Robotics

After learning about automation and robotics in class i got to wondering how far man has really come in this field.I surfed the net and found something rather interesting. Theres a company called 'The Braingate Company' and it is a privatly held firm that is focused on the advancement of neural interface systems. On their web site you can clearly see that ,"the goals of the Braingate Co are to create technology that will allow severly disabled individuals to communicate and control everyday functions literally through thought."

Braingate was founded by Jeffrey Stibel. Today the firm is run by a "seasoned team of entrepreneurs." The firms goals are accomplished through strategic partnerships with leading academic institutions, corporations, and varios non profit and government organizations working on research, science, and technology development. The firm's ultimate goal is to improve the quality of life for all humans.

As early as 2004, there were clinical trials performed on humans, that involved an aspirin sized implantable brain-computer interface.The braingate device can provide paralysed or motor impaired patients a mode of communication through the translation of thought into direct computer control.

currently prosthetic limbs are controlled with mechanical switches. However, once perfected, Braingate hopes to provide a more natural control of these devices using brain signals to control movement.

"We hope to provide paralysed individuals with a gateway through which they can access the broad capabilities of computers, control devices in the surrounding environment,and even move their own limbs." - Tim Surgenor, president and CEO of Cyberkinetics

Microsoft Surface

So the most recent invention of technology is "touch screen" and the more it improves, the more you're able to customize. This creation is called application software. As an example for the latest and most recent inventions of technology, the class was introduced to the Microsoft Surface. The Microsoft Surface a.k.a the Milan is a multi touch computer that responds to natural hand gestures and real world objects, helping people interact with digital content in a simple and intuitive way. This trendy "coffee table came out in 2007 and is just now beginning to become a supply on the demand list. The only major problem for the increase of sales is the price. The Milan cost roughly around $10,000. This price isn't really a big deal for most businesses, but non business buyers find this price a bit much.

Using the Milan for Businesses:

Most businesses find this new piece of technology extremely useful. It provides tremendous potential for businesses to improve communication and be more effective in how they deliver information and services to customers. AT&T was the first retail company to introduce the Microsoft Surface in their stores. AT&T tech supporters mentions how the they plan to harness the power of the surface to provide its retail store visits with unique opportunities to learn about the growing universe of mobile applications and devices. In the future, you'll be able to:

Learn: Customers can review features of a particular mobile device by clicking on it. Also you be able to select multiple phones and bring them side by side and compare them

Explore: Customers can view interactive coverage maps at the national, state, local, or street level using a simple touch.

Customize: In the future, customers will be able to drag and drop ringtones, graphics, videos, and more by "grabbing" the content with their hands from a menu and "dropping" it into the phone.

I think this is only the beginning of the improvement of technology. Sure the prices are a little steep, but at the end of the day, this is something that is going to be worth it. What do you think?

Tell Time on Your Wrist and Talk?

Hello all my fellow bloggers! It's a new week, which mean it's time for something new to blog about. I have overcome something that really caught my eye over this pass weekend when I was surfing the web. I really couldn't believe my eyes. It is a watch that your can tell time, of course, and talk on like a cell phone. Its called the cell phone watch!

The cell phone watch is very cool so I thought I would share it with you guys. Its cost around $300 according to cellphonewatchshop.com (click the image above to see). As you also see in photo, the accessories of the cell phone are the charger, blue tooth, headphones, USB, and more.

If you are interested in the cell phone watch, you can look it up on youtube, google, or cellphonewatchshop.com. At cellphonewatchshop.com you can actually purchase this product.

