you thought i was done...

forgot to give ya my project site:

pages.pomona.edu/~csj02003

guess ya know who i am now.

-wild c 15

it's over!?! =) =( =)

alright, alright. so this is the last blog, and i'm finally gonna do everything i've wanted to do with this blog all semester, but didn't think i could. i'm gonna forget capital letters, i'm gonna write words like "gonna," and i might even intntionally missssspell a word or to. wow! that feels awesome!!! ok, so this entire semester i took the blog completely seriously. i would write a standard one-page, single-spaced reading response in Word, and copy and paste it on blogger. it was time-consuming, tedious, and completely ungratifying because i got NO feedback on the the quality of my thoughts or writing style. because writing this blogs, which more than once turned out to be 4-page essays, took me so long, it wasn't until waaaaay into the semester that i finally made time to start looking at everyone else's blogs, and i was stunned...for a couple reasons. first thought: jealousy. their posts were like journals, like unplanned, free-flowing thoughts, like a discussion. they were fun to read and had interesting references to applications that pple actually go to on the web. THAT is something i am really interested in because i know so little about it. sometimes i feel completely out of the loop with all this new media stuff because i've never done livejournal or xanga. before this class, i never wrote a blog or "stepped" into a chat room or knew about online comics or thought video games had any redeeming value besdies (oh yeah! i am sooo leaving that type-o!) developing hand-eye coordination, and i even thought that was a lame reward--try basketball!

so, anyways, after being jealous, and then being interested, i then became curious: could i write like that, too? are they disobeying the instructions? did i not understand the instructions? from the first day of class i remember hearing that one blog is supposed to be a reading response, and one general thoughts. when i took KF's intro class my frosh year, i worked my A** (can i actually say it?) off with those reading responses. the grade was out of 10 points, and i aimed for that 10 like there was no tomorrow. i'm not a complete grade-grubber, but the cool thing about KF's grading was that, in general, i felt i totally earned every grade i got. so a 10 meant that i was writing to my potential. coming into this class, i thought blogging would be no different. write it in word and post in online. simple. ok, so i know nothing about online social culture. not getting feedback left me unmotivated; why should i devote so much time to creating a (at least in mind) perfectly shaped piece of writing if no one's gonna read it?? that has been confusing me the whole class--what's important? when is a blog NOT good or a project idea NOT developed enough? yeah, i'll write for me; it's not jsut(<--oh yeah!) for the class. and honestly when i did sit down and write those four-page essays on wikipedia or virtual reality in the movie vanilla sky and did that research to find out that cryogenic freezing actually does exist and when i started taking the freedom of the blog to comment on how i wanted to use new media and how i was finally starting to see it in sites i was using, like the pomona website, something as standard as that--when all of this happened, i did have a good time and learning was fun and invigorating.

as i have come to realize that there is virtually no restrictions to these blogs except for the fact that they have to actually be here and have at least something to do with the reading, i have really had to think about the value of traditional assignments or lack thereof and the restrictions of expression or likelihood of the assignment getting done and being a polished piece that everyone can read...they say that the internet gives pple a voice, but it can almost seem liek (<--that's rgiht!<--doubel<--triple time!!!) the opposite. when i write on assignment on paper, i know at least someone is gonna read it and really consider it--the teacher. i also know that i will keep it and perhaps reference it later in the year, during another semester or even after college. i do that sometimes with elementary school stuff. if you put your heart into something and really grow in the process of doing it, you want to remember it and you want at least SOMEBODY to validate it, to validate you and who you are and what you are trying to become. so then, the internet is like throwing a letter in a bottle into the ocean--it might seem romantic--because potentially aaaannybody could read it--but realistically, your ideas are lost to the world. it's largely symbolic, and it's largely for the cathartic purposes of the actor. and right now, that is what this blog is for me. i really don't think anyone is gonna read it, and even if you do, i don't think you're going to read up to here. (if someone does, please send a reply blog to me, and i will take you out to lunch in the village--seriously.) anyways, this blog about blogging has actually been excellent for me to just say practically everything i wanted to say about this course and my frustrations and my excitements.

to start summing up:

• i Y stream-of-consciousness writing!!!! and the subtle yet exhiar(<--eee!) lating feel of not capitalizing things and not worrying about strucutre and if this sentence says exactly what i want it to to fit into this paragraph to fit into this argument to prove this one point. i cannot believe that it took me this long to realize that i could do this for this class!

abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz

ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVW X YZ

A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

• my g r a d u a l transition b P from formal F reading response to this J , my first post NOT r written in word first, my first post WITH grammatical errors (at least on purpose)--this progression has been really interesting. i think i have been able to appreciate the readings whichever way i write, but i lament the fact that i did not interact more with the rest of teh class. i was too busy doing the student thing--the i'm-gonna-write-the-best-paper-ever thing. !fp!! (stressful) that's sooooooo restricting.
• I Y blogging at PO! now that i'm finally reading other people's blogs, i love it! i mean, it's like i'm getting letters written to me, like i'm having a "fireside chat" as they advertised in the digester the other day (it was in harwood, did anyone go?). it's like the intellectual student-student exchange you come to college for, but on your own time, and actually FOR class!! i have sorta looked into a couple of chat rooms/blogs, and they seem so pointless--writing stuff you don't have time to write, about stuff you probably don't care that much about, to pple who probably (and understandably) don't care about you or have very much in common with you other than boredom. but *THIS* is somehow better. even though i don't think anybody's gonna read this, i just feeeel like i saying something in a community that feels like home, in a place that, if pple do read this, they might actually think it means something, they might actually care and some sort of interaction might actually come about because of it. or maybe not, cuz of the whole anonymity thing. but you never know. you're gonna have to tell me where to meet you, if you want that free lunch in the village-haha! but, yeah, so i'm thinking of the movie you've got mail (which is awesome by the way, as far as msuhy- ["msuhy" looks so much mushy-er than "mushy"] romantic-comedies-that-can-potentially-say-something-moving-about-society go). in that movie, meg ryan and tom hanks have these meaningful exchanges with an anonymous person. although i have no tom hanks/meg ryan, i feel listened to. (i wonder what social networking deal they used??)

IN CONCLUSION i just want to say a silent thank you to you all. i guess why i'm feeling this blog, and can't feel common public blogs is that whole thing about "imagined community"; it's something intangible that makes communication worthwhile, not so much the F2F (face-to-face). i have really enjoyed being in class with all of you and talking to you and making lots of new friends who regrettably are mostly soon-to-be-departing seniors. i luved the final projects; being a recent media studies fan, i can sorta see what i want to learn now, to be able to do some of what y'all did. it's funny. just writing this blog--my first one not originally on Word--makes such a difference. the internet interface, the feeling of writing to friends and not just a teacher (no offense, if you're reading this KF), the ability to mess with all the the webdings fonts...it's pretty awesome. and different. i'm looking around and there's some cool html-tab things that i wish i had looked into a little earlier this semester. maybe i could've made the webdings sing and dance for y'all--lol! =) maybe if we take digital art together next semester... ok-enough is enough! i'm going to bed! peace out! much luv, and hopefully i'll see you all around. say hi!

wild c 15

as pple say ] :

onward 48 and upward 5!!

fun game if you have time (and are bored and playfully creative)now or during winter break.

Make a story/poem from these random webdings. mine's underneath. it's a very freudian thing to do, and it's funny what you end up saying. merry christmas/happy hannukkah/go kwanza--ok, just have a nice break, you pluralistic society, you! con carino and mahal

~@&BUH:CXTR#$9853whinfsd

like thunder we work with tools and win medals and blah blah and then go home. fast forward, and we're climbing a pyramid that is life and it's like a megaphone is shouting at us and blah blah-danger! railroad tracks! where did that come from? oh well, such is life. what? does that say no alcohol? not sure, i'll just ignore it, lookin cool in my sunglasses. oops! i need to rewind--should've paid attention to the no alcohol sign. ok, fast forward again. there are ups and downs in life and we aim for a certain sweet spot, the hole-in-one feel. sometimes there are troubles (siren!) it's all about figuring out the "i"--where do i fit in this big dark circle-thing (i mean earth). there's a train call. should i stop writing? yeah, it's the po-po; better go to sleep before i get into (more) trouble.

Destroying Hierarchy?

Tags can be seen as a democratizing aspect of the web, because, as Mathes reveals, they require no training in the way that professionally-generated metadata does. Nor do they follow logic in the way that a semantic web built on syllogisms would effect (as described by Shirky.) Tags are clearly more simplified methods of categorizing, utilizing keywords to sort by association, not hierarchy. But the question must be asked: What are we losing in this simplification?

