sociotechnical

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Interesting! #John

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https://news.sky.com/story/hackers-could-turn-off-school-and-military-base-heating-systems-11168089

Taking it to a new level #John

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We can at least blame Facebook et al for some of the woes of society...

Looks like a road to Damascus conversion for former Facebook execs who are worried at how social media  “exploit[s] a vulnerability in human psychology”

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/dec/11/facebook-former-executive-ripping-society-apart

now, who else can we pin blame on?

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An 8 year career max. Because by 25 your too old...maybe I'll hang in there with the ould public service while I continue to hone my skills.

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So why do I feel like an inmate of gongmen jail?

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Social Media and Procrastination,

Interesting article - I have done this for one or two assignments :-) 

https://www.phddissertation.co.uk/blog/how-social-media-is-leading-to-academic-procrastination/

Rowena 

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Jeremy Hunt has come out strongly criticizing the new Facebook messengger app for kids, has he a point?

#John

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Cool new feature for those who regularly use Instagram like me! #John

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Changes coming for Snapchat. They going down a slightly different route.

#John

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Who got retweeted the most in 2017?

Good Morning Everyone,

This guy just got a free box of Chicken nuggets for having his post retweeted the most in 2017.  Is this what we have to do nowadays to get free food?

Its makes you think how powerful social media is. I am starting to feel hungry, I might tweet burger king now for a free whopper.

https://news.sky.com/story/who-got-retweeted-the-most-in-2017-11157175

Rowena 

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Bad design, or criminal?

OK, the soap dispenser didn’t work for you...but how about going to jail instead?

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/dec/04/racist-facial-recognition-white-coders-black-people-police

Seamus

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When trust breaks down.

The erosion of trust in Russian products continues apace, with a recommendation from UK Cybersecurity that all government bodies stop using Kaspersky anti-virus products...but it’s fine for personal use! You can hear the rush starting...

It reminds me of the internal security knowledge that, if you wanted to be secure, you had to have two independent firewall products from different countries. Checkpoint was always suspected of having a backdoor for Israel and Cisco was always thought to be accessible by NSA

Keep your friends close...and sure you might as well keep them indecently close while your at it.

Seamus

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So, see this article on Facebook, the first text message was sent to a mobile phone 25 years ago today, and it took a few years for the service to take off. In the UK in 2012 151 Billion text messages were sent.

In the picture promoting the story is an old school Nokia, and one of the first comments on the FB post was “The phone that it was sent on still has 34% battery” which made me laugh, even knowing at the time it had actually to be sent from a computer.

Another small invention that revolutionized the way we communicate.

Personally I never got into the habit of text speak and absolutely hate it when people use it, from texts, to email, to posts, that most be the old man in me shining through.

William

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Internet - The Best Thing Since Sliced Bread?

So was talking about work yesterday and it occurred to me the fact I’m with GT over 13 years and working in IT now for 18 years and I’ve been interested in IT since getting my first pc, a glorious ZX Spectrum+ for Christmas in 1985 with it’s tape deck for installing games, the longest 5 minutes you can have as a kid.

So 32 years in IT and it got me thinking of all the changes I’ve seen in those years and the advancements made within IT in those years, microprocessor, HDD’s, laptops, networking, mobile phones, networking, the internet, gaming, social media and way, way more to mention.

So what tops the lot in IT advancement, for me it has to be the evolution of the Internet, of course this would not be possible without the hardware and infrastructure, but without the idea, think what we’d be missing.

You’d have closed networks, limited IT communication, no internet leading to no social media, no online presence, no online resources, like can you picture IT without it?

So what do you think has been the best IT Advancement in your lifetime, and more importantly, what was the best thing before sliced bread came along?    

William

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Wikipedia - Do You Donate

So was on Wikipedia today, probably researching our group case study of Brazil OSS, and got the pop-up asking for a donation, which I’ve seen a number of times in the past and studiously ignored.

However, this time round, I decided to donate, as it can be an invaluable service, which I’ve probably used more in the last 15 months than I had don the previous 5 years due to course assignments.

So if you use a free service on a regular service, do you donate when they ask, or hope someone else does to keep the service free? 

William

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Time for a tomato? Pomodoro!

The Pomodoro Technique was invented in the early 90s by developer, entrepeneur, and author Francesco Cirillo. Cirillo named the system "Pomodoro" after the tomato-shaped timer he used to track his work as a university student. The methodology is simple: When faced with any large task or series of tasks, break the work down into short, timed intervals (called "Pomodoros") that are spaced out by short breaks. This trains your brain to focus for short periods and helps you stay on top of deadlines or constantly-refilling inboxes. With time it can even help improve your attention span and concentration .

Pomodoro is a cyclical system. You work in short sprints , which makes sure you're consistently productive. You also get to take regular breaks that bolster your motivation and keep you creative. Here's how to get started with Pomodoro, in five steps:

Choose a task to be accomplished.

Set the Pomodoro to 25 minutes (the Pomodoro is the timer)

Work on the task until the Pomodoro rings, then put a check on your sheet of paper

Take a short break (5 minutes is OK)

Every 4 Pomodoros take a longer break

That "longer break" is usually on the order of 15-30 minutes, whatever it takes to make you feel recharged and ready to start another 25-minute work session.

So all you need now is a timer. The one I can recommend is not a tomato, but a sheep...try Workrave here. It’s an open source product that simply counts how long you have been working before enforcing either micro or main rest breaks by locking your screen. So stop procrastinating, get off Facebook & give it a go.

Seamus

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Help with Assignments

Hi All, 

A guy in work told me about this link, might help with assignments https://scholar.google.com/

Rowena