Online services

Online Services
Kirsty Daniels

Communications-
Email – eg, using services like hotmail or outlook express to communicate with other people instantly in any part of the world.Telephone – Using a telephone to communicate by talking to people.Facsimile – Using machines such as fax to communicate with people by faxing through almost anything to anybody with a fax machine. Video teleconferencing – This is using a service such as a television or a webcam to connect and communicate to people using live video footage. Bulletin boards – These can be found on websites such as myspace, or in an office. This is a way for someone to post a bulletin about how they feel or if they need to contact someone in an emergency.Discussion boards-This is a tool which allows groups to communicate online. It is quite similar to e-mail, but is separate from your e-mail account and is accessed, stored and organized centrally. The entire group can read all the messages. You can read old messages or post new messages at any time.

Education-
Online learning (distance) VLE. VLE (Virtual Learning Environment) is a software system designed to help teachers by facilitating the management of educational courses for their students, especially by helping teachers and learners with course administration. The system can often track the learners' progress, which can be monitored by both teachers and learners. While frequently thought of as primarily tools for distance education, they are most often used to supplement the face-to-face classroom.




There is lots of online learning available, VLE is one of them, others include learn direct, home learning college and computeach plus many more. You can gain qualifications from learning at home with the internet and software they supply.


Real time information-
Real time information is information that is updated on a regular basis for example like the weather and traffic news that need to be updated on an hourly basis.

This is also good for businesses as real time information (RTI) can help them keep an eye on their shares as well as their product production and keep an eye on any faults that may be occurring.

RTI also helps with timetables such as flights and bus times but can also be made to keep an eye on workers making sure they turn up at work.




Commerce-
Commerce is a branch of production which deals with the exchange of goods and services from producer to final consumer. It comprises the trading of something of economic value such as goods, services, information or money between two or more entities. Commerce functions as the central mechanism which drives capitalism and certain other economic systems (but compare command economy, for example). Commercialization or commercialisation consists of the process of transforming something into a product, service or activity which one may then use in commerce. Examples of commerce are online shopping such as eBay, Tesco etc. Also online banking is another example as there is no need to go to your local bank when you can do it at home on the net.


These are examples of online shopping, (Tesco’s and EBay)





Government-
You can now pay government taxes online on www.officialpayments.com, this is easy, quick and secure.
Also students can now apply for grants online in easy step by step forms.
A website www.theyworkforyou.com has loads of information on the government also you can just type your postcode in and find out who your local MP is and find details about them.

Business-
Video conferencing – This is a service that most business people use. It’s a way for everybody attending a staff meeting/conference without having to sit in a room; you can be anywhere as long as you have a webcam. This system is very beneficial to most reputable companies.




Entertainment-
Multi-user games – This is where you can interact with other people all around the world and play a game with them through the computer.

Music Videos – This is a way for you to watch a music video on your computer system.


Games – This is simply just playing games free or from a downloaded service on your computer.



Download Services-
Download services places where you can get information and “download” them on the computer. There are websites you can download from as well as software that can be loaded on to take thing from the internet.

There have been an increasing number of pirate copies from films to other products due to the downloading age which can lose the people who have made them a lot of money. The quality of the products is not as good as getting them from a retail shop but can still use them to some great degree. However it has also been know that people have put viruses in the products that you want to download creating a big mess on your computer.

This is where virus protection software comes in. There is a number of virus protection software such as AVG and Norton antivirus these have the ability to find and destroy or contain the virus stopping them hijacking your computer and getting any information the people want. These software have an auto-update which searches there respective sites and downloads new information to help fight off the viruses.



Archiving-
An archive refers to a collection of records, and also refers to the location in which these records are kept. Archives are made up of records which have been created during the course of an individual or organization's life. In general an archive consists of records which have been selected for permanent or long-term preservation. Records, which may be in any media, are normally unpublished, unlike books and other publications. Archives may also be generated by large organisations such as corporations and governments.
Archives are distinct from libraries insofar as archives hold records which are unique. Archives can be described as holding information "by-products" of activities, while libraries hold specifically authored information "products". While many archives are publicly accessible, some archives (called dark archives) are kept private.

Ideas to solve the digital divide

I have a few ideas that could help with the digital divide, but all involve money and the governments help.
My first idea is for the government to be able to fund a computer per household, this would help as then all families would have a computer. This would also involve a help line or something similar which would have easy steps to inform people of what they want help with, this would be free. For families to have the full privelegde of technology i believe that broadband should be cheaper and those with lower incomes would have a discount on that.
This idea would be problematic as computers would need updating quite alot or they would need new computers if they were broken, stolen or really old and i do not believe that replacements or updates would be an easier and cheap thing to do. Also those with a higher income are more likely to be able to replace them, so therfore it would just cause a divide again.
Another idea of mine would to have free teachers to train those that do not have much of a clue on a computer or internet. Also i think a good idea would to have in each community a hall or something with access to free computers and internet with a helper there to teach them either new things or help with things they are unsure on.
These would all cause problems and alot of money for each community and i believe what ever solutions people come up with there will always be some kind of a divide.