Module 3

Module 3

This week started out with a discussion of the history of the world wide web and discussion of several of the used protocols. It hit me at this precise moment that I live in a very amazing time. The world wide web only really took off in 1993 due to protocols suggested by Tim Berners Lee. Shortly afterwards Netscape became the first easy to use GUI. It quicly captured market dominance by 1995 (Wikipedia 2008). The following browser war between Netscape and Internet Explorer resulted in many Buggy releases and Internet Explorer ultimately becoming the victor of the first round. Several important protocols that were instrumental in the development of the web are:
HTTP: Hyper Text Transfer Protocol. This is the underlying protocol for the world wide web and defines how all communications are formatted and transmitted. It is the ‘language’ of the internet that allows communication.
URL: Uniform Resource Locator. This can be thought of as the address of a webpage similar to the street address of a house. If you want to visit you have to know the address (or ask a search engine to find it)!!!
HTML (also shtml for the secure version): Hyper Text Markup Language. This defines the layout and structure of web pages to enable a browser to interpret the information. It could be thought of as similar to the rules of our grammar and language that create a specific standard by which we interpret the information we receive.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Browser_wars

Linear vs Non Linear Documents:
A linear document is one that is read in an ordered manner from start to finish. A novel is an example of such a document as the reader starts at the front and reads through to the finish. The reader is expected to understand all sections they have read prior to the point they are up to and not know the content in the following sections.
Non linear documents are documents containing small pieces of information that can be read independently such as dictionaries or websites with links. Referring back the argument of Professor Karin Wenz I would however suggest that a non linear document is in fact a collection of small linear documents. A dictionary contains sentences that are expected to be read in a linear fashion and as Prof. Wenz argues if a piece does not follow a logical sequence or order it is difficult for our mind to interpret. As such even non linear documents follow the rules of linearity inside each section that is expected to be read independently. Even when reading multiple of these supposedly independent sections (as discussed in the html section) I would still suggest that while a formal linear structure no longer exists the reader is still bound by their own logic processes which would (usually) move in a definite ‘linear’ fashion as the mind jumps from one node to the next.

Next I completed the book of the Sand puzzle. I was expecting there to be some twist or some revelation and was rather disappointed that plain old logic solved the puzzle so easily. It does however demonstrate how linear thought operates and how thoughts strung together in a specific order are necessary for a narration to make sense.
Blogs:
I regularly post blogs on one of the news sites I visit (as I may have mentioned previously) However my blogs are very different to the ‘purest form’ of blogging. Frankly hearing about the day to day activities of a nondescript person (although that last assertion would be argued against by bloggers) bores me. Articles I post are matters of interest or topics I wish to discuss including politics, society, social theories, and generally scientific things.
Web 2.0
The key features of web 2.0 as I understand it are that it is an ‘uncontrolled’, user driven resource. It is a place where anyone can write and post articles, where the end users are also the moderators (meaning they access and censor articles themselves). The java revolution is also crucial as it allows users to manipulate an online environment in ways never previously possible. This has of course led to a battle between Microsoft and Google to control the new technologies being offered based on java in various forms. A large driver of ‘web 2.0’ seems to be free or cheap access to a huge variety of sources. Many old industries are resisting this change especially in fields such as music and movies, however I’d say it is likely that many such things will eventually be very cheap to access. Personally, I’m all for more widely accessible data for lower costs. An example would be the music industry. Many start-up artists have great difficulty developing a following while record companies plunder profits of those that do ‘make it’. Falling production costs coupled with the ability to transfer data efficiently should hopefully even the industry out and reward those who truly do make original and high quality music