The end has come

What I have taken away from this class, is a whole new outlook of what the world has become thanks to the use of technology. This has happened at much faster rate than I had ever really thought, the events that I will talk about later in this paper shaped how stores price items, how companies could now shift work to other places.. Also I will address the question that has really plagued me the whole time in this class.

The best supply chain, this phrase is synonymous with Wal-Mart. After reading Thomas L.Friedman “The World is Flat”, I have learned a great amount about the workings of what makes a good supply chain. Prior to my reading of this book, I felt I knew everything I needed to know about Wal-Mart. But learning what makes their company supply chain the best was the key element to understanding Wal-Mart. What this companies supply chain has done has made it so they have almost monopolized the consumer market. Is this a good thing or a bad thing is whole other topic, but they what have done has made it possible for you to get the cheapest best quality things all at one store. After reading this part of the book it made me think, to stay a head you must be willing to bend the rules of the business world, also the idea of being moral is definitely called into question. Overall, this class has given me a look into things such as supply chain, I know I can see that this really is what makes or breaks a company.

Some of the other things that have still stuck with me from this class are how outsourcing is not always a bad thing. Before this class, I had always been given the one-sided opinion that it was bad, and that nothing good could come from it, but now I can see there is a lot of good that comes from it. The thing that caught me off guard was that it ultimately creates the opportunity for higher paying jobs, and also simultaneously promotes the idea that education is how to get those jobs. This class has also given me a more worldly opinion on many things that I always have been narrow minded about before.

Overall, I found this class to be a history class of things that have happened in the past 70- 50 years in the tech world. I have learned so many things just from my reading of The World is Flat.  The sad truth is that these are things I should have had some more knowledge of, but in k-12 this was never a subject that was gone over. So that being said, I really enjoyed becoming more educated on things that have happened in my lifetime before I could really understand what the milestones meant. Now I can see know the real story behind how things in the 21st century started and is paramount to understand what is possible, and what is just a branch idea from the first core ideas of this century.

I really have no suggestions for how this course could be improved in the future. At first I was a little hesitant of using a blog. But after using it for this class it was simple and easy to understand, and I enjoyed doing it because I have never done it before.  The book that we read for this class was very compelling, and it held my attention with ease. Overall, I found that the class was very easy to understand what was asked of you. The simplicity of how the course was laid out made it easy to engage the core material. I read a few pages a day out of the book, and on Saturday wrote about it. That made the class not feel like I was in a rush Saturday to read all of the pages and write on my blog.

GNR Mind Tricks

The way that Bill Joy talks of GNR it is convincing to the reader, he is able to show the down side and some unexpected things from all three. Genetics is the first thing I will talk about of the GNR aspect of the paper. Joy talks on the unknowns that genetics bring to the table, from what I took from it, he felt that there was far too much risk in genetically altering food, and that it was unthinkable to try it on people. He felt that if you were able to genetically alter something that there would be benefits to it, but the main point  I took from my reading of his article on this topic was the risk will not outweigh the reward. Another point he drove home was that notion of equality would be lost as of the cause of human cloning.

 The second part of GNR is the Nanotechnology, this is things such as machinery that can replicate anything such as simple cell structure. This topic was something that really had Joy questioning the risk involved with them, for example his argument was that this will not be a weapon that is going to be hard to get your hands unlike the NBC. Bill Joy felt that “GNR technologies have clear commercial uses”, what this means is that it will be much easier to use as a weapon.

 The next part of GNR is Robotics, Joy felt that the world would become even more taken over by the elites of the world with the introduction of robotics. He also felt there was some chance that man power would be taken over by the more effective robots power. The end result of this would be that the need for people in the world would shrink, and on top of that the world would be controlled by the elites of the world and the lives of millions of people would hang in the balance of their choices.

Personally, I felt the author's fears where right and a little far off, but I did feel the author made a good point of how we never think of what will happen with the next big break through. When I say that I felt that he was a little far off, it is because I don’t see the same outlook he does. First, I do want to say his opinion on GNR is great, but personally I see different truths from it. This could be that he just is far more educated on this subject, and is able to have far better foresight than I.  But I just can’t see that far in to the future, I simply do not see these 3 fears that Joy does only because I am so new to the subject matter. I just don’t see robots being the reason mankind kill over, and I also don’t think that Nanotechnology is going to grow in leaps and bounds in the next 20 years as does Joy. Overall, I really enjoyed Bill Joy “Why the future doesn't need us”, it really gave me a new outlook to the way that I perceive humankinds future. But to me, I would much rather try to think of what mankind can do for the good of all with the future of technology.

