Thursday, May 23, 2013

Can we stop the printing of guns?



The printing of 3D firearms is becoming a very dangerous thing in America. Well the government is attempting to crack down on current illegal weapons makers, these gun manufactures are able to create and give away full 3D blueprints of firearms that people can print in their own homes. This is such as scary turn of events that the department of homeland security has issued a warning to the public, stating that it would be very hard to stop the printing of these 3d firearms. They say that because this is a printed weapon and not a real firearm, it does not require a serial number, therefore, can be distributed by anyone with a federal firearms licensee and bought by literally anyone. This is not only a scary thought, that anyone can purchase these weapons, but it is scarier that an ordinary person can download the file to any of these weapons and print them on any accessible 3d printer.
 3d-gun
This event can only get worse and worse. In the past 2 months, this company has gone from printing upper receivers to the full models of firearms. What happens when we give this another 2 months? Or a year? What we will eventually see is firearms that can put more than 200 rounds through them. Sooner or later, we will see fully functional assault rifles that are able to hold more than any legal rifle today, that is fully automatic and can be bought for FREE and printed at the fraction of the cost of purchasing the same rifle. This is what we are probably going to call the ‘next stage’. These stages occur when revolutions or breakthroughs happen in a short period of time. In cases such as the world wars, we saw the heavy advancement of all military weapons and tactics. We went from bolt action rifles, swords and horses to Jet fighters, long-range bombers and nuclear weapons. This advancement is not on the scale of let’s say a nuclear weapon, but it is an advancement that should be feared even more. How easy it would be to take a printed gun everywhere, on planes, into subways, on buses; and the only current logical solution to find these weapons is a full body pat down. What it is eventually going to do is have an event, a tragic, awful event that will force the government to take action against these forms of weapons. 




Tornado In Oklahoma



Over the past few days, Oklahoma City suburbs were ravaged by a massive tornado. The number of dead from the beginning of the tornado has reached over 20 and the numbers have been rolling up. The massive tornado has been listed as one of the largest seen ever in the city and had a base size of several kilometers. Landing on the ground and eventually covering close to 24 miles of damage, this tornado completely decimating the area, leaving hundreds homeless, injuring over 200 and doing all of this, completely by surprise. This event that has ruined the lives of hundreds of people had started and ended in the small period of less than 40 min. This is such as short period of time, but it still managed to devastate the local population. What has hurt the community the most was the death of 9 small children in the event.
          An aerial view of the destruction caused by the massive tornado that struck areas south of Oklahoma City on Monday, May 20, shows the magnitude of damage left in its path. The storm's winds topped 200 mph as it <a href='http://www.cnn.com/2013/05/21/us/severe-weather/index.html?hpt=hp_t2'>carved a 17-mile path of destruction</a> through Oklahoma City suburbs. On Tuesday, May 21, CNN sent photographer David McNeese to capture the story from above:


           This is an awful and tragic. What is worse is that we could not have seen it coming. This might be tornado season, but it is very hard to figure out when these types of things can happen. It is like trying to predict when a volcano will erupt. We can say that it is 100,000 years overdue to explode, but that does not mean that it will tomorrow. It could stay dormant for the next 100,000,000 years just because. What we all find hurtfully is that so many people had to die for a meaningless cause. These natural disasters should be avoidable, if not by public services that are provided (such as bunkers or safe houses). When you get right down to it, there was no real foreseeable way that we could have seen this coming, so all we can do not is prepare for the next one. 

Tuesday, May 7, 2013

North Korea moves missiles from costal launch site




It is believed that North Korea has moved two of its medium range missiles from a critical costal launch site. Previously, the warheads could have been launched at any time but have been made unlaunchible for their preparation to move. This move has relieved some tension off the surrounding nations and seems to have been a very quick withdrawal. This action could be seen as a possible combat manuviour as they North Koreans had only first moved the missiles to the costal site on April 10th but could also have been seen as a natural standing point. Realizing that the North Koreans are not actually stupid enough to fight the United States, only to bluff them into less oppression.
 Musudan missiles are being displayed during a military parade in Pyongyang (15 April 2012)
I feel that if this is not an act towards ending the current violence that the North Korean government has undertaken, then it is a strong act of military strategy. The standard placement of your primary weapons is key in any conflict, and this ‘withdrawal’ seems to be a step to ‘avoid’ an actual future conflict. If in fact this is a move towards peace, the sole reason the north Koreans are acting in this way is to attempt to take pressure off themselves. On the other hand, it could be a ploy; solely for the purpose of reorganizing weapons or creating a false sense of security for people outside of north Korea. Either w way, north Korea is in a very bad spot right now and it will take time to get out. 

Wednesday, May 1, 2013

Craving Wi-Fi, Preferably Free and Really Fas



As more and more of the world’s transaction and wealth is run over the internet, it would be fitting for most of us to use electronic devices to aid us in our day to day routine. These devices, ie phones, tablets and laptops have become a major part of most business life and are close to being a necessity for all business workers. What flaw that many people are feeling the effect of is the lack of Wifi. Without this invisible stream of information that allows us to connect to the world wide web, your computer is little more than a small typewriter. More commonly, passengers are looking for more routes to connect to wifi well they travel on flights in and around the world. Many airlines have attempted to implement a wifi system into their planes but it is becoming increasingly difficult to have a few hundred people attempting to steam hours of video and upload massive files well traveling on an aircraft at 500 miles per hour. Never the less, several companies have implemented small amount wifi to allow passengers the chance to check email or download a small file; but this area is very unpublicized. Most airlines do not release what planes have wifi and which ones do not.  To combat this fog of uncertainty, several websites have been created to track and display what flights from dozens of different airlines, offer the amazing service of this wifi.
 
I feel that this is not only the next step for all airlines but it is probably the most important one to date. People, now more than ever are relying to Wifi to run their lives and direct all of what they do. It allows people to upload thousands of lines of text for the world to see, it allows you to stream video of people from all the way around the globe. This service is not only a necessity for most people, but completely implemented into their lives. When the first airlines can offer high speed, strong internet connection on all their planes, that will be the airline that will end up taking more and more of the market, and that is a fact. 

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/01/business/travelers-increasingly-demand-high-quality-wi-fi.html?hp&_r=0