ICT's and it's current flagship, the internet, has revolutionized the world we live in. This week's class on ICT and the associated readings did provide me with and intriguing insight into some aspects of ICT's which I have overlooked in the past.
Cloud Computing was a topic in the lesson that really captivated me. The reading on cloud computing has indeed provided a valuable insight into this new form of technology and it's possible implication to business. As I see it, cloud computing looks like it may very well be a " game changer " in the business sense . Firstly, the benefits it potentially provides to companies such as the reduction in hardware and software cost will indeed go a long way to helping all companies and their bottom line ( be it SME in starting up cost or the big banks and their huge information systems ). Futhermore, shuch systems provide firms with and option to scale up or scale down their data storage or IT system requirements on the go. This is in my opinion an extremely useful benefit. Take banks and their IT services for example.( during working when consumers are swiping credit cards or people are transferring cash, their IT services usually undergo extreme pressure to cope with such data flow. However, during of peak hours, their servers usually lie idle. Cloud Computing offers a remedy to such situations, instead of banks having to fork out huge sums of money for vast mainframes, cloud computing may indeed allow banks to just pay for the processing power on the go , with demand very much like how they would do so with electricity. It is my belief that it will help banks and big institutions drive down cost since it would no longer need to employ a whole IT team along with costly hardware. Which is sitting idle most of the day, instead by paying on demand for cloud computing, it will greatly help to improve business efficiency and operating cost down. Cloud Computing indeed offers a whole range of new oppourtunities. The very fact that Google's Chrome operating, system( which is slated to challenge windows) is based on cloud computing principles also bring to light an interesting question , how will cloud computing impact the masses in the future ?
Another interesting topic that was brought up in class was the transformation of web 2.0 to 3.0 .The internet at it's current state does already seem so advanced that it at times can get difficult to imagine it getting better. yet as discussed in class, it seems that web 3.0 will further increase the efficiency in the flow of knowledge and information around the world. With people spending more and more time online , it does seem possible that one people spend more time in the virtual world then interacting in the physical one. This makes the argument as seen in the videos in class of the internet becoming the primary source of revenue for business a likely one. Perhaps another aspect of the future internet that could be considered is the increase in business efficiency brought about by the network itself. What do i mean by this ? Just take a look at g-mail or Google search for example. Advertisements are suited to your personal interest and searches engines can even predict what you are going to search for. The internet is becoming less of a place where unstructured information floats about , but instead , it is becoming more organised, able to cater to the needs of individuals, able to match products to consumers and increase the efficiency of economic transactions.
Lastly, Project Natal, introduced to us by Proff, was a real eye opener. What stunned me was how natural the interaction between the human and the system was. I do have and equally interesting idea to bring up .It is a Defence advance research project agency ( DARPA / the people who created the internet !! ) project : mind's eye which aims " to add the perceptual and cognitive underpinnings for recognizing and reasoningabout the verbs in those scenes, enabling a more complete narrative of action in the visual experience." essentially it will allow computers and artificial intelligence to understand their surrounding and not just process it as information. Just imagine the possibilities that could be open to human machine interaction if both these technologies are merged. It Just may be possible that computers may one day to mimic, human to human interactions indistinguishably form the real thing. This would be in fact what I wished could have been discussed more in class : will it actually be possible for artificial intelligence to actually gain "sentience" such that if talking to it , we would be unable to distinguish it from a real human ?
overall I would give this lesson a 9/10
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