End Post

For my last post, I am going to go off the radar a little, on how the effects of technology on communication has personally affected my life. My Fiancee and I met thru and online blog ring, and then later on MSN Messenger. We communicate thru Skype now, and send each other emails every day. So you can say I owe my relationship to the leaps and bounds in which communications media has improved over the years.
Currently, I am writing this from the town of Cadillac, Michigan. I flew over in early March as my Fiancee needed to go for surgery on her arm. She currently is sleeping in the recovery room now as I'm typing this. If schools had not adapted to the mediums available to the every-man, I would not have been able to maintain this particular blog for the interest of school work. I would have had to defer my course, and probably start with the next batch of students, and might have wasted a few months waiting to boot.
So yes, I am grateful to what technology has given me. And I shudder to think what I would have lost if we didn't have that technology present. Everything from CNN, where I get my news, to Xanga, where I first met my Fiancee, to Chucknorrisfacts, where I get my daily dose of insanity. I look forward to what technology has to offer communications in the future. I have no doubt that it offers the world a brighter future that it could imagine. it's time to go. My fiancee's waking up, and it's time to take care of her.

The joy of Blog Rings

The online blog is used for a variety of reasons, from expressing a personal opinion, to exploring new scientific frontiers, to simply being an emotional wreck. And unfortunately (for us), those emotional wrecks, or emos, as we call them, actually have an online community in which to share their third rate poetry and sad musings. Blogging communities have been sprouting up like Dandelions on a warm summer's day. Everything from the truly amazing Scientific Community, to the seriously pointless and suicidal Emo Blog Rings, anyone online can find a community that shares and partakes in that individual's point of view.
Although it's rather comforting to find that there are many others out there who share the same point of view as you do, regardless of distance, as in the virtual world, distance has no meaning. It's a vast change from the past as many old publications would pick and chose whomever they felt was a suitable fit to their perspective. So from scientific dsicoveries, to what kind of eye shadow to use to make oneself look even more Goth, there is a blog ring out there for everyone online.

The changing medium of comics

The world needs to be saved. Everyday, thousands of trees are cut down to provide the necessary tool that each company uses and wastes without thought: Paper. Comics are a medium that has been wasting this valuable resource since the 1930s. From the swashbuckling adventures of Zorro the masked Avenger, to the staunch patriotism of Captain America. Every comic printed for each teenage fan contributes to the damage of our environment, which is ironic, considering the average comic fan has the same chances of procreating as a fly driving a Shermans Tank. So saving the environment would probably be low on their list of priorities. However, a few aspiring comic book artists decided that since no self respecting comic publisher would even consider publishing their substandard artwork, they would be wiser to publish their work online. Unfortunately, since doing so, they actually found a like minded community who appreciate substandard artwork and shoddy story lines, and thus start making them rich by continuously checking out their websites and generating hits, and boosting their self confidence to make even more substandard work. A few examples are PVPonline, Penny Arcade, and Blank label Comics
The only upside of the popularity of such comics is that less trees would be chopped down to make paper.
So save the world. Indulge in some substandard artwork and sloppy storylines.

Blogging

The old fashioned method of writing your deepest thoughts or secrets in a journal and hiding it away seems to be dying off. It seems that people are now to lazy to put pen to paper and find it easier to type things out on the screen. Easy as that may sound, it leaves the user open to satire an d ridicule from posting such thoughts online (eg. I have intimate carnal knowledge of a shetland pony). Putting pen on paper was an easy way to hide the most intimate secrets, and the person may choose who to share them with. But having an online account means that to the typical online hacker, you are fair game. But then again, some bloggers go on to gain fame in the online world, like Xiaxue and Dawn Yang, by shameless posting their ‘deepest secrets' online. Here’s a spot of advice: Write it in a book and never show it to anyone.

A short (sort of) history of News.

People are spoilt for choice now on how they get their news. Gone were the days where the average caveman would step out of his cave one morning, coffee mug in one hand, stretching a muscle here and there, and the next moment, have his skull fractured by a slab of granite thrown by the Daily Granite News delivery boy. This contributed to the low cavemen population until some bright spark came up with the idea to kill the delivery boy, thus ensuring the survival of the cavemen, but garanteeing the spread news through the most powerful form of communication known to man: Gossip.
Fast foward a few thousand years, after the advent of paper and ink , people had an easier medium to use for disseminating daily news and events. But unfortunately, it would have worked only if the average man on the street could read. Thus came the age old tradition of wrapping up fish and chips with the papers in which the news was written on.
However, as technlogy improved and literacy became more widespread, people started becoming more aware of the world around them, and the hunger for knowledge grew. Also, they discovered that newspapers were also good for rolling up and smacking whichever domestic pet that had transgressed against them.
With this new awareness, came the need for more knowledge. Newspapers became the standard medium in which people would find out more about the world, and how a events half the world away away would end up affecting them. ( IE. Tyra Banks wears a revealing bikini, scores of men all around the world experience a sudden tightening of their jeans.).
But with the advent of the world wide web, people now no longer need the medium of paper. As long as there's an internet connection available, they can log on to the news website of their choice. For example, there's CNN, Channel News Asia, Fox News, and many others.
Thousands upon thousands of choices for the everyman, depending on their locality, political leaning, and yes, choice on which models with the biggest yabos they would love to gape at.
But what of the humble newspaper? The medium in which educated and informed the average man about the world around him for the better part of 2 centuries?
Based on this writer's opinion, the future of newspapers looks bright. There still will be places that do not have access to the internet. And even if they do, the access may still be restricted. Also, a computer is needed to access the world wide web, and the price of each computer is still relatively high, especially to those in a third world country. A roll of newspapers on the other hand, cost very little.
Besides, until the day I can wrap my order of fish and chips up with a computer, I'd say the newspaper is here to stay.

A changing world

Technology is constantly changing the world around us. Back in the days of yore, when the first neanderthal began scrawling on cave walls by cutting open a finger tip with a sharp rock and sketching their daily thoughts (IE. which body part was scratched today), thus ensuring their extinction from blood loss, people realised that there was a need to communicate their inner most thoughts through other means besides grunting and bleeding. Fast forward to today, and the ways and means of communication seems boundless. From the television, to the internet, to the cell phone and the radio. The world has made vast leaps in communication technology by always remembering this absolute rule: Bleeding is bad.
The aim of this blog is to take a satirical look at communication and the media today. The important messages that they bring to us (all natural male enhancement pills), the freedom that they grant us, and yes, they way they shape our world now.
So take a seat, pass out the potato chips, lean back and enjoy the ride.