Week Twelve, 23rd May 2008: Social & Ethical Issues

Lecture
In this week’s lecture we talked about social and ethical issues about the web. There are many problems on web, such things as; copyright, plagiarism, privacy, security, etc. These problems have always existed, but now that the internet use is rising, this problem has been growing and should be stopped. At ECU they take plagiarism and cheating very seriously, and a high form of plagiarism (doing it on purpose) can lead to a student being kicked out on their course and also kicked out of university overall.

There are many problems to do with privacy, and there have been many cases of people putting out their personal details over the web, which leads to identity theft or other serious things.
There are many ways to secure your details and prevent identity theft or other serious things. You can do things such as;

1. Install Install a Firewall
2. Install Antivirus software
3. !Beware of Attachments!
4. Be aware (and Beware) of Spyware
5. DO NOT give personal information about yourself
6. Do not reply to SPAM mail
7. Set online programs to maximum security settings
8. Use Peer 2 Peer (P2P) software with caution
9. Update your Antivirus software at least weekly
10. Always scan documents (with Antivirus software)
11. BEFORE you open them for the first time.
12. Turn the Preview in your e-mail client OFF

Tutorial (Work Shop Twelve)
Our first task this week was to visit the Australian copyright council website on www.copyright.org.au and choose five information sheets that would be relevant to me as an undergraduate. Here is the list of information sheets I chose;

• Photographers
• Websites: creating and publishing in the internet
• Databases, compilations, tables and forms
• Graphic designers
• Internet: copying and downloading

The second task today was to visit the APRA website on http://www.apra.com.au/music-users/online_mobile/online_mobile.asp, after reviewing the website, our task was to explain what we need to know about music and the web. This is what I wrote.

Many people who download music over the getting music for free should pay attention on the people who actually wrote the song and how they are getting cheated. By downloading music without paying, mean the songwriter does not actually get paid. Now imagine this happening every day, by many people. How much is this songwriter getting cheated for his or her money that she rightfully deserves. Any use of copyright music requires the appropriate clearances to be obtained. Whenever music is downloaded or streamed over the internet, there are a number of rights which are exploited. These include: The reproduction of a musical work; and the communication to the public of a musical work (APRA, 2008).

The third task was to write a plan on how to protect myself from attacks on my privacy and security.

• Firstly, I should check if my internet is firewalled
• Secondly, I should check whether I have an antivirus installed, if so, my computer should be checked at least once a week.
• I should always check attachments for viruses before opening them.
• I will never give out my personal information (name, number, etc.)
• Lastly, I will turn off the preview section of my emails

This week's lecture and tutorial was very informative, and will come in handy next time I receive an email that looks very unreliable and unfamiliar.

In the tutorial Gary also wanted us to include two videos in this week's blog, after putting the video in this blog, he wanted us to one of them, when come across, play automatically. My videos will be found below.

Videos from youtube.com

I found this video on the home page of youtube.com, it is a random video, which is pretty funny.

I also found this on youtube.com and found it very funny, I hope you enjoy it.

Readings
Reading One: ‘EFF's Top 12 Ways to Protect Your Online Privacy’
The first reading was about how to keep yourself and you computer safe, it gives such tips as, don't give out presonal information, do not replay to SPAM, etc. basically what I underlined in the from the lecture and tutorial summary.

Reading Two: ‘Ethics in Computing - Social Justice Issues: Electronic Monitoring’
The second reading is similar and gives tips on how to keep your computer away from viruses etc, it gives example of cases where things have gone wrong where emplyees download photographs that may contain harmful viruses.

Reading Three: ‘Brown & Michaels - Overview of Intellectual Property’
The third reading is about how to protect your intellectual property. For example, you come up with something original, how do you protect it from being stolen? It lists numerous ways to keep your own ideas from being plagiarised. You should do such things as copyrighting, trademarking etc.

Week Eleven, 16th May 2008: Building Knowledge

Lecture
In this week’s lecture we went through previous week’s and summarised. We were also introduced to the subject of Data, Information and Knowledge, their definitions, importance and how they are related.

Data or also known as datum is a fact of proposition (price, shares, weather, census, etc). Information is a collection of facts or data that relate to each other (budgets, tables, etc) and Knowledge is the sum or range of what has been perceived, discovered or learned (white papers, press releases, etc).

