Facebook, The Medium for My Medium.

     When I was first trying to decide on a platform in which to advertise my digital media production (The Hosting Facade) my initial thoughts were to place it on WHT (Web Hosting Talk), which is a prominent resource in the web hosting community for both buyers and sellers. However upon closer inspection I realized that advertising my website in such a place wouldn't be appropriate as the main purpose of my website is to expose the wrongdoings of web hosts, many of whom use WHT themselves. I came to the conclusion that placing a potentially controversial website as mine on WHT could potentially cause me personal problems, as well as legal problems.

     Since my digital media production is a website and the content is static (on my servers) I feel that Facebook is a fulfilling alternative to WHT based on its user count (1.01 Billion as of September 2012), it’s sociability and its overall recognizability, and its viral marketing capabilities. Using Facebook’s status feature I wrote a simple sentence with a link to my website for all of my friends to see asking for their feedback and to re-share the post with their friends. (Facebook Status Update) . I felt that Facebook was a good alternative to WHT because like WHT it offered a modern web 2.0 Rich user interface as defined by (O’reilly), as well as a networked participatory plethora of content created by its users. In “Streams of Content, Limited Attention: The Flow of Information through Social Media" Danah Boyd illustrates the idea that web 2.0 is participatory in nature, meaning that users can interact with the content, create new content and even offer feedback. Facebook’s unique design allows it’s users to instantly receive feedback on their thoughts and ideas, it allows them to share content with others and it is a constantly buzzing with information. When users see something they like on Facebook they can “Like” the post or they can share it. By counting how many times my post has been shared I could create a strong statistical model for how many people are truly seeing and taking an interest in my digital media production.

     Since my website is essentially a web 2.0 product as a service that I want people to use, viral marketing through Facebook is an appropriate tactic to use in order to increase my website’s viewership (How Do I get My Website Out There?). By using so called “smart” viral marketing techniques for example creating specific groups of friends that can see my website-related status updates I can more successfully advertise my website to specific target audience(s) in order to avoid my actions being seen as spam like by individuals with no interest in web hosting. This in conjunction with sponsored stories (Facebook Turns Friend Activity Into New Ad Format) allows for the endorsement of my website by individuals who like my website and endorse it overtime. Adding to my websites creditably over time, its users can endorse it to their friends to whom their friends and colleagues can endorse to their friends and so on and so forth thus taking an advantage of an established web 2.0 participatory organism, Facebook.

Humanity and Mathematics

So I was chilling on Facebook earlier and I came across this little gem.

Math Education: An Inconvenient Truth

I have to say its probably one of the most interesting things that I have seen lately.

When I was in school we did something kind of like this in our primary schools. We even "learned" matrix multiplication in 5th grade.

Mathematics has always been my downfall in life. While everyone is "taught" to believe that computer programming needs tons of math it really doesn't  Most programs are just basic math, applied in specific patterns. I took Computer Organization which deals a lot with assembly , and for the most part I understood it. I understood how the basic math (mostly shifts) were applied what I struggled with most was memorizing the formulas for applying the shifts. I feel like in this day and age a lot of emphasis is placed on memorization, and for classes its almost always short term memorization.  Consider for example any class that you have taken within the 1 year to 2 years, if you were confronted with that material today and tested on it how would you do?

I really liked how in this video the authors of those books said that they found it an incorrect use of time when it comes to memorizing algorithms for solving basic math problems, that seems to be the general direction of our universities as well. When we pay for classes like World Cultures we are essentially paying to learn something short term, and therefore never are fully learning it and by not learning it (could be argued that this is based on the motivational level of each individual) we are only learning the skill momentarily the difference between what the middle schools and universities are teaching is only based on the content difficulty. If the purpose of a university is to prepare us for our future employment then why are we being taught to forget what we've learned after 14 weeks? By the logic of the middle schools they are implying that nothing we are learning in college is important enough to remember through graduation. If this is the logic they are following then why in the hell does society demand that I be here?

