Novelis
Jedi Master
Hello everybody,
I had this idea when the conflict broke out between Georgia and Russia, and then, when the following news came out in Taiwan, I felt heeded to write this post:
_http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory?id=5645801
The drama above has been playing out for a while now. When this happened I looked on the SOTT page to see if there was any coverage, but didn’t find anything. I tried the search function too, but I thought maybe this item was just missed or deemed insignificant compared to all the other things going on in the world.
However, I thought that the implications of this news event, and its political repercussions in this part of the world, could be significant.
Indeed there is a lot of heat here between China and Taiwan, as I’m sure any informed person is aware of, but any speculations/hypotheses on what the PTB are planning don’t tend to get much attention.
Unless I suggested the article and posted my own thoughts about it, that is.
There’s an avalanche of information coming out everyday, and keeping up with this dynamic web of possibilities to see what the leaders may have in store for us is an immense task (thank you to all SOTT for making what we HAVE possible). Now, given the western origins of SOTT and the global distribution of readers, it isn’t surprising that the SOTT team will focus on more “homegrown” matters.
However, now that Amerika is bringing the war of terror to Russia’s front door, and their plans for the east will immerge more and more as time goes on, I thought about how to broaden the scope of SOTT news coverage, and how to create a more global layout of unfolding events, in real time, on the SOTT page.
Now, I know that SOTT is reaching for becoming global in scope, and the more it widens its lens, the more objective our working hypothesis can be about our real situation.
Ideally, if SOTT’s news coverage expanded to cover every square inch of the globe, and every article was analyzed and probabilities were hypothesized with an equal amount of attention and careful consideration, then everybody who uses SOTT could connect the dots in a much more objective manner.
But how could SOTT achieve this ideal? Won’t the work be too substantial for the current network of people? If it’s possible, how close could we get to this kind of data gathering?
I am thinking, and please correct me if I’m wrong, that the design of the SOTT page layout and the fundamental organization of the data could be changed.
Currently on SOTT, it’s true that the majority of the news articles that are covered, discussed and expanded upon are USA and European news. There are many reasons for this that I won’t get into here.
There is a section dedicated to UK & Euro-Asian news, and an “around the world” section too, but I feel that the current design doesn’t offer a ”visual picture” of the global end game in real time action.
News articles are presented in a LIST format, under headings that are deemed appropriate.
Since there is so much news that are covered on a daily basis, the lists are tiring to wade through, new information is added very quickly, while old articles move into a history section, where there are more endless lists of articles.
This makes the handling and manipulation of the data impractical when trying to piece together evidence for hypotheses and speculations.
As an example, look at the current dataset for bodies from outer space, I feel the limitations of the list format become more apparent. It takes ages of scrolling down the lists of headings to find a particular piece of information. If I wanted to read them all, I wouldn’t have time for literally ANYTHING else in my day (Maybe I’m just a poor reader? :P).
Wouldn’t a visual representation of the impacts over time be clearer and easier to understand?
The list format has it’s merits if viewed as a whole, since the sheer magnitude of how many rocks are hitting us can be visualized from looking at how large the dataset is. But as of yet, there is no visual representation of where these rocks are hitting us against scales in time without some serious investment of time and effort.
We all like graphs and charts, when we need to understand a complicated piece of information, it’s better to complement the information with something visual, something that could be referenced and remembered at a glance.
As an old saying goes, a picture says a thousand words, or rather, contains a thousand meanings, which can be extracted in a second, all at once. This principle has been applied to in teaching languages, where one COULD stand there describing what a dog looks like at length, or simply show a picture – it’s clearer, simpler, and checking understanding is also a piece of cake.
The way our brain processes networks of meanings and concepts lies beyond our methods of expressing them. Showing a picture of a dog instantaneously “activates a schemata”, bypassing the need for words, triggering its meaning to anyone who has ever seen a dog in no time at all.
