Reflection on Guest Speaker

     In class, we had a guest speaker, Erick Hanberg, an entrepreneur who has worked for multiple tech companies. He talked about how he has written and self-published multiple books in his career. Erick mentioned how the web has made this a lot easier for him and how companies such as Amazon have made him a more successful author. The use of online Ads and the ability to self-publish have also contributed to his success.  What I found the most fascinating was when he talked about how certain authors have started to incorporate the use of AI into their work. Although he is not interested in using AI for his books, he did show us examples of prompts he gave to AI. Some of the stories generated by AI were not the best, but one of the ones he demonstrated by AI Claude was actually pretty good.  

    This made me ponder how AI impacts authors and other aspects of media such as film. Currently, what AI has created is not as great as what humans can make but is still very impressive. I wonder if with time, AI will be indistinguishable from humans and if it could eventually take over what humans make such as art, music, books, and film. It’s exciting and terrifying to think about what AI will be able to do. There are so many possibilities for what our world could look like, and this discussion from our guest speaker truly made me stop and think about what our world could look like with AI. 

Scavenger Hunt

 This week in class we paired up with a partner and completed a class scavenger hunt. This particular scavenger hunt was based on certain things we had to find searching on the web. I found the things we had to find very interesting they varied from itineraries to more specific information. I often forget how much information is available online, such as personal information. For example, I found it kind of creepy how when I googled myself all my past addresses were available to include the address of the house my husband and I recently bought, it also included when we bought the house and how much we paid for it. It seems like all this information that is out there is so normal to us that we forget how cool and scary that actually is. If someone wanted to, they could easily find out so much information about you, to include your address and contact information! 

On the other hand, having all this information available to us could be incredibly beneficial. We have become so accustomed to all this information that we take it for granted. I can’t even imagine how different our world would be if we used the web to learn new things and create new innovations rather than just spend our time on social media. The web is such an incredible tool, it’s hard to think about the times it wasn’t around since ever since it’s been around since I could remember. I wonder how different it may look in a few years. 

Protocols, Internet & The Web

      A protocol is an agreement on a way to do something, such as a set of rules that dictates the way data is being received and transported between technological devices. As discussed in class, an example of a protocol is the Transmission Control Protocol/ Internet Protocol (TCP/IP). Another important protocol we discussed in class was the Hyper Text Tech Protocol (HTTP) which in the past I heard of but did not know was a protocol. Before I took this class, I was not aware of what a protocol in the context of computers were but it makes sense that they are such a vital part of ensuring connections and no data being lost.  It is important for communication between computers on the internet and the web because it can create security for the data being transmitted. Another important reason for this communication is it allows us to communicate close to real-time, even if a disaster occurs, because of this communication between computers on the internet and the web we can still get in contact.

    Although many people may think the internet and the web are the same thing, they don’t realize their differences. One of these differences is that the web is a service in which it operates on the internet, the internet is more like a global network that works as an infrastructure for the web. It is difficult to think of the internet and web as different things since we have used the words interchangeably and we forget they are not the same. This class has broadened my knowledge and sparked my curiosity about technical topics.

Artificial Intelligence

     Last week we covered the topic of artificial intelligence in class, we talked about the “father” of AI, Alan Turing, and the Turing test he developed which evaluated if a machine was intelligent. I found this interesting because it got me thinking about what intelligence means. We talked about past machines such as Eliza and Sophia and although they were very advanced for their time, I don’t know if they were “intelligent” or just a very well-programmed machine. While in class I brought up a piece of news that I found fascinating, it was a new AI-powered research and study tool called Notebook LM that allows you to paste any information into a text box and it generates a very real podcast episode of the information given. Although this is also very advanced is this actually intelligence? 

    The class discussion made me ponder if AI is intelligent, this is a challenging thought because in some ways, yes, AI is intelligent but not in the same way humans are. Consciousness and emotions are a key part in my opinion that defines intelligence. It’s scary to think about what AI will advance to and what it will be able to do next, but I don’t think that it will a conscious or have emotions as humans do. Then again, in class we discussed the film Ex Machina, and this could be a possibility perhaps, in which AI learns to portray emotions and be self-aware. I think AI is an incredible thing we have created but I don’t know if we as humans really understand and if we will know when to stop. 

My Thoughts on The Machine is Us/ing us & Epic 2014

    I found the beginning of The Machine is Us/Ing Us very interesting, it starts off with someone writing text with a pencil and then it transitions to typing on a computer. It made me think of how flexible and how much easier it is to type text than writing on paper, it seems so normal to me that I never really thought about it before. It was fascinating to see the development of the web, how so rapidly everything changed and so many new websites were created. The video mentions how at the time this was released about 100 billion times humans were clicking on the web, I can’t even imagine how much this number has grown to this day. The Internet is such a crucial part of our lives that it is difficult to imagine our daily lives without it. Watching this video made me think of how different life was before the internet and how insane it must have been to suddenly be able to do so much more with the internet. 

     While watching the Epic 2014 video it took me a while to realize it was a bit of sci-fi. I really enjoyed this video and the storyline of the rivalry between Google and Microsoft, although it was not all true at the time it’s interesting how Epic sounds familiar to how the web is now and how we all contribute to it. It’s interesting how in the video The New York Times goes offline because I can’t imagine that ever happening. If anything I think most newspapers are going digital, these videos made me reflect on how some things have stayed the same but also see all the changes that have happened since then.