MINDLESS MOVIE

The computer-related film I’m going to talk about is Fast and Furious 7. I just want to give full discloser that I will be speaking of the plot, so if you want to see the film just keep that in mind. The reasons I chose to use this movie to talk about is simply the computer element is very heavy, and innovate. In the movie there is a tracking device called Gods Eye, this computer can track people by using every electronic in the world to do so. The Gods Eye can use street cams, cell phones, and the list goes on. This idea is crazy to me because it is plausible that the government could actual use something like this. I just want to give some idea of how powerful Gods Eye is, it can use cell phone cams on phones in your area to confirm your identity. To put it in simple terms, it uses a workflow system that lets you use all the cameras and microphones in the world to track someone.

This idea is realistic, our world wants everything intertwined and there is going to be some cost for this. I do feel this idea is great, but we have to think that it would be used to spy on the world. But I can also think of the benefits, war would never be the same. Being able to target the leaders and their exact location would save so many soldiers, and on top of that far less civilian casualties. The Gods Eye would have cut every war the world has ever had in half, by only having to target the head of the monster you would save lives of millions of people. The idea of Gods Eye will definitely become a weapon of the future, the only real question is when. In my personal opinion, I really think that there are weapons very similar to this one already. The world that we live in is a sobering reminder that we need something like Gods Eye to feel safe anymore. Our country is fighting a war that is played in the shadows by the Islamic extremist. They are using forms of terrorism that takes our country by surpasses. But if we had something like Gods Eye we could make this war a much fairer and balanced playing field.

The social and cultural issues in Fast and Furious 7’s computer elements all boil down to the inevitable downsides to Gods Eye. The question that is asked is what would happen if Gods Eye is used for evil or taken by a country like North Korea. The problem is that this power is not meant for the world, this would have so many side effects with our lives. For starters, we would be using it to invade the public’s right to privacy. Second, all other countries would feel that we would use this to gain an edge, and the end result would be hate towards us.

I chose to talk about this movie because I really could see how the Gods Eye uses a lot of what we have talked about in this class as far as things like workflow software and countless other things. This computerized weapon uses all of the innovation that the world has made, by doing this it uses a platform that was already set out for it, and it cashes in on the work of others. All this weapon is doing is leapfrogging from all forms of technology to achieve its goal. Overall, this movie has a much unexpected computer element that is actually one of the most realistic things that is portrayed in this film.  

THE MAN NAMED JOE

To think that this story was written almost 70 years ago is absurd. On the basis that we have almost all the same advantage and disadvantages that the story has, it really is just matter of opinion. Being able to guess some of the things that we use in our lives today almost 70 years ago is something that really shocked me. Given how little technical advancements came in that area, it’s almost mind blowing to think someone had that much foresight into what will come.

The story is all about the temptation of technology that people in the story and our lives will face and have faced. The ‘logic’ in this story has some real similarities to some of the technology we use in our lives today.  The first similarity between the two was the searching for answers. The story used its logics to find answers, we use search engines. There are some similarities with the two being that it gives the best answer the system can give. The difference is that search engines do not give the exact answer to ever question. But the logics in the story gives an exact answer to whatever question is asked in the story. The story gives there logics more power than the people. But with our search engines there is only so much knowledge that a person can gain given they are powered by what people know, it can’t generate answers to things that are still mysteries to use.

I want to touch back on the use of search engines, and how in the story they almost felt naked by the ability of people being able to see their personal business. This is not similar to us at all, we all live in a time that it is just common knowledge you can find out anything about anyone. I could go online and look up anything about anyone, this is just the day and age we live in. besides that people that go on Facebook and divulge their lives stories anyways. Modesty for personal information is dead unlike the story where the people felt so violated by this.

The story talked of the use of censors and the errors that still occurs even with them. I found it interesting that the story spoke of being able to use logics to find out how to better perform criminal acts. I can compare this to our use of the web, you can find out how to build bombs just by jumping on the internet. This really seemed to me to be prophetic, being able to see that people would abuse the use of the technology was very apparent to the author of “A Logic Named Joe”. I’m sure he just understood human nature, and knows that given the chance to use it for wrong, people would. Also I felt that in the story and in our world, we both search and find things that really should not be found. You can almost type in any word on google and have something inappropriate pop up.  In the story you could ask how to kill someone and it would give you the exact info you need. This is a sad truth, but we can’t use the internet without running into these sickening things. The story had the same end result of too much info on things we do not need to know.

