The Rise of the E-Readers

An E-Reader is a piece of hardware that is used to read e-books. Many people are switching over to using e-readers because it is much easier to store and access many of your favorite books.  Products like the Nook and the Kindle Fire allow you to purchase many novels and store them digitally for you to read whenever you like. Many people prefer using e-readers because it is easier to carry around, rather than carrying a bunch of books in a bag.

One in six Americans use an e-reader and the same percentage are likely to buy one in the next six months. Also interesting was the discovery that 36% of e-reader users said they read more now than they did before purchasing their e-reader.  Ask yourself, how many people do you know that own an e-reader. I am sure that many of you can find at least one person in your circle of friends that has and uses an e-reader.

Many do not want to use an e-reader because they prefer to have a hard copy of the book or magazine they want to read. I personally prefer to have a hard-copy of novels that I read , Many people share the same opinion that have about e-readers also. How about you? Do you use an e-reader? Has it changed your reading habits? Do you think that e-readers will eventually replace books. Only time can tell what will e-readers and their future.

Cloud Computing

Cloud computing is becoming a very popular with many users and companies that have data saving and data that needs to be moved quickly. For those of you who do not know what cloud computing is, cloud computing is the storage of data not on your on device, but on separate servers. Websites like Drop box allow users to store a certain amount of data on the servers that they provide. This allows users to access this data from any device. Cloud computing is extremely convenient to anybody who uses.

 Companies use cloud computing because of many reasons. First of all, companies try to escape the satiation where they have to use dedicated servers. The reason behind that is that dedicated servers cost lots of money whether they are being used or just idle. On the other hand cloud servers cost less because you can scale them to the amount that you need. Companies also use this technology to make use of the time the employees waste outside the company. For instance, through cloud computing; employees can work from home and save the company money and time.

Although the increasing use of cloud computing technology by companies, schools and universities; People have doubts about this technology. Users of cloud applications are afraid that their data may get stolen or may be even get sold by the company to another party.

With this being considered, the risk of your data being stolen or viewed by a third party is rather low. The data is very secure and encrypted by the cloud servers themselves.

If you have not used this available technology, please try it out. It is very useful and can make transferring stuff like music and videos, very useful. 

Are you a Pirate?

Piracy is a crime in the U.S., and most of us do it at one point or another.  Many people do it and never think twice about it. What most people don’t know is that 50.4 billon dollars has been lost since 2009 form piracy.  For those of who don’t know, anyone who sells, acquires, copies or distributes copyrighted materials without permission is called a pirate. The most prolific pirating nations are Brazil, India, and China. The average piracy rate in the Asia-Pacific area is 59%. Yahoo News reports that the 59% number means that 900 million computers in the area run pirated software.
(http://www.dailytech.com/Report+501B+Lost+Globally+to+Software+Piracy/article18350.htm)

With this being said, do you think that piracy is something that should become banned altogether?  There are many groups, policies, acts, and etc…. that work day and night on preventing and punishing piracy. On Jan. 20, 2012, U.S. Representative Lamar Smith withdrew the controversial Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) from consideration on the House floor. The proposed legislation drew fire from numerous critics while massive organizations like the Motion Pictures Association of America (MPAA) and Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) defended it. With this much support behind an act like this, it is hard to just ignore and keep everything the same. 

Let's get this out of the way right at the start: Stealing is wrong. It's unethical and usually illegal to take something that doesn't belong to you without permission or some form of compensation. It's easy to illustrate this point with physical objects -- if you steal apples from a store, that store has fewer apples to sell to other customers. But things get a bit tricky when it comes to digital property. When somebody steals an app from apple through jail breaking, apple does not lose any stock or items. They simply lose out on a chance to make money. This is why people have such a hard time accepting that piracy is wrong.

So ask yourself how you feel about piracy.

Imagine how the companies feel about losing billions of dollars every year. Also think about the people who pirate the material and imagine how they feel about all the strict new laws and policies.

Is My House Alive?

As many of you know, when we go to the movies to see a sci-fi movie based in the future. There is commonly a scene with a house that reacts to commands of the owner.  Many people think that this is not something that will be available in the near future.  The technology that supports an interactive home is actually available right now. The only problem is applying the technology.  You ask yourself, how exactly would an interactive house work? 

Well, anything in your home that uses electricity can be put on the home network and at your command. Whether you give that command by voice, remote control or computer, the home reacts. Most applications relate to lighting, home security, home theater and entertainment and thermostat regulation (http://home.howstuffworks.com/smart-home.htm).

The idea of an interactive house has already been applied to many people’s homes already.                             Bill gates (saw that coming )  built a smart home for a total of 100 million dollars.  The idea of having an interactive house was thought to only be popular with wealthy people with a background in technology. Interactive houses are actually more popular than most people assume. In 2005,  About 14 million dollars was spent on making homes interactive, by 2011 it grew to almost 85 billion. 

Could you imagine having a house that responded to your commands? How about a thermostat that could change without you lifting a finger, or a coffee machine that would brew on your command?  Could you imagine, if your house were alive?

Smart phones, Tablets, and Notebooks. Oh My!

