A Kick Start..not rlly?

Alright, Thanksgiving had passed and it's time to get back on TRACK! So from last week, the talk with my lab professor cleared most of the things up. What I need now are more terms, quotes, and other materials that is mainly text based or image-based (only usable with links that lead OUT to the image).

One of the definition she told me check up on was: intermediation. According to the FACS2930 wiki of keywords, it says "To occur between two extremes, or faciliate the transfer between those two extremes." Also, another definition that is related to technology (given by Derek G. in the wiki) would be, "As this relates to technology, 'intermediation' would be the role of the computer as the person interfaces with the software, and data on the internet. The GUI intermediates between the user and the magnetic data stored on the hard-drive, so they can come to a common level of understanding.

Similarly, the web browser intermediates between the code (HTML, XHTML, Java, Perl...) and the user to reach a middle ground that they both have the 'code' to understand; the visual website."

From this, I approached Derek about his definition and asked if he could explain it a bit more. He said that intermediation is like the middle of me and the hard drive. In other words, the interface is like an intermedation that let's me see the hard drive in a visual way. Or like even talking about internet-wise, it's like having an extra plugin for Firefox let's say to show the websites the way you want. ie: with a different background or text for every website you open.

If I use this idea with the hacking of interfaces to what the user wants to see it could get me somewhere bigger. Yet...at the same time it doesn't really make me go broader to what I need to find information about. All I know now is that the intermediation of the computer and I is the interface. In this term, I would be talking about the GUI (Graphical User Interface) and how people would try to resource hack it to change visual. Since it's a GUI, it should allow the user to choose how it looks like instead of restricting the user from changing it. However, Microsoft/Apple tend to put up a mini security so that the files would not likely be changed.

I feel like I'm just going around and around with ideas and information...instead of actually getting somewhere. What to do...