Week Twelve Social and Ethical Issues

Lecture

Week 12's lecture focused on the characteristics of copyright and plagiarism on the Internet and being able to have privacy in some areas. Intellectual property (IP) has no restriction to what is on the Internet. This is the problem when plagiarism creeps in and ignores the rights to copyright and the system is abused and ignored. When dealing with copyright some things we learnt were to always acknowledge the work of others. Always refer to the reference guide to ensure that you reference correctly. Another huge issue discussed was the lack of privacy on the web. The Internet leaves digital trails which shows where a person has been on the Internet. We also discussed the issues with freedom vs. protection of information, and the rights of individuals or, organisations.

Tutorial

In tutorial, the first task asked us to go on this website www.copyright.org.au and pick FIVE information sheets that are or will be relevant to us as an undergraduate. The followings are what i think is relevant to us:

1. Data Base
2. Educational Institutes
3. Ideas and Legal Protection
4. Photocopying
5. Protecting Your Copyright
   

We were also required to take a look at the US department of justice website and pay particular attention to a copyright case regarding software piracy. It was stated that the largest ever sentence regarding software piracy laws was handed down to Barry Erickson for his crimes, and was sentenced to 33 months jail. Having created havoc in several countries around the globe. An even larger sentence was given to the leaded or the piracy network and was sentenced to 44 months jail.

The second task wanted us to go on http://www.apra.com.au/music-users/online_mobile/online_mobile.asp and record on our log what we need to know about music and web.
This website is about providing the most common questions and providing answers (FAQs). The questions are very good and also reasonable. A question that can be interesting to most people would be to find out who actually holds the copyright in a piece of music-the artist, record company, publisher, composer or all three. Some are just common knowledge but it does provide good information for people, especially people who download music on the internet and aspiring musicians.

The third task wanted us write plan to protect our self from attacks on our privacy and security. From the websites listed in Blackboard these are the steps I would follow in order to protect myself from copyright:

1) Do not reveal personal information inadvertently.
2) Turn on cookie notices in your Web browser, and/or use cookie management software.
3) Keep a "clean" e-mail address.
4) Don't reveal personal details to strangers or just-met "friends".
5) Realize you may be monitored at work, avoid sending highly personal e-mail to mailing lists, and keep sensitive files on your home computer.
6) Beware sites that offer some sort of reward or prize in exchange for your contact information or other personal details.
7) Do not reply to spammers, for any reason.
8) Be conscious of Web security.
9) Be conscious of home computer security.
10) Examine privacy policies and seals.
11) Remember that YOU decide what information about yourself to reveal, when, why, and to whom.
12) Use encryption!

What is a Trojan horse?
A Trojan horse is seemingly a harmless computer virus that turns out to be extremely destructive. A Trojan horse often comes in the form of programs in a clever way, claiming newer versions to ensure the downloading of these harmful viruses. A virus is a program written to cause damage to a computer system. It is a self-replicating program that inserts copies of it in computers and documents. A virus might attach itself to a program and every time that the program runs, the virus runs too giving it the chance to replicate and attaching itself to other programs. It is very harmful and it can be very harmful to your computer as well as other people’s computers.

Reading 1 Summary

EFF's Top 12 Ways to Protect Your Online Privacy – This is a simple reading which gives the user a list of the top 12 helpful information on using the internet. Some of the hints are simple and should be implemented. Also gives links for the user for further information.

Readings 2 Summary

In the reading “Ethics in Computing - Social Justice Issues: Electronic Monitoring” Many issues are presented regarding privacy in many different industries. In some instances every movement is being monitored in regards to an employee’s coffee, toilet break, phone usage and Internet usage. The ethics behind these scenarios is questionable as trust and privacy issues are breached.

Reading 3 Summary

Brown & Michaels - Overview of Intellectual Property - this website provides information about protecting your intellectual property. It goes into detail about trademarks and also copyright. The whole point of this is to tell you about your limitations.

