Technology Part IV

In summary, we have looked at three aspects of the history of computers:

· Old mechanical computers like that created by the British scientist Babbage, the German mathematician Leibniz, and the abacus. The abacus is the oldest “computing” device and was probably invented in China thousands of years ago.

· We briefly looked at the work of Alan Turing (the father of computer science) and Conrad Zuse (the German scientist who created the first computer language for an electrical-mechanical computer in his living room!)

· The 1970s was the period when we moved from huge mainframe computers to the personal computers like the Apple, the Commodore Pet and the Commodore 64.

Question:

Why were computers like the Apple and the Commodore 64 called “Personal Computers”?

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In this brief lesson we will briefly discuss the Internet and how it has become indispensable (so important) in our lives.

The word Internet comes from two words that were linked together:

INTER(national) NET(work)

A network is just two or more computers that are connected so that they can share files and information. The computers are connected by wires or use wireless to communicate with each other.

The word International just means that it is something that spans many countries around the entire world.

Therefore the Internet is just all the computers in the world connected together so that they can share information.

Without the Internet today, and especially with this virus pandemic, we would not be able to communicate with each other.

We as human beings, more than all the other living beings on the earth, need to socialize and communicate with each other.

Take a moment now and reflect. What would life be like for us during this pandemic if we were not able to communicate with each other? Write two or three sentences on how you would feel if there was no Internet right now.

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Let’s briefly discuss what types of information that is shared by humans around the world using the Internet.

Social Media:    We share images, text, voice and video.

Commerce: Money is exchanged over the Internet as we buy and sell goods and services to each other.

Gaming: Humans have always played games together. Gaming is just part of our social connection. It all started when we get together and just a kick a ball.

War and conflict: Humans have always had conflicts with one another. We have beliefs that we want to impose (force) on others and we have always envied what others have. The Internet may well be the next battlefield.

Storing, retrieving and sharing information. Humans have always stored information about the topics that we learn about or that interest us. For example, we share information about food prep, fashion, mechanics, carpentry, geography, history and any of the thousands of topics that we learn about. The Internet provides us with an easy method to store and a quick method to retrieve that information. We can share information with photos, video, voice.

Music: Humans are emotionally moved by music. We use the Internet to create, share and listen to music.

Learning: Older humans share their acquired knowledge with younger humans. This is what we are doing right now.

Transportation: We are using the Internet more and more to travel and move around.

As the Internet progresses, we will use it to store and share all the different ideas that we have. We will use the Internet in new and novel ways in the future.

Assignment:

The following are some terms that we have become accustomed to hearing about and using. Classify each of these terms as:

commerce

transportation

social media

music

gaming

information storage (retrieval and sharing)

 learning

 war and conflict

Example:

Amazon:             commerce

Pintrest               information storage

Classify the following Internet terms:

Minecraft           ____________

Facebook           ____________

eBay                    ____________

Instagram          ____________

Grand theft auto _____________

Twitter__________________

Tumblr _________________

Snapchat _______________

iTunes _________________

Spotify __________________

Youtube __________________

Google docs ________________

Google classroom _______________

Zoom _____________________

Google Maps ____________________

Reddit _____________________

WhatsApp ______________________

Write down the names of any other Internet platforms that you are aware of.