Daphne
Saturday, May 12, 2007 @ 10:14 PM
A web camera, or better known as webcam, is any real-time camera (usually attached to the PC, either directly or wirelessly) which generates images that can be accessed by and displayed on the World Wide Web through a server.
Essentially, the webcam works by taking a live picture or snapshot and is uploaded to a website from the camera at regular intervals, typically every few minutes. Furthermore, by looking at the web page from which the camera operates, one will be able to can see what the camera sees almost as it happens.
Today, the webcam technology is so widely used by all sorts of people for all sorts of different reasons. In fact, there are literally thousands of webcams across the world showing images of practically every topic imaginable (eg. cities, weather, volcanoes, space and animals)
The uses of a webcam are limitless. Since the first webcam was set up in 1991, webcams have soon crept into homes, businesses, public streets and buildings. Not only are they often used for personal use in the home by parents who want to give distant relatives visual access to their children or want to monitor what goes on in the home while they are at work, people might also use them in the home to keep an eye on things while they are out of town. Businesses often use webcams for video conferencing. Some schools and day care facilities use a webcam to allow parents to see what their children do at school.
Not only that, webcam capabilities have also been added to instant messaging text chat services such as Yahoo Messenger, AOL Instant Messenger (AIM), Windows Live Messenger, and Skype. With that, one-to-one live video communication over the internet has now reached millions of mainstream PC users worldwide.
In the modern world we live in today, almost everyone is able to gain access to the Internet. Hence, with the addition of the webcam technology, it further enhances the convenience which technology brings by enabling people to see live images of each other even when they live across the globe. With that, people no longer have to travel on long flights just to catch a glimpse of their loved ones before returning back to their normal hectic life elsewhere as they can now easily do so with the use of the webcam.
The conveniences that a webcam brings about is so widely accepted and appreciated to the extent that it is even used by cheese makers in Somerset show the maturing process of a Cheddar cheese via a webcam on the Internet, which attracted views from thousands of cheese lovers all around the world. (from the news article, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/somerset/6501889.stm)
Friday, May 4, 2007 @ 10:06 PM
YouTube is a popular video sharing website founded in February 2005 by three former early employees of PayPal, which is a San Bruno-based service that uses Adobe Flash technology to display videos.
Basically, Youtube is a site whereby users are allowed to upload, view, and share video clips. The wide variety of site content includes movie and TV clips and music videos, as well as videoblogging. Furthermore, videos can be rated with the number of times a video has been watched and its average rating both published.
During the summer of 2006, YouTube was one of the fastest-growing websites and was ranked as the 5th most popular website. According to a survey, 100 million clips are viewed daily on YouTube. In addition to that, 65,000 new videos are uploaded per 24 hours.
With a short span of nearly two years of establishment, Youtube has managed to easily gain an overnight, world-wide popularity. And today, Youtube has become a household name to any Internet users. However, due to the extremely wide range of videos Youtube allows its users to upload freely, much complication involving piracy and slander have evolved as a result.
In my opinion however, I feel that the occurrence of such complications is inevitable. With Youtube’s current status being an internationally known website and with millions of users and viewers under its belt, it will not be possible to filter every single piece of video being uploaded. Hence, there will be a certain limitation in control over the uploaded videos for the Youtube crew.
Next, Youtube has grown so influential to the extent that the giant search engine, Google, announced on October 9 2006 that the company would be purchased Youtube for US$1.65 billion in stock. This was considered to be Google's biggest purchase of that time. (from the news article, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/6034577.stm)
Similar to most other social-networking sites, YouTube has been the focus of much controversy. Issues regarding sensitive political and personal topics have seen the site banned in several countries. Popular, controversial videos such as the Saddam Hussein hanging and Naruto anime have seen the topic of YouTube blocking being raised again and again in public schools and libraries. Not only that, due to the non-text and ever-changing nature of YouTube, parental controls and filters are often ineffective at blocking specific videos or portions of the site.
With reference to the news article “Youtube in’08: Kingmaker and Heartbreaker”, http://adage.com/article?article_id=116423:
Subconsciously, the internationally known website has begun to play an increasingly significant role in political campaigns. Instead of paying huge sums of money for advertisements through common media such as television programmes and newspapers, political campaigners have discovered a new and certainly cheap way of effective campaigning. That is, through the giant video-sharing network, Youtube.
Therefore, from the article, we can see how great an influence technology can have even on political matters. In fact, technology plays a huge and influential role in determining the success of a political campaign. Once scandalous videos of political candidates are released on Youtube, they can instantly cause these candidates, whom initially may have been riding high on popularity, to fall right into the dumps. What makes matters worse is that due to the internationally established network of Youtube, it certainly will not be easy to make a successful comeback.
Basically, Youtube is a site whereby users are allowed to upload, view, and share video clips. The wide variety of site content includes movie and TV clips and music videos, as well as videoblogging. Furthermore, videos can be rated with the number of times a video has been watched and its average rating both published.
During the summer of 2006, YouTube was one of the fastest-growing websites and was ranked as the 5th most popular website. According to a survey, 100 million clips are viewed daily on YouTube. In addition to that, 65,000 new videos are uploaded per 24 hours.
With a short span of nearly two years of establishment, Youtube has managed to easily gain an overnight, world-wide popularity. And today, Youtube has become a household name to any Internet users. However, due to the extremely wide range of videos Youtube allows its users to upload freely, much complication involving piracy and slander have evolved as a result.
In my opinion however, I feel that the occurrence of such complications is inevitable. With Youtube’s current status being an internationally known website and with millions of users and viewers under its belt, it will not be possible to filter every single piece of video being uploaded. Hence, there will be a certain limitation in control over the uploaded videos for the Youtube crew.
Next, Youtube has grown so influential to the extent that the giant search engine, Google, announced on October 9 2006 that the company would be purchased Youtube for US$1.65 billion in stock. This was considered to be Google's biggest purchase of that time. (from the news article, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/6034577.stm)
Similar to most other social-networking sites, YouTube has been the focus of much controversy. Issues regarding sensitive political and personal topics have seen the site banned in several countries. Popular, controversial videos such as the Saddam Hussein hanging and Naruto anime have seen the topic of YouTube blocking being raised again and again in public schools and libraries. Not only that, due to the non-text and ever-changing nature of YouTube, parental controls and filters are often ineffective at blocking specific videos or portions of the site.
With reference to the news article “Youtube in’08: Kingmaker and Heartbreaker”, http://adage.com/article?article_id=116423:
Subconsciously, the internationally known website has begun to play an increasingly significant role in political campaigns. Instead of paying huge sums of money for advertisements through common media such as television programmes and newspapers, political campaigners have discovered a new and certainly cheap way of effective campaigning. That is, through the giant video-sharing network, Youtube.
Therefore, from the article, we can see how great an influence technology can have even on political matters. In fact, technology plays a huge and influential role in determining the success of a political campaign. Once scandalous videos of political candidates are released on Youtube, they can instantly cause these candidates, whom initially may have been riding high on popularity, to fall right into the dumps. What makes matters worse is that due to the internationally established network of Youtube, it certainly will not be easy to make a successful comeback.