Poster Project Completed...

It was kind of bittersweet when I was standing in front of my poster project with several pictures of hypotheical vertical farms on it. On the one hand, it was nice to "turn the page" on this semester, especially on my 7:30 wake up time every Monday and Friday. On the other hand, I had an oppurtunity to tell several people about a very distant solution to a very distant problem. If my college experience has taught me anything, it is that advanced planning and spreading the word to get more minds to tackle an issue is the key to success. I enjoyed this poster project because I got to research an idea/technology that I find very interesting, and I also got to spread the word about this concept to other people whom might have better ideas on how to solve the problem of a fast growing world population. My semester was a very long one, yet it felt like we had just started. I will miss Com 435, however part of growing up is the abilitiy to take what you have learned from your experiences, and to grow and develop your view of the world. Com 435 has opened my eyes to some incredible immerging technologies, and when I think of the future impact any one of these technologies could have on society I get very excited about the future.

Mind Controlled Toy...

In Com. 435 we just were studying how electronics and computers are becoming more and more intrecual in everyday life, and how the concept of a "Cyborg" is already upon us. This toy, called the "Mind Flex" actually channels the electric inpluses your brain emits while concentrating, and manipulates a small ball with fans throughout an obstacle course. This type of technology could have huge implications for society if we begin to link everyday techology with this type of brainwave recieving techology. Here is a link to that game's website: http://mindflexgames.com/

It seems pretty amazing, and if a child's toy is beginning to use brainwave recognition technology, imagine the positive implications this type of technology can have for those people with disablilities, or what this technology can do in terms of modern day convience. Imagine having the ability to turn on your computer or surf the internet simply by thinking about a subject...

Poster Project

I have just summarized several articles on vertical farming, and am now preparing a rough draft of my poster. I think this is a very interesting topic, and we are beginning to see small signs of vertical farms in urban environments gain popularity, such as rooftop gardens. My research has made me aware of the large amount of potential problems the human race faces in regards to obtaining sufficient food sources in urban environments, and I believe that although not yet feasible, great thought should be invested in the area of vertical farming. I hope to learn more throughout next year, and this may be a topic I pursue for a research paper next semester.

Vertical Farming

I just saw an old episode of the Colbert Report over Thanksgiving break, and it resparked my interest on the topic of vertical farming. I believe that I will do my presentation poster on vertical farming, simply because it couples both of my degrees that I am pursuing here at Purdue; Agricultural Economics, and Communications. Vertical Farming is currently not feasible, however in the next 50 - 100 years when the human populations explodes to over 9 Billion people, land will become a very restricting factor in supply food to Urban areas. I hope to learn more about vertical farming, and am looking forward to doing my project on this topic.

Nature, You Crazy!

I just saw this video and thought to myself "Wow, nature you crazy!"

http://news.bbc.co.uk/earth/hi/earth_news/newsid_8391000/8391345.stm

(There was no embedded code, however it's a pretty cool video)

Mario Bros. New Game

The Nintendo Wii has a new Mario Bros. game coming out in which there is a return to a very basic story of saving a princess, and nothing too complicated. Up to four players can play this new game at a time, and it promises to be very well recieved by young and old alike. Mario Bros. is one of the greatest selling franchises of all-time, and anybody that grew up in the U.S. will tell you of at least one time when they destroyed Bowser's castle. I hope to play this game sometime soon, and hope that Nintendo still has the charm they did almost 25 years ago.

Corperate Social Media Concepts

I just stumbled upon this article and found it pretty interesting:

http://information-security-resources.com/2009/11/10/evaluating-corporate-social-media-strategies/

(there's the original article)

According to the article, most corperate companies obviously know about Facebook and LinkedIn, and many of them use these resources to screen potential job canidates. This just goes to show you that you need to be careful about what you post/ how you reflect your image online.

Another interesting concept is that a lot of companies have begun using their HR departments to use Facebook and LinkedIn for potential customer canidate reports. In the articles, Wallace states "Customer-facing functions such as sales, marketing, public relations and customer service are coming to realize that customers want to engage in a dialogue not a monologue and social media is a great facilitator of this two way communication.
An IT manager that becomes an obstacle to adoption of social media based on security concerns is likely to eventually lose the support of key business constituents. "

This is a very interesting notion, and leaves me wondering why it has been so hard for the corperate world to tap into the incredible network system these social media sites have established. It's not to say companies aren't trying, however I believe that we are still a long way from companies fully understanding how these systems work.

Webbook...

I just read this awesome article about a new concept called the "Webbook" which would act as a basic platform for "cloud computing".

The orginal article is here: http://phonestechnology.blogspot.com/2009/11/litl-webbook-12-inch-web-book-based-on.html

The concept is that this new type of platform will essentially make it easier to connect to networks such as Flickr or Facebook, and that social media will be the main focus of this type of platform. Cloud computing sounds like a very interesting concept, and I am excited about the possiblities that this platform could have with operating systems such as Google Chrome, that also has cloud computing as the #1 focus.

Recession Over Indeed...

