Accessing the internet from your car

I recently listened to a podcast on All Tech Considered titled " For Automakers, Internet-Connected Cars are a Balancing Act" . This podcast went into the strengths and weakness of having access to the internet via your cellular device. Overall people do really want to access the internet in  their car, but it needs to be safe first off. I believe the having access to internet in our cars could possibly be a good thing for the passengers of the vehicle, but it could create another potential distraction for the drivers. Another thing i wanted to mention is that Google is currently working on cars that are going to be able to drive themselves soon once we have that up and running it could be like your own personal office on the go. As it stands though i think drivers should have both hands on the wheel and full attention on the road and not the web.

Underwater Exploration For Everyone - Assignment 6

Underwater Exploration for Everyone

I recently had the opportunity to watch a video on Ted Talks Titled "David Lang: My Underwater Robot". The video was mainly about ROV's which are also known as Remote Operated Vehicles. The video was about a small group of guys who wanted to explore and under water cave in the foothills of the Sierra in search for gold. They didn't have the money to buy a an ROV as they were broke and an ROV is a pretty expensive piece of equipment.So they decided to build an ROV of their own.


ROV's have been around for decades now. So the ROV David built wasn't special at all its how the ROV was built which was special. David didn't necessarily know how to build an ROV right of the top of his head so he took to the internet for answers. David and his friend created the website openrov.com which was a site designed for people to give David input on how to build their ROV. Eventually they were getting input from all sorts of people including oceanography engineers. They soon were able to design the ROV. Eventually a lot of the people involved in the blog wanted to get theirs hands on the kit for the ROV. So David created a kickstarter and they exceeded their funding within 20 hours.

They were able to create a drastically cheaper ROV in comparison to any other model on the market and they couldn't have done it without the help of their community.

David used various videos of his ROV in actions to display the ROV's capabilities. The video inspired to try and Obtain an ROV of my own and the several references to Jame Cameron were very Humorous.

The Use of Facebook & Twitter by companies

The effective use of Facebook & Twitter

Facebook and Twitter are easily the two largest names in the world of social media. Most companies in America and across the globe utilize Twitter & Facebook, some use it effectively and others do not. An example of a company that uses twitter very effectively is Zappos. Zappos use's Twitter as more than just a medium to promote their products, they use it as a customer service medium.  Zappos uses twitter's API streaming service to track all conversations and respond to all tweets involving @zappos. I believe the way Zappos use of twitter is a very effective use of the medium. Zappos usually will respond to a tweet within 24 hours. This creates a very strong relationship between zappos and their customers. And it's proven Zappos products get mentioned in up to 60 tweets per day, they don't even need to promote the products themselves when their followers can just do it for them. Zappos uses Facebook more for promotion's, which isn't a bad thing. Facebook is just different from Twitter and it's a lot harder to start a conversation. I believe Zappos audience would be their customers, mainly because I don't think you'd mention Zappos in a tweet unless you've shopped with them before. Zappos has a lot of integration with twitter such as their mobile app  which uses twitters native integration. Another very popular company  that is an effective user of twitter is L.L. Bean. One of L.L. Beans primary goals with using social media is to offer a platform friendly two way communication. Some people don't necessarily want to call company and ask their questions some would prefer to contact the company through other mediums such as Twitter or Facebook. LL Bean uses twitter to not only as medium for customer service, but twitter also helps develop a LL beans brand while also driving an increase of customers. Twitter and Facebook can be used to reach customers in several different way's and when it's used right a company can really benefit from it. 

References:

http://www.slideshare.net/smbme/ll-bean-and-social-smbme

https://dev.twitter.com/case-studies/zappos-uses-twitter-generate-over-1200-conversations-month-its-customers