New Jobs for Millennials

Numerous social media platforms have created a new wave of work for millennials. Social Media Influencers have become wildly popular within the marketing and advertising world. Check out my final research paper about Social Media Influencers Here. 

The Fall of Rapture

Below is a link to the Final Research Paper on The Fall of Rapture and the city's inability to maintain itself as the New York City of the sea due to rising conflict in leadership.

The Fall of Rapture - Doc

Sean McCarney

Essay Exhibit Blog

During class, we were asked to examine to other of our peer's final essay exhibit pieces and write a blog post on them. The two peer's projects I chose were Cory Gear's and Kendall Mahony's. Cory's was regarding to video games and how it is becoming a well-paying profession and Kendall's was about the use of emoticons in daily life. I chose these two exhibits because I found both very relatable.

To start, Cory's piece discussed the emergence of E Gaming and how it is becoming a well-known profession and how it is breaking across popular television networks across the world. Furthermore, I found it super fascinating how well some professional video gamers are being paid. Cory's presentation made it clear that there are numerous gamers who are making millions of dollars every year from their participation in these popular gaming competitions that are broadcasted across the globe. Finally, I also chose to review Cory's because a few days before I was actually flipping through the channels and came across a drone racing competition which is very similar to the way they host the gaming competitions as well.

Moving on, Kendall's exhibit was on how we use emoji's or emotions in daily conversation via social media outlets as well as texting and other messaging services. Whether it be texting my friends or scrolling through social media, I encounter emoji's hundreds of times a day which made her presentation extremely relatable. Kendall talked about how emoji's can have numerous different meanings, and how they can mean different things to different people. Not to mention, while discussing the exhibit we also moved forward into the deeper discussion of Bit Mojis. Bit Mojis are emojis that are tailored to look exactly like the user they are representing.

Overall, both exhibits were extremely interesting and I was able to relate to each one in a different way.

Essay Exhbit Blog

     During our class time, we got the chance to walk around and listen to what our classmates were going to write their papers about. In this blog post, I will share some information about two of them. Kendall wrote about emojis and how they have changed the way we communicate Justin wrote about Artificial Intelligence and Virtual Reality.

     Kendall’s main discussion is about how emojis are used in everyday language. Emojis are little pictures that are used to communicate. Some people used them to replace words in a typed out text. However, people do not necessarily interpret them in the same way. Depending on the people, one picture of a flower could mean spring, happiness, or simply just be a flower. There are endless meaning to emojis because each person thinks differently. I think that this topic is fascinating because emojis have become part of language that I do not think people will ever live without.

Justin wrote about AI and VR. He dove into the subject starting with Artificial Intelligence. One part that really caught my attention was when he talked about the Turing Test. This test is when a computer and a person are in a separate room from the other person and answer questions. The point of this experiment is to see if the evaluator can or cannot tell a difference between the person and the computer. The other part of this exhibit that I found interesting was the idea that AI and VR combined could train, help, and teach people. It can train police officers, pilots, and firefighters through VR by putting them in real life situations. It can help people by exposing them t their fears and helping them get through those obstacles or help people with disabilities. VR and AI can also help people in schools learn through programs on the computer or similar technology.

 

Devan Orr

Exhibit Thoughts

The first exhibit in class that caught my eye was one focused on artificial intelligence (A.I.) and its uses and benefits.  Artificial Intelligence includes anything from computer learning and virtual reality (VR) to self-driving vehicles and Google's own self-learning & adapting algorithms.

A few examples of A.I. in this exhibit included self-driving vehicles, personal assistants, and VR. Self-driving vehicles are changing the automotive industry in a way never before seen or experienced before in that people, for the first time, may get place to place in a vehicle without needing to function the vehicle themselves.  Thanks to improvements in cameras, sensors, and computer technology, self-driving cars are expected to drastically improve vehicle safety and possibly prevent any accidents from occurring at all.

Seen Below: Self-Driving Volvo (Uber Prototype)

Personal assistants such as Google Now, Cortana, Alexa, and Siri are aimed to simplify and improve device users' lives through predictive text, reminders, voice commands, helpful information, and news that may be important to the user.  Making their way into vehicles, the A.I.-based voice assistants are constantly learning, improving, and correcting themselves so as to provide the very best and most helpful responses and information as possible.

Seen Below: Bixby, Samsung's new personal assistant

Lastly covered in this exhibit was the topic of VR and its many benefits and implementations. Firstly, VR machines such as HTC Vive provide learning experiences for professionals that improve on their own skills (i,e. a doctor using VR to practice a surgery before the actual, real life procedure). Another example of VR's usefulness lies with its ability to help disabled folks retrain themselves or aid in bettering their lives.  An example of this may include a paraplegic learning to walk again through the use of VR.

