Tuesday, August 4, 2009
Monday, August 3, 2009
Proposal
Sorry, forgot to post this last week when I finished it.
When I first began looking into Digital Democracy as a theme, I wanted to get down to how it really functions. What impact does the massive snowball increase in technology have on the ways we live our lives? Some of the basic questions surrounding technology involve our adaptation of it into our lives: communication, transportation, information, etc. However, the role which technology has taken in our interpersonal relations is one of the things that I was most interested in investigating.
For example, how does the use of the internet change our systems of behavior and interaction? I want to examine how our connections, primarily via the technology generated from the internet and computers, have changed when translated to the digital sphere. Social networking sites, online gaming, chat and fan sites: all of these things exist uniquely within our perception of the internet, and they each have their own codes of behavior. How does democracy adapt and exist within that shift?
My goal is to work with screen capture technology to create some mini-videos and still frames, along with my own narration, to look at these sorts of internet “meeting places” and find out how all of this has changed and developed. I’d like to investigate primarily the worlds of social networking (primarily via Facebook and Myspace), massively multiplayer online role playing games (by looking at posted videos of World of Warcraft and/or Halo), and the fan sites/discussion boards that have sprung up across the internet (mostly through some of the Harry Potter and Wheel of Time fan groups, along with a hefty dose of IMDB).
I would like to look at the communication processes between people in these various spheres of internet influence, and determine what role that digital influence has had. The various types of slang and acronyms that have sprung up are a great introductory example of what I am planning to look at; the world where these sorts of things exist isn’t exactly the one we are generally thought to inhabit on a day-to-day basis. The internet is a whole different world, to many users, and I want to pick at that phenomenon and look at how and why it works. Common practices here in the “real world” have an established precedent, and by attempting to remediate the original websites and information through my mini-video project, I’m hoping to hypermediate the whole thing in such a way as to look past the conventions we’ve come to take for granted when dealing with the internet.
In the end, the goal here is to examine the internet through a secondary lens of technology. By going in and looking at how behavior is determined as “OK” or “unacceptable”, I want to get back to the first conventions most of us ever dealt with when interacting with other people online. By utilizing different areas of contact between groups (n.b. the vast differences between Facebook and World of Warcraft), I am going to put us back into a learning frame of mind. And, hopefully, by observing that initial interaction, I’ll be able to use that to show the development of a digital democracy between users.
When I first began looking into Digital Democracy as a theme, I wanted to get down to how it really functions. What impact does the massive snowball increase in technology have on the ways we live our lives? Some of the basic questions surrounding technology involve our adaptation of it into our lives: communication, transportation, information, etc. However, the role which technology has taken in our interpersonal relations is one of the things that I was most interested in investigating.
For example, how does the use of the internet change our systems of behavior and interaction? I want to examine how our connections, primarily via the technology generated from the internet and computers, have changed when translated to the digital sphere. Social networking sites, online gaming, chat and fan sites: all of these things exist uniquely within our perception of the internet, and they each have their own codes of behavior. How does democracy adapt and exist within that shift?
My goal is to work with screen capture technology to create some mini-videos and still frames, along with my own narration, to look at these sorts of internet “meeting places” and find out how all of this has changed and developed. I’d like to investigate primarily the worlds of social networking (primarily via Facebook and Myspace), massively multiplayer online role playing games (by looking at posted videos of World of Warcraft and/or Halo), and the fan sites/discussion boards that have sprung up across the internet (mostly through some of the Harry Potter and Wheel of Time fan groups, along with a hefty dose of IMDB).
I would like to look at the communication processes between people in these various spheres of internet influence, and determine what role that digital influence has had. The various types of slang and acronyms that have sprung up are a great introductory example of what I am planning to look at; the world where these sorts of things exist isn’t exactly the one we are generally thought to inhabit on a day-to-day basis. The internet is a whole different world, to many users, and I want to pick at that phenomenon and look at how and why it works. Common practices here in the “real world” have an established precedent, and by attempting to remediate the original websites and information through my mini-video project, I’m hoping to hypermediate the whole thing in such a way as to look past the conventions we’ve come to take for granted when dealing with the internet.