Technology and grammer

It is not only texting that isn’t helping the grammar of people today, computer also aid in doing this. When it comes to computers; the computer didn’t just replace a person, but changed the way humans do most things. Instead of writing letters we now can write e-mails or send instant messages in a program called aim. There is no longer a need for books because with the internet you can look up anything that you might ever need to know. Studies Show that 85% of college students alone have a Face book page. Face book is a social website where you can meet and talk to people from all around the world. It has taken over the minds of and lives of so many kids and adults. The worst effect from computers is its impact on kids. Instead of kids playing outside and doing educational things they are preoccupied with the computer and play games. Studies show that 73 percent of kids play PC games. Now people don’t even need to leave their house’s to go shopping due to computers. Everything can be done online. Restaurants are now coming out with ways to order food from online. These days’ people don’t even need to go to the movies to see a movie. Instead they have different things like Netflix. This is a company where you pay a low amount every month for them to send you movies through the mail. All you must do is tell them online which movies you are interested in. This may take longer than just planning to go to a movie that night, but people are now willing to wait because to them it’s more convenient.

Giant ipod or great new technology?

I have personal feelings about the iPad. I persoanlly think that it is ugly, but looks aside I still dont like it. It can basically do anything that a normal laptop can do but it looks like a huge iPod touch. I like the iPod touch because I feel that it is truely a great new form of technology, but the ipad has already been done in the form of a mini laptop. I know that it's all touch and that is really neat and it has some of the signature apps, but there is not that big of a difference. The only apple thing that I own is an ipod touch and i really like it but as for everything else that apple has I do not like apple at all. I feel like everyone of most people that will use a laptop already have one and the only difference in the ipad is stuff that the ipod touch has to offer us. I dont know exactly what they ipod has qto offer but I am not impressed. I know I wont be in line to buy the new ipad.

Computers Functions

What can one computer do? With the development of the technology, there are more and more answers for the question. Because computers are able to do so many things now. In another words, they have more and more interesting functions such as a speech recognition system, a face recognition system and a fingerprint reader.
Speech recognition system is used to enable deaf people to understand the spoken word via speech to text conversion, which is very helpful. Substantial efforts have been devoted in the last decade to the test and evaluation of speech recognition in fighter aircraft.
Now, you can find a face recognition system and a finger printer reader in some new released PCs. They help you protect your intimate information in your computers.

Hacker

Hackers are looked as as bad people who basically mess with computer in a way that shouldn't be. If I had any type of big company I know that i would for sure want a hacker to be part of my staff. Hackers have a bad label, but they can be very valuable assets to companies. Companies hire hackers in order to see if there are any flaws in the companies system. I think that this is such a great idea. What better way to make sure that no one can hack your computer system and get to important files then to hire the kind of person who you would be trying to keep your important data from. Another type of hacking is also not something that is bad. There is a type of hacking that is just to find out how something works without trying to do anything criminal. This is something that is completely harmless and may only be to educate themselves. I think that hacking and hackers are not given the best image and people need to learn more about who they are and what they can do. They are useful in many ways.

Computers and My Life

I can't live without my computer! I guess almost all students have the same feeling as I do. Today, computers plays a more and more role in our daily life. We apply school online, pay our tuition online, do our homework with Office software. We read news online, play online games, enjoy video chips on youtube, and so on. Whether we are doing our business or entertainment, we can not live with out computers.
As I remember, several years ago, when I was in China, in one English class, we were listening President Bush talked about computers and network at US. He said in his period he hope every students could enjoy internet in class. Right now, in China, almost all students in big and small cities can enjoy internet, too. That's really exciting!
Although computers are widely used in both China and US. There are also a lot of difference. At US students are usually required to do their homework with computers. In China, teachers prefer their students do homework by hands. In case you get some "resource" online instead of from yourselves.

Hackers

Last week, our professor talked about hackers in class. According to Wikipedia, hackers refers to the re-configuring or re-programming of a system to function in ways not facilitated by the owner, administrator, or designer.
Hacker is not only unmoral, sometimes they are illegal. I just read a news about hacker ,witch reports Hacker Max Ray Vision was sentenced to a prison term of 13 years and ordered to pay restitution of $27.5 million bucks for stealing credit card numbers and selling them.
The word "Hacker" remind me one movie called the Martix.

4th blog/ security

In class there was a big discussion of security and common hacking tactics. I didn't know there were so many different ways of hacking or finding information out about people. Everything that is secured might not be legal, and what is legal is NOT always secured. I learned that the hard way.



