Rhetorical analysis

My articles from the IEEE Computer Society have all followed roughly the same structure. A problem, a hypothesis, and what the future of it may be. There may be a new technology coming along to replace an old one, which they explain. They then go into details as to how it can be improved, and why. Finally, they give us a test of how the new technology might look and feel when it actually gets here. Most of the articles followed this same structure, especially being that they were all scientific entries about computer technology.

This brings up the next point, reference. As mentioned above, no technology is scrapped, only added upon. In one post I talk about Web 3.0, which is Web 2.0 upgraded. Each article mentions how the technology can be improved upon, never just thrown out. In the oil spill article, they look at the problem and find out how to fix it, as opposed to simply creating an entirely new software system for oil rigs.

The language used in each article can be read by anyone who is familiar with technology. Some of the content may only make sense to someone in Computer Science like me, but most of it is for the layman. All of the writing if scientific, there is really know humanistic or philosophical point of view. It is all to the point and laid out easily.

Although some articles were difficult to fully comprehend, even to me, I feel like the scientific journals provided were interesting and really brought life to my major and where it is going...

Did computer software cause the BP Oil Spill?

We don't have access to all the data from this incident. However, Transocean's interim report, submitted to Representative Henry Waxman's committee in the US House of Representatives on 8 June 2010, stated the following under an "Action items/work needed" section: "Full control-system software review. Software code requested from manufacturer for investigation." Apparently, in studying the disaster, there's speculation of a software connection.


Offshore oil rigs comprise dozens of complex subsystems that use embedded software or are operated under software control. For numerous reasons, each system is a potential point of failure. For example, three rigs with the same design built over four years can end up with different equipment and software versions that might not integrate as expected. This could also lead to serious configuration-management problems.

Another problem is that much of the software residing in or controlling components is routinely delivered well after the equipment is onboard the rig. Engineers test the interfaces at the last minute, if they even test the software at all. Equipment interfaces thus present the weakest link in offshore oil rig systems in terms of reliability and safety, because the industry lacks interface standards and sufficient testing methods.

We'll learn more about software's role in this disaster as additional evidence surfaces.

Fallen behind yet again... Also, ROBOTS!!!

A miniature helicopter enters your workplace through an open window. It avoids alarms and security cameras as it navigates its way to your boss's office. It removes a flash drive from her desk and deposits a substitute, possibly even bearing a potent virus, so the crime goes undetected.

This would have been science fiction until recently but now it is part of the Sixth International Aerial Robotics Competition, held at the University of Puerto Rico in 2010. While this is a wonderful challenge, it also serves as a forceful warning of crime’s coming robotization.

Soldiers now can launch missiles from unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV's) without ever being in the line of fire. But what happens when the wrong hands get the same technology? And what if there's is better? As AI and robots advance these are all things that need to be taken into account.

Is it time for Cloud Computing?

Cloud computing is Internet-based computing, whereby shared resources, software and information are provided to computers and other devices on-demand, like electricity. This technology has become a significant technology trend, and many experts expect it to reshape information-technology processes and the IT marketplace during the next five years.

Using the technology, users on various types of devices such as PCs, laptops, smart phones, and PDAs, can access programs, storage, processing, and even application-development platforms over the Internet, by services offered by cloud-computing providers. Resources are kept on providers' servers, rather than on users' systems. Proponents like the technology's advantages, including cost savings, high availability, and easy scalability.

Industry observers say the technology's growth potential is enormous. Market-research firm IDC expects IT cloud-services spending to grow from about $16 billion in 2008 to about $42 billion by 2012. IDC also predicts cloud-computing spending will account for 25 percent of annual IT expenditure growth by 2012 and nearly a third of the growth the following year.

Using this technology, data is easily accessible over the network instead of just sitting on the users' devices. It is becoming easier and easier to do this, and will make information transfer and backup much easier. The future of cloud computing is promising, and will explode in the coming years.

Web 3.0

People are already looking at Facebook and saying "That is so 2008." It just goes to show how fast the world wide web is expanding and technology is helping it. Because these technologies are largely based on mashups that occur at the data, rather than application, level, and often involve the read-write nature of Web 2.0 applications, there has been a tendency to give this new evolutionary stage of the Web its own name: Web 3.0. We can basically view Web 3.0 as Semantic Web technologies integrated into, or powering, large-scale Web applications. The specifics of Web 3.0 technologies are difficult to define, the outline of emerging applications has become clear over the past year. Key enablers are a maturing infrastructure for integrating Web data resources and the increased use of and support for the languages developed in the World Wide Web Consortium (WWWC).

