HISTORY OF BEFORE THE EARTH WAS FORMED

The big question

How did it all begin? That question has been asked and answered, in an infinite variety of creation stories, ever since human beings discovered speech. People have always felt certain of the answer, probably rather more certain than now. But then the answer in the past was provided by priests and by holy texts, easily trusted by believers.

Now it is delivered by scientists, whom we trust but find hard to believe.


Yet everyone in the past has been wrong, and we appear to be the first generation to stand a reasonable chance of being right. The turning point comes when the American astronomer Edwin Hubble is able to prove, in 1929, that the entire universe is expanding.

One possible explanation is that it began with a single mighty explosion and has been expanding ever since. It is predicted on a theoretical basis that if there was a Big Bang, echoes of it must still survive.

In 1965 faint background radiation of precisely this kind is discovered. That is the scientific evidence underpinning the statement that for the first time in history a creation theory stands a good chance of being correct.

Even so, the story which the scientists ask us to believe taxes the imagination more profoundly than any myth put about by the priests.

The first moment

The very first moment of the universe has seemed, in recent years, extraordinarily hard to pinpoint. In the late 1980s the conventional wisdom was that Big Bang occurred about 15 billion years ago. But evidence collected during the early 1990s by telescopes in orbit (Hubble and Hipparcos) seemed to reduce the universe's probable age to less than 10 billion years. Meanwhile other methods of analysis suggested that some stars are much older than this. The universe seemed in danger of being younger than its contents.

By the end of the decade more refined techniques and improved images from Hubble resolve the issue. Astronomers agree in placing Big Bang in the region of 13.7 billion years ago.

From the start things move fast. At that first moment all matter is in one speck, unimaginably hot and unimaginably tiny. The word million is more evocative than any string of noughts or powers of ten: the suggested temperature for that speck is a million million million million million million degrees Centigrade. It has a diameter of only a hundredth of a millimetre.

And there are more millions to grapple with. By the time a millionth of a second has passed, the primeval pinpoint has expanded into a seething mass of elementary particles occupying a space almost as large as our solar system. The priests never asked us to believe anything like this. But the evidence suggests that somehow or other we must.

From elements to galaxies

Tiny particles of matter (protons and neutrons) collide ceaselessly in the expanding cloud of chaos, and some of them merge to form the nuclei of hydrogen and helium. These exist by the end of the first three minutes, according to modern calculations, but it will be another 300,000 years before electrons combine with these nuclei to form hydrogen and helium atoms.

These atoms of hydrogen and helium are the first building blocks of the universe; with them, matter acquires enough density to become subject to the laws of gravity. And so the dense scalding fog of the expanding fireball becomes increasingly transparent, separating into cooler areas of space and hotter clusters of gaseous elements.

In these more localized infernos, matter begins to recover a fraction of its original density. The protons, neutrons and electrons, which in relatively simple combinations have formed hydrogen and helium atoms, now begin to merge in the more complex patterns of the other elements. From this developing gas, the galaxies coalesce.

The first galaxies are believed to have been formed between 1 and 3 billion years after Big Bang. They become self-contained gravitational systems, with the gas steadily pulling into tighter clumps to form individual stars. Even in our time many galaxies still contain much free-floating material which has yet to coalesce into stars.


Our solar system: about 4.6 billion years ago


In our own galaxy, the Milky Way, a star is formed about 4.6 billion years ago - about two thirds of the way through the story so far of the universe. It is the star which we know as the sun.

As its material contracts, many particles are left spinning freely round the central mass of the new star. It is these which coalesce to form the planets, including earth.



In our emerging solar system many smaller lumps of matter are also within the sun's gravitational field. Some of them, the asteroids (varying from a few millimetres to a kilometre and more in diameter), settle into orbit round the sun.

Larger bodies, such as our moon or the satellites of Jupiter, begin orbiting individual planets - as do the particles, varying in size from pebbles to rocks, which form the rings of Saturn.


Mercury, the nearest planet to the sun, has a daytime surface temperature of around 350° Centigrade - far too hot to support life. Pluto, the outermost planet, is believed to be covered in a blanket of ice some 150 miles thick.

By contrast the earth, third in distance from the sun, has the moderate temperature range with which we are all familiar. It is one, but only one, of the factors which make life on earth possible.

FACE BOOK (PROFILE)

An in-depth profile of Facebook, written by Mashable contributor Sid Yadav and edited by Pete Cashmore. Image credit: Bryan Veloso.

Facebook is the second largest social network on the web, behind only MySpace in terms of traffic. Primarily focused on high school to college students, Facebook has been gaining market share, and more significantly a supportive user base. Since their launch in February 2004, they’ve been able to obtain over 8 million users in the U.S. alone and expand worldwide to 7 other English-speaking countries, with more to follow. A growing phenomenon, let’s discover Facebook.

The Facebook Phenomenon

First, let’s start by looking into Facebook in a broad spectrum – as the network, the phenomenon, the company, and its brand.

