social tools and cloud computing Week 10

This week's material focused on social bookmarking as well as cloud computing.  Social bookmarking is a service that allows users to visit websites and save the websites to a neutral server like delicious.  The user is able to categorize, adjust, name and describe the bookmark to make it easier to identify at a later date.  For instance if a person stumbles upon a website they like pertaining to travel arrangements, they can label the bookmark as a travel bookmark and describe the service that it provides so that they will know what it is later.  There is also a website called stumbleupon that allows for users to get randomly transferred to various websites within certain categories.  If someone is interested in rock music, the website can help find other websites pertaining to rock music that the user would probably never stumble upon.  Cloud computing was the other subject of the material this week and specifically google docs.  Cloud computing is a very interesting idea in that it allows for a user to submit and edit content existing on the web and rather then send a copy of the work to someone, they simple allow the other person access to the online content.  This takes away the need to send many emails and make many copies of the same thing that inevitably vary and become confusing and overwhelming.  When working in a group for example, all members can make adjustments to the same document rather than having to send around copies of the various versions of the document.

I think that cloud computing is much more relevant to my major and profession than social bookmarking.  Google docs could be useful to every major but also very useful to film making.  When moving from pre-production to production there are many different versions of the same script that change all the time.  It would be much easier for everyone to log into a google doc and view the script as apposed to having to make changing and send multiple copies.  It would also be useful for scheduling purposes as well.  Coordinating all of the people in a production could benefit greatly if there was a type of cloud computing scheduler or calender.  I'm sure there is one out there and I will definitely look into google docs into the future for projects.

LINK: http://www.airset.com/AirSet.jsp#app.Home

The link I found is for a website that utilizes cloud computing to organize schedules and contacts and also allows you to create groups.  I've already stressed that I think calendar applications for cloud computers in very beneficial but having contacts for a large business or just a social butterfly would also help.  The service called airset allows you to hook up to the program using a smart phone or computer.  Airset also allows you to safely backup files from your computer onto the "cloud" so that you can access them from anywhere.  I'm sure many companies are designing cloud software including google but it is good to see that cloud computing is expanding to include many different aspects a person may need.  I was not aware of any of this technology before but after looking around the internet I've found that there is a lot of different options to "cloud compute" and there are many different applications that seem practical and beneficial for pretty much every type of use a person may need.

Week 14. Games for Teaching and Learning

This week's material covered how games are being used for educational purposes.  After watching the videos and reading the articles in this week's section I couldn't help but feel somewhat removed from what apparently is going all around me.  I had never heard of "second life" but apparently it is very popular and teaching people things over the internet community that were once taught in a classroom.  Through "second life" players are able to become immersed in the learning material as they act out plays in digital English theaters or explore ancient Rome.  There are also scavenger hunts that allow for students to explore definitions and find information on their own as apposed to having information told to them.  Avatars can even be quizzed by their environment and different objects.  The articles in this weeks section also showed examples of games that helped education on politics, fast food and even computer science.  People can go to a political candidates' site and play their game that centers around health reform and hopefully learn about the issue.  The McDonalds game I found very disturbing.  It goes through the process of farming and delivering food to customers but conveniently excludes the part where the cute digital cows go into a Wonka-esque machine for processing and little hamburger patties come out.  I'm not sure I agree with tailoring games towards kids that highlight products with health risks and lacking any nutritional value.  The computer science game was a bit dull for me and basically just added up numbers.  Then again I no interest in computer science.

I cannot think of any way that learning games could really help in the film industry as film is highly creative and too technical for simple games.  I could maybe see how second life would be important in the film industry in getting information out or possibly even screening movies in the online community.  I don't think I would have any interest in doing it but I'm sure there are filmmakers who would like to gain exposure by showing work over the internet community through second life or other avatar based games.  I don't really think the time requirements for making films lends itself to being able to create an entire online social community.  Film making is a very collaborative process where social interaction is very important.  I think that online gaming or social media takes away from these aspects and detracts from the most important aspects of film making.

http://nwn.blogs.com/nwn/2010/08/falco-sl-machinima.html

I found a very strange link that pertains to film making within the online game community of "second life."  There is a German film maker who takes footage from within second life and cuts it up into movies.  The movies he makes are god awful and as soon as the first one started playing I broke out into laughter by the juxtaposition of serious dialogue coming out of computer characters' mouths but I have to admit it is clever in some weird way.  There are a lot of people in this online game who would consume this bazaar content and appreciate it.  I'm not sure I would consider this film making as much as animating but whatever.  Interesting look into how games are evolving into the film industry and as far as learning goes, the editing of these movies can teach real life practical editing skills I guess.