Articles tagged 'essay'

As a sort of organizational nut who grew up playing many hours of Sim City and other simulation games, I naively wondered how I can so easily create an efficient virtual metropolis in Sim City, yet how real cities like Detroit can utterly fail. Did Detroit not have the kind of real-time information and analysis […]

For LMC 3256-F Spring 2013 – Qi Wang Introduction South Korea of the mid-1990s was in nothing short of a political revolution, with its former President Kim Young Sam targeting corruption and formulating Korea’s long-term globalization policy of segyehwa. This policy to unify Korean interests and pivot itself to the world economic stage included an […]

English Avenue is a neighborhood on the edge of downtown Atlanta, historic for its and past residents as well as its recent social decline. As a food desert and civically neglected neighborhood, its residents have faced declining resources and prosperity. Since 2008, the Friends of English Avenue organization and others have contributed to reinvigorating the […]

LMC 3252-F Spring 2013 – J. P. Telotte Battlestar Galactica’s 2003-2009 re-imagining of its original incarnation challenges what is means to be human, or a person, and what evil lurks in the hearts of humans and machines. This distinction between human and machine is the first challenge that the show presents to its audience, as […]

A gravestone is meant to answer the question, “Who is buried here?” Yasujiro Ozu requested his answer to be “mu.” This absence of an answer and denial of the question forces the audience to reconsider what is being asked by the subject and how the object of a scene is modified. Ozu perhaps influenced Edward […]

Design is a way of organizing complexity or finding clarity in chaos. With his mise-en-scène and editing techniques, Ozu masters the design of filmed space and time, wrangling them from their reality as progenitors of chaos while preserving perfectly familiar characters and their lives as narrative. As an information and visual designer, I can relate […]

English Avenue is a neighborhood on the edge of downtown Atlanta, historic for its and past residents as well as its recent social decline. As a food desert and civically neglected neighborhood, its residents have faced declining resources and prosperity. Since 2008, the Friends of English Avenue organization and others have contributed to reinvigorating the […]

Through this food and civic media project studio, I have discovered methods of research through design as well as perspectives in food systems from other students’ projects.

About MediaWiki MediaWiki is the PHP framework of top-ten website Wikipedia. When founder Jimmy Wales created Wikipedia as an academic experiment the site was based on UseModWiki, a general-use wiki framework written in Perl, and not quite yet well-known. Once it found popularity via high-profile bloggers and news sites, their system was failing in overdrive, […]

Internet infrastructure currently operates in many networking modes; however, to most people, it is the web: a technology stack of files, their unique identifiers, and transfer protocols to serve to user agents. However, now that the web has evolved to include ubiquitous web services, search functions, and other indirect queries or manipulation, the the underlying […]

I have a problem with this book. The problem may be that it was written by a couple guys who know exactly what they’re talking about; that they have planned just how and when to answer questions they think the reader will ask; and that I’m expected to learn half the material in this class […]

In our class discussion of free will and determinism, I was frequently reminded of “god-of-the-gaps” arguments, where gaps in science are explainable by something supernatural.[1] Instead of science and religion, though, what if the concept of free will is the supernatural, the god, in the gaps of causality? Perhaps free will is a purely human […]

My goal for my college education is to learn the foundation and current scope of work in improving how humans interact with computers, how friendly they can be with each other, and how to bring the computer from a thing to be learned and trained for to a simple extension of its user. In essence, […]

of the myriad lessons from this class I have taken is how to best design an experience for a program’s user. Two languages I’ve learned for projects have been more keen on developing my ability to author such an experience: Inform and AIML. Both allow the user to explore stories, and thus making the experience […]

Computationally. ELIZA and its contemporaries are programs that take textual input (natural language) and produce relative, natural language output that only makes sense if it either directly references the user’s previous statement as another statement or poses a question that is at least indirectly related. Removing the textual and language aspect of this model, it […]

Over the last two decades of extremely rapid, silently revolutionary development of the user-touser networking platform that is collectively referred to as the internet, or “Web 2.0,” productivity and even a nation’s economy is dependent1 on how its users and contributors continue to develop it. Businesses like Behance LLC, for example, who offers three main […]

Tools and productivity artifacts developed in just the last decade for digital art are absolutely new media that still mimic its original counterparts, paper and pen. While an eminent figure like Theodore Nelson may see this as baffling and counter-revolutionary, it is more of a transitional phase in art history. If art is to express […]

First let me say that never before have I felt my personal space so invaded than as I attempt to perform (what would in my usual life be un-commented-on) actions. Perhaps I do just want to jump without friend computer condescendingly suggest hopping around the dungeon, expecting itself to applaud, or promoting me to the […]

My most recent webdev project was the design for the Interactivity @GT 2011 event website. Thanks to Matt Wilczynski for the back end work. Interactivity is a yearly exhibition of projects by graduate students in Georgia Tech’s Human-Computer Interaction and Digital Media programs for the benefit of industry representatives. Organized by the GVU, Interactivity is […]

A significant portion of humanitarian problems arise from social inequity, and the greatest problem in determining how to achieve social equity is how to recognize it. Equity is the logos to the pathos of equality, which people the world over have fought fervently for, taking for example Jamaica’s independence and decline because of social inequity […]

