Pitch

In today’s world the state is putting up more and more red light camera’s. I am not talking about intersections that have camera over them. I am talking about the ones that have the camera that flash. They have signs warning people that they have to come to a complete stop before the white line. If they cross the line while the light is changing from yellow to red you get a ticket. The tickets come in the mail with a picture of car and license plate.The tickets are like $90. They even have a website you can go to and watch a video of yourself not coming to a complete stop. There should be a way to avoid getting these tickets. Well my idea is to have an app that tells you where all the red light camera’s are. You type in where you are then it comes up on a map with red dots showing where the camera’s are. You can click on the red dot and it will show the directions of the camera’s. It will also let you know what the cost of the fine is. 

By knowing where the camera’s are will prevent you from a ticket. It will also keep people safe. Camera’s are usually put where there is a bad intersection. So if you know you could get a ticket your more likely to drive safer at that point. This will help everyone  out. You would also pay a small fee for the app. 

Wooden Skyscrapers

In todays world “going green” is a really big deal. A lot of companies are going green and try to make green products. But there is a misconception about building wooden structures. When we think about building things out of wood some of the concerns are that the structure is very flammable and not as strong as steel and concrete. The other concern is deforestation and green house gases. Michael Green did  a TED talk called “Why we should build wooden skyscrapers." He has come up with a way to make large pieces of wood by glueing smaller pieces together. That may sound like plywood to you but its different. These panels are 8 feet wide and 64 feet long. By making a the panels like this the building are as strong as steel and concrete skyscrapers. When people hear his idea, certain things come to mind. One big one is wood if its a wooden building it can catch fire very easily. He explains it like this, if you hold up a log and take a match to it, it wont burn. But if you have tiny pieces of wood it burns and eventually you can put the big log on. And when the big log catches fire it takes a long time for it to burn. 

If a wooden skyscraper where built it would hold a lot of carbon. A 20 story wooden building would make 3150 tones of carbon. But it store over 4,360 tones of carbon. 1000 tones carbon is like 900 cars on the road. So that would be like taking 900 cars of the road. Michael Green is planing on building a 30 story skyscraper in Canada.

Cybernetics

3-D printing has taken printing to the next level with cybernetics. The Philadelphia Inquirer recently reported that “Princeton research creates a bionic ear.” “The scientist send bovine cells mixed in a liquid gel through the printer, followed by tiny particles of sliver.”  Once the ear is printed they put it in a petri dish and let it cultivate for 10 weeks. By then the ear changes its color to a flesh color. The is able to retrieve radio signals and turn it into sound. The end product is not to replace the human ear just yet. It is a stepping stone in the right direction. It shows the capabilities and limitations the 3-D printer can do. They were able to push the 3-D to a new level. Eventually in the future maybe will see organs and ears being rebuilt by 3-D printers. I think that they can push this idea and many more like this a lot further.

Learning

When we are in the class room the teacher is usually lecturing about a certain subject. Then after they are done lecturing they ask if there is any questions. What if at the beginning of class they asked a questioned about the topic. By asking a question they are in gauging the class and make us think and get us interested. Ramsey Musallam recently did a ted talk on this topic called 3 rules to spark learning. His three rules are curiosity comes first, embrace the mess and reflect. He says “questions can be windows to great instruction, but not the other way around. When he says embrace the mess he is taking about trial and error and that its ok to make mistakes. Reflection is going back to what yo have learned and looking over it again. I feel like this is a good idea by getting your attention at the beginning makes learning less painful. Being curious is natural so why don’t we use that to our advantage.

Wiki

History 

“The Fisker Karma was revealed at the 2008 North American International Auto Show in Detroit.[16] It is the first car from Fisker Automotive, a new auto maker based in Anaheim, California, founded on 5 September 2007.[17]

Production began in July 2011,[5] and the first two deliveries took place in the United States on July 26, 2011.[8][18] In October 2011 the first Karma delivered in the UK was auctioned to benefit Pratham UK and raised a bid of GB£140,000 (around US$220,000).[19]”

Fisker Karma has not built a car since July 2012.[87] The company is heading towards bankruptcy and they have fired 3/4 of their workers. Originally the base model was starting at $102,000 USD. Today you can go on ebay and find the car going for $40,000 USD to $80,000 USD. The problem is if you buy one of them and they break down is, you will not be able to find anyone to fix them. The cars are not very reliable and tend to need some work. 

Henrik Fisker decided to leave the company when the company was going down hill. When another company showed interest in buying Fisker Henrik is now back with the company.[89] He wants the company thats interested in buying Fisker help him settle a 171 million dollar debt.[88]  

[86] ^ a b Jaynes, Nick (2013-05-28) Henrik Fisker – having his cake and eating it, too – wants to buy back sinking Fisker Automotive

[87] ^ a b Davies, Alex (2013-05-15) You Can Now Buy A Fisker Karma For 60% Off

[88]^ a b Seetharaman, Deepa (2013-05-24).Henrik Fisker joins Hong Kong tycoon to salvage Fisker -sources

Alternate Publishing Plan

For an alternate publishing plan I was thinking of using an article that i’ve posted. The article that I picked is the future of the design rewrite. However I would still need to do some editing to it. I also would have to rewrite certain parts. I would try to submit it to the  New York Times instead of This American Life. This American Life seems to be more about news. The  New York Times has an area where the post would be printed and that seems more like a discussion area. So its not only about news and whats going on in the world it can be about anything as long as the reader is engage. My article is more informational and tries to get the reader thinking. I think thats what the New York Times is looking for.

Midterm

Midterm Proposal

Find a few propaganda posters and go into detail as explaining why reason behind them. Where did they come from ? Why were they used? What type of style are they? Who was the artist? What else the artist did?