In the end, the goal here is to examine the internet through a secondary lens of technology. By going in and looking at how behavior is determined as “OK” or “unacceptable”, I want to get back to the first conventions most of us ever dealt with when interacting with other people online. By utilizing different areas of contact between groups (n.b. the vast differences between Facebook and World of Warcraft), I am going to put us back into a learning frame of mind. And, hopefully, by observing that initial interaction, I’ll be able to use that to show the development of a digital democracy between users.
Monday, July 27, 2009
Interactive Media
Well, there are a bunch of things I like to mess with on a day-to-day basis, but the two biggest are probably these: Pandora, and Super Smash Bros.
Pandora is great for a variety of reasons. You get to design the station around something you know you already like, and, with uncanny accuracy, Pandora will find similar artists and music. Should you dislike something, you can ban it from the station, and it'll never be played again. Or, should you get tired of something, you can just temporarily ban a song or artist for a month or so. One of the biggest benefits to something like Pandora, though, is that it finds out what you like, and then searches out artists who have little-to-no recognition at the everyday level, so you're constantly finding new things to interest you.
Smash, on the other hand...well, I'd try to describe it, but the video just sums it up so damn well. That's my paragraph for that.
Pandora is great for a variety of reasons. You get to design the station around something you know you already like, and, with uncanny accuracy, Pandora will find similar artists and music. Should you dislike something, you can ban it from the station, and it'll never be played again. Or, should you get tired of something, you can just temporarily ban a song or artist for a month or so. One of the biggest benefits to something like Pandora, though, is that it finds out what you like, and then searches out artists who have little-to-no recognition at the everyday level, so you're constantly finding new things to interest you.
Smash, on the other hand...well, I'd try to describe it, but the video just sums it up so damn well. That's my paragraph for that.
Wednesday, July 22, 2009
Response to Crystal
Crystal's first question today is about the cultural impact of immediacy versus hypermediacy. I have to agree that the culture in which the context takes place is the most important part of how that is interpreted. Say that two separate cultures observe the same piece of art, created in the first culture (ie the Africans versus Westerners debate). Only by having a solid grasp of its context can you find a method to evaluate the art within its form of medium. The other culture, however, completely unaware of that art piece's context and meaning, is separated into the immediacy field, because there is no way for them to relate it back; it transcends its medium completely.
Questions Again
1. Do you really think that media must compete with other forms of media, or that they can indeed be isolated?
2. If any given medium must "economically" find its own niche, in order to become successful, then what does that mean for previous types of media? Does this even make sense, seeing as practically every type of media still abounds (not necessarily thriving) despite newer replacements?
3. The discussion of early photographers vs. artistry brings up an interesting point. Is any form of media (such as pictures) really that distinct? Wouldn't ever different use (art vs. documentation, for example) be a different form of media?
2. If any given medium must "economically" find its own niche, in order to become successful, then what does that mean for previous types of media? Does this even make sense, seeing as practically every type of media still abounds (not necessarily thriving) despite newer replacements?
3. The discussion of early photographers vs. artistry brings up an interesting point. Is any form of media (such as pictures) really that distinct? Wouldn't ever different use (art vs. documentation, for example) be a different form of media?
Tuesday, July 21, 2009
Response to Megan
Megan's final question today ponders the question of media's ability to stand alone. It would seem, to me, that whatever ends up being produced is THE media, whether it incorporates various types or not. Everything has its own little category, and making an assertion that it "requires" more types of media to be complete seems a little absurd. If that's the case, then everything is really a series of different media, because of the idea-creation-interpretation fallacy. Everything, under that thought process, is a variable form of media.
Questions
1. Do you think that everything, as produced, is inevitably a remediation? Because we're trying to create an image we see in our heads?
2. How do you think the rise of videogames, specifically the type mentioned in the reading (first-person adventure/explorations), have effected our perception of the forms of media?
3. Considering the current decline in print journalism, do you think it has fallen to a consumer-based rise in demand for such readily accessible media as video? What's your take on that difference in hypermedia?
2. How do you think the rise of videogames, specifically the type mentioned in the reading (first-person adventure/explorations), have effected our perception of the forms of media?
3. Considering the current decline in print journalism, do you think it has fallen to a consumer-based rise in demand for such readily accessible media as video? What's your take on that difference in hypermedia?
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