5.1

Beneficial and Harmful Effects - Reflection

The Pros and Cons of Computer Science:

Increased Productivity and Efficiency: Computer Science has transformed our daily lives and work routines by providing more advanced tools for communication, data processing, and problem solving. However, it has also led to job automation and decreased employment opportunities.

Improved Education and Access to Information: With the advent of the internet and computer technology, people have greater access to educational resources and information. However, this has also contributed to the spread of false information and a decrease in focus and attention spans due to increased distractions.

Greater Connectivity and Globalization: Computer science has enabled people to connect and communicate globally, bridging geographical and cultural gaps. This has led to greater collaboration and understanding, but also to the spread of hate speech and cyber-bullying, and a decline in personal interactions.

Benefits of our Specific Project:

  • Allows users to better manage their business inventory and stock quantity
  • Good way for business to keep track of their inventory
  • People who use this application will see themselves more organized

Potential Con:

  • May not be completely functional

Dopamine and its Problems

With the advancement of technology, people, particularly teenagers, have become increasingly desensitized to dopamine, leading to the rise of dopamine detox lifestyles. Social media, in particular, provides users with a constant stream of dopamine through the simple act of scrolling through 15-second videos. This has contributed to the decline in attention span, with people now only having an attention span of less than 10 seconds. Content creators have adapted their products to cater to these short attention spans, resulting in a continuous boost of dopamine. However, this constant stimulation has caused a desensitization of dopamine among teens, leading to increased rates of depression and anxiety among Gen Z kids. The writer admits to spending an excessive amount of time on social media, despite not having a negative impact on their academics and social life. Despite this, they believe it is important to consider reducing their cell phone usage to avoid desensitization to dopamine.

5.2

The Steps to Digital Empowerment:

Improve digital literacy: Acquire the skills necessary to use technology effectively and safely, including knowledge of online privacy and security. Establish a strong online presence: Build a personal brand and create a professional profile on social media platforms. Secure personal information: Protect passwords, limit the information shared online, and stay alert for potential scams. Stay informed: Keep up with the latest technology trends and advancements to make informed decisions. Network and collaborate: Connect with like-minded individuals and build a professional network. Continuously learn and adapt: Stay curious and open to learning new skills and technologies to stay ahead in the ever-evolving digital world. The writer, who considers themselves digitally empowered, offers ways to help others who are not empowered, such as demonstrating how to do something, giving tips and tricks, and helping set up technology and tools.

Summary

Paper-based systems and bureaucratic processes can act as barriers to digital empowerment. By digitizing information and processes, organizations and governments can reduce the burden of paperwork, making it easier for individuals to access information and services, which can promote digital empowerment. However, in some cases, limitations such as restricted access to websites on school networks can hinder digital empowerment, as the writer has experienced while in school. Despite the need for security, restrictions on access to necessary resources can impede learning and growth.

5.3

Crossover Group Work - Answering the prompted questions:

  1. After googling “What age groups use Facebook” vs “… TikTok”?”, we came to the conclusion that the average Facebook user is in the range of 25-34, and TikTok between ages 10-19. We are arguing that the differences between these average ages is simply due to a generation gap. As it can be seen through other Facebook-owned companies, such as Instagram, the average age is again in the mid teens because of how well it has adapted to a newer generation.

  2. Yes, the female voices in AI assistants were purposeful implementations, and many take it in a manner that is offensive. Companies believe the female voice is more soothing and appreciative, but probably failed to take into account the derogatory meanings behind such a product. However, these assistants do have the options to be sounded as men as well, so people just need to change the default settings

  3. An algorithm that influences our decisions is that of TikTok, which spreads trends and awareness with incredible speed and popularity.

Pairs:

  1. Although the owner is jokingly upset that the software doesn’t work on him, it is difficult to tell whether or not he is genuinely calling out HP for being “racist”. Our group hypothesizes that the software was only tested on people of lighter skin tone, and therefore wasn’t able to recognize a darker skin tone.

Brief Summary of Reading:

The reading discusses the topic of computer bias and its effects, specifically in the context of algorithms created by programmers. It raises questions about the possibility of intentional or purposeful bias in algorithms and technology, as well as the potential harm it can cause. The article looks at examples such as age group preferences for social media platforms, the use of female voices for virtual assistants, and an instance of a computer that was deemed “racist”. The article invites discussion and reflection on these topics, asking questions about the intentionality of the bias, the potential harm it may cause, and what steps can be taken to produce a better outcome.

