All those late nights reading computer books and using the Internet seem to have paid off. I am a professional programmer these days with volunteer duties in Internet studies with some of the world's well known scholars of the Net.
I attended a workshop at MIT and spoke about knowledge management. Three learned professors gave me feedback on my presentation. I also heard many presentations on Internet topics and also work related sociology. This included development topics, politics, open source, Wifi, call centres, country comparisons of internet use, and network graphs.
I spent the last week writing my paper. I spent a few hours on Thursday and Saturday testing the conference presentation site in Second Life. My final draft has been sent in now. I have two jpg slides. I am ready to go after sleeping.
I passed both economic system's design and applied probability this term just past.
It is the end of term now and I am free from authoritarian school for the summer. I borrowed about ten books on cyberculture and have been reading them this afternoon. I wore black today in honour of workers killed or injured on the job.
As a school project I created a simulation of the labour contract at a simulated firm. I used Stella 9 to do this work and the teachings of a professor at the University of Ottawa and also the theory of the former marxist microeconomist Samuel Bowles.
I was searching for web mastering books in particular a book for learning Dreamweaver. I got lost on searching for wobbly books.
I am writing a final exam in economic systems design this Monday. I have been reviewing notes and reading for this course this weekend. I also took a break yesterday from studies and work to watch the NHL playoffs. This is one of the only forms of TV entertainment I can enjoy these days. I also enjoy Stargate SG-1 occassionally.
I am continuing to study probability. That is the belief that things will occur. I have done some school work this weekend in this subject. Of course I wrote the mathematics home work on a computer using LaTeX. I have also read some Ian Hacking this past year on the topic of probability.
This whole year at school will have me studying probability. I will have the summer off of studies unless I study two courses this winter term. In about three weeks I will have completed the conditional requirements for my admission into graduate school which is this basic course in probability. Next term I think it natural to keep the momentum and study the advanced course in probability. I will then have four courses left to study in the first phase of this graduate school. But I could try two courses this winter term. I would then be allowed to study a course this summer as well. I would then have only two courses to complete next year and could start the winter term with the second part of the graduate school which is one course and a thesis. So I could complete the one extra course next winter and begin the thesis then too.
I am reading a book on simulations. I also studying a basic C++ book and a C++ recipe book for programming neural networks. I am also reading a book for managing a dissertation.
The last books I bought I think were some health and safety reference books I ordered on-line. The ordering was done on a German web page and they just sent the books and invoiced me in Euros. I wasn't even sure I had read the web order page correctly because my German is very weak. I got the books in the mail a few weeks ago and just read some more of one tonight after getting home from work at school. I finally after about two days of trying, a few weeks ago was able to afford to buy a money order in Euros from my bank and mail it to the German publisher. This money really comes from my union who give me money every school term for doing this health and safety representative work at the campus. The latest magazine I bought I bought today and it is about Linux computers.
You have to know that this author Chris Hables Gray wrote a book called Cyborg Citizen. This is also where the inspiration for this web site came from. I borrowed one of his recent books a couple of weeks ago. Here is the cite Gray, Chris Hables. Peace, War, and Computers (New York: Routledge, 2005).
I completed reading Donna Haraway's paper written in the 1980's. Here is the cite: Haraway, Donna. A Manifesto for Cyborgs: Science, Technology, and Socialist Feminism in the 1980s in Haraway, Donna. The Haraway Reader (New York: Routledge, 2004) at 7-45. This is the paper that inspired me to establish this web site.
I have been a member of the association of internet researchers for one year now. In fact, my membership dues are due again. I have been following the list server for aoir for about a year and a half now. I have gotten a copy of the aoir's ethics guidelines for internet research in a book. I tried to read these guidelines when I got the book but it was dry reading or involved guidelines for methodology I would never use. The topic of Internet survey's is debatable though.
I sick of all this activity. I work incredible hours on the union work at school and also my own school work. I also work sickening hours on the teaching assistant marking. I getting sick and tired of all this work. I need to not do things. I need to revolt against this oppression. The incredible bills pile up for all this cyber technology. In the past I was more desparate for recovery. I was more desparate for a certain world. Now I seem to be seeking a cyber world.
There is a lot of talk about simulations in post modern thought but do these talkers really know the probability and permuations and other statistics and computer programming that goes into these simulations? I was just discussing simulations and experiments inside a computer during my experimental design course. Because it might be easy to repeat an experiment, and change factors if these factors are computer controlled the idea of experimenting inside, or with a computer becomes a practical way of testing large numbers of factors or treatments. This type of experiment would also be easy to control and adjust. The recording of the changes to factors and responses observed would also be easier to record, organise and analyse.