Week Eleven Building Knowlegde

Lecture

This week’s lecture was about data, information and knowledge. We defined what each of these are, and according to the lecturer, “datum was a fact or proposition, information was a collection of facts or data that relate to each other, and knowledge was the sum or range of what has been perceived, discovered or learnt.” We learnt that without data there is no information, from this, without information there is no knowledge. This is the importance of these. Without one there is none of the rest. It was described to me that there was a pyramid, similar to a food pyramid, with data being the base, information being the middle and knowledge being the point or top. After understanding each of these we were presented with the conclusion that we then gather an understanding. With these strategies, we taught that assignments will be logical if we have each.

Tutorial

In tutorial, the first thing we were asked to do was to go onto the yahoo website and define; data, information and knowledge. So, the yahoo definition for data is, “In general, data consist of propositions that reflect reality. A large class of practically important propositions are measurements or observations of a variable. Such propositions may comprise numbers, words, or images.” information is” Information is the result of processing, manipulating and organizing data in a way that adds to the knowledge of the receiver. In other words, it is the context in which data is taken” and knowledge was “Knowledge is what is known. Like the related concepts truth, belief, and wisdom, there is no single definition of knowledge on which scholars agree, but rather numerous theories and continued debate about the nature of knowledge”.

We were also asked to list five companies that collect data.

1. Credit card companies- address and phone number, in case credit card is stolen.
2. Doctor- medical history donor information.
3. Government- statistics.
4. Taxi service- collects your information when you call from a land line and you are permanently logged into the system.
5. Banks collect information from clients so that they can give information about their banks account and also so that they can give updates on clients banks statements.
   

All these organizations collect data and information so they can perform better for their clients’ health and interests.

Reading 1 Summary

The article on the webpage www.systems-thinking.org/dikw/dikw.htm looks at the difference between data, information, knowledge and wisdom.
Data: symbols.
Information: data that are processed to be useful; provides answers to "who", "what", "where", and "when" questions.
Knowledge: application of data and information; answers "how" questions.
Understanding: appreciation of "why".
Wisdom: evaluated understanding.

Reading 2 Summary

This reading is also about data, information and knowledge. The reading presented the relations between the three. It then finally went on to discuss some questions they listed there like what is it? Who is collecting it? And why are they collecting it?

Week Ten Information Management

Lecture

What I learned from this week's lecture was how to use technology for accessing and organising information. An information format is atom based e.g. Books, papers, reports and etc. There are pros and cons with the atom based format. Such pros are that we know where our source is, it is easy to protect and difficult to copy. The other information format is bit-based such as digital reproductions and electronic content. Just like atom based there are pros and cons with the bit-based format. Pros are it is very flexible, very cheap and easy to mass produce and broadcast. The cons being lack in privacy, lack in authenticity and unsolicited broadcast e.g. SPAM. I can see the differences in the two formats as I use both and find that there are pros and cons with each. Because I use the computer a lot daily I mostly use the bit-based format to access and organise information. These days people want to find ways to manage their information quickly and easy. Some ways of organising and retrieving information are file extensions, folders/directories and search engines such as Google. Simply by creating bookmarks of your favourite, most used or most reliable websites organises my information quickly and easily.

Tutorial

In tutorial class we were asked to create a favourite list that had three folders in it and we had to go on this website http://archives.obs-us.com/obs/english/books/nn/bdcont.htm and talk about the bits and atoms. afterwards we had to give a summary on the DNA information

This screen shot is of the first folder "Games" contains two site's I have marked as favourites.

This screen shot shows the second folder that’s listed on my favourites, the folder is titled 'Links' and it also contains to web sites that I marked as favourites.

This is the third and final screen shot, the third folder is titled 'UPC Classes'. It contains two websites that I use for my UPC classes.

