Post #4: Communication Technology/Carrier Pidgeon

 

Introduction

Throughout history there have been many animals that were used for the purposes of letting people communicate with one another. One of the earliest and longest lasting however is that of the carrier pigeon and its cousin species. For thousands of years these birds helped to share words between people and were still used for communication up until the 1950s. These birds may have been small but they made a large impact on how we as humans shared our ideas.

Early Use of Carrier Pigeons

The early history of carrier pigeons is a little hard to pin down. There are few different areas that are believed to have been the start of carrier pigeon communication but most people have agreed that it began in Egypt around 3000 BC. During the time the methods for using the pigeons were a bit more crude and they would simply take the bird from its nest and release it whenever they wished to send a message with the expectation it would find its way home. The next recorded instance is in Mesopotamia around 2000 BC and was believed to allow communication between the various city-states of the region, this is further shown in the story of Noah’s Ark where a dove, a type of pigeon, brings him a message about land. Ancient Greece was the next place the use of carrier pigeons was documented. The pigeons were used to inform the city-states participating in the Olympics Games who won the overall games. The last major use before the turn to AD was by the Romans who used pigeons for a variety of different things. Most notably it was used by the military to inform Rome the results of battles and by the senate to communicate laws. All these early empires were trying to solve the similar problem of trying to decrease communication time between regions.

Early-Modern Use of Carrier Pigeons

The year 1167 was the next notable point for carrier pigeons in Baghdad when the first regular service line was established by Sultan Nur ad-Din between Baghdad and Syria. This pigeon network was later adopted by the Mongols in 1280 after they took over Baghdad. The Mongols would use a pigeon network in order to police their trade lanes which aided heavily in the low amount of banditry they experienced. The next major event that can be seen is the evolution of carrier pigeon use by many European powers for the purposes of military communication. During this time frame we see a clear change from the carrier pigeons being used for a mix of different purposes to being solely used by nation states in order to enforce their command and authority.

Modern Use of Carrier Pigeons

Looking at how carrier pigeons were used past the 1500s we see another clear evolution of how people used them. Many European powers began using pigeons to help them defend their borders due to the speed they could send out messages. In 1860 we saw the next step in the use of carrier pigeons as Brussels began using them in a more civilian manner to inform the citizens of important news and stock prices. This use was short lived however as new technologies replaced them in the civilian area fairly quickly but pigeons were still vital for the operations of militaries. The Franco-Prussian War in 1870 was the first major war that saw extensive use of carrier pigeons by both powers at war which would only encourage their use by other powers by the turn of the century. By WWI in 1914, all nations in the war used carrier pigeons in some way to aid them in the war effort, be it communication between units, distress messages, or artillery coordinates, these birds made an impact on the results of the conflict. Between WWI and WWII many new technologies replaced pigeons but as war once again came to Europe the bird went with it and WWII was the last major war pigeons were a part of before they were replaced.

Impact

The last pigeon service in use closed down in 2006 but the impact of these birds can not be understated. It is fair to say that many of our modern technologies would not be the same if it were not for carrier pigeons creating these ideas of what we were looking for in a communication technology and creating a base for other technology to be based around.

Post #3: Values of Free Expression

 

Values Of Free Expression

Through the history of the United States the ability for people to freely express how they feel about certain aspects of the nation has been a key piece of the foundation that the country was made on. As time has moved on more of these values have become more important as more and more of the world have realized the importance of free expression for the citizens. These values all have an importance but there are two that I feel are most important to us today and those are the idea of Stable Change and the idea of Individual Self-Fulfillment. 

Stable Change is the ability of the people to vent their problems which helps them decrease the likelihood of them turning to violent means which on its own is super important due to the large number of differing opinions we can now find in the world. This becomes even more important when considering Individual Self-Fulfillment however. Being able to express yourself in many different ways to create a new identity is the basis of Individual Self-Fulfillment so when you combine this ability to express yourself in various manner and the ability to be able to vent your ideas and state what you don’t like, you get and a compounding of both ideas with one another allowing not only for sole individuals to create an identity for themselves but allows entire groups to create an identity and move as a group.

Free Expression In Games

These two values can be found in many places throughout our modern culture in response to all sorts of topics. From politics to music preference, the ability to vent and express yourself has become a core aspect of what we can do within the United States. There is one area however that I feel that these values can be found extremely heavily and that is within the bubble surrounding games.

Games have created the ideal area for both of these values as they created a unique environment for people to be able to express themselves. First and foremost, most people love to vent about games, especially if a game manages to build up a large amount of hype around it.  It is human nature to like to state their opinion on something they spent money on, so when a game doesn’t meet your expectations or, even worse, falls below expectations you better believe they will let you know how they feel. 

The most recent major example of this Stable Change expression in the game industry was with the release of Fallout:76 in 2018 which had the failure of meeting the player exception, the full attention of the game industry, and the dubious actions of the games producer Bethesda caused players to have a large amount of problems that they wished to vent. As the tried to vent their problems they often found their voices being snuffed out or muted as the company tried to do damage control so in anger the player decided to put everything that Bethesda made to the torch by flooding the company's games with bad review, refund requests, and complaints which ultimately hurt the company more which is expected to be one of the reasons they sold to Microsoft in 2020. This a clear warning to other companies what can happen if you deny the players who buy your games the inability to vent then they will turn to other methods.

