Guitar Lesson 5

Reflection

DS106 was a class that I never saw coming when I signed up for it in the summer. I was shocked when I realized that it was not about video games, since the book had a lot on creating stories for video games and such. After that shock, I was kind of disappointed that it was going to be about the web and that we had to read or listen to long articles or speeches about Web 2.0 and how it came to be and how it eventually died (I don’t think the web is dead though). But it was after those couple of weeks when the fun and cool stuff starting rolling out in front of me.

We started experimenting with our blog and changing things on it with plug-ins and personalizing it to our tastes. We did things such as taking pictures, which I have not really done before, and messing with audio with Audacity. These were things I never imagined I would ever do in a class, let alone in my free time. Then when the video experimenting came in, I had a blast as I could use video games in my work and express them to other people. The Videos were the best part for me (except the screen casting one, because my town was pretty much a big corn field and that was it) but the mash ups were the best of the video stuff though I admit I wished I could tamper with mine more to fix some of the audio problems that I had. I was even encouraged to pick up my guitar and learn how to play it and teach some of the things I learned to my fellow peers in the hopes of getting them to start guitar or picking that dusty guitar back up and messing with it once again.

Though DS106 was pretty much overall an awesome class, there were some problems I had which dealt with the blogs in particular. When I learned that it was going to cost me about 50 dollars for this class, I almost decided to leave especially because I did not have a credit card. But Grooms was nice enough to help me get through that problem to start the blog so that was a relief in the class. Another problem was in my computer itself which led to some frustrating problems with editing videos such as the mash ups. But other than those small issues, the class was awesome.

I have to admit though that in the beginning of the class, I was kind of in a slow start in my blog progress but I caught up to speed during the audio parts and the video parts. My Digital story also was suppose to be around 8 – 10 videos but in the end I only got about 5 or 6 which meant the project became more of a bi-weekly thing than a weekly one. But I think I managed to get some of the more important parts of the guitar and I showed how the Web and its guitar community can help you learn how to play guitar in ways never before possible. I was probably horrible though at commenting on other people’s blogs as I did about an average of maybe 2 comments a week. Commenting was bad for me because I would have trouble giving people comments that have not already been said to them. Also the fan fiction one was kind of a low point for me since all it was, was a list but some of the other things I had planned ending up not working for my taste.

DS106 was a pretty cool class in the end and I was amazed that on some of my work I was praised for it by Grooms. I thought a lot of people did amazing things such as Kevin’s mash ups and I wished I commented more on them. But I’m happy with my results in this class as I learned things that I never knew and during this semester I actually became a go to guy for my friends when it came to videos and audio, which would have never happened if I did not take this class.

Guitar Lesson 4

Chords are one of the next steps in guitar playing and one of the hardest for a beginning guitarist. There are many chords, all which consist of two or more frets being played at the same time. From chords stems a lot of things such as arpeggios, which is a chord but the strings are played at different times. Barre chords are the hardest things for a beginner to learn since it involves mostly of the strings and finger strength really comes into play. To get better at chords, you must simply play them a lot and practice them a lot as well. Chords will need to be played in  a similar beat in songs and will require fast transitions between chords such as a G chord to a D chord.

Top Ten Kingdom Hearts (1 and 2) Bosses

Bosses are a big deal in most video games because their like a test that measures your skills in the game and sometimes are the only way to progress further in that game. Bosses in Kingdom Hearts are no exception to this rule and I picked some of the coolest bosses in Kingdom Hearts I could find. They aren't really in any particular order, except for Sephiroth because he's actually hard, but some of them are hard while some might be easier than others, but these are the ones that stood out to me.

10. Kurt Zisa : He's like a secret  boss, and is actually one of the toughest in the series

9. Phantom : Like Kurt Zisa, he's a secret boss and he's pretty hard as well

8.Ansem: The first game's main boss and villian

7.Xaldin: I hated this guy, he was to me the third hardest boss to beat (behind Sephiroth and Phantom)

6.Xemnas: The second game's main villian and leader of the organization 13

5.Hades : Villian of the underworld and kinda hard to beat depending on where you face him (ex. in the tournament, he's kinda hard and elsewhere he kinda easy)

4.Xemnas (Armor) : One of the forms of Xemnas

3.Chernabog : This guy just erupted out of this volcano and was a surprise to me when I saw him

2.Dragon Maleficent : One of the major Disney villains and perhaps the strongest of the Disney characters

1.Sephiroth : Final Fantasy character and really tough, I had to use a bit of a strategy to beat him

This is for people who want to move from WordPress to Blog Spot

First make a Blog Spot account (Its Free!).

