Its honestly so sad to see this semester go by. And CT101 is one of those reasons as to why. Thank you, Professor Seslow for making the class such an entertaining learning environment.

I feel like I’ve learned a lot because of CT101. Such as finally learning how to make my own animated gifs. I say “finally” because gifs was something I’ve known a lot about and something I use a lot. Especially when talking to friends. So being given the chance to actually learn how to make them for myself was amazing. I also learned the importance and convenience of hyperlinks. Being able to hyperlink things was something I also had no idea how to do before CT101. After I learned how to do it I eventually started using hyperlinks in most of my other classes. Not only this but I also learned a lot more and was given more insight about I already knew about. For example things such as copyright and its positive and negative affects on creators. And our professor even touched on things such as deaf awareness. Which was really interesting to hear about.

 

Here is one of the assignments that I have done throughout the semester that I’m most proud about:

Assignment# 2 GIFs

For me this course is so far really good. I was kind of skeptical about the course only cause the professor told us that a lot of people chose to drop the class only after the first session. I on the other hand loved hearing about what we would be learning in class and what my peers expected of the class. The professor seems like a really chill person and I am a fan of the types of assignments he has given us so far. Especially this one. I really like GIFs so its weird to me that I’ve never made a GIF before, nor ever thought about making one. Here are a couple of GIFs representing how I feel about the course and the things I enjoy about it so far.

Me in the first zoom session of the course hearing what we are going to be learning about and going over,

Me after finding out that we would be making our own GIFs and that the course could have a focus on animation,

Me after finding out this course doesn’t have a final exam,

Me after finding out that this course does not require me to purchase any books,

This was an assignment where we had to create our own animated gifs. This blog post was easily my favorite one to do and in my opinion, the best thing I’ve learned throughout the entire semester.

In terms of my overall grade and performance in this class. I think I deserve a low 80 or a high 70, (if that makes sense). I did a good job keeping up with work and assignments however, I feel like I could’ve done a little more. Like maybe participating more during the class sessions.

Finally, here is the link to my website.

http://galerasarts.com/

Before you go and take a look at it however, I wanted to inform you that you may or may not be able to access my website because I’ve been having problems with logging in to it myself.

 

 

But to talk a little about my site, I honestly don’t see myself keeping my website up for long term. This is because when I was making it I didn’t put too much thought into it. And pretty much did whatever I wanted with it (especially with the domain name) just to get by. This is because I had a hard time coming up with what I wanted my website to be about. Which was the main difficulty I had with making it. If I was to make a website that I would keep for the long term I would definitely want to put more thought into it. And make it somewhat professional.

 

Id like to end my final blog post with saying that I thoroughly enjoy this course. Learning and participating in a computer science type of class was truly a treat for me. And I cant wait to apply what I have learned in CT101 for other classes to come. Thank you again, Professor Seslow.

After watching the TED talk about copyright I was informed of so many different perspectives and viewpoints in terms of Copyright. And the narrator, Larry Lessig, did an excellent job at highlighting these two perspectives while staying true to what he believes. One of the quotes by him in particular that I really liked was, “We live life against the law”. This quote really stuck with me because it was something I never once realized til now. And after taking some time to think about it, I found a lot of truth to it.

Overall however, I would say I agree with Lessig but to an extent. There were plenty of things in his presentation that I heard and was shaking my head “Yes” to. A lot of people don’t realize how most of what we watch, do, listen to, play, and create came from something that has already been done before. And that doesn’t mean that people are trying to copy or plagiarize other works. When people see something or someone they are inspired by they first become or do that thing and then improve on it. Society continues to move forward because of the fact that as generations move on people will continue to take things that already exists and make them better. That’s why that quote stood out to me so much. Because yes, people live by laws, but copyright should not be one of those. The ability to express yourself creatively under the influence of someone else shouldn’t be a law people have to live by. Despite all of this however, I still think copyright laws do have a place in society. The sad reality is that there are many people who commit acts of plagiarism. People who see ideas from others, will steal them and profit.

While I do feel like copyright laws do have a good purpose to serve, there is definitely a point to where it can go overboard and be taken out of proportion. Like the story of the planes that Lessig spoke about. 

Hey everyone, my name is Garrick. For my website I initially didn’t know what to do with it, and still in a lot of ways don’t, which is one of the reasons I had put it off for a while. To try and find a plan or map out what theme my website was going to be about. However, I eventually just came around to it and made my website off of purely going with the flow. Which benefited me more then waiting to come up with ideas. And I will continue to decide what direction to go in and make improvements. But without any further ado here’s my website.

http://galerasarts.com/

How am I doing in CT101 so far???

How am I doing in CT101? What grade do I believe I am maintaining? 

I think that in CT 101 I am maintaining a high 70 or low 80 kind of grade. I have completed most of the blog posts in the beginning of the semester but admittedly have been on a downward slope in terms of getting my assignments posted on time or at all. This is something I plan to fix moving forward however.

What have I learned the most? What is my greatest learned asset in this class so far?

I wouldn’t say this is my greatest learned asset in the class but something that I definitely learned that I didn’t know before taking this class was how to make my own animated Gifs.

What skills have I developed , cultivated and displayed regularly in my posts?

A huge takeaway from CT101 that I slowly start incorporating in some of my other classes is the usage of hyperlinks. Hyperlinking sources or websites to my work was something that I never done before when doing online assignments. And while It hasn’t made siting sources and website easier or harder by any means, it makes essays and other assignments look very clean in my opinion.

How do I assess my performance through self-reflection in this class?

I think in this class the way I assess my performance the most is if I have a good understanding of the assignment that we are completing for the class. Even if its something that I’m not necessarily interested in a deep understanding of the concept can usually go a long way.

What do I know now that I did not know before taking this class?

One of the things, as stated before, that I didn’t know before taking the class that I know how to do now is how to make my own animated gifs. Gifs is something that I know a lot about and I really like looking at gifs as a form of entertainment. But making them for myself was something I had never done before or knew how to do before the course.

For me this course is so far really good. I was kind of skeptical about the course only cause the professor told us that a lot of people chose to drop the class only after the first session. I on the other hand loved hearing about what we would be learning in class and what my peers expected of the class. The professor seems like a really chill person and I am a fan of the types of assignments he has given us so far. Especially this one. I really like GIFs so its weird to me that I’ve never made a GIF before, nor ever thought about making one. Here are a couple of GIFs representing how I feel about the course and the things I enjoy about it so far.

 

Me in the first zoom session of the course hearing what we are going to be learning about and going over,

Me after finding out that we would be making our own GIFs and that the course could have a focus on animation,

Me after finding out this course doesn’t have a final exam,

Me after finding out that this course does not require me to purchase any books,

Hi everyone my name is Garrick and one of the things that makes me happy on the internet is meme culture. There are plenty of things that I and many other people don’t like about the internet, but if there’s one thing people on the internet do right it’s making memes out of anything meme worthy. Especially throughout the past year. Memes also, in a way, keep me up to date with what is happening in society. Whether that be a current event or something a celebrity may have done. Memes to me have always been a way for people to come together and joke about what may be happening in the world. In the case of 2020, memes made light of a lot of the serious and weird events that took place within that year. Another thing that makes me happy on the internet is YouTube/twitch. YouTube and twitch have both served as a nice form of entertainment for me since quarantine started and even before then.

I mean, she wasn’t wrong

I wish I could forget this to experience it a second time

For those of you guys who don’t know these memes came from The Weekends performance during the Super Bowl halftime show .