This failure of Fallout:76 however has also shown the values of being able to have Individual Self-Fulfillment. Even though the game came under a large amount of heat during its release, there was always a small community who even though the game didn’t meet their expectations still enjoyed the game and they also voiced their opinions on the things the game managed to do right. These people created a group identity by expressing where they stand with the game and as such managed to create a small cult following of the game that still lasts to this day.

Post #2: U.S. Supreme Court

The Supreme Court

Before this video I knew only the surface details of what the Supreme Court was and a small base on how they operated. After watching the two parts of the video however I was surprised by many aspects of how the Supreme Court operates and the powers they hold. 

Firstly I learned the process in which a potential law or petition must go through in order to first reach the Supreme Court and then the process it goes through within the Supreme Court to either be accepted or denied. Learning the steps in how this bureaucracy works was very interesting to learn and comforting as knowing the steps that our government has to go through in order to make something into law helps me feel more at ease knowing that there is an effective balance of power in place.

Secondly, I feel that the most important takeaway from the videos is that the Supreme Court needs the trust of the people in order for their acts to be respected and upheld. Due to the vague circumstances around the article describing how the Supreme Court functioned, it had to work very hard to establish itself in equal standing to the other powers of the United States government. One of the main reasons it managed to do this was by challenging congress and ruling that certain laws they were trying to pass were unconstitutional which helped the people gain trust with them as power to counterbalance the U.S. It is because of this trust that lets the Supreme Court be seen as a final say and if that trust is lost they could lose a large amount of their power.

The most surprising thing to me while watching the video was how the Supreme Court must treat any petition that manages to reach them with equal standing. So no matter if the petition comes from a convict or the president they must be treated with equal standing. AT first glance this feels weird but thinking more about this it helps to let every voice that can be heard if the country has deemed it important enough to let it reach the Supreme Court.

After watching this view I view the Supreme Court as a large stabilizing factor within our way of life that acts as a balance to the other branches of power. Through the process of looking at the constitution to see if upcoming laws are constitutional or not they help the United States evolve to a better nation while also upholding the freedoms we have been given.

Post #1: 5 Game News Sources

 I'm not the sort of person who looks at the news of the world super often. When I look at tradition news outlets such CNN or Fox I don't find myself reading the articles and more just taking a glance at headlines to get a quick understanding of what is going on. There is however one area where this differs and I take deep dives into articles and analyze what is in them and that is news articles relate to games and the game industry. These new outlets allow me to understand what is going on in the field I wish to enter and help me prepare for when I ultimately enter the industry. With this in mind there is a few that I read more than others that help me understand the industry.

Game Informer

While having the downside of being a subscription service, I would say Game Informer is one of the best new sources for every relevant topic within the game industry. Each article that they write is extremely well crafted and communicates clearly what is going on with the topic they are covering by proving parts of interviews, answering common questions about the topic, and providing important statistics and dates about the topic. I often find their articles fueling my imagination as I read through how different companies are inspired make their games and value the different perspectives the write about to widen my own views. Though not the best new source for a quick glance on a topic , I recommend taking a look at Game Informer if you want a more detailed and closer look at aspects of the game industry.

IGN

IGN is a great news source when it comes to looking for a quick article about something going on in the world of the game, film and television industries. Their articles are exceptionally useful at providing reviews on current release game or major game industry events in a easy to consume way as they divide their articles into different sections based off the information they feel is the most helpful to their readers. I personally use their articles to help me understand a general over view about a recently released game or game inspired show to allow me to build base to build other research upon what worked and didn't work for the game at launch. If you want a quick overview on a new game or major event in the game industry IGN is good new sites to start looking into it.

Kotaku

Kotaku is another game news site that is extremely to similar to IGN in terms of the content it covers and can also be used to help create a base understanding of a game related topic but that is not what I read it for. What makes Kotaku unique is that one of their focuses is how games affect the culture of our world. It often looks at how games have trickled into our culture in various ways such as NBA players using Nintendo sound affects when the score or how games inspired voice actors to pursue a jobs within the game industry to voice the characters they love. I highly recommend Kotaku if you want a look at how games have impacted our modern culture.

GameRant

GameRant is the game news source I turn to when I want a different perspective on a game related topic as it tends to have a different and sometimes opposing views to other game news sites. This is very valuable to have as the game industry is normally divided on almost everything that occurs within it so having multiple views from two different news sources is extremely valuable when looking at how to make a certain type of game. I primarily use GameRant to look at their perspective on potential games that are similar to those I would want to make and what opinions were on their release. I recommend using GameRant to help expand your views into areas you normally wouldn't.

Tabletop Gaming News

I have a personal love for board and table top games that are often overlooked by larger game sites such as IGN and GameRant. Tabletop Gaming News helps to fill in that gap by providing the current news on board and tabletop games as well as kickstarterss for new ones. This helps me expand my view on the unique different game mechanics and game systems that these games often have helping me to be exposed to gaming systems I otherwise would of never seen. If you have a love of board and tabletop games then I would recommend you look into Tabletop Gaming News.