History

Originally called thefacebook, Facebook was founded by former-Harvard student Mark Zuckerberg (while at Harvard) who ran it as one of his hobby projects with some financial help from Eduardo Saverin. Within months, Facebook and its core idea spread across the dorm rooms of Harvard where it was very well received. Soon enough, it was extended to Stanford and Yale where, like Harvard, it was widely endorsed.

Before he knew it, Mark Zuckerberg was joined by two other fellow Harvard-students – Dustin Moskovitz and Chris Hughes – to help him grow the site to the next level. Only months later when it was officially a national student network phenomenon, Zuckerberg and Moskovitz dropped out of Harvard to pursue their dreams and run Facebook full time. In August 2005, thefacebook was officially called Facebook and the domain facebook.com was purchased for a reported $200,000.

Availability

Unlike its competitors MySpace, Friendster, Xanga, hi5, Bebo, and others, Facebook isn’t available to everyone — which explains its relatively low user count. Currently, users must be members of one of the 30,000+ recognized schools, colleges, universities, organizations, and companies within the U.S, Canada, and other English-speaking nations. This generally involves having a valid e-mail ID with the associated institution.

Surveys & Studies

A large number of surveys and studies have been conducted around Facebook – some with interesting results. For instance, according to an internal September 2005 survey, approximately 85% of the students in the supported colleges had a Facebook account, with 60% of them logging in daily. A survey conducted by Student Monitor revealed Facebook was the most “in” thing after the iPod and tying with beer, and comScore Media Metrix discovered users spend approximately 20 minutes everyday on Facebook. Another 2005 survey said 90% of all undergraduates in the U.S. use either Facebook or MySpace regularly, and a detailed questionnaire analysis by Chris Roberts revealed that 76.2% never click on its ads. Perhaps the most amazing statistic of all may be that Facebook is the 7th most trafficked site in the U.S.

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Business & Funding

Given the situation other social networks on the web are facing, Facebook is in a good position financially. While it hasn’t managed to get acquired like its rival MySpace (despite some rumors about an $800m deal with Viacom), it’s been quite lucky in most aspects. For its initial funding, it received $500,000 from Peter Theil, co-founder of PayPal. A few months later, it was also able to get $13 million from Accel Partners, who are also investors in 15 other Web 2.0 startups, and $25 million from Greylock Partners, making their overall venture equal to approximately $40 million.

For users, Facebook’s core service is completely free and ad-supported. In fact, in August 2006 Facebook signed a three year deal with Microsoft to provide and sell ads on their site in return for a revenue split. The deal followed an announcement from Facebook’s direct competitor MySpace who signed a similar deal with Google. The youthful demographic that both the services attract is highly prized amongst advertisers and should return a good amount of revenue for both the services to stay alive – and profit. Another deal which made news in July was Facebook’s agreement with Apple to give away 10 million free iTunes samplers to Facebook users. A deal has also been signed to provide Facebook credit cards.

Lawsuits & Concerns

In its early days, Facebook faced an extremely threatening lawsuit from ConnectU, a very similar social network which – like Facebook – shares its roots back to Harvard, and as a result almost got shutdown. The founders of ConnectU alleged that Facebook’s founder Mark Zuckerberg stole source code while he was in their employment. Zuckerberg denied the allegation and the lawsuit was dismissed.

Facebook has also been host to other issues and concerns, especially in the privacy sector where its privacy policy states “Facebook also collects information about you from other sources, such as newspapers and instant messaging services. This information is gathered regardless of your use of the Web Site.” Another theory is that Facebook could also be a data-gathering project or if not, used extensively for these purposes. Facebook’s policy also states that it “may share your information with third parties, including responsible companies with which we have a relationship.”

The Service

Now, let’s look into Facebook – the service itself, and some of its features, highlights, and the things that got Facebook where it is today.

Facebook Profiles

As Facebook has evolved, so have its profile pages – new fields have been added and users can share more information than before.

A typical Facebook profile consists of a number of different sections, including Information, Status, Friends, Friends in Other Networks, Photos, Notes, Groups, and The Wall. Most of the sections are self-explanatory but some are specific to Facebook.

Facebook Photos

With over 1.5 million photos uploaded daily, one of Facebook’s most popular features has been the ability to upload photos. Users can upload unlimited photos from their cell phone or through its Java-based web interface. Facebook is one of the few services to offer an unlimited quota with their only restriction being a 60-photos-per-album limit – this is much appreciated by Facebook’s college demographic.

The process of uploading photos is very simple. Users create albums which they can assign limitations to (e.g. visible to my friends only) and upload photos within them. The album is then put into their profile, and other users with right credentials have the ability to see and comment on them. Facebook also gives the feature to share the photos with a simple web link or send them via AIM or by e-mail. What’s more, users can also order prints online through a simple integrated interface.

