Murphy's Law

In the spirit of "if something can go wrong, it will go wrong," yesterday at the end of the presentations session, it did go wrong.

When you all presented, you left your presentation on the instructor's computer. But just as I was about to copy all the presentations over to my jump drive, the computer decided to restart itself and when it restarted, all of the material on the desktop was gone and is not recoverable.

I was able to recover most of the presentations from your web sites, but in a few cases, the link on the website is either not there or is not working.

I have my notes from the session which will work for me, but I would like to see a copy of your work. So I am going to send individual notes to those of you all for whom I do not have a copy of your slides. If you don't get a note, I have your slides.

database task

To date, I have all but five of your databases. I will be grading them this afternoon and tonight. If yours isn't linked to your website, please do that as soon as you can.

Task 04 spreadsheets are downloaded

But I find the tasks to be downloaded by looking at your web sites and downloading them from  those sites. If your web site isn't linked from this page, I can't see it. If your web site is linked from this page, but I can't find the link to your stored task, I can't download it.

Project Loon

I thought this was an interesting video about Google's Project Loon, which is an attempt to bring Internet access to all people.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/06/15/us-google-balloons-idUSBRE95E0K620130615

Role of the subform in the book form

Question:

From: Unknown
To: bergr@email.unc.edu
Subject: Comments on WWW pages

Name: Unknown
Return Address: Unknown

firstname:
Subform 
comment about INLS261-461_001:
My subform keeps deleting the authors. What is the subform supposed to do? 
-------------------

Response:

It sounds as if you are entering new data in the subform. If your subform includes the author foreign key field from your BookAuthor table, you should see the list of possible names appearing in the subform when you go to create a relationship with an author. Clicking in the author field should reveal that listing, if you remembered to add a lookup table to the foreign key in the design of the BookAuthor table. Remember the subform in the report is a tool to create a relationship or a connection between the book you just entered and an author who already exists in the author table.

Presentations Across Genres

Recently I watch a TED talk an author I like gave to NASA students and staff. As we're starting, finishing and giving our presentations I thought this was a really great and fun piece to look at. Maggie doesn't use a power point (or any video) but as she talks she's simply interested in connecting with her audience. As we watch each other's presentations and we all try to think of how to connect with our audience, think about Maggie (a YA author, def. not a scientist) talking to NASA - something totally outside her purview. Our different stories/presentations are important, no matter what they're about and this talk gives rise to the idea that if we try to connect, if we want to connect, we can. Food for thought.

TedxNASA - Maggie Stiefvater - How Bad Teens Become Famous People

America's Youngest Venture Capitalist

I came across this article about Alex Banayan, America's youngest venture capitalist. He turned a simple inquiry into a life changing opportunity. 

The link to the article is:
http://techcrunch.com/2012/06/10/how-i-became-a-19-year-old-associate-vc/ 
The article is written by Banayan himself.
Here is another article written by him:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/alex-banayan/20-lifechanging-realizati_b_1855057.html

One particular paragraph that stood out to me was this one:

"People tend to get the words humble and modest mixed up. Humbleness is an internal sense of gratitude whereas modesty is a facade of meekness. At that lunch meeting I was humble, but I sure as hell was not modest. Being humble is one of the most important virtues in life—it is a state of gratitude in which you acknowledge that all the opportunities available to you today are thanks to the tracks laid out by the people who came before you. Modesty, however, is an attempt to mask how awesome you are as a way to charm others. Never shy away from sharing with people your crazy stories and your prized accomplishments—modesty is fool’s gold."

The Importance of Presentation

As a Mac enthusiast, I really enjoyed seeing Brianna Pearson's blog post the other day about the evolution of apple products. Her post made me think back to Steve Jobs and his focus on creating the full experience for apple customers when they buy the product. I am planning to break open Jobs' biography (it describes the importance of the full experience of the product at length) as soon as summer starts, but for now I'll just have to show you what I found on the web.

As the CEO of Apple, Jobs thought that every aspect of every product was important. In reference to this topic, he once said, "I love the process of unpacking something. You design a ritual of unpacking to make the product feel special. Packaging can be theatre, it can create a story.”

An enthusiastic article about this can be found here.

Another interesting article on the Bloomsberg Businessweek website talks about Steve Jobs' focus on the importance of his presentations and the physical presentational experience that Apple customers have with Apple products. It is obvious that Apple continues to emphasize the presentational excellence in their latest commercial and the iOS 7 preview video.

Forbes also has a neat article about this.