These things I have talked about in this paper are the subject I found to be prophetic in the story of “A Logic Named Joe”. I also just wanted to show how they compare to our use of technology. The fact that someone could really see all these things come to shape is truly amazing, but the author just did not see that we would become so desensitized to it all.

Oil On The Brain

I found chapter 14 of “The World Is Flat” by Tomas L. Friedman to be very insightful. It talked of the “Age of Interruption” and how we have become overly indulged in media and electronics. We all have seen someone that cannot look away from their phone or computer, well you are trying to talk to them. This is not a thing of the past it has become much more overwhelming since the release of this book. Now children have become sucked into this sickening cycle of over indulging of technology. This has become very big problem in our lives, people can do so much more to stay updated on other people but choose to lose the real human contact. I really liked this chapter because it showed the down side of the use of technology. I felt that this chapter really showed that the book outlined both the ups and downs of the flattening of the world, and the side effect of the use of technology.

The building of a Dell laptop is the true show case of collaboration by working with nearly 400 suppliers from North America to Asia, and few others in between. The Dell computer company can have a computer built in Malaysia and sent to you with in four days. It all starts with you placing your order over phone and giving the exact specifications of what you want. Shortly after that you give your card info, and then the order is sent to the production system. After all your pieces for your computer are ordered by dell to its supplier they are than only given 90 minutes to fill it. Then after the orders are filled, they are dropped off and put into assembly bins, after this the inventory is then assembled by a team on site. Then the computer is sent to the software center for the download of the desired software. Shortly after this it is boxed and sent on a charter jet to Tennessee where it is taken to the factory in Nashville for additional external parts then shipped to the customer. This is all done in a very short time span which speaks to the power of their supply chain.

It’s very scary to think that al-Qaeda has a supply chain, but it is true they have found a way to benefit from something that we all love and benefit from. They are able to upload videos, find recruits and outsource their training. They use there supply-chain to distribute the needed supplies and the end result is pandemonium. The chain that is used all too often gives them the ability to communicate and work together like never before. The use of a there supply-chains has let them become a much bigger threat. This new flat world has made the small businesses much bigger with the use of supply-chains, groups like al-Qaeda are now been able to find that same niche. They are able to communicate with the other members across the world giving them the power of building a much bigger membership base.

The curse of oil is just a sad thing for all those oil rich countries, because of the money the countries make from the oil there is no taxation which mean no voices for the people of these countries. The oil  in these countries are almost all the governments revenue, this means there are not  many jobs given the lack of free trade with other countries, there is no need for the dictators to seek out ways to make money given there oil. I found this topic very interesting on the basis that we all feed into this sad fact by buying gas. I found this very similar to the saying, “Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day, teach him to fish and you feed him for life”. We are just playing into the dictators hands by buying their oil. But if we could get oil from somewhere else we could make those countries blossom into a much better place for their countrymen.

credit to the computer

Computers have always been part of my educational experiences throughout school.   I found that through grade school up until now computers have made school so much easier to succeed. Another point I wanted to touch on was how computers have given us an ability to get the best and most creditable sources by just simply typing it in to a search engine. The simple fact is that the children of today have it so much easier than we did at their age in school simply based on the advances in computers and the entire tech world.

The use of computers in school is almost an afterthought, but at one time this was not the norm. When I personally was in elementary, the use of computers in schools was still very much in a beta phase. We could use them but not for anything very productive to learning. What I remember using them for was playing games like The Oregon Trail. But as I came into junior high we started being able to use computers for a few more things. But the only class I still was only able to use it for was intro to typing class. Looking back at this, it makes me laugh to think that the only class that I used a computer was typing. This in some right is sad to say though only because it was much harder to learn something if you could not understand how they did it in class, now you can go to YouTube, or Khan Academy and they can help fill in the blanks for you. But I don’t want to get too much on this subject only because I will address it later in the paper. After junior high school came the next big shift in my use of computer in school. It was in high school where the use of computers became more apparent, not so much in school but more so in the use of a home computer. At this point in time it was very common to own home computers, so teachers began to tell students to use them for homework and other things such as writing papers, after this time period I was out of school for many years. But now I am back and I’m blown away at how much the use of computers is needed to be a good student. I also can see it has made school so much easier for the students. I personally love the use of canvas, this has made keeping up with school so much simpler. By giving you everything you need to navigate the due dates of assignments to letting you test scores to see what it will take to get your goal grade.