Second go to this Website and convert your WordPress exports into a Blog Spot appropriate file.

Third, now you can import your converted files into Blog Spot. 

Thats it, pretty easy but there is one problem. Blog Spot can not use any plugins (to my knowledge), so anything that you used a plugin for like for YouTube videos (unless you embedded them) you need to put it in yourself again. That might take the majority of the time if you have a lot of plugins in your posts.

Visit my old blog to compare with this one. Edsworld  .

My Obsessions

I really don't like to obsess over things but there are a few things that I guess would be considered obsessive. As everyone can guess, I am very interested in video games, but other than that and guitar there really not any more interests that I have. Heres the few Obsessive things that I obsess over :

The Office: One of the greatest shows I have ever watched. Dwight Scrucht and Jim Halpert are among my favorite characters in the show and are also the main cause for most of the humor in the show.

South Park : This animated show is one of my daily watches and also my favorite among all animated comedies. South Park also makes fun of things that no one usually does, but that is what makes it so awesome.

Kingdom Hearts : This game is probably my most favorite of all games I have ever played. I played this game when I was in 6th grade, but the appeal of it is still with me to this day. I have waited years for the third title (which probably will not come out until 2012-2014) hoping for it to come. My main reason for a PS3 was for this game (though now it seems it wont come out for PS3 so thats bad). Kingdom Hearts is definitely number one of my list of favorite personal games. Its also a mash up of its own as it has Disney characters like Mickey and some Final Fantasy characters such as Sephiroth (which won't make since unless you play the game itself.

9Eyes Captions

As cruel as School Children

Slippery when Wet

Wide Load comin through

Hulk Smash!!

Alice in Wonderland - going through the rabbit hole

Trick or Treat

My Google Map Digital story

I selected the town of Montross, where my high school was located, to show people the rural place where I grew up at. There is nothing really exciting about Montross, but my other choice Matehuala, Mexico did not have the streets that I wanted to show to you guys. Hopefully this second choice does the job.

Mash-up

Its not that good, but its Terminator Salvation and Modern Warfare combined...

Guitar Lesson 3

This lesson deals with metronomes and Tab. Tabs are a way that the guitarist can easily learn a song without learning sheet music. Tabs are recommended because of their easiness to read, but unlike sheet music, can be very inaccurate due to no tempo or information on the beat.

Also I could not include this in the video but heres an answer to a previous question:

Electric guitars are cool, because you can make them sound different. You could put various levels of distortion or clean or other things like more bass and etc. Clean essentially mean you are making the guitar sound acoustic. My electric-acoustic guitar is kinda unique because its a half and half. Half electric (there are no pickups (their the things on the electric guitar where the hole should be) ) and half acoustic (low sound due to body). When unplugged, it sounds exactly like an acoustic though a little quieter. When plugged in, it can sound like a loud acoustic or like an acoustic with distortion but it won't really sound like an electric because I have no pick ups. Pretty much my guitar is an acoustic that can be connected with an amp and add bass and depending on the amp other things like distortion.

If that does not answer any questions or if you have more questions please comment!

Whats a Mash-up?

A mash-up in my view is when two separate things are combined to create something unique and different than the original sources. These things could be audio, movies, or anything that can be mashed up. It could also be two separate things like audio with a video or vice versa. To me the best mash-ups are the ones that make something enjoyable to watch/hear and are also funny as well.



This mash-up was hilarious and could be considered a mash-up because it took Star Wars and put the A-team theme over it. I liked it mostly because it was funny and they did the " ...as Han Solo..." parts really well.



This mash-up was pretty funny and it looked like it could of actually been in a movie, if you did not know anything about Star Wars or Rush Hour. Lando's appearance and Chris's voice are pretty well together.

Red Dead Redemption made me sad...for Sasquatch...

So, if you read my blogs, you probably heard about Red dead Redemption. Well, Red dead has a new expansion called Undead, which it takes the cowboy setting but it adds ZOMBIES to it. Awesome, I know! Well, one thing that surprised me is that in the expansion, the developers added mythical creatures. When I heard that added Sasquatch, I was so happy. The reason is pretty long to explain but I will try to explain it...

In Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas (the same developers of Red dead) there was this forest in the game. This forest had people's hopes of them finding Sasquatch and killing it. You know how everyone wants to hunt for Sasquatch, its like a holy grail. Its that rare thing, its almost like in every open world, people want Sasquatch in it. So in San Andreas, people would not leave the developers alone about Sasquatch. So, six years later, Red Dead comes out ,but with no Sasquatch. Again, people complain and clamor for Sasquatch. The developers finally gave in...but gave us a taste of bitterness along with it, when the Undead expansion was released. Theres a mission in which you must kill 5 Sasquatchs,  because they are eating babies. The main character meets up with the final Sasquatch and prepares to kill it...when this happens...



This story, this game, made me think about my wants, people's wants and their consequences. Think about it yourself. Think about it...

TERMINATOR COMMENTARY

Beginning Guitar with Eddie: Lesson 2

This lesson helps give up a few warm-ups for the fingers. These warm-ups are very important and help build callouses and stretches the fingers to help ease playing Guitar. Also a fun warm-up is including for the first three strings (Twinkle Twinkle Little Star). Practice makes Prefect !

The Process of a Guitar Lesson Video

When I started my digital story, I knew I was going to be recording myself a lot, so my first problem was getting a camera that was able to track me with out any noticeable lag. I bought a web cam and that proved to be troublesome as when I played my guitar the sound would come a second earlier, which is horrible. It made  the videos all awkward, but thankfully I had a solution! My wonderful PlayStation 3 had a wonderful accessory called the PlayStation Eye which had a wonderful frame rate good enough to produce my videos and record my audio as well.

With the camera set, I decided that the easiest way to post them was YouTube. My videos take about an hour to be uploaded to YouTube. YouTube is the perfect choice because I can always embed them or post them anywhere. I really don't use a video editor except for the Windows Live Movie Maker, which just helps me trim the video but thats about it for the editing process.

The hardest part of the guitar lessons is the information. I want to make sure my information is exact because I don't want anyone to go to Guitar Center and have an awkward experience because they don't know anything about their guitars. Also with my lessons, I give the viewer some of my experiences with the guitar such as tuning and the pinky problem of the beginner. When I make my videos, I usually plan to stick to one topic unless its very short and then I would include another part with the video.

My next video is actually going to delve into the musician side of the guitarist such as tabs and music sheet notes and other basics such as beats.

Beginning Guitar with Eddie (Take 2)

So my health got better and I decided to redo my last lesson. I added some more parts such as finger exercises to the video as well.

My Sister's Story

This story was with my sister and it deals with her experience in her job.



Sorry, I was sick this week, so there a couple of sniffles in it.

Credits:

melancholic burble in F# major by Connum/ http://www.freesound.org/samplesViewSingle.php?id=12693

My First Project Video

Here my Guitar project, I was kinda sick so there was a lot of coughing and other things as well.



I hope to improve later with the series...does anyone know some editing software for video, I had a edited version but the sound was delayed by two seconds and I decided to use the unedited version because of that (I looked on the web, and they said Movie maker was the best, but its really limited in my opinion)

Xbox 360 or PlayStation 3?

There a lot of debate of whether to buy a Xbox 360 or a PlayStation 3, and its a pretty hard question to answer unless you have an idea of what you are going to play. Here a quick pro and con of each console: (ADD SOMETHING IF YOU WANT JUST COMMENT )

XBOX 360:

PROS:

1. Xbox live is probably the biggest online space for games if you are interested in that ESPECIALLY if you love shooters like Call of Duty or Halo.


