POPULARITY OF WEBAPPS - GOOGLE - PART III

POPULARITY OF WEBAPPS – YOUTUBE


YouTube created in February 2005 by three former PayPal emplyees ( Chad Hurley, Steve Chen and Jawed Karim,) is a video sharing website on which users can upload and share videos. During all those years YouTube has grown like no other sites on the INTERNET (before facebook and twitter) It totally revolutionized the multimedia in the Internet. The original story behind creation of YouTube was that Chad Hurley and Steve Chen after they had experienced difficulty sharing videos that had been shot at a dinner party at Chen's apartment in San Francisco Though of an on line video sharing site.

YouTube offered the public a beta test of the site in May 2005, six months before the official launch in November 2005. The site grew rapidly, and in July 2006 the company announced that more than 65,000 new videos were being uploaded every day,and that the site was receiving 100 million video views per day. In 2009 YouTube was dominating provider of online video content in US with market share of over 43%.
It is also estimated that in 2007 YouTube consumed as much bandwidth as the entire Internet in 2000. In March 2008, YouTube's bandwidth costs were estimated at approximately US$1 million a day. Alexa ranks YouTube as the third most visited website on the Internet, behind Google, Facebook.

YOUTUBE VIDEO ABOUT YOUTUBE :)




In 2006 Google acuired YouTube for US$1.65 Billion. And has the mayority of shares till now.
YouTube revolutionized the internet media sharing. You can watch trailers, funny pictures. YouTube video are used in TV news magazines. There was A YouTube orchestra first concert published online. YouTube is still evolving now putting HTML5 (flash free support) and HD resolution to their content. YouTube TV's access. This list keeps growing every few months.

I WANTED TO ASK WHAT WAS THE BEST USAGE OF YOUTUBE YOU SAW ?

Dub Music

PART 3

Jamaican roots of Hip-Hop

The basic process of creating a dub from a reggae instrumental is called "versioning". Which involves taking little snippets of the original track (sampling ), and changing it into something new. And clearly hip-hop culture is based, more than any other music, on sampling.
This idea came to the US with DJ Kool Herc, who is one of the very most important figures in hip-hop culture. He spent his youth in Jamaica and was under a huge influence of sound system culture.
He took that idea of the DJ not just being the disk-jockey as the person that plays the records, but the DJ as somebody who's going to be playing the records and then vocalizing on top of the music to get the people more excited.
Without Kool Herc hip-hop wouldn’t be as it is.

Jamaican roots of European music.

In the 60s many Jamaicans have emigrated to other countries, especially to the United Kingdom (when the country was still under British rule), the United States, and to Canada.
Jamaican music came to England along with the first wave of Jamaican immigrants. Many of them took a long 20-day journey on a small boat with all of their belongings: furniture, records, everything. If they’d stay in Jamaica, they would die of hunger.


Punk and Reggae.

The reason that rock and reggae blend together is their heaviness. If you listen to the rock guys, they pride themselves on being loud and heavy. Reggae and dub has the same boast.
Punks liked the anti-establishment vibe of the tunes. And the fact that the lyrics were about something, they dealt with things like: "how are we going to live?". And it was themes similar to this that inspired the punk-rock movement.
In fact, Lee "Scratch" Perry was working with The Clash,

Mikey Dread was working with The Clash...

Paul Simonon and Joe Strummer loved reggae very much.

Dub Scene in Present

Nowadays Jamaican communities exist in most large UK cities. Most great DUB producers like: AlphaΩ

or Vibronics

or Zion Train

live in UK. And it must be said, England is a gateway to the continent. If a tune is a hit there, it is a hit in continental Europe.




Drum’n’Bass.

