Intro to New Media Studies

I was really impressed with the presenters today, I thought there was a lot of creative and clever stuff going on with research and the “make something” aspect of the assignment. First off, the Amazon presentation was quite well done, I’d never really thought about how important the review function of the website is and how many people really write their opinions about things on the site. But for me, the reviews have definitely come in handy especially when I’m looking at buying something from a private user on the site, I base my choice solely on what previous customers have said about that person and their reliability of service. I also thought it was really cool how many people responded to your new thread on the website, it shows how much of a dedicated community there really is on Amazon.com.

I was also interested in the Webkinz presentation because I found it really similar to NeoPets, a website I admittedly used to love at the end of middle school. Unlike Webkinz though, there is no physical pet that initiates your online friend’s new life- I guess maybe you can buy NeoPets stuffed animals, but that’s not a major part of what they’re all about. Basically, you pick your animal species, name it, and then you can earn money for food and clothing and housing by playing games and such. It was pretty addictive. As far as I can remember there wasn’t really a networking portion of the site but I could be wrong. Anyway, it definitely provided a kind of wholesome safe haven for kids on the internet who are too young for MySpace or Facebook. I think that in this age of technology it’s important for kids to be comfortable and familiar with computers, but internet safety is a huge issue and sites for Webkinz and NeoPets are a good way to keep kids safe and get them acquainted with computers at the same time.

Looking forward to the last batch of presentations!

I think the first three presentations were a great way to begin the end of this class. I particularly enjoyed the Finale presentation partially because I had just recently been introduced to it and was itching to learn more about how it works.

I was visiting my 87 year-old grandfather a few weeks ago and he was so excited about this new program he had on his computer that he was using to compose hymns. It turns out he had purchased Finale and spent a great deal of time figuring out how to use it, additionally purchasing a keyboard to play directly into the program much like Jeff and Adam did in the presentation Thursday. He had written music for several gospel numbers using Finale and was able to play them back for me to hear. I was so impressed that someone his age who had certainly not been exposed to computers for most of his life was able to fully grasp the computer and Finale and be able to utilize it to its full potential. Just a testament to a.) my grandfather’s impressive persistence and b.) the accessibility of programs like Finale to all age groups and skill levels.

Just thought I’d share : )

I was thinking about what Dr. C said at the end of Tuesday’s class: “The Web succeeded because it gave you more than you needed– it gave you context” and I realized how really true that is. One of the reasons why we are so hooked on the internet is because it is so helpful, when we’re researching about something it provides us with links to topics we may never have thought would be relevant. The internet essentially goes above and beyond– when we search for something on Google, even if nothing exactly matches our search, results will pop up that contain some of the words or contain related words or could possibly be related in another way…I think that’s pretty remarkable. I know that I’ve been doing research a lot of times and stumbled upon some side topic that I would never have thought to relate to the topic at hand but nevertheless was extremely helpful.

Links are another example of the context the internet provides, like when you’re reading an article on Wikipedia and some of the words are highlighted to indicate their linkage, it gives us the opportunity to contextualize the information and learn more about what we’re reading…again, the internet going above and beyond the necessary information to provide us with more than what we actually need. In a way, the internet is spoiling us. I mean, I don’t know how healthy it is to get used to this excess of information and always getting more than we need.

This last article got me thinking back to my first experiences with the internet and my family’s first computer– I was ten or eleven when we got a computer in our house for the first time and it was this very mysterious new thing that my dad wouldn’t let me touch for the first several months. I was allowed to play with things like Oregon Trail and Paint but finally I was allowed to go on the Internet and make my own e-mail address. This was such a new and exciting thing for me- I had no idea how important the Internet would become in my life and how often I would be using it for so many different kinds of things.

It’s amazing to think that a few people’s conception of this thing called the World Wide Web could have such an impact on how the world functions, communicates, and learns. The so-called “pool of human knowledge” has grown by leaps and bounds since its early development. It has become so easy to gather and share information, and I don’t think anyone could have predicted that our pool of human knowledge could ever be so enormous and thorough…and it’s still growing! Who knows where the internet will take us in the future and what other developments will arise but I’m excited (and a little scared!) to see what people will come up with.

So I’ve been thinking about this class a lot and how it’s changed my views on new media and the internet and how I feel about the way all of it is changing our society. In some ways, I am completely astonished by these new developments in technology and how they make things so much easier and faster for us. But in other ways, I’m scared of it all. I’m scared of the directions it’s taking us- with child predators and identity theft and internet addictions, there are so many negatives that come along with these seemingly amazing advancements. Sometimes I wish I lived back in the days before technology– before television and computers and video games. People interacted face-to-face more, people were outside more, things were generally simpler. I guess I’m just old-fashioned but I like to think there’s an important element to that life of simplicity that we’re lacking today…

Then again, it’s pretty cool to be able to send an e-mail to your uncle in India and have him respond within the hour. It’s amazing to reconnect with your best friend from 3rd grade after not having talked to her in over 10 years. There are certainly things about the internet that I’ve gotten attached to and that my life would be very different without but I think I might be okay if all of it were removed.

