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Week 7 = Catch Up Week

Recently, several apps were discussed that allowed individuals to utilize the tool of virtual reality. This is just one additional aspect to the amazing world of technology as we know it today. One app, in particular, is called Space Needle.This app essentially uses the actual Space Needle landmark, and allows users to view the perspective that actually visiting the Space Needle offers via virtual reality. This feature is ideal for those who have a fear of heights (AKA me). Through this virtual reality technology, you don't even have to leave your bed to have the experience.



Another app that utilizes virtual reality is Google Cardboard. This app allows users to use the lenses to view apps that are compatible with Google Cardboard in a virtual reality sense. The main idea behind this is that it is low cost and very simple to use, and quite literally uses a piece of cardboard as the lenses. 

Another app that was mentioned is Elements 4D . This app, available to both Apple and Android users, the purpose of this app is educational. It offers an extensive visual representation of elements from the periodic table. Users than can manipulate the cubes that the elements are presented in to form reactions and see such resulting products of manipulations. The special feature that this app uses is called augmented reality.



On a similar note, there is the use of Anatomy 4D . This app is very interesting to me personally because of my intended background of becoming a physician. Using the same augmented reality technology, this app offers a immense images and scans of the human body as well as its details. One particular software feature that this app offers is it allows users to "peel away" or dissect layers of the body just like one would do during a dissection. The attention to detail in this app is truly amazing, and very beneficial to the medical community.

The concept of augmented reality (AR) is so beneficial to the community in numerous ways that even educational systems are incorporating its use into their curriculum. For example, it is projected to be part of Marine Corps training soon according to this article. My fiance, who is currently a U.S. Marine, has dealt with such training techniques among his time in the numerous trainings that he has undergone, and he said that it really helps with the training. It's a very futuristic type of technology that really allows Marines to envision a particular type of setting that will help them anticipate attacks. Another use of AR is one by Target. Aside from being useful for educational purposes, AR is also useful for every day tasks such as shopping. In the article, it showcases how Target utilizes AR so that shoppers may fully browse furniture pieces. Specifically, it allows users to see how the desired furniture piece looks like in their home. Target among other stores like Ikea are incorporating this technology into their shopping features as a way to make it convenient for shoppers to browse.

To put it into the Halloween perspective (Happy Halloween!), AR can also be used to even carve out your pumpkins! Washington Post introduces an app that allows users to stencil their favorite image onto a pumpkin for carving! Even if you are not tech savvy, you can even download the desired stencil image and print it out to sketch it on the traditional way. Using the app, it allows you to project the image onto the pumpkin to see if it is a desired image.



Another app that I mentioned that is beneficial to the medical community is Medscape. This website (and app) acts as a go-to place for healthcare providers so that they can stay on top of the most up-to-date information in their field. If you see on the left side, there are a list of all the various specialties of medicine. Throughout the website, recent published medical articles are also found as well as new research. Also, there is a tab that provides further education for healthcare providers so that they can learn all the new techniques and drugs that are being introduced. There is also an anatomy tool as well as a drug tool that quickly checks for possible drug interactions. These features are convenient, quick, and easy to navigate to and ideal for busy healthcare providers to quickly check upon. 



As we know, social media has a lot of potential. It has a lot of potential to do both good and bad to the person who is in charge of the account. Recently, I talked about how one famous YouTuber Laura Lee  lost a tremendous amount of subscribers and received an immense amount of backlash for the resurfacing of her Tweets from 2012. These Tweets were very racist and derogatory in nature, and while she did make 2 apology videos, they were not received well by the audience at all. As a result of this turmoil, every single one of her business partnerships dropped connections with her and Ulta even canceled the premiere launch of her own makeup line. To reiterate, anything you post is permanent forever. Think twice before posting because, like in Lee's case, it can literally come back to haunt you. 



In Chapter 3 of Untangling the Web by Steven Dembo and Adam Bellow, some useful presentation tools are introduced. Although Microsoft PowerPoint was the beloved presentation tool for many many years, other tools have since followed in its footsteps and released several other types of presentation tools as well. Some of the tools that were mentioned included Prezi, SlideShare, VoiceThread, and Poll Everywhere. These platforms have the same general notion as Microsoft PowerPoint, but they each have their own individual unique features that differentiates them from the others. For example, Prezi is very similar to Microsoft PowerPoint but just with enhanced transitions. The visual transitions really can improve the quality of the presentations, though some users say that the transitions are a bit excess and can therefore be visually distracting. Another type of presentation tool is SlideShare. SlideShare is associated with LinkedIn so that means your presentation is shared with the world. This allows for further networking and discovery based on what your presentation entails. Poll Everywhere differs from these tools in the sense that it's not really a presentation tool. It's more so of a tool that helps with interacting with your audience when speaking. Specifically, this is helpful when the presenter wants feedback from their audience via text messages. It is a company that is used widely by well known brand name companies. Lastly, VoiceThread was mentioned in the book as well. VoiceThread is very interactive in the sense that it allows users to connect and interact online via the app. In fact, even files such as Microsoft PowerPoints, PDFs, audio, texts, etc. can be shared all in one platform for a targeted audience to see and comment about. This app is very diverse and has the potential to really allow a specified community to thoroughly engage and interact with each other. 



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