Technology News (Gold Day Students)

Please browse your NewsGator RSS "technology news" feeds.  Read an article and write a short summary of the article, be sure to leave the URL for your article in your summary.  Please write in complete sentences and use proper grammar.  This assignment will be due before class starts next week, and will be a 20 point homework assignment.

Comments

[Georgie Stephens]

Last week, around the due date for taxes, Turbo Tax was swamped with last minute tax returns and the company faced a major computer slow down. Turbo Tax also had to contend with the anger of its clients, as they faced potential penalties for late taxes. This surge insitgated a debate over the fees the company charged their customers for filing tax returns online. People felt that they shouldnt have to pay to file taxes that dont even make it to the IRS on time. H&R Block also sells software which enables users to file their taxes online. They did not have any problem with their system slowing because of late entries. Their fee is also less than that of Turbo Tax. This situation of course gave H&R Block the oppertunity to snag some of Turbo Tax's consttuients.

[Michael Boyd]

This article is about a new technology used to block or dim light from stars to find smaller planets that may be orbiting them. This would aloowsd astronomers to see planets that are Earth's size in order to get an idea of how many other "Earths" may be out there. A 32mm disk is put on the telescope to block out the light from the parent star. If you have ever seen a picture of the Sun with a black circle covering the main part and "arc" shooting out from behind the black disk, this is the technology being used. This, of course, is necessary to find extraterrestrial life. Earth-sized planets are a perfect size to support life. NASA hopes to put this technology on the currently underfunded Terrestrial Planet Finder.

[Eyobe Bisrat]

The article talks about how Bill Gates offers software for a cheap price for developing countries. He does this because he believes it can help bring more opportunities for people who dont already know about Microsoft and thier great softwares. Gates main goals are to promote technology education, helping growing communities, and making more jobs for the people. The software package is called the the Student Innovation Suite and has an exclusive price for them for about $3. I think what Gates is doing is very noble and is a good idea for getting more recognition of Microsoft from other countries.

[Steven Crane]

I believe that this claim if false. The internet probably has corrupted many people but it cannot be blamed for people's actions. Eventually, people would be exposed to the exact same things that the internet shows them. In fact, the internet may provide information to kids that can help prevent some of these crimes that the internet is accused of being responsible for.

[Katie Kundrat]

In the article "Big money in Little Screens," Google, Yahoo and Microsoft have all expressed interest in putting search engines on cell phones. Cell phone users will be able to find the answers to urgent questions such as, "Where is the best local pizzeria?" or "What’s the fastest way to get to the airport?" However, before the search engines are put onto cell phones they must first get past the cell phone carriers, such as Verizon, Cingular and Sprint. While mobile search engines prove to be a large upcoming business, cell phone carriers are reluctant to form alliances with the companies in fear that they will miss out on the profits. As of now, search engines have formed alliances with smaller companies and in other countries. For example, Google works with China Mobile which is the world's largest mobile phone operator. As Sam Jadallah, has invested in mobile phone technology start-ups, said “If you look at how often people look at their phone now, wait until mobile search is real.”

[Katie Kundrat]

In the article "Big money in Little Screens," Google, Yahoo and Microsoft have all expressed interest in putting search engines on cell phones. Cell phone users will be able to find the answers to urgent questions such as, "Where is the best local pizzeria?" or "What’s the fastest way to get to the airport?" However, before the search engines are put onto cell phones they must first get past the cell phone carriers, such as Verizon, Cingular and Sprint. While mobile search engines prove to be a large upcoming business, cell phone carriers are reluctant to form alliances with the companies in fear that they will miss out on the profits. As of now, search engines have formed alliances with smaller companies and in other countries. For example, Google works with China Mobile which is the world's largest mobile phone operator. As Sam Jadallah, has invested in mobile phone technology start-ups, said “If you look at how often people look at their phone now, wait until mobile search is real.”

[Molly McGarvey]

My article is about RSS and how people now a days think that it is too geeky for today society.John Mahoney and Instant information came to the rescue with a new idea for a video that can help people that use the internet to better understand it. The first way is a seven minute video that helps people to understand how it works and how RSS can help us. I think that this video can help the people that don't understand RSS to understand it a lot better. I think it is a great invention and will help a lot.

[Kevin Nguyen]

The article i read was about one of the newest laptops made today. It is called the Lenovo 3000. The customer ratings average out to 7 out of 10 stars. It has Low price; high-end components; solid performance and decent battery life; comfortable keyboard; wide-aspect display; integrated optical drive; solid assortment of ports and connections, including media-card reader; fingerprint reader; and robust system-management and help utility. But the bad things are that it has One-year warranty inferior to some business models; small trackpad and shallow mouse buttons; and few dedicated multimedia controls.

