Podcast Script

Samantha Elliott
Comp 106
25 November 2008
Podcast Script
Title: Sammy’s Solar Show
Complete Show Length in Minutes: 15 minutes
Episode 1: Topic: NASA Launching Probe to Map Solar System
Intro Music Clip: Title: Third Rock From the Sun- Joe Diffe Minutes: 10 sec
Intro: Space craft Minutes: 3 minutes
Hello! I am Samantha Elliott and I love talking about space! On October 19, 2008, NASA launched the Interstellar Boundary Explorer. The spacecraft is the first of its kind and will go all the way out to map out the outer edge of the solar system. This is similar to the Voyager I and Voyager II but will do more complex things and go further.
Segment Music Clip: Title: Walking on the Moon-Police Minutes: 20 seconds
Segment: What is the Spacecraft Doing? Minutes: 5 minutes
The spacecraft is heading farther than a spacecraft has gone before. It’s going to a place where the most dangerous cosmic rays are. The spacecraft will send back the first ever pictures of the heliosphere, which is a bubble that protects us from the dangerous cosmic rays. The solar winds in the heliosphere are the weakest that they have been in 50 years. The hope is that the spacecraft will be able to help us understand why this is happening. The IBEX will send back pictures unlike anything that we have ever seen in our solar system. David McComas is a scientist working on the mission. He said, "IBEX will let us visualize our home in the galaxy for the first time and explore how it may have evolved over the history of our solar system."
End Segment Music Clip: Title: Space Odyssey- David Bowie Minutes: 20 sec
Ending: The Endless Frontier Minutes: 5 minutes
This space exploration is unlike anything that we have ever experienced before. Robert MacDowall, another scientists working on the mission, said, "the solar system’s frontier is billions of miles away." He is so right about that. We cannot physically travel all the way out there ourselves. We have to rely on the spacecraft to do it for us. It will take years for the first pictures to come back but when they do they will be astounding. I am so excited to be able to have a chance to see these pictures and everything that comes out of it. You should be too. This is something that will change science around the world and we all get to be a part of it.
Ending Music Clip: Title: Telestar- Tornados Minutes: 1 minute

NASA Essay

Samantha Elliott
Comp 106
25 November 2008
The Solar System’s Frontier
On October 19, 2008, NASA launched a spacecraft into space. This spacecraft was unlike any other that NASA has launched before. This spacecraft did not have any astronauts on board; it was on a mission. The spacecraft was the start of a project to help study the outer edges of the solar system.
The spacecraft, called Interstellar Boundary Explorer (IBEX) was launched from a rocket above an island in the Pacific. If everything goes smoothly, then the IBEX will become the first spacecraft to complete a feat like this. To do something in "a place where solar wind smashes into the gases from outside the solar system."
The region that the spacecraft is heading toward is where the most dangerous cosmic rays lay. "No one has seen an image of the interaction at the edge of our solar system where the solar wind collides with interstellar space," said David McComas of the Southwest Research Institute in San Antonio, Texas. According to ABC’s website, solar wind is "a stream of charged particles spewing from the sun at one million miles per hour," and "carves out a protective bubble around the solar system. This bubble, known as the heliosphere, shields against the most dangerous cosmic radiation that would otherwise interfere with human spaceflight."
The solar win, for reasons unknown to scientists is at the weakest wind pressure it has experienced in over 50 years. Hope is that the space probe will be able to tell us why. Scientists suspect that the heliosphere could be shrinking.
The spacecraft will send back astonishing photos unlike anything that we have ever seen. We cannot travel that far ourselves, so we have to rely on the spacecraft to do it for us. "The Solar System’s Frontier is billions of miles away, so it’s difficult for us to go there, but interesting things happen at boundaries, and with IBEX, we will see them for the first time," said Robert MacDowall, an IBEX Mission Scientist. McComas added that, "IBEX will let us visualize our home in the galaxy for the first time and explore how it may have evolved over this history of the solar system."
I am so excited for this mission to continue. We all should be. The pictures that this spacecraft comes back with are going to change science, as we know it. It will come back with pictures we never could have imagined and help us to understand the solar system as a whole and figure out exactly where we fit. We should all be happy and excited to be a part of this.

Chang, Alicia. "NASA to Launch Probe to Map Solar System’s Edge." Los
Angeles. October 17, 2008. ABC News Internet Ventures.
http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/wireStory?id=6058797
Gruener, Wolfgang. "IBEX Probe Launched to Study Outer Solar System."
Tigervision Media. October 20, 2008.
http://www.tgdaily.com/content/view/39808/133
"Spacecraft Blasts off to Probe Edge of Solar System." Cable News Network.
Turner Broadcasting System Inc. 2008.
http://www.cnn.com/2008/TECH/space/10/20/solarprobe/

Activity IV: Visualizing "Isms"

