Kimye takes the spotlight

Not only did Kim become famous from a sex tape, having a televised relationship with Reggie Bush, the shortest and most expensive marriage to Kris Humphreys, having a reality show about her family, a baby out of wedlock with Kanye West, but now she can say she assumed the cover of Vogue magazine.

The March 2014 issue of Vogue magazine contains the most controversial cover in the magazine’s history. The cover featured Kimye, the infamous couple of Kanye West and Kim Kardashian. The world's most influential fashion magazine turned heads by allowing such a controversial woman to be on the cover. The majority of Vogue covers are occupied by elite fashion models, with an occasional female political figure making an appearance. This is the first woman to assume the coveted cover who has a well-known sex tape and is arguably one of the most dramatic public figures in the 21st century. This stunt may have cost Vogue their iconic position within the fashion industry and have turned it into a trashy magazine comparable to less prestigious Cosmo.  

As an avid reader and collector of this iconic magazine, I am offended that Vogue would print this cover, knowing that their readers aren't into the trashy life of Kim Kardashian, but rather into a more polished idea of poise and etiquette. Reading this magazine gives me a life to aspire towards, and I would never aspire to be Kim Kardashian. Ever. 

The criticism that the magazine got in response for putting such a trashy woman on the cover may have affected the future of Vogue. The mere fact that Anna Wintour, Editor in Chief of the magazine, had to publically defend the cover shows how much backlash the cover created. Historically, the magazine created an alternative world where people have diamonds and elegant gowns paired with unarguably perfect figures and flawless beauty. 

What once was aspirational and undeniably classy has now become a nesting ground for parvenus reality TV stars. Perhaps Vogue is trying to change the type of readers they attract by bringing in Kim Kardashian, but in the process, they are losing the readers that loved the magazine for the impossibly beautiful fashion it contained. 

The cover of Vogue has broader implications than simply a pretty face in a pretty dress. It creates societal expectations and trends. Part of the long tradition of Vogue magazine is the ability to feature those who define culture at any given moment.  The trend of a floozy being important enough to assume to cover presents a shift in society. The vociferous approach that Vogue took by placing such a cultural provocateur on the cover captured the modern media. Kim Kardashian is indisputably trending and with the help of her hubby, they are defining a new idea of society. Kanye, with his impeccable fashion, and Kim with her flawless beauty have become a visionary couple, despite Kim's terrible reputation. There is indisputably no doubt that Kimye are defining a new social norm, from outlandish clothes and ostentatious cars to reality TV shows. Today, it seems as though society has become more open and accepting, which may mean America is becoming more pompous in the process. 

As a magazine that has always set the trends, Vogue is setting the trend for a more acceptably distasteful society. Allowing a trashy figure to take the spotlight and be the trendsetter not only gives Kim an even bigger ego boost, but also negates everything Vogue had created over the past 100 years. Perhaps Vogue foresaw society evolving in this matter with or without their presence, and thus had to be proactive in redefining what society should aspire to become. Even though acknowledging that Kim is able to capture modern media much greater than any of the past featured cover models, Vogue changed their readers view of the magazine.

While the risk that Vogue took isn't necessarily being rewarded at the outset, it may be evidence of a shift in target audience and the evolution of society. Vogue did a bold thing by putting Kim on the cover, and in doing so they are fulfilling their unique role as a cultural barometer for a global audience. Though society enjoys the juicy details of Kim K’s life, Vogue is not the place for such drama. Vogue is no longer viewed as an exemplary classic, but rather a place for tasteless décolletage of past trash turned class.  

Conspiracy Theory

The most recent theory of Malaysia Flight 370 was that it purposefully avoided detection from Indonesian airspace when it was flying on March 8th, 2014. As of yesterday, experts believe the Boeing 777 ended up in the southern Indian Ocean because of the debris field that showed up on satellite images.  

Based off the last communication from the cockpit of Flight 370, the plane was just north of Malaysia. Shortly after, the plane was piloted deliberately around northern Indonesia instead of flying over the county. Aviation specialist, Peter Goelz, confirmed that the actions in the cockpit were deliberate and would have required planning and could not have been done on the spur of the moment. What once was considerate a terrorist act is now being seen as an inside job. The focus of the investigation has been shifted to the flight crew because of this deliberate piloting over Indonesia.

