2/28/14 My Digital Life

Digital communication is essential in the world of today.  Of course, digital communication is the sharing of information digitally through technology.  Something with so much influence must have a substantial risk of danger.  Many people don't know that what they do on the internet can dramatically impact them.  It's on the web, right?  It's just a computer.  This isn't so.  Not only on the internet can you be in danger, but also when using digital devices in the real world.  Texting is a great example of this in action.  Though the majority of people don't text while they're driving, it's still a major issue causing numerous car crashes every year.  Many people think that it will just take a moment to respond to a text.  Though this may be true, that fact doesn't take away from the danger of doing it while driving.  When texting and driving, your brain can only focus fifty percent on each.  This does not result in doing a good job at either.  This can quickly and easily result in disaster.  The best thing to do is put your phone out of reach, turn it off, or ask someone in your family or a friend driving with you to text for you.  You are also in potential danger online.  Whatever you upload or send can never be deleted.  At least, it's so extremely unlikely that it is almost impossible to get rid of it.  People save photos, share videos, send texts, repost audio files, and reblog things all of the time.  If any of your friends or family are ever in trouble on the internet, you should talk to them about it immediately.  You should also inform an adult, preferably the victim's parents, so that they can offer any assistance they can to help fix the problem.  Let's say somebody sends an inappropriate, revealing picture to a close ¨friend¨.  The ¨friend¨ might send it to some of his or her friends who could send it to their friends.  Eventually the picture could be spread out across hundreds of people.  Everyone digitally communicating must be careful with what they send and receive on their digital devices.  Many things can very quickly get out of hand.  I found a video called A Brief History of Communication at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rDkxsNmKDGk&scrlybrkr=5ba99451 that, like the name alludes to, illustrates communication from the beginning to the communication of today.  It explains how people first shared information through speech with each other.  Later they write it down, sharing the information with others.  Then a man communicates through a telephone to a person that broadcasts it on the radio.  A baby and grandmother here it over the radio.  A couple sees it on their television.  A man prints out a fax of it.  Another man sees it on his computer and calls a friend to tell him or her amidst a world full of technology where everybody is connected.  I agree with binjder, the person who posted the video, ¨Live life unmuted¨.

2/21/14 My Digital Literacy

Computers are becoming more and more important as time goes on.  All computers are made up of three parts.  There is the hard drive, RAM, and the processor.  The hard drive stores all the things you need for later.  RAM, or random access memory, makes some information quick and easy to access.  The processor is always completing tasks and making things work together.  In the past, computers were solitary workers that worked alone in homes and businesses.  Though in today's modern world, the internet allows us to use our computers in the cloud.  Cloud computing secures and backs up your information at other locations.  It enables your work to be accessible through the web.  The cloud companies have nearly unlimited storage and resources so that the user can continue to add to it without worry.  The information is backed up at numerous locations promising protection.  The user only pays for what they use.  The user can also use new kinds of services that live in the cloud that are available on the web.  Email, word processing, and photo sharing can all be used in the cloud.  Cloud computing is efficient for businesses as well as people like you and me.  stored in the cloud, are always backed up, and accessible from any internet connection.  I think that computers will improve at an extremely fast rate.  Think of how long it took for Apple and Microsoft to become what they are today.  Apple was established on April 1, 1976.  Microsoft was established on April 4, 1975.  In about thirty-nine years, computers have evolved from the Altair 8800 in 1975 to the 2014 iMac.  I think that in the next five years, more computers will have slightly curved screens.  Game systems will be faster and be able to hold more information.  I think that in the next ten years, computers will be able to run much faster, charge much faster, and hold more information.  In the next fifteen years, I think that computers will be even smoother, thinner, durable, faster, lighter, and be much more versatile performing tasks nearly unimaginable today.  Just like last week, I found a wonderful TED Talks video that explains cloud computing at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jeOb0rKrt7A.  A long, long time ago, people could only share information through speaking and drawing.  The only way to share that knowledge was by showing or telling somebody in person. Eventually writing came about making information more easily accessible.  When computers were created, it made information from around the world accessible from your lap or table.  Though this is all nice and good, the information is still somewhat trapped.  Cloud computing bundles up a whole bunch of information and makes it instantly available in software service packages.  As Juan De Fuca said in his TED Talk, cloud computing is ¨a canvas for using and sharing knowledge that was previously unavailable¨.  Computers have come a long way in the past thirty-nine years, and cloud computing makes information all the more abundant and accessible. o:-)