The big thing that I've found to be most popular lately is stealing credit card or social security numbers. Both are very personal important pieces. There are many websites out there that try to sell, or even go in a joint venture, with the stolen credit card numbers and personal information. In the joint ventures other network users will use the stolen numbers to buy things and send them to a random location and have someone else go and get them, then the items are sold and the money is split up between all partakers. New people to the network have to prove themselves by doing "dummy" runs.


Another big area to deal with identity thef involes previous employees. by hacking into the networks or computers of their old jobs. Once they steal the information they most often will sell it all and let others do the stealing with it. I found a very informative website while searching around, http://www.privacymatters.com/identity-theft-information/identity-theft-computer-hacking.aspx , you should check it out.

Anna's 5th post

One subject we have talked about in class is small general purpose microcomputers. These include smartphones. Smartphones are some of the most popular computers used today. Examples of popular smartphones include the iPhone, Blackberry and Android.

There are many reasons smartphones are practical. The most common reason is e-mail. It can be really annoying to constantly log on to a computer to check e-mail, especially when waiting for a specific message. It is so much easier to get all of your e-mails to your phone so that any message sent you will receive immediately, and important messages won't sit in your inbox for days. One example of this feature was my experience on Wednesday. When my alarm on my phone went off Wednesday morning for class, I saw that I had several missed messages from the night. One of them was the announcement that school was cancelled. It would have been horrible to go to class only to find out it was cancelled. I probably would have checked my laptop anyway, but this saved me time.

Another useful application of smartphones is GPS. Everybody has those times when they are driving home from a concert, a sporting event, a college visit, and they get lost. It is so nice to have a map readily available that can tell you where you are and how to get home. It's so much better than pulling over, reading a map from the glove compartment, trying to find where you are and plot the best way home.

Without sounding like a promoter for smartphones, I really do suggest that everyone gets one. I will admit, they are expensive, my bill is thirty extra dollars a month to have internet access, which must come with the phone. However since I got my phone my laptop time has been cut in half. The link attached compares different versions of smartphones.

Future of Technology

In this day in age technology is improving everyday as we speak. Before cell phones weren't able to do all the things they are able to do now. It seems that almost every week a new cell phone is being brought out in a different company. And video games are being made daily. Technology is now something that is apart of everybody's life. New upgrades are being made daily to make sure that everything is perfect for our future technology. It can also make our lives easier and lazier at the same time.

The resaon I say that is because the main purpose of new updates for technology is to make our lives better and easier. More and more people are being interested in ways to make their life simple and easy.

Things such as Ipods, Cell Phones, and even watches are now more advaced than ever. Some combined the two together all in one. This generation of kids have lived around nothing but technology. It was something that wasn't instinct but it was adapted to us as a whole.

Computers effecting out every day lives.

In simple terms, a computer is a machine which processes data based on a set of instructions. They have become a tool and a necessity in our every day lives. Computers are one of the biggest factors of man kind today. Family and friends that have grown apart, moved away or have not been contacted in awhile can send a simple e-mail to catch up. Now there are websites such as myspace or facebook where anyone can contact you by sending you a "friend request". Many graduates who have lost connections because of college have reconnected using the internet. People who live in one state can ‘go to college’ in another by taking online courses. You could be living anywhere in the United States and as long as you are accepted into that college, you never have to step food onto the campus. Try imagining life without the use of a computer. There would be no e-mail, resources, online college courses, online shopping, communication, inside looks at specific information or turning assignments in online. People who are caught up in the television drama can now watch shows or episodes they’ve missed right online. Music is now available to anyone with a computer. You can illegally or legally download any song you want, plug your ipod in, and there it is on your play list.
Another way computers have helped people is that banking accounts have provided online access to balance your checkbook for you. You can also pay all your bills online. Finances can be very difficult without any tools, but when you have access to a computer you can do it virtually online without having to go through the hassle of filling out paperwork, using stamps and gas to go do it in person. And who wants to get dressed and fix themselves on a day where they aren’t feeling well? No one. Online access has been one of the most magnificent inventions in all history.
In conclusion, the growth of the internet expanded much faster than predicted. It has become the world's largest database for information. Search engines such as Google and Yahoo constantly develop new ways to find information for the web users. Web sites now offer everyone a place to put their personal information to become popular. Educational software becomes more useful and interesting to students because everything seems more engaging online. Larger computer storage capacity and the growing prevalence of CD-ROM and DVD drives make it easier for students to store large capacities of work and transfer them to different computers.

