Our Class Wiki - So Far

1. I've created a BaruchNewMedia account

2. I've created my own bio page with my info and a picture

3. I've linked my bio page so everyone on Community Portal can see it

4. Currently researching "games" topic about MMORPG's - An Integral part of the New Media

5. I've found a lot of information about MMO's dont really know where to post it :)

P2P File Sharing

File sharing is the practice of distributing or providing access to digitally stored information, such as computer programs, multimedia (audio, images, and video), documents, or electronic books. It may be implemented through a variety of ways. Common methods of storage, transmission, and distribution used in file sharing include manual sharing using removable media, centralized servers on computer networks, World Wide Web-based hyperlinked documents, and the use of distributed peer-to-peer networking.
Peer-to-peer (P2P) computing or networking is a distributed application architecture that partitions tasks or workloads among peers. Peers are equally privileged, equipotent participants in the application. They are said to form a peer-to-peer network of nodes.
Peers make a portion of their resources, such as processing power, disk storage or network bandwidth, directly available to other network participants, without the need for central coordination by servers or stable hosts. Peers are both suppliers and consumers of resources, in contrast to the traditional client–server model where only servers supply (send), and clients consume (receive).
P2P or Peer-to-peer file sharing allows users to download files such as music, movies, and games using a P2P software client that searches for other connected computers. The "peers" are computer systems connected to each other through internet. Thus, the only requirements for a computer to join peer-to-peer network are internet connection and P2P software. The first generation of P2P software was Napster, a central server-based model that was eventually shut down. The second generation of P2P software is Gnutella and following Kazaa network, which are user-based model. However, they are legally controversial until now. BitTorrent becomes the third generation of P2P network. Difference between BitTorrent and previous generations is that it creates a new network for every set of files instead of trying to create one big network of files using SuperNodes, web caches or servers.

Advice to Baruch College

Use of telecommunications i think is a good advice. Skype and Facebook have a great ability to conduct online classes trough there telecommunication applications. Classes like this one for example can be taught on Facebook or Skype at least once a week. That would give students who taking online classes a chance to see there classmates and a professor, discuss major topics of the the course and share opinions. Recently, Skype and Facebook have merged there features in video calling. In stead of having Blogger, Twitter, Facebook and whole bunch of other social-networking websites we can use just one, let's say Facebook, to conduct classes like this one.

Creativity

Creativity in technology innovation arises from interaction in social systems. One person cannot be creative alone.We should study technology innovation as the ways that creative minds interact with others to facilitate and take advantage of creativity. To show the importance of interaction in complex technologies, my paper looks at technologies that are more complex than a single individual can fathom. The creation of complex technologies

requires a combination of complementary disciplines. This article describes a group of creative engineers that use three knowledge breakthroughs in different fields to construct two technologies for floating off-loading and production of oil. Social network analysis reveals how nested networks of industries, organizations, and individuals contribute opportunities and resources to complete the innovations. The firms where these innovations take place are located onthe fringe of the oil industry, and not immersed in existing technological paradigms. The initiators and their closest collaborators have careers that span several firms in different fields in shipping and oil activities. These networks embrace all sectors of the oil supply industry. The initiators have direct links to all the firms that supplythe fundamental knowledge. They and their connections mobilize all the necessary resources to complete and install the innovations at oil fields, altogether 113 people in 32 organizations.

Modeling Reality with Virtual Worlds

A virtual world is an online community that often takes the form of a computer-based simulated environment through which users can interact with one another and use and create objects. The term has become largely synonymous with interactive 3D virtual environments, where the users take the form of avatars visible to others. These avatars usually appear as textual, two-dimensional, or three-dimensional representations, although other forms are possible (auditory and touch sensations for example). Some, but not all, virtual worlds allow for multiple users.

There are hundreds of virtual worlds to choose from, each targeting a different segment of the population. There are virtual worlds geared toward children such as Disney’s Toontown, Club Penguin, and Pirates of the Caribbean. There are also virtual worlds for teens such as Whyville, Habbo Hotel and Second Life for Teens. Finally, there are virtual worlds geared toward adults such as The Sims Online, World of Warcraft, and Second Life. Thus, there is something for everyone and each virtual world shares the traits outlined above while focusing on a specific age group.

Second Life, a three-dimensional virtual world created by San Francisco based company Linden Labs, was released in 2003. While other virtual worlds exist, none has matched the popularity of Second Life. This is due to its strong user base and strong attraction for new users, with some attributing its popularity to the large amount of varying in-world activities. Most virtual worlds are free to join, but some require additional fees to customize one’s experience or purchase virtual “goods” such as clothes and accessories. This customization has resulted in a cottage industry of sorts. While anyone can create content and design objects in a virtual world, it does require considerable time and basic design skills. For those who prefer not to take the time, some items can be bought and sold online, tax consequences notwithstanding.