The base of Web 3.0 applications are in the Resource Description Framework (RDF) for providing a means to link data from multiple websites or databases. With the SPARQL query language, a SQL-like standard for querying RDF data, applications can use native graph-based RDF stores and extract RDF data from traditional databases. Once the data is in RDF form, the use of uniform resource identifiers (URIs) for merging and mapping data from different resources facilitates development of multisite mash-ups. With Web 3.0, the explosion of data on the Web has emerged as a new problem space, and the game-changing applications of this next generation of technology have yet to be developed.

Eventually people will be saying "That Web 3.0 application is so 2012!"

Technology, Wikipedia, and the Smart Mob

Stepping away from genre which seems to be touchy with some people, I wanted to talk more about what the topic says: technology, Wikipedia, and today's smart mobs. Do you remember when you were in elementary school and the teacher said to go research a topic? Where did you usually go? I went to the library, asked about my topic, and the librarian found the correct Encyclopedia. I would see what the Encyclopedia said, and use that for my research.

Step back and think about that for a minute. What do you do now for a research project? Google it. Google usually has a Wikipedia entry up near the top of the page. You go to it, browse it, and look through the sources. Surprisingly these sources contain relevant scholarly articles, new and breaking news on the subject, and even links to online encyclopedias. Why do this when the information could be incorrect? When something gets edited, the user is told it has been, and has yet to be reviewed. So you know it may not be true. But if something is cited, it is usually trustworthy.

Technology, specifically the internet, has created this pool of information. I call it a knowledge HUB where anyone can go, gain knowledge, contribute knowledge, all for free. Microsoft is now trying to pay people for their entries on Microsoft products, but this is not going over well. To help lighten the mood here is Stephen Colbert talking about the latest on Wikipedia and what he calls Wikiality. Excuse the stuff at the end, this guy is trying to get his message across through YouTube videos, but this is the only version online:



This technology has lead to the "smart mob," a self-structuring social organization through technology-mediated, intelligent emergent behavior. James posted a hilarious, yet enlightening, video on his blog where people all did the M.C. Hammer dance in a store at once. People were unbelievable confused. But it was funny. The internet birthed the knowledge HUB, but also the social HUB. You can not only look up an entry, you can look up and event, people, and even organize the people to come said event. Technology has evolved society as we know it. Computers, cell phones, iPods, etc, all contribute to these HUB's. I can post an event on Facebook that says "Party at my place - invite your friends" and invite everyone on my friends list. One person is bound to choose to attend, and invite their friends. Another may attend, and invite their friends. I now have two people attending, but roughly 500 people with that same invitation. More people decide to attend. They send the word out. They text their friends. Eventually my apartment is so full the party has to end. I created a smart mob.

I remembered an example of a campus smart mob that happened the past two years. It started with posters pinned throughout the halls. A Clemson Silent Rave. What was it? Then I saw the Facebook event. A pre-finals stress-reliever where everyone plugged in their headphones and just had fun raving in the library. No noise or disruption, just fun. It spread throughout campus, and before you knew it, this thing was actually going on. Someone decided to do this, and convinced others. They talked to their friends, who made posters. Someone made an event. A chain reaction occurred that turned into a full on event in the library. Just take a look:



Technology was a catalyst for extensive information exchange. This lead to Google, Wikipedia, Facebook, etc. Those lead to smart mobs, creating things from nothing by the will of one. In this day in age, technology rules, and when we write, it has to keep up with the times.

Jimmy Wales and Andrew Keen Debate Web 2.0

Jimmy Wales has created what could be considered the one encyclopedia to rule them all. It has more entries and less errors than Britannica, a pretty big accomplishment. This is all due in part to the Web 2.0 revolution.

On the other side of the coin, Andrew Keen brought up some good points. Who are posting these articles? How accurate are they? And how can an outsider know what is more important, Pokemon or Shakespeare?

Web 2.0, in my opinion, has brought society to a new level. And I think it is a good thing. I can get on Facebook and find old friends from elementary school. I can post links to my friends that I find funny. It's a social HUB that most people are on. People can Tweet what they're doing and millions of followers instantly know. It is a social and cultural revolution.

When I want to find information on a topic, my first stop is Wikipedia. Because it's reliable and I know it's all true? No. Because I know hundreds of people have reviewed that article and it has plenty of sources at the bottom. I can go to those sources and see corresponding information that helps me back up the information I was looking for. Just as Facebook is a social HUB, Wikipedia is a knowledge HUB.

Andrew Keen has good points about anonymity and not knowing who exactly is contributing, but I disagree in that they NEED monetary compensation. If they wanted it, they would ask. Wikipedia is not "dumbing down" users. Articles are based on sourced documents. Wikipedia is just a compilation of information.

I have to side with Jimmy Wales, especially since he is doing this non-profit, not even charging people to access this plethora of information. What harm has Wikipedia done?