There are many characteristic relating to these terms. Data is; factual, non judgemental, transient, non inferential and has no intrinsic value. Information is summative, relational dimensional, permanent, it has meaning and is uncertain value. Knowledge is inferential, experimental, judgemental, and subjective and is very valuable.

These terms are very important. Data is a collection of valid, unbiased data, which is essential. It must be quantitative rather than qualitative. It must also be representative. Information, must inform, it must be rational, and it must relate and be meaningful. Knowledge, although subjective, its origins should be clear, it should be a logical conclusion and it should be justified from the data and information.

Their relationships; Data are individual facts or propositions. On their own of limited value, but and be built into. Information is a collection of facts that establishes trends and precedents in order to generate. Knowledge is how human experience and wisdom is applied to information in order to make sense of it and form the bases of a prediction.

From all these terms, data, information and knowledge, an understanding is made.

This lecture was very informative and gave me an insight of all these words, which gave me an understanding of how all these terms can relate to people who are wise and know a lot about a particular subject.

Tutorial (Work Shop Eleven)
In this week’s tutorial, our task was to browse the website ‘Knowledge Map of Information Science’ (http://www.success.co.il/is/dik.html), and also other internet sites to collect different definitions of the words; data, information, knowledge and wisdom, then come up with our own definitions that make sense to us. This is what I came up with.

Data- From the different definitions I found on the word data, on the internet. I came to the conclusion, that, data(or singular verb, datum) are individual facts, statistics or items of information. Data are collection of facts that results or conclusions can be drawn. Data is also valuable to increase the human knowledge and in addition to enlarge our field of scientific, theoretical or practical knowledge(Biagetti 2008)

Information- There are many definitions on information, one of which was “Information is gained through study, communication, research, instruction etc” found on dictionary.com. I came to the conclusion to increase your information; you have to go through other sources of information. Information is what you receive when you are informed of a particular subject.

Knowledge- Knowledge is the understanding of information. It is information accumulated in the human mind. It is from past experiences that knowledge builds up and is easier to retrieve information without the need to consult external information sources.

Relationship Wisdom- From going through that past experience of data collecting, receiving information and gaining the knowledge. It is safe to say, some may be quite wise at a particular subject matter. Wisdom is the accumulation of knowledge of information learnt in the past.

Understanding the relationship between data, information and knowledge can assist me through university studies, because knowing that during university, I will be single handily be collecting data, which will be used as information of some sort, I know some day I will gain the knowledge to know more about the course I will be doing which, will give me more understanding and will help me through my university studies.

The last activity we had to do was search and list down five organisations that collect information from clients ans the public and why they would do this. This is what I came up with;

1. CentreLink- To record your pay and benefits, etc so they know if they are sending out money to people who are worthy for it or not.
2. Educational places- To keep record of all students, who still attends or who has dropped out etc, also to keep track of who has paid their fees or not.
3. Doctors- To keep track of your health records and know when you should have a check up next if needed
4. Census- Keep record of the public and how many people are in each household. This is usually done to make an approximate count of the population.
5. Banks- To keep record on who is a member of a particular bank and also keep track of people savings and/or loans.

Screenshots

my print screenshot the relationship between data, information, knowledge and wisdom

Readings
Reading One: Data, Information, Knowledge, and Wisdom
The first reading gives a little insight into what exactly data, information, knowledge and wisdom is and how they are related.

Reading Two: Information Literacy Tutorial
The second reading a website that helps with literacy. It covers some things we have learnt in previous weeks, and include online quizes. This could help student build knowledge on particular subjects.

Week Ten, 9th May 2008: Information Management

Lecture
In this week's lecture we learnt about Information Management. Information Management are different ways of managing your information on the computer.

There are two types of Information Management formats that we learnt. These are; atom-based and bit-based. Atom-based are for such things as books, papers, reports etc. The pros for atom-based information are that;
-Exists in space … we can see it
-We can know where it is
-Easily concealed … we can hide it
-Easy to protect
-Difficult to change
-Difficult to copy.

