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This week on "Our World" ... technology and the presidency ... a possible new approach to battling malaria ... and science meets art at a California museum...
LEWIS: "He was the guy that devised a system of rotating paper disks, which are called volvelles. You can perform calculations by rotating these disks. And this work is as much a calculating instrument as it is a work of art
Those stories and more, plus human-made noise in the ocean and how it's affecting marine life.
I'm Art Chimes. Welcome to VOA's science and technology magazine, "Our World."
Forty years ago this week, Douglas Engelbart gave the first public demonstration of the computer mouse at a conference in San Francisco. The original mouse was a clunky wooden box with two metal wheels underneath to track horizontal and vertical motion. Its first mainstream appearance wasn't until the 1980s, when Apple introduced first the Lisa and then the Macintosh computers.
Englebart's demonstration also included email, video conferencing, and other technologies that in 1968 were more likely to appear in science fiction than in real life.
Well, it's 2008 and a lot of what was science fiction four decades ago is now part of everyday life for many people around the world, and the potential is just starting to be explored.
For example, technology is exponentially changing American politics. Journalist and media executive Carin Dessauer notes that in the last presidential election four years ago, social networking websites and online video services like YouTube were in their infancy or not even invented.
DESSAUER: "Barack Obama changed the political landscape. By using the Internet and all of its related technology to collectively create community, build and control a political brand, redefine grassroots tactics, and fundraise - all strategically integrated with the entire campaign operation."
Dessauer led a panel discussion this week on technology, new media, and the presidency, hosted by George Washington University, here in Washington, D.C.
Panelist Jose Antonio Vargas of the Washington Post says the interactivity of the Web has changed the nature of political campaigns. He recalls that when Hillary Clinton announced her presidential bid, she said she wanted to have a conversation. Vargas says that's a change from previous campaigns, which were more like performances.
VARGAS: "The politicians get up on a stage, strategists handle them. And for the most part, we - like, the people - have always been outside the process. We've always been the audience, just looking in. Well, with the arrival of Faceboook and My Space and YouTube, and the ethos that they've created, people want to be involved."
Even critics concede that the use of the Internet and other technologies by President Elect Barack Obama's campaign was masterful. They raised a lot of money online, and used technology to recruit supporters and stay connected to their volunteers. The campaign's director of new media, Joe Rospars, says that to keep their supporters engaged, they poured out an "almost unlimited" amount of information on audio, video, and text platforms.
ROSPARS: "Strategy briefings from the campaign manager to give our volunteers context for the organizing tasks that they're being asked to do. It took the form of inspriational videos to make people more likely to donate when they were asked at a given time. It was individual profiles of our supporters to put a human face and a real story behind the campaign and the movement."
Analysts generally agree that this time, the Republicans weren't as competitive in the new media arena. Republican operative Mindy Finn says that has to change.
FINN: "The Republican Party has to make Internet and technology its number one priority. You can't be fighting a 21st century war with 20th century tools."
Not that Republicans were totally clueless. The candidate Finn worked for, Mitt Romney, took a hard anti-abortion position this year. But in the past, he had been considerably more flexible. Opponents were quick to post video that highlighted the discrepancy on YouTube.com. The Romney campaign knew voters could easily find the negative video, so, as YouTube news director Steve Grove notes, they uploaded their own - positive - video.
GROVE: "And so when you search for Romney's position on abortion, yeah, you might see the piece of content that someone uploaded from the mid-1990s or something that denegrates or criticizes Romney's position, but you also see his. And so, that sort of listening and responding, that dialog that takes place online, is really I think the hallmark of campaigns that use this medium well."