Ong discusses a related comparison between two versions of the Genesis story. One version is from 1610, when there was oral culture still lingered; it had nine introductory “ands” (37). The second version from 1970 has two introductory “ands,” as well as other words, like “when,” “then,” “thus,” and “while.” Ong says that this shows the additive nature of oral culture, as opposed to the subordinative (or hierarchical) structure of chirographic culture. Because chirographic culture seems to be progress, it seems that hierarchical thinking should also be considered progress. Yet, tags seem to be destroying that type of thinking by emphasizing keywords. Are we reverting back to a simpler thought process? Are we making ourselves stupid?

The answer is not so simple. It must be mentioned that there is order in tags. For example, the PageRank algorithm employed by Google follows an intellectually sophisticated mathematical formula. The user enters a keyword (the tag), and results pop up. However, it is not the user who does the tagging; it is the algorithm. This form of tagging requires the increased intelligence of a few programmers, for the increased ease (i.e., allowed/encouraged laziness) of many. Additionally, the elaborate associative webs and visualizations created by Manovich and certain websites to display associate relationships show the detail behind associative thinking; yet, like with Google’s algorithm, just because there is detail in association, it does not mean that users of associative searching have to do that thinking; the machine, the machine’s programmers, and the inquisitive media theorists who create visualizations do it for them. Tagging (such as that employed by Google) does allow for less thought-intensive information searches, which some may argue breeds laziness, while others may argue that it gives more time for people to pursue new thoughts.

That last point is consistent with the idea that technological determinism is not true. However, technology does influence. McLuhan’s famous adage—“the medium is the message”—eludes to this. The medium of search engines like Google that tag information, as well as tags that users explicitly create, do deter one from hierarchical, or structured thinking. This must be acknowledged to guard against it.

(For more thoughts on associative thinking, refer to my 10/9/05 post entitled “Hypertext: Digression or Progession?”. Hypertext is what enables tags.)

Amazon, E-mail Contacts, and CTRL + F: Tagging Predecessors

While reading about del.icio.us on Mathes’s “Folksonomies,” I kept thinking about similar programs. The main one was the “favorites” function on Internet Explorer (as well as many other browsers.) This function allows the user to add web pages and categorize them. It wasn’t until the sharing function of del.icio.us was described that I understood the full implication of this application. As a piece of social software, it connects users, in this case with the benefits of viewing websites that other users who connected to the site you are currently visiting, also visit. It is a sort of recommendation system based on actual viewing patterns, as opposed to advertising.

A useful comparison is with another predecessor, Amazon.com’s customer reviews; according to Mathes, these customer reviews are an “integral aspect of online commerce [that leverage] consumer created metadata to create sites that are far more informative than comparable commercial sites.” Honest, uncensored, consumer input is a significant alternative to advertisements; it oftentimes gives both good and bad outlooks, so potential buyers will really know what to expect. Del.icio.us is similarly beneficial, offering an option other than Google, with its limitations, for finding information that others found helpful.

Going back to even further predecessors of tags in general, I thought of e-mail contact functions, such as those found on Microsoft Outlook Web Access, Pomona’s e-mail center. To make this comparison, I find it necessary to first present a definition of what a tag is; Mathes describes tags as “keywords…[that] allow users to describe and organize content with any vocabulary they choose.” Essentially it is a label for grouping. Similarly, Outlook enables one to create contact groups, whereby independently existing contacts can be included in a list; when that list is entered under “to,” everyone in the group is sent the e-mail. The label is a tag that organizes content (e-mails), and it can be anything the user wants it to be, from the standard “PDAC mailing list” to the random “people who like junk mail.” Outlook’s contact features clearly fit the “tag” description.

One final predecessor is the “find” function (control + F) of a typical computer. It utilizes the user-specified keyword to organize all relevant sections of the document in which that word or phrase is found. (Actually, it just hilights the word where it appears in the text, which still serves the purpose of organizing. A similar function can also be found on Amazon.com where the customer can search inside the given book to find all sections which include a given keyword.) The find function makes the actual content the label, the tag. Its limitations are that it is limited to the document it is in, and the keywords are not completely at the user’s discretion; only keywords that are found in the text will yield any relevant sections.

