Often the ideal conditions for an outbreak of Malaria, West Nile, etc. are tied to climate factors such as rainfall and temperature. This is because of the nature of the transmission vectors of these diseases, namely insects, obviously the mosquito, particularly the Anopheles gambiae which carries the more deadly form of the malaria parasite. I've used interpolated averaged (read: doubly inaccurate) climate information (rainfall, temperature) to rather accurately map the areas where malarial outbreaks would occur in Eritrea (a country in NE Africa, next to Ethiopia). Creating a model utilizing real-time climate statistics aided by local reporting could seriously assist in the fight against malaria in sub-Saharan Africa, I only hope the information is put in the hands of the right people.
Why not just get a mac and then buy XP to dual boot/virtualize? At least then you'll have two decent operating systems. At my college, macbooks are the thing to have.
But I've always been interested in all things science and technology. The cleaning job I have is part time and kind of landed in my lap when a family friend needed someone to fill the position. Funny this is, I also work as a Teaching Assistant for Cartography and GIS courses at my college for which I would consider myself somewhat skilled labor but make minimum wage there, compared to a few dollars more per hour as a grunt janitor. Here's hoping I can get an even better job when I'm done with school!
Occasionally, I am one of those people, though not at your office. Backpack Vacuums are great for upholstery and even very dusty hard surfaces. They are ill suited for cleaning carpeted floors very well, though, because they are essentially just canister vacuums, they just suck, they don't have brushes to really pick up the dust. But they are rather comfortable to use, especially with waist and chest straps. Schools often use them because it is easier to use that to get around desks than a traditional upright.
I work for a large church with lots of big carpeted areas, and for that we use an NSS Pacer 30, which is a 30 inch vacuum that is like a lawnmower to use, but VERY effective. In smaller areas we use NSS Pacer 218 uprights which are 18" wide and do a good job, but whenever we can we like to use the 30 incher, just because it will leave a carpet practically spotless.
I interned with the Michigan DOT for two summers, they only just upgraded from NT 4.0 (circa 1996?) to Win XP (circa 2001) in 2005 and I don't think they finished until 2006. Some of the design machines were already running XP as needed, but the number of in-house software packages for data management (property info, job info, accident info, financial info) is tremendous in government, so upgrading programs to deal with the new OS takes time.
It was at MDOT that I first learned that a computer is only a good tool if it can help do more work faster and a new OS is only worthwhile if it can make things faster/cheaper/better.
Given a few years, I doubt MDOT will have even considered upgrading to Vista for anything but design machines and only if Benteley locks them into having to use Vista for Microstation. I would love to see the department go open source for OS, but I think that is always contingent on the software they need being available for that operating system.
Steve Jobs would like to be Time's Man of the Year in this the year of the MP3. As of yet he is the only figure with something at stake to stand up and say that he is for the end of DRM. He's going to have a breakout year, fueled by jealousy of You, for winning last year (and using his computer on the cover)
At my college, every student is required to take a course called Fundamentals in Technology (F. iT for short) In it, all the subjects of this study are examined, students are taught what to look for in reputability and bias in a website as well as timeliness of the information. In addition, students are also taught more or less basic computer skills like a bit of powerpoint, website design with dreamweaver, and a bit of excel. Seeing the results I see that it is probably important that it is a required course.
This study certainly doesn't show that student are not tech savvy, I'm certain that a large percentage are. They can live the digital lifestyle (iPod, Digital Camera, facebook, cell phone, etc. etc.) far better than the generations previous. It also doesn't show that they are idiots by any means. In fact, if you did this same study on college graduates from 20 years ago now you'd find the same result or worse. As some have pointed out, these critical thinking skills are the skills that are underdeveloped with many people without the added technology, so it shouldn't be such a shock that people are having the same trouble with the internet environment.
I agree with you point that people have a lot of "friends" on the facebook, people they sat next to in class, or shared a drink (or six as in your example) at one point or another. I think this is what put people up in arms, that their "every move" is reported to those people they don't even care about, and on the other end, you are finding out things you never really cared about other people.
Perhaps Mark Zuckerberg and company did overestimate the value people put in facebook friends, or perhaps, he sees this as a way to help friendships and relationships grow in the information age. Never before have people been able to quickly see what other people are interested in, what people are doing, when people break up.
When you break off or start up a relationship, you make it "facebook official" it's like the new going steady with the class ring and everything. This just allows all your friends to see that, so they know, so there isn't that awkward, "how are you and your girlfriend doing" conversation. To all the nay-sayers of the newsfeed, I say, "Welcome to being Friends in the 21st century."
I'm going to have to disagree with your metaphor. While I agree, this has nothing to do with privacy, there is a flaw in your argument. You say writing on a person's wall is something between two people, this is not true at all. A facebook MESSAGE is something between two people. A wall post is just that, writing on the wall for ALL to see. As a longtime user of the facebook, I've commented on people's walls about how it is silly to post on a wall as if it were a private message, but then we do it anyways because we aren't concerned with other people reading it.
Nothing that the Newsfeed broadcasts is anything private, unless you mistakenly posted something you intended to be private to someone's wall or to your favorites. Facebook is a very well layered system of public and private channels, as a user, you have to be attentive to which channel you are using when you communicate.
