User:Emeraldfirehorse

Learning, laughing, loving -- my goal is to fill each day with as much of all three of these activities as I possibly can. I'm a huge fan of Wikipedia as a partner for learning. It facilitates what I believe to be the best kind of learning: self-directed. By enabling self-directed learning, Wikipedia helps fulfill the promise of the internet and computers themselves. What Edward R. Murrow said about television roughly fifty years ago is very much true of the internet and computers today: "This instrument can teach, it can illuminate; yes, and it can even inspire, but it can do so only to the extent that humans are determined to use it to those ends. Otherwise it is merely wires and lights in a box."

The fact that Wikipedia is so widely used -- and growing in popularity -- gives me no small degree of hope that many of us plan to use the box in front of us for learning. My day job is as a business analyst in the field of software development for electronic commerce applications, primarily for the food industry. Some of my personal interests are:  Music (especially acid jazz, jazz, hip hop music, swing music and heavy metal music) Mandarin Chinese Motorcycles (mine: 2007 Kawasaki Ninja ZX-14 Special Edition - white with flame decals removed) Mopar muscle car restoration (mine: 1970 Dodge Challenger) Alternative Energy Nutrition 