On the labels of the records in the 70s there used to be written: "Drum 'n' bass - King Tubby's".
And drum 'n' bass itself is now a genre of music. Yet the first man to put his name to a drum 'n bass track was King Tubby. In the early 90s Jungle was born it was becoming more and more popular.
These tracks often combined ragga vocal tracks with broken beats and bass lines. By 1994 jungle began to gain mainstream popularity and fans of the music (known as junglists) became a recognizable part of British youth subculture. The sound took on a very urban, raggamuffin sound, incorporating dancehall ragga-style MC chants, dub basslines, but also increasingly complex, high tempo rapid fire breakbeat percussion.

At this time jungle began to be associated with criminals and criminal activity and perhaps as a reaction or perhaps independently of this, producers began to move away from the ragga style and create what they labeled drum and bass. There is no clear point at which jungle became drum and bass, though most jungle producers continue to produce what they call drum and bass.



Questions:
Do you like drum’n’bass scene in Poland?
Have you ever been on a DuB party?
Would you agree that dub is a foundation of whole modern music?

Dub Music

PART 2

Music and politics.

Let’s start with a little background info about slavery in Jamaica:
By the beginning of the 19th century, Jamaica's heavy reliance on slavery resulted in blacks (Africans) outnumbering whites (Europeans) by a ratio of almost 20 to 1. Even though England had outlawed the importation of slaves, some were still smuggled into the colonies. The British government drew-up laws regimenting the abolition of slavery, but they also included instructions for the improvement of the slaves' way of life. These instructions included a ban of the use of whips in the field, a ban on the flogging of women, notification that slaves were to be allowed religious instruction, a requirement that slaves be given an extra free day during the week when they could sell their produce as well as a ban of Sunday markets.
Following a series of rebellions and changing attitudes in Great Britain, the nation formally abolished slavery in 1834, with full emancipation from chattel slavery declared in 1838. The population in 1834 was 371,070 of whom 15,000 were white, 5,000 free black, 40,000 ‘coloured’ or mixed race, and 311,070 slaves.
Jamaica gained independence in 1962. There were few years of successful economical growth. However, the optimism of the first decade was accompanied by a growing sense of inequality, and a sense that the benefits of growth were not being experienced by the urban poor.
That obviously increased tensions in society and affected the nature of the music. Many people were killed down there in the 1970s, through the political civil war in Jamaica. Unfortunately King Tubby, the most important persona in dub culture, was gunned down.

The politic is built into the structure of the music. When you play a heavy dub bass and this heavy , it sounds like you wanna destroy Babylon. These cultures, like dub and dancehall from so called "ghetto areas", proved to be very vibrant, very enduring, because they have to work hard to satisfy people in oppressed conditions. They have to take them out of those conditions so they have to be strong to do that. They have to lift people out of that surroundings and make them forget; like Bob Marley said:
when the music hits, you feel no pain.


Reggae and dub came up with the idea of making the bass a melodic factor, "hook line", it's the catch, it's what grabs people. Whereas in western pop music usually, melody is played on guitars or keyboards or the vocals. ln reggae and dub it's the complete opposite. Dj’s put the bass at the top.
lf you go to a Jamaican dance, the bass is very important to the set. Sound systems used to use incredibly powerful amplifiers and speakers. There could have been 12000W just for the base line.
Parties for poor masses were organized on the beaches. They were called dancehalls, but there was no hall. They took places under the sky. Such a party could be heard from few miles, they ought to attract people and energize them.




This is a King Tubby’s remake of very popular jazz theme: Take Five.

QUESTIONS:
Would you agree that dancehall parties are very like parties in clubs nowadays?
Have you ever been on a dub / dubstep party?

Dub Music

This week presentation is about DUB music. I am going to try to find an answer on: What is about that little island that has produced so much brilliant music? is it the "sufferation"? is it the climate? is it the weed?