There are also many con’s for atom-based information are that;
-Bulky – Encyclopedia Britannica
-Costly – Resource implications
-Difficult to edit
-Difficult to distribute
-Inflexible … not interchangeable

Bit-based are for such things as digital reproductions, electronic content, etc. The pros for bit-based information are;
-Very Flexible – easily move between formats
-Very Cheap – Resource implications much less
-Easy to Edit
-Easy to mass produce and broadcast

The cons of bit-based information are;
-Privacy – easy to copy and steal
-Authenticity – easy to fake, alter and edit information
-Unsolicited broadcast – SPAM

There are many way of organizing and retrieving information, such as;
-File extensions
-Folders/directories
-Create metadata
-Search function (OS)
-Search engines

This week's lecture was very informative, and when it comes to stroing information on the web that I want, this would come in very handy.

Tutorial (Work Shop Ten)
The first task in this week’s tutorial was to an online tutorial on how to use and make bookmarks and favourites (http://www.inette.com/aibtinette/favoritesI.html). After the online tutorial, we were to make our own favourites list, with three folders and two websites in them. I made a screen shot of this, that you will find below.

The second task was to visit “Being Digital” on http://archives.obs-us.com/obs/english/books/nn/bdcont.htm and read ‘The DNA of information’ by Nicholas Negroponte. After reading this, we were to write at lease 150 words on, if it still relevant today considering in was written 13 years ago. This is what I came up with.

After reading ‘The DNA of Information’ by Nicholas Negroponte, I realized the differences between atoms, bits, and there pro’s and con’s. There are many good points Nicholas made in this part of his book, many of which are the changing of businesses trying to go ‘digital’. As this book was written 13 years ago, his point of view was pretty much proven. This book 13 years ago was atom based, and would have been bought in stores, or ‘FedEx’d’ to many places around the globe, now this book has transformed in to bit based (on the internet), where anyone can access and just copy it. There are many positives in atom-based information, more so books, which has a high-contrast display, is light weight, easy to read through and not too expensive, although there are many positives to atom based information, there are many negatives, which include, they are easy to lose, which is proven by the stats given by Nicholas, and how $3 billion out of $12 billion dollars in U.S video rental business are late fines. Atom based information is also harder to ship, where as inventory can get lost or help up in customs, as well as the cost of shipping it makes it easier for people to turn to bit based information. Bit based information is easy to access and easier to send to other people as it is sent through such things as e-mail and it is always there, compared to atom based where books or magazines can get out of stock or date. Unfortunately, bit based is not all good; the negative towards bit based information is that it is easier to plagiarize and copy.

This week's tutorial gave me a deeper understanding to bits and atoms and how they are different and all the pros and cons of each.

Screenshots

Print screenshot of my three 'favourites' folders with two websites in each.

Readings
Reading One: ‘Grazing the Net’
This reading is about raising a generation of free range students. This article is includes things to inform people it is important to raise young students to think, explore and make meaning for themselves.

week nine, 2nd May 2008: Communications

lecture
Today the lecture started of with a quite funny video that Helen showed us about bad powerpoints. The comedian was pointing out the worst habits people have on power point. For example clogging up a slide with every single word you are actually going to say, and also putting in too many key points in to to slide which makes it difficult to read. So basically, Hellen started off with some of last weeks lecture which we missed out on due to anzac day.

The second part of the lecture(the second powerpoint slide) was about Information & Communication Technology(ICT), or more so, specifically about the 'C' in ICT, Communication. The slides outlines the different types of communication, such as, blogs, live chats, websites like myspace and facebook(social networking), and others include podcasts and the 'wiki' sites.

Tutorial (Work Shop Nine)
In the tutorial, Gary started off with checking our bloggs, then going straight into working on our journals. He reminded us when our group assignment is due, and when our next informal blogg check is.

Workshop task:

The first task was to go into google groups and type in a topic of interest to me. I searched 'p-platers' as it is the topic I am doing in UPC 0001, and thought it could give me some insight to how others think on the same topic. I found, when I search the words p-platers, that many of the groups were about how bad and inconsiderate they are, and actual p-platers replying back about why they are wrong. This is an on-going argument, on the internet and more so out side of the net.