Quit Playing Around!

Wow! There is so much talk, especially at Pomona, about institutional inequality, yet I never really thought that applied to the Internet. Like so many other users, I saw the Internet as a very open and democratic forum, perhaps with the exception to those who do not have access to a computer. Nakamura explains the demographics of the Internet, that most users are “white, male, highly educated, and middle class” (2). For this reason, many sites are ethnocentrically structured, and “in the absence of racial description, all [users] are assumed to be white” (Nakamura 2). All three of the authors discuss this whitewashing, pointing out that it is the result of an ironically PC attempt to create harmony through avoiding divisive issues, supposedly granting equal freedom to every user. This inevitably strengthens the idea of a norm, which supports the dominance of the majority: white middle class males.

Other clues of the ethnocentric nature of the Internet exist. The designation of English as the prime language of the Internet (Gómez-Peña 5) clearly gives easier access to those who speak English. Additionally, “the theoretical vocabulary utilized by critics was hyper-specialized…and de-politicized (post colonial theory and the border paradigm were conveniently overlooked)” (Gómez-Peña 5). Favoritism is shown toward the technologically adept (which typically means those who are highly educated, usually meaning financially stable and most likely white and male), and progressive theory about diversity is notably absent, just as is the discussion of race.

I think it is a common problem to not see the realities of injustice because we are so enmeshed in that reality; it is difficult to view it as an outsider would. But this outside perspective is crucial if we are to make the Internet the democratic forum that it has the potential to be. Gómez-Peña calls for increased political discussion in Internet discourse and a social justice application, bringing Internet technology to expand the world of disadvantaged children. Nakamura seconds the idea for continued race discourse in the face of opposition. McPherson ponders the ramifications of viewing the Internet as a form of political expression and development, as opposed to a playground, countering the American tendency to place more value (at least monetarily) on entertainment than as intellectual progress and societal equity. The Internet (including artistic forums, Dixie-Net, and LambdaMoo) is a tool. How do we want to use it?

** side note: I found this instructional on how to start up with LambdaMOO. It also gives a brief summary of what MUD’s and MOO’s are, which I found helpful. However, I don’t know if it would be worth it to join this demonsratedly racist/sexist group. Maybe just for exploration and experimentation.
http://www.cc.gatech.edu/classes/AY2001/cs6470_fall/lambda.html

Quick Thought: Media Redefining Success

I was struck by Bell’s discussion of how we are defined by the medium through which we are viewed. This at first shocked me, because I do not feel I have the technical prowess to express myself and who I feel I am on-line. I then thought about where I can adeptly express myself, such as in writing and talking. This relates back to Ong and the parallels between the changes computers are effecting with the changes that the introduction of other technologies have effected. I realize that maybe some people do not feel as comfortable as I do with speaking and writing, and they are better with computers or art, photography, etc. This is a decentralizing thought for me, because I have always thought that I was mastering the skills of life because I was succeeding in school. When you realize that what you learned in school isn’t all that you need for life, that’s confusing. The introduction of “new” media as integral to success in today’s world may give more power to those who are not naturally talented in traditional forms of expression. In this way, media is democratizing, because it allows for the increased value of various abilities, incorporating more types of people into the categorization of successful. Whose talents are valued? Whose esteem is affected? Media changes these fundamental perceptions of individuals in society.

Internet: The Realm of the Mind

Anderson suggests that nations are “imagined communities.” Weeks proposes the need ton see identities as “necessary fictions.” And Bell argues that current modes of thinking cause “a progressive eroding of this stable, unified, essential view of the self.” All of these seem to suggest that identity is a social construction, which was created by humans and thus can be destroyed and refigured by humans. Though this is destabilizing, it is also empowering. I think it permits for broader interpretations of community and personal identity, which should theoretically lead to a greater milieu of tolerance in society. However, the majority of people do not wholly espouse (or even know about) these new postmodern, constructionist views.