>>Thoughts on next week There’s not much to say about last week, considering it was mostly essaying. Next week we’re moving from the fundamentals of the game players to the fundamentals of the game itself. Sixth Extinction’s material doesn’t tell me anything new, really, other than some people’s opinions and specific facts that I could’ve […]

Economic growth has always been a cultural phenomenon, starting with the European intellectual movements. Through the Medieval Age the traditional concept of work – economic life and social life as one – sustained in nearly every culture. Though markets were indeed present, there was no market system or economy other than the transfer of countries’ […]

>>Thoughts on last week I learned quite a bit about corporate philosophy this week from the readings, but I really didn’t like the movie. It seemed to be one of those “ahh! scary corporations sucking the life out of us!” It seemed that some fundamental ideas of capitalism and market-level libertarianism are treated as sinful. […]

I recognize three views, observe two views, and actively engage in one view: super-macroscopic, macroscopic, and microscopic. Macroscopically, I am completely negligible and have absolutely no use to this particular universe except in terms of entropy and act as a physical manifestation of energy. There is no goal I can accomplish alive than dead. Thus, […]

>>Thoughts on last week Economic personality and trends are often shared by generations. Post-WWII generation saw epic growth, which led to healthy spending and financial security, assumed it would continue. 1980s generation saw major downturn, forcing more saving habits and drive to ensure a better future for next generation. Readings touched on globalism, considering the […]

The most prominent feature of central-eastern European cinema is its overt challenge to Russian influence of communism and Stalinism that imperialized the region in the latter half of the 20th century. Films such as Sedmikrasky, a 1966 Czechoslovak “new wave” film directed by Věra Chytilová, and Przesĺuchanie, a 1982 Polish “cinema of moral concern” film […]

http://aapj1102.blogspot.com/2009/11/why-documentaries.html One of the greatest atrocities of modern societies is ignorance. This ignorance can either be intentional – like in the sheltered life of the suburbs or parents preventing their children from seeing conditions or ideas that contrast with their own – or unintentional – like the majority of Americans who wish to simply live […]

http://aapj1102.blogspot.com/2009/10/utopia-and-dystopia-in-cinema.html [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dp4B4z3wfmc&hl=en_US&fs=1&rel=0&color1=0x3a3a3a&color2=0x999999]

Fritz Lang’s Metropolis and Stanley Kubrick’s adaptation of A Clockwork Orange share intellectual ideas of technocracy, societal degradation, failed prioritization, and a disregard for humanity via their dystopian or side-by-side utopian/dystopian settings, highlighting the youth’s address of these problems. The origins of these ideas stem from the zeitgeist of each film’s era, where the youths […]

http://aapj1102.blogspot.com/2009/10/interracial-ideas-in-film.html One of the major pre-1960s cinema trends was role segregation, where the film industry considered non-white actors somehow unfit for a particular role solely because of race. Roles non-white actors could, however, manage to land were often confined to minor, static characters having little to no complexity or development. Often, a white actor even […]

There are relatively few encounters in life that show the consistencies in human behavior and the inconsistencies in why we think we behave that way. Everyone lives with some purpose: getting through life happily, getting a decent job to support a family, getting to heaven, getting more cocaine from the gentleman in the alley. However, […]

http://aapj1102.blogspot.com/2009/09/house-of-flying-daggers-commentary.html In our class, the feeling of heavy Westernization (strongly relying on visual effects and CGI to attract and hold an audience) is strong; however, the plot at least is strong, and the scenery complements it in an interesting way. The plot is indeed twisty, with the audience probably most confused with Jin, who is […]

The youth vote has spiked lately, with participation in primary elections just shy of the record set when the voting age was first lowered to 18. What’s more intense is the youth political movement, with some form of political discussion common in the everyday high school conversation. To provide a more engaging environment for these […]

Shakespeare presents Othello in a way that highlights villainy and jealousy in normal, domestic circumstances that destroys the reputable. Topic sentence summaries Domestic scale – topic summary Reputation – topic summary Jealousy – topic summary Shakespeare’s other works showed the main conflict on a grander scale; Othello puts tragedy and intense villainy equal to that […]

As quoted from the Thirteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution, “Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude . . . shall exist within the United States.” Mandatory military service is, in a way, forced servitude in compliance to any decision by the commander-in-chief. Selective service is unconstitutional, outdated, and far too morally unacceptable for the modern […]

Our minds, now outfitted with the v-chip (standard), May learn how to properly live, according to your ideals What you do, what the media reports, Reports far more than it reveals   We know how a modern human ought to live, But the larger action conceals the smaller. We accept what we see as reality […]

Communism Socialism Command Economy Organized anarchy, collectivism; relies on total societal cooperation Transitional tool that organizes and stabilizes government to be handed over to public control; very delicate, requires trust and honor of the goal Total centralization of economy, agriculture, industry, welfare, and employment; Soviet Union style economics glorified by the Red Scare Since the […]