Slashdot Mirror
Often the ideal conditions for an outbreak of Malaria, West Nile, etc. are tied to climate factors such as rainfall and temperature. This is because of the nature of the transmission vectors of these diseases, namely insects, obviously the mosquito, particularly the Anopheles gambiae which carries the more deadly form of the malaria parasite. I've used interpolated averaged (read: doubly inaccurate) climate information (rainfall, temperature) to rather accurately map the areas where malarial outbreaks would occur in Eritrea (a country in NE Africa, next to Ethiopia). Creating a model utilizing real-time climate statistics aided by local reporting could seriously assist in the fight against malaria in sub-Saharan Africa, I only hope the information is put in the hands of the right people.
Why not just get a mac and then buy XP to dual boot/virtualize? At least then you'll have two decent operating systems. At my college, macbooks are the thing to have.
Simple Answer: College Student.
But I've always been interested in all things science and technology. The cleaning job I have is part time and kind of landed in my lap when a family friend needed someone to fill the position. Funny this is, I also work as a Teaching Assistant for Cartography and GIS courses at my college for which I would consider myself somewhat skilled labor but make minimum wage there, compared to a few dollars more per hour as a grunt janitor. Here's hoping I can get an even better job when I'm done with school!
Occasionally, I am one of those people, though not at your office. Backpack Vacuums are great for upholstery and even very dusty hard surfaces. They are ill suited for cleaning carpeted floors very well, though, because they are essentially just canister vacuums, they just suck, they don't have brushes to really pick up the dust. But they are rather comfortable to use, especially with waist and chest straps. Schools often use them because it is easier to use that to get around desks than a traditional upright.
I work for a large church with lots of big carpeted areas, and for that we use an NSS Pacer 30, which is a 30 inch vacuum that is like a lawnmower to use, but VERY effective. In smaller areas we use NSS Pacer 218 uprights which are 18" wide and do a good job, but whenever we can we like to use the 30 incher, just because it will leave a carpet practically spotless.
I interned with the Michigan DOT for two summers, they only just upgraded from NT 4.0 (circa 1996?) to Win XP (circa 2001) in 2005 and I don't think they finished until 2006. Some of the design machines were already running XP as needed, but the number of in-house software packages for data management (property info, job info, accident info, financial info) is tremendous in government, so upgrading programs to deal with the new OS takes time. It was at MDOT that I first learned that a computer is only a good tool if it can help do more work faster and a new OS is only worthwhile if it can make things faster/cheaper/better. Given a few years, I doubt MDOT will have even considered upgrading to Vista for anything but design machines and only if Benteley locks them into having to use Vista for Microstation. I would love to see the department go open source for OS, but I think that is always contingent on the software they need being available for that operating system.
Steve Jobs would like to be Time's Man of the Year in this the year of the MP3. As of yet he is the only figure with something at stake to stand up and say that he is for the end of DRM. He's going to have a breakout year, fueled by jealousy of You, for winning last year (and using his computer on the cover)
At my college, every student is required to take a course called Fundamentals in Technology (F. iT for short) In it, all the subjects of this study are examined, students are taught what to look for in reputability and bias in a website as well as timeliness of the information. In addition, students are also taught more or less basic computer skills like a bit of powerpoint, website design with dreamweaver, and a bit of excel. Seeing the results I see that it is probably important that it is a required course. This study certainly doesn't show that student are not tech savvy, I'm certain that a large percentage are. They can live the digital lifestyle (iPod, Digital Camera, facebook, cell phone, etc. etc.) far better than the generations previous. It also doesn't show that they are idiots by any means. In fact, if you did this same study on college graduates from 20 years ago now you'd find the same result or worse. As some have pointed out, these critical thinking skills are the skills that are underdeveloped with many people without the added technology, so it shouldn't be such a shock that people are having the same trouble with the internet environment.
I agree with you point that people have a lot of "friends" on the facebook, people they sat next to in class, or shared a drink (or six as in your example) at one point or another. I think this is what put people up in arms, that their "every move" is reported to those people they don't even care about, and on the other end, you are finding out things you never really cared about other people.
Perhaps Mark Zuckerberg and company did overestimate the value people put in facebook friends, or perhaps, he sees this as a way to help friendships and relationships grow in the information age. Never before have people been able to quickly see what other people are interested in, what people are doing, when people break up.
When you break off or start up a relationship, you make it "facebook official" it's like the new going steady with the class ring and everything. This just allows all your friends to see that, so they know, so there isn't that awkward, "how are you and your girlfriend doing" conversation. To all the nay-sayers of the newsfeed, I say, "Welcome to being Friends in the 21st century."
I'm going to have to disagree with your metaphor. While I agree, this has nothing to do with privacy, there is a flaw in your argument. You say writing on a person's wall is something between two people, this is not true at all. A facebook MESSAGE is something between two people. A wall post is just that, writing on the wall for ALL to see. As a longtime user of the facebook, I've commented on people's walls about how it is silly to post on a wall as if it were a private message, but then we do it anyways because we aren't concerned with other people reading it. Nothing that the Newsfeed broadcasts is anything private, unless you mistakenly posted something you intended to be private to someone's wall or to your favorites. Facebook is a very well layered system of public and private channels, as a user, you have to be attentive to which channel you are using when you communicate.