PART 1

Let’s take a closer look at history of DUB:

HISTORY

lf you go back to the late 1940's sound systems already were prominent in Jamaica.
They were bringing the music to the people. Although there was a thriving jazz scene in Jamaica, with live jazz music being played at least as early as the 1920's, most of these live events catered to the wealthy elite, so poor people couldn't afford the high price that these live concerts demanded.
So the sound system sprung up.
The sound system concept originated in Kingston Jamaica. DJs would load up a truck with a generator, turntables, and huge speakers to set up street parties. The sound system scene is generally regarded as an important part of Jamaican cultural history and as being responsible for the rise of modern Jamaican musical styles such as ska, rocksteady, ragga and dub.

Exclusivity has always been a major component of sound system culture in Jamaica.
And a way of helping to preserve it would be to scratch off the labels, so that no one could identify, what the song was actually called. No rival sound could identify what song you had.




Coxsone and Duke Reid started to make their own music in Jamaica. They made music specific to be played in the sound system. That was the beginning of record business in Jamaica.

Dubplates.

dubplate is an acetate disc — usually 12 inches, 10 inches or 7 inches in diameter — used in mastering studios for quality control and test recordings before proceeding with the final master of the record to be mass produced on vinyl. The "dub" in dubplate is an allusion to the plate's use in "dubbing" or "doubling" the original version of a track. The name dubplate also refers to an exclusive, 'one-off' acetate disc recording pioneered by reggae sound systems and drum’n’bass djs.
Dubplate history is very interesting, like most great inventions it was discovered by coincidence.
ln 1968, a man called Ruddy Redwood, operator of a sound system called The Supreme Ruler of Sound, went to Treasure lsle studio to run off some material exclusively on dubplates. But the engineer forgot to put in the voice. Ruddy took that record to a party that week and he played the vocal, which everyone knew, and then he played this version, without vocal. That was a big hit with the crowd. He went back to Duke Reid and said: "you can put that on the other sound of the record."
Science that moment most reggae releases have dub version on B-side. And not just reggae albums, this is common in ragga, dubstep, d’n’b and even widely understood electronic music.
Making a dub requires a lot of electronic equipment: samplers, reverbs, flangers, effects, filters... Note that we’re talking about 60s, when professional sound devices where very hard to find. People like King Tubby (dub legend) modified old electronics to obtain specific effect. Cutting and gluing tape was very common practice. Ingenuity of Jamaican artists was really incredible. Lee Scratch Perry tried to record cow mooing, to use this sound in one of his remixes. Cows were afraid of microphones and ran away. Perry took a cardboard roll, that is used in paper towels, wrapped it with tin foil and used that to imitate cows.
There were several studios in Jamaica: Studio One, King Tubby’s Channel one, Coxstone. They attracted crowds and other artists, because they had very good beats. If a tune was becoming a hit, other artists wanted to remake this tune. Especially Coxstone’s and Studio One’s beats and tunes became backbone of Jamaican music.
And new producers came after Coxsone, they saw that Coxsone had some good . So why shouldn't they copy them? And maybe they'd have the same success. A lot of great music is a result of remixing known themes.

"l'm Still ln Love With You" tune. This tune was a hit in the sixties.


Then it was a hit in the seventies.
Althea & Donna did "Uptown top ranking",
with the same rhythm track.


Sean Paul comes and rides it in the 2000s! So it's a hit again.

lt was easy to do that because there was no copyright law in Jamaica related to recorded music.

QUESTIONS
Would you agree that lack of copyrights helped create excellent tunes? If so, what do you think of copyrights now.

HUMANOID ROBOTS

If you red my previous entries you are probably expecting this. Today
I tell you about humanoid robots. I will leave the "mainstream" things
out just because everybody saw it. So no ASIMO, Honda P-Series etc.
Let's focus on most interesting developments.








Again, wikipedia definition is very good to begin with:

"
A humanoid robot is a robot with its overall appearance, based on that
of the human body, allowing interaction with made-for-human tools or
environments. In general humanoid robots have a torso with a head, two
arms and two legs, although some forms of humanoid robots may model
only part of the body, for example, from the waist up. Some humanoid
robots may also have a 'face', with 'eyes' and 'mouth'. Androids are
humanoid robots built to aesthetically resemble a human.
"










Now you know the definition, you want to see some action. Let me tell
you about most advanced NASA achievement on this field.

