Praise on Sara D's Blog Post

Link to Sara's BlogPost: http://sara808.blogspot.com/2013/02/the-first-machine-dynasty-vn-by_21.html
I have recently read Sara's response to The First Machine Dynasty by Madeline Ashby. And I must say, she really gave me a great opinion start on this book. I've actually never read this book and neither have I seen it around,  I usually judge books by titles when I don't see their covers. [Or by blurb and the person who I know has good taste or something o-o] 

Since I really haven't read the book I don't really know what I disagree with Sara with the book. But, what she did good was giving a summary of the book (Not too quick, not too long, not giving away too little so I don't understand it or giving away too much that it ruins the whole book for me.) She connected the way the police is like in the real world to the way it's like for Amy-the main character in the book according to Sara. She also relates to what most people do, they look out for themselves, and there are rare people who actually look out for others first before themselves-like Amy. Sara also makes us think about what the author wants us to possibly think about the book. "The author I think wants to make the reader percieve Amy as a wonderful caring person. Also I think she wants the reader to percieve the humans as more monsterous creatures. For instance the gage that Amy has in her mouth contains acids that is she bites into it will melt her. They would never do this to their oun kind. The reader makes the humans seem racist and cruel." [From Sara's Blogpost itself.] She connects the book whole book in many different ways, not just comparing the characters to other people like most people usually do. 

What I also like about Sara's response is that she gives her own opinion in the end. Though it is short, Sara clearly states what she wants to happen in the book, what she thinks about the way the robots are being treated, and what should happen with the characters. In the end-end, Sara like, leaves us with a suspense of what might/will happen in the book. She leaves us hanging [Not in the high-five way xD] and actually makes us wanna read this book, well okay, maybe some others won't read it or want to read it, but after reading this, I certainly wanna read it. 

I also, don't really want to sound all...uh, angelic or something-conceited might be the right word here?- , but I actually wanna say Amy sorta reminds me of myself. I may not seem like it to some people, but I usually think of others before myself. I don't care if I'm poor and in rags [Though, I rather not be] but as long as my friends are in the good life, as long as they aren't sad, in despair, angry, or anything, I'll be fine, as long as their happy. I don't really know if Amy is like this, according to this response of Sara's she is. I guess if Amy was a real character and she and I met, we'd probably bond or something, or maybe we wouldn't since we'd be worrying about each other and it would probably get all awkward. I guess being so emotional, so much of a softie, makes me seem like Amy. I am honestly not sure how Amy's whole personality is but from the looks of that blogpost, I guess me and Amy are very alike. [Though, most of you won't agree XD]

So, yeah, awesome job, Sara! I can't wait to read this book! And I'll come back to this, and see if I still agree with you. :3 But, really, nice job, I liked this blogpost. xD

-Angel of 804

Facebook Life [or, Part of it]

Facebook Life

Is Facebook’s Privacy confusing?

Everyone here basically has a Facebook, or at least knows what it is. The chatting site that Mark Zuckerburg created, the one that gets millions of hits when people log on. The site  that companies use to advertise their stuff they wanna sell, where friends get on to chat, like things, poke people [everyone loves a good poke ;3] and sometimes stalk people [Okay, most people don’t do this, I’m just throwing it out there…or, at least I hope no one does this o.o]. 

Over the years, Facebook has gotten more people to use it. Kids as young as 10 have been using Facebook though the proper age to have a Facebook is 13. Facebook seems to becoming popular fast. [Oh how happy Zuckerburg must be!] But as Facebook becomes more popular, people begin to add and change stuff-or at least try. The way things like who can see what, who can tag who, who can block and all that. Basically, it’s called Privacy of Facebook. People seem to change how the Privacy-Rule is being run. 

Privacy is a good thing-who would want people to stalk them [No offense to those who do? o.o] You want to upload  a private family photo that only certain some people can see, well Facebook can allow that. But, is it all becoming too confusing for people to understand? Are they really able to stop some people from seeing their things?  