Saying the word “dog” and showing the picture of it repeatedly “cuts a groove” in our minds as to how to express and decipher this meaning using our communicatory code system - AKA languages.
Unfortunately, this method of teaching requires the teacher to prepare the material for the learners, which is a heavy burden, but the picture can be used again and again (I’ll get back to this later).
Why not transfer this principle of using pictures into the SOTT layout of data?
For example, if I wanted to know about the news happening in England on SOTT right now, I would scroll through the articles displayed under the appropriate headings to find what I’m looking for, or I’d use the search tool, which scans the lists for me, looking for keywords that may or may not contain what I’m looking for.
Whereas, if the SOTT page simply displayed a picture of the world, and news items are displayed via links that are connected to the geographical location of its origin, I’d take a quick glance to find England in its geographical location (Which is a schema far more familiar to us, and thus, quick to activate compared to a list under ANY heading), click on it, then link to the relevant news from England.
News items that originate from a certain location, but which influence and affect more than their political borders, could be linked under more than one country, or as a “hot topic”, rather like the new forum layout.
With this kind of a display of the news, not only could readers scan for specific data in an easier and quicker fashion, but members of the forum across the world, when posting suggested articles from their locations, could pop the new data straight into the appropriate “filing cabinet”, and it would become instantaneously accessible to all.
Once the system has been running for a while, assuming all the contributions are made from SOTT members as well as the SOTT data gatherers, and the body of information grows larger and larger, the SOTT editors could get a FULLER scope of what is going on in a visual way and connect the dots in ways that require much more time/work using the current format.
Finally, since all articles are dated and sorted geographically, when the political “lines of division” across the globe could be SEEN in a visual form, and as the “movements” of the various powers of the world are analyzed, checked for motives and intentions in the brilliant way the SOTT team does, we could build up a visual representation, getting more and more detailed and objective as the body of data grows, of the working hypothesis of the end game progressing in REAL TIME!
Furthermore, countries might be, for example, sorted into colours of alliances, for example, grouping Israel, America and England in one colour. When these colours “move their chess pieces” to expand their territory (once this fact has been discerned by proper investigations, of course), then new areas under their “sphere of influence” could then be colour coded to represent this fact.
Using a computer model to sequence this activity against a time scale, it would actually be possible to view a section of time, watching how the game is being played out. This diagram wouldn’t be based on speculation at all, but based on the most objective analysis of the current situation that we can currently find.
Using this design format, SOTT could also plot all the outer space bodies information onto the same model of the map according to where the bodies have hit, which, if catalogued using location and time, could give us a real image of “spread” of where these bodies are hitting, as well as measure the “downpour” as it increases in intensity since records began on the SOTT website.
Computer models of these measurements could be made for political movements, UFO encounters, natural (and not so natural) disasters, extraterrestrial bodies and anything that could be plotted on the map and measured against a time scale.
These charts could become a visual support for the words being said on SOTT, and become priceless computer models that measure the various progressions in the world, these measurements can even be crossed referenced to find synchronicities in, say, the political powers’ movements VS UFO sightings in a quick and easy way, and anybody can understand this information without the long hours of reading!
However, as I mentioned earlier about how there is a tremendous mental and physical burden on the teacher to prepare all these pictures and visual ways of representing concepts, the task of programming this design layout, not to mention the re-cataloging of the vast amounts of information already on SOTT into appropriate areas, would be a mind boggling task to say the least!
I’m not a web page designer or a computer programmer, so I don’t have a clue about how to create this, but I imagine it to be rather simple once it has been carefully considered.
Like how a teacher can use the pictures again and again, once the core system is running, the responsibility of data collection and distribution is shared out to all forum members to post in the news from their respective locations (as many do already), and the system starts to run on its own steam, we could potentially create a media coverage and analysis method, not to mention a visual support for what’s being said on SOTT, that has never been seen before.
Anyway, just a thought... Tell me what you think.