Most virtual worlds allow their users to create an “avatar” (from the Sanskrit word for "a form of self") which is a computer user's self-representation or alter ego. This avatar can be a realistic facsimile of their real identity or, in the case of many virtual worlds like Second Life, can be a robot, animal, mythical creature or other graphical representation. In many virtual worlds, this avatar can be controlled using the keyboard and can often cate (using speech or text) with other avatars in real-time. While avatars can be made to look like just about anything, sometimes a non-human avatar is not appropriate, such as during an interview or a meeting. According to an recent estimated published by Gartner Group, 80 percent of active Internet users will have a virtual presence in the form of an "avatar" in at least one virtual world by the end of 2011.

The number of people using virtual worlds is increasing at a rate of 15% every month and this growth does not appear to be stopping or slowing down anytime soon. This is the same with research being carried out in virtual worlds. It is an ever increasing way for business and governments to use the resources to gather and collate information for their use. Research for information systems purposes is being carried out in virtual worlds for the look in open sourcing, providing tools without the need for sponsorship of corporate businesses. It provides a look into the virtual world creation and how it is able to spread itself around the internet for different people from different countries to interact and provide information. It provides an insight how people find the information and how that information is being used by different people. Governments are also beginning to interact in virtual worlds and are a discussion point for some in terms of governance and law. Virtual world is neither public nor private owned. It is the people interacting in it that make the world. Governments research into the use of virtual worlds by people as some have virtual property, amounting to a second life online in another world. This is where governments have to look into if it is viable or even feasible for them to tax those with a second life to govern them with taxes and laws.

Although the social interactions of participants in virtual worlds are often viewed in the context of 3D Games, other forms of interaction are common as well, including forums, blogs, wikis, chatrooms, instant messaging, and video-conferences. Communities are born in places which have their own rules, topics, jokes, and even language. Members of such communities can find like-minded people to interact with, whether this be through a shared passion, the wish to share information, or a desire to meet new people and experience new things. Users may develop personalities within the community adapted to the particular world they are interacting with, which can impact the way they think and act. Internet friendships and participation in online communities tend to complement existing friendships and civic participation rather than replacing or diminishing such interactions.

Blog about Twitter

Twitter website is much fancier than Black Board. It defiantly has more features and more powerful in case of communication. There's a simple explanation why. Money!! Twitter is a commercial project. It's designed to make money from marketing unless Black Board which was designed for study purposes which are boring and so people don't really like it. Another good thing about Twitter is that you can communicate with the rest of the world when Black Board is limited to college student. On Twitter you can respond to your favorite celebrity that is what exactly people do.

Social Networking Sites

Facebook is a social networking service and Web site launched in February 2004, operated and privately owned by Facebook, Inc. As of July 2011, Facebook has more than 800 million active users. Users may create a personal profile, add other users as friends, and exchange messages, including automatic notifications when they update their profile. Facebook users must register before using the site. Additionally, users may join common-interest user groups, organized by workplace, school or college, or other characteristics, and categorize their friends into lists, e.g. "People From Work", or "Really Good Friends". The name of the service stems from the colloquial name for the book given to students at the start of the academic year by university administrations in the United States to help students get to know each other. Facebook allows any users who declare themselves to be at least 13 years old to become registered users of the Web site.
Myspace is a social networking service owned by Specific Media LLC and pop star Justin Timberlake. Myspace launched in August 2003 and is headquartered in Beverly Hills, California. In August 2011, Myspace had 33.1 million unique U.S. visitors. In July 2005, News Corporation acquired Myspace and its parent company Intermix Media for $580 million. From 2005 until early 2008, Myspace was the most visited social networking site in the world, and in June 2006 surpassed Google as the most visited website in the United States. In April 2008, Myspace was overtaken by Facebook in the number of unique worldwide visitors, and was surpassed in the number of unique U.S. visitors in May 2009. Since then, the number of Myspace users has declined steadily in spite of several redesigns. As of October 2011, Myspace was ranked 103rd by total web traffic.

Twitter is an online social networking and microblogging service that enables its users to send and read text-based posts of up to 140 characters, informally known as "tweets".Twitter was created in March 2006 by Jack Dorsey and launched that July. Twitter rapidly gained worldwide popularity, with 200 million users as of 2011, generating over 200 million tweets and handling over 1.6 billion search queries per day. It is sometimes described as "the SMS of the Internet." Twitter Inc., the company that operates the service and associated website, is based in San Francisco, with additional servers and offices in San Antonio, Boston, and New York City.

Google+ is a social networking and identity service, operated by Google Inc.The service launched on 28 June 2011, in an invite-only "field testing" phase. The following day, existing users were allowed to invite friends, who were over 18 years of age, to the service to create their own accounts. This was suspended the next day due to an "insane demand" for accounts. on the sixth of August, each Google+ member had 150 invites to give out, but on 30 September 2011, Google+ was opened to everyone 18 years of age or older without the need for an invitation. After Google+ went public, users registered to Google with an age under 18 were unable to sign up for Google+. Google plans to open up Google+ to all users over the ages of 13 after proper safety features are added. Google+ integrates social services such as Google Profiles and Google Buzz, and introduces new services Circles, Hangouts and Sparks. Google+ is available as a web site, and will be available as a desktop application,[citation needed] and is already available as a mobile application, but only on the Android and iOS operating systems. Google has launched an API platform for developers. Sources such as The New York Times have declared it Google's biggest attempt to rival the social network Facebook, which had over 800 million users in 2011.