Randi Zuckerburg-the sister of Mark-had tried to upload a photo-a family photo-where only some people could see it, she used the privacy settings to make sure of that, or she thought. But Callie Schweitzer, a mutual friend of the Zuckerburgs saw it and shared it on Twitter and Randi found out and didn’t like it, Callie was realizing it was supposed to be a private photo. She was like it’s "way uncool" for Schweitzer to post the private photo to Twitter. But, how could Callie have known? The photo hadn’t been private like Zuckerburg thought it was-though she had a bit of her brother’s help-it showed up in her news feed, and Callie thought it was good enough to share.  

Of course, Callie deleted the photo from Twitter and apologized-though some do think that she shouldn’t have, it was Zuckerburg’s fault that the photo was seen, one person even says: ” But hold the phone, Callie! Don't apologize. Doesn't Randi Zuckerberg understand her privacy settings and how a photo on Facebook might suddenly fly out of her control? She's merely compromising her personal desires for the forward march of Facebook's benevolent reign and the advancement of the new, new social-media contract. No comprende? That's her problem.” So now, it’s a big thing, all because the Facebook-Privacy guide line was too confusing for poor Randi. 

This isn’t the only problem. For a while, Facebook has been accused of having a too-difficult guideline to Privacy, no one is really certain if their things are private to some people or not. In a photo album, people put their settings to a certain thing, thinking it goes the way they set it, then later, do they found out that the photo album is really not private, that it’s public, that people the person didn’t want to able to see the photo album can actually see it. [If it’s too confusing, here I’ll use names. Okay. So. Person who sets their photo album so only certain people can see it: Ali. Person Ali doesn’t want to see her album: Maria. Ali sets her photo album views to a certain thing. Or so she thinks. She realizes that Maria can actually see her photo album, and now she’s fed up because she thought it was set to a certain setting.] 

Have you ever had Privacy-setting issues? Have you ever wanted to make sure the public didn’t see a certain thing? Like a family photo like Randi? But then you realize that the public could actually see it? And you get pissed off or upset? Don’t worry, you’re just one of millions of people who have the same problem. I’m sure Facebook will fix it. [Also, don’t let this affect how you use Facebook. o.o]  Just…be careful who gets to see certain things of yours, okay? o.o

The City of Bones

I am currently reading a book called The City of Bones by Cassandra Clare. The book is basically about 15 year old Clary Fray being sucked into a life that her mother-Jocelyn Fray-has so desperately wanted to hide from her. It all starts when she meets Jace Wayland, Isabelle and Alec Lightwood, and Hodge, the shadowhunters of the world. The Shadowhunters are, as Hodge describes, “We are sometimes called Nephilim. In the Bible they were the offspring of humans and angels. The legend of the origin of Shadowhunters is that they were created more than a thousand years ago, when humans were being overrun by demon invasions from other worlds. A warlock summoned the Angel Raziel, who mixed some of his own blood with the blood of men in a cup, and gave it to those men to drink. Those who drank the Angel’s blood became shadowhunters, as did their children and their children’s children.”  Jocelyn tried very hard to keep all this away from her daughter, because when she was a shadowhunter, well it wasn’t really pleasant thing for her, as Magus-not mentioning who he is, I don’t want to spoil too much ;3-said: “Keep in mind that when your mother fled from the Shadow World, it wasn’t the monsters she was hiding from. Not the warlocks, wolf-men, the Fair Folk, not even the demons themselves. It was them. It was the Shadowhunters.”

But, now Clary has found herself in the middle of this. Her mother can longer protect her from the twisted world, and with no one else being able to do the job, Clary gets sucked in. She gets attacked by monsters that also had trouble with her mother, vampires, and finds out that the only reason she could never remember all this-she had the sight to be able to see the other world-was that it was blocked. Anything that she remembered of the other world would be repressed-looks like her mother really wanted Clary to stay away from this side of the world, but the question is why? What’s so bad about battling some demons (Don’t say death. That doesn’t count now) seeing some “deadly” fairies, vampires, werewolves, and all that? Personally, I think it’s cool, so why would Jocelyn go through so much for Clary? Magus said it wasn’t the demons who Jocelyn wanted to run from-it was the Shadowhunters, what was so bad about the shadowhunters? What did they do to Jocelyn that she wanted to hide, doing anything to hide? Only Clary’s mind holds that answer-but is Clary ready to see the answer? Is she ready to face the actual burden of the truth her mother so desperately tried to hide? Is she ready to face the Shadow World?

