Ben's Leads

Compare and contrast-

In 1946 televisions were small, bulky, boxes owned by only .5% of United States families. Today, however, the majority Americans own over two televisions and they have gotten as big as 100 inches.

Startling Statement-

Most Americans consider television to be a good thing, but some experts say it is taking over our lives.

Descriptive-

I walked into Jim Girardeau’s office, carefully stepping over parts of computer chips and foam packing peanuts that littered the ground. He was bent over a small chip with a soldering gun, meticulously burning on parts of the delicate piece of technology. Hesitant to interrupt, I waited until he was done and then asked the first question.

Eddie Plaut- Three Leads

Descriptive: At Scott, Douglas and McConnico, each lawyer’s office is a testament to the growing hulk of information in the law field.  Walls are lined with numbered binders, papers are piled on floors and on desks.  There is hardly enough room to work in some cramped areas.  This growing problem of too much information is fixed by basic programs used to organize cases, cutting down on great stacks in a room, and creating organized “dockets” on a computer.  Anybody can edit these dockets if it is shared with them, making big cases a breeze.  This “computerization” of documents has led to, as many lawyers say, a destruction of the paper medium.

Narrative: Gail Schilly works in her office, sifting through binder after binder to find the right information to mention in an upcoming hearing.  Her office is overflowing with paper; some in stacks on her desk, others more organized on shelves.  These documents contain information about case rulings, testimonies and other law related topics.  This is not different to other offices here at Scott, Douglas and McConnico, a testament to the growing hulk of information in law offices.

Compare and contrast:  Most classic law practices are horribly tedious, requiring hours of handwritten papers that can easily become disorganized.  Many veterans of the trade still go through these painstaking, scrupulous processes.  However, nowadays, the different workers in law offices all around the nation have grown accustomed to different computer programs, that help ease their enormous loads of work.  

Three Leads - Evan Tey

Twist:
     The tune of "Ode to Joy," the final movement of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony, has been ingrained into my memory over the years. As if a pianist played the piece on the back of my head and created an inextinguishable melody in the resonance chamber of my skull, the ringtone of my phone came to life and filled the room.
     Realizing that I had been staring aimlessly at the ringing telephone, I pick up the outdated home phone from its base and hold it to my ear.
     "Hello! Good morning!"
     I hear the heavily-accented male voice explode from the speaker's end of the phone.
     On the other end of the line is my Malay-speaking cousin from Kuala Lumpur, who knows no English.
Descriptive:
     Formality. Tension. Like a ticking time bomb, all the leaders of the world sit inside a sealed building. The doors locked tight. Not a single soul exists inside the confines of the solid walls besides the most powerful people in the world. Unlike other monumental summits, translators aren't needed. No, President Obama hasn't learned a couple the hundred languages for all the people in the world, but in every prominent figures' ear is an earphone with a tiny chip that translates the spoken languages into each individual's language of preference.
Narrative:
     In the year of 2004, Stephen Theby faced a marketing problem. He had to distribute a product into 26 different languages around the world as soon as possible for the maximum marketing profit. Under normal circumstances, this job would take up to a year, and consumer waiting for a separate version of the product would always be a year behind, but Steve Theby had an idea that may change the course of world-wide lifestyles in addition to marketing advancements.

As of now, I'm going with my second lead. From peer feedback, people liked it the best. I will go back later, because I think there are words and descriptions that I can fix which would strengthen the mood of the lead. I also want to fix the first lead, because feedback proved that it confused readers and I think that it has the strongest content. (ode to joy is the ringtone of my phone, but I didn't want to start with the typical onomatopoeia! The phone rang.)

Weston Hill's Feature Story Leads

Startling statement:  Garbage is usually treated as a burden and a nuisance. But this new technology promises to make it a commodity.

Descriptive:  The United States is drowning in garbage. Large metropolitan areas such as New York City dump tons of trash into the ocean, creating large dead zones. In the Virgin Islands, landfills on the beach leach toxic chemicals into the water. If trash is burned, it releases toxic fumes and results in toxic ash. Getting rid of waste is a difficult problem and there seems to be no easy solutions. However, there is a new technology that could get rid of all of these problems and provide energy at the same time.

Contrast and Compare:  Currently garbage is put in a landfill or dumped in the ocean.  But a new technology could get rid of waste and produce energy at the same time.

Robots: The Future of Warfare?

Last Fall during the U.S. Army’s Robotics Rodeo two small Piper Cub flew over a village and within minutes spotted their target, a tarp staked to the ground, and, being unable to navigate the streets, radioed for help. Soon afterwards a blue Porsche Cayenne, operated without any humans at the controls, drove down the streets, seeking out the sent GPS coordinates. The planes continued to circle overhead, gathering more information about the targets and its surrounding. In less than half of an hour the SUV had zeroed in on its quarry. This is one example of the usefulness of robots and what they bring to warfare. These fully autonomous robots could help keep soldiers out of harm’s way through things like searching out hidden explosives. However, there are some downfalls that make relying entirely on these autonomous robots impossible. They are often put in situations that are not designed in their programming and their responses cannot be accurately predicted. Some of the most advanced robots carry dozens of sensors, including high-resolution night-vision cameras, 3-D imagers, and acoustic arrays, yet cannot even differentiate a bush from a dog. Humans are still needed to interpret data and coordinate tasks among multiple systems, and in the near future this is how it is likely to remain. Some argue that robots should never be able to act and make decisions completely on their own.

For more information, visit this IEEE Spectrum article.

Picture found here.

Snail Power

One of the many problems that has delayed progress in the biotech world is the lack of energy needed to power artificial body parts. Over the past few months researchers have been testing a method that has the ability to harvest energy from the electrons inside of organisms, specifically, snails. By placing an electrode, coated with enzymes, inside of snails, researchers were able to harvest electrons from glucose and put them into oxygen molecules, creating a steady current of energy. Although materials are still being chosen to maximize the electrode's harvesting ability, the future for this technology looks bright. Besides the obvious application in biotechnology to source for bionics, spectators believe that the implications of this technology may have many more uses than we can see. With the ability to power any miniature devices, scientists have begun to develop camera and other sensing technology for the purpose of using animals to spy and receive information from places we may not be able to reach. In addition to this, the discovery of self generated energy in general leads to the opportunity for more and more biotechnological inventions. But there are several problems that must be addressed before people make a jump on this creation. First and foremost, technology is the inherent opposite to nature and no one in has been able to create a biological entity that exists coincident with technological parts.

For more information, visit the Wired article.
Picture found here.

Printing a Robot

If you wanted to build your own robot, you would have to design it, order components, modify or build your own components, build your robot, and then figure out that it doesn't work and have to start over.  However, a group at MIT is redesigning the robot creation process.  Their aim is to create the ability for robots to be designed on a computer and them fabricated on a special printer.  This would allow for an average person to create and program a robot in a matter of hours.  Just as a compiler is used for creating a program, the team seeks to make a “compiler for building physical machines.”  Such a system would take a simple set of specifications and makes a robot with simple materials.  A few robots have already been created, such as a six-legged insect, a robot arm, and a fish.  The material that the robots are made of is a material called PEEK, or polyether ether ketone, which is sturdy and can easily be machined.  The bodies of the robots are made of this material and the circuit boards are made using a standard fabrication process.  This method could be the future of robot design and drastically reduce the amount of time that it takes to build a robot.

Read more at Wired.
Picture from MakerBot