2/12/14 My Digital Literacy

Digital literacy is the ability to use technology to navigate, evaluate, and create information.  It touches almost everyone in the world today.  Though digital literacy is very beneficial, it started off very quickly causing many to fall behind.  Most fields require its workers to be some what digitally literate.  Technology is also important when communicating with family and friends.  Digital literacy is helpful in daily life for personal enjoyment and managing events with others.  I want to learn how to use electronics more effectively, efficiently, and safely.  I would like to easily choose and know how to use the best format available when wanting to record information digitally.  Digital literacy is a very important skill set.  In today's world, it would be quite difficult to live without having at least some digital literacy.  So much revolves around it, and more and more is becoming that way as time goes on.  There are digital natives and immigrants.  A digital native is someone born into the digital age.  This does not mean that he or she is automatically digitally literate.  They still have to learn everything in order to become a digital citizen, or a person who utilizes information technology aiding them in engaging in politics and society.  Somebody that adopts technology later in life is a digital immigrant.  Digital natives are hindered in their education due to the fact that teachers today are almost all digital immigrants.  Studies show that technology has changed the way students process, read, and perceive information.  Luckily at Peninsula Catholic, we all use Google Chrome for much of our academic work.  This helps us to gradually grow our digital literacy as we progress through our classes.  This blog that you are reading right now is a product of this progressive learning environment.  Digital literacy has proved most successful in producing successful, lucrative economies in countries around the world.  I found a Ted Talks on digital literacy at the website http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A8yQPoTcZ78&scrlybrkr=e1737340.  I like how in this video, Doug Beshar compares it with learning to play a musical instrument.  It takes a while for gestures to get engrained.  It takes practice.  He also mentions memes.  They are ideas, behaviours, or styles that spread in a culture.  They have been around for more than one hundred years.  There is a picture from 1905 of a cat in a dress sitting in a chair with text below that reads, ¨What's delaying my dinner.¨  His point is that when people have ideas, they use tools to communicate it.  In the digital world of today, it is much easier to communicate information.  Mr. Belshar says that there are eight essential elements of digital literacies.  They are the cognitive, constructive, communicative, civic, critical, creative, confident, and cultural with the remix at the center.  Real digital citizens utilize these elements to communicate their remix on information they want to share.  Digital literacy is very important.  I am looking forward to learning how to be more digitally literate in my life.

12/12/13 Current Event

Riskalyze is a new company that helps to calculate how much volatility investors are willing to risk.  It uses a web-based questionanaire to find how much people are willing to invest in stocks and what kind of losses may incourage them.  This tool guages the risk the investor is willing to take by asking up to twelve questions.  The investor recieves a score from one to niety-nine.  One means that you should avoid all risk and ninety-nine meaning you have a strong willingness to invest in risky things as long there is a chance of large gains.  Various scenarios can also be tested by Riskalyze.  It has been a real success with companies helping their clients to decide on where to invest their money.  We have been learning about different ways to invest your money recently in class.  I think Riskalyze sounds like a great tool.  It informs people how secure their money needs to be depending on their circumstances.

The informative information in this blog was obtained from myself and the site of http://money.cnn.com/2013/12/12/investing/riskalyze-market-volatility/.

Hey!  By the way, a man is found dead on a Sunday morning. His wife calls the police immediately. The police question the wife and staff. The wife said she was asleep, the cook said he was cooking breakfast, the gardener said she was picking vegetables, the butler said he was cleaning the closet, and the maid said she was getting the post. The police immediately arrested the murderer.

Who was the murderer?

