Human Interaction with Technology and Information

This episode is all about music on the PC.  It covers CD’s, MP3’s, and electronic music composition.

Even though the episode is 6 years old and covers things which everyone in my generation knows (how to burn a CD), it also discusses items which people might not know about.  For example, how track names are imported when you insert an Audio CD.  This comes from the CDDB database.  The first part of the episode covers the use of the EasyCDCreator software.  I’m sure that nobody uses this program these days since iTunes, WMP, and WinAmp are pretty much the standards.

The next part of the program covers mp3’s and wav’s on websites.  They talk about embedding sounds in webpages as well as the real time editing capabilities with the help of flash.

They also cover the use of the program Acid for music editing and production.  Acid was/is a well known brand name in music editing but has since been replaced by more professional grade software like Logic and Reason.

Next they start getting into hardware.  They quickly discuss midi keyboard.

Finally, they wrap it up with a portable mp3 player, the Personal Jukebox by Remote Solutions.  The 5 gig harddrive was a big step at this point.  Compared to today’s 80 gig iPods though, it’s not much.  However, it was likely a big step toward the portable mp3 players of today.

Description of the Data

The purpose of the data set will be to list the cars currently made that have the highest mile per gallon ratings. The data set will also contain baseline cost for each model and advertised MPG vs. actual MPG.

Why the Data is Interesting

The data is interesting because modern day society is highly dependent upon transportation.  With gas prices at over $3 per gallon, saving money on the daily need of transportation is something everyone would be interested in.

How do we Obtain the Data

We can obtain all the baseline prices and advertised mpg information from the company websites and/or dealerships. The only way to find the actual MPG would be to take a brand new model of each car to an indoor race track, fill it with an exact known amount of gas (3 gallons should be enough to get an accurate reading) and drive it until it stops. Each car would have to be driven in the same fashion as far as acceleration to testing speed, final cruising speed, and rpm management. For accuracy you could repeat this test one or two times for each car. This would give you a general “highway” MPG. If you wanted a city MPG you could do the same thing, but have repeated scheduled stops to represent traffic and traffic lights.

What Specific Questions Will the Data Answer

a)  Which makes and models get the most miles per gallon (both city and highway)?

b) Which companies are being honest about their advertised MPG rating?

c)  Is the cost of buying expensive Hybrid technology worth the money you save in gas?

I’m not sure how many people are supposed to be in each group and whatnot, but I have a fair amount of programming background and technical knowhow. So, I think I would do best in that role in whatever group.