Recently, a senior Malaysian government source that the plane intentionally was taken along a route designed to avoid radar detection. This bring Malaysia's involvement into question. If a government is saying that this was purposely devised to stay off the radar, maybe Malaysia had a different final destination than Beijing.

There has been a lot of criticism and response from Malaysia regarding the loss of the flight, including contradicting statements about potentially dangerous lithium batteries on board, contradictions of the prime minister's account, and falsified voice communications.

Many of the conspiracy theories can be found here and here .

Overall, I think that people always jump to conclusions and point the finger at innocent people just to try and reason out a tragedy like the disappearance of Malaysia Flight 370. Whether it be two men with stolen passports, or the Malaysian government, it will most likely never be proved what actually happened to this flight. I think that conspiracy theories are interesting, and I can almost convince myself that they are true, but the reality of the situation is that a disappearance like this does not go unnoticed and people will continue digging for information until the truth is discovered or they give up.

Edward Snowden Speaks Up

"The right of the citizens is the future of the internet"

In March of 2014, Edward Snowden virtually appeared into the TED headquarters to speak about his NSA breach. He started talking about how he is not a hero, and how he is comfortable with the information that he leaked.

He explained PRISM, which is a program in which the government can compel Corporate America to do its dirty work for the USA. Companies tried to challenge this program in a secret court, and continually lost. He talked about how "secret" judges in "secret" court ruled the concept of PRISM lawful, but PRISM has never been tried in a public court.

Snowden believes that in order for companies to protect themselves from the NSA, "the biggest thing that an Internet company in America can do, right now, is to enable web encryption on every page you visit. That will increase the privacy and rights that people have worldwide."

Boundless Informant is a NSA program hidden by Congress, and it was hidden because "to tell Congress would be to invade their privacy." Very briefly, this program shows that there is more communication intercepted in America about Americans than in Russians by Russia.

On Snowden's idea worth spreading: "The last year has been a reminder that democracy may die behind closed doors, but we as individuals are born behind those same closed doors. We don't have to give up our privacy to have good government, we don't have to give up our liberty to have security."

All of the information that Snowden discussed during his TED talk was very informative and helped to clarify some of the issues that have been addressed over the past 9 months since the initial leak, including the primary purpose of leaking the information despite being accused of espionage. It seems as thought Snowden is starting to be seen as more of a hero than a terrorist because the information is becoming more insightful to the NSA's behind closed door operations. Additionally, the NSA is being very selective on what they want to comment on, making sure to not fully inform Americans about what is really going on. This has created plenty of uncertainty in Americans.

The Deputy Director of the NSA, Richard Ledgett made some responses to Edward Snowden's TED appearance. He mentioned that there was a little bit of truth to the information disclosed but there were also a lot of extrapolations and half-truths. When Ledgett was asked for specific examples of how Edward Snowden put our lives at risk, he simply said that "our people overseas in dangerous places face a greater risk," completely avoiding the purpose of the question. Ledgett kept his answers very vague, which makes Edward Snowden's argument that much more valid. Granted, there would be a breach of security if the NSA disclosed what they were doing. However, the NSA is keeping everything very vague and that just makes them look much more guilty.

I'm Not Bossy, I'm THE Boss

Sheryl Sandberg has done it again, she has managed to spark a vision that all women should become leaders and not let trivial words from our childhood impact our future of leadership. After her Lean In talk and her in depth book describing the steps that women need to take in order to rise up to the next level, a few powerful women joined the bandwagon for change.

Most recently, Sheryl Sandberg has created a campaign based off her idea that women should be the boss, but not be called bossy. The #banbossy campaign aims to have girls at a young age continue to exhibit leadership qualities and not shy away from leading because they were labeled as “bossy.” The word bossy itself is naggy and has a negative connotation, but when broken down, the word “boss” is something that all ambitious, aspiring boys want to be. Simply changing boss from a noun to an adjective by adding the –y at the end changes it from a goal geared towards boys to an insult aimed at girls.

