This Year....C-R-A-Z-Y

Its hard to believe that this year is rapidly coming to a close. Quick recap of the semester:

-Became a father

-2 Career fairs

-Interviewed with 6 companies

-Accepted an offer for a full time job after graduation

-Family reunion over Thanksgiving

-Finished 2 major projects for school

Wow...I can't believe that I am still alive after all of that! So much has happened, but I do believe that I have gained a TON of knowledge that I will take with me and use in the future.

I loved learning about the Open Source communities through my final project, and the possibility of connecting with so many people through projects and forums.

I enjoyed sharing my computing knowledge with others, including Boolean logic, AI, hacking, and copyright.

I appreciated the ability to channel my learning myself, and research nuclear bombs, databases, altruism, and various digital literacy labs.

The class was set up flawlessly. From self directed learning, to the meshing of digital culture and historic content, it all worked together perfectly.

I really really really really really really really really enjoyed this class. I normally do not enjoy history classes at all. The first civilization course I took was absolute torture. However, once I learned about a course that emphasizes digital literacy, I took notice. I was intrigued, and I wanted to be a part of it! As an Information Technology major, I find so much more satisfaction in learning about modern technologies than about past problems.

All in all...I loved this class, and I would take it again in a heartbeat!

What have I done?

What have I done for my project:

• Set up google site
• Manage Google Site
• Import CaTB text to site
• Create Wiki
• Create Wordle
• Read article and take main points
• Create 'Best of Page'
• Create Webslides (for presentation)

Enough? Probably not...but its a start!

Final Presentation

Wow...again, time eludes me. Thanksgiving was pretty crazy and hectic, and I am finally getting back to normal...now I just have to catch up on my blog posts and finish this class strong!

Here is our presentation!

We are presenting on remixes, specifically the Cathedral and the Bazaar.

The Cathedral and the Bazaar has a very interesting concept and back story. Eric Raymond initially thought that software products needed to be built like a Cathedral. It should be extremely grand and secretive. Only the architects have access to HOW it was built and HOW to maintain it. However, the Open source movement is overcoming the software industry. Instead of a grand cathedral, development is more like a bazaar, thousands of people, yelling, trading, and sharing information. This bazaar may seem disorganized and unsuccessful, but it is completely opposite. Eric present 19 points on how the bazaar is better than the cathedral.

Eric initially wrote this article as a petition to a company called Netscape, pleading for them to release their cathedral, Mozilla, to the public and turn it into a bazaar. Netscape eventually did, and they have been EXTREMELY successful ever since. Mozilla has turned into one of the top web browsers with a development department as big as the world. Over 2 billion Add-ons have been downloaded for Firefox!

Our presentation will be able to positives of Open Source, as Eric explains. We will show examples of how we remixed his article, because of the Open Publication license which he has. Finally, we will show the POSSIBILITIES that exist due to Openness.

Taken from Daniel Zapalla

Go team!