Computers, and Computer elements

There are so many ways computers can dramatically affect our daily lives. Everyday we are using some type of technology like a computer or has some elements of a computer mentioned in class, even driving a car is using a computer. In todays vehicles, cars have so much technology in them that its hard to imagine how cars were working along time ago without having some type of computer elements. Today cars are very sophisticated and very technological. Your car can determine what is wrong with it by plugging an external computer and figuring what’s the problem.

Also our gaming system is an element of a computer but it has changed so much within 20 years. When I was a kid, I remember my first Nintendo which was a really simple device, yet so much fun to play with. Those gaming systems have changed and now we have XBOX 360 and the new PS3 which you can connect online and browse just like a computer can do. Also another great change is our cell phones, now we can also browse the internet with our 3G network.

Another example is the Ipod, the first couple generations the Ipod only had the elements to play music and download games, Video, podcasts but from a computer. Now they have the Itouch which you can surf the web on and check email. Computers and computer elements are all around us, it’s a great thing.

here is an article that i found interesting.

http://www.punkypaige.com/how-computer-affect-our-daily-lives.html

My life & computers

When I found out the real definition of computers I was surprised. I honestly thought computers were only laptops, desktop, mainframes and other things that we generally called a computer. When we were told that a computer was "something that computes", I thought to myself, duh! The word computer does not just apply to something with keys and can connect to the internet, but something that can make decisions based on instructions.

I didn't know there were so many different forms of memory either. I thought there were only floppy disk, cd's and flash drives. There are more forms of memory than what I originally thought existed such as Blue-ray, Holographic Versatile Disc, and magnetic disks. I remember using floppy discs in junior high. They were so big and annoying, and I hated them!

I am such a mainstream computer/tech junky. I don't know about everything regarding tech but I do keep up with all the mainstream things such as the iPad, new cell phones, software programs and laptops. I like staying in the loop of new tech, because the world changes and gets so much more efficient everyday. I don't want to be left out by my peers.

The automated world

So, we have been in the automation age for quite some time now. Most businesses require its use to be successful. The purpose of it has changed, however, from increasing productivity and reducing costs, to increasing quality and flexibility in their process. Take example the car industry. When you have employees install an engine part, say a crank case, you have an error range from 1-1.2%, but if you have the process automated, you now have an error rate of .0001%.

WHen it comes to a new type of flexibility in the automation process, it gets a little tricky. When a company wants to say switch products on their assembly line, it usually requires almost completely tearing down and rebuilding the production lines. Automated guided vehicles have helped tremendously with this issue.

When it comes to being a business owner, and you are making a product over and over again, the obvious choice is automation. Sometimes you have to ask yourself the question of morality though: If you have a bunch of robots working for you, where do the people that once did that machine's job go? The unemployment issue goes hand-in-hand with automation. If robots were as smart as humans, would employers not care about humans anymore? You can read more about this subject at how stuff works. I am anxious to see what happens in the near future with this.

The Future of Computing

During Tuesday's class, we talked a lot about where technology is heading as far as computers go. It is amazing to go back to the beginning of the course and think about the computers that could only do simple computations and usually only one or two. Now, we can fit devices in our pockets that can tell us the weather, make phone calls, surf the internet, send and receive photos, play music, and much more.

