Mudderoy
02-16-2010, 01:39 PM
http://voyager.jpl.nasa.gov/images/voyages_heliosphere.jpg
A few years ago several of us HAMs were having a discussion on the local 2 meter repeater. We were discussing the Voyager spacecraft (http://voyager.jpl.nasa.gov/) which I believe had left the solar system. The discussion really centered around the ability of the Earth bound scientists to communicate with a space craft many millions of miles away. As radio enthusiasts we wondered what kind of RF (Radio Frequency) power output the space craft's transmitter had.
Arriving at my destination, work, I looked up the Voyager team, and found the e-mail address for the director of the project. I sent him a brief e-mail explaining the reason for my electronic message and my question. To my delight I received a response writing from the pen, ahhh keyboard, of the director of space craft operation. The answer was 65 watts, about the power from a house hold light bulb.
I was amazed that a technology such as the Internet gave me the ability to contact and communicate with someone that I otherwise would have had little hope contacting much less having a mundane question answered.
I was more impressed with this ability than I was about the answer.
Now fast forward a few years. The latest FAD on the Internet is Twitter (http://twitter.com). The idea here is to send short messages, generally from a phone or PDA, to your friends on the Internet. In Twitter terms. The idea here is to send tweets, generally from a phone or PDA to your followers on the Internet.
One of the really fun things about Twitter is following celebrities. The tweets are live and uncensored. You can get a better in site to who these people really are. Some celebrities that you think would be fun to follow on Twitter are really boring, and others are great fun.
Some of you may be familiar with the Fox News show "Red Eye" that airs Tuesday through Saturday at 2 a.m. Central time. I record the show and watch it as I have time. The show is very funny and they have guests on the show. One member of the Red Eye is Andy Levy. They gave his Twitter information on Red Eye, so I started following him. He is quite funny and Tweets various "interesting" things he finds out about. I think he job is to cruise the Internet. One of the other things he does is mention who's on Red Eye tonight. As I mentioned Red Eye has guests. Anne Coulter has been on several times. Dianna Falzone and Alison Rosen are two others that guest on the show regularly.
I'll be honest I don't know who many of these people are, but after seeing them on the show you get a sense of whether you enjoy seeing them or not. One guest that I found particularly funny was Alison Rosen.
Alison is quite active on Twitter, and it was through this Internet medium that I found out about her show, "ALISON ROSEN IS YOUR NEW BEST FRIEND".
http://xjtalk.com/images/special/alisonustream.jpg
Here is Alison Rosen during the broadcast of her "Internet" TV show.
Now we are all familiar with the polished multi-camera shows that are on cable and network television. Alison's show takes two steps back, okay it's more of a city block back. Ms. Rosen uses her PC (It's a MAC - I don't mean to offend), a web camera and a Internet streaming service called UStream. Basically she streams sound and full motion video from her apartment to UStream and UStream sends it out to scores of people on the Internet. Her show "airs", an antiquated term referring to transmitting radio frequency signals through the air, on Wednesday nights at 10 p.m. Eastern, or 9 p.m. Central.
Alison has guest(s) on her show. The first show I saw two weeks ago featured a TV producer that was there to be interviewed by Alison and trim her hair! One of the most fun aspects of the show is the viewers ability to interact with the people that they are watching. Namely Alison and her guest(s).
For example. Just after Alison had a little bit of the end of her hair trimmed it was obvious that she was nervous about her hair. I made several comments "via text chat" that her hair was shorter on the passenger's side (her right side). She saw the comment and was starting to freak out as she was pulling the right side of her hair trying to make it the same length as her left side, or driver's side. She was using the webcam and the image on her computer screen as a mirror, so she was facing all of the viewers while she did this.
Eventually she had to excuse herself from us and her guests to run to the bathroom and check her hair. It was hilarious. Her show lasted 3 hours! I was laughing almost the entire time.
I got on to the show late the following week, but it was still great fun. Not only do you interact with the people on the show, but also the several hundred viewers in chat. I was making my little comments, trying to be funny, and got more caught up in the chat than the show, only for a moment. That's when Alison decided to ask me a question. I froze. I wasn't sure what had happened. I watched the screen as Alison and her guest just sat there, not moving, or saying a word. Just watching the computer screen intently. Then Alison says "No hurry we can wait". I heard just enough of what she had said to know she was talking to me.
My big break and I missed it, because I wasn't paying attention. Remember this from school guys?!?!?! When the teacher calls on you and you weren't paying attention? After a few more seconds they gave up and continued with the show.
It strikes me that as we progress, technically, we move from an environment where we only have access to a few people, 100 or so when we lived in farming rural communities, to hundreds as we moved to towns, thousands as we moved to the cities. With the Internet we could have access or the ability to interact with literally millions of people. This can be quite staggering if you think about it.
When I was a kid and I took my first steps into radio the awe was the ability to communicate with people all over the world. With the Internet we now all have this ability, albeit a much easier thing to do through the Internet than HAM radio. Just like in HAM radio where you have the ability to regularly communicate with people and become friends, so it goes on the Internet.
Where as I may never become a friend of a celebrity, minor or otherwise, I can communicate with a celebrity and perhaps even make a small difference in their life. To me, as a child of the 60's, I truly believe I have seen the twenty first century unfold before me.
