Today is Day 11 and it is bittersweet since it is our last day abroad, but it was also my birthday! We first spent the day at University of Nicosia for the second time and attended lectures. The first one was given by Dr. Trihinas who gave us an introduction and overview of data science. He explained that the internet initially involved connecting many computers together, but with the addition of lots of smart devices the internet now connects all of these “things”. He told us a lot of interesting facts about the internet such as the reason it is fast and slow is because of Netflix. It is slow because Netflix saturates many channels of the internet in order to have its content viewable to its customers. Netflix also made the internet fast because of their customers have standards and expectations. He also gave us interesting facts about 5 of the largest companies. Netflix is the largest TV provider, but they don’t have any cables. Uber is the largest transportation service company but they don’t own any vehicles just like Airbnb doesn’t own any real estate but they are the largest home rental company. Facebook is the largest social media platform but they don’t have any content just like Instagram is the largest photo sharing platform but they don’t sell any cameras. I found his presentation very engaging and interesting to listen to. He also talked about machine learning which was interesting because I wondered how AI programs were created and developed. I always found it really fascinating that we live in a society now where we can essentially have a conversation with a computer and it learns and can give us personalized feedback. I wondered how humans could program computers to be able to learn from its user.

The second lecture we attended today was given by CEO Polemitis who is the CEO of the University of Nicosia. Since UNic was the first university in the whole world to create a crypto and block chain course in 2013, CEO Polemitris gave us an overview of blockchain and databases. He explained that the world is full of data bases which are all own by private companies and have an administer. In order for us to understand what he meant by this he gave us an analogy involving taxis in NYC and Uber and Lyft. Prior to Uber and Lyft being invented, any person could hail down a taxi and get a ride to wherever they wanted around town. It would have been very difficult to instruct all taxi’s to not let a specific person get a taxi. Since Uber and Lyft are on a database with an administrator, that administrator controls who the system approves and doesn’t. So if there is a person that Uber believes should not be allowed to use their service they can easily flag the person in their data base. This is true for all other websites including banks, shopping websites, food, etc. There is a database that keeps track of all user’s information and if someone should not be allowed to use the companies platform they can go in and remove or flag the person. Basically there is someone in charge of monitoring the information. Now with blockchain, it is still a database but there isn’t an administrator. CEO Polemitis tried to simplify the concept and say that blockchain gives users a platform that is considered public instead of private so that no one can tell them they can not do something. The idea is similar to no one can say that someone can’t walk down the street since its public, but a company could tell someone to get off their property since its private.

We got back to the hotel around 1:30 pm and had free time until our farewell dinner at 7. I spent the afternoon first getting lunch at a local Cypriot restaurant called Furen with a group of my friends. I got a wrap that had turkey, lettuce, tomato, pickles, and honey mustard. It was super good and I wish I could go back again before we leave but unfortunately that is not possible. I then did some shopping and then headed back to the hotel to start my efforts in packing and then decided to take a nap before getting ready for dinner. We then went to a Cypriot tavern for dinner where we had a meze which is typically a 14 course meal served family style. I sat next to our tour guide we had for the week, Dimitra who told many stories about her life and time in Cyprus. I was then surprised with a cake which was super delicious. I had a lot of fun today and I am going to miss everyone on this trip and all of the friendships I have made. I can’t wait to reunite with them back at school in the fall!