A Passing Thunderstorm

My journey through the effective internet research course is described as a passing thunder storm as the journey was swift however I did encounter some obstacles along the way like for example managing time between EIR and my other subjects.

My EIR journey begins on the 20^th April 2011 at 8:00am. On the first lesson we were briefed on the things that we would learn from the subject and were broken up into groups of four students per group. Furthermore we were tasked to complete several ice-breaking activities.

I could clearly recall that one of the activities involves thinking of a metaphor to describe oneself as I feel that the activity is quite meaningful as people may see you in a different light after hearing about your metaphor. My metaphor is lazy but reliable like a sloth, during the lesson we were also tasked to create a Facebook account if we do not already have one as we need to join the EIR Facebook group.

In the same lesson we were also introduced to twitter and similarity we were also tasked to create an account which we would use to tweet about the happenings in EIR. We were also tasked to create a blog for the purpose of reflecting of things learned in EIR.

Now fast-Forward time to present time, 2^th August 2011 8:00am I feel that through the learning journey of EIR I have learned a lot of things at I would usually overlook for example the purpose of the website.

Before going through the EIR course I would never have guess that websites have different purpose, however after going through the course I learned that websites have different purposes like advocacy, news, marketing and entertainment. Overall the journey has been swift and enjoyable with only a few road bump along the way.

My Dream Holiday

 I used the presentation and arrangement of graphics criteria to evaluate the multimedia websites for my “Dream Holiday”  due to the fact that if the information on a site is poorly presented and arranged potential customers would find it hard to locate what they are looking for and ending up giving up and search for an alternative site instead.

I choose Japan as the destination for my dream holiday as I have always loved Japanese scenery, culture and architecture. Examples would be for example the blossoming Sakura trees, the arts of being a ninja and the many castles in Japan.

 

Compared to the hassle of evaluating a website to order to decrease the chances of an bad holiday experience due to inadequate planning by the tour organizers, going on a dream holiday  in Virtual Second Life is much relaxed as you could just read up a description of the place that you wish to go and by clicking on the teleport button you would be sent to the location free of charge with no side effects unlike in real life one have to purchase plane tickets and during the trip if the plane experience shaking one may be prone to vomiting.

Invisible Web(Database)

Today during class we were introduced to the functionality of invisible web and we were asked if it is more effective to search the invisible web than using search engine, meta-search engine or subject directories. Well, I think that it is more effective to use the invisible web (databases) than using search engines, meta-search engines or subject directories as through the use of invisible web I am able to find my previous relevant sources that I use for my assignment on the first page rather than search engines for which I would have to sift multiple pages to find a source relevant to my topic as the search engine relevance ranking may not be able to entirely correct. Meta-search engine may not be to relevant as it depends on the type of search engines it uses to search for its results Lastly articles found in subject directories may be too general and you would have to go through many categories and sub-topics to find a relevant search result.

We were also asked to name two particular databases which we would be using for our course and  our research topics. For me I would use Temasek Polytechnic EBSCO HOST database for my research topic as it provides multiple relevant sources related to my topic, furthermore it also provides additional search features like Full text option which displays all the search results with links to the full text article found at the bottom of the results unlike search engines which only displays the web page and the user would sometimes have to navigate through the webpage to find the full text document. Next I would use Newslink as for my course as Newslink provide a diverse varieties of newspaper articles and I can make full use of those articles for some of my research topics like for example for my Japanese language CDS project that requires me to find the types of Japan influences in Singapore. I would then make use of Newslink database to search for the types of influence that Japan have on Singapore.

E-Shopping adventures in Second Life !!

  

Today I decided to embark on an shopping trip through the virtual world known as Second Life. Armed only with $10 credit that I obtained by signing up as an new user I decided to check out some free clothes by searching freebie clothes on the search engine in second life. This brought me to an user shop named Trovon, in Trovon there are selection of clothes to choose however most of the clothes displayed are way over my budget of $10, the most expensive item sold is a red jacket priced at $500. Luckily there is a Free clothes section, from which I selected my new clothes, a pale blue checked shirt and a light brown pants. Compared to my E-shopping activity on the internet I felt more involved in my shopping in second as I am able to sort of like see my product on site and interact with the product unlike the E-shopping through the internet where I am only able to view my product through the images provided by the seller. I enjoyed the the experimenting with my character skin tone through the preference option, once i change my character skin tone to a metallic gray and at that moment my character really resemble a cyborg.

Reflections

I enjoyed selecting the item for the E-shopping activity, how I wish the 500 bucks were real I really could used a laptop :). Furthermore it is also a first for me to buy item online through the social game SecondLife.

I think that researchers has a need to know the different purposes of websites as for example I usually access sites like anime44.com for my anime fix and stomp.sg for the latest local gossip. These websites main purposes are for entertainment, researchers are required to know this as it would help in narrowing down the search results and cases that the information is unreliable, for example information from a personal blog is usually unreliable as you do not know the author.  

I choose the Hep C Advocacy website. to compare with Amazon.com. the differences between the websites are firstly the purpose, the Hep.C website main purpose is advocacy while Amazon.com main purpose is Business/marketing. Secondly the advertisements, Amazon.com advertise the products that they are selling through adverts placed on their website while on the Hep.C website there are no advertisements. Lastly the content, in Hep.C case the contents of the site is mainly on the different types of Hepatitis while in Amazon.com case the contents is mainly on products with which people could place a price tag on ranging frerom computer too gardening tools.

From practical 1&2 I learned the different purpose of websites from entertainment to advocacy.

E-Shopping Spree

 
Apple MacBook MC516LL/A 13.3-Inch Laptop

I decided on buying the Apple MacBook as I currently only own a desktop and it is the only computer in my house, thus it is quite difficult to get hold of at times as my family members maybe using it when. However with after purchasing the Macbook, I could use it to complete my tasks as and when i like without needing to wait for my turn to use the desktop.