Facebook Groups

Just like every other social network, Facebook has something called ‘groups.’ Users can create new ones or join and participate in existing ones. This is also displayed in their profile and is a good indication of hobbies and interests a person might have.

There are two kind of groups, a normal group and a secret group, which isn’t shown on the profile. A normal group is just like any other, but users can also create and invite others into secret groups. These can be used for collaborating on university projects, and provide a way to have closed discussions. About 80% of the groups are ‘fun-related’ and companies can even sponsor groups – as is the case with, for example, the Apple users group.

Facebook Events

Another Facebook success is their ‘events’ feature, which provides the ability to organize, be part of, and plan for events. This feature has been extremely successful when it comes to organizing parties.

Along with organizing and joining events, users can also invite and recommend others to an event. This feature, however, has raised some controversy as it is generally the start of underage drinking and dry campus violations. Colleges and universities use the feature to catch planning of such events before hand and investigate those that are over. In any case, it’s one of the most popular features of the service and even beats some of the competing products made specifically for this purpose.

Facebook Developers

As of August 2006, Facebook has offered a free Developers API called Facebook Developers. This essentially gives anyone access to Facebook’s internals and lets programmers create widgets, mashups, tools and projects based around Facebook.

This is an important feature for Facebook since it makes it the first major social network to give access to its API. Although it is limited to 100,000 requests a day, it’s more than enough for a decent web app to come through. What’s more, a selection of applications have already been created. FaceBank is a promising tool which lets you ‘keep track of depts and shared expenses with friends.’ Another interesting application is lickuacious which lets you ‘rank your friends by wall popularity.’ The Wall, of course, is Facebook’s comments feature.

Facebook Notes

Facebook’s most recent addition launched in late August. The service is called Facebook Notes, and allows users to write a Facebook blog. All notes are displayed in the user’s profile, and other members can add comments.

Notes possesses an important feature, which is the ability to import and syndicate an external blog, although unlike Technorati, doesn’t allow you to claim one only to yourself (e.g. it’s possible to claim the New York Times syndication feed easily in one’s Notes). The service allows HTML to be included in the posts, although JavaScript and Flash are disabled. You can attach photos and also post via cell phone by sending your notes to notes@facebook.com. Another interesting feature is tagging – tagging a post with a username will automatically send it to that specific user. The Notes feature has been well received.



The Future

Facebook is a massively successful social networking service that grew to prominence in virtually no time. It’s not hard to see why: its features and tools are highly appealing, and Facebook users are extremely well networked in real life. Rumors of an acquisition continue to circulate, with some estimates putting the price in the billions of dollars. In the short term, however, Facebook plans to go it alone, continuing to build out one of the world’s most successful social networks.

Computer Radiation

Studies show that long-term exposure to radiation increases the risk of all forms of cancer, tumors, blood disorders, miscarriage, headaches, insomnia, anxiety, aging of the skin, skin burn, etc.

Radiation exposure over time can cause skin burn, dry wrinkled skin and photo aging. This skin damage is identical to sun damage and causes the same health problems. Many electronic products that we use on a daily basis expose us to harmful radiation.

A television, microwave oven, cellular phone and computer are examples of products that emit radiation. To preserve your health use electronic products carefully, in ways that shield your body from radiation.

Computer radiation is most harmful to skin health because we sit directly in front of the computer for long periods of time with our face absorbing the radiation. Lessening this type of harmful radiation is important.

Computer radiation can make you feel sick and burn your skin. Most people are not aware of this, and continue to suffer with ill health they have no explanation for. They do not realize sometimes ill health is related to computer use.

Using a laptop or LCD does not exclude you from the negative health affects of computer radiation. All computer monitors emit low levels of radiation. Laptops and LCD monitors emit less radiation than the old-fashioned CRT monitors. However, all monitors emit enough radiation to affect your health and appearance.

A healthy solution is to use a computer accessory called a radiation filter. This product will eliminate 94-99% of the harmful radiation emitted from your computer screen. Radiation filters are available for all types of computer monitors, and they work well to protect you from radiation.

It is also helpful to move the processor tower as far away from your body as possible. This will reduce radiation that could reach and affect your body.

The negative health effects of computer radiation are a well-known topic. There is much research on the web that explains its health hazards. But unfortunately, it is also a much avoided subject. Most people do not realize the harm that radiation can cause to the human body, even at low levels. It is also not a widely advertised problem because it would negatively affect industry and the economy as a whole.

By law, there are basic health and safety requirements that manufacturers must meet for electronic products. Many manufacturers today are improving products to emit less radiation, and great technological improvements have been made in the last five years alone. Be health smart and research any electronic product before you buy to make sure it emits low radiation.

Most industry standard computer monitors do comply with low radiation guidelines. However, low radiation does not mean zero radiation. Computer radiation levels are still allowed to be high enough to cause health problems.

It is very important to use products that emit low radiation, and shield radiation emissions. Following this simple advice can help to preserve your health and well being.