Reactions to Hurrican Sandy

Alright so Hurricane Sandy is blowing up the East Coast and it has people going wild. The subsequent actions of people have me questioning the sanity and reality of our society.  It seems as though every event is extremely over exaggerated and is made much more of a big deal than needed by the media of today. They build things like the hurricane up so much that it makes everyone freak out much more than necessary. The governor said that Hurricane Sandy could be the biggest threat to human life ever in Connecticut and it has done nothing compared to last years Irene or  snowtober event.  I get that they want us to take the storm seriously and take proper safety precautions but they are making it seem like the end of the world is coming. The cancellation of classes is understandable in the aspect that teachers or students traveling to school and walking to class could be an issue but the evacuation of colleges seems a bit over the top. Why would students who live in perfectly safe dorm rooms that have generators and food supplies on campus leave to go back to their homes that are more than likely less safe to be in. As I look outside there are not many huge trees anywhere near the tall brick buildings of the university that would threaten its inhabitants. It is the part that people are never happy with what they have and are constantly complaining that really gets to me. What I mean by this is that the university has cancelled classes and allowed for students to go home. Therefore just because students are allowed to go home they are very quick to do so saying things like, "I'm getting out of here" and "Yes I can go home." It doesn't make any sense to me if you do not want to be here in the first place then why are you nobody is forcing you. It is the constant complaining and negative attitude that really bothers me. What better are you going to do at home than at college, especially if power is lost, you can do the same things here as there why bother going home, just cause you can? I don't know if it is just me that looks at society's reactions to things in the media this way but it gets annoying at times. 

The iPhone5

With the release of the new and improved iPhone 5 approaching us it is a wonder to me how technology always continues to improve. I personally own the iPhone 4s and think it is one of the greatest things ever created; I absolutely love it. I bring it everywhere, use it constantly throughout the day, and rely on it for very many important things. The phone does everything I want and has barely any issues which leads me to think, how can this product even be improved? Sure minor fixes and additions can be made, changes really is what you would call them rather than improvements, but it is getting to a point where you start to wonder. Are the companies really making major improvements to these new products or are they just using the technique to basically rip off the customer by calling the product something new when really it is really the same or barely better than the previous version? The difference between the iPhone 4 and the iPhone 4s was very minuscule and in many peoples mind, including mine, a waste of money. However the advertising techniques use by Apple and other companies make people want to buy their product, as well as the idea that people want the newest things just to have the latest technology and consider themselves somewhat superior.  Having the newest technology is similar in a way to a person buying brand name products rather than store brand or knock off items. They want them because they are viewed as being better when in reality the products may indeed be equal or even possibly better. Now that the iPhone 5 is coming out it makes me wonder if the process will ever end and if there will be say an iPhone 20 and so on. I mean how much better can our technology really get? New research is always being done of course but will we ever reach the peak of technological improvement, is there and end? I feel as if we are now making smaller improvements and slowing down our increase in technology. The graph below displays what I am talking about where over time our increase in technology is constantly slowing down, where as in the beginning it was increasing rapidly with the invention of things like computers, televisions calculators, and cellular telephones. The major improvements on the iPhone 5 according to the marketing is the new shape and size of the phone and the new design of some of the apps and software. These all would be considered more of changes than real improvements that are not necessarily better only different. These factors pose the question to me, is the new iPhone 5 really worth spending the extra $100 for? I say no but some who seek to have the newest and best of the best disagree. I came across a very interesting and somewhat comical picture on a social networking site the other day which I also posted below. There are four pictures showing a man in the exact same position only dressed in a different colored shirt with each of the recent iPhone versions under the pictures. This picture perfectly shows the idea that the iPhone has not improved much at all and only changed over the recent versions, which is resembled by the changed shirt color in each of the pictures. According to engadget.com 50% of cell phone users have smart phones and of that percent 48.5% have androids while 32% own iPhones. These statistics show that Apple is not at the top of the charts in smart phone sales and production, which is somewhat of a surprise to me. So, since Apple is not number one it seems as if they are advertising and marketing as much as possible, along with the tactic of creating new products with minor improvements or changes, in order to increase sales and revenue. This reason alone may explain why the company continues to come out with new products when they are generally the same as the previous version. As it is a business world revolved around nothing more than money, has Apple really reached its peak in technology or is it simply a technique used to bring in profit? The world may never know, only through time will the question be answered.