I wrote a video game once (approx 12 years old at the time) in which the main character had 360 degrees of movement, and was able to shoot in the direction of the mouse click. In order to do this, I used Google to search for an algorithm to do what I needed. If universities and schools are teaching short term learning, and anything can be found on Google then why doesn't education revolve around learning how to accomplish everything with a search engine? After all Google is a cesspool of information, both good and bad, just like textbooks. I suppose everyone has an opinion on this subject but It is my true belief that formal education will diminish before I am and dead, and all education, and the knowledge of every human being will be on place like Google. The world wide web will become reality, individuals will be able to reason through problems more effectively while knowing little about anything, all of the experts of the world will cease to exist and the summation of humanity will become completely digital.

Web 2.0

In short Web 2.0 is a theoretical combination of technology based services, and practices that result in a more collaborative and effective network of information.

Software companies are starting to drop the idea that software is a product and are focusing primarily as software as a service (i.e Google and Google search). Software development firms, are retraining staff and redesigning products to be accessible from within anywhere in the world through the web. No longer are techno geeks and corporations the only ones who are able to have a say in the content that gets placed on the web. Thanks to blogging individuals can promote their ideas, and discuss current events or pretty much anything they want to.
The idea that software is no longer shipped but maintained is a big aspect of the Web 2.0 idealism. Previously there were no such things as updates to software, once you purchased that particular version of software you were stuck with it until the next release cycle, or you were forced to rely on hacks to make it work.
Web 2.0 is the driving force behind RICH internet applications, for example Google maps, and gmail.
No longer are applications only available on the computer they are installed on. The web being the new primary form of application delivery, fully functional and sometimes better than traditional forms; has led to the development of an entire sub industry with its own related technologies and methods such as AJAX, JQuery, and Boostrap. (See Rich User Experiences for more info.)

Web 2.0 content is not broadcasted, it is networked. If you find something you like on a website like Amazon then you can share it with your friends/family/etc, through social networking sites like Facebook, Twitter or Pin interest. No longer is content read only, but its participatory. Find an article you don't agree with on the Huffington Post ? Feel free to comment on it and state your views. The whole web 2.0 concept is to promote a more unified and diversified internet, one that is not controlled by technological constraints but one that exceeds them.

I enjoyed most of the articles, but being somewhat of a technology enthusiast I already knew a lot of the information that they contained.
Thats pretty much all I've got for this reading. I'm tired, sleepy and hungry.

80% Critique

Sarah

1. The purpose of this digital media is to inform people about Vocal Achord.
2. The media is well designed and the argument is obvious.
3. Some sort of color scheme would help to improve the overall presentation of the media.

Charles

1. Inform people about club indigo.
2. Nice design, well organized.
3. A little plain too "stock" feeling not much creativity with respect to information being displayed.

James

1. Inform people about online piracy, its consequences and statistics.
2. Well designed + informative designed.
3. Poor color choice, it feels awkward.

Cassandra

1. Inform people about greek like and its leadership opportunities.
2. Pretty nice , well thought out transitions.
3. Color of font is difficult to read sometimes and the presentation went way to fast.

This Project

Makes me want to cry.

I have never been so frustrated with a project in my life.

I would rather redo mushroom mapper all over again than do this project.
Every time I start I feel like I've already failed.
The first project I wanted to do was too risky, so I changed it and then I found that again that project was too complicated (Spend 5 minutes with Adobe Fireworks and tell me how you feel), and now I'm stuck doing something that I am less passionate about than I was at the start of this project. When I first heard about this project I was excited, enthusiastic even. Now I feel like blah. Blah is such a funny word, it describes the amount of work that I have actually been able to accomplish less a design plan on this project.
I figured turning to IRC for suggestions on what tactics are used in the hosting industry to scam people was a good idea, the community was actually very helpful  But once again, I risk repercussions and steeping on some powerful toes if I carry through with this.

I would like to think that this is one of those projects that I can just half ass but its not my style.
When it comes to something in my domain, the digital domain that is I feel like I have to put in 110% effort.
I have come to realize that I no longer know what I'm doing anymore in this class. I have never felt so stressed, rewarded and frustrated from a single class in my life. I used to work in an apple orchard, and the boss there used to get mad and throw things. Once while I was working making donuts he got some bad news and walked into my area, picked the tray up where the donuts were being laid after they fried and threw it across the room. He then looked at me and said "If you can make it here you can make it anywhere". That's how I feel about this class. I'm pushed to the point of breaking, just like I was at that job. I still don't even have 60% of my project done, and I still feel very confused, if anything at this school has made me really sit down and think about how my life and how things are going its this project...

