Blog Post #9

     One of the main takeaways from this video is that AI is changing the way we live in a ton of different ways. The possibilities of AI appear to be endless which is why governments all over the world are investing billions of dollars and tons of manpower into it. The video mentions that the Chinese figured out the potential of AI when they built a computer to beat the world champion in a very challenging game called Go. Scientists are also comparing data to oil when it comes to the most valuable resources in the world. It is hard to argue with the potential of AI, however, there is also some danger that comes with it. 

    With something like AI that has the potential to change the world, we have to hope that it will only be used for positive things. Giving governments the power to build and manage weapons that use AI is something that is very dangerous and could end very poorly. Another reason to be fearful of AI is that if we are unable to control it. It is very possible for AI to become self-aware and possibly harm people whom it feels might be a threat to it. Personally, I find this to be very concerning. I also think it is concerning that we are trusting our government to find the fine line between what might be dangerous to people and what isn't.

    Another thing that AI could be used for is hacking and possibly threatening our national security. Hacking from cyber terrorists is already a big problem nowadays, which is why the idea that AI could be used for hacking is frightening. If a cyber-terrorist is able to do a ton of damage already, what are the limits to an AI-powered supercomputer that the Chinese government has access to? In my opinion, the race to become more advanced with AI can be compared to the race for nuclear weapons. I don't think it is crazy to say that AI has just as much, if not more potential to be more dangerous than nuclear weapons. Overall, we really just need to hope the people in power act responsibly and act in the well-being of the majority of humanity.

Blog Post #8

    The topic that I presented was whistleblowers. To keep it simple, a whistleblower is someone who reports evidence of wrongdoing to the authorities. In most cases, whistleblowers are usually government officials of some sort who are reporting other government officials. Whistleblowers put themselves at risk as government officials have money and power. It is not uncommon for whistleblowers to face some sort of retaliation for speaking out against people of power.

    Watergate is a very famous example of a whistleblower who made a big impact. Mark Felt informed on Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein who worked for the Washington Post. Felt worked for the FBI when he leaked information about Nixon’s involvement in Watergate. On the morning of June 17th, 1972 five men broke into the offices of the Democratic National Committee attempting to bug their offices to gain information that would help Nixon win the election. They were ultimately arrested and Nixon was linked to the attempt to Bug the building, which forced him to resign as President. This is one of the more famous whistleblower stories in American history as the rule-breaking went all the way up to the President of the United States. I think a lot of people lost trust in our government officials after this situation, due to the nature of it.

    Chelsea Manning is another famous whistleblower in U.S. history. She worked as a data analyst during the Afghanistan war and was sentenced to 35 years in military prison for leaking classified documents to the WikiLeaks website. She spent a total of 7 years in prison from 2010 to 2017 until Barack Obama had her sentence commuted. The information she leaked discussed U.S. military operations in Baghdad and Iraq which she saw as human rights violations due to the fact that innocent civilians were killed. Some sources think that the U.S. military was trying to make an example out of her by sentencing her to 35 years in prison to make sure that no other soldiers spoke out against them.

    Frank Serpico is a famous whistleblower who openly testified about corruption in the NYPD. During the 1970s there was a lot of corruption within the NYPD that included cops taking bribes. Frank tried to report these crimes to the FBI, however nothing came of that. He eventually went to the New York Times which published a story about the corruption. Frank ended up getting shot in the face for whistleblowing and retired from the NYPD because of it. Frank is a good example of a whistleblower who faced retaliation for his actions.

    All of these whistleblowers share the fact that they put themselves at risk in order to bring people who had committed wrongdoing to justice. Personally, if I were to be put in their shoes, I'm not sure that I would make the same choice as them. They were all put at serious risk and the only one of the three who didn't face serious retaliation was Mark Felt. This is interesting to me because Mark Felt arguably whistleblowing on the biggest story out of all three. Overall, whistleblowers should be seen as very courageous people who speak out for the greater good.

Blog Post #7

    As time has gone on and technology has evolved, our privacy has continued to be violated all while our governments have done the bare minimum to protect us. Between the cell phone companies themselves along with social media companies, these major companies are tracking, collecting, and selling our information for their own game. Christopher Soghoian talks about this in his Ted Talk where he mentions that it isn't just Apple and the service companies violating our privacy rights, but companies like Meta, Tik Tok and X collecting and selling our data. 

    These issues affect everyone who uses this technology, which is pretty much all people in modern society. A specific example that frightens me is the fact that my 8-year-old brother has had an iPad for a few years now and they are already tracking his information. The fact that they are tracking and using his information for their own purposes, is very dangerous and in my opinion, should be unlawful. I also feel like people are very unaware that these companies are tracking their data. This is dangerous because they think their phone is safe when in reality, anything they type or say is tracked. Another thing that is kind of scary is that when people find out their data is being tracked, some of them don't really care too much. An example of this is my Mom, who doesn't understand the significance of these companies using her data for their own benefit.

    I think one thing we can do to protect ourselves from having our privacy continuously violated is to read the terms and agreements that these companies make you sign to use their products. They purposely make these terms ridiculously long, which in my opinion should be illegal. I think our government needs to do more to keep these companies in check when it comes to obtaining, using, and selling our information. Data is incredibly powerful and these companies are gaining access to it pretty much for free.