The Ban Bossy Mission is:

When a little boy asserts himself, he is called a “leader.” Yet when a little girl does the same, she risks being branded “bossy.” Words like bossy send a message: don't raise your hand or speak up. By middle school, girls are less interested in leading than boys—a trend that continues into adulthood. Together we can encourage girls to lead.

Change the words.

Change the future.

Ban Bossy.

Encourage girls to lead.

 

Sandberg collaborated with some very prominent women while creating this campaign, including the Boss herself, Beyoncé. Beyoncé ends the campaign video with the statement “I’m not bossy, I’m the boss.” There is no denying that Queen Bey is in fact the Boss, and the distinction that she makes between boss and bossy is crucial to the development of leadership skills within young girls. Girls should aim to be the Boss, not bossy.

Just like any other campaign, #banbossy has created a lot of controversy. Ann Friedman, a writer from NYMag, believes this is going to be a failed attempt because she feels it represents a feminist strategy that has failed in the past. Additionally, many people that object to this new campaign believe that the word “bossy” is not as significant of an issue to warrant celebrities like Jennifer Garner and Beyoncé to be sponsoring this movement. 

Some of the negative feedback from this newly launched campaign includes:

“Among African American women, bossy is an anthem, not a pejorative. “

Sandberg wrote in Lean In that women should not be afraid to negotiate, or to take a seat at a table where men are. “This is useful advice if you are already in the room, but less so if you can't even get a foot in the door. Only people with privilege have the time or the inclination to argue the semantics of whether a woman's feelings are hurt by being called bossy or bitchy.” – Joshunda Sanders

 “The main reason I can’t stomach a bossy ban, though, is that it represents a feminist strategy that’s failed in the past, and it plays into a negative characterization of feminism more generally.” – Ann Friedman

“If we try to simply remove struggle from their lives, and shelter them from what this world, positive or negative, might have in store for them, it is a disservice to our children. Are we not supposed to help our kids understand emotions, obstacles, solutions and problem-solving to the best of our abilities?” - Brandon-Regina Payne-Hilton

My issue with the #banbossy campaign is that it is such a childish issue. No man in the workforce would go up to his boss, or coworker for that matter, and call him or her bossy. This word is primarily used on playgrounds and in classrooms when a young girl exhibits domineering traits. I understand that the whole purpose of the campaign is to have girls be less affected by this “negative” word so that they can let their leadership skills continue to grow. Is this really a problem that requires media attention? Personally, I do not think that Beyoncé or Jennifer Garner would be offended if someone were to call them bossy. They are both very strong, powerful women who have excelled in their careers and they are role models of so many people, including myself.

If Sandberg believes that the elimination of degrading words including “bossy” will increase the amount of women leaders, how does she describe the lack of leadership from girls who were never punished or called derogatory words during their childhood? I know that when I was growing up, the only person that called me mean things was my bully of a brother. Even at a young age, I knew not to listen to him and not to take what he said seriously. I am sure that I am not the only girl that was not called bossy as a child. How would Sandberg explain the lack of leadership skills from people that grew up in sheltered, supportive households?

I think there is a much greater problem than simply eliminating the word bossy being used in a negative context towards girls at a young age, and I would agree with many critics that banning bossy isn’t the answer. 

Data is the New Oil

After the terrorist attacks in 2001, the Bush Administration issued warrantless surveillance under Title II of the Patriot Act. President Obama reinstated this act in May of 2011. Since the reinstatement, many people have questioned what the NSA is really doing with the surveillance obtained by the Patriot Act and Edward Snowden seemed to have found the answer. Edward Snowden, an ex CIA employee, took a huge risk during his time at Booz Allen Hamilton by stealing top-secret documents. That wasn’t the end of his rampage; he then decided to inform Americans of the information he stole. After immediately being accused of espionage, Snowden took asylum in Russia, which furthered the accusations that he was a spy and was working with the KGB. Since his initial interview in June, Snowden has continued to release more and more information about the NSA, which has forced the government to address these issues to the public. More recently, tech companies have been under scrutiny by the public because of the distrust they have. The distrust originates from the rules being set by the NSA and government to regulate the tech companies. This blatant violation of the fourth amendment towards all citizens questions the privacy that the government is impeding on. The government should not be entitled to privacy if the public is not allowed this same privilege.