[Heather Phelps]

The article "Circuit City, Napster to Offer Music Service" is about exactly what the title says. Circuit City and Napster are joining together to start a new music service in order to compete with iTunes. The service goes into effect on April 29th, and will cost $14.95 per month. This is just one of several attempts for electronic retailers and internet music services to team together and compete better with iTunes. Best Buy did the same thing with SanDisk Corp and RealNetworks, Inc. Napster also just recently integrated more than 225,000 AOL Music Now customers into its service, and their share price has seen a recent boost. AOL actually bought Circuit City's music service in 2005, and will switch to the new accounts unless Napster customers disagree.

http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1759,2120361,00.asp?kc=EWRSS03119TX1K0000594

[Taylor Eury]

I think that people shoud get over listening to one or two commercials every 20 minutes. My mom is in advertising at WASH-FM. she makes all the money for our family by buying commercials for the radio. I like the commercials because my mom had something to do with them and because it gives me money and food when i need them.

[Kaela Chambers]

In the article "Apple's Got The iPhone Buzz", the author talks about how although the iPhone hasn't been made available yet, there is quite a buzz going around about it. About half of U.S. adults knew about the early release of the iPhone in January in San Francisco, but only about 17% of that half were interested in buying it. Many people also want to wait until the price of the phone comes down because the expected price is $500. So why is there so much talk going on about this phone? Well, the phone's large storage capacity, as much as 8 Gbytes, was the hottest feature among consumers. Along with the mere facts that it can make calls and play music. Surely, this new phone will sweep the nation and be the next big item among many Americans across the country.

http://www.informationweek.com/story/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=199200378&cid=RSSfeed_IWK_News

[Matt A]

Scientists are developing a new method of surgery using magnets to operate tools under the patients skin. This new method will prevent incisions from being so large, and therefore will cut down on the patient’s scarring. This new idea involves making very small incisions big enough to fit the magnets connected to specific tools especially camera devices. Then, magnets outside the abdomen or body can be used to direct and guide the instruments inside of the patient. This method was proposed by Dr. Cadeddu is still being worked on. Not only will this new technology take time to be developed, but it will also require doctors and surgeons to practice this new technique. The idea looks promising, and in the future a patient may have only a few very small scars instead of having long noticeable scars.

[Ryan Kilner]

The article i read was called Manners Lacking When it Comes to Technology. It talks about how technology can make people be insensative. for example, people text in movie theaters and other places that may be inapropriate to text. According to VitalSmarts there was a citing of a guest at a funeral taking a picture of an open casket. I think some poeple use technology at the wrong times such as these, and it should stop. The survey they took showed that 91 percent of poeple have encountered a "personal display of insensitivity." More than 1000 people participated.

[Courtney Gaddi]

The article that I read has to do with a new technological development of software that will let the user turn smartphones running on Microsoft Corp.'s Window Mobile platform to virtual BlackBerries. This software is produced by Toronoto (Reuters)- Research In Motion Ltd.. RIM plans to offer the software for a number of devices runnig Windows Mobile 6.0. It will also give users access to BlackBerry applicatiuons like its e-mail, phone, calendr, address book, instant messaging, and many of its othe functions. The Waterloo, Ontario-based company will make the softaware available on devices offered by a number of Telecom companies later this year, most likely in the fall. And Orange Buisiness Services that they will launch the first Smartphone with Windows Mobile 6.0 on the British Market. This software will appear as an icon on the screen of the smartphone and will also have the same interface as a Blackberry. The users of this product/software will be able to move back and forth between Windows Mobile and Blackberry interfaces.

[Katie Pennington]

The article I read was about how much marketers are able to present whatever it is they are advertising and convince people to sign up for their programs online. It discussed how marketers are very sneaky into tricking people out of their money. One of the main reasons people sign up and pay for the programs is because shopping online has become so easy. All one has to do is click and pay and you are done. There are several ways to avoid being scammed. One way is to just completely ignore the pop ups. Another way is to be aware of the charges on your credit card. If you notice anything fishy, pick up the phone and cancel the subscription. You should also try to get a refund of your money.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/19/fashion/19Online.html?ex=1334635200&en=36e434568e7dc91a&ei=5088&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss

[Mike Vivian]

The article that I read about was called "Web threats to surpass e-mail pests." It talks abut how e-mail has been the main means of attack for online users. It said that by 2008, most of the threats you are facing will have to do with the Web. It stated that the reason for this is because security tools for e-mail have become a common place for viruses and other trojans. To help fix this we can use products and other attainable services to help block such viruses and scan web traffic. I found this article to be very interesting because it talked about common problems that everybody, who owns a computer, goes through and has to deal with. But the good news that I got from this article is that there is a way to get rid of these attackers and their means of attacking.

