History of the computer

Lecture: History of the computer
Charles Babbage- 19th century born 1791
Invented 1st digital computer it was mechanical not electronic
Computers first commercially produced by IBM 1950’s
Gordon Moore produced Moors law- the capacity of microchips doubles every 2 yrs
Xerox Parc Developed the mouse, graphical user interface (GUI) and pull down menus
1975 first PC was released named 0
Bill Gates wrote a language call BASIC for the Altair used for applications like word processing, basic accounting and games, and started Microsoft
Apple created by Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak
Produced Apple 1- consisting of single circuit board, no case, no key board
2 yrs after Altar Apple II was launched in 1978
1979 ‘Killer-application’ bought off Dan Bricklin and Bob Frankston
IBM and Microsoft
Bill Gates Language and Operating system was sold to IBM and was payed royalties for every use of it
Internet- a network of networks, the sum of interconnected computer hardware and the software that runs it
Definition of Internet
i) is logically linked together by a globally unique address space based on the internet protocol (IP) or its subsequent extension
ii) is able to support communications using the transmission control protocol/ internet protocol (TCP/IP) suit or its subsequent extension/ follow ons and or othe IP compatible networks
7 servers across the world
www- World wide web
HTML- hyper text mark up language is language web pages written in
Internet is not same as the web, the web is just one part of the broader internet which includes many other things as well as the web.
Early internet applications Email (electronic mail), IRC (internet relay chat MSN), MUD, MOO’s, MUSHes (multiple user platforms)

Reading: 'Whats new about new media"
What’s new about new media? Discusses what is considered when deciphering between new and old media in terms of technological development of new media and remaking of old media. The World Wide Web is one of the fastest developing forms of new media today, though still coinciding with old forms of media such as the news paper and radio by digitalizing them on the internet. The use of the internet connects people and information through computers which connect to a high speed telecommunications network and allows for interpersonal and group communication.
The World Wide Web has four features that are important to the popularization of the internet.
1. Allowed the display of colored pictures, audio and music, data and text which introduced multi media capability to the internet.
2. Based upon hypertext principles, allowing for linking of information, links from one info source provide simple point and click access to related information available from other sources.
3. Hypertexts value became more apparent with development of web browsers which provided data bases of all info stored on the internet.
4. Development of http: Hypertext Transfer Protocol, which provided a platform- independent means of connection between websites and HTML: Hypertext Markup Language, a writing source code for the World Wide Web.
These factors and more are why the internet has become the fastest growing medium ever recorded.

Topic 5: Why I Hate Wikipedia

“Why I hate Wikipedia” Lecture notes:
Wikipedia was discussed for a long time and the fact that anyone can edit the articles on the site. I personally haven’t used Wikipedia before this subject therefore I have not much experience or understanding of it.

How do we know the truth?
Correspondence theory: Just facts- Observable, measurable
Coherence theory: Does it fit together and make sense?
Per formative theory: I do declare
Social theory: What can we agree on?
Journalists rely on 2 authorative sources with the same story to establish a claim to the truth, how valid is this if the sources are processing information from the same pool?
Necessary truth: 2+2=4
Conditional Truth: It is/is not raining outside
The Matrix opens up difficult questions about the certainty of the sense data that we rely on to make our observations of the world.
Do the corporate media have an influence on our identities and how they develop in relation to how film and T.V. production techniques develop?
Virtual reality: Virtual Rationality
New possible ways of viewing the world (virtual reality) where the line between reality and appearance is so blurred that there is no discernible difference between the 2.

Tutorial Task: Intervene on Wikipedia
Article 1… 1http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Entourage_%28TV_series%29#Upcoming_Season
Is this an accurate article?
This article is accurate in the fact that it lists all the actors correctly and its about the upcoming 5th season of the show.Does it cover all the basic facts that you'd need to understand this topic?
Yes it’s a basic topic so the article covers the basic need to know.Does this article follow the Wikipedia guidelines for useful articles?
yesIs this article fair and balanced, or is it biased towards a particular side or argument?This is more promoting the new season and discussing the reason the writers have included certain things in the new season.
What changes would you make to this article to improve it and make it useful for the wider wikipedia community? I wouldn’t change it.

Reading: Jorge Buis Borges, Tlon, Uqbar, Orbis Terius (1940)
Jorge Buis Borges discusses the way that definitions in the encyclopaedia were changed and a fictitious place Uqbar was made up, a kind of imagined reality, evidence was found of this place which then questions the reality of the definition. Was it just fabrication of truth at a societal level? It questions how well we know the truth and what makes the truth the truth?

Topic 4: Old Communication Technologies & Theories

LECTURE: Old communication technologies and theories
Summary of lecture notes because there were so many…

History of communication:

Evolutionary bases of communication- 40,000 yrs ago human’s experienced anatomical evolution that gave better control over spoken sounds along with facial expressions.

Tribal Practices- consisting of costumes, paintings, dances, stories and songs that represent deeper mythological meanings, e.g. rock art

The origin of the alphabet- Writing has been around since 8-6 000BC including hieroglyphics in Egypt. Ugarit compiled the first alphabet in 1500 BC

Ancient text written by scribes first came from the Middle East, India and Europe where books were created and the first libraries came about Print then developed earlier in China but in 1452 Gutenberg printed the bible in Germany.

Telegraphy came about in 1837 by Samuel Morse

Telephone in1876 by Alexander Graham Bell

Phonograph in 1876 by Thomas Edison

Radio in 1895 Marconi invented wireless telegraphy initially carries Morse code. In 1930’s radio was modified and the radio industry was established. Australian radio broadcast pioneered by ABC.

