At first, I was planning to write about Nicholas Carr’s “IT Doesn’t Matter,” but unfortunately, Brian got to that article first.  This is what I had so far:

"I … value that article, as well as Carr’s follow-up book, “Does IT Matter?”  It was valuable to me in that it was the first book I read here at CGU, in IS328 with (coincidentally) Tom Horan.  For those outside IT who are reading this entry, starting off my PhD program in IT with “Does IT Matter?” is equivalent to a theology student starting off his/her degree program with a book titled “There Is No God.”  Right off the bat, I was exposed to a skeptical Devil’s Advocate perspective on IT, one which I would refer back to long after I dropped the class (heh).  This interest in the skeptical perspective was extended when I discovered http://www.roughtype.com/ , Nicholas Carr’s personal blog, where he espouses skeptical views on a wide range of topics of interest in the field of IT, from wiki’s to blogs (yes, he used his blog to complain about blogs in general)."

I ended up using that for my midterm, so I decided to pick a different article.  The article I uploaded was “Design Science in Information Systems Research,” by Hevner et al. 2004.  As with the Nicholas Carr article, this is another article I read in the first week of a class I dropped a few days later.  Before I read this paper, I was having a little bit of an identity crisis, as my Master’s Degree at USC was in Software Engineering, yet most of the articles I was reading displayed a shift away from the technical and towards the more managerial and organizational issues (As reiterated here: http://www.isworld.org/Researchdesign/drisISworld.htm).  Reading this article, which focused on a return to the technology aspect of IT, sort of made me realize what kind of research I wanted to do (I was lucky to read the article as CGU held a Design Science conference on campus).  The article talked about research that involved the development and use of an artifact (which could include constructs, models, methodologies, or instantiated systems).  I decided that this is the kind of research I wanted to do, since the design and construction of a system artifact would put the skills I learned at USC to use.

I’d like to comment on Brian’s most recent blog entry, where he mention’s Nicholas Carr’s article, “IT Doesn’t Matter.”  Mainly because I’m somewhat peeved, as I was planning on using that article for my Assignment 7 (D’oh!).  Oh well.  I do value that article, as well as Carr’s follow-up book, “Does IT Matter?”  It was valuable to me in that it was the first book I read here at CGU, in IS328 with (coincidentally) Tom Horan.  For those outside IT who are reading this entry, starting off my PhD program in IT with “Does IT Matter?” is equivalent to a theology student starting off his/her degree program with a book titled “There Is No God.”  Right off the bat, I was exposed to a skeptical Devil’s Advocate perspective on IT, one which I would refer back to long after I dropped the class (heh).  This interest in the skeptical perspective was extended when I discovered http://www.roughtype.com/ , Nicholas Carr’s personal blog, where he espouses skeptical views on a wide range of topics of interest in the field of IT, from wiki’s to blogs (yes, he used his blog to complain about blogs in general).  And most of all, Nicholas Carr is such a lightning rod that he’s always a good topic to bring up in a conversation about IT here in the department.  I’ve nearly lost track of the number of variants on “Jesus, Nicholas Carr is such a c***sucker.” I’ve heard from my classmates.
One last note on Brian’s blog entries in general: I’m glad Brian’s blog entries are all very interesting to read.  Maybe it’s because he seems to put more of his personality into his entries than most, or maybe it’s because he’s more prone than most to going off on weird tangents (magic tricks for Blink?), I just can’t put my finger on it, but I won’t say anymore about them, on danger of sounding like a suck-up.