Samantha Elliott
Comp 106
22 November 2008
Visualizing "Isms"
This project was probably one of my favorite projects that we have worked in for this class. I enjoyed finding my own meaning in the definitions and finding pictures to go along with them.
The most difficult image to find an image for I would probably have to say was Geocentrism. Geocentrism is the belief that the Earth is the center of the universe and was thought that way by the church for quite some time. A bunch of the pictures I found were book covers saying that the church is right and I didn’t want that. The picture that I found I really like. It’s the Earth with planets around it and the Earth is flat. When people though Geocentrism was correct, some also still thought that the Earth was flat. So I really like that picture and think it really goes with the definition.
Bonism was probably my favorite slide. Bonism is the "doctrine that the world is good but not perfect." For this slide I chose a picture of a large rock in nature with a large crack down the middle. It just shows that nature can be beautiful but still flawed. Two more favorite slides were optimism and pessimism. The two had opposites of the same picture. Optimism had a picture of a dark cloudy sky with a painter’s palate where someone had painted a bright sunny sky. The pessimism slide showed a bright sunny sky with a painter’s palate where someone had painted a dark cloudy sky. I really liked how the two fit together.
While deciding on images I took an audience into consideration. I wanted creative pictures that I felt went a little deeper into the definition but were still easy for someone else to understand without having me explain it to them.

Podcast Topic

Earlier this year NASSA launched a space probe out into space. The destination of the probe is the very outer edge of the solar system. The plan is to map out space so we can have a better understanding of what is out there. Hopefully the probe will be able to get better pictures of Pluto since we do not have very clear pictures. I am fascinated with learning about space, so I am excited to do more research on this topic. This topic will have a long lasting impact because it takes 9 years to get to Pluto. The solar system stretches farther than that so we will be hearing about this for years to come.

Personal Blog

So I thought that my personal blog was already up. Apparently not....here it is.

One of the most controversial issues that I know of is the issue of gay marriage. I do not believe people will ever stop arguing about this topic. I know I wont. Not until ever last state legalizes gay marriage and gay rights will I stop fighting.
It just confuses me so much that people are so against it. I know so many argue that marriage is between a man and a woman. The last dictionary that I looked in said "a union between two people." People just need to start learning to accept change. Whether you like gay people or not they’re out there and they always will be. There’s nothing you can do about it. You can’t help who you fall in love with and no one should have to.
I don’t see any sense in a gay couple paying thousands of dollars extra for 2 separate insurance’s through their companies just because the state wont recognize them as a couple. It’s sad when someone’s life partner doesn’t have any say so in what happens if a life or death matter comes up in the hospital because the state wont recognize them.
People say that gay people can’t be parents and that I really don’t understand. Everyone saying that children need to grow up in a "real" household. Who are we to define a "real" household especially in this day and age? How many people actually grow up in a household with a mom and dad? I was fortunate enough to be able to do that but I know several people who were not as fortunate. Just because a child is raised by two girls or two guys does not mean that they are any less of a person. Gay people, in some cases, will be much better parents than a few guy-girl couples that I know.
I guess I’m just tired of people being so judgmental. Learn to accept people as they are and don’t discriminate. We live in a world where you should be able to be who you want to be without worry that you will get discriminated against. I think that eventually gay marriage will be legalized so we may as well accept it now. Also one more question. For those of you who are so anti gay people but also anti abortion here's my question. Would you still fight for the rights of the fetus if you knew that they were going to grow up gay?

Samantha Elliott
Comp 106
6 November 2008
Project 2 Essay
Question: Why do girls feel the need to express themselves so openly on myspace?
Answer:
IF you look at a typical girl’s myspace page, they will be filled with pictures and an "about me" filled with extreme details of their life. Sure there are some exceptions, but these are typical pages. Most girls’ pages that I looked at had immense details in this particular section. Studies also show that females are using myspace profiles in larger numbers than males are.
The Gender Differences in "Social Portraits" Reflected in Myspace Profiles by Melissa Joy Magnuson and Lauren Dundes, helped me to understand why this was a little better. The article explains how girls feel that they always have to explain to society exactly who they are. Boys feel more complete for the most part. Their profile pages will usually be simple and to the point. They will not usually go into too much detail about their everyday lives because they already feel whole and do not have to tell society who they are.
Girls feel the need to always be telling everyone exactly who they are. I think that because girls feel the pressure, especially in high school, to life up to certain standards so they will make sure that they portray themselves that way. Girls will be more likely to change their "about me" more often if they feel they are falling outside of the norm that society expects.
When it comes to relationships, girls are definitely more open. 37% of females mentioned their significant other between two and ten times in their about me section compared to the 14% of males who did. In their interests section, 67% of males who were in a relationship made no mention of it whatsoever, whereas 47% of females did. In the relationship aspect, it seems like you’re "cool" if you have a significant other. Certain studies show that females are quick to change their status quickly if they enter or end a relationship. Females also feel the need to connect their career goals with their family goals.
All in all, I think females are caring too much about what society thinks and trying to fit into the norm. I don’t see the point in trying so hard to get someone to like you. Society should just accept people as they are. I have both a myspace and a facebook and both say that I am in a relationship but I do not mention my significant other or post pictures of him everywhere because I don’t see the point. Your personal love life should not be plastered for the world to see. Females just need to stop thinking so much about what society thinks.
Magnuson, Melissa and Lauren Dundes. Gender Differences in "Social Portraits"
Reflected in MySpace Profiles. Cyber Psychology and Behavior.
Volume 11. 2008.
Hempel, Jessi. The MySpace Generation. December 12, 2005.
http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/05_50/b3963001.htm
Thelwall, Mike. Social Networks, Gender and Friending: An Analysis
Of MySpace Member Profiles. August 9, 2007.
http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/journal/117954556/abstract?CRETRY=1&SRETRY=0