I am going to take a bit of a different approach to this article, so bear with me.
This article brings up a number of good ideas: rhetoric, definition of community, expectation, identity - I can go on and on. But what I really want to talk about is my personal experience with 'communities' such as these. I read a number of blogs where a person has or has had some sort of ailment. One such blog is called "Especially Heather". Heather is a young mother who was diagnosed with an inoperable brain tumor, and her daughter Emma has had pretty severe health problems since she was born, but they have both fought for a long time. Emma passed away on April 22, 2011, which is heartbreaking for their family, as well as the community of readers at Especially Heather. Heather is a highly religious person, although I hate to use the word 'religious' because I know she would not classify herself that way, but for lack of a better description, I shall use it.
Heather, did indeed, have brain surgery, and she blogged through the whole experience. Just recently she had to go back for an MRI to check on the state of the tumor, which came back clear. A little over 3 years ago a number of Dr's told her that she had approximately 3 years to live. As you can imagine, this turned her world upside down. She is living on what she calls 'borrowed time' at this point since she has lived past the expectations of the Dr's. Dr's in her area, and many specialists told her that her brain cancer was inoperable. The Mayo Clinic said otherwise and took her as a patient almost immediately. Heather is still alive, and she has blogged through her experience with facing death, not only her death, but her daughter's as well.
I feel connected to Heather, as do the folks involved in her 'blog community'. I know for a fact that those folks gathering around Heather to support her, through the internet, feel a close connection to her. She has built a genuine community through her blogging, and I would be horrified if I