Recommended Books on this Topic: 
Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson
The Presentation Secrets of Steve Jobs by Carmine Gallo

Does technology work for or against us?

In reading an article posted by MIT review, it reminded me of how technology is not only affecting how we are able to work, but who is able to work.  I was referred to a site that allowed for people to come together, in a world-wide setting, to be able to trade work.  Sounds great to begin with, but not so much when you are actually looking at the technicalities of it.  Because technology now allows us to reach other areas of the world, there is sometimes a large discrepancy between what can be offered... for instance, a person working in the Philippines can offer a significantly lower price for the completion of a job than someone in the US, simply because there is no standardization that is occurring.  While, yes, one has to remember that you get what you pay for, it is definitely going to be something that will have to be addressed.

http://www.technologyreview.com/featuredstory/515926/how-technology-is-destroying-jobs/

I don't remember the site off hand, but when I do, I'll post it.

Would you like to live forever?

An interesting interview from a Russian billionaire about his project to allow people to "live forever." I think it is pretty cool that there is a concentrated effort into integrating human consciousness and machines even having digital avatars. Although that seems to raise a number of questions ranging from practical and ethical such as, what happens if the power goes out?


http://www.theverge.com/2013/6/12/4422924/dmitry-itskov-wants-to-help-you-live-forever-by-swapping-your-body

Everyone has an opinion ...

... but many of them are about the presentation aesthetics more than the content.

Dear NSA, let me take care of your slides. from Emiland

Starters for presentation session

1. Googled
   • 100 Powerpoint Ideas ... contains a collection of ideas and visuals that can help when you're brainstorming
   • BBC NEWS | UK | Magazine | The problem with PowerPoint 19 AUG 09 If you have worked in an office in the Western world in the past 25 years, you will probably have sat through a PowerPoint presentation. But there's a problem. They're often boring, writes presentation expert Max Atkinson.
2. radio - if you were planning a road trip, you might want to listen to these stations in the car, but you can also listen online
   • heading west on I-40
     • WNCW, eclectic music from Isothermal Community College in Spindale, North Carolina
     • WEVL, community radio from Memphis, Tennessee
   • cruising along I-10 on the Gulf Coast
     • KBON, Louisiana Proud Radio is a locally owned Louisiana Music powerhouse situated in the heart of Cajun Country, Eunice Louisiana
     • WWOZ, New Orleans' Jazz and Heritage Station
   • heading south on I-35
     • KYSM, from San Antonio College in San Antonio, Texas
     • KNBT, Radio New Braunfels in New Braunfels, Texas
   • and if you make it to the West Coast
     • KCRW, all kinds of good stuff from Santa Monica Junior College in Los Angeles, California
3. newsletter - Windows 8 Officially Sucks. But So Does Every Other PC Interface Usability expert Jakob Nielsen pans Windows 8's redesign. But has a truly intuitive desktop UI ever existed? [Technology Review]
4. interesting - Are You Totally Improbable Or Totally Inevitable? by Robert Krulwich on NPR. Look at the graphic and ask yourself if you are a miracle.
5. Economist - Daily Charts, Maps, and Graphics. More ways to think about things and visualize them for presentations [you can also read this via UNC Libraries' e-journals]
6. Issues to consider - The Web Is Dead. Long Live the Internet. By Chris Anderson and Michael Wolff, Augus
7. Blaise Aguera y Arcas demos Photosynth

Prezi with narration

A presentation on Syria

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MIT Technology Review article about bitcoin

I have attached an article about the concept of Bitcoin, a digital currency that is gaining popularity. The article discuses the political and economic implications of a currency that is not produced by a government. It is interesting to see how technology is even having an impact on the monetary system of the United States.

http://www.technologyreview.com/news/515391/bitcoin-millionaires-become-investing-angels/

EMC and Lotus F1 Team Up

The company I work for, EMC Corporation, has partnered with the Lotus Formula 1 to bring cutting edge Information Technologies to the team both on the track and in the lab.

Checkout the blog post from EMC and the associated video here.

Handsfree Texting Isn't Any Safer?

I found this article about how new cars are being loaded with features that allow teens to send Facebook wall posts and text messages by using voice commands.  The article talked about how this method can actually be considered just as dangerous because the driver is looking ahead, but still has a sense of "tunnel vision" and isn't aware of his/her surroundings.  I can understand this, having attempted to use Siri to send a text message before while driving.  Sometimes those applications can be frustrating and can take your attention away from the road instead of actually helping you.

Here's the article from the local WRAL news:
http://www.wral.com/hands-free-texting-still-distracting-for-drivers/12544041/