I know that’s not possible and that things will just get more technological and new media-based and I’ll probably continue to get overwhelmed with the whole thing, but at least I’ve come to be able to have some honest thoughts about this new media phenomenon that I hadn’t really spent time with before. I don’t know what the point of this whole post is or if anyone will really care but I just thought I’d reflect on what this class has done for me…

I thought Turkle’s article about video games was really interesting, I have never thought about the psychology behind these games and why they become so addicting for people. I know that the video game industry is HUGE and there is a ton of money to be made off of gamers these days– I have a few friends who are definitely hooked on video games, always buying the latest ones as soon as they come out, they have all the systems, all the newest accessories, etc…I can kind of understand the addicting qualities of video games, the gamer’s ability to essentially get lost in another world, completely immersed, and control the outcome of the game– a certain power comes with gaming.

One of the most interesting parts of Turkle’s article for me was a quote from Jarish about the contrast between video games and real life and how he feels after finishing a game:

“You feel sort of cut off. When I play the game, I start getting into it, and you start taking the role of the person…and then the game ends. And you have just put all of your energy into it. It doesn’t make me angry, more like depressed. You walk out of the arcade and it’s a different world. Nothing that you can control.”

He’s describing the sort of video game hangover…there’s a certain disorientation one feels after immersing yourself in a video game for a length of time. When you go out into the real world afterwards, you feel kind of let-down. You are no longer able to control what goes on around you and you are no longer highly stimulated by the action on the screen. It’s easy to see how people can get so addicted to those feelings of control and excitement that video games allow. But addiction comes with a price! $$$$ (and sometimes a loss of friends…)

So Tuesday’s class got me thinking about loneliness and why humans have such a need to be connected with other people– and why new media seems to be so centered around social networks and keeping people in better and faster contact with each other.

I think there are a lot of factors that go into this desire for companionship and connectivity with other people. I think that humans are inherently curious. Curious about ourselves, each other, the world, pretty much everything. So because of this curiosity, I think we are drawn to find out what other people are like: what their interests are, their opinions, their personal lives, etc. We just want to know things– and not have to wait for them, which I think is one of the driving forces behind iPhones, newsfeeds, and other new media devices providing us with on-demand updates and information.

But curiosity can’t be the only thing that draws humans to each other…maybe we realize that we are imperfect creatures and look to others for a sense of completion. Perhaps we think that if we collaborate with others and combine our ideas that we will somehow become more whole. Having connections and communications with others makes us feel like we have more potential, that we can overcome being imperfect creatures.

Or maybe none of this is right. Maybe we are just social creatures whose emotional well-being is dependent upon interactions with others. Or maybe all of the above! Whatever the reasons, we are certainly preoccupied by connecting with other people and new media is consumed with making this happen.

One of my professors for another class brought up Second Life in his lecture today and focused on how it fulfills so many people’s need to escape from the real world into a realm of virtual reality in which they can immerse themselves and temporarily shut out what is going on in their real lives. I can understand why this would be fun and relaxing but some people take it to the extreme. I remember talking about Second Life last semester with my roommate who was doing a presentation on it. She had read an article about a couple who got divorced after the husband financed a Second Life wedding to another woman using his real money. The real-life wife must have been appalled. It’s one thing to spend a minimal amount of your time flying around and chatting with people from all over the world and playing games or what not. But when people start to confuse and intermingle their real lives with this virtual realm, things can get really twisted. Where do you draw the line? Would you consider this man a cheater? He had apparently never met this woman in real life so there was obviously no physical cheating going on but this whole new level of technology completely blurs the boundaries of fidelity in this case.

With these amazing technological advances happening all around us, we are placed in a situation of so many emerging difficulties and controversies. With all this new technological goodness comes a bunch of bad stuff trailing behind…

As I was reading through Illich’s “Deschooling Society,” one point in particular stuck out to me. Illich talks about the differences between educating the poor and the rich and how even if each batch of students is put in the same classroom with the same teachers and taught the same curricula, it is likely that the poor student will still fall behind and not succed to the level of the rich student.

Poor children lack most of the educational opportunities which are casually available to the middle-class child. These advantages range from conversation and books in the home to vacation travel and a different sense of oneself, and apply, for the child who enjoys them, both in and out of school.

I think it’s important to understand that not all educational stimuli come from the school itself. A more privileged student will likely have books readily available, engage in intelligent conversations at home, be able to travel and broaden their horizons and world-view, etc. etc… Lesser privileged students may not have these educational opportunities available to them. Their parents may be under-educated and therefore unable to engage in intellectually stimulating conversations with their children. These families may be unable to afford books and/or travel to other places, so the students may not have an understanding of themselves in a larger world context, which I think is important to a well-rounded education. So while Illich’s discussion of “deschooling society” is quite daunting and multifaceted, I think it’s important to recognize all the factors that go into a person’s education and think about how to create a wholly educated human being in today’s complicated society.

One of the most interesting ideas that Viola brought up in his article “Will There Be Condominiums in Space?” was the thought that life is a continuous thread, we are constantly acting and living and it is only our fragmented memories and sleep cycles that make us feel like our lives are sectioned. He then brought up the idea that:

Life without editing, it seems, is just not that interesting.

This quote reminded me of reality TV shows and how they are so heavily edited to create interesting plot lines and conversations that all of the boring stuff is cut out. There’s hours and hours of footage that the general public would not find interesting at all, so editors work hard to piece together small fragments of these recorded lives to make an interesting show. It made me wonder if our memories do the same kind of thing– taking out all of the boring times and retaining the times in our lives that we found exciting, horrifying, or otherwise particularly memorable. Perhaps there are lots of little editors hacking away at the memory tape in our heads! Something to think about…