Robonaut 2 (R2) is a state of the art highly dexterous anthropomorphic
robot. Like its predecessor Robonaut 1 (R1), R2 is capable of handling
a wide range of tools and interfaces, but R2 is a significant
advancement over its predecessor. R2 is capable of speeds more than
four times faster than R1, is more compact, is more dexterous, and
includes a deeper and wider range of sensing. Advanced technology
spans the entire R2 system and includes: optimized overlapping dual
arm dexterous workspace, variable stiffness series elastic joints,
extended finger and thumb travel, miniaturized 6-axis load cells,
redundant force sensing, ultra-high speed joint controllers, extreme
neck travel, and high resolution camera and IR systems. The dexterity
of R2 allows it to use the same tools that astronauts currently use
and removes the need for specialized tools just for robots.




Walking is maybe the most difficult thing for robots to achieve.
Bi-pedal walking is about dynamical balance. Since all of you probably
seen ASIMO I will not show it to you. Instead I found something
spectacular for you:

Jumping robot.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cgo7RZZqrXM&feature=related

What could be harder than that? Perhaps riding a bike in extreme
conditions? I admit, I cannot do, what this robot can, can you?


Japanese company Murata Manufacturing created a bicycling robot to
show off some of their various sensors. The robot named Murata Boy is
equipped with four types of sensors: two gyro sensors used to detect
angular velocity and inclination; an ultrasonic sensor to detect
obstacles; and a shock sensor to detect rough surfaces.

http://www.murataboy.com/en/about/img/image.jpg



so I have show you HUMANOID ROBOTS, don't they look human? Watch this:





This are ANDROIDS, they are design to look like humans..

Fears and concerns about robots have been repeatedly expressed in a
wide range of books and films. A common theme is the development of a
master race of conscious and highly intelligent robots, motivated to
take over or destroy the human race. (See The Terminator, Runaway,
Blade Runner, Robocop, the Replicators in Stargate, the Cylons in
Battlestar Galactica, The Matrix, THX-1138, and I, Robot.)



Let's hope we will not loose control over them some day.



Read more:

http://www.murataboy.com/en/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robonaut
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ASIMO

BIOMORPHIC ROBOTS(part 2):

ok, we've been through swarms, and self-replicating robots. let's talk
about biomorphic robots at general


@wikipedia
"Biomorphic robotics is a sub-discipline of robotics focused upon
emulating the mechanics, sensor systems, computing structures and
methodologies used by animals. In short, it is building robots
inspired by the principles of biological systems"


But our list is much more interesting and contain newest achievements
which wasn't documented yet in Wikipedia. And this post is more than
just a list, it is an attempt to answer the question what can we learn
from animals about robots, and about them.


Robots imitating animals? Oh, yes, it was always like that. But why?
Please, take some time to watch, we have them all, "all the zoo of
robotics", fishes,dogs,snakes,salamandras, cockroaches,birds..

Why would scientists want to imitate all this farm?

This will not take you a lot of time and one day maybe can even save
your life;). Try to look at robots as they were real animals. Try to
observe they behaviour, but forgot about appearance, they are not
sculptures, they don't have to pretend nothing. How close they seem to
animal world in your opinion?

A FISH, A CARP..





BIG DOG:

This possibly the greatest and most powerfull robot ever. Built by
DARPA, you have probably seen this!



Watch closely how it reacts when kicked. How it behave on ice. What
animal does it look like?


Believe it or not you can find list of robotic dogs.. in Wikipedia!
The famous is japanese robot Aibo.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_robotic_dogs


SNAKE:

"Why can snakes move ahead on without legs?"

From this problem, we starts every research of snake biomechanisms.
Snake Robots have many possible applications, even though the
structures are simple.




