I started out early on a Sunday with these readings and thought the video would be the best way to start. At first, I thought Zittrain was a little too American for me to relate; talking about the differences between the US east and west coasts. He then presented the case of a cardboard robot released into New York City, relying on passers-by to direct it to its destination. I was immediately interested in this event and thought Zittrain had some good metaphor regarding this to present his lesson or point of view, but he didn’t. He started talking about the east and west coasts again and I lost a little more interested. I think he took a long time to get to a proper point behind his lecture. Mostly this presentation was like others I’ve seen myself, a display of many different and innovative ways the Internet is used. Gill’s research looked towards a utopian Internet with opportunities for work and expression for all who’re online. I feel much of the net is going in this greatly beneficial direction but every time I read Youtube comments or stumble upon a forum, I find people posting deeply offensive and aggravating things and wonder if a lot of these people might ruin the Internet for so many others.
20110410
Omnipresent Media
New media is literally everywhere. There are screens on an amazing number of surfaces my favourite places around Brisbane. And with the vast amount of information that can be present on any screen, we have the potential to see almost anything, anywhere.
Deuze's claim is that media are "building blocks". I wanted to think that he was overstating media's role and presence but the more I thought about it the more I agreed. There are days where I'm too busy to socially network like I would otherwise and I think of these as like little vacations but even on these days I end up checking facebook and the end of the day and watching television at some point. I associate media with the newest things like wi fi and social network but forget about television and radio especially. Media is always there.
This is also apparent in China, which Genevieve Bell mentions with stats like "100 million messages per day" on mobile phones in China. This reminded me of a movie called Global Metal, a documentary about the heavy metal scene in non-English speaking countries and how, in China, for years the genre was virtually non-existent and now, with the spreading of new media, the people there have more freedom and the ability to share in media from around the world.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1249171/
Deuze's claim is that media are "building blocks". I wanted to think that he was overstating media's role and presence but the more I thought about it the more I agreed. There are days where I'm too busy to socially network like I would otherwise and I think of these as like little vacations but even on these days I end up checking facebook and the end of the day and watching television at some point. I associate media with the newest things like wi fi and social network but forget about television and radio especially. Media is always there.
This is also apparent in China, which Genevieve Bell mentions with stats like "100 million messages per day" on mobile phones in China. This reminded me of a movie called Global Metal, a documentary about the heavy metal scene in non-English speaking countries and how, in China, for years the genre was virtually non-existent and now, with the spreading of new media, the people there have more freedom and the ability to share in media from around the world.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1249171/
20110328
"This I Believe..."
This week hosted the topic Taylor (his blog is here: http://taylorcasu.blogspot.com/ - he talks a lot about music which I can relate to) and I did our presentation on New Media, Beliefs, Politics and Ethics, so I feel like I have extra to talk about here. I can post the links I talked about but obviously couldn't post in the speech.
Top 15 Web Hoaxes: http://mashable.com/2009/07/15/internet-hoaxes/
Walken for President: www.Walken2008.com
I find this online culture of sorts to be very interesting. Once, mankind had myths and legends where now we have online hoaxes. I've had probably too many conversations with friends about methods of fixing scratched game CDs or building makeshift weaponry (jokingly, of course) which were discovered online. Naturally, I've decided that putting toothpaste all over my old San Andreas disc isn't worth the risk. I thought about this in conjunction with the politics-focused first reading for the week. Clearly there's been plenty of passionately organised meetings focused on various political stances and beliefs, but I wonder if any that have been empowered by New Media turned out to be hoaxes too (similar to Walken2008 but more serious). It seems to me that there's significant risk if this is the case, as history shows how politics without New Media can be so devastating.