Thanks,
Jason
I had this idea when the conflict broke out between Georgia and Russia, and then, when the following news came out in Taiwan, I felt heeded to write this post:
_http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory?id=5645801
ABC news said:
The drama above has been playing out for a while now. When this happened I looked on the SOTT page to see if there was any coverage, but didn’t find anything. I tried the search function too, but I thought maybe this item was just missed or deemed insignificant compared to all the other things going on in the world.
However, I thought that the implications of this news event, and its political repercussions in this part of the world, could be significant.
Indeed there is a lot of heat here between China and Taiwan, as I’m sure any informed person is aware of, but any speculations/hypotheses on what the PTB are planning don’t tend to get much attention.
Unless I suggested the article and posted my own thoughts about it, that is.
There’s an avalanche of information coming out everyday, and keeping up with this dynamic web of possibilities to see what the leaders may have in store for us is an immense task (thank you to all SOTT for making what we HAVE possible). Now, given the western origins of SOTT and the global distribution of readers, it isn’t surprising that the SOTT team will focus on more “homegrown” matters.
However, now that Amerika is bringing the war of terror to Russia’s front door, and their plans for the east will immerge more and more as time goes on, I thought about how to broaden the scope of SOTT news coverage, and how to create a more global layout of unfolding events, in real time, on the SOTT page.
Now, I know that SOTT is reaching for becoming global in scope, and the more it widens its lens, the more objective our working hypothesis can be about our real situation.
Ideally, if SOTT’s news coverage expanded to cover every square inch of the globe, and every article was analyzed and probabilities were hypothesized with an equal amount of attention and careful consideration, then everybody who uses SOTT could connect the dots in a much more objective manner.
But how could SOTT achieve this ideal? Won’t the work be too substantial for the current network of people? If it’s possible, how close could we get to this kind of data gathering?
I am thinking, and please correct me if I’m wrong, that the design of the SOTT page layout and the fundamental organization of the data could be changed.
Currently on SOTT, it’s true that the majority of the news articles that are covered, discussed and expanded upon are USA and European news. There are many reasons for this that I won’t get into here.
There is a section dedicated to UK & Euro-Asian news, and an “around the world” section too, but I feel that the current design doesn’t offer a ”visual picture” of the global end game in real time action.
News articles are presented in a LIST format, under headings that are deemed appropriate.
Since there is so much news that are covered on a daily basis, the lists are tiring to wade through, new information is added very quickly, while old articles move into a history section, where there are more endless lists of articles.
This makes the handling and manipulation of the data impractical when trying to piece together evidence for hypotheses and speculations.
As an example, look at the current dataset for bodies from outer space, I feel the limitations of the list format become more apparent. It takes ages of scrolling down the lists of headings to find a particular piece of information. If I wanted to read them all, I wouldn’t have time for literally ANYTHING else in my day (Maybe I’m just a poor reader? :P).
Wouldn’t a visual representation of the impacts over time be clearer and easier to understand?
The list format has it’s merits if viewed as a whole, since the sheer magnitude of how many rocks are hitting us can be visualized from looking at how large the dataset is. But as of yet, there is no visual representation of where these rocks are hitting us against scales in time without some serious investment of time and effort.
We all like graphs and charts, when we need to understand a complicated piece of information, it’s better to complement the information with something visual, something that could be referenced and remembered at a glance.
As an old saying goes, a picture says a thousand words, or rather, contains a thousand meanings, which can be extracted in a second, all at once. This principle has been applied to in teaching languages, where one COULD stand there describing what a dog looks like at length, or simply show a picture – it’s clearer, simpler, and checking understanding is also a piece of cake.
The way our brain processes networks of meanings and concepts lies beyond our methods of expressing them. Showing a picture of a dog instantaneously “activates a schemata”, bypassing the need for words, triggering its meaning to anyone who has ever seen a dog in no time at all.
