstaking, longer-term efforts to engage with political institutions and reform movements' and this is a view I strongly support. The needs of individuals to continue to push for what they believe in to bring about change or revolution is something that has been going on for a large amount of time, and Social Media Networks simply provide a new platform for doing so. But this is not all they can be used for....

When I first started hearing about the influence of Facebook/Twitter/Youtube on these events I immediately thought of that infamous Facebook party. For those of you who don't know what I'm talking about here's an article Teen's Facebook party cancelled as 200k threaten to show up . Basically a young girls 16th birthday party attracted thousands of Facebook attendees after she created the event which was 'open house' and 'open invite.' Now obviously this event is much less serious than those in the Middle East, but it still does show the potential of these networks for mass communication and organisation. In a matter of days thousands of people had knowledge of the party, said they were going to attend or began inviting their own friends. The speed of this mass communication is phenomenal, particularly in comparison to how information was spread before the internet or even the telephone. Would mass protests like those in the Middle East have been organised with the speed and efficiency that they were? Of course not. Months and Months of organisation would have gone in to not only plan but stage and manage that type of event. Although Morozov has argued that there probably was indeed much planning and organisation, there is no question that these Social Media Newtorks magnified the situation enormously and their influence on these revolutions is undeniable. 


What do you think? Have Social Media Networks made these revolutions possible...or have they simply provided a new faster and easier platform to organise?


References

Morozov, E. (2011) ' Facebook and Twitter are just places revolutionaries go' The Guardian, 7 March.
[URL: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/mar/07/facebook-twitter-revolutionaries-cyberutopians]

Grubb, B. (2011) 'Teens Facebook party cancelled as 200k threaten to turn up' Sydney Morning Herald, 15 March. [URL:http://www.smh.com.au/technology/technology-news/teens-facebook-party-cancelled-as-200k-threaten-to-show-up-20110314-1btsl.html]

Too hack or not to hack...that is the question..

So the topic of hacking is a very strange one to many, particularly considering the many shapes and forms it takes. When I immediately hear the word hacking I always think negative. Thoughts of people stealing you're private and personal details or hacking into government computers to damage systems or cause problems instantly spring to mind. Obviously, this isn't a good thing. Flip the coin around and you start to observe organisations like WikiLeaks as Khatchadourian describes as 'a media insurgency....designed to publicize information that powerful institutions do not want public' in his article No Secrecy. So is the latter a good thing or a bad thing?

If we look back numerous weeks into the course one of our discussions was on the whole argument of free speech in the cyberworld vs those that want to control. We had cybertarians who believed that information should be free to everyone and should be shared, that nothing is secret. On the other hand you have organisations, particularly governments, who through censorship and other means attempt to control the flow of information for their own benefit. Does anyone see a parallel here?


To me the concepts of hacking, hacktivism and civic hacking are not necessarily new, they have just been adapted into a new form. Activism itself has been around for years and years, and although again it can take many different shapes and forms the principle is still the same, to bring about some kind of change. In terms of WikiLeaks I see them doing just that, they are revealing information that is being kept secret by Government's to protect themselves. By releasing this information they are trying to bring about a change so Government's begin to see that they should tell the truth from the start, if not it will come to light anyway. I see this as a good thing, even though it is associated with the hacking title, because WikiLeaks does indeed hack. What I like is that they leave systems intact and only aim to reveal information as they believe it should be free and thus people are entitled to know about it. To me, this might be the only real benefit of hacking and since they are going about it the right way....I applaud them!

Source: Khatchadourian, R. (2010) 'No Secrets: Julian Assange's mission for total transparency' The New Yorker, June 7. URL: http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2010/06/07/100607fa_fact_khatchadourian

From industrial media to citizen journalists...