[Brendan Donnellan]

I read an article on all the new technology that is being used on cell phones and computers. The new technology allows you to have internet on your phone, i tunes and wireless technology that allows you to call someone without using your hands. The new technology on the computers is pretty much the same as the cell phone except for the internet. I thought it was really interesting that we now have all this technology so we dont have to have a computer with us everytime we want to use the internet, instead we can just use our phone and we will also be able to listen to music on our phone.

[Kendall Haley]

I read this article called " Violent video games 'exhilarating' escapism". it talks about how technology now can make a video game do anything such as voilent acts and basically the artile did a survey onm how people felt about these violent video games such as Manhunt and Grand Theft Auto to World of Warcraft and kids were saying it wasd exhilarating and thats not good but with fast developing technology, today's "cool" game soon becomes outdated.

[Danilo Molieri]

In the article i read, "PC games rebound," computer games were selling a lot for the first two months of 2007. In teh first two months of 2007 retail sales of PC games sold about $203 million. The computer game genre increased grew 43% over the same period of last year. This year it was a 48% increase over $136.8 million. The computer game industries grew dramatically in sales over the past year and is a very good sign for the industries.

[Javier Garcete]

The article I read was about Dell users. They forced the company to start selling windows XP computers again. On the Dell website, there was a survey about not elminating windows XP yet,it got 11,000 votes. Microsoft respond saying that Dell only was responding to a small minority of customers. At the end of January 2008 PC makers will not be able to sell PC's with XP as the operating system. Because they will not be able to buy new licences for the operating system.

[Nicole Adam]

The article I read was form CNN technology and it was about the possibility of text messaging harming written language. By using text messing, students do not, or use limited vocabulary and punctuation. When people text messages on their cell phones a lot, they tend to try and say the least they can for people to understand. So when they go back to school and try and write a paper, they use the same vocabulary and aberrations they do when they text message.

[Jeanne Benedetti]

I read an article that told about all of the new technology that has been brought to consumers on their cell phones. Users are able to connect to the internet from their phone. From this access they are able to look up current events, scores to their favorite sports, and even talk to their friends that are on the internet. This is very helpful for things such as road trips and in air ports. This technology helps people stay in touch eveyrday and helps them to be aware of their surroundings. I think it is a great advancment that has taken cell phones to a whole new level.

[Mary S.]

Recently at Carnegie Mellon University, researchers have created a type of robot that they claim is fairly simple to put together, but is very technologically advanced. These type of robots are flowered shaped, but can take other forms too. They are equipped with cameras, internet connection and infrared sensors. After creating a robot with a recipe and basic hardware from the Telepresence Robot Kit (TeRK), an individual can access and control their robot over the internet. This is possible because of a unique controller called Qwerk.
This article reminded me of the movie "Artificial Inteligence" because the author mentions the fact that five years ago a robot like the flowered robot would not have been possible. Technological advances are gradually increasing and at one point in the future there may actually be robots that can think for themselves. It sounds scary, but there are many researchers who would be very excited to create such robots.

[Jackie O]

I read an ariticle from apple news that was called "Damien Villière: Up, Up and Away" This article is about a new, huge, "flying machine". The first line of the article says, "There’s big. And then there’s really, really big." Damien Villière was hired by Frédéric Bault to design an introduction to the new air bus. The air bus is supposed to be a huge air plane, in fact The A380 is the largest commercial airplane in the world. I think this is very interesting because it shows how much our technology has been developing over the years. This article also makes me very nervous becuase with new technology comes a lot of unknown results. Nobody knows what to expect out of this aricraft but im sure it will be the next huge thing in air craft.

[Mark Salvador]

The article I read was about how a group of hackers were able to hijack Google adwords. They hacked into their systems and attempted to install viruses into users computers by linking ads to malicious software. This was discovered when an employee searched business links on Google and noticed that the link attempted to install spyware through a discreet program. Google is taking this problem very seriously and is working to find and remove the problem links. I think that this is very interesting because it shows how much powers hackers can have. Millions of people use google every day and the effect something like this could have would be huge.