With all of these advances in technology, computers are doing basically everything for us. They allow us to do extremely complicated computations and give us access to unlimited amounts of information all by typing in some words or numbers, not really giving much thought to what's behind that information or calculation. With all of this availability of shortcuts and quick information, soon we won't really have to do much for ourselves.

Some may argue that all of this advancing in technology is improving our lives and raising our education level by making more things available to us and with greater ease. On the other side, don't you think it is making us lazier and less motivated at the same time? Why would people want to pay attention in class when they can go home and google something and find the answer in seconds? Also, it scares me to think how much technology is NECESSARY in our daily lives. Before all of these computers and smartphones, people survived just fine. Now, since they have been introduced, I couldn't imagine living without my phone or my laptop; they are just too important. This dependency on technology is making us less self-sufficient and more reliant on computers to do what people did for hundreds of years without.

Thoughts? Concerns?

Computers

In the last class we talked about computers and how they are used in everyday life and are becoming the cornerstone to the point that we rely heavily upon them. We talked about mainframes and midrange computers. And how you can purchase midrange systems and add on to them instead of buying a large and costly mainframe.

We also looked at some of the new high tech systems that Microsoft has coming out, like the Microsoft Surface. This is a unique system were people can share information, send and receive documents, and purchase merchandise by setting your cell phone or PDA on the surface of the table. It is already being used in the iBar in Harrah's Casino in Las Vegas. Its used for entertainment purposes now and I'm sure it after its in full production, they will be used everywhere. Right now they are priced at $10K, but the price will come down within the next 5 years.

The Amazon Kindle is another device that I believe will change the world. After the price comes down and is affordable by all, book stores will began to lose money. And then the magazine companies will began to feel it as well. As soon as there are a few legitimate competitors, they price will then begin to fall.

Computers in Life

The last class period discussed computers and it got me thinking about how vital computers are in today's society. Just about every household in the US has a computer or some form of one. A cell phone, laptop, or a home based PC. Computers assist us with work, communication, and they help provide information. As a young generation, we have become so dependent upon computers I have tried to imagine how we might function without them.

Imagine using a type writer to write a paper. If you make a mistake, there is no backspace, you'd have to pull the sheet out and start all over; unless you're good with White-Out. Or think about having to find information the old-fashion way...in the library! How crazy does that sound? I think I have been to the EMU Library 10 times in my two years at EMU. Computers are such a necessity to our way of life it is very difficult to imagine how we would get through life without them.

I use a computer every day for my job. I am a sales representative for a golf company and my laptop is my lifeline. I am constantly emailing orders to California (headquarters), I am emailing clients, my boss, and I use the excel program regularly to record sales orders that I have made. As all of you already know, computers are a huge asset in the world of business. Major corporations can conduct meetings, and arrange huge transactions all through a computer. Banking is now done almost entirely with a computer. Money today is electronic, so for those of you who think that TCF has a vault with your money stored, no so much. Today, a person can transfer millions of dollars from one bank branc to another simply through a computer.

It is astonishing how much we as a society rely on computers in our every day lives.

Computers

After class on Tuesday I began to think about all the ways in which computers affect our lives. Twenty years ago it was very rare to have a personal computer. Today, it is almost impossible to imagine life without one. Most American's have at least one personal computer in their household. Even those who do not own their own personal computer still use computers daily. The most apparent way is by accessing a public computer, but also though PDA's, cell phones or even driving a car they are being affected by the use of computers.
As mentioned, driving a car is using a computer. In class we discussed how cars have many computers within them, this makes me think about all the ways in which we utilize computers that we never think twice about. For example, video games, microwaves, dishwashers, traffic lights, and iPods all have computers within them.
It is inevitable that our lives are affected by computers, even if we don't seek them out they are all around us. Think about the driver next to you playing with the internet on their phone, they are affecting you by putting you at risk. I think the most important concept about having computers in our everyday lives is to make sure we use them properly, afterall computer misuse can and has lead to major societal problems.

If this blog has got you thinking, one website that expands upon this idea is : http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/1047105/how_computers_affect_our_lives.html