Wysocki & Lynch, Chapter 3

In chapter 3 of Wysocki & Lynch we are presented with various strategies for effectively communicating a rhetorical situation. I visited the web page that the book suggested but I was unable to find anything of interest. The first few sections of chapter 3 basically explain that arguing is a social activity, and the purpose of an argument is generally to get someone(s) to modify their position on a particular subject. The purpose of an argument as supplied by Wysocki & Lynch is "shifting someone's level of belief in or adherence to a position or attitude: through argument". Now this might seem somewhat redundant, but based on the traditional idea of what an argument is "a statement, reason, or fact for or against a point" (link), Wysocki & Lynch's definition addresses the purpose more than the argument itself. 

Chapter 3 also talks about creating compositions to serve different purposes. For example: a composition that's main purpose is to communicate a particular argument may be different than a composition aimed at teaching others to learn. I have observed this difference myself many times. When was in Scientific and Technical communication here at Tech, I was required to create a design plan that taught someone how to do something. I picked creating a cheese quesadilla as my subject, I developed a design plan for it with the media being a paper and PDF instruction booklet. Now, for my business I use design plans all of the time when creating websites or applications. The way in which you present an informative website vs. the way you present an instruction set are very different. The main difference being when you produce an instruction set you have to take into account the audience's skill set, but with a website you only need to take in account the audience's ability to understand the material. This is similar to the concept of connecting audience, context and purpose in the reading.  For example how you communicate information to a audience of kids might differ greatly from how you would communicate the same information to a group of teenagers. Wysocki & Lynch explain in great detail about how audience profiling, and how when you create a production piece it is important to consider the audience's skill sets as well as their past experiences when trying to communicate a specific goal or idea to them. This would be extremely important to consider for example if you were communicating to children how to build a bird house from a kit, vs how you would build a bird house from scratch to adults.

All in all this reading was fairly informative, I already had a pretty clear understanding both in theory and practice of most of the concepts presented in this reading but I never knew the technical names or analysis for each of them so I feel more informed now.

Purpose Plan for Assignment #3

Statement Parts

Purpose:	I want to design a web page to create awareness about the filthy state of the plates, cups, and silverware used in the dining halls.
Audience:	The audience for this project is mainly potential students, as well as current students and their families. Secondary audiences will be Michigan Tech staff, and other people who happen to come by my web page.
Context:	Various dirty dishes that have been discovered in present time throughout breakfast - dinner will be examined, and photographed. The availability of dirty dishes could affect the outcome of this project as dirty dishes are hit or miss, but they are usually available all of the time.
Strategies:	Effective presentation of this argument will be completed by producing a web page that contains photographs, and time information about the frequency in which a dirty cup, plate or piece of silverware is encountered. I will create a timeline graphic of some sort to illustrate this information. I will go to the dining hall at 10:30 AM for Lunch, 12:30 PM for Post-Lunch and 5:30 PM For Dinner every day M-F in order to try and achieve some level of accuracy with my observations.
Medium:	The medium for my arrangement would be web based/digital media.
Arrangement:	The arrangement I have chosen to use for this project will be a simple web page layout consisting of simple three page design including a jQuery timeline. The entire site will not make heavy usage of gradients, and will be fairly quick to produce, as well as load for the user. The website content will be displayed similarly to the diagram below.
Ethos:	I will appear qualified to my audience because website will look professional, as well as effectively demonstrate my argument of how filthy the cups, plates, bowls, and silverware are in the dining halls. Since I have over 5 years of catering experience including washing dishes I will appear qualified to make this argument. In addition I am also a Michigan Tech student and that also makes my observations more valuable as it is coming from a first person student point of view.
Pathos:	I feel that my target audience (prospective Michigan Tech students) will feel more informed about the state of the dining halls here at Michigan Tech and therefore will be able to determine if dorm living is right for them, in addition if the university hears about my observations maybe they will attempt to do something about this problem.
Logos:	I have washed dishes for 5 years at a professional catering facility, I know what it takes to properly clean dishes, this in conjunction with my observations should be sufficient evidence to prove that the dishes on campus are terribly maintained.