I personally thinks all these social, media web-sites are huge waste of time. I use Facebook once in a while to say Happy Birthday to my real-life friends before i actually call them afterwards. I don't know anyone who uses MySpace anymore. As long as I know people stop using it because of it's overload of graphics and music on peoples' profiles. Twitter is a dumn idea. People constantly twitting what they are doing at a particular moment of time and others are reading it like there is nothing else to read. For me it looks like text-messaging between people who don't know each other. I don't use Twitter and i had to create an account just for this class purposes. Google+ is a parody on Facebook!!

Social Networking

Social networking sites, such as Facebook, Twitter and MySpace are examples of communication tools available online.With proliferation of social networking online comes impact on society; a difference in what people do and how they do it. Changes in society are simultaneously useful and negative and this is the case with the impact of online social networking. A social networking site is described as “a website where individuals can set up an online profile, describing his/her interests”. Most sites support the maintenance of pre-existing social networks, but others help strangers connect based on shared interests, political views, or activities.” From this, it is evident that the main use of social networking sites is interaction and communicating with others. We use them to keep up to date and in touch with existing friends and relations, or to create new relationships. The amount (and type) of additional features and services offered by different social networking sites often relates to their popularity.
The significance placed on interaction and participation within these social networking sites is evident in the numerous ways in which communication is encouraged. For example, some social networking sites, such as MySpace and Facebook offer users the ability to create sub-groups (or message boards) of people based on similar interests. Unlike ‘fan pages’ or ‘followers,’ which are largely one-dimensional, these groups are “analogous to clubs in the offline world”. These can vary from support groups, to fan groups, to community organisations or school groups. The basis behind them is to share information and communicate with others. Apart from using these groups to interact, people have the ability (depending on privacy settings) to comment and respond to ‘status updates’ and statements or comments that others have posted, thereby initiating communication. On sites such as YouTube, people may even give a video response. By allowing such feedback, there is the prospect of conversation, of debate, of sharing information or perceiving new ideas. It is this capability of interaction that makes social networking sites multi-dimensional in communicating, unlike the one-dimensionality of earlier websites and blogs. As such, it also points to the fact that social networking sites are often an extension of ‘real life.’ The article "Tweeting From The Operating Room" says that While the hospital’s chief of plastic surgery, Dr. Viirender Singhal, operated, the public information officer, Sherry D. Gibbs, posted live updates on Twitter from the operating room. The “tweets” were visible to anyone following the hospitals Twitter feed, and the family gave permission for all the updates to be made public.
Is there a 'a dark side'? I personally believe there is 'a dark side' that comes out of social networking. Yes they bring people together, but other than that what do they do? As one of the article says: "Pear Analytics, based in San Antonio, Texas, said that it randomly sampled 2,000 messages from the public stream of Twitter and 40 percent of Twitter messages 'pointless babble'". They are a easy way to stock people or lead to all the rape or kidnap stories we hear about. They are also addictive, with Facebook and Myspace there are many games that require you to check everyday. Teens who use Facebook more often show more narcissistic tendencies while young adults who have a strong Facebook presence show more signs of other psychological disorders, including antisocial behaviors, mania and aggressive tendencies. I work in a middle school. I know from my own experience that Facebook can be distracting and can negatively impact learning. Studies found that middle school, high school and college students who checked Facebook at least once during a 15-minute study period achieved lower grades. Daily overuse of media and technology has a negative effect on the health of all children, preteens and teenagers by making them more prone to anxiety, depression, and other psychological disorders, as well as by making them more susceptible to future health problems.

Blogs vs. Wikis

WIKIS VS. BLOGS

What is a Wiki?

A wiki is a website that allows multiple users to create, modify and organize web page content in a collaborative manner.

What is a Blog?

Blog is an abbreviated version of Weblog, which is a term used to describe Web sites that maintain an ongoing chronicle of information. A blog is a frequently updated, personal Web site featuring diary-type commentary and links to articles or other Web sites.

Differences:

Multiple Authors	Usually a single author. Sometimes can have multiple contributors
Pages Edited Changed Added	Chronological Content Posts/Entries Comments on Posts Responses to Comments
Edited by a group or team	Author posts, user comments
Knowledge Sharing	Opinion Sharing
Links to other Wiki pages	Links to outside
Grows rapidly, at all hours of the day	Grows slowly, one post at a time
Articles constantly change and are continuously updated	Each post becomes stale over time
Discussions can take place on pages or in the discussion forum	Discussions take place in the comments of a post, typically approved by blogger.
Many-to-many communication	One-to-many content