Educational

The Facebook Matrix

Everything in moderation – that includes viewing photos and news about your friends and uploading photos and news of yourself. Of late I have come to realize that if a person spends on average 1 hour per day on a site like facebook starting at age 15 and lives until 90 (not an unreasonable life expectancy), then that person will have spent over three years non-stop on Facebook. Think about what can be accomplished in three years – a college degree, a three year prison term, etc.

Facebook and online social media including the blog you are reading right now are sapping people of time that they would have otherwise hopefully used in a more productive way. This blog, while in my opinion better than Facebook in that it belongs to me, the ads are mine not Facebook’s and much of what I write requires research and learning, is still most likely going to take up at least a year of my life before I’m finished (literally and figuratively).

In essense, what I’m trying to say is next time you want to ‘poke’ someone on Facebook consider driving over and phyiscally giving that person a poke (after considering the legal implications and of course the social acceptability of the action). Next time you decide to peruse someone’s photo album, take a moment and consider whether it’s worth it – perhaps the time would be better spent getting on the ground and doing 50 push-ups.

A few things to consider:

• Facebook will never tell you how many hours you have spent on the site, it would reduce popularity!
• Advertisements can utilize any information you put on Facebook, such as exact age, political party, music interest, religion, etc. in order to fool you into thinking they are specifically catered to you!
• All photos submitted to Facebook may be used by law enforcement, employers, news papers, etc. without your permission – the photos are no longer yours.
• Blackmail – Facebook rarely deletes your information, even if you change or delete it from your profile.
• Profiles are never deleted, they are only archived and put into hibernation until your revive it.

Yay no school!

In an effort to cut budget costs every single public school in Hawaii is going to skip over a dozen Friday classes. Hawaii is burdened with over one billion dollars in state debt, and her school system is lagging behind the rest of the US according to the National Assessment of Education Progress.

Obama, who spent time in Hawaii growing up, has recently been stressing that children need to spend more time in school, yet ironically his home state is under so much financial pressure that they must resort to four day school weeks. Parents have understandably voiced their criticism, as this forces many of them to find ways to take care of their kids while working.

Iowa, on the other hand, is comfortably above the national average in terms of school performance. Is it just me or does it have to do with the weather? While in Hawaii the weather is always perfect Iowa’s weather forces kids to stay inside with nothing better to do than study!

The following is an Australian-made video made by the police portraying an example that may very well happen due to text messaging while driving. The video is banned from being shown in the US for that purpose, as it is graphic and sad. However, I think it is a good idea to watch it as there is less blood and gruesomeness in this clip than in some PG-13 films.

The above film was just a public service announcement aired in Australia, but the link below will show a real-life result of texting while driving. Do not click the link if you are quesy or cannot handle seeing blood or death.

http://angelnoah.blogspot.com/2008/01/texting-while-drivinghang-up-and-drive.html

Bus Driver Texting While Driving