Scholar bell hooks says that just because something is a lie does not mean it isn’t real, and I think that is true for all social constructions. We make them real and define our own reality. These constructions in RL are influenced by the physical context in which they exist. For example, the constructions of oppressive stereotypes are both less likely and more likely to result in offensive action. In RL, aggressors can physically harm a counter-normative person, although they cannot do so in many places due to policing and criminal law. On-line structural abuse, portrayal, and discrimination through such procedures as flaming are much easier to effect than RL discrimination, because of the paucity of Internet rules, as well as because of the anonymity that disinhibits users from the respect they are taught to show (or at least feign) toward others in public; however, it is significant that physical violence is not possible. Regardless of the type of discrimination, prejudice is still a part of the Internet culture.

Another problematic aspect of culture is the excessive stereotyping of women and queers. Disembodiment does not erase stereotypes, but instead leaves the mind free to envision stereotypes as an actuality for lack of a real picture. This stereotype becomes sort of real to the person holding it.

What I am driving at in this response is simply to say that the Internet is the realm of the mind. There aren’t the physical limitations of the body. Stereotypes can run rampant if the user lets them. Thoughts are often rude due to anonymity. The Internet is the uncensored mind, with all its potential for good and bad.

(** Side reference: In the movie/book Sphere, by Michael Crichton, I believe, this issue is addressed. If people had the power to make anything they thought a reality, is it worth it? It gives one so much power, but as humans, we may not be able to responsibly handle that power, making it deadly. On a lesser level, the Internet gives more weight to the mind to create the kind of world with the kind of social codes and forms of identity that it wants, regardless of what the social reality or their personal identity is. This increased power requires increased responsibility, and unfortunately, there will always be people in society ready to exploit any opportunity given to them. The mind can be dark, and in giving it a freer forum, we do run the risk of more abusive action, as opposed to less harmless prejudiced thoughts.)

Cyberculture: For best results, use as directed.

Bell’s chapter, “Community and Cyberculture” seems to perpetuate the dichotomous thinking that cyberculture either fosters or harms RL community. He identifies Wellman and Gulia’s concern with the “Manichean” nature of this debate, but then he discusses it in terms of the two opposing camps. He seemed to reason that he would be going deeper to the fundamental question of what is a community, and he finds that the inclusive concept of Bund (which is basically community) describes cyberculture. This seems to be avoiding the question of establishing a middle ground on the bigger question of whether or not cyberspace is good for RL society. I think certain time-tested principles are relevant here. The first is “All things in moderation.” This shows that cyberculture does have its importance in what it can contribute to society, but too much of it will lead to problems, including withdrawal from RL society. Not having cyberspace limits our society’s ability to expand our types of relations with each other. The second principle, or aphorism, is “Wherever you go, there you are.” This alludes to the organic and natural condition of cyberculture, as suggested by Rheingold. Again returning to McLuhan’s description as media as “extensions of man,” we can see that cyberculture is an extension of RL culture. As in natural evolution, it is the result of environmental conditions—here the importance of and reliance upon technology in society, as well as the need for efficiency. This is the culture that is the most appropriate for the life we as a society have come to value. I think that people who are against cyberculture should focus their energies on improving RL culture to have it have a higher appreciation for the community values they see lacking in on-line communities. For example, why do we have HMO’s who are so driven by efficiency and profit interest that they do not allow for a doctor to spend much time with a patient? That is impersonal, and face-to-face interaction means nothing (or something bad). Or why don’t we emphasize the importance of music, art, and sports programs as integral to education? These are interactive forms of RL communities, but they are being devalued for information, which is easily obtainable from the “information super highway.” Cyberculture is just a reflection of the societal need for efficiency over the development of relationships and personal well-being. To blame technology for these problems is technological determinism.

To unite these two aphorisms, “Wherever you go, there you are” seems to suggest that yes, cyberculture is as valid a culture as any other because we go there and we are still ourselves. “Everything in moderation” validates the designation of cyberculture as a community, while adding the caveat that, although it is a part of us, it shouldn’t be all that we are as people. It is not inherently bad, but it is how it is used. Yes, it fosters certain values, but those values are important to us. By creating programs that foster other values, we are balancing the overimportance the Internet places on information.

