Internet Usage :: Essays Papers

Internet Usage atomic number 18 Mainstream Scientific Researchers Using the Internet to its full Multimedia Potential?As a look for presentation medium, the Internet has been designed to offer vastly more to publishers than easy text access. Its astoundingly primary to incorporate photographs, diagrams, illustrations, sounds, animations, motion-picture shows and all kinds of non-text electrical capacity into a weave put using todays user-friendly web development software. This subject, Networks and Multimedia in Science and Technology, has been designed to open its students eyes to the exciting multimedia possibilities obtainable that can communicate enquiry dressings more accessibly, effectively and concisely than intelligible text. A look with some of the research presented by many an(prenominal) of these students, found linked to the NAMIST CONFERENCE PAGE, calls it clear that well-designed web sites can make even the most potentially boring topics (statistics? butterf lies?) attractive and interesting through the use of intuitive structures and appropriate multimedia.However, a browse through the web site of Australias principal government-funded Scientific validation, the CSIRO AUSTRALIA page, reveals myriads of research papers published nearly exclusively in text-only format. The http//www.nobel.se/announcement-98/physics98.html official 1998 Nobel Prize award announcement for the plain of Physics includes some diagrams, but nothing one would not find in a 1970s textbook. Many of the links from american science organisation www.Sigmaxi.orgs science resource page, http//www.sigmaxi.org/scienceresources/scienceresources.htm, have a small amount of pictorial content, but only one site I found, http//volcano.und.nodak.edu/ - a site dedicated to volcano research - made consistent use of movie files, sounds and animation, and this site was filed under fun for kids on sigmaxis resource list.I guess there are many reasons for the scientific commun itys apparent dislike for multimedia. not a small factor could be the possible perception that research that is presented in a flashy, colourful way is lacking in substance, that researchers who overlook large amounts of time on presentation are compromising the research itself. The traditional presentation of research has been through publication in scientific journals, not renowned for their attention to visual appeal, and the use of extensive visual or multimedia assistance to focus the readers attention could be viewed as condescending.Furthermore, making use of the available technology, whilst relatively easy using todays advanced, user-friendly development software, is nonetheless far more time-consuming than the use of simple text. In the context of a scientific report, visual cues are far more labour intensive to include than equivalent textual explanations in most cases. Furthermore many researchers are unfamiliar with the techniques required to nonplus them, and more wi lling to attempt written explanations than commission graphic artworks.