12/3/13 Current Event

Nigeria is now the largest economy in Africa.  It is home to one-fourth of the population of Sub-Saharan Africa and has a booming economy.  South Africa has a good economy, but Nigeria's is more open to newinvestment and has a population that is four times larger.  President of Nigeria, Goodluck Jonathan, is improving their economic state now.  His re-election is expected to be held in the first quarter of 2015 but could be as soon as December of this year.  Though Nigeria's economy is doing well, it still has a lack of consistent power resources.  If Nigeria's economy fails, so does the economy of West Africa.  They are in charge of West Africa's success.  One of the major investers in Nigeria's economy is South Africa.  South African banks and businessesa are both partners and competitors.  Increased business between the two countries will hopefully imrove their cooperation together.  I am glad to read that South Africa and Nigeria compete to improve their economies.  Recently, every one in our class did a project on a specific Sub-Saharan African country.  Afterwards we voted on which would be the best to which we should contribute.  It is good that Nigeria is prospering.  This will benefit the entire region of West Africa and improve their standard of living.

Almost all of this exquisite information was obtained from my huge brain, but to  be honest, really all of the facts came from the website of http://www.usnews.com/opinion/blogs/world-report/2013/12/03/what-nigeria-becoming-africas-biggest-economy-really-means?scrlybrkr=ad539e27.

By the way.  Why should you never marry a tennis player?

11/21/13 Current Event

Have you heard about the new hundred-dollar bill?  It is new and improved with added security features.  The security thread to the left of Benjamin Franklin's head has the letters USA and 100 on it that can be seen when held to the light.  A 3-D security ribbon above Benjamin Franklin's left shoulder has a the Liberty Bell that changes to 100s when tilted back and forth and up and down when tilted from side to side.The Liberty Bell is also in the inkwell and changes from copper to green when tilted.  The quill used to sign the Declaration of Independence and phrases from it are present on the right side of the bill.  The engraving process includes the effects of raised printing for the first time giving it a unique texture.  Theis new bill will increase the difficulty for counterfitters to reproduce the bill.  We watched a video in class this week on how money is made.  The new hundred dollar bill is upping the ante for security standards.

All of the terrific information put forward in this fantastic blog were mined from the miraculous dark depths of my genius and the website http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/business/2013/10/07/100-dollar-bill/2936097/?scrlybrkr=3af3eced.

By the way, try to figure out this cynical conundrum.
Three guests check into a hotel room. The clerk says the bill is $30, so each guest pays $10. Later the clerk realizes the bill should only be $25. To rectify this, he gives the bellhop $5 to return to the guests. On the way to the room, the bellhop realizes that he cannot divide the money equally. As the guests didn't know the total of the revised bill, the bellhop decides to just give each guest $1 and keep $2 for himself. Each guest got $1 back: so now each guest only paid $9; bringing the total paid to $27. The bellhop has $2. And $27 + $2 = $29 so, if the guests originally handed over $30, what happened to the remaining $1?

This radical riddle is from my marvelous memory and the website http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Missing_dollar_riddle?scrlybrkr=9c7f19b6.

11/6/13 Current Event

This week we have taken notes on measuring economic activity with G.D.P. and business cycles with its four stages and what caused the Great Depression.  G.D.P. stands for gross domestic product.  It is the market value of all final goods and services produced within a given period.  A good or service must be a final good, be produced during the time period, and be produced within a nation's borders.       Read this blog.                          I think you'll like it.                                              We figure the G.D.P. because it is an indicator of how well the economy is doing. The business cycle is always rising or declining on its way to the other. We go through times of prosperity, recession, depression, and recovery. Today we are thought to be going into a stage of recovery. The Great Depression was, as the name tells, a depression. Caused by farmers going into debt from buying mechanical utilities for farming and America's weak banking system, it was a time of worldwide economic depression from October 29, 1929 to 1933.

By the way, the cross country states meet is this Friday.  The entire team would love to be safe and win.  Please keep us in your prayers.  Have fun watching the Shark Tank episode or whatever you do.

Why do melons always have big weddings?                                                

I obtained all of the information on this page from my brain and my notes from Ms. Weser's economics class.