Top 15 Web Hoaxes: http://mashable.com/2009/07/15/internet-hoaxes/
Walken for President: www.Walken2008.com
I find this online culture of sorts to be very interesting. Once, mankind had myths and legends where now we have online hoaxes. I've had probably too many conversations with friends about methods of fixing scratched game CDs or building makeshift weaponry (jokingly, of course) which were discovered online. Naturally, I've decided that putting toothpaste all over my old San Andreas disc isn't worth the risk. I thought about this in conjunction with the politics-focused first reading for the week. Clearly there's been plenty of passionately organised meetings focused on various political stances and beliefs, but I wonder if any that have been empowered by New Media turned out to be hoaxes too (similar to Walken2008 but more serious). It seems to me that there's significant risk if this is the case, as history shows how politics without New Media can be so devastating.
20110321
Week 3 Readings
This week's topic reading was entitled "The New Media Amusement Arcade: Music, Games & Films". Just reading the title gets me interested in this topic as I'm an avid gamer, love music and films too (and I also study film).
I found the article from Time the more interesting of the two. I've never had much experience with Bollywood cinema and find it an interesting, almost exotic topic. The idea discussed in the article is that Bollywood movie producers are doing what Hollywood producers won't by making their films available for download worldwide. This reaches a very wide audience and helps to stop streams of movie piracy which causes "33% of Indian film companies' revenues" to be lost. This kind of forward thinking, I believe is very important in the world of new media. Indeed, it's this kind of thinking that keeps it "new," and constantly changing and staying as advanced and amazing as ever. There's a line about the producers using YouTube to distribute clips and trailers revealing that "its clips have been viewed 15 million times". I just found this interesting because it reminds me just how effective YouTube (and similar new media outlets) can be.
I found the article from Time the more interesting of the two. I've never had much experience with Bollywood cinema and find it an interesting, almost exotic topic. The idea discussed in the article is that Bollywood movie producers are doing what Hollywood producers won't by making their films available for download worldwide. This reaches a very wide audience and helps to stop streams of movie piracy which causes "33% of Indian film companies' revenues" to be lost. This kind of forward thinking, I believe is very important in the world of new media. Indeed, it's this kind of thinking that keeps it "new," and constantly changing and staying as advanced and amazing as ever. There's a line about the producers using YouTube to distribute clips and trailers revealing that "its clips have been viewed 15 million times". I just found this interesting because it reminds me just how effective YouTube (and similar new media outlets) can be.
20110313
Week 2 Readings
This week's readings present some interesting views on social networking which are refreshing. Normally, social networking sites present nothing to think about with regards to modern society and relationships, but these papers are the beginning of a new viewpoint that I, at least, had never considered.
Donath and Boyd's Public Displays of Connection, seems like the less relevant of the two readings, perhaps because of its age, being published in 2004. Some of the social networking sites they talk about, namely Friendster, Orkut, Tribe.net, Ryze and LinkedIn, have since sunk into obscurity. Before reading the paper I'd actually never heard of either Orkut or Ryze and was even a little surprised to find they're still running. This fact, in a way, contradicts one of the paper's final statements that social networking sites follow "a typical fashion diffusion pattern," (Donath & Boyd, 2004).
Erika Pearson's All the World Wide Web's a Stage felt more contemporary and interesting, claiming that social networkers "perform" to an extent in their online profiles. This seems an apt analysis as Facebook, for instance allows users to write about themselves in whatever fashion and to any capacity they choose.
Donath and Boyd's Public Displays of Connection, seems like the less relevant of the two readings, perhaps because of its age, being published in 2004. Some of the social networking sites they talk about, namely Friendster, Orkut, Tribe.net, Ryze and LinkedIn, have since sunk into obscurity. Before reading the paper I'd actually never heard of either Orkut or Ryze and was even a little surprised to find they're still running. This fact, in a way, contradicts one of the paper's final statements that social networking sites follow "a typical fashion diffusion pattern," (Donath & Boyd, 2004).
Erika Pearson's All the World Wide Web's a Stage felt more contemporary and interesting, claiming that social networkers "perform" to an extent in their online profiles. This seems an apt analysis as Facebook, for instance allows users to write about themselves in whatever fashion and to any capacity they choose.
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