In Metaforas, there was interesting terms and facts to learn about. The subsections about numbers, digital vs. analog, decimal and binary, algorithms, punched cards and history of the computer each held a lot of information. In numbers, we learned that they are today’s digitization’s originator. Also, counting and numbering started as just that but then went on to being part of addition, subtraction, multiplication and more. Digital and Analog were defined in this section and then talked more about it their own section. Digital systems are numbers said to be whole or integers and the encoding can be copied infinitely. Analog systems have no end, breaks or steps, they are continuous. Both digital and analog methods must create a remembrance of events. For example, analog are privately held or in libraries and digital is accessible to everyone. In decimal and binary, it states that our base 10 decimal counting system is not universal, therefore, a binary system of numbers is used because it’s easier to store in electronic circuits. In algorithms, it is learned that it is “a set of rules for finding the solution to a problem”. A type of algorithm is a computer program. After translated to a code the computer will understand the language. In punched cards, we learn that it is a digital image tracing back to 1801. In this section it states, “To understand modern digital files, it must be accepted that images and sounds do not consist of physical elements of what they represent”. What the images and sounds are, are virtual representations. In history of the computer section, it is broken down into 9 points. Point one starts with the earliest calculating device and point nine ends with a published paper “A Mathematical Theory of Computation” which was the birth of modern info theory. Each point talks about an invention dealing with mechanical devices from calculators to computers. It states the years and the inventor of each. The reading was very informative and didn’t leave much room for criticism because it was just about inventions and numbers.
In the video lecture download, it explains the difference between the internet and the web. Internet is a massive network of networks and has protocols. Where as, the web is way of accessing info and was built on top of the internet. Vanevar Bush described Memex in 1945. It was an imagined idea of what the internet and web could be like. The speaker goes on to tell about others and their involvement on getting the internet/web to the point it is at today. ARPANET started computers and it started out as only a few on the West Coast and then spread to the East COast and then all over the world, very rapidly. The founders of the internet were influenced by nodes in the brain and circuits. We get a sense from this from the last readings from Metaforas about circuits and the world brain.
In the Youtube video, “1981 Primitive Internet Report on KRON”, it was surprising to see technology be far below where we are today. At the time, KRON was a brand new system that was being tried out. You had to make a call to the newspaper to connect, then you could view the paper over your home computer. It was stated that reading the paper over the computer took 2 hours and it was a $5 charge per hour. ($10 to read on the computer, when you could buy a paper on the street for $0.20). One man in the video talks about how 500+ people responded to the ad and seemed interested in reading the paper over the computer, but he didn’t think they would make money off of it or that it would become that popular.
Metaforas Article Question: One of the earliest calculating devices was the abacus is the Middle Ages, today we now have computers with the basis of EDVAC that can change themselves. As we know, today we can do pretty much anything on the computer, stay in touch with people through social networks, shop online, online banking, check the weather, read the paper, etc. Do you think that the computer can keep expanding? With everything already accessible on the internet, what more could possibly be added to be able to do on the computer? It seems like we have it all already.
Video Lecture Download Question: Do you think Ted Nelson’s idea Xanadu in 1967 about the preserving and increasing the connection of art and literature that never came into reality will ever come into reality?
YouTube Video Question: How would you feel if Google or other internet sites made us pay to view their information like the newspaper companies did in 1981 to read the paper on the computer?
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