Cinema- 19^th century inventors developed photography; the Lumiere brothers (among others) created an early form of cinema. The first full length feature movie was produced I Australia.

Television- In 1926 John Logie Baird first demonstrated television it was then marketed in the late 1930’s, though due to WW2 it wasn’t till 1940’s that T.V gained mass market in USA.

T.V first came to Australia in Sydney and Melbourne in 1956.

Video- Was first introduced in 1976 with the use of VHS this was challenged unsuccessfully by the Betamax system then challenged successfully by the introduction of DVD in 1997. DVD then overtook VHS in 2002.

Semiotics- The 20^th century saw a Massive increase in communication technologies.

Elements of a semiotic approach:

Semantics: The relationship of signs to what they stand for

Syntactic: The formal or structural relations between signs.
Pragmatics: The relation of signs to interpreters.
Reading: Walter Benjamin’s “The work of art in the age of mechanical reproduction.”

Reading: walter Benjamin

Walter Benjamin's article 'The Work of art in the age of mechanical reproduction' written in 1936 discusses the way artwork is reproduced by man and the way technology has evolved has influenced the way man reproduces art. Benjamin also discusses how arts authenticity can diminish with the constant reproduction and how an artworks ‘aura’ diminishes due to mechanical reproduction. With the invention of photography and the influence it had on art being designed for reproducibility and wether photography was even considered and art. Then the development of film and how it was seen to represent an incomparable means of expression, and the way it changed acting in particularly the way stage acting’s ‘aura’ was changed by the use of flim.

It is a very long article and very hard to read and take in but i did find it interesting when I reminded myself it was written in 1936.

Tutorial Task 4: Questions
1. Who was the creator of the infamous "lovebug" computer virus?

Onel de Guzman age 24, from the Philippines

www.altavista.com http://archives.cnn.com/2000/TECH/computing/06/29/philippines.lovebug.02/index.html

2. Who invented the paper clip?
Norwegian - Johan Vaaler invented the paperclip in 1899
www.yahoo.com

3. How did the Ebola virus get its name?
Ebola virus, named after a river in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (formerly Zaire) in Africa
www.webcrawler.com
http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/dvrd/Spb/mnpages/dispages/ebola/qa.htm

4. What country had the largest recorded earthquake?
Chile, South America in 1960, 9.5 on Richter scale
www.aol.com
http://www.extremescience.com/GreatestEarthquake.htm

5. In computer memory/storage terms, how many kilobytes in a terabyte?
1,073,741,824
www.answers.com
http://www.t1shopper.com/tools/calculate/

6. Who is the creator of email?
Ray Tomlinson in 1971
www.20search.com
http://itmanagement.earthweb.com/entdev/article.php/1408411

7. What is the storm worm, and how many computers are infected by it?
W32.Storm.Worm is a worm that seeks out Microsoft Internet Information Services (IIS) systems that have not applied the proper security patches. Any such systems that it finds are then infected with the worm. The payload of this worm performs a denial-of-service attack on http:/ /www.microsoft.com
Infected approximately one million and 50 million computers worldwide
www.ask.com
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2007/oct/21/1

8. If you wanted to contact the prime minister of australia directly,
what is the most efficient way?
www.msn.com
http://www.pm.gov.au/contact/index.cfm
If you go to this website u can email the prime minister or mail him on this address which is also on the site.
The Hon Kevin Rudd MP
Prime Minister
Parliament House
CANBERRA ACT 2600

9. Which Brisbane-based punk band is Stephen Stockwell (Head of the School
of Arts) a member of?

10. What does the term "Web 2.0" mean in your own words?
I have never heard of the term before but I just looked it up and its to do with using the web as a platform.

Topic 3: Alphaville and new wave cinema

Screening: Alphaville (1965) by Jean-Luc Goddard

Alphaville was a little bit hard to get my head around at first but once the story got underway i found it really weird but artistic and kind of interesting. I mainly found the concept interesting because i hardly ever watch really old movies and this being set in 1960 would be something that i would ignore this movie if it was on t.v. I really liked the science fiction side to the story, though i found the voice of the computer to be really over the top and it got hard to keep hearing by the end of the movie. It also took awhile to get used to the movie being set on another planet, because it looked like a normal city. It was clear that the director was portraying that technology is slowly “taking over”, I liked the concept of the 'Bible' which the detective finds is a dictionary and it was used to represent the increasing oppression of the residents living in Alphaville caused by the computer Alpha 60.

Reading: Article about Aphaville

There was a lot of interesting information in the articles about alphaville I found the film and screen glossary useful. I really liked the film review by Laura Bushell, it gave me a better insight into what the movie was trying to convey and the writes that the films alternative title was Tarzan Vs. IBM, which is more to the point of what the film is based upon, when the title is that straight to the point it makes people assume they will know the plot and not watch it, so Alphaville is a better name. She also writes that Goddard uses droll humour throughout the film such as the movie being set in the future but he only shoots the movie in real locations in 1960 Paris.

Tutorial Task 3:

I use alot of different types of technology to communicate with my family and friends. the Main sources i use daily are my mobile phone to call and text my family and friends i also use my mobile phone to take pics and video. I use the internet daily such as email which i use for uni and to recieve my phone bill and bank statements instead of recieving mail. I have a facebook and myspace to stay incontact with my friends, i find it to be the easiest way becasue these days everyone is hard to catch up with. I have been using these different types of technology for about 8-10 years since i was about age 10. I started with the internet at age 10 using my email and chatting on msn with friends from school, myspace has only been around for 4-5 years but i have had my account for 4 yrs. I think i would find it really hard if i didnt have my mobile phone or the internet in my day to day life.