2. Stores usually have a huge selection of games for Xbox 360 especially GameStop.


3. Detachable memory drive (if you ever run out of those 100+ gigabytes)


4. I like the Xbox 360 because you can play music when you are playing your games.


5. Plays original Xbox games (most of the cool ones that is)

CONS:

1. If you buy a used model, chances are it gonna die on you (This is a question of time not if (IT WILL DIE ON YOU))


2. Red Ring of Death (see above) This happens when it overheats, but can still happen even if you are careful with playing


3. To play against people there is a fee (Its about 10 a month or 50-60 a year)


4. D-Pad is horrible

PLAYSTATION 3:

PROS:

1. Essentially a computer in terms of online experience (browse, watch videos on YouTube) + Free online gaming


2. Blue Ray Player


3. No batteries for controllers

CONS:

1. Can't play PlayStation 2 games (Only the original can, but they still can play PlayStation 1 games)

WHAT THEY BOTH HAVE:

1. Wire less Internet built in(Only new models of Xbox and all PS3 have this)


2. High Definition playing


3. Have an excellent selection of games


4. Both have motion sensing items coming soon or already out (Move is already here and Kinect is coming soon)


5. Buy games online

Also if you like Role playing games like Final Fantasy or action games like God of War, the PS3 is the way to go.

If you like Shooting , Xbox 360 is the way to go.

Hint:

DON'T BUY THE ARCADE VERSION OF THE XBOX ITS NOT WORTH IT (NO MEMORY DRIVE/ TO SMALL MEMORY)

IF YOU WANT TO PLAY MOTION GAMES OR FAMILY GAMES, THE XBOX 360 IS 299.99 AND THE PS3 IS 299.99 AS WELL (OR YOU CAN THE WII FOR 199.99 OR SOMETHING)

Playstation Move

I recently bought the new PlayStation move, and I'm impressed. I thought this was just going to be another Wii clone, but stupider because you waved what is essentially a wand with a colored ball on it. I was proven wrong. The PlayStation move detects on a whole different level than the Wii. It detects how far away from the camera you are, how the the remote is positioned and a lot more. But it does share  some similarities with the Wii. One is that its a lot of fun. The game I have for the PlayStation move is called Sport Champions and has four games:

1. Ping-Pong: Your controller becomes a paddle and you spike, serve the ball around. Its actually one of the funniest games out there.


2. Bocca Ball: This game is kinda weird. Its more like bowling and darts combined. You have to roll a ball and get close to non-player ball. Your opponent can knock your ball away or the non-player ball. Whoever is the closest to the non-playing ball wins.


3. Volley Ball:This is a blast especially when watching people jump to spike the ball (You don't need to jump, people just do it out of instinct)


4. Archery: You compete against someone for points in this arrow and bow game.


5. Disk Golf: Golf and freebie combine to create this game. Try to have less points than your opponents in the end of the game.


6. Gladiator! This is the funniest of all the sports. You wield a sword and a shield and essentially try to knock someone out conscious or out of the ring.

All of these games are fun, but on the higher difficulties can be a real challenge. And thankfully the challenge does not come from the controller, but in most games you need to strategically plan stuff out to win.  The PlayStation move is cool and if you have a PlayStation 3, test this out at Best-Buy or something and see if you like this or not.

The Web 2.0 ... Suicide Machine

I was at my house recently and I was watching the WETA channel (its some kind of learning channel), and they had something on about Facebook and Twitter. I wasn't really paying attention until I saw a South Park reference about Facebook, but after that they mentioned a Web 2.0 killing machine.  It apparently "kills" your Twitter and Facebook accounts, so that you  can hang out with your real friends. i thought it was cool especially since we had a discussion about the death of the Web. It seems that people are willingly killing the web on purpose.

Anyway, heres the link to the website : http://suicidemachine.org

Also here the South Park reference that made me watch it: FaceBook/SouthPark

Project Ideas

I have two ideas for my digital story:

1. ZOMBIE MOVIE: I made a zombie movie with my friends a couple years back, and it was pretty cool. Sadly, I don't have the movie or neither do my friends; we filmed it on a phone and since phones are always updated, we lost the data (because the phone is essentially in the trash). Though it would be fun to try at it, but with more resources  with me.


2. LETS LEARN HOW TO PLAY GUITAR TOGETHER: Playing guitar was always something I wanted to do, but could not really afford. It was only until recently that I bought one and started to play. I got hooked on it but decided not to bring to college (I thought people would get annoyed if a beginner guitarist was playing in his room a lot)

Hopefully during the week I will pick one and start next week with the videos!

Don't Try To Rip Me Off!

