Entertainment in the information age

Life in the information age entertainment

Entertainment is changing more and more as ways of accessing it and new forms of entertainment are being made. With new ways of gaming, listening to music and watching films and they are becoming smaller but can hold more information.

Gaming

There has been a huge change in gaming in recent years, graphics have improved dramatically and with the introduction of the Blu-ray disc more information can be put onto a disc. There are 4 main platforms that people game on, these platforms are:

Microsoft’s Xbox 360

The Xbox 360 is the second video game console produced by Microsoft and the successor to the Xbox. The Xbox 360 competes with Sony’sPlayStation 3 and Nintendo's Wii as part of the seventh generation of video game consoles. As of September 30, 2011, 57.6 million Xbox 360 consoles have been sold worldwide. On June 14^th 2010, Microsoft announced a redesigned Xbox 360 that would ship on the same day. The redesigned console is slimmer than the previous Xbox 360 model and features integrated 802.11 b/g/n Wi-Fi, TOSLINK S/PDIF optical audio output, 5 USB 2.0 ports (compared to the 3 from older versions) and a special AUX port. Older models of the Xbox 360 have since been discontinued. The first new console to be released features a 250 GB hard drive, while a later, less expensive SKU features 4 GB internal storage.

Microsoft also revolutionised motion capture technology an enjoyable, family orientated hands free experience. It is called “Kinect” Kinect is a "controller-free gaming and entertainment experience" for the Xbox 360. It was first announced on June 1, 2009 at the Electronic Entertainment Expo, under the codename, Project Natal. The add-on peripheral enables users to control and interact with the Xbox 360 without a game controller by using gestures, spoken commands and presented objects and images. The Kinect accessory is compatible with all Xbox 360 models, connecting to new models via a custom connector, and to older ones via a USB and mains power adapter. It had a release date of November 4, 2010.

Sony’s Playstation 3

The playstation 3 (PS3) is the third home video game console produced by Sony Computer Entertainment and the successor to the PlayStation 2 as part of the PlayStation series. The PlayStation 3 competes with Microsoft's Xbox 360 and Nintendo's Wii as part of the seventh generation of video game consoles. It was first released on November 11, 2006, in Japan, with international markets following shortly thereafter. The Blu-ray Disc is its primary storage medium. Following speculation that a 'slim' model was in the pipeline Sony officially announced the PS3 CECH-2000 model on August 18, 2009 at the Sony Gamescom press conference. Among its features are a slimmer form factor and quieter noise when powered on. It was released in major territories by September 2009. Numerous accessories for the console have been developed. These accessories include the wireless Sixaxis and DualShock 3 controllers, the Logitech Driving Force GT, the Logitech Cordless Precision Controller, the BD Remote, the PlayStation Eye camera, and the PlayTV DVB-T tuner/digital video recorder accessory.

Nintendo’s Wii

is a home video game console released by Nintendo on November 19, 2006. As a seventh-generation console, the Wii primarily competes with Microsoft's Xbox 360 and Sony's PlayStation 3. Nintendo states that its console targets a broader demographic than that of the two others. As of December 2011, the Wii leads the generation over the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 in worldwide sales, and in December 2009 broke the record for best-selling console in a single month in the United States. A distinguishing feature of the console is its wireless controller, the Wii Remote, which can be used as a handheld pointing device and detects movement in three dimensions. The Wii is Nintendo's fifth home console and the direct successor of the Nintendo GameCube, with most models being fully backwardly compatible with all GameCube games and most accessories.

PC gaming

A gaming computer (also gaming PC and gaming rig) is a personal computer that is capable of playing computationally demanding video games. Gaming computers are very similar to conventional PCs, with the main difference being the addition of a performance-oriented video card. Gaming computers are often associated with enthusiast computing due to an overlap in interests. However, while a gaming PC is built to achieve performance for actual gameplay, enthusiast PCs are built to maximize performance, using games as a benchmark.

Music has also changed from the portable formats to the devices we use to listen to our favourite songs and music artists.

iPod

iPod is a line of portable media players created and marketed by Apple Inc. The product line-up currently consists of the hard drive-based iPod Classic, the touchscreen iPod Touch, the compact iPod Nano, and the ultra-compact iPod Shuffle. iPod Classic models store media on an internal hard drive, while all other models use flash memory to enable their smaller size (the discontinued Mini used a Microdrive miniature hard drive). As with many other digital music players, iPods can also serve as external data storage devices. Storage capacity varies by model, ranging from 2 GB for the iPod Shuffle to 160 GB for the iPod Classic. The iPod line was announced by Apple on October 23, 2001, and released on November 10, 2001. All of the models have been redesigned multiple times since their introduction. The most recent iPod redesigns were introduced on September 1, 2010.

CD

The logical format of an audio CD (officially Compact Disc Digital Audio or CD-DA) is described in a document produced by the format's joint creators, Sony and Philips in 1980. The document is known colloquially as the "Red Book" after the color of its cover. The format is a two-channel 16-bit PCM encoding at a 44.1 kHz sampling rate per channel. Four-channel sound is an allowable option within the Red Book format, but has never been implemented. Monaural audio has no existing standard on a Red Book CD; mono-source material is usually presented as two identical channels on a 'stereo' track.

E- readers

e-book reader, also called an e-book device or e-reader, is a mobile electronic device that is designed primarily for the purpose of reading digital e-books and periodicals. An e-book reader is similar in form to a limited purpose tablet computer.

Education in the information age

Education in the information age

ICT has become a main part of education in recent years, from class teaching to independent learning. Now in every classroom in every school there are interactive whiteboards. An interactive whiteboard is a large interactive display that connects to a computer and projector. A projector projects the computer's desktop onto the board's surface where users control the computer using a pen, finger, stylus, or other device. The board is typically mounted to a wall or floor stand. They can be used as a regular white board for writing on, presenting work and interactive learning.

Now in schools there are computers in every class room, at my school there is at least one computer in every room and at least 600 computers in the whole school. This is a great comparison to how technology is becoming more influential in everyday life. Computers can be used to take notes in class, do homework or used as a virtual learning environment.

Teachers now use registration software called SIMS (school information management system) it is used by more than 21,000 schools in 150 local authorities across the United Kingdom. It keeps records from behaviour and achievement, planning curriculum and lesson structures, dinner money, educational learning plans, data sharing for the 14-19 agenda, managing registration and admissions. This is good because teachers can keep track of student’s progress.

Students now get swipe cards to pay for school dinners, due to healthy school program there is a cap of how much money a student can spend a day on food however parents can change the amount they are allowed to spend, when your card is swiped it comes up with a picture of you so no one else can use your card it also comes up with the amount of money you have left on your card. Swipe cards are good because it means children don’t have to carry around money that could be stolen or lost; it also will also help to decrease the amount of obese children in the UK.

Parents put money on the card through parent pay it provides online payments, income management and dinner money administration for schools, authorities and caterers. It helps more than 2,000 schools save time and money. ParentPay’s school ePayment system means over 1 million parents can pay school online quickly and easily, helping to keep children safer.