The whole premise of the government spying on everyone wasn’t really an issue until Edward Snowden made it one. During his time at Booze Allen, he started to dig deeper into the NSA than he was authorized to. He was in a position of privileged access, which gave him more access than the broader employee to this highly classified information. Snowden began to see more and more of the abuses that were taking place. Unlike his coworkers who just let the matter rest and continued on with their work, Snowden felt compelled to talk about it. As he began to talk about it with other employees, he was hushed and was told that it was not a problem. He then realized that his coworkers should not be the ones to dictate if this matter was considered important, that was the publics’ job. Snowden discovered that the NSA domestically targets the communications of everybody, filters and analyzes the communication and then finally stores this data in case they might need it at a later time. Snowden tried out this system of surveillance during his time at Booz Allen Hamilton. He was given enough authority that he could wire tap anybody he wanted “even the president, if I had a personal email.” Snowden felt that the public had the right to know what was going on behind closed doors. When asked about what made him want to go public with this info, this was his response:

"I would say sort of the breaking point is seeing the Director of National Intelligence, James Clapper, directly lie under oath to Congress. There’s no saving an intelligence community that believes it can lie to the public and the legislators who need to be able to trust it and regulate its actions. Seeing that really meant for me there was no going back. Beyond that, it was the creeping realization that no one else was going to do this. The public had a right to know about these programs. The public had a right to know that which the government is doing in its name, and that which the government is doing against the public, but neither of these things we were allowed to discuss, we were allowed no, even the wider body of our elected representatives were prohibited from knowing or discussing these programs and that’s a dangerous thing."

He felt that the citizens that were being watched should know the secret actions that the government was taking without permission. He also believed that it is not the place of the government to decide if the policies being implemented were right or wrong, rather the public should decide because it directly affects them.

When Snowden came out with these accusations of the government and NSA, the President had no choice but to make a statement to defend the government. The White House maintains that the program is lawful, even in spite of a U.S. privacy-policy board concluding that the bulk data collection is illegal and should be stopped. President Barack Obama has directed the Justice Department to defend many of the policies of George W. Bush, including warrantless wiretapping, which started after the terrorist attacks in 2001. While Obama plans to stop the NSA from keeping phone records, the president defended electronic spying in his most recent speech addressing the matter. Former President Bush believes that there needs to be a proper balance between security and civil liberties. That is easy for him to say because he is on the inside of what is going on in this situation, more hyperbolically he has his cake and can eat it too. The chief of the CIA, Gen. Michael Hayden, made such bold and preposterous statements about Edwards Snowden, claiming that Snowden will become an alcoholic, even though he has never drank in his life. People that are firm supporters of the NSA spying were doing everything to discredit Snowden, even if it included absurd lies.

Even though Snowden knew he would be scrutinized and charged with espionage, he still went public with this information. This brings his intentions into question. He addressed this concern when he went public, and he simply wanted the people to know that the government is spying on all citizens, even if the citizens aren’t currently under suspicion of terrorist activity. Should you do something wrong in the future, they can pull all of your data from the past and use it against you: “They can derive suspicion from an innocent life and paint anyone in the context of a wrongdoer.” He believed citizens should rightfully be informed of this surveillance, which is inevitably why he went public with the information.

Populations around the world are expressing serious indignation at the NSA and at their own government to the extent they have collaborated. Many people, including computer security expert Mikko Hypponen, believe that “we have been hacked by our own government.” He says:

“The United States is fighting the war on terror, but does the government think that every citizen could potentially be a terrorist. Are we really thinking about terrorists as such an existential threat that we are willing to do anything at all to fight. We are throwing the constitution and bill of rights in the trash because of the existential threat of terrorist. Privacy is non-negotiable, it should be built into all the systems we use, and privacy should be a building block to democracy.”

The more sinister effect of these classified programs is that they effectively create “permanent records” of our daily activities, even in the absence of any wrongdoing on our part.

