Slade’s Made to Break pgs 1-81

In the first section of "Made to Break" by Slade, he mentions obsolescence. Obsolescence is when an object is still in perfect working condition, but being abandoned. Obsolescence often occurs when a new technology comes out, updates, or outdated. Slade's idea is that many products in United States are made to be broken after a certain amount of time therefore consumers will be required to purchase a new product. This is because we live in a capitalist country. Perfect examples of this would be daily products such as a computer or a television set. After a certain amount of use, the computer always seems to be breaking. But without any viruses why is the computer starting to break? Same for the television, after a certain hours of watching, the screen starts burning out. The idea of obsolescence started out in GM, general motors, in 1927. Their idea is to create a annual model, but with a little additional luxury hoping that consumers will like it more than the previous models. A perfect example of this would be my car, BMW 528e 1988 model. The newer version is obviously a lot better than my car condition wise. But if you look at the inside, my car has a lot of the similar feature the newer model does. My car has power seats, power windows, air condition and heat, wind shield wipers... things that most cars have now, but it is just outdated. But obviously a 2010 BMW is very different than a 1988 BMW in every way possible.

Why Wiki Web? Critical Analysis 7-113

In Andrew Dalby's "The World and Wikipedia", Dalby talks about the people who contributed to Wikipedia, (Wikipedians) who invented Wikipedia, why it was invented, and the pros and cons of Wikipedia.Gaius Plinius Secundus, referred to as Pliny, spent everyday having books read to him while taking notes on them. But the problem with writing notes was that there are simply too much to be written down or to be kept updated. "He is the first known author to have used the word encyclopaedia, 'full circle of knowledge'" (pg 20). But soon encyclopedia enthusiasts moved everything to CD-ROMs. It was a good idea at the time, but the hassle of changing CDs to search for information was just not efficient. Wikipedia came from the idea of online encyclopedia. It all started with Larry Sanger and Jimmy Wales with the initial idea of online encyclopedia. The name Wikipedia originated from the word "wikiwiki", which means fast and "pedia", from the end of encyclopedia. Larry Sanger soon thought of the idea of adding a software which enables users to "edit" the information freely on wikipedia. But the problem with that is people can put false information which leads to misinformation to the subject. In my experience, my friends used to make up words and put on wikipedia and it would be allowed and published. A lot of people will turn to wikipedia as the first source of information when encountering an unknown subject. To be honest, I do that as well. When I first come across a new subject, I will use wikipedia first to get a small knowledge of what is ahead. Many professors would not even take wikipedia into consideration of a source. But a lot of times wikipedia is very accurate and useful. “Ever more often, students find themselves using Wikipedia because their treat it as a teaching aid” (pg 104). Even though wikipedia is not the most reliable source, I believe wikipedia has its advantage because of the accessibility and convenience. But when using wikipedia, users must be careful and not be mislead but any false information. It is important for one to research further after using wikipedia to confirm the information to be correct.

Technopoly 2

In Neil Postman’s “Technopoly: the Surrender of our Culture to Technology,” he continues to discuss the danger of living with an abundance of readily accessible technologies. People relying on technologies cause them to lose the sense of responsibility. Postman sees computers as thinking machines. But because of the lack of full cognitive abilities, the computer is not as powerful as a human. A computer is allowed to have thoughts and the ability to think, but the thoughts do not belong to anyone or anything. People are blaming computers for the ideas and thoughts they come up with, instead of taking the blame for it themselves. When people say things like “the computer shows that” or “the computer says,” it shows the lack of responsibility of the person. When people use computers to do researches online, it is inaccurate and unreliable, which can lead to misinformation. Having technology in the tip of your finger could be a positive or negative depending on how you utilize it. The positive effect would be the convenience of being able to research for something quickly on the internet when needed. But the negative effect would be the lack of responsibility and reliable information. It creates laziness in people and making the computer a source which is not accurate.

Technopoly 1

In Technopoly: the Surrender of our Culture to Technology by Neil Postman, he discusses problems seen in today’s world such as technology controlling our culture and mind. Postman discusses three kinds of cultures: tool-using cultures, technocracies, technopolies. Tool-using culture employs technologies only to solve physical problems, as spears, cooking utensils, and water mills do, and to serve the symbolic world of religion, art, politics, and tradition. Postman characterizes technocracies as compelled by the “impulse to invent,” an ideology first advocated by Francis Bacon in the early 17^th Century. He believes that mankind could acquired knowledge about the natural world and uses it to improve their lifestyle. Technopoly is identified as the submission of all forms of cultural life to the sovereignty of technique and technology.

In the first stage of Postman’s book, science was feared and misunderstood. In the second stage of Postman’s book, the technocracy people still had doubts about technologies. But as technology progresses, machines started taking over. People were replaced by machines.  In the last stage of Postman’s book, technology balances out of good and bad. A positive from technology would be information accessed by school, media, and internet. But the negative from technology would be the willingness to search for information and research.