My second task was to investigate the messaged posted in these groups. Many of the messages were from only a few number of people, going back and forth, arguing about one topic, both with facts of their own.

Our third and fourth task was to look up a topic of our interest on yahoo as a podcast.(http://podcasts.yahoo.com/) and listen to at least two podcasts and to record why a podcast would be useful to university students.

Firstly, I should tell you what exactly, is a podcast. A podcast, or called iPod broadcasting, is an online broadcast, it is a 'non-music' audio, which comes in the format of either a mp3 or mp4. It was first initiated in 2001 by Apple Ipod. These pod casts would be useful to univeristy student who learn better at listening than reading. If a university student look for a podcast to do with his/her course it would be easier for them to just listen to the podcast than going over it on blackboard or with another student who may leave some critical points out.

Screenshots

Here is a screenshot of the yahoo podcast search site

Readings
Reading One: Guide to using e-mail
The first reading includes what to do and what not to do when writing as email, also the right ettiquette to use when adressing someone over email.

Reading Two: The problem with SPAM
The second reading is about the problem with SPAM, there are many problems when it comes to SPAM, these include such things as, there is no limit of the amount of SPAM that can be transmitted, it's a waste of time dealing with all the SPAM one person can get, SPAM destroys the value of email, it denies someone the choice of what they want in their email, etc.

week eight, 25th April 2008: Presentation Strategies

Lecture
This week we missed out on a lecture and tutorial as it was ANZAC day, but if we did have a lecture this week we would have learnt about presentation strategies and how to deliver a good presentation.

There are many types of presentations, for example, a self contained presentation(ie webpage), written presentations such as essays, or presentations you stand and deliver such as oral presentations. To deliver a good presentation it has to be structures properly, it has to include three parts, introduction, body, and conclusion. Presentation should grab the audiences attention and also give the main ideas you are talking about clearly.

Your presentation should be prepared way before the due date, you should use visual aids to guide the viewer and remember to alway back up your presentation in case it gets lost. Alway use the KISS method, Keep It Simple Studpid. If there are is too much with the presentation the veiwer gets lost and bored. Keep the audience involed in the presentation by doing such things as, giving them quizes or something to read about your subject so they don't get bored and wonder off.

These are all different things I learnt in this week's lecture(which we did not have) which I will definitley follow to make good presentations in university.

Tutorial (Work Shop Eight)
In the tutorial work shop we were asked to visit Online resources for how to prepare and deliver a presentation; http://www.personal.psu.edu/uxg3/blogs/undergraduateresearch/2008/02/online-resources-for-how-to-pr.html, to take a look at the website and make a top five list of strategies in making a good presentation. This is what I came up with
Top five list of stratgeies for a good presentation

1. Show up early and organised


2. Get the audience involved


3. Use humor, BUT, use it wisely


4. Practise, practise, practise!


5. Be confident in what you are saying, other wise noone will believe what you are tyring to put across.

The second activity was to create a powerpoint with six slides on how to give a low impact PowerPoint presentation. The screen shot of my six slide are below.

Screenshots

Slide one of my presentation include many pictures and one irrelevant picture, this makes it a low impact slide, as there will be things that have no relevance to the subject

Slide two of my presentation, include what will be in the 3 main body slides, which include an animation of a confused person, indicating that's how the audience will react

Slide three of my presentation, is the first of my thre main body slides, which encourages to make a presentation unclear and unmessy, this is because that is what a low impact presentation looks like

Slide four encouraged people to make it boring and too not add any colour, this is because a low impact presentation would be kept boring and make it look like no thought was put in to it what so ever

Slide five encourages people to speak fast and quiet, because behind a low impact presentation is the speaker, who will not engage the audiences attention at all

Slide six was the summary which I summarised in about three lines, which also makes this presentation a low impact one, as usually a good presentation wouldn't regurgitate what is in the presentation but would re word things to make it clear to the audience to what has been said.

Readings
Resource Summary: PowerPoint Tutorial
This resource would come is handy for anyone who has trouble on trying to make a good presentation. It also helps those who don't know how to use powerpoint. It include tutorials in print, a teachers guide, and also include such things as creating slides, making changes, adding images etc. This website can help someone to make a powerful presentation, and to keep the audiences attention.