Category: technology

Gaming, in all its glory

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As many people are already aware, I am quite the dabbler when it comes to video games.  Really any kind of game “floats my boat.”  Whether that be shooting terrorists, saving the universe from some alien race or just driving a Bugati Veyron at top spead into oncoming traffic.

The thing is, video games allow one to really do well just about anything.  A lot of people often associate gaming with nerdy or geeky people, and the really only exceptions is frat boys getting together to bust out some Call of Duty multiplayer.

But the truth is, video games are an art form in themselves. The countless months, and sometimes years it takes to create a game is remarkable.  In essence video games create an entire article virtual world with its own laws and physics, when said that way, they seem pretty awesome.

It really is a true business.  As much as designers wished gaming studios ran similar to Grandmas Boy, they don’t. Many designers really put their heart and souls into designing their games.

When I played Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2, russians invade the eastern seaboard, and you play through a war-torn Washington DC, fighting towards the capital building.  In it their is a scene of the half-destroyed Washington monument, and it is really a piece of art.  The entire world is rendered on a computer with the intention of millions of people playing through it in their own ways. Imagine creating a world that can filter and allow millions of different choices and decisions, it like creating another world.

In essence that is what Video games really are. And I dabbler in them whenever I can.

Facebook posts found tornado items

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Due to the terrible tornado strikes in the mid-west of America, many lives are lost and many properties are lost too. Recently, a group on Facebook has created a page to try to link the victims with their lost documents, photos, and other personal items they have lost in the tornadoes. The page was created on April 27, and had more than 50000 “likes” and more than 600 images of found items. The page’s creator, Patty Bullion, said the inspiration for it came when the worst of Wednesday’s storm flew past about 10 miles from her home in northern Alabama.
“When it went over us, it literally just started raining pictures,” she said. “We got parts of Bibles, hymnals. … I just started saying, ‘There are parts of people’s lives falling out of the sky.” They found a signed year book page, which shows a group of boy eyeing on a female student. Many of these item are very important memories for those people. “If they’ve lost everything and could just get one picture back, I know that would mean a lot to me.” said Patty Bullion.

Aliens?

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I was watching this video, and it really got me thinking. Do aliens really exist?

I’m completely serious!

If you think about it, we are one planet among billions and trillions of others. Is it possible that we are the only other life out there?

The idea of us being alone seems proposterous to me. Of course there are all the videos of fake UFO sightings and the random Area 51 rumors, but could be there some truth behind them?

And there are videos like this that honestly confuse me. Could that all be real or is it just a hoax. I mean it is on the History Channel. It has to be somewhat legitimate

Maybe I’m crazy, but I do believe that there is something else out there. I’m not saying that aliens are going to come and attack us, or that I believe in 2012. I more think that there just has to be something more than the population on Earth.

Or maybe I’m just crazy! You tell me.

Don’t Fear X-rays from Airport Scanners

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We all know that radiation is bad for our health. People usually don’t want to get too many x-rays in their lifetime, or they don’t want to live next to any nuclear power plants.

However, The Transportation Security Administration began installing full-body scanners in American airports. Since passengers have noticed this device, they are very concern about their privacy and health, because under the x-ray, everything is visible.

For privacy concerns, it is true that the machine is able to see the image of our body. However, for health concerns, according to an article published online Monday in the Archives of Internal Medicine, there’s no significant threat from the full-body scanners. Although they use ionizing radiation, which is known to cause cancer, the amount is so low. It is less than 1% of the additional radiation a person gets from flying in an airplane and the same we received through 3 to 9 minutes of daily life on the ground.

“If individuals feel vulnerable and are worried about the radiation emitted by the scans, they might reconsider flying altogether since most of the small, but real, radiation risk they will receive will come from the flight and not from the exceedingly small exposures from the scans,” wrote the authors, Pratik Mehta of UC Berkeley and Dr. Rebecca Smith-Bindman of UC San Francisco.

We Shouldn’t Be Afraid

weirdjenny1 Comment

nullWhile we are playing basketball, OVS freshmen Anthony Ho said” Hey! It’s raining, so we better go back to our room, because the rain has radioactive materials in it!” People in United States, especially in the west coast are aware of the radiation which leaks from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant in Japan.

However, Nolan Hertel, nuclear engineering researcher at Georgia Institute of Technology, said the United States is thousands of miles from the leaks and once the radiation gets into the air, it disperses and dilutes as the wind blows it.