I’d also like to comment on Tomimi’s October 1st blog entry, mainly because I was tempted to list video games as one of my favorite gadgets but changed my mind at the last second.  Part of the reason I didn’t list video games was because I simply haven’t had the time to play much since I became a grad student (especially true when I was cramming for my screening exam).  Even then, though, my video games did surprisingly serve as a good study aid last winter: My little nephews from Australia were visiting, and they never wanted me to study.  Every hour of the day, they’d make it their mission to keep me from studying with cries of “Daniel, let’s play ‘War!’” or “Daniel, let’s play ‘Hide and Seek!’” (Yes, I am aware that at some point I should’ve put my foot down and told them I can’t play with them until I finish my work, but my petty ego demands that all my nephews and nieces think I’m the coolest uncle in the world, which requires me to spoil them more than any of my other cousins).  After a few weeks went by (with absolutely no studying accomplished) I showed them the ole’ Nintendo DS.  Within minutes, they had forgotten I even existed, completely engrossed in the game, concentrating only on getting Mario’s polygonal go-kart across the finish line before all the other racers.  After finally being able to study for the first time in about a month, I concluded that the Nintendo DS was the greatest study aid of all time.
But now, looking back, I haven’t really commented on Tomimi’s blog: I’ve just went off on a tangent (call it over-influence from Brian).  Tomimi’s blog on war video games got me thinking.  Another of my nephews once rented a game called Black Hawk Down, based on the movie that depicted the 1993 Battle of Mogadishu.  Somehow the thought of making a game based off of that incident made me a little bit uncomfortable.  Seeing the game in action gave me the same feeling of “too soon!” I got every time I saw a commercial for Oliver Stone’s “World Trade Center.”  I don’t want to sound like one of those crazies (i.e. Jack Thompson) who go on TV to spout a bunch of bull about how video games are corrupting today’s youth, but I think the nature of the video game medium does have an innate weaknesses in portraying such events, in that in the film version of the events, it’s a very emotional event when any of the characters die.  The video game medium has an unfortunate disadvantage in portraying these events in that such portrayals in video games has a trivializing aspect.  When an opponent dies:  Good for you, your score is raised.  When you die:  It’s a minor inconvenience, at least until you respawn.  That is not to say that video games are completely unable to portray death as an emotional event, it is just that usually such events are scripted and out of the control of the player.  But back to my original point, what makes a game based on the Black Hawk Down incident give me bad vibes while a game based on World War II does not?  What separates the two?  Time, mainly.  But maybe it’s also that we didn’t get our asses handed to us in WWII.  Seeing games based on the Viet Nam War also seems to make my blood boil (but maybe that’s because I’m half South Vietnamese and the War is still a touchy subject for a lot of my family).
Seeing as how I’m on the verge of going off on another tangent, I’ll end this with a point of irony:  Back when I was younger, I used to love this arcade game called 1942.  You play as an American fighter pilot in the Asian theatre of World War II.  The object of the game is to make it to Tokyo and to wipe out the entire Japanese air fleet.  It wasn’t until much later that I looked back and realized that the game was made by Capcom, a *Japanese* company.  Amusing, no?

Finally, I’m running out of time, but I think it’s amusing how many people listed their cell phone as their most hated gadget (one person listed it as her favorite AND her most hated gadget).  I’ve come to rely on my cell phone, and I’ve marveled at how I even managed to survive without it, but I know many who look at their cell phones as some sort of fashion statement.  My sister and several of my cousins have gone out of their way to pimp their cell phones (Hey, I just used a word I learned on MTV!): Their cell phones have been completely plastered with plastic pink jewelry and glittery stickers that it barely even resembles a phone anymore.  I’m not sure exactly where I’m going with this, but I guess, on this topic, my cousins might say something like, “Your cell phone might be your least favorite accessory, but that doesn’t mean it has to look pedestrian.”

1. Describe (and bring in) your favorite and least favorite gadget (Show and Tell). –Post the description to your Personal Blog. 

The favorite gadget that I brought in is my webcam.  Though not my favorite gadget, it is one that I’ve used a lot over the last few months.  The first use was during the meetings for the Social Learning Software Lab.  The webcam, along with a program called Skype, allowed us to communicate with team members who couldn’t make it to campus when everyone else was free, and gave us a little bit of freedom when planning meeting times.  Another time I used the webcam was when my sister moved to her dorm at San Francisco.  She’s attending classes at UCSF, and was a little homesick at first, so for those first few weeks we used the webcam to communicate until she settled in to her new environment.  The webcam served as a better method of communication than simple telephone conversation, due in part because of the visual aspect: Through the webcam, we could see each others’ faces and she could still see our home, so for her it felt like she hadn’t really left.  The third major use I used the webcam for was when my study group was preparing for the Screening Exam over the summer.  One of our team members, Saif, was back in his home country (The United Arab Emirates) over the summer and couldn’t personally sit in on our study sessions, so once again we used a webcam and Skype in order for him to sit in on our study sessions.  Though separated by several thousands of miles and at least 10 time zones, it felt as if Saif was studying in the room with us.