You can get more information on Alison Rosen on her website AlisonRosen.com (http://alisonrosen.com/)
http://alisonrosen.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/07/Alison-268-TU-240x300.jpg
A few years ago several of us HAMs were having a discussion on the local 2 meter repeater. We were discussing the Voyager spacecraft (http://voyager.jpl.nasa.gov/) which I believe had left the solar system. The discussion really centered around the ability of the Earth bound scientists to communicate with a space craft many millions of miles away. As radio enthusiasts we wondered what kind of RF (Radio Frequency) power output the space craft's transmitter had.
Arriving at my destination, work, I looked up the Voyager team, and found the e-mail address for the director of the project. I sent him a brief e-mail explaining the reason for my electronic message and my question. To my delight I received a response writing from the pen, ahhh keyboard, of the director of space craft operation. The answer was 65 watts, about the power from a house hold light bulb.
I was amazed that a technology such as the Internet gave me the ability to contact and communicate with someone that I otherwise would have had little hope contacting much less having a mundane question answered.
I was more impressed with this ability than I was about the answer.
Now fast forward a few years. The latest FAD on the Internet is Twitter (http://twitter.com). The idea here is to send short messages, generally from a phone or PDA, to your friends on the Internet. In Twitter terms. The idea here is to send tweets, generally from a phone or PDA to your followers on the Internet.
One of the really fun things about Twitter is following celebrities. The tweets are live and uncensored. You can get a better in site to who these people really are. Some celebrities that you think would be fun to follow on Twitter are really boring, and others are great fun.
Some of you may be familiar with the Fox News show "Red Eye" that airs Tuesday through Saturday at 2 a.m. Central time. I record the show and watch it as I have time. The show is very funny and they have guests on the show. One member of the Red Eye is Andy Levy. They gave his Twitter information on Red Eye, so I started following him. He is quite funny and Tweets various "interesting" things he finds out about. I think he job is to cruise the Internet. One of the other things he does is mention who's on Red Eye tonight. As I mentioned Red Eye has guests. Anne Coulter has been on several times. Dianna Falzone and Alison Rosen are two others that guest on the show regularly.
I'll be honest I don't know who many of these people are, but after seeing them on the show you get a sense of whether you enjoy seeing them or not. One guest that I found particularly funny was Alison Rosen.
Alison is quite active on Twitter, and it was through this Internet medium that I found out about her show, "ALISON ROSEN IS YOUR NEW BEST FRIEND".
http://xjtalk.com/images/special/alisonustream.jpg
Here is Alison Rosen during the broadcast of her "Internet" TV show.
Now we are all familiar with the polished multi-camera shows that are on cable and network television. Alison's show takes two steps back, okay it's more of a city block back. Ms. Rosen uses her PC (It's a MAC - I don't mean to offend), a web camera and a Internet streaming service called UStream. Basically she streams sound and full motion video from her apartment to UStream and UStream sends it out to scores of people on the Internet. Her show "airs", an antiquated term referring to transmitting radio frequency signals through the air, on Wednesday nights at 10 p.m. Eastern, or 9 p.m. Central.
Alison has guest(s) on her show. The first show I saw two weeks ago featured a TV producer that was there to be interviewed by Alison and trim her hair! One of the most fun aspects of the show is the viewers ability to interact with the people that they are watching. Namely Alison and her guest(s).
For example. Just after Alison had a little bit of the end of her hair trimmed it was obvious that she was nervous about her hair. I made several comments "via text chat" that her hair was shorter on the passenger's side (her right side). She saw the comment and was starting to freak out as she was pulling the right side of her hair trying to make it the same length as her left side, or driver's side. She was using the webcam and the image on her computer screen as a mirror, so she was facing all of the viewers while she did this.
Eventually she had to excuse herself from us and her guests to run to the bathroom and check her hair. It was hilarious. Her show lasted 3 hours! I was laughing almost the entire time.
I got on to the show late the following week, but it was still great fun. Not only do you interact with the people on the show, but also the several hundred viewers in chat. I was making my little comments, trying to be funny, and got more caught up in the chat than the show, only for a moment. That's when Alison decided to ask me a question. I froze. I wasn't sure what had happened. I watched the screen as Alison and her guest just sat there, not moving, or saying a word. Just watching the computer screen intently. Then Alison says "No hurry we can wait". I heard just enough of what she had said to know she was talking to me.
My big break and I missed it, because I wasn't paying attention. Remember this from school guys?!?!?! When the teacher calls on you and you weren't paying attention? After a few more seconds they gave up and continued with the show.
It strikes me that as we progress, technically, we move from an environment where we only have access to a few people, 100 or so when we lived in farming rural communities, to hundreds as we moved to towns, thousands as we moved to the cities. With the Internet we could have access or the ability to interact with literally millions of people. This can be quite staggering if you think about it.
When I was a kid and I took my first steps into radio the awe was the ability to communicate with people all over the world. With the Internet we now all have this ability, albeit a much easier thing to do through the Internet than HAM radio. Just like in HAM radio where you have the ability to regularly communicate with people and become friends, so it goes on the Internet.
Where as I may never become a friend of a celebrity, minor or otherwise, I can communicate with a celebrity and perhaps even make a small difference in their life. To me, as a child of the 60's, I truly believe I have seen the twenty first century unfold before me.
You can get more information on Alison Rosen on her website AlisonRosen.com (http://alisonrosen.com/)
http://alisonrosen.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/07/Alison-268-TU-240x300.jpg