Seen Below: HTC Vive

These examples of artificial intelligence are, in many cases, life saving. As these technologies continue to evolve and help more people and businesses, we may (will) eventually see the first entirely self-aware A.I., capable of making decisions and judgments on its own while living and learning from and with humans in our world.



The second interesting exhibit included the discussion of eSports and its importance to the gaming industry.  Examined were possible ideas and explanations as to why eSports, gamers playing video games competitively for money and a title, was and is taking off so fast as well as where it may go in the future.

Seen Below: Official Rocket League Championship Series (eSports) logo

According to this exhibit, there are three main factors in considering eSports' importance and appeal. First, it allows players and viewers to escape from the every day pressures of life and transports them into vast, beautiful, and often competitive environments of which teamwork and communication are paramount to success in the industry.  Secondly, curiosity is enough to have many people intrigued - "Why are they playing video games for money?", "What are they playing?", "What has everyone's attention?", "Who will win?.  Finally, the simple novelty is enough to intrigue people.  Seeing gamers play video games for money and a title is the equivalent to seeing professional athletes compete for their own title.  Many people grew up playing video games, whether Pac-Man or Red Dead Redemption.  The love for gaming remains, though perhaps is dulled over time due to life happenings, work, and events.

Seen Below: eSports attendance filling out entire arena

ESports is a profound, if not unexpected, form of activity and entertainment that has spawned over the years as an important and significant pillar of the gaming industry.

Sean McCarney

Stephen King Archive: w/a Twist

For this group blog post, we were presented with the task of having to decide a topic of which we would create an archive for and then have to pitch it to Justus through a blog post. Brainstorming within our group, we came up with the idea to create a Stephen King Archive. "But isn't there already like a 100 of those?" Yes, but ours will have a twist opposed to a traditional archive of all King's literary and cinema works.

For our King archive, we thought it would make sense to produce an archive specifically dedicated to keeping a collection of his UNPUBLISHED works. A collection of his works, that by his standards, maybe just weren't good, but would still be an absolute thrill to watch and read for us. Our archive would contain everything from film scripts and novels, as long as they weren't mainstream like most of King's work.

Furthermore, the whole reason behind archiving these pieces is because they are actually in danger of disappearing, whereas all the mainstream works of King will certainly be within our reach and possession for decades to come. Furthermore, while it may not seem like so, King has numerous works of published that one can read about sporadically across the internet. While this is great, it is not easy because they are all in different places. Our archive's goal would be to bring them all into one central location for people to enjoy for years to come.

Moving forward, some examples of unpublished works by Stephen King include pieces like The Aftermath, The Cannibals, Squad D, and many more. To conclude, our archive would be a place where Stephen King's unpublished works can congregate from the past, and for years to come.

Technological Convergence

Technological Convergence is, in its most basic sense, the coming together and fusion of various technologies.  Convergence itself is the merging of distinct technologies, industries, or devices into a unified whole.  Combined with the term "technological", this creates the idea in which various technologies may be combined to create a simpler, more robust piece of hardware and software.

One example of Technological Convergence may be found in the modern smartphone. Through the combination of camera, display, speaker(s), silicone hardware and software, a single, cohesive item is created of which is great at performing multiple tasks (i.e. taking pictures, calling, watching videos, etc.).  

Seen Below:

Samsung Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus

Another example of Technological Convergence may be found in the form of a modern gaming consoles from Microsoft and Sony (i.e. Xbox One S, Xbox Project Scorpio, PS4, PS4 Pro) and Nintendo to a much lesser extent with the Switch.  The former examples combine hardware features such as an SoC (System on Chip), motherboard, and controllers as well as software capabilities to which an individual may game, check email, and speak verbally to the system and have it recognize language (Cortana on Xbox One) all on a single system.  

Seen Below:

Microsoft's Project Scorpio logo

Seen Below:

Microsoft's Project Scorpio SoC

Seen Below:

Sony PS4 Pro

Something else to consider is the Black Box model in which a single, "black" box is able to perform all necessary tasks within itself (i.e. no need to other hardware or software - all is performed by a single box).  Two important factors to consider that prevent this single box from existing are as follows...

1) A single box this capable would cannibalize a company's own products as they would no longer be necessary if this single box can perform everything well by itself.  

2) A monopoly could be formed in which a single company or product rises the point of no customer purchasing and no consumer utilizing another product(s).

Technological Convergence exists today in many facets of the technology industry (from TVs to smartphones and even refrigerators with TVs in their doors).  As long as technology continues to grow, progress, and expand into new markets, one may safely assume that Technological Convergence, too, will grow alongside the hardware and software enhancements themselves.

Sean McCarney

Devan Orr

Jack Shirk