Summary of 'The DNA Information'
This site jokes around about the fact that some atom based equipment (physical material) was meant to be sent over for a meeting, but some of the material got caught up in customs, whilst the person that wrote this site says he was shipping about ‘bits’ from his computer and they never got caught up in customs. This is because ‘bits’ is only information and could be sent around the world with out getting caught up in customs. This is a good thing about bits. The other uses of ‘bits’ is that it’s cheap. You could send an online book to someone for next to nothing, however sending a book when it is physical material cost money, for the inventory and shipping. The downside to ‘atom’ based things like the video cassette is the inconvenience to the customer of having to return the material before a due date. Where as someone could just download a video of the web and not have to return it or risk getting a late fee. There are also good things about ‘atom’ based things; such as having a hard copy of something that you can easily carry around. It is much to carry a small CD than it is to carry a computer with you if you needed to play some music. And it’s the fact of having something write there in front of you, like having you cheque book with you to pay for things when you need it, instead of using the computer to pay for something, because you can’t carry that around with you to a shop.

Reading 1 Summary: ‘Grazing the Net’

This reading is about the internet being avaliable to kids through school for eductional purposes. Questions are being discussed about whether its relivent for kids to be learning about the internet and how to use it at such an age. Schools across North America are in favour of it, the government has granted support and encouragment. Apparently the 'electronic highway' is almost a priority. Though there is no evidence that networks improve a child's education developments such as reading, math, and thinking skills unless they are special learning programmes.

Week Nine communication

Lecture

Today’s lecture covered communication between people through various communication devices and systems. This type of communication serves great purpose for many people and/ or organization: people use it for various reasons such as for personal usage, business, and organization. Today we also learned that there are four types of networking through communication:

1. Chain Network
2. Circle Network: between people at the same level
3. Wheel Network: team that report to managers
4. All Channel Network: brainstorming

As the lecture goes on, we learned that when we communicate through online there is a system that tells us that whether we are communicating in real time and the same place or vice versa. Such a system called Synchronous and Asynchronous. Synchronous takes place when everyone participated at the same time at the same place or different place: IM, MSN Messenger…etc. Asynchronous, in contrary to Synchronous, is when everyone takes part at the same place or different place and both cases in different time: Email, Bulletin Board…etc.

We then intensively talked about how many people in the class uses the above mention system as the mean of communication and quite a lot of students answered yes. As we surveyed about communication via internet orally, many student said that they use this communication system as a way to be in touch with others who they don’t see often.

When we communicate through Asynchronous way, we have to be extra careful about the way we convey our message because the message you want to pass down through email maybe misread by receiver and that can lead to confusion.

Tutorial

A-In tutorial class we had to go on www.google.com, and type in a term of our choice and click group.

B-I choose basketball as my term choice and Wikipedia came as my first group where it explains the nature of basketball as well as the inventor of the game. It was interesting to read about that article, however, I wanted to read about the actual teams that play this game today. Therefore, I went to my second group which it was somewhat interesting. It highlights NBA headlines and features.

C- Podcasts are becoming popular because of its ability to let everyone share an audio file through listening online or downloading onto the computer or any electronic devices that is capable of recording audio files for later usage. It can also store images. It is very helpful for students who do have poor listening comprehension; they can replay the audio until they understand about whatever files say.

Reading One

In this reading passage illustrates some of the things we should or shouldn’t write when we communicate through email. It also gives some information on how to keep the reader interested in what we have written. It said that we should refrain from sending sensitive materials. In writing the message, we should be extra careful about font size, capitalization…etc. Don’t use sarcasm because the reader might not understand about your intention. And also, when you write for the first time to someone, address that person appropriately. For instance, instead of saying ‘Dear Sir/Madam’, address him or her by his or her first and last name.

Reading Two
Spam is the topic for the second reading assignment which almost everyone who has email experienced it. This selection of reading informs the reader about some precaution that an account holder should take because opening spam message can lead to other trouble. This reading is very helpful especially for the people who don’t really know about much about spam.

Week 8 Presentation Skills

Lecture

This week's lecture focuses on presentations strategies and how to produce a presentation of university standard. The lecture slides provided valuable information on three presentation types, these being an oral presentation, a written presentation and a PowerPoint presentation. The structure of each presentation type was discussed and information given on what should be included in the introduction, body and conclusion of a presentation. Ways to engage and interest an audience were also focused upon, such as including pictures, sounds and animations in a presentation to enhance it.