September 30, 2010. I went to Central Park with my friend Javier. I bought a game from Game Stop. I then went to Best Buy and saw the game about $20 cheaper at Best Buy. My friend then told me to return the game back to Game Stop. I did that. But when I left the store I counted the money that he refunded and found out he gave me $20 short. I went back to the store and told him that I he gave me twenty short. He looked at me and told me he could check the register and see if he has an extra twenty in the box. He counted and gave me a smug look, telling me that he counted the money right and I was just trying to rip him off. I got angry because he gave me a look that made me feel like he was branding me as a criminal or con-artist. I told him to count it again. This time after he counted he looked at his hands and promptly gave me a twenty without looking at me. He felt guilty and probably stupid for his previous remarks.

Lesson:

I don't lie to people (who I don't know)  / count the money you get because it can look suspicious if you leave the store and come back saying you don't have all your money / Shop around first , trust me, because for electronics its totally worth it!

Top 8 Dailyshoot Photos (Awards)

Assignment:

1. Foliage: The best one in my opinion is "In for the Kill" by Jim Grooms.I picked this one because it had a bee about to do it's thing, and had a sense of action in it as well.                                                                                                                            http://bavatuesdays.com/daily-shoot-in-for-the-kill/


2. Complementary objects: The best one would probably be  "Ash and Ichabod" by sour_dotz's. This one reminded me of the little devil on someone's shoulder and it won because it kinda creeps me out a little too. http://www.flickr.com/photos/sour_dotz/5003138448/


3. Talismans: The best one would be ..."The thing that should not be" by me. Yeah, I know, its not cool to pick your own, but I can't ignore my piggie! The story behind that little pig is that it is actually MAGICAL. Ever time I lose my piggie, it always comes back (usually in a closet) to me. I lost my piggie in my senior year of high school and when I came here to UMW, I looked in the closet to put my clothes in... and BAM! He was sitting in there...There just some things that can't be explained in life...                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                http://www.flickr.com/photos/53597985@N06/5005374288/


4. Soft: This one has to be "A Softer 12 in deep blue" by Jim Grooms. I have a thing for cats, and this cat kinda reminds me of mine at home. I also think its funny when you pick your cat up because usually they struggle when they are in the air and they remain clueless of whats happening.                                                                                                                                                                          http://www.flickr.com/photos/jimgroom/5009380848/


5. Mirrors: This one is definitely Wesley's picture. The reason is because his friend looks like a ghost in that other mirror. This one was cool and the mirrors in their position helped with that ghost look.                                                                                                       http://www.flickr.com/photos/54048396@N02/5013016591/


6. Messiness: This one goes to the paper clips by Ashley. Paper clips by their own nature are chaotic. Its only fitting that their chaos gets captured for this assignment, that and how paper clips can be neat to chaotic in less than a second.                               http://www.flickr.com/photos/p1nkaag/5015921640/lightbox/


7. Symmetry: This one goes out to "Old School" by les.espinards. Not only does this picture have the 3x3 look going on, its from one of those old telephones. I look at this and ponder to myself what kinda phone is this? Is it one of those wall ones or a jumbo portable one?                                                                                                                                                                                                                 http://www.flickr.com/photos/13276185@N08/5018580112/


8. Books: This one goes to "Learning" by Kevin. A lot of people just took pictures of books (I did) but Kevin instead opted to balance those said books on someone's head. That just makes this picture even cooler than just a bunch of plain books sitting in a shelf (no offense to anyone).                                                                                                                                                                              http://www.flickr.com/photos/kcmasterpiece/5020940270/

Daily Shoot 8

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The Office Returns

One of my favorite television shows, The Office, had their new season air on Thursday night. Its the seventh season and supposedly Steve Carrel's (Micheal Scott) last season with The Office. The new episode aired and it was kinda lackluster when compared to the other episodes of The Office. This one deals with Micheal's nephew and how he punishes him (He spanks him), but also revolves a little on the comedy trio (Dwight,Jim and Pam to a lesser degree).

"Bigger the key chain the more powerful the man"

"That's right, a janitor said that"

My Image Story

I thought of telling a story with an unhappy ending and this just popped in my mind so I went with it.

Daily Shoot 7

Image Story with an impact

http://www.flickr.com/groups/visualstory/discuss/72157624855508587/

The above image story was hilarious to me. But on to the real deal stuff. This picture below, tells me a story that really affects me deeply. It tells a powerful story of thousand,maybe millions, of Hispanics who face ridicule either because they can't speak English or they are simply seen as something else entirely due to them being Hispanic. This has so many stories that it becomes hard to pinpoint what it could be.

