Week 6: Clear

      

Multimedia

In week 6 a new topic was introduced, namely multimedia. The lectures we had to watch were about (1) images, (2) audio and (3) video. They all began by explaining what an image, audio or video data actually is and what the key characteristics are. After that "compression" was dealt, followed by the explanation of different file formats. Finally, the lectures closed by outlining which hard- and softwares are used to fully exploit images, audios and videos.Of course each lecture had its own specific "character" but the structure was quite similar which made it convenient to follow them.

In the lecture about audios, the concept of DRM was explained further. DRM means "digital rights management" and described a way to control access to an audio file. By using DRM you can limit the access to a file to one device and you can also set an expiration date after which the file cannot be used any more. But Mr. Olsen also explained a way to circumvent these restrictions.This way is called "Analog hole" and is a quite simple way to get around access controls. If a file is restricted to one device you can just record it to a second device and so set up a completely new audio file on that device, by just losing minor quality. To find out more about the "Analog hole" just click here.

In the lecture about images, the software Google Picasa was named as an example for softwares useful to work on images. I immediately downloaded the program (here), as I lacked a proper software for working on images before. Thus, the program is really valuable for me as it is a simple tool to enhance the quality of your images. You should definitely download it if you are looking for a software for working on images and start playing around with it. This is probably the best way to find out about the different functions of the program, as it is a really simple and clear program.

Week 2: Clear

For week two we were required to watch several lectures, one of which dealt with the topic of ergonomics. As my sister studied ergonomics and I almost never keep the "correct" position when using a computer, I was very interested in the video shown at this lecture.The video gave a clear understanding of what ergonomics is about and why it is important for the business environment.

Ergonomics is about the design of jobs and equipment to fit workers. Further that means that your workplace should be designed so that well-being of the workers and productivity are optmized. Therefore you need to keep a certain position (see above or in the video) while using a computer, and keep often used things close. This is especially important for the business environment because nowadays there is hardly any business without computers and thus without workers using a computer.

If you want to find out more about this topic, there are several websites explaining the rationale of it in more detail then possible here (eg. wikipedia). All in all, ergonomics gets more and more important and one should at least have heard about it, when starting to work in the business environment.

Week 1: Muddy

Before starting the quiz of week 1, I watched the video "A fair(y) Use Tale" on http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CJn_jC4FNDo . For me as an exchange student from Germany, this video was really hard to understand. Instead of clear, short and descriptive sentences about copyright, several animated characters speak one word of a particular sentence, which makes the explanations very difficult to understand. This was really muddy and annoying.

Therefore I suggest, to learn about copyright and its implications it would be more helpful to have a look at either http://www.copyright.gov/ or http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright. Of course these websites are not trying to be as "funny" as the video, but instead they are much more informative and clearer to understand. It may be that local students did not have any problems to get the content of the video, but as said above, for me as a non-native English speaker this was quite difficult.

Finally I would like to shortly explain what copyright is about. The term copyright describes a set of rights, exclusively granted to the creator of different kinds of work, e.g. music, films, songs, etc. . These rights include the right to copy, distribute and adapt the created work. Of course there is a lot more to learn about "copyright", its implications and the several details of the law. Therefore I suggest interested readers to have a look at the proposed websites to get informed without having to deal with muddy explanations.