When I think of news many thoughts and words go through my head...truth, deception, fabrication, importance, relevance, stupidity, agenda, point of view, arrogance and I guess limited choice. When we are presented with news as it was initially intended by the industry, one to many and to a mass audience, we have only two choices. We either take in what they have to say or we switch off and ignore it. As A Bruns (2009) recognised in his article there has been a shift from the notion of gatekeeper to that of gatewatcher. In the past the flow of news and what is actually considered news content has been at the hands of the industry, in which they have acted as gatekeepers. Now the introduction of the internet, mobile technology, blogs and twitter etc has allowed users to generate and distribute content to the world. Thus, they are able to create their own news, which is freely available to anyone who wishes to view or use it. As individuals we now have a lot more choice and freedom in which news we want, the agenda it has and how we wish to absorb it. We are the gatewatchers. Better yet this allows us to cross check and reference with a ridiculously large number of sources allowing for a more succinct analysis, in which to determine truth, significance and relevance.

On the topic of citizen journalism I was browsing through the internet trying to find further information. I came across a post which was created by just that, a citizen journalist. His name is Michael and he is a computer science and maths graduate from England. Michael had this very interesting point to say in his post titled Crowded Journalism:

The Internet isn't just a new medium for delivering the same old news. Citizen journalism brings (alongside a lot of noise) important reports faster and closer than any professional correspondent can get. News isn't delivered, it flows. Stories can't be controlled, structured or segregated. They have to be curated, the important content mined from the ceaseless torrent of the world's fractured perspectives.


This is exactly what we talked about in our tutorial discussion and there are two very interesting points that he makes. The first is that citizen journalism creates a lot of noise. This of course links back to a previous week of study on mass amateurization, whereby there is such an abundance of information and so many sources that there is indeed a lot of useless crap out there. As a result it is up to us as individuals to sift through the noise and find the news/information we need. Now some would say this is a huge disadvantage, as it is time consuming and can be arduous. However, it allows for a number of advantages such as allowing for a larger scope of information and a varied array of viewpoints, opinions and analysis on a topic/issue. 


The second point that Michael makes is that news is continuous, uncontrolled and unstructured. In the past industrial news outlets have been able to manipulate and change news in order to make it more favourable in terms of a story. In fact some countries are doing the same in the form of censorship to try and control what news is viewed by it's public and how it is viewed. New media and technology has given rise to the ability of users to turn information into news much quicker than news outlets themselves. An incident can happen at 11pm and a photo taken at 11:01 through a mobile phone. This picture can be uploaded to facebook, twitter etc in a matter of seconds and in a matter of minutes a huge amount of people know what has occurred, when and where. In the past it may have taken hours or even days for a story to circulate with the amount of speed and ferocity that news can travel today.


On a side note...Don't you find it interesting when typical news outlets use twitter, facebook and youtube for news stories, photos and quotations??


Sources: 
Bruns, A. (2009) 'News Blogs and Citizen Journalism: New Directions for e-Journalism' 
URL: http://produsage.org/files/News%20Blogs%20and%20Citizen%20Journalism.pdf

The long tail...is it long enough?

So after this week's readings and lecture my mind was opened up to the whole notion of the long tail, and although the term was new to me, what it entails is not new. To me it pretty much just summarised the idea that people want more choice and if that choice is available it benefits not only themselves, but whoever is on the other end giving that choice. The common example used was that of Amazon, who through very intuitive and clever measures, has become the biggest and most notable book store in the world. Amazon is an online book store and as result do not have physical store fronts to serve their customers, it is all stored in warehouses and distributed to consumers when they purchase a certain product. This means they are not restricted by physical limitations and as such can stock a ridiculous amount of books, notably more than a physical store, allowing them to target niche markets. As Chris Anderson mentioned in his article The Long Tail 'the market for books that are not even sold in the average bookstore is larger than the market for those that are.' So how does this apply to other stores and shops in a similar position? 