Saying the word “dog” and showing the picture of it repeatedly “cuts a groove” in our minds as to how to express and decipher this meaning using our communicatory code system - AKA languages.
Unfortunately, this method of teaching requires the teacher to prepare the material for the learners, which is a heavy burden, but the picture can be used again and again (I’ll get back to this later).
Why not transfer this principle of using pictures into the SOTT layout of data?
For example, if I wanted to know about the news happening in England on SOTT right now, I would scroll through the articles displayed under the appropriate headings to find what I’m looking for, or I’d use the search tool, which scans the lists for me, looking for keywords that may or may not contain what I’m looking for.
Whereas, if the SOTT page simply displayed a picture of the world, and news items are displayed via links that are connected to the geographical location of its origin, I’d take a quick glance to find England in its geographical location (Which is a schema far more familiar to us, and thus, quick to activate compared to a list under ANY heading), click on it, then link to the relevant news from England.
News items that originate from a certain location, but which influence and affect more than their political borders, could be linked under more than one country, or as a “hot topic”, rather like the new forum layout.
With this kind of a display of the news, not only could readers scan for specific data in an easier and quicker fashion, but members of the forum across the world, when posting suggested articles from their locations, could pop the new data straight into the appropriate “filing cabinet”, and it would become instantaneously accessible to all.
Once the system has been running for a while, assuming all the contributions are made from SOTT members as well as the SOTT data gatherers, and the body of information grows larger and larger, the SOTT editors could get a FULLER scope of what is going on in a visual way and connect the dots in ways that require much more time/work using the current format.
Finally, since all articles are dated and sorted geographically, when the political “lines of division” across the globe could be SEEN in a visual form, and as the “movements” of the various powers of the world are analyzed, checked for motives and intentions in the brilliant way the SOTT team does, we could build up a visual representation, getting more and more detailed and objective as the body of data grows, of the working hypothesis of the end game progressing in REAL TIME!
Furthermore, countries might be, for example, sorted into colours of alliances, for example, grouping Israel, America and England in one colour. When these colours “move their chess pieces” to expand their territory (once this fact has been discerned by proper investigations, of course), then new areas under their “sphere of influence” could then be colour coded to represent this fact.
Using a computer model to sequence this activity against a time scale, it would actually be possible to view a section of time, watching how the game is being played out. This diagram wouldn’t be based on speculation at all, but based on the most objective analysis of the current situation that we can currently find.
Using this design format, SOTT could also plot all the outer space bodies information onto the same model of the map according to where the bodies have hit, which, if catalogued using location and time, could give us a real image of “spread” of where these bodies are hitting, as well as measure the “downpour” as it increases in intensity since records began on the SOTT website.
Computer models of these measurements could be made for political movements, UFO encounters, natural (and not so natural) disasters, extraterrestrial bodies and anything that could be plotted on the map and measured against a time scale.
These charts could become a visual support for the words being said on SOTT, and become priceless computer models that measure the various progressions in the world, these measurements can even be crossed referenced to find synchronicities in, say, the political powers’ movements VS UFO sightings in a quick and easy way, and anybody can understand this information without the long hours of reading!
However, as I mentioned earlier about how there is a tremendous mental and physical burden on the teacher to prepare all these pictures and visual ways of representing concepts, the task of programming this design layout, not to mention the re-cataloging of the vast amounts of information already on SOTT into appropriate areas, would be a mind boggling task to say the least!
I’m not a web page designer or a computer programmer, so I don’t have a clue about how to create this, but I imagine it to be rather simple once it has been carefully considered.
Like how a teacher can use the pictures again and again, once the core system is running, the responsibility of data collection and distribution is shared out to all forum members to post in the news from their respective locations (as many do already), and the system starts to run on its own steam, we could potentially create a media coverage and analysis method, not to mention a visual support for what’s being said on SOTT, that has never been seen before.
Anyway, just a thought... Tell me what you think.
Thanks,
Jason
