Assignment 8- The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly

The Good- FreeRice.com http://freerice.com/#/english-vocabulary/1539

The first website i chose for a good part of the internet is called freerice.com. This internet site provides free rice for the world food programme. Basically a person can log onto the site and for each trivia question they answer correctly 10 grains of rice are donated to the programme to help stop world hunger. This is obviously a great site because it helps students lean new vocabulary terms while it also supports the fight to help end famine around the world. The trivia questions are mostly grammar and vocabulary based so they are a great way for a student to prepare for the SAT's. The site is a unique idea to help people who are starving while also reminding its users how fortunate we are to be able to not go to bed hungry every night like some people do around the world.

The Bad- Pro Football Player Tweet http://www.latimes.com/sports/sportsnow/la-sp-sn-stevie-johnson-north-korea-patriots-20130404,0,2171675.story

A wide reciever for the buffalo bills recently stirred up controversy when he made a tweet about north korea. Stevie Johnson the Bills number 1 wide reciever tweeted that if north korea was going to drop a bomb that they should drop it in foxbourough, massachusetts. Foxbourough happens to be home to the New England Patriots who are the chief rivals of the Bills. Obviously Johnson was not thinking when he tweeted (which is a problem for many proffesional athletes) however the tweet came at a very insesitive time because it had been rumored that North Korea had been planning on using some bombs they had created. This tweet happened before the trajic boston marathon bombings but regarless nobody should ever wish that type of event on a major city. Athletes and celebrities have a responsibility to be role models for our youths and this tweet is a direct example of how social media can hurt our country.

The Ugly- Man asks to be arrested for child porn he had http://www.news-gazette.com/news/local/2013-05-02/man-asks-be-arrested-over-child-porn.html

A man was arrested by police officers when he flagged them down and admitted to them that he had child pornography on his persons. The man, Patrick Paul Jones Freeman had claimed that he was being followed by people who wanted to hurt him because of the child porn he had. He was taken into custody and arrested for owning child pornography. Sotries like these are very sad and sickening because children are the most innocent people in our world. A child should not have a worry in the world and should never be taken advantage of by adult yet it still happens regularly. The internet provides places where child pornography can be down loaded and up loaded which is truly a shame. I am very protective of children and it sickens me to think that their are deranged individuals out their who was to see children in compromising videos. I hope that one day that we will never have to worry about children being used for such filth but unfortunatly I believe that this is just a situation where technology can truly hurt us.

Pre-Paid Cell Phones

This issue is a bit more puzzling for me then the issue in my last post of whether or not i believe its acceptable to put tracking devises in humans. Pre-paid phones are used by many people as an inexpensive way of having a cell phone for people who can't afford expensive cell phone contracts. However they are also used by criminals so that these people can avoid having phone records. I truly believe this issue is somewhat similar to the issue are country in currently having with gun control. Basically the idea is that ya the government could "ban guns" but everyone  still knows no matter what the government says or does there are still gonna be people who find guns. I do understand at the same time that the government could control pre-paid cell phones but i honestly think it is a violation of our rights. If a person wants to buy a pre-paid phone to stay off the grid i dont blame them. It is quite alarming to me how easy it is to find information about any person you want through phone records or internet use and people should have the right to keep their lives private if they so chose. If this means that their are gonna be bad people that benefit from this then so be it. THe thing about criminals is that even if we change the game for them they will find a way to still do what they do. There were criminals 200 years ago and 200 years from now their will still be criminals. They will never be stopped simply because some people can't be anything else but a criminal. I would understand if government regulated pre-paid cell phone usage but if people think that this will stop crime or prevent it they are wrong. Criminals dont need pre paid phones or even weapons. I honestly have always believed that to be a criminal the most important thing you need is to be able to not care about anyone but yourself. Selfishness is something the government will never be able to control.

Tracking People Using Computer Chips

The question posed is basically whether or not i believe it is ethical to track young children, teenagers, or forgetful senior citizens using computer chips that would be put into their body. I do not believe it is ethical to to use tracking devices on people simply because of freedom. I understand that worrying parents might want to track their young children but why do you have to put a computer chip in your child who is under the age of five. In my opinion a good parent would never lose track of their children and when they are in situations where i couldnt be present (such as pre-school) you simply have to trust people to take care of your children the same way that my parents trusted other people to take care of me. I understand why people want to track young children but i think it would be extremely unfair to track a teenager or a senior citizen. Teenagers need their space and freedom and if anything i believe if they knew you organized a way to track them you could potentially lose all of their trust and respect. Most teenagers are rebellious but i personally do not believe that putting a micro chip in their skin will stop them from doing anything. If a parent truly feels the need to track their children they can set up tracking devises on their cell phones and we all know that teenagers cant live without their cellphone. With senior citizens i just don't believe that we should be aloud to chose whether or not a tracking devise could be put into them. They are adults and have been their whole lives and sometimes we just need to believe they can take care of themselves and if they can't take care of themselves there are places they can live and be taken care of but still i see no use in putting a monitoring system on them. I would not be supportive of an act to require children to have I.D. chips in them for all the reasons i have stated above. Kids had to grow up in the forties and fifties and they were never tracked and their were no issues back then so i dont see why we need to cross a line simply to have more peace of mind.

Entry Number 1

The first day that I walked into class I had no idea what to expect other then assuming that the class had something to do with the internet and computers. SO far we have had the learned about the opportunities and dangers that the internet can bring to us. Ive learned so much about how easily it is for us to be located because of all the information that the "grid" brings to the public. Over the years i have used the internet to go on many different websites but it is really eye opening to think that we have a profile or personality based simply on the websites we visit. Its scary to think how easily we as people can be tracked but also comforting knowing that we can be found simply by the click of a mouse.
However the class has just begun and it is quite interesting to think about all of the potential topics that will be covered during the course. Hopefully if i am lucky enough i will be able to take information i learn in this course which i can then use in real life when i enter the business world post graduation...but right now the last thing i want to think about is the real world or graduation because the college life is a great life.