A great example to look at is JB Hi-Fi and particularly their music department. This is the department that most notably has the widest range of products on offer, basically due to the reason that stock can be imported from overseas and bought from suppliers who focus on getting overseas CD's. DVD's on the other hand cannot be imported from overseas and can only be bought from Australian suppliers, thus there is a much smaller amount of product available. An individual can get a DVD from overseas personally, but it is illegal for a company to do it under what is known as parallel importing. Anyway, so one of the great benefits of the CD department of JB Hi-Fi is that they have access to a large range of products both from overseas and local suppliers. In the past if there was that rare CD you wanted and couldn't get....you went to JB Hi-Fi ( or a number of smaller retailers of CD's such as Utopia or Red eye records). However, with the introduction of iTunes, MP3's and other forms of digital content JB Hi-Fi no longer has the longest tail, at least not in terms of their physical store. They have tried to counter attack this though through their online presence, which much like amazon.com provides information on other products consumers bought or related items which may also be of interest to a buyer. Is this enough however to survive, at least in terms of the music department? 


Given that the music industry is struggling to deal with issues of piracy and digital content in particular I would have to say the days of the CD store are somewhat numbered. It seems much easier these days to download music, whether legally or illegally, and with the amount of choice on offer it is almost a no-brainer. Kevin Kelly (2008) labelled eight generative values, of which I feel three apply directly to digital downloads, those of immediacy, accessibility and findability. Although some of the other values may not be present when downloading content, such as personalisation, it is still enough to make us value the product because of the speed and availability on offer. Would you rather pay money for a CD that might take a few weeks to come in (if not longer), or pay for the digital content which is downloaded almost instantly and was much easier to find? As much as I'd hate to say it, the latter is definitely the preferred option. As Clay Shirky (2002) said 'Diversity plus freedom of choice creates inequality, and the greater the diversity, the more extreme the equality.' In other words, the rich get richer and the poor get poorer.





Anderson, C 2004. The Long Tail. Wired, 12.10  URL: http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/12.10/tail.html


Kelly, K 2008. Better Than Free. URL: http://www.edge.org/3rd_culture/kelly08/kelly08_index.html


Shirky, C 2002. Weblogs and the Mass Amateurization of Publishing. 

URL: http://shirky.com/writings/weblogs_publishing.html

From Producer to Consumer to Prosumer...

So this weeks topic is Media convergence...the idea of various technological platforms merging together and forming a transformer of sorts. Devices capable of numerous and varied functions that have changed the way we use technology not only personally, but also on an industry level. What I found particularly interesting is the whole idea of the prosumer, the merging of the producer and consumer. Where as in the past information has been produced by media industry corporations and then fed to us as consumers, the convergence of technology has allowed the consumer to produce it's own information of sorts. This is something that I noticed whilst having a discussion in another subject at uni.

The discussion focused on media audiences and the reasons why we use certain media. It was interesting that the topic of Amy Winehouse popped up and a large majority of the class mentioned that they only found out about her death through Facebook, myself included. Now if you looked back 10+ years the only way you would have found out this information was through the typical news outlets such as the newspaper, radio and television. If you didn't find out through these means you probably would have found out a day or two later at school or at work. However, this information was readily available almost instantly after the event occurred and most people found out through social network sites.

So I guess the question is where do we go from where? What will happen to things like newspapers, magazines, television etc? Has the notion of us as prosumers contributed to the demise of these media platforms? Are all these media forms soon going to die out or will the mutate as was discussed in yesterdays lecture? (Ted Miteow 2011). There is no real question that these forms are starting to lose their strength and people are getting information more freely and easily then ever before. If I ever want to check out the news I head to an online newspaper...rather than walk to the newsagent and buy the print version. This is simply because it is much easier, cheaper and contains much more information, hypertext and hyperlinks etc.

I however think that there still is some value in these media platforms though and we all know that it takes a while for a media platform to die. We all saw how many of us said we had bought CD's recently, even though we have access to the newest media music platform in the form of Mp3's, digital copies etc. I have no doubt that pretty soon most things will be digital and there will be no need to buy cd's, newspapers, magazines etc. Though for the most part I think we will still see these media forms around, simply because some people still want to consume rather than prosume products. Although as prosumers we like to be involved and actively pursue content and information, we also like being hand fed information.