Journal Entry #5

Google Book Search is a tool from Google that searches the full text of books that Google scans and stores in its digital database. This kind of tool once open to the general public, would either spread like wildfire or quickly diminish. Google's relationship with publisher's I believe would grow because the service only publishes books in there full content only if the publisher agrees. Otherwise, they take what they call "snippets" from books thats copyright date have expired and uses them as a reference whenever someone "googles" that books title. Having such a tool, Google is know reigning as the king of all search engines to date. But other search engines such as Yahoo are trying to keep up with Google by making similar tools. This project will become a great reference tool to many. An example of a group of people that this would help out are students. It will become a great studying tool for them. But they have to know the limits of it. If they copy, it is plaguarizing. With this new development, librarians would not need to worry. Many of the books that are on Google Book Search are not copyrighted anymore. So Google saw this as an oppurtunity to create their own little library so to speak. But they are many books that do not appear on the sight including "Harry Potter", "To Kill A Mockingbird" etc. These types of books are what people go to the library for. So if i were a librarian, I would not worry because with the vast variety of books being published daily, there will always be a new book that Google would not be able to put on their website. In conclusion, i think that Google Book Search is a wonderful, helpful tool that can help many people on a daily basis.

Journal Entry #4

In partnership with IBM, National Geographic has taken on a project that would change the world. Together and with the help of many scientific experts, they will find they true answers to where we have come from and how did wew get here. This project is titled "The Genographic Project". The Genograaphic project is a project that involves world wide participation. Scientists have been placed around the world where they will encounter indigenious groups of people trying to find an answer to their question. They will do this by taking a sample of DNA from people from these groups hoping to find an answer. They would also need as many samples of DNA from people around the world so that they may build a family tree of sorts so that we may trace our exsistence back to the beginning. Scientists belive that when DNA is manipulated throught the life cycle, many change while others stay the same. If they could find those strands that stay the same between us and the many other people around the world, they will be one step closer to finding out this mystery. This project has just come to par with us because now, we have the right advancments in technology to accomplish a feat such as this. This has also come under great timing because with the world now mixing and the indigenious groups of people diminishing, scientists have to work fast if they hope to get the answers they want. Without the indigenious groups, we would have none or a very little to start from. So in conclusion, this project in my mind is a great idea that should be monitored more seriously by the general public because I believe you don't really know who you are unless you know where you came from.

Journal Entry #3

Over the last couple of years, games that deal with any form of war have been on a steady popularity rise. The reason for this is simple. When game designers have to come up with a new game, they try to reflect on what events are happening around them so that people would be more interested in their product. A great example of this is sports games. Companies come out with the newest sports games for all the sports just before the season would start for each respected sport. So when gaming companys such as Microsoft and Sony came out with war games, they new that people would sweep them off the shelf with the on going war in Iraq. Also, these games are very great when it comes to the actual gameplay. Games such as "Call of Duty" and "Socom" bring you right into the action. In respect to the comment that "If it's not realistic, it's not worth playing.", I believe that playing games like these is all fun and games but i truly think that it desensitses people on the real aspects of war. When we look at a bloodied cartoon character, we see no harm in this because it is just a cartoon, so in relation to these war games, when someone dies in the game, you don't really care and you move on. But now picture yourself in an actual battlefield. If someone in front of you just stepped on land mine and was killed, you probably would be paralized in a trance that you wouldn't know what to do. So in conclusion, i fell that war games are a great genre of games. They are very exciting to play espically with friends and when you do, you have fun. But we must remember not to be insensitive to the actual people that are fighting in the war right now. To them, it is not a video game, it is their life.

Journal Entry #2

1. One of the reasons why I came to Mary Ward because I'm a very hands on kinda guy. I don't like people telling me what to do every 5 minutes. In my opinion, using ipods as a method of teaching is a great idea. Many of the students in our school tend to work by themselves or with others with as little teacher student interaction. Having the option of viewing their teachers lectures or seminars on their ipods would make a great tool for these people. I myself enjoy working with others but if i ever need help, i would ask a teacher. But the idea of the ipod classroom would do me well because if i ever needed to review something that i may have missed the first time, i could always look it over again and again.

2. If Mary Ward would embrace such technology, there would be a handful of both advatages and disadvantages. On the brighter side, we as students would have a great tool for catching up on a seminar that we may have missed or just for the sake of looking it over again. Other advantages include less seminar times the teachers would need meaning more floor times. But with the good comes the bad. Having this kind of technology could always backfire on you in an instant. If the school were to have this technology, not all students would have the necessary equipment needed for this. Also, if there were to be a problem, the whole system would be shut down andd no one would be able to use the service. In conclusion, i think that in the not so distant future, that this kind of technology would be in almost every school.