A stick with rocks...

This a picture me and my friend took of his little hideout...

I was so interested in his little hideout that I took a picture of it...I thought it was funny to have this stuff hidden in his room.

Daily Shoot 6

Bear and the trial of the Aviator glasses

Bear sees a shark with a pair of cool aviators. He wants them, because they are so cool. He jumps into the water to get the glasses. Once he has the glasses he becomes super cool and gets a little red bear as a companion.

Made by:

Edward Martinez

Garrett Bush

Kevin Cherniawski

Daily Shoot #5

Daily Shoot #4

Daily Shoot #3

Daily Shoot #2

DailyShoot #1 (Leaf Jungle)

FIFA 11 demo

I recently downloaded the Fifa 11 demo, and it is different than any previous Fifa games I have ever played. To compare to Fifa 10, Fifa 11 (from what the demo had)  has these changes and new things :

• Players do not sprint as fast


• The Stamina bar get used up quicker


• Player tackles are more realistic (In Fifa 11 usually both will lose possession and another player will get the ball)


• You can play as the goalie in career mode


• Passes and shots are harder (especially penalty shots, they have a bar for the player's calmness which can drastically affect the shot)


• Players are more like their kin in real life (Sucky players suck, Good players like Messi or kaka are amazing...)

These changes are different and the old tactics in other Fifa games may not work due to the changes, but games are more realistic and play out like a average match. Fifa 11 doesn't have too much of a graphical improvement, but its still good. Fifa 11 comes out in September 28.

Iron Man 2 in 6 Frames

Iron Man 2 begins with Starks competitor Hammer making his own suits of battle armor. Whiplash a villain attacks Stark but is stopped. A prototype of War Machine fights Iron man . Whiplash has teamed up with Hammer to create battle robots which are led by a new version of War Machine. The battle robots turn evil and Iron Man and War Machine must fight them. Whiplash is finally defeated.

Images from (As they appear):

Movie-moron.com

Comicbookmovie.com

Msnbcmedia4.msn.com

mimg.ugo.com

ummagumma.files.wordpress.com

Youtube.com (CampRock2Film2010)

3D CHALK!

I was on YouTube looking for optical illusions (I was bored) when I stumbled on, perhaps, the coolest chalk-related thingy ever : 3D Art! What makes this cool is not the drawings themselves (except for a couple of them) but the way they were made to make you think they were 3D. This is one skill I wished I had!

Heres a video from YouTube showing some wicked 3D chalk drawings:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fKJ0KYnB5R8&feature=fvst[/youtube]

(p.s the one with the hose isn't a hose,  its the actual drawing...took me a while to figure that out)

The reason for my name...

I noticed on a couple of people blogs that they explained why they named the blogs after certain names, and I thought I should do this as well. Edsworld has a reason of existence as a name (Even though it does sound stupid...) for my blog. You see, when I was thinking of a name for my blog, I was brain storming ideas, and during this process one thing came to mind. Wayne's World! The 1992 comedy was fresh on my mind, that movie was hilarious especially Garth and Wayne's characters. If you don't know what I'm talking about heres a scene with the song Bohemian Rhapsody .Wayne's World. Wayne's World! Also heres the intro into Wayne's world.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nQjVcXqhyLg[/youtube]

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2YDwj-BRKwc[/youtube]

Red Dead Redemption: Amazing game

Red dead Redemption is perhaps one of the best games I played (that actually has a story) this year. You play as John Marston, a former outlaw whose is threatened to do dirty deeds for the government or else his family will pay the price for his past crimes. John Marston is a believable character but whats even better is the believable setting. This is the Wild West (though its dying) as we were all told it was. The game has some twists and turns that I am not going to reveal because they only have impact when you have been on the journey as Marston. That what makes Video Game's stories different; they can only be appreciated fully when the player is immersed in the world. This is a great game that anyone can have fun with. Its a must buy if you seek a game with action and story as well. Here three games that have done this : (These are just the games I have played and only regard the current console generation)

• Bioshock


• Batman: Arkham Asylum


• Red Dead Redemption

Any one of these games will be a perfect week to spend with. (Only on Xbox 360 and Playstation 3)

Long live the Internet!