If anyone knows me, they know that I am a very fiscally minded person. I really enjoy economics because it really is the study of people. It includes things such as behavior (what people buy), psychology (why people buy things), trends in society, gives metrics for shifts in social behavior, shows what a society and people value (things that make money tend to have the support of society). Economics is very interesting because, in its most fundamental form, it can transend all other social or cultural barriers errected over generations. Trade is the answer most cited when explaining the reasons for the European Renaissance (J. Bradford De Long and Andrei Shleifer (October 1993), "Princes and Merchants: European City Growth before the Industrial Revolution", The Journal of Law and Economics (University of Chicago Press) 36 (2): 671-702 [678]), and as such trade is still very important in shaping the events of future generations. This is why I believe that the "rules" toward partication in the economy should be as simple as possible. The more that different types of people participate, the more reason each of these groups of people have to maintain constant warm relationships. Even after the bloody, highly idealistic crusades trade routes remained between the Middle East and Europe. The reason trade relationships maintained was due to the simple fact that the one party had something the other party wanted, and visa versa.

Our current "economy" in the United States has a huge flaw when evaluating this simple, yet essential fact and premise of trade... Others have things we want, however there is a growing trend that we no longer have what the other party wants. Post WWII the U.S. Greenback (dollar) was the stablizing force for any economy destroyed by the war. The principle reason for this trend was because of the amount of industry that the U.S. was able to produce during wartime. After the war, in an effort to "redistribute" this wealth and to rebuild Europe/Asia out of ruins, the United States began to sell off its industry so that others could have a stablizing economic base (Germany/France began producing steel and coal due to the Rhineland, etc.). This development of foreign industry worked so well that the United States began realizing that it was much easier to sell off industries overseas because of the amount of cheap labor available.

In 1971 President Richard Nixon took the U.S. Greenback off of the goldstandard http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gold_standard (which offered a gold guarentee for every dollar in cirrculation) due to the fact that the U.S. was spending well beyond its means, and also financing a war in Vietnam that it could no longer afford. Since 1971 the U.S. dollar has been backed by absolutely nothing, and currently has no "check-and-balance" system to prevent massive amounts of money from being essentially produced out of thin air. This is the current trend, and I believe that this is why the U.S. is beginning to see such a drastic decline in GDP. I am not alone in my thinking, and this Chicago SunTimes article hits at the popular concensus:

http://www.suntimes.com/business/currency/1859328,CST-FIN-savage02.savagearticle

The American people are fed up with their government's irrespondsiblility, and rightfully so. What the public does not fully comprehend is that the fundamentals of our "live well beyond your means, easy credit" society are very flawed. Something is no right when a society has a negative savings rate! The blame for this, however, can be partically placed upon our government's fiscal irrespondsiblity, and the failure for our government to educate people of the dangers of debt. It is time for a new way of trade for the American economy, one in which we produce things that other parties want, rather than just us printing less valuable and less valuable pieces of paper out of thin air. We need an economy that is based on real wealth and respondsible production rather than one that is based on the premise of "American Superiority". The United States did do a hell of a job freeing the world after WWII, however the international community is beginning to ask "what have you done for us lately", and if all we can respond with is create needless wars, and donate more valueless dollars, then I'm afraid those others parties are going to begin calling in their debts.

I will leave you with an analogy, and a very simple graph. The analogy goes like this:

If you had an oz of gold in 2001, you could essentially trade it in for $250. If you were to save this oz of gold and set it on your table until right now, you could essentially trade that SAME oz of gold (to which nothing has happened to it) for $1050. This is not a scheme, or a story of gold becoming more valuable, but a story of how weak the U.S. Dollar is becoming. This can be easily explained through a quick glance at the monetary (amount of dollars in cirrulation, credit) base published by the Federal Reserve. This jump comes after the financial crisis, and should be looked at with the notion "if you have more of something, isn't it worth less?" If you had $100 in 2001, your $100 has essentially been printed 4 more times, making your money worth less (in net wealth). You may have even gained another $100, however your same 2009 $200 would only be worth $50 2001 dollars. Here is the reason why:

I hope that someone learned something from this, and begins to question the basis of our economy now.

Dwight Schrute...

For all those that enjoy the life-philosphy of Dwight Schrute, here is Dwight's "insightful" Health Care plan:

Obama, Congress, please take notes...

23... A bit Old...

Well,

I just turned 23 last week, my buddy fell out of a window the day before my birthday and broke a vertabra and his left wrist, I should have graduated by now (I'm going for two degrees though), I miss Chicago terribly everyday, I lived in Berlin last Spring and it was AMAZING, I found that Germans are the sane people of the world, I interned in Washington, D.C. this summer and now dispise our current politians, I love baseball, running, and music, and I am pretty computer illiterate compared to a lot of people my age. This is my first "blog", and I have the interest of a young child. I always admire sunsets, thunder storms, clouds, bugs, animals, and all sorts of other stuff that people learn to tune out by the time they reach this age. I plan on revisiting my adventures over the past year which included trips to Berlin, Yellowstone, Montana, St. Petersburg, Paris, Chicago, Washington D.C., Oshkosh, West Lafayette, Santorini Greece, Athens just to name a few. I am constantly being reminded of my age when I see high school peers getting married, having children, and obtaining "real jobs" and I constantly find myself asking "WHY?!?"
If you constantly feel like you have no idea where you are going, but know that that's the best part of life (the adventure) then perhaps you will enjoy reading about this. If not, more power to you. Your call though, and I'm not forcing you to read anything. I hope you enjoy "The Twenty-Somthing'er"...