With each leak from Edward Snowden, who unleashed a trove of documents exposing the U.S. government’s programs to monitor phone call logs and Internet chats, break Web encryption and tap into overseas data cables, Silicon Valley increasingly has had no choice but to opened up in Washington. This includes Twitter, which excoriated the U.S. government in early February 2014, for its transparency practices. A week after tech companies brokered an agreement with the Justice Department that allowed them to disclose new data about national security requests, albeit with strict limits, Twitter said the settlement “violates our First Amendment right to free expression and open discussion of government affairs.” And with it, the company threatened potential legal action. Silicon Valley has been under a lot of scrutiny recently because they are trying not to comply with the NSA requests because it will make users lose their trust, and inevitably business, if they should release the data to the NSA.

Rovio Entertainment Ltd recently was caught it a scandal because there was speculation that the NSA targets one of their most popular apps, Angry Birds, to collect end user data. Rovio made it clear that they do not share data, collaborate or collude with any government spy agencies such as NSA or GCHQ anywhere in the world. The accusation that Rovio is facing is based on information from documents leaked by Edward Snowden. Additionally Lavabit, an encrypted email service, has shut itself down rather than participate in what it calls "crimes against the American people", and in doing so, has gone to the legal limits in order to go public with what has happened. There will undoubtedly be more acts inspired by Snowden's initial choice to unravel his own life to make the world aware of what the US government has been doing in the dark. Using PRISM, the cover name for collection of user data from Google, Yahoo, Microsoft, Apple and five other U.S.-based companies, the NSA could obtain all communications to or from any specified target. The companies had no choice but to comply with the government's request for data.

At stake here is the entire tech business model. Customers use these companies only if they think the data they share with the companies will be kept private. But now that people believe the NSA can break the companies' encryption, users are going to be much more selective of the information they put in cyberspace. Plus, it turns out some companies have been secretly ordered to share data with the NSA. When customers no longer trust these companies, they're less inclined to do business with them, and this becomes a huge problem for some of the biggest companies across the country. Tech fortunes rest on the ability to keep their users' data secure, but the NSA is doing everything in its power to gain access to that data. Microsoft’s general counsel, Brad Smith, released a statement asserting that, “People won’t use technology they don’t trust. Governments have put this trust at risk, and governments need to help restore it.” “Study after study has shown that human behavior changes when we know we’re being watched. Under observation, we act less free, which means we effectively are less free,” he wrote. The lack of privacy that tech companies are now facing is furthering the separation between the government and every other entity within the United States. Not only are individual citizens being monitored and under constant surveillance, but the government is also starting to require data from the tech companies that gather data on the citizens. Next thing, the government will have data and intelligence of every aspect of every American and company that operates within the United States. Not only is data collection by wire-tapping and surveillance unethical, but the government is trying to obtain even more information than readily available, which is explained by the reliance on tech companies. The government is attempting to control every means of communication, even systems they cannot hack into. This is a pressing matter because it shows that there is reason for concern. If the government was not suspecting malicious activities going on, they wouldn’t be demanding this information from tech companies in addition to the surveillance that they have already been doing. 

This is bothersome because it is representative of the fascist dictatorship that will result from the government being all knowing. They are tapping into every resource possible to make sure that no information is kept secret. Currently, it is unclear what the intent of all this stored data will be used for, but one thing is certain and that is that there is data being collected and stored on all Americans. The NSA is creating a library of data, from surveillance to information gathered from tech firms, and is saving it for a rainy day. The information is of no use at the time being, but there is no reason to believe that they won’t go back to this data at a later date and dig up information from the past and turn it into suspicions of terrorist activity.

The culmination of information that Snowden released is not the important itself, rather the idea that the government does not trust the American citizens is more significant. The government has gone to such extremes to make sure that justice will be served should an American decide to engage in unpatriotic acts. These unethical decisions that the government is making, unbeknownst to the general public until recently, has brought the governments intentions into question. The President can speak about how the end goal is to protect America and that the surveillance is for our benefit, but if it truly was for our benefit, we should have the right to know about it. If the US government is genuinely concerned enough about our safety that they are implementing unethical procedures to ensure safety, they should have taken precautionary measures much sooner to prevent all of this from happening in the first place.

