N.C. web site to track how money from the federal economic stimulus bill will pay for projects

N.C. Gov. Bev Perdue has launched a Web site to track how money from the federal economic stimulus bill will pay for projects in North Carolina. The site, ncrecovery.gov, also will provide information about local contract and grant opportunities. More

Filed under: Uncategorized, Business and Economy

IMAX Theater Coming to Stonecrest area in Charlotte

The first commercial IMAX theater in the Piedmont should be open by July. Regal Entertainment Group is installing a digital IMAX projector at its Stonecrest venue, off Rea Road near I-485. The system will be installed sometime in the second quarter, as part of a Regal IMAX conversion that also includes three theaters in Southern California and one in Seattle. Read More

Filed under: Uncategorized, Charlotte, NC

Video Game Industry Reconsidering The Players: Everyone is a Potential Customer / Gamer

If the state of a media business can be measured by its capacity for self-satire, then perhaps video games are the healthiest precinct in all of entertainment. Design Innovate Communicate Entertain, is one of the year’s most important events because it brings together the industry’s top minds in a low-noise environment, literally and figuratively. Major companies like Microsoft and Sony are playing catch-up in thinking of potential customers not as gamers but as everyone. Read More

Filed under: Uncategorized, Gaming and Simulation

28 Incredible Photoshop Image Manipulation Techniques and Tutorials

All of these tutorials will show you how to take the simplest image and create something eye-popping and professional. Each one uses different techniques to achieve the result, and I am sure you would agree they are all amazing. Each image shows the before and after to give you the full effect. Read More

Filed under: Uncategorized, Technology

15 online (browser-based) photo editing tools compared

Tools that let you edit photos in the Web browser have come a long way in the last few years. We wanted to take a moment to do a feature comparison with a grouping of editors–big and small, to see what each one is capable of. Most of the services on this list take advantage of Adobe’s ever-developing Flash platform, which in its latest iteration got a huge boost with support for the large images coming out of today’s high-megapixel cameras. On the flip side of that, several of the non-Flash-based editors use AJAX to make the changes happen without reloading the page. The benefit here is that you can run these on machines without the latest versions of Flash installed. Read More

Great stuff for when you’re on a netbook or cloud computing!

Filed under: Uncategorized, Technology

Legal Tweets: Twitter Posting From The Courtroom: Federal Judge Grants Request

Federal judge grants a reporter’s request to send Twitter posts from the courtroom during a trial. U.S. District Judge J. Thomas Marten ruled Monday that the posts would not prejudice jurors since they’re told to avoid newspaper, broadcast and online reports about the case. Wichita Eagle reporter Ron Sylvester requested to use Twitter while covering the trial of a group of men accused of racketeering through the Crips street gang. Read More

Google Blog Search Tags: twitter, tweets, legal and twitter, law and twitter, court and twitter, twitter posts, twitter and judge, twitter and ron sylvester, twitter and crips

Filed under: Uncategorized, Technology

Privacy Risks and Cloud Computing

Last week, we had a wave of panic roll through Facebook users as many realized that the site had changed its terms of service in a way that implied it might soon broadcast their most embarrassing photographs to parents, teachers, and prospective employers. On Monday, the World Privacy Forum released a report that says those fears are just the tip of the iceberg. Read More

I love the ending of the article: “Don’t put anything in the cloud you wouldn’t want a competitor, your government or another government to see.” Duh-huh.

Google Blog Search Tags: cloud computing, cloud computing and privacy, internet privacy

Filed under: Uncategorized, Technology

SGD125 White Box v Black Box diagram on pg 103

SGD125 students, this is just a quick note / heads-up about the White Box v Black Box systems diagram on pg 103 of the book. It’s backwards! Don’t let it confuse you. Adam Brooks

Filed under: Uncategorized, SGD125

SGD125 Chapter 4 Quiz + Week 7 is Available!

SGD students, a short chapter 4 quiz has been made available in week 6. Be sure to read the chapter thoroughly before taking the quiz. Also, read the directions before starting! Week 7 content and resources are available in Blackboard as well. If you have not yet fully read the chapters, now is the time to really start pounding through it as we are gearing-up for the midterm exam shortly. On-campus class is tonight at 6pm. Email me if you have any questions or issues.Adam Brooks

Filed under: Uncategorized, SGD125

U.S. Game Market To Reach $20 Billion In 2009

Janco Partners analyst Mike Hickey forecasts that U.S. video game sales — minus accessories — will reach $20 billion this calendar year, growing 6.7 percent over 2008′s $18.8 billion. Making the comments in a note released after GameStop’s financials yesterday, Hickey expects 2009 software sales to account for $12.6 billion of that figure, up 15.3 percent over $10.96 billion in the previous calendar year.  Read More

Filed under: Uncategorized, Gaming and Simulation