Tutorial

In this week tutorial class we had to visit this site http://www.personal.psu.edu/uxg3/blogs/undergraduateresearch/2008/02/online-resources-for-how-to-pr.html and this week’s lecture slides to make 5 lists of strategies that will help us with our presentation. We were issued with a worksheet asking us to produce a MS PowerPoint presentation which included a title slide, an introductory slide, at least three main "body slides" and a summary slide. In this MS PowerPoint presentation we also had to include graphics and an animation to help enhance the presentation. Information was also provided on resources to access if we were having trouble completing this task. Once the presentation was complete we had to post pictures of it on our blog. My presentation was on mobile phones.

Top five lists

1. Examine the audienceBefore I deliver an oral presentation I examine the audience. This helps me decided what techniques I should use to engage them. If I sense the audience is a casual group then I am more inclined to use humour to make my presentation more appealing. However if they are a serious group then I will focus only on the main points of my presentation.

2. Practise makes perfectBefore I deliver a presentation I like to practise reading it out aloud. This helps me remember and better understand my presentation and increases my confidence to stand up in front of a group.

3. PreparationI believe preparation is very important before delivering an oral presentation. I always make sure my notes are well prepared, clear and written on Palm cards. If I am delivering a MS PowerPoint presentation I make sure all the equipment and technology is working correctly before I start. Good preparation helps me boast my confidence and as my mum always said "a stitch in time saves nine".

4. Stance, voice and facial expressionsThese days people tend to judge on first impressions. Thus if I am delivering a oral presentation I try to make sure my first impression is a good one. I stand up straight, speak loud and clearly, and ensure I look confident and knowledgeable. These techniques help gain the audience's respect and reassures them I know what I am doing and what I am talking about.

5. ContentThere is no use being really good at presenting an oral presentation if the content of that presentation is poor. I like to make sure the content of all my oral presentations is relevant to the topic and informative to the audience. This means I like to research my topic extensively to ensure the information I provide is correct and engaging.

The followings are 6 powerpoint slides on how to give a low impact presentation:

Resource - PowerPoint Tutorial

This resource provides a step by step approach to using MS PowerPoint. However as I have used PowerPoint before I did not need to refer to this information for help while creating my own MS PowerPoint Presentation.

Week 7 Endnote

Lecture

In today's lecture we learnt how, why and when to use End Note. It stores and remembers information so you don’t have to retype a reference once it has been entered. The program allows you to choose your own reference format; the format that was relevant for me was APA 5th, which automatically presented the reference list in alphabetical order.

Tutorial


To use End Note you need it to be easily accessible. The program is available at ECU for free and you can download form the ECU library site.Once End Note is opened you choose the type of reference you want it to do i.e. book, journal, article etc. Once that is selected a page will appear with a section for each bit of information needed to successfully reference a text. Once all the required information is entered to view it in a sentence you just close it and highlight it. It will then appear across the bottom of the page, automatically in the correct format for ECU. To add the reference to a Word document copy the sentence and then paste it into the document.
In this weeks tutorial we had a number of references, we had to work out what type they were, and then enter them using an endnote. An example of how it turned out is located below.

The second task was to open the Cite while writing Endnote exercises. The aim was where ever there was red italic writing, read the writing then follow the instruction it was asking of you. You had to use Endnote to fill in these blanks with the references you found in the previous exercise. Here is the screen capture of my word document Cite.

The five different type of electronic format and reference are

1. Website:Technical specifications (iPhone). [n.d.] Retrieved November, 2007, from Apple: http://www.apple.com/iphone/specs.html
   
2. Periodical:VandenBos, G., Knapp, S., & Doe, J. (2001). Role of reference elements in the selection of resources by psychology undergraduates [Electronic version]. Journal of Bibliographic Research, 5, 117-123.
   
