Bush, Vannevar. “As We May Think.” The Atlantic July 1945. The Atlantic. Web. 19 July 2013.

Vannevar Bush was the Director of Office of Scientific Research and Development and coordinated the activities of 6000 leading american scientists in the application in terms of warfare. In this article emphasises science outside of the battlefield to give man access and command over the knowledge of the ages.

Dr. Bush was clever enough to predict the technology advancements of today. He claimed that one day there will be a camera the size of a walnut that will sit upon the forehead or upon a pair of glasses and take high quality photos. He said the wearer would use the lenses of his glasses to frame the photo and simply press a button or pull a chord to take a HQ coloured photograph. Wait a second… this all sounds somewhat familiar…

Yes, Google Glass. It exist. A fantastic innovation of technology. Although there is one flaw in which they haven’t figured out yet. It’s how to not look like a cyborg while wearing it.

Dr Bush somewhat predicted digital photography as he explained how useful it would be to be able to instantly review a photograph. Furthermore, he questioned how long it would be until dry photography was in use.

Now its time for my ramble. Advancements in technology today tend to make things smaller and smaller. This can be explained by

Moore’s Law which is an observation that states that every 2 years the number of transistors in a dense integrated circuit approximately doubles. During the 2000’s phones continued to get smaller and smaller until everyone finally realised… our hands aren’t getting any smaller, we are staying the same size. Phone companies then decided not to make phones smaller and as a result of this they could pack better processes, memory and features. Just think of the Samsung Galaxy Note compared to the miniature brick you had in year 9. Cameras are getting smaller for instance the GoPro although a DSLR is never going to be the size of a walnut as it is not practical.  My point is that although the ability for smaller technology is constantly advancing the inventions themselves will not always get smaller.

Predict the future,

Luke Egan

Miles, Adrian. “Network Literacy: The New Path to Knowledge.” Screen Education Autumn.45 (2007): 24-30.

This reading outlines in simple terms what print literacy is and uses this to help explain network literacy. In today’s world everyone who had a proper education is print literate. You would think that in modern society we would be equally literate in terms of online networks. Although majority of us are quite decent at using online networks we do not have the same deeper understanding of the protocols and logic that we do of print. Firstly, its important to recognise that online content and its containers, for instance webpages, blog posts, videos, photos etc. are weaved together across the network using simple protocols. For example using RSS I can post a photo on Instragram and by using a particular set hash-tag the photo will be automatically uploaded to my media factory blog. Furthermore, this post will be automatically shared on my Facebook page. Although I am able to do things like this I am simply using services that do most the work for me. I am not literate in the code and nor should I have to. As long as I am able to do what I want to right? Admittedly though it is useful to have at least some knowledge of code and protocol as to ease communication with IT experts, software engineers and the like.  For instance in Luke Vanderzeils blog he talks of how when he was younger it was always him who had to communicate with the IT expert as he had greater computer literacy then his parents.

This blog is helping me improve my network literacy even though many of the functions are automated for me through third-party plugins.