Comments on Tracing the Decay of Fiction

I just wanted to put out a few thoughts on this database narrative. I did enjoy it, because it was like I was exploring—going through an old hotel and seeing bits of its history, as if from various people I met. The thing is, though, it is not literature to me. It does not seem to have a plot. It is just a simulation of real life when you do not have access to a real old hotel to explore or real people or videos to reveal what the hotel life was like in the past. I feel like, in some ways, this type of simulation simply encourages the sedentary lifestyle that is characteristic of the U.S. Perhaps I am too critical. Perhaps I am condemning this media for doing what all media do, which is replacing the real. I suppose I am just confused at how different this is from traditional homework and how there is no real goal. It is so lifelike. To me, this might mean that this type of homework is meant to give one a new perspective on the multidimensionality of real life, enhancing real experience, opening up one to think sociologically (or in a historical context). This could translate into understanding changing structures of society, which might lead to social justice. Interesting. With Soft Cinema, we might be encouraged to pay more attention to our senses and to really question how the format of what we are shown or told really does affect our overall conception of that story. This might make us more critical of politics and even the psychology behind human interactions. This could lead to our ability to see a situation for what it is, and not just how it is presented, which can be useful in establishing a grounded sense of reality. Not to mention it develops our sense of aesthetics. I guess there are some useful applications of this type of homework. It is almost like philosophy.

Remodeling the Old

We have discussed how new media tends to recreate the old media from which it came. This holds true in the case of database narrative. Kinder and Anderson have helped us to see how recent movies, including Kill Bill, Memento, and Pulp Fiction, have adopted some aspects of the database narrative by rejecting linear plots. Other movies incorporate split screens to show various images, whose juxtaposition creates a new feeling within the viewer (such as is done in Manovich’s Soft Cinema).

I would like to show that this remodeling of the old also holds true for a more distant ancestor of the database narrative: print. Newspapers, in particular, very much embody many aspects of new media’s organization, including the hyperlink-like connections to each of the story’s on the front page. Its layout can also be influenced by database narratives. The random generation of new formats (such as in Manovich’s Soft Cinema) can offer new ideas for the aesthetic and emotion-provoking abilities of layouts.

Additionally, traditional forms of summarizing information (mind maps, concept trees, outlines) have also taken on new meaning and new form. I am here thinking about the visualization aspect of Soft Cinema, where there are constantly circling images from three different countries that intersect at various points to show what is on the screen. This is the closest thing to an outline that we get, and its ever-changing quality seems necessary to describe ever-changing literature. It is almost surreal how literature can be so alive.

In addition to movies, print’s aesthetic presentation and organizational structures have also been influenced by database narratives, perpetuating the constant interaction between old and new. You can teach an old dog (past media) new tricks.

Nothing New? From Dreams to Artificial Intelligence

We have dreams where various elements of our lives and thoughts are selected subconsciously and recombined, sometimes with an overall meaning, sometimes not, and sometimes just because we create one based on what we are thinking at the time. A TV editor looks at multiple screens, all showing the same event from different angles. He picks ones that work well together as a whole to capture the spirit of an event. Finally, there is a writer who has been thinking up certain characters that she would love to write about, characters based on a combination of traits from people she has known. She has a similar collection of pieced-together places and plots she would also like to portray, and she will combine all of these elements to make a cohesive story.

Each of these situations—the dream (Anderson 5), the TV editing, the story writing—all involve selection and combination, which is exactly what a database narrative is: “Database narrative refers to narratives whose structure exposes or thematizes the dual processes of selection and combination that lie at the heart of all stories” (Anderson 2, quoting Kinder). New media is taking over this concept to generate programs that do this same work of selection and combination, traditionally done by humans, whether consciously or subconsciously. This relates to Marshall McLuhan’s description of technology as “extensions of man.” It seems that the ultimate goal of the database narrative would be to create valid stories without an author. It is true that the author sets the parameters of selection for the database narrative, and it is true that no story has passed the Turnin test for being undistinguishable from a human story. However, it seems that with enough parameters programmed into a database, it might one day be able to pass that test. These parameters might be based on human instinct or even on cultural values. Artificial intelligence is not unconceivable.

To summarize, although database narrative seems to be accomplishing nothing new, it is a new approach. It seems a step back in some ways, because the computer-generated material is currently not up to par with human-written material. However, when completely developed and even now, it offers new possibilities, including artificial intelligence. Every form of machine man has ever created really does nothing a human could not once do; it is just a new, usually more efficient or helpful approach. Database narrative is similar. However, I would ask about the end result: “What do we plan on doing when we have essentially recreated ourselves?”

Lexia to Perplexia: Metaphor for Humanity?