5.4

Group Work

APIs Utilized:

Car API Wikipedia API Medical Symptoms API Flashcards API Github’s Most Significant Find:

Github.dev Viewer - Enables viewing of any raw file on Github. Top Kaggle Datasets:

The top 10 to 20 datasets on Kaggle are diverse and pertain to social trends.

Hacks

  • A potential effective crowdsourcing strategy for CSP students could utilize the capabilities of Slack, such as emoji reactions, to gather student feedback in the Slack channel. Del Norte crowdsourcing could be achieved through Instagram polls, as most students are active and accessible on this platform.
  • Crowdsourcing would be extremely beneficial for our project, as it focuses on user experience, by allowing groups of individuals to test certain features and provide feedback through a polling mechanism.
  • To gather an overall evaluation of our site at N@MT, we could collect ratings on a scale of 1 to 10, providing insight into the popularity and effectiveness of our concept.

5.5

  1. When you create a GitHub repository it requests a license type. Review the license types in relationship to this Tech Talk and make some notes in your personal blog.
    • The different license types in this Tech Talk are Creative Commons Zero v1.0 Universal, Open Source MIT License, and Open Source GPL License. The Creative Commons Zero v1.0 Universal license is doesn’t allow copyrighting and it is given out for public use. The Open Source MIT License is when closed source can be distributed and the owner wants credit for the work. In the Open Source GPL License it allows the owner to do whatever to the project except distribute the the closed sources.
  2. In your blog, summarize the discussions and personal analysis on Software Licenses/Options, Digital Rights, and other Legal and Ethical thoughts from this College Board topic.
    • Personally I think that we should use the Open Source GPL License for our GitHub Projects. The legality and ethicality of the sources is that we should credit the owners of the source we use from other code.Music and movies companies have Digital Rights on their content to protect it from being pirated and it regulate their ownership over the content. In this class we can use Creative Commons software because we are using it for education and because it is free for all use. Open source code is free, so businesses don’t make their licenses open source, but they need the open source code online in order to do well.
  3. Make a license for your personal (blog) and Team repositories for the CPT project. Be sure to have a license for both Team GitHub repositories (frontend/backend). Document license(s) you picked and why. FYI, frontend, since it is built on GitHub pages may come with a license and restrictions. Document in blog how team made license choice and process of update.
    • For my own personal blog I made my repository a Open Source GPL license. We also made the license for the group repository a Open Source GPL License. We chose this license because it allows our code to be open for anyone’s use but it doesn’t allow anyone to distribute our closed sources of the code.

5.6

  1. Describe PII you have seen on project in CompSci Principles.
    • The PII I have seen on project in CSP is that we know each other’s names, emails, photos, education, and for some, birth date, addresses and phone numbers. I have seen these on project in CSP because we display it on our github projects.
  2. What are your feelings about PII and your personal exposure?
    • I think that we should be mindful of what we put online because of the PII. I think it is fine to share our names and email, but we should not share private things like social security numbers, passwords, and other private things. But these PII may be good for companies to make their websites cater to our interests to improve their website’s popularity.
  3. Describe good and bad passwords? What is another step that is used to assist in authentication.
    • A good password is one that has many different types of characters: uppercase, lowercase, numbers, symbols, and punctuation. A bad password is like full words, passwords, pet names, and things that are easily known by others. Another step to assist authentication is two factor authentication. This means that two devices are needed to sign into an account.
  4. Try to describe Symmetric and Asymmetric encryption.
    • Symmetric encryption is where one secret key encrypts and decrypts the information. Asymmetric encryption uses two keys, a public and private to encrypt and decrypt the information.
  5. Provide an example of encryption we used in AWS deployment.
    • An example of encryption we used in AWS deployment is the SSL encryption. And this uses both the symmetric and the asymmetric encryption.
  6. Describe a phishing scheme you have learned about the hard way. Describe some other phishing techniques.
    • I have not learned the hard way with a phishing scheme because most of the phishing emails I receive go to the spam. But when I do see one, I read the email and see that it is a phishing scam. But one time a friend of mine got hacked on Discord and they sent file and I almost clicked it. Some phishing techniques are sending emails pretending to be big companies. Also by hacking peoples accounts and sending links to people they know.