SALAMANDRA:

Salamandra robot? how weird is this?

If you are still with me and reading you've come to the greates part.
There is a chance you can understand WHAT IS THIS ROBOT REALLY ABOUT.
This is work of team from "Lossana Polytechnique". Their work
demonstrates that spinal cords of salamandras contains rather
sophisticated neural circuits that can control complex movements while
receiving only HIGH-LEVEL command signals. And here we come to a
moment when biomorphism in robotics helps us understanding
biology,evolution.. maybe even more! If you are a
programmer/administrator you probably know what "high-level command"
means. It means abstraction. When you finally realize that what
differs us from salamandras is just few levels of abstraction.. That
is where robotics is becoming very scary.





COCKROACH:

Yes, cockroaches. If you're courious to see robot climbing up the
wall, watch this one:



BIRD:


Flying mechanism similar to that we can observe on animals, is very
sophisticated, and hard to imitate. There are some breakthroughs
lately, I found a movie of a very slow flying robot. Amazing.


So you thought robots can imitate only animals?

A FLOWER:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flower_robot


What else robot could imitate? Do you feel threatened by robots?


After this post I would like you to know what biomorphic robotics
mean, and what it means to you;p


http://birg.epfl.ch/page65446.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flower_robot
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biomorphic_robotics

POPULARITY OF WEBAPPS - GOOGLE - PART II

POPULARITY OF WEBAPPS – GOOGLE

Alexa is the #1 site for checking websites popularity. As we can see Google is an absolute leader. Fallowed by facebook and YouTube.

So what is really behind of success of Google ?



Google named from largest number know by humans GOOGOL(10 to the power 100). Was started as a privately held company on September 4,1998 by two Stanford University students Larry Page and Sergey Brin. Since now Google has been repeatedly named Fortune Magazine's Number One Best Place to Work and most powerful brand in the world.
Alexa lists Google as the Internet's most visited website. It was only 12 Years that Google became one of the most powerful companies in future world of IT.

Maybe not everyone knows, but most of google success came from Google AdWords.

YOUTUBE...



Google AdWords is a flagship advertising product that google intrudoced in 2000 and it was really extension of idea that Bill Gross borrowed from YellowPages. Google AdWords gave company in 2008 a USD$28 Billion revenue.
AdWords offers pay-per-click (PPC) advertising, and site-targeted advertising for both text and banner ads. The AdWords program includes local, national, and international distribution. Google's text advertisements are short, consisting of one title line and two content text lines. Image ads can be one of several different Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) standard sizes.

Google dominated the advertising on the internet which was on of the most important decision in company development over they past ten years.

Another success follower from Google was introduced in 2004 as invite-only beta the Google-Mail better known now as Gmail. Now Gmail as of july 2009 has 146 million users and counting. Gmail offered few new and for that time revolutionary services that decided about Gmail success. With an initial 1GB storage Gmail significantly increased the Webmail standard for free storage from the 2 to 4MB its competitors offered at that time. Gmail has a search-oriented interface and a "conversation view" similar to an Internet forum. Software developers know Gmail for its pioneering use of the Ajax programming technique.







Google yet most popular service is Google search engine itself.

It's still the most used web search engine on the web. Google receives several hundred million queries each day through its various services

Than google started to ship a whole range of products available to public.
With official Gmail google announced Google Apps suit for business users.
Google calendar integrated with gmail. Google docs, and on line office editing capabilities, contacts etc. Google started to work on their smart phone operating system called Android and now even their own operating system based on linux Google Chrome OS which is really the Google Chrome web browser (another product of Google) closed in an OS. Google Picasa and Web Albums are worth to mention also as they have strongly underlined Google multimedia aspirations. As well as the Google Earth and later Google Maps where a revolutionary for their times, and now are used in Townsend of apps and web pages across the world.

In your opinion what was the most interesting Google product you have been using or you'd started using or began with Google ?