Like others, I am trying to understand the method behind the madness in this creation. There were the four sections to the work, and I focused on the first, “The Process of Attachment.” This section frequently showed diagrams about the I-terminal, and I believe there was a human story behind all of the punctuation and technical vocabulary. One phrase said, “At the termin.all of hum.andity—possessed by a remotional attachment to terminals elsewhere” (Memmott). Does this mean we (humanity=hum.andity) are connected in a way determined by or similar to the technology that we use? The program froze on another screen (intentionally or not, I do not know), which said, among other things, “Cyborganic protocol is interimacy” (Memmott). This, also, seems to imply the merging of the cyber and organic worlds and the unique state of intimacy that arises from the combination. Also, grids showed up at various points, seeming to allude to the constructed underpinnings of the game/presentation going on. Another important symbol was an eye, which often led to new scenes, once clicked; does this say how it is actually human will that can still at least, in part, direct the processes of technology? If so, it would be commenting on the role of Manovich’s automation trait of new media and asserting that “human intentionality” (32) is at least partially involved in the technological process; symbolized through the eye, it had some power to direct the series of events, but not all power. Positive and negative signs surrounding the eye on one screen could have been about emotion or quantity. Really, the symbolism was tricky, although still interesting. A further comment: there were moving lines as well, which I am not sure if we were supposed to interact with, but they definitely added to the overwhelming hypermediacy and to the general “perplexia” of the situation.

Throughout all of these reflections, I am still curious to know what the point is. If it is trying to show the relation between human thought and computer commands or how they influence each other, I think that is very valid, but I could appreciate this piece a lot more if I knew more of what it was trying to prove or display.

The Non-Automatic Aspect of Automation

Automation, one of Manovich’s characteristics of new media, is very controversial nature. As he explains, “…human intentionality can be removed from the creative process, at least in part” (32). The very idea of having a machine do a human’s work is both liberating (freeing man from unnecessary work) and enslaving (forcing man’s dependence on machines). In either situation, the “thought processes” of man and machine become similar enough to the point that they can perform at least some functions in the same way, all of this leading to the thoughts that man is becoming mechanized and machines are approaching artificial intelligence. Is this increasingly blurred distinction problematic or a sign of commendable scientific progress? Manovich does not really delve into these implications, but we can look back to Vannevar Bush and Marshall McLuhan for such insights.

Vannevar Bush would argue favorably for media’s role in human development. He states, “[Man] has built a civilization so complex that he needs to mechanize his records more fully if he is to push his experiment to its logical conclusion and not just merely become bogged down part way there by overtaxing his limited memory” (Bush 47). Bush is very much about using technology to help society utilize its resources to meet its potential, as evidenced in his conceptual development on the memex, the predecessor to computerized information retrieval (now done through the Internet). This goes along with Marshall McLuhan’s idea of media as “extensions of man,” which seems to posit media as just another tool.

On the reverse side, the same idea of McLuhan’s can be seen as a contamination of the natural state of human existence. Bush expresses, “Our present languages are not especially adapted to this sort of mechanization… . It is strange that the inventors of universal languages have not seized upon the idea of producing one which better fitted the technique for transmitting and recording speech” (Bush 40). Bush is oblivious to the disturbing concept behind his statement. He is wondering why mechanized communication is not more prominent than natural communication. With automation, we definitely establish a connection between ourselves and machines. The danger lies in the depth of this connection; do we use machines as discreet tools or do we graft them to ourselves?

Whatever the result, there is no questioning the progress being made in automation all of the time. We are moving from “ ‘low-level’ automation…in which the computer user modifies or creates from scratch a media object using templates or single algorithms” (such as with blogger.com), to “ ‘high-level’ automation…which requires a computer to understand, to a certain degree, the meanings embedded in the objects being generated” (i.e. artificial intelligence) (Manovich 32). The latter is being manifested primarily in video games, a seemingly harmless application, but it is the very innocuous nature of this application that may blind us to the insidious infiltration of artificial intelligence into the way we play and think and then perhaps live. The one non-automatic aspect of automation should be our acceptance of it. We always need to question how technology is forming us; we need to be aware (or beware) of the dangers as well as the perhaps more apparent benefits.

“She died a famous woman denying/ her wounds / denying / her wounds came from the same source as her power.” –Adrienne Rich, “Power”