This all comes down to the fact that the bulk collection of data is illegal, yet the President still supports this data mining. When you take a step back and try and picture the situation from the eyes of the US government, it makes a little bit more sense. The government is not inherently bad; they are implementing these illegal precautions for our benefit. Should the data mining go as they anticipate, they will be able to crack down on potential terrorists and make the United States a safer place to live. The process of cracking down on surveillance with the hopes of catching terrorists before they do any harm would be a great plan if it could be properly executed. Additionally, the end goal of the US government, which they claim is to prevent future attacks on our nation, seems unfeasible by simply wire tapping into all three hundred million citizens living in the country. The thought that they will be able to filter through that much data and come out with a real victory seems slim to none. In the process, they are losing the trust and faith of the majority of the people by making such questionable and unethical decisions without considering the consequences that they may face. The mutual distrust between the government and the people will just continue to grow if the government does not inform the people of these precautions. As a citizen, it is really hard to trust a government that claims to be doing everything for the good of the nation but continually keeps the citizens in the dark about what is really going on behind closed doors. The only reason the government should be keeping things from the people is if it will genuinely endanger either the government or the people if the truth was out, which is not the case with surveillance. This is our country and our government is spying us on, something just seems unbelievably wrong about that. As the distrust begins to grow between the government and the people, there will be less reason to cooperate and more reason to rebel.

While the United States has the right and obligation to protect its citizens from suspicions of terrorist activity, it ultimately results in a circular reasoning of distrust that will never be resolved. The government will continue to surveillance the citizens for potential acts of terrorism, which will make citizens trust the government even less, which could potentially increase the amount of terrorism within the nation, thus increasing the caliber of surveillance on the citizens. The unethical qualities that the United States is exemplifying by blatantly breaking the most important law that the government put into place centuries ago shows that the government will do everything in it’s power to maintain order within the country. This double standard that the government is setting for itself is doomed to fail because a country that has an unethical leader setting bad examples will most likely result it more unethical (and potentially harmful) decision being made by the citizens. The right to privacy is no longer a right, but rather a privilege once you have proved yourself worthy enough to the government. However, the government seems to be able to keep all of their unethical actions in privacy, thus creating an even larger separation between the people and the state.
  
 Perhaps, once the citizens succumb to the spying that the government will continue to do, it will seem more like totalitarianism state than a democracy. Granted the only difference would be that the “state” ruling over the United States would be the government with the help of top-secret operatives working at the NSA, as opposed to a dictator. Once again, this results in another level of circular reasoning between the NSA and the technology companies that service the NSA. These companies disapprove of the spying that the government is doing on the citizens, and thus do not want to help the government. Realistically, these tech companies really cannot say no to the government, and thus they have to provide their data mines to the NSA. The government should not be entitled to privacy if they are not allowing this same right to be enforced by their constituents, whether it be the citizens of the United States or the tech companies that have the capacity to obtain every piece of data imaginable. The overwhelming circular mess that the government is initiating by breaking the constitutional rights of citizens will continue to be problematic until the government trusts the American citizens more and begins to focus its attention to more important matters elsewhere.

Where must the line be drawn?

In the past week, Ukraine accused Russia of invading Crimea in order to provoke an armed conflict. Just a brief summary of what has happened thus far: Russian armed men in military uniform have taken over the civilian airport and Russian aircraft's have landed right outside of Simferopol with nearly 2,000 suspected military troops.

A Russian military volunteer said:"We're simple people, volunteers ... We're here at the airport to maintain order."

Ukraine's interim president, Oleksander Turchinov, has accused Russia of open aggression. Turchinov related this invasion to when Russia went to war with Georgie in 2008 over the breakaway Akhazia region (which was largely populated by Russians).

“They’re provoking us into an armed conflict. Based on our sources, they’re working on scenarios that would be analogous to Abkhazia, when they provoke conflict, and then they start to annex territory.”

Turchinov feels that this invasion is for the same purpose as it was in 2008. Turchinov is also skeptical of deposed president Viktor Yanukovich. He believes that Yanukovich may have something to do with this invasion.

This potential threat to Crimea, and Ukraine as a whole, has reporters questioning what the civilians think about this invasion. After many interviews with residents of Crimea, many consider themselves Russian, not Ukrainian, which validates that Crimea is pro-Russian. Additionally, the citizens of Crimea want to be protected from the Fascist Ukraine. This then begins to create controversy within Ukraine.

The most striking part of this invasion was President Obama's address. The President said that " any violation of Ukraine's sovereignty would be deeply destabilizing and there will be costs for any military intervention in Ukraine."