Saving the World and Other Extreme Sports

Saving the World and Other Extreme Sports

CONTAINS SOME SPOILERS!!!!

I am currently reading a book called Saving the World and Other Extreme Sports by James Patterson, the 3^rd book of the Maximum Ride Series. The whole series is basically about 6 bird kids, 14 year old Max, Fang, 12 year old Nudge (Yes that is her name), 8 year old Gazzy (Yes that’s his name and note: his name is what he literally is like!) and 6 year old Angel (Gazzy’s biological little sister). So, basically Max and her Flock have a mission-to save the world, but sadly it’s not really as easy as you can say it. Many mad scientists (Ya know, the ones that experimented on Max and her Flock before they escaped years ago? Yeah. Glad ya know what I’m talking about ^-^) keep interfering insisting that their side is better and all that.  

What’s worse now? Max, many times, has been offered to keep away from the whole plan; she and her flock can just give in and rest, while the scientists destroy the world. Dr. Martinez and Ella-2 ordinary people (ya know the ones that aren’t like, scientists, ordinary, normal, run-in-mill people?)-have showed Max what it was like to be ordinary (Despite having wings) how she could just be able to do and relax. When she accidentally ends up near them again she even says: “It wasn’t as though they had saved my life or anything-Ella and Dr. Martinez. It was worse: They had shown me what life could like in Normal Land. It haunted me ever since I’d left them.” But it’s not like Max could just drop everything and go and live in Normal Land. She had a  mission-save the world, it’s not just some people but the world-where she lives, how can she just go drop that, ignore that, so she could live in Normal Land? 

Besides, how is Max going to be certain that all of what the scientists promise is gonna happen? For all of her life, Max has been lied to. The person she thought was going to be taking care of her for most of her life since he helped her and the Flock escape the School, the place where they were experimented on, had lied to her. He made it seem like he was a “good guy” and in the end, all he did was just go back to the School to help with the whole destroying the world thing. And now, after Max and Fang finished visiting Dr. Martinez and Ella-by “accident” according to Max-Max is basically in shock again. Fang has just told Max that he found a picture of the Baby Gazzy in Dr. Martinez’s office-“I needed a paper clip”-Fang-“Between two books in Dr. Martinez’s home office. Between a book about recombinant-DNA theory…and one on birds.” Max’s reaction: “Well. If sudden knowledge had a physical force, my head would have exploded right there, and chunks of my brain would have splattered some unsuspecting schmuck in a grocery store parking lot down below. Let’s just say I was stunned, and it takes a fair amount to stun me, I promise.”  

 

Clearly, this isn’t just a simple coincidence; I mean Dr. Martinez-a vet-has a book about DNA theory and birds, plus she had a picture of Gazzy, who I’m certain has never met in her life! What if Dr. Martinez is a scientist-or whitecoats as Max and her Flock call ’em. Max trusts Dr. Martinez, by being so; it would mean she hid something big from Max who has bad experiences with whitecoats. How can Max be certain now of anything anyone tells her? Sure, she can trust her Flock, but what the ones who promise to leave her alone if she lets the whole World-Destruction thing go by?  How can she make sure they really mean what they’re saying? Sure, people shouldn’t judge others based on one thing, I’m sure Dr. Martinez has a reasonable reason for having that picture and books, but when you’re Max, when you’re the girl running from everyone who wants to destroy you, from everyone who wants to use you for their own benefits, you can’t just take any chances. And if Dr. Martinez is one of the whitecoats…well, it’s better safe than sorry, eh?