24-30 September 2012

This was a short week, and we didn't do too much in CompSci.  Our first task was to finish the last Conspiracy Theory presentation.  Sitting through it was easier than sitting through the earlier 7 presentations of the exact same matters, simply because it was separated by a weekend.

Still, it was boring.  It doesn't appear like there was any hidden secret in the project, and for the rest of the week we studied binary to an extent I already knew.  (Binary is a system of representing numbers that uses only the digits 1 and 0; the last digit indicates the number of 1s, the next-to-last the number of 2s, the 3rd-from-last the number of 4s, then 8, 16, and so on).  We have a new project dealing with representing numbers in binary; but frankly, like the rest of the week, it seems straightforward.

Well, I know this won't continue forever- Unit 1 started in a slow manner as well- so perhaps I should be savoring the relaxation instead of complaining about it.

17-23 September 2012

                This week marked the conclusion of our Conspiracy Theory project.  The solution to the identity theft case was surprisingly identical across the groups.  Was it really that easy a project, or was there a trick to all the information we could use?  I’m left with a strong feeling that something about the project’s straightforward nature was suspicious.  Still, it’s a school project, so perhaps it’s not worth thinking too much about.

                Fittingly, our group- like all the others- decided that the culprit in the theft was a conspiracy of five students.  It all seemed very neat, with every suspect being guilty and a lot of information- such as a series of poems- seeming out of place.

                Besides finishing and presenting the project, we studied mobile devices and personalization technologies- cell phones and cookies/privacy violations.  The former was mostly a repetition of matters I already knew, but the latter impressed on me the difference between first-party and third-party cookies.  Basically, one has cookies, which are small files downloaded from a site onto a computer.  First-party cookies are the useful cookies; they are downloaded directly from the site being browsed, keeping track of such things as preferences and whether you’re logged on.  Third-party cookies, meanwhile, are downloaded from some other site, usually advertisers, and track a user’s motion throughout the Internet.  The former fulfill almost all of the useful functions of cookies, and the latter the vast majority of their negative functions.

10-17 Spetember 2012

                This week, the scheduling was back to normal, and we had two CompSci classes in five days, featuring “collaborative documents” (wikis and Google Docs) and “digital manipulation” (Photoshop and remixes).  There seems to be a trend to make our subject sound more intimidating than it actually is.

                Throughout the week, we continued work on the Conspiracy Theory project, a mission to get to the bottom of an identity theft (of the “Fakebook” type).  So far, it really does look like a conspiracy theory, involving half a dozen malice-doers.  That seems hard to believe, but then again the whole scenario is fictional.

                “Collaborative documents” really impressed on me how utterly helpful wikis and Google Docs can be.  Effectively, they present a document everyone can edit simultaneously; in the case of wikis, there is also the possibility of having various pages link to each other in a web of information.  In effect, a wiki is a mini-Internet.  Wikis offer a lot of possibilities I have rarely used, and get at the core of the good digital technology can do.

                “Digital manipulation” is far less clear-cut in terms of morality.  Effectively, it is the act of modifying some visual work (image, music, video, etc.) using digital media.  The downside is that Photoshop is by now used everywhere, and it is rarely made clear when something has been digitally manipulated.  It’s frustrating not knowing what’s real; but then again, in the digital world, nothing and everything is real.

3-9 September 2012

So Computer Science has begun in earnest.

In a four-day week, we've had three CompSci classes.  This happened because of somewhat unbalanced scheduling; it was probably for the best, though, as it gave us time to understand half our classes in detail while not having to worry much about the other half.  (The homework caught up to me on the weekend....)

Most of this week was devoted to understanding the sheer power of change currently being unleashed by the Internet.  Social networks (Facebook and the like) featured prominently.  Social networks are a topic I have an uusual connection to- I'm part of the tiny minority of teenagers that doesn't have a Facebook.  I'm rather paranoid about how much total strangers can find out about me, and I feel no need to concentrate this information in a single place, especially as I see no compelling reason to join a social network.  It's somewhat shocking, then, just how popular they are and how fast they have grown.

What worries me is that social networks are becoming increasingly expected.  In fact, the digital world as a whole has become something unavoidable.  That's a problem- if we cannot function without an Internet connection, we are making our society depend on something that, in the end, doesn't always work.  The Internet is powerful, but fragile, which is not what a society's foundation needs to be.

If all of this sounds like an op-ed, that's because class so far has been about a topic- computers' impact on society- that is extremely divisive.  In fact, a large part of class time  has been spent in discussions, which have on occassion resembled debates.  Compared to most of my peers, I'm on the cyber-conservative side of the matter; but I fear that soon there will be no choice.