The Web is dead. In class we were asked that if we were the web, and since the web is dead does that mean that we are dead. I think that in this article it implies that the web may be dead but the Internet and the apps are what we have become. It like when a caterpillar goes into a cocoon and becomes a butterfly. The caterpillar is gone only for it to become a butterfly. The point of this is that we as a people have become something else from the web. As we were once the web, and that gave way for the web 2.0 we have simply become apps (weird). The article talks about how we have become more of an easy, fast, app society. But isn't that suspected. As humans we also simplify things to improve them. We made things from a a keyboard thing to a now "touch" thing. We can touch stuff instead of applying pressure on some keys on a keyboard. We made typing faster and cooler looking.

What I think the article is more about though, is that the web (people sharing and searching over a space) is gone because people kinda have a general idea of what we want. We want things that are popular and don't bother to search for them. I remember when Myspace was all the rage when I was in my early High School years. Well, after Facebook came we pretty much made fun of any one who stilled used Myspace. We were like "Facebook is cool and Myspace is dumb and stupid, why the hell are you using it?!!" People  got lazy and instead of searching for things we just click (or touch) an app and got what we want. I think that this might have arise,the death of the Web, from the fact that you have to pay for internet. Its not free. You can stroll into Starbucks and get Wi-Fi but thats probably figured into the price of the coffee. Internet and the Web for that matter cost money. That why people have a general idea of what they want, they used the web until they got what benefited them and companies turned those things into apps. The Web is dead but it will arise in a new form along with apps. I don't have an idea of what Web 3.0 is going to be, but does anyone know what the thing that going to kill the internet is going to be? We just have to wait for the future and speculate until they arrive.

Web 2.0

What is Web 2.0? I read the article by Tim O'reilly and I have a general idea of what Web 2.0 is. On the basic level its kinda like Google. It not really a product that gets shelved in stores and something that must be bought every couple of years like a computer. Its defined by O'reilly as a service. You don't have to pay for Google, and Google updates itself on a regular basis.

But Web 2.0 is more than just Google. Web 2.0 also has the important factor of sharing. Users, who are now seen as co-producers instead of consumers, upload and comment on stuff. Its usually the users who are giving the material while a service is simply listing them for fast and easy findings. This is like Youtube. Users upload their Videos and other users can find them and comment on them. This concept of  "sharing" is almost everywhere in the web nowadays. You got Facebook, which acts like a social meeting place but you also share videos, photos and comment on each other person. Sharing is a vital component of Web 2.0 because thats how it differentiate itself mainly from Web 1.0.  Sharing also goes into the concept of open software.

Open software is vital to Web 2.0 because people can improve stuff and they usually do it in a mass numbers in which it gets refined pretty quickly. It is even suggested in the article that services like Google should make their software "hackable". It allows hackers to improve and experiment with the proven code to make something better or something entirely different.

Web 2.0 also ,I think, is something that is always getting better. Since people are sharing and improving stuff on the web, the web gets better. At the end of the article, O'reilly does state that just because something has any of the things he listed does not mean that it is automatically Web 2.0. It needs to excel in those things. I think in general this is what Web 2.0 is.

Why So Serious

The Joker-Why so serious

The story that the Joker tells in the Dark Knight represents to me what a good story should be about. It should grab your attention and have you think about it way after the story is told. The Joker tells how he got his scars but makes the viewer believe what he says and has them ponder on his past and what drove him to his insanity.

Themes and Plug-ins

So I was looking for a theme for my blog , and I found a couple that were cool but ultimately I chose Graphene, which I think is pretty cool looking. Other than that I was searching for some plug-ins and found a couple. I installed a Facebook plug-in that listed my notifications. These are located on the admin page, so if your on your blog, you can check your notification instead of going to Facebook. I did download another plug-in that managed videos and photos and stuff, but found out that the best of it was in the premium part. I later deactivated it, it might come in handy later...

A Personal Cyberinfrastructure : Reflection

Gardner Campbell tells of the personal cyber infrastructure in his video and his article. He shows us that he believes that students should be learning how to create websites instead of be given a folder from the school. He goes on to say that this is better because the students learn a skill but also have their own creative place on the internet in which they can interact with other users on anything. I believe that Campbell's idea is great in that in a world in which the internet is connecting people all over the globe what better than having your own space in which you control, like a house. Campbell's idea is something that we are going to experience and I hope I have fun doing it.