Viva la Vida what?

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Before I start, I would like to make two preliminary statements:

- I don't listen to Coldplay very much so I don't know exactly the style of their songs and the themes they usually deal with;
- I love to sing songs in foreign languages and I usually pay more attention to their words than to what they are saying. Moreover, when I listen to them for the first time, I like to guess their meaning from the melody and from the words I can catch immediately.

I know the text is very important, but let's admit it, there are many songs which seem sooo nice and deep and reveal to be soooo stupid when you read their lyric carefully!

Just to give an example: When I was younger, I adored Lemon Tree by Fool's Garden. I literally went mad when I listened to it. The text was quite easy to understand, their pronunciation was very clear (they are German), but let's check the lyric...Maybe I still don't understand its allegories or the metaphor of this lemon tree (if there is a metaphor), who knows, but when I understood it was just a song to relax and have fun... I don't know..Well, I still dance like Hawaiians and I sing when the radio broadcast it but..it will never be the same. Tears ;(

(now I have to write a note. While I was writing these words, I looked for the lyric in order to put it as a link but...guess what?I found an explanation!Ohhhhh, it' sooo sad!It talks about depression..maybe.I don't know if it's the right interpretation, the melody seems too happy to me, anyway..If you listened to it without knowing its real meaning, have a look at it. It is a rediscovery to me ;)

Ok, since the last example was wrong I think about songs by Las Ketchup or the man who sang "Chihuahua". But who knows, maybe they are methapors, too...mistery!

Well..maybe I talked too much..let's dwell on Viva la Vida..I read the text carefully and I the first sensation I got was that it talks about Geroge W. Bush. There are many references which made me think it:

- Since the first line, when he says I used to rule the world..the president of USA actually rules the world, its power is enormous. Bush started his career being acclaimed but soon he revealed not to be up to his task (and this can be related also to the statement there was never an honest word..the first thing that flashed into my mind was that he used the weapons of mass destruction as an excuse to make war on Iraq);

- Be my mirror, my sword and shield can be an incitement to its people. Maybe he wants them to follow his rules and reflect his ideologies (mirror), to fight for his/their opinions (sword), to protect their country (shield) and to spread the American culture, for example when America wanted to teach the ideals of democracy to the Middle East (be my missionaries in a foreign field);

- People couldn't believe what I'd become, because he disappointed Americans'expectations. For this reason, he can say revolutionaries wait for my head on a silver plate (they can be American people or some leaders of Middle East countries);

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In conclusion I don't know if it's the right interpretation, anyway I think the text dwells upon power and its abuse, which can be perpetrated by religious institutions or politicians. I don't believe it talks about Satan or love because he makes references to history (Roman Cavalry), religion (Jerusalem bells, missionaries), politics (revolutionaries), which make me think about more prosaic themes.

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Image taken from flickr, from kiwi_GaL and anniebee

Coming to a conclusion...

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This is the last post...it's so sad..mmm...naaaaaah!:)
Before talking about my personal learning environment, I would like to say something about this last year of English. Even if my English is still not perfect, I realized that blogs, wikipages and the exchange with the American guys helped me to improve it so much, to the point that I really see differences between the things I wrote last year and what I wrote in the last few months.
I think that the use of computer, its technology and Internet made the learning process more interesting and spontaneous, and gave me many tools to work with, like Google Scholar and Del.icio.us.
I appreciated the possibility to have a blog written in another language, I think that I will keep it but maybe I will talk about my interests and I will put the things I like the most.

Network security

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Wow, the topic of this week is information security!Very good!

Let's start by saying that, thanks to this task, I learned a couple of interesting things about hackers:

• first of all, it is curious to know that when we talk about hackers, we are not referring only to people who commit information crimes (the right term to define them is crackers). Anyway, nowadays everybody means that. Originally, the verb 'to hack' meant 'to mess about';

• ok, we usually know that a hacker does illegal things...but did you know that he can be divided in two great categories? He can be a black hat or a white hat. The first one uses his knowledge to get a personal advantage. He creates and sends virus, trojan horses, he penetrates into private systems..in short, he gets people into trouble. The second one uses his competences in order to test security and for this reason he is called ethical hacker. Then there is the grey hat, too, that is the ambiguous one;

• there is a hacker ethic, which focuses on sharing and openness. I like the idea that, at the bottom of this ethic, there is the consideration Computers can change your life for the better.

Internet can be dangerous if you use it ingenuously (sometimes, even if you don't do it). There are a lot of bad things which can happen to your pc and that can undermine your privacy. Anyway, in my opinion, the idea to avoid internet is inconceivable. Willy-nilly, it has become an essential part of our life. It's a great power, and, as all the great powers, it can have its light and shave. Sometimes it is wielded with bad consequences: it's the price to pay.

The only thing we can do is be responsible when we use it and try to protect ourself using firewall and antivirus. And hope everything goes well!

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If you want to know more:

• Hackers breach UC Berkeley computer database .Recently, students' personal information like Social Security numbers and personal medical records were breached..this in an example of crackers;
• Top 10 most famous hackers of all time, if you want to know what they did and how they overcame it ;)

There is something about Google Docs

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I never heard about Google Docs before but I rember that once I heard talking about something similar during an exam. The professor asked me to list all the different possibilities to save information so as to read them even when I wasn’t at home. The only possibility which I didn’t mention (and probably the only one he wanted to know from me) was represented by the use of online programs which allow you to edit and save documents in some servers. Google Docs is one of them.

I’m still newly-fledged with it but I can see immediately its strong points:
- everything you write is saved automatically, so that you are safe from pc failure and oversight;
- if you want, you can share your documents with other users, which can edit your text as well;
- you can see all the changes you or they made by looking at its history (like on wiki);
- you can write a piece of text online and then save it in your pc choosing the format you prefer, even PDF.

Personally, I find it really useful. My internet connection speed is very slow at home, so I usually go to the lab of university in order to work online. I use to save my search on a pen drive but, up to now, I lost as many as three of them (and everyone had pictures of me and my friends :S ). As matters stand, I think I will use this tool soooo much!