3. Computer Software:Computer literacy for nurses [Computer software]. (1985). Edwardsville, Kansas: Medi-sim.
   
4. Email:Office of Research and Development. (1995). ARC large grant guidelines. Email December 2, 1995, from mailto:t.lampard@cowan.edu.au/Get%20ARCLG95
   
5. eBook:Wilkinson, R., & Marmot, M. (Eds.). (2003). Social determinants of health: The solid facts (2nd ed.). Retrieved December 2, 2007, from http://www.euro.who.int/document/e81384.pdf

Reading 1 summary

In this weeks readings we had to read up on the guide to EndNote software (ECU's guide). It gives us a bit of background on what EndNote actualy is and then goes on from there into detail about the many functions. it helped me figure out how to do my workshop succesfuly.

Reading 2 summary

The second reading consists of additional reading on EndNote. Within this it contains frequently asked questions, issues, extra downloads, guides and tips. I find that this sort of thing can be very useful as you should know as much as you can of a software so as to use it to achieve great benefits.

Week 6 Evaluation & Authentication

Lecture

This week lecture is about evaluation and authentication. The slides just briefly explain how to find quality information on the World Wide Web. The World Wide Web IQ has two context and they are open protocols and open architecture. Open protocols is convenient for exchanging information and anyone with the access to a computer can create a web content. But open architecture has no enforceable quality control and the dynamic/fluid content structure causes error. The IQ has no control of who publishes on the World Wide Web why they publish it and what is published. There are five ways of evaluating the internet these are accuracy, authority, objectivity, currency and coverage.

Tutorial

For this week tutorial we had to view the following two WebPages.
http://www.ithaca.edu/library/training/think.html
http://www.taftcollege.edu/newTC/Academic/INCO48/sec6-4.htm.

We were asked to compare the differences between the two websites and to briefly describe the criteria’s in the website which is accuracy, authority, objectivity, currency and coverage.

When investigating a website you should consider the following six suggestions.
1. Authority - Make sure you are in the right place. You need to know who the author is and check for their educational background if it’s available.

2. Accuracy - Make sure that the website information is reliable and the documents are factual.

3. Objectivity - You need to recognize purpose of the site, what are their intentions? What are they trying to accomplish?

4. Currency - You must make sure if the site is updated daily, monthly and yearly. Not all WebPages are updated regularly, so it’s best to check when it is last updated.

5. Coverage - Check if the site is designed for educational or entertainment purpose. Check if the site provides you information based on your topic.

6. Value – you should check if the web information is supportive. Check for grammar and spelling errors.

The two websites are very similar I didn’t notice the difference between the two. They both offer information and guides to a successful research.
However this site http://www.taftcollege.edu/newTC/Academic/INCO48/sec6-4.htm gives detail on the domain type and the meaning.
Domain Type .com............ ...a commercial business, organization, or company
.edu ...............an educational institution
.int................an international organization
.gov ...............a nonmilitary government entity
.mil............. ..a military organization
.net...............other organizations: nonprofit, nonacademic
.uk, .au, .us etc...... Country codes denoting servers found in other countries.

We were then asked to evaluate the two websites using the steps we have written above. The website that I choose evaluate is the American Cultural History: 1960 -1969. This website is basically about some of the events that occurred in America during 1960-1969 and the way it changed the way we live today. It has information on Important Historic and Cultural Events such as 1961 - Peace Corps created by Pres. Kennedy, 1963 - Martin Luther King and his I have a dream speech, 1963 - Pres. John F. Kennedy and his assassination in Dallas, Texas and much more. This website looks accurate to me and it is well written. It was last updated in December 2006 by Susan Goodwin. It has author’s details and contact number so it’s trustworthy.

The second website that i evaluate was The Psychedelic'60s.
This site was madeby the Rector and Visitors of the University of Virginia". From reading through some of the links from the home page I think most of the infomation on this page maynot be all completely factual and probably not a very good source of infomation but i also don't believe that all the infomation on the site is unture. I think that this site was put together by students and is mainly made up of stories and interviews from people who lived in that generation.