I am not sure why President Obama feels the need to threaten the Russian Military, but I felt it was completely unnecessary. If anything, this conflict is between Ukraine and Russia, maybe the EU, but the US should have no involvement in this issue. I believe that the US gets unnecessarily involved in foreign affairs too frequently. This conflict has nothing to do with the United States, yet President Obama feels the need to threaten Russia. I think that the President should focus on domestic affairs before sticking his nose in other country's business. 

Smart Home

All of us have imagined living in a smart house at some point in our past, whether it was after watching Disney's Smart House or after envisioning our lives being lived like the Jetsons. This fantasy idea of a home being able to do everything for you is becoming less of a fantasy and more of a reality. Homes are now being equipped with technology such as Sonos, Roku, and systems that let ou turn on the lights, turn up the heat, and unlock doors from virtually anywhere. Just like everything in life, these systems come with a price tag (ranging from a mere thousand dollars to well into the millions). Technology companies are starting to create apps that allow smart home systems to use all of their systems from the same app, instead of toggling many different applications. SmartThings was created to "remember your daily routines and automatically adjusts things like climate, music, lighting, and more to your preferences" in order to make living that much easier.

 

Imagine you are sleeping peacefully in bed and then you start to wake up a little bit. You toss and turn a few times, anticipating your alarm going off at any moment. Your FitBit senses the movement and signals to your "Smart Home router" that you are waking up. The router then tells the coffee machine to start brewing, your shower to turn on, and your radio to start playing smooth jazz to wake you up. Before you even step out of bed, your coffee is halfway brewed, your shower is ready and you woke up serenaded. This is the goal of smart home systems.

Tech companies are researching and developing a program to program our lives. These new programs will eventually link to one another and make everything possible on one simple program. 

These advancements in home technology are taking away from the simple pleasures that keep us from becoming robots. I think part of the joy in drinking coffee is the smell and sound when it is brewing. Those sensual elements are eliminated when your coffee is brewed while you are still laying in bed. More importantly, these tech ideas don't solve humanity's big problems (according to Jason Pontin).

During his Ted Talk "Can technology solve our biggest problems?" Pontin specifically addresses that Silicon Valley is funding less ambitious companies than it did back when it was funding Apple and Intel. The development of smart home systems indicate that people are choosing not to solve big problems and are trying to minimize the politics that go into decision making. Pontin presented a great analogy about how space travel is controversial and would have a lot of political debates, thus R&D companies are trying to avoid technology that brings in politics. Are these smaller technological advancements, like smart home systems, the country's way of avoiding big advancements that bring up political issues? 

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A new kind of arms race

There was all sorts of buzz in December when Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos announced that Amazon is undergoing research and development to create drones that will deliver packages within thirty minutes of placing an order on amazon.com. These sky robots will definitely help Amazon become the most convenient online marketplace and will no doubt increase their market share, that is unless someone else beats them to it.

Amazon plans on implementing the Amazon Prime Air program in 2015, after approval from the FAA. They would be the first company to take such a risk, but the reward would be enormous. Little does Amazon know that another man has the same idea and might be cleared for takeoff before Amazon. The UAE is experimenting with drones to deliver documents and medicines in Dubai. These drones, if released before Amazon, would make the UAE the most business-friendly innovation hub in the Middle East. While Amazon is still battling with the FAA over air regulations, the UAE has full approval to release the drones. The drones in the UAE would be used for government services, which would make the approval a lot easier seeing how their government is in full support of the program. If UAE successfully launches the drones, Amazon may have less trouble getting approval to unveil their own drones because the United States government won't want another country to win the technological arms race. The arms race will continue for both sides, and the pressure sure is on for Amazon.

Should the UAE release their government approved drones before Amazon, they will have won the arms race and victory will go to the Middle East. However, Amazon and the UAE are not the only people developing drones. Domino's test drove the DomiCopter with the hopes of capturing the award for most innovative way to deliver a steaming hot pizza to your front door. Will the advancements in technology eventually take away jobs from blue collar workers? If Domino's and Amazon start using drones to deliver, are all of the UPS drivers and delivery boys going to become unemployed? Although these incredible advancements in technology are great, I believe they will make our economy worse off. How are young boys going to be able to afford Call of Duty to be delivered to their doorstep in less than thirty minutes if they got laid off from being a pizza delivery boy (thank Domino's for that)? Granted, it could be argued that the overall society would be more advanced and more innovative, we still need to consider the small effects that the implementation of drones would do to the economy.