The Situation Gas prices have inflated to extreme levels lately – nation at $3.61 and San Francisco average at $4.00 – and voters have a few plans laid before them by presidential candidates Clinton, McCain, and Obama. The Facts Clinton Obama McCain Impose windfall profits tax (tax on a profits from a product that suddenly […]

Our “elected” leader’s good old boys truly endeavor to please our nation’s source of power and affected eminence: the corporations. A more reasonable, cost-efficient strategy for the government is to simply abandon any prospects of preserving the Earth for our posterity. Why should such trivialities as the environment or the world’s future concern our surely […]

Margaret Atwood’s novel Alias Grace, published by Anchor Books, is a historical fiction novel that aims to recount the trials of Grace Marks more accurately than the original chronicler, Susanna Moodie, who tended more toward theatrical than factual events. Atwood explains the Grace Marks story via Grace Mark’s own account (in as much fact available […]

Watching the movie Hotel Rwandavindicates my conviction of the futility of present international relations in this new age of factional conflict. The plight of Rwanda, in international context, is frustratingly minor due to its largely subsistent and politically volatile population. A comprehensive aid package – addressing security, stabilization, and commerce – is necessary to quell […]

In a clear presentation that elucidates the deleterious result of the human’s pollution on the global environment, the way humanity thus reaps its rotting fruits must maintain the only known platform for its basic existence: Earth. The source of pollution is not just a chimney on the White House, but the parasitic mutualism of international […]

Virginia Woolf relates to this hay-colored moth on a personal plane; she discerns her own ultimatum of life from how this moth opposes its natural course. “… I watched these futile attempts for a time without thinking, unconsciously waiting for him to resume his flight, as one waits for a machine… to start again without […]

The “War on Terror,” the Bush administration’s chimerical attempt at a positive legacy, is an entirely unconventional war that the government has struggled to adapt to as it employs tactics of conventional warfare. Whereas terrorism has no centrality, no common goal, no single leader, and no possibility of complete disestablishment, the government continues to shun […]

Mandatory civil service, though largely beneficial to the country’s infrastructure, is not a plausible feat for this generation. “Service in America is so vital because it is decentralized and privately organize, addresses perceive needs, and grows out of people’s sense f duty and compassion” (B). The idea of the U.S.’s society shows that patriotism may […]

“Intelligent design” is this epoch’s religious effort to fill in scientific gaps and simplify complexities; theology has no function in a scientific setting despite the idea of incorporating all ideas, for if that were the case, the solid, proven foundation of science would be compromised by contradictory ideals. “…Intelligent design is science, not religion. It […]

A democracy, a system of government by the people and for people, so dedicates itself to the principle of social equality; yet, such an integral tenet seems to lose itself in translation. “In a true democracy, every man and woman is taught to think for himself or herself.” Brady’s condemnation of Cates’ pedagogic duty to […]

Mixed cultural signals often appear via media outlets, especially advertisements appealing to a targeted audience. Stereotyped races are most often applied by the media to target a specific issue in the narrowest span of time, despite the equally narrow perspectives of a race so commonly implied. The media’s underlining motive for the stereotype is, as […]

Our “elected” leader’s good old boys truly endeavor to please our nation’s source of power and affected eminence: the corporations. A more reasonable, cost-efficient strategy for the government is to simply abandon any prospects of preserving the Earth for our posterity. Why should such trivialities as the environment or the world’s future concern our surely […]

Surgeon-poet Richard Selzer, the author of The Exact Location of the Soul, narrates his fruitless quest in pursuit of the location of the soul. He explains the soul’s elusion, “No one but the poet [sees the soul], for he sees what no one else can.” The soul eludes him, yet he still espies it in […]

Nazi Germany’s secret police operated as the government’s mob to locate and destroy any political opponents of the new totalitarian regime. Under the aegis of Hermann Göring, appointed to minister of the interior of Prussia at the time of the Gestapo’s inception, the Gestapo, acronym of the Geheime Staatspolizei, established itself in 1939 Nazi Germany […]

I awaken in a puddle of my own sweat and a thick layer of dust on the solid, granite floor. This ancient citadel, dating back to the 3rd age, was home to the Monks of Malus. Large stained glass windows, depicting the numerous deities of the lands, allow one shaft of light piercing through the […]

Income tax reform is sorely needed in a state that requires a person to pay income tax at only $4,600 in annual wages. Income Tax Definition Where does it come from What it is used for Nationally Locally Regressive Tax Structures Definition Manipulation by the state Proportional realities Alabama’s National Ranking Sales tax Property Tax […]

Though all activity has ceased on the now vacant pitch, the moonlight through the branches has wrought its own ghostly players upon these eerie grounds. The once resounding cheering from the crowds has long since ceased, and all that is deafening now is the silence. These seemingly Herculean bleachers that before supported not only the […]

The sophisticated Italian returns! You should know I’m not a Birkenstock-wearing-country-loving-guy-who-shops-at-Dixie-Oufitters kind of person. When talking about me, prepare to enter the realm of pasta-guzzling, Latin operas, and death-matches involving the Backstreet Boys. OK, jumping right into it, Hot Topic is my favorite source for wonderful sarcasm based text T-shirts. With shirts saying something like, […]