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Mysterious Mercury

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This is the first time that Earth has a regular orbiting eye-in-the-sky spying on the smallest planet in the solar system, Mercury. NASA’s spacecraft is called Messenger, which was successfully launched into a pinpoint orbit on Thursday night. Messenger was launched in 2004, which has cost NASA $440 million. The scientists believe that Messenger will start to transmit pictures and investigate the mysterious magnetic field and unusual density of Mercury. This is the fifth planet in the solar system that NASA has orbited. “Everybody was whooping and hollering; we are elated,” Messenger’s chief engineer, Eric Finnegan said. “There’s a lot of work left to be done, but we are there.” Mercury is one of the most difficult planets to get to, because of its extreme climate. While it is facing the sun. the temperature can get to 800 degrees. However, when it is not facing the sun, the temperature can get low to 300 degrees below zero. Robert Strom of the University of Arizona was a scientist on the Mariner, a spacecraft that NASA has launched to Mercury in 1970s, and current Messenger missions and he said he thought he wouldn’t get a second peek at the mysterious Mercury. The main purpose of this mission is to look for any living species in the planet and any liquid form water in those craters with frozen ice.

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Honor’s Ski TRIP

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UGH! My mittens were filled with snow…again. I dusted my jacket off as I strained and struggled to get on my two feet. My poles dug deep into the white, icy powder and my body pushed itself up. Finally, I was standing and all I could think was “I need to get back to the cabin.”

Cross country skiing was not what I thought it would be. I jumped at the opportunity of going on the Honor’s Ski Trip, thinking it would be a breeze, especially because of my love for downhill skiing. Little did I know that cross country skiing had nothing in common with downhill skiing…except for maybe the poles.

I struggled to keep up with the rest of the group my first day. I was falling here and there, into deep pits of powdery snow. Even when I was standing up, I would somehow manage to fall over.

However, I had a lot of time to contemplate life, just as a I do every camping trip. It’s something about being isolated from technology and being beset in nature that makes the mind flow so clearly. Letting the mind flow was very refreshing and well needed, although now quite the opposite is happening with all of the backed up school work that is calling me. Regardless, for the time being, the trip allowed me to unwind and have some quality thinking time.

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Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind

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As humans we are entitled to make mistakes. In fact it’s our nature to make mistakes, and then to regret.
What if we could erase what we had done on our own minds?

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind is a movie that discusses that very idea.

Scripted by Charlie Kaufman, the sci-fi romance film follows an odd couple, Jim Carry and Kate Winslet, through their relationship. Clementine, Kate Winslet, has ever-changing colors of hair and is the first of the two to erase their memories. Then follows Joel, Jim Carry, only to find that what they lost through the operation only brought them back to the starting point with the famous phrase “Meet me… in Montauk…”

Personally, this is my third favorite movie, after Transformers and Donnie Darko. It’s strange to see Jim Carry in a serious movie but he did an amazing job.

Without getting too personal, this idea comes about more than I would think when I’m alone. What if we could forget certain parts of our lives? Is it ethical?

In the movie Joel asks “Is there any risk of brain damage?” in which the technician replies, “Well, technically speaking, the operation is brain damage, but it’s on a par with a night of heavy drinking. Nothing you’ll miss.”

Ultimately it’s up to the participants, but I thought that I would let this idea sit ineveryone’s head.

Easy Steps to Hack a Smart Phone

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Which digits should you defend the most in your life?

Most people would say their social security numbers.

But, in the 21st Century, things changed. Many of us now possess this multifunctional device called “smart phone” where we input our innermost personal information negligently.

So, let me make a slight change to the question above.

Which digits should you defend the most today?

It’s your phone number.

A hacker can gain your social security number, pictures, texts, and name me other personal information in three easy steps.

First, get the number and name of the smart phone owner. This is when business cards become particularly handy.

Second, send programs such as snoopware, simphishing, spam, bluetooth, to trap the device.

Third, uncheck the SSL and “wipe” or hack the device for information.

Now this “smart” phone would not sound so smart anymore.

To maximize our smart phone security, downloading “Norton Smartphone Security” is strongly recommended.

However, “We’re still in the late ’90s when it comes to security on mobile devices,” Tyler Shields, a computer and mobile security researcher, said.

What can we truly do?

Give yourself a second thought before typing anything onto your exquisite device. Because it can bring you harsh consequences within seconds.

Check out this article from New York Times and videos.

The New Ipad

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Since the iPad 1 was released in 2010, 14.79 million of the tablets have been sold. On March 2, 2011, Steve Jobs returned from medical leave to introduce the new iPad, iPad 2.

The new iPad is a thinner, lighter, and faster version of the old one, but it will sell at the same prices as the original models. The iPad 2 includes a front and back camera, which the people are allowed to have video chat.

It will be available on March 11, and the prices will range from 499 dollars to 829 dollars. Despite his health condition, Mr. Jobs still show up to introduce the new item because he strongly believes that iPad is Apple’s future. “We’ve been working on this product for a while and I just didn’t want to miss today,” he said.

Although companies like Samsung, Dell, Motorola have also introduced rival tablets, they are not able to match the iPad’s pricing. For example, the Motorola Xoom costs 800 dollars, and The Samsung Galaxy Tab is available for 500 dollars, but it is way smaller than the iPad. So Mr. Jobs believes that the new ipad will still be the leading tablet computer in the future.