Blog Post #6

Throughout the history of the U.S., it has been a common theme for citizens to want to do everything possible not to get involved in foreign conflicts. People have been protesting war and the United States' involvement for pretty much the entire history of our country. The government has persecuted people for protesting war and in some cases has even violated their liberties, protected by the First Amendment. Nowadays this is very unlikely to happen as there have already been precedent cases to iron out the kinks of the laws.

Mainstream media seems to limit the amount of attention given to people who are antiwar, especially in the modern era. I think this has a lot to do with the government and the ties that the owners of mainstream media have with members of Congress and also just politicians in general. The government would not want to give tax cuts to media sites pushing antiwar propaganda. It is very beneficial for social media companies along with media companies in general to have good relationships with government officials. I think that people are also somewhat scared to speak out about the United States entering wars on foreign soil because a lot of times their opinion is not a popular one. 

The reason I think it is hard to find sites like Antiwar.com and The American Conservative is that the government probably has some sort of deal with Google or the other search engines to push these websites to the bottom of pages, making them harder to find. I think that this is somewhat scary and it comes close to violating our rights. I especially think that this is scary because the government is really the ones who decide if and when we get involved in world conflicts. 

Overall, I think we should reconsider the amount of power the government has when it comes to banning speech on the internet and censoring antiwar speech.

Blog Post #5

    The product that I learned about from Jaiden was Twitter, which is now referred to as X. Jaiden mentioned how Twitter was founded in 2006 and would serve as a space for people to share 140 characters or fewer posts about whatever they pleased. Over the years it has developed into a global phenomenon where you can do a lot more than just share your thoughts. Twitter has faced plenty of issues over the years including problems with harassment, trolling, and misinformation. They seem to have gotten a pretty good handle on these problems as X has been operating pretty smoothly in my opinion.

    In 2022 Elon Musk, owner of SpaceX and Tesla, decided to buy Twitter for over 40 billion dollars. He would go on to fire the majority of Twitter's executives and pretty much clear house. When he bought Twitter, Elon emphasized the importance of making it a haven of truth. He discussed how there had been a lot of misinformation on Twitter in the past and he wanted to change that. One issue that he was very outspoken about was COVID-19 and how Twitter had been fact-checking some people while others were free to state their opinions. It was interesting watching all of this unfold and seeing the way Elon has transformed Twitter into X.

    Nowadays Twitter is used for a wide variety of things. You can get your news from Twitter which is actually something that I tend to do. I like how there are a lot of different sources to choose from, as this makes it easier to tell which sources are interested in giving you the facts and which sources are interested in spinning the story for their own narrative. I also like getting sports highlights from X as they tend to get uploaded very quickly. You also hear a lot of drama and trending stuff on X which is also something people use it for.

Blog Post #4

 

    The product that I chose to research and present for the class is Apple’s iPhone, arguably the most well-known piece of technology in modern times. The company Apple was founded by Steve Jobs in 1976 and they began solely producing computers. There was a lot of work that went into developing the first iPhone, as it was a pretty complex piece of technology. Scientists spent years trying to figure out how they could make a handheld phone that essentially acts as a computer. They also had to do a lot of brainstorming on how to make their product different from the blackberry which was dominating the cellphone market at the time. One way in which they would differentiate themselves from Blackberry was by adding a touch screen to the iPhone. Touchscreen technology has been around since the 1970s, however it had never been used on a phone. At the time people didn’t really know what to think about the touch screen aspect of the iPhone as most people didn’t even know what a touch screen really was. The next obstacle Apple faced was figuring out how they could power a device like a touchscreen phone. They eventually decided on using a lithium ion battery which would be able to store enough power to keep the iPhone running. The last challenge they faced was getting the internet onto a phone. This was no easy feat as they would need to add a processor that would basically make the iPhone into a mini-computer. Through years of development, Apple was able to create the first iPhone which began being sold in June of 2007 and started at $499 for the 4G model.

    Over the years there have been twelve basic models of the iPhone, along with 26 additional models made with extra features. Another pretty wild statistic is the fact that the iPhone has sold over 2.3 billion iPhones since the first iPhone was created. That statistic alone speaks to the magnitude of the iPhone in my opinion. To think that there are 7.8 billion people on earth and yet there have been 2.3 billion iPhones sold is pretty wild. This invention has drastically changed the world and the way people communicate. In modern-day America, it is harder to find someone who doesn't have an iPhone than it is to find someone who does. We take it for granted, however, if you look back 20 years ago and proposed the idea of having a mini computer that acts as a cell phone in your wallet, people would've looked at you like you were crazy.

    I think that the iPhone has overall positively affected the world and changed the way we communicate, however, I do also think it has had some negative effects on people as well. One of those negative effects is that social media apps tend to be very addicting and can cause some people to spend too much time on them instead of being out in the real world. I see this all the time with younger people specifically my younger siblings who can't even sit through dinner at a restaurant without wanting to use my parent's phone. This is pretty scary as people might lose the ability to socialize and become overly dependent on their iPhones. Social media also can have a negative effect on children. 64% of teens say that social media has a negative effect on the way things are going in the U.S. The iPhone enables the use of social media and in my opinion, plays a big role in the effects that social media has on children. I think monitoring your kid's screen time is very important when it comes to trying to limit the effects of social media on them.