As many of you know, Smartphone, tablets, and Notebooks are becoming much more sophisticated and popular. Out of the 310 million people in the U.S., 225 million of them own a smartphones. This is an all-time high for the United States for mobile device use. This trend is only set to increase in the near future. When you read this, ask yourself how many people you know that do not have a smartphones. Most likely you will not be able to think of many people who do not have smart phones. When it comes to tablets, they are gaining popularity all over the world. In 2012 over 100 million people purchased ipads, nexus 7, and many different types of tablets. Many people already own notebooks already, but not to many people have a notebook that is rather advance. I personally own a slightly more powerful notebook, and it is very easy to tell how more and more people are switching to stronger and more divers notebooks. Smartphones are set to have the most growth out of all the other mobile devices we have been discussing. As the worldwide mobile phone market grows in 2012, smartphones are projected to see an increase of sales of about 40% while feature phones will see a decline of about 10%.According to market-research firm IDC, vendors will ship approximately 1.8 billion mobilephones this year, and are predicted to ship 2.3 billion phones by the end of2016. Compared to last year, shipments only increased from 1.7 billion phonesthanks in part to a sharp decline in feature phone sales. In 5 years, askyourself again. How many people do you know that don’t have a smartphone?

The Internet and its Beginning

The internet is the biggest convenience to society. Could anybody imagine what life would be like without it? What would you do if you needed to check Facebook, or check your e-mail. The internet has been around for so long, that we could not imagine life without it. The internet, like many other things, did not just start out the best thing on the block. When the internet was in its infancy, It was a study for information transfer between four universities. After the first stage of testing was over, the military adopted the idea of the Internet. The military’s main use for the internet was to safely transfer important information from base to base. Eventually the government refined the technology and made it more convenient and useful. Through the 80’s and early 90’s, the internet was still only available to military and universities around the country. In 1993, The World Wide Web was made for public use. The initial layout for the World Wide Web was very basic, it still had many commercial uses. Many companies started making ways to accessing the internet easier. Browser’s like Netscape ( an early version of Mozilla ), were the early ways of getting around quickly. Over the years as the population grew worldwide, more companies began selling their products using the Internet.

By the year 2000 companies were making billions of dollars through internet sales. Eventually social websites and internet gaming became more popular, giving the internet more and more purposes. In the end, the internet has evolved into an all incumbent asset to the human race.

Computers in America

When you wake in the morning, what is the first thing you do? Check the time on your phone? Turn on your T.V., go to your fridge, or run to the restroom? All these have been made possible by the Billions of computers in the U.S. that contribute to make our lives easier. Every aspect of our lives is controlled by CPUs all over the country. Let’s say you go to the store to purchase some groceries. The store that you go to has all of their items registered in organized system that uses bar codes. When you go to the restroom, you don’t realize that something as simple as flushing the toilet is also made possible by many computers. These computers control the sewage in your town to make this accommodation possible. The average household in the U.S. has 2 computers in it ( not counting smartphones or tablets ). If you add in smartphones, tablets, and many other smart devices. You are up to about 7 devices per home. There is about 148 million homes In the U.S. That is about 1 Billion personally owned CPUs! This nation is comprised of a society that is by and large based on technology ( as the previous example stated. ) The technology that has made our lives much easier is not going to slow down or stop. In fact the Computers that control this nation will only grow in numbers and complexity. In the near future, most of your home appliances ( washers, microwaves, fridge, etc.. ) will have CPUs placed  inside them to increase efficiency. This will make it possible for the companies that produce these products to monitor if they are functioning properly. This would make it very convenient for the owner to fix problems with their appliances. Another product that is new to the market is the Google smart glass. This is a pair of glasses that responds to voice commands, and is also linked to the area you are in so it can direct to where you want to go. The smart glass can also take pictures and make phone calls. This product is in its early stages, but in the near future, this will become another normal day-to-day aspect of our lives. This is a prime example of how computers have always influenced our lives, and how they will continue to do this in the future.

Computer science: Today and tomorrow

My Beginning

When I was a very young boy, my mother was beginning her collegiate career. Her declared major was computer science and Development. Little did I know that this decision my mother made would impact my life severely.  When I was in the 1^st grade my mother started her first year in college towards her degree. She came home one day very flustered and aggravated. She told me that she had much work to do; she also had to make dinner for my family. I was only 6 years old and I asked if I could help her with her homework. She quickly dismissed my offer and chuckled for a minute. Over the years I became more and more interested in the work that she was doing for her degree. She would try her best to explain what she was doing so I could understand it. I could never quite understand, but her doing this was increasing my fascination for computers and technology even more. Later down the when I was in high school my mother would spend hours explaining to me exactly what she was doing for her major. I took to it very well, I became knowledgeable about the subject before I came to college. Towards the end of my high school career I decided that computer science was a subject that I wanted to look into for my college career.  I still wasn’t sure if this was something that I would really want to do for the rest of my life. I decided to come to JSU in the summer to talk to Doctor Ford (the head of the CS department).  He explained many things about the major to me while I was there. This sealed the deal for me. I finally decided that I was going to be a Computer science major.

Welcome to the Wonderful World of Josh

Hello everyone! my name is Joshua Scaggs and I'm  a computer science major. If you guys have not figured this out yet, i have the best major ever, Computer Science! I'm from a town called Talladega, Alabama. It is about 45 minutes from JSU's campus. I have a couple hobbies that are not involved with my major. I happen to be a member of the JSU Marching Southerners ( Blow Southerners ). I am a member of the percussion section ( the people who bang on things like a bunch of crazed monkeys ). I absolutely adore watching Alabama football and football in general.


Now that I have indulged my self for a while, i can explain the main reason for this blog. This  blog serves the purpose of informing people of what computer science is contributing right now to society and what they will provide in the future.