Is Valentine's Day really necessary?

As we all know, the much anticipated day of love ended a mere 12 hours ago. Valentine's day has been the root of heartache for single women and has made men break into their savings accounts for far too long.

U.S consumers spent over $17.3 BILLION dollars yesterday, with over a third of this cost going to flowers. Maybe I am different than the rest of the girls in the world, but I would much rather have a nice homemade candlelit dinner with my hubby than spend $100 on a prix fixe dinner and $70 on a dozen long stemmed roses. All of this for what? To tell your significant other that you love them? I think you should tell your loved one that you love them everyday, not only on an overly commercialized holiday. Not only are you spending money to tell someone you love them, but roses die in less than a week. You could buy groceries for two weeks, but instead you are buying twelve roses that have a shelf life of less than a week. I guess flowers are more important than food in this day and age.

Don't get me wrong, I like to be pampered and receive surprises from my loved one, I just think that Valentine's Day is completely overrated and unnecessary.

It Really is Beautiful

Last week, I posted about the controversy about the Coca Cola ad that aired during the 2014 Superbowl. This past Friday, Coca Cola aired the full length version during the Opening Ceremony of the 2014 Sochi Olympic Games. Unfortunately, I missed the initial viewing during the Opening Ceremony, but thanks to the increase in technological advancements (aka Youtube), I found it online after it aired.

As a college student, I typically browse the internet in class (meaning that my computer is on silent), and I ended up watching this commercial during one of my lectures. I guess you could say that I viewed it differently because I was blind (more like mute in this case) to the controversial issue that existed in the initial commercial. Honestly, I think that the commercial had a very strong effect on me while it was on silent. I saw diversity, happiness, and red, white, and blue. Overall, the commercial showed America as the melting pot of all cultures and diversities. I personally liked watching the commercial on silent because I was slightly offended by the commercial when it was sung in seven languages other than English. 

Coca Cola sure did take away the overarching effect of the commercial by having America the Beautiful sung in eight different languages.

It's Beautiful

During the 2014 Superbowl, avid sports fans and other "once a year" fans tuned in to watch the Denver Broncos take a beating from the Seattle Seahawks. More important than the game this year were the commercials, pricing at roughly $4 million dollars for 30 seconds of TV time. This year marked the first year that there was a gay family in the Superbowl commercials. Additionally, the majority of commercials that were aired incorporated diverse races and ethnicities. The most controversial company to take this approach was Coca Cola.

For starters, Coca Cola made a ballsy decision to incorporate a gay family, but that wasn't all that Coca Cola did... The overarching goal of the commercial was to show that America is diverse and we are still united in this melting pot that we call home. Their approach failed. Instead of showing that we are a diverse country, they sang it. More specifically, America the Beautiful was sung in 8 different languages. This created an uproar. One Twitter user responded to the ad by saying "Hey @CocaCola This is America. English, please." Another user tweeted the following:

 

Honestly, I think that Laura Ingraham has a very valid point. Creating this commercial promotes being bilingual and still having the same love for America. I think that the one thing that every American should have in common is the English language that we speak. If we aren't all obligated to speak English, it takes away from the unity that we pride ourselves on. 

One critic mentioned that the commercial would have been much more heartwarming and touching if America the Beautiful was sung by U.S. military members of diverse races. I mean, two lines of the song say:

"O beautiful for heroes proved in liberating strife

Till all success be nobleness"

To me, nothing screams hero more than a member of the military, and nothing is nobler than putting the lives others before your own life, which is what members of the military do on a daily basis.  That being said, I think using diverse military members instead of singing in a different language would have had a more powerful effect.

I think that Coca Cola approached the ad the wrong way, but they certainly did get attention, so maybe their goal was accomplished? Not only did they incorporate a gay family, but also showed how diverse America is. They are reaching into new uncharted territory and it will take time for critics to get used to this.