31552SPRING2011: January 2011

Monday, January 31, 2011

Binary

There are 10 types of people in this world, those who understand binary and those who don't.

This was the sentence that Mr. John and Robin wanted us to put in binary. Basically the whole thing is a joke, yet I did not figure that out until after I finished writing out the whole sentence in binary. Anyways, the part that says "there are 10 types of people in this world" refers to our decimal system as the number 10 is our base number. Binary is how the computer communicates and only has zero's and one's. The binary system is based off of the base number 2. I understand binary and appreciate what our computers are able to do as it would take me a year to figure out a paragraph in binary.

Thursday, January 27, 2011

One red paperclip

I thought the story of the "one red paperclip" was really interesting. At first, I was confused and did not understand why he was trying to trade a red paperclip for a house. I really did not think that was going to happen. However, he did indeed trade the red paperclip for an item and then continued trading. He eventually did get a house. Therefore, he got a house for a red paperclip. The story really is crazy, yet amazing at the same time. Some people's junk are other people's treasure. So, although he may have been seen as a slacker and lazy, he ended up with a house becuase he posted a picture of a red paperclip and explained his story of how he wanted a house. Wow...crazy stuff.

Wednesday, January 26, 2011

Binary Code

I was amazed at how computers talk in binary code. At first, I thought it was going to be difficult, yet Mr. John helped us understand the way it communicates. Binary code, the way computers communicate, is all zero's and one's. It is eight numbers because one byte is eight bits. By better understanding the way the computer talks will help me better understand about the computer as a whole. By using the site below, you can look at the decminal column and can figure out what the binary code would be in correspondence to it.
http://www.asciitable.com/

Tuesday, January 25, 2011

The Social Network

I started watching "The Social Network" today, altough I did not have time to finish it. Mark Zuckerberg is the youngest billionaire in history today, which is crazy. I found his story, the part that I saw, to be interesting. He got into a lot of trouble for what he did at school. Also, I did not know that he practically stole the Facebook idea from someone else. That alone was the most interesting fact that I noticed in the movie. I had no idea that he wasn't necessarily the founder of Facebook.

Monday, January 24, 2011

Google awards $100 million to Eric Schmidt

Google awarded $100 million of equity to Eric Schmidt who is stepping aside as the CEO. He is going to stay as the company chairman. He is being replaced as Google's CEO by the co-founder Larry Page. Larry Page will take over as CEO in April. An interesting fact is that Schmidt held about 9.2 million of Google's shares as of December 31, 2010.
I thought the article about this was interesting as Google consumes most of my time at school. The job of CEO is a big deal, so I hope Larry Page is ready for what he is getting into.

Friday, January 21, 2011

Logos Bible Atlas

I recently discovered the Logos Bible Atlas on our computer. It is already a feature on our computer and I opened it to discover what it was. I think it is a really neat program and can teach us alot about the Bible and about Jesus. We used it today in World Religions to help us go back to the beginning to learn about Jesus. It gives maps as well as easy little explanations.

Thursday, January 20, 2011

Google vs Bing

I always use google, yet Bing always seems to pop up. Bing is the new search engine, yet I do not like it. I find google more efficient and easier to use. I guess I am more accustomed to it, and have a hard time changing what I use. Basically, I feel I use Google about 30 or more times a day.