Final blog of Semester

I originally felt as though I did not need IT 100 since I am so computer literate form all of my audio and radio experience. However I have learned a lot of little trips and tops for using Word and excel that i did not know before. I enjoyed the access lesson because I very rarely use the program and any new information on it helps. I felt like we are all very proficient in PowerPoint so less time can be spent on it. I feel as though more access might help. I believe IT 100 is important for all because faculty can all demand a certain amount of literacy and prifecciency in computer from all students. Plus it helps for getting a job. I really enjoyed the hybrid it forced me to really read the book and practice really hard before doing a project. I think it should stay the same. The class was really good.

Weekly Podcast Review

There were two very interesting topics in the podcast that attracted me. The first was the story on China and how the IOC is requiring the Chinese government to allow fully uncensored Internet use to all 14,000 journalists that are in China for the Olympics. I find it interesting how big of an issue Internet censorship ins in other countries . The second issue was the news that Itunes took over Wal-Mart as the United State's largest music retailer

The China story is so interesting because of how free the Internet is in many Eastern countries in Europe and the United States. it is often very hard for many citizens in the United States to consider an Internet where the information is filtered and monitored as to not go against the government. Having lived in the United States my whole life and having never had to deal with such a situation I find it very hard for me to ever understand how this could occur or how hard it would be to endure. I understand this is a huge issue and that it will be very important as China tries to establish itself as a super power at this years summer games.the second issue effects my major and that is the fact that Itunes has taken over Wal-mart as the largest retailer of music in the united states. I realize that this will have a huge effect on how music is sold in the future. The marketing of music and many other aspects of music are changing as the world goes more and more digital this change in music retailing will have a huge effect on the future for all musicians. No longer will musician measure album sales as albums but singles are going to be more important than ever before as Itunes sells individual songs over albums.

Who i commented on

I commented on laura Ann's post at
http://lauraannxoxo.blogspot.com/.

and on Christina's blog at
http://cfratisblog.blogspot.com/.

Extra Credit

I tried the Live Search challenge and I had mixed results.
The first challenge with the Broadway search lead me to a few problems and after the ten minute time limit I was unsuccessful. In the end I realized that the link was inactive and it was not my fault so I was not wrong in my search of Broadway shows, Broadway past to present, Broadway 1984. etc.
The second challenge of Kermit was of mixed results. I found the correct page, but the school changed he website address to include the college's full name so I was only slightly successful. I used Kermit and Degree to find the webpage. I used several different keywords suck as Kermit and degree, Kermit and college, and Kermit and graduate to get the right webpage.
The final search I tried was gas pump price. I tried gas 1920, gas price 1920 and 2005, and then I tried gas 1925, 2005 and inflation which gave me a chart that was similar to the one for the answer. I did however come up with several of the wrong sites, but no correct answer. So I was successful one of three times.

Keyword Challenge

I tried the keyword challenge for class and was amazed at how bad I did compared to how I thought I would do. I do a lot of work at my internship online searching different topics both online and in the company databases and I was amazed at how poorly I scored on my attempts. I listed below my attempts and how terrible I did. I didn't attempt the final challenge I did not want to cry.

The first one I tried was the Broadway challenge:
1st attempt 57%
2nd attempt 71%
3rd attempt 67%
Efficiency 59%

The second challenge i tried was the stamp challenge:
1st attempt 58%
2nd attempt 68%
3rd attempt 53%
Efficiency 43%

the Third Challenge I tired was the great wall challenge:
1st attempt 55%
2nd attempt 65%
3rd attempt 65%
Efficiency of 58%

Phishing and E-mail

Phishing is a very interesting topic when it comes to email safety and security. Phishing is a very difficult topic to address to the public because many people are too busy or do not care enough to look into what phishing is and ways they can avoid being caught up in a phishing trap. I personally have caught several phishing traps and have been involved in several attempts at ID theft. Two times I have had an unauthorized balance transfer on my credit card, and once I had an unknown pay pal payment of $300. Luckily for me I had organizations that were willing to work with me to correct the situation and set me up with new accounts. In neither attack did i get caught in a phishing attack but still the results were just as bad with me having to set up new accounts and getting new passwords to offset all the security breaches that occurred. Now my problems were different than phishing related problem they still showed me how careful I needed to be on the web. every web surfer who does any business on the web from tax returns to pay a phone bill must be careful about the websites they go to. They should check the links and even the colors of the logos to make sure they are at a website that is official and not a fake website set up to grab your information and run.

The game was fun to play and a great idea for educating the public which is often to stubborn or to ill informed for their own good. Since the game is fun and simple to play it allows more people to try and have a fun time learning about phishing while at the same time being a more informed web surfer.

Reaction ot the Symantic Internet Security Threat Report

The report that we had to read for class was very interesting. It was very inter sting to see how open we all are to online threats at any time no matter how safe we believe we are. I also find the level of security.. One of the most interesting facts that I will take away is how many attacks come from IP address registered to fortune 100 companies, that being 4%. I am shocked so many come form people at work or using work machines. Another interesting fact was how many attacks occur form within the US and how unsafe college data is with it being the most stolen info out their. However my belief is that names alone are of no significance so if that is all that the security breach is then there really is no need for more safety for documents of just names. However with social security Numbers birthdays and addresses then we have a different story. I also assume that most cyber attacks are form poor countries and not form within the United States something that this report proved untrue.