News Report #3

"Congress Eyes Restrictions On Exporting E-Waste"

September 18, 2008 4:30am

Posted by: Stephanie Condon

CNET News

Congress is now looking at the current restrictions on e-waste. E-waste is electronic waste that includes recycled electronics and electronic waste. E-waste is being exported to other nations such as China and India. These countries are improperly handling the waste and it could be harmful to their population and the environment. Currently the EPA has very little restrictions on e-waste. The restrictions cover only old cathode ray tube televisions and monitors. These existing regulations are not well enforced. Other exported used electronics such as computers, printers, and cellphones "flow virtually unrestricted" into other countries. There is a significant economic incentive for recycling companies to export hazardous e-waste because the need for raw materials in a country like China is driving up the demand for electronics. The only restrictions on e-waste, which covers CRT televisions, were implemented in January of 2007 and since then only one company has violated them. However, the Government Accountability Office posed as foreign CRT buyers and 43 U.S. companies were willing to ignore the current restrictions. "The U.S. fails to hold manufacturers responsible for the end-of-life management of their products that contain toxic materials" The GAO has proposed three recommendations to solve this problem. The EPA should expand its restrictions on hazardous materials so that they cover all products that pose a risk during disassembly. The U.S. should improve it's identification and tracking of exports to identify used electronics. Congress should implement legislation to ratify the Basel Convention. The Basel Convention would control and monitor the trans boundary movement of hazardous waste. Not all companies are at fault. Companies such as Dell and Hewlett-Packard have programs that safely recycle used electronics. I am surprised that the EPA didn't have more restrictions on e-waste. I guess it has not been much of a problem until late. I like that congress is looking into this and is trying to impose the Basil Convention. Hopefully congress passes these ideas and keeps U.S. companies from taking advantage of other countries.

Reading Assignment #1

Before I read this article I had not realized how large of a role libraries played through out time. Libraries were originally created as an archive of manuscripts, art, and important documents. Libraries are so important because they contain the foundational building blocks for all of humanity. During the medieval times, books were very expensive because the printing press had not yet been invented. This made libraries not only archives but a collection of lecterns with books chained to them. Then the printing press was invented and it out over 500,000 books into circulation by 1500. This invention created a higher demand for books and libraries. The combination of the printing press and Andrew Carnegie's funding for 2,509 libraries caused a huge turning point in the evolution of libraries. We have evolved from a time when information was scarce and precious to today were information is vast a readily available. Because there is so much information available today we keep striving for the latest, most technologically efficient way to store all of this info. Libraries are constantly evolving to keep up with the latest technology. Not only do they have to keep up with the new technology that emerges every month but they also have to dispose of out dated technology as well. As time goes on newer and better technology will be created and will replace older technology. We are now in the process of replacing CD's with digital devices. Since technological breakthroughs occur so often we barley even notice them. Many people don't realize how these breakthroughs are changing the world. This technological rampage that we are on is creating a more globalized world. Soon we will be in a new era of global systems. We will have a global tax code, global currency, global ethics standards, etc. This will force libraries to transition from centers of information to centers of culture. Libraries will be an experience/culture based and will include museums, theaters, parks, and educational institutions. Libraries will be one of the few technological concepts to not be replaced.

News Report #2

"Yahoo announces social networking app for iPhone"

http://reviews.cnet.com/8301-12261_7-10037907-51.html

CNET News - Posted by Stephen Shankland

September 10, 2008 10:47am

I found an article about Yahoo's new applications for the mobile phone. Yesterday Yahoo announced a free new application for iPhone called OneConnect. This program helps centralize communication and social networking. It is like a socially connected address book. One feature of OneConnect, called pulse, allows you to see everything going on with your friends by pulling news feeds from Facebook, MySpace, and the other leading social networks into one joined view. It also has a "favorites" feature that allows the user to track or quickly contact people in there inner circle. There is also a feature that groups all of the messaging together(text messaging, instant messaging, and e-mail). This program is not strictly for the U.S. or Apple. It will be available shortly to the entire world as well as other phone programming companies such as Windows Mobile, BlackBerry, Nokia Series 60 phones. Yahoo is also developing software called Blueprint. Blueprint has a "runtime" foundation tuned for each supported mobile device. This software can be used by programmers as a foundation for mobile phone applications. "This software is designed to ease the development difficulties of ensuring compatibility with hundreds of different devices. " 

I like that Yahoo is pushing the envelope on mobile phones because it will challenge the rest of the mobile phone companies to step up. It is similar to the article I read last week about Google Chrome. This increasing competition in the technology field has encouraged a users market. I am not real big in Facebook or those other social networks, I was a couple years ago though, but there are a lot of people who are and this makes social networking possible on the go. I also like Yahoo's idea of creating software that will allow cellphones to live up to their capabilities. Blueprint will allow phones to use any applications or devices it is capable of using. More sophisticated phones are able to get more sophisticated options.    

Reading Assignment #2

According to this article, the younger generations are bombarded with information. Not only with print information but easily accessible electronic information. There are over 8,000 more online databases now than a decade ago and more than 100 million websites, up from 18,000 in 1995. This abundance of information has confused them, or made them lazy to the point that they use inaccurate sources. Many students are information illiterate before, during, and after college. ETS gave an information literacy test to college and high school students across the country and the results of this test supported the idea that much of the younger generations are information illiterate. The test proved that 48% of the test takers could not identify the objectivity of a website. This test along with many others have encouraged schools on all levels, but mainly the college level, to improve their students information literacy by requiring students to take a class on research skills, library class, or hold a library degree. On the other hand some professors disagree with IT classes because they want students to use reliable and reputable print source instead of the Internet. 

The main point to this article is that the younger generations are information illiterate. Which means we don't know how to use the library or information technology properly. I partially agree with this accusation. From my experiences, many college students don't know how to use online databases and don't know how distinguish between an online infomercial and facts. Many students also have no idea that Wikipedia is an open source encyclopedia that anyone can edit. There are also the students out there that are information literate that are just too lazy to go through the correct steps in gathering reliable and accurate information.

Chrome is Google's new browser. It is similar to Internet Explorer and Firefox but has more and improved features and applications. This new browser is supposed to run todays complex web applications much better. Chrome has a more powerful JavaScript engine to run the next generation of applications that can't used in today's browsers. Chrome is also able to keep each tab in isolation to prevent one tab from crashing another. Chrome has it's own task manager that makes this possible. Through the task manager you able to look at how much memory each tab is using and you can close individual tabs that are acting up. Chrome provides safe browsing by showing a warning message before you enter a site that is suspected of malware or phishing. You are able to browse the web without storing a record on your computer through incognito mode. This mode opens a new window and anything browsed in this window will not be saved after you close the window. Chrome provides a number of other benefits, I just wanted to touch on a few. If Chrome becomes the preferred browser, it will put a lot of pressure on Microsoft and Mac. This is good news for the users because it provides more competition to create the most stable, fast, safe, and user friendly browser. This browser may quickly become popular among individuals, but it will have a hard time working it's way into companies. Most companies have IT services that approve what software can be run on their computers. These IT services move really slowly in adopting new software. This is because they need to manage and administer software in a systematic, larger-scale way and they need tools for that. Chrome could infiltrate companies the way instant messaging did, through users setermined to use the software they like, without IT approval. I think Chrome will be a hit and will become the preferred browsing tool among individual users. It so handy and easy to use. It makes using the internet so much easier and faster. I like it because it has integrated some Mac, Microsoft, and Firefox features to create an improvement on all of their browsers.