The use of computers has made finding the best creditable sources for papers so much easier. I can only imagine how long it would take to search a book to find creditable sources.  This really has empowered the student to always have the power to find the best source for their argument. I personally am so happy to be able to use a search engine to help me find the best support for my argument. I also love the fact that if I am unsure of anything I can use my computer to also solve that problem. Students are so blessed to be able to have such a great aid at our fingertips. I really can’t imagine what school would be without it.

The kids today have the world at their fingertips with how much computers can help them learn, there is no reason to fall behind. Computers can give you the ability to learn anything you want. I personally wish that computers had the capability as they do today for when I was a child. I am so envious of what they can do to supplement what they have learned in school by simply using free sources of education. Even being in college, I love using supplement material to help me understand my classes that much more. The computer has just given us all so much powers to make ourselves more intelligent people. The main point I wanted to show is that as a student I only hope to use computers more for my schooling. The computer will always help us as student to reach our goals.

all you need to know

This week’s reading of “The World is Flat” by Thomas L. Friedman, was very compelling on many different fronts. One thing that stood out to me was the fact that Ireland has become a power of a country, I would have never guessed that. I found it very interesting that they offer basically free college for their people. By them doing that they eliminate the stress of losing jobs to cheaper labor, and stress the importance of having a well-educated labor force. The country as a whole decides they need to make changes, and by doing so they have seen where they need to improve, where they did and still need to. This country has done great, but my argument is the fact that they only have 4.6 million people as of 2013. The U.S has 316.13 million as of 2013. My argument is that we can’t hope to use the same tools they did to become a better country in the flat world. We have to go through the same growing pains they did before we can fully embrace and understand what we should do. I feel that education is paramount to us being able to move forward in the future. Every country that has been able to thrive in the new flat world has realized it, and we still need to as well. I just wanted to talk about Rob Watson, I felt he made a good point by saying there are “far more environmental lawyers and scientists than environmental businessmen”. This just shows you can make a difference in the world by just thinking about what is best for our environment. I also have respect that he went back to school to find out how he could make a green business more profitable. Our world is something we should care for far more than saving a few cents here and there. This has to become a standard at one point to help make our planet livable for others in the future.   

Some countries have been able to do more with the same possibilities at hand. The main reason is that development is a voluntary process. The people in power of this country hold in their hands the outcome of what can happen when it comes to trying to develop their countries.  After they become invested in wanting to develop their country they must do four basic things. One, they must try to improve their infrastructure. Two, become more invested in the importance of education in your country, this will create a more educated labor force. Three, having good governance will help attract companies to your country by having flexible labor laws and low corporate taxes. The last but not least is having an open economy for open foreign trade. Some regions of the world shoot themselves in the foot when it comes to why they cannot attract business to them. They chose to let their culture get in the way, these cultures chose not to be open to changes that could help them out in the long run. The regions that have cultures that chose to be open and willing to change have a great advantage.

 A self-directed consumer is a consumer that wants the feeling of every product and serves being tailored for them. This has made companies have to offer much more options for the consumers, but it also gives them the ability to give us a buffet to serve ourselves. As a company you can not only offer what you want consumers to buy anymore. Now with the rise of self-directed consumers we can serve ourselves anywhere to see what the best prices are. The rise of the self-directed consumers has made buying from the internet much easier to do. Essentially you are taking away the retailer from the buy experience, you become the employee by simply checking yourself out. This saves the company money by not having to pay for work that is ultimately done by the customer. I can honestly say I am a self-directed consumer, but I like to be in control so I will never change that. I just like to always have control of how I can buy and this gives me that control.

When I was thinking globalization I wondered what other countries felt about it, and what scared them most about it. But after reading this week I was dumbfounded to find they felt that the American cultural would overtake their own, and that they would lose their beloved culture. But this did not happen until the world became flatter and brought with it the diversity of the entire world. With the use of the internet, cultures became even stronger. You could now communicate with others from thousands of miles away with ease. We can now see that Americanization has not happened like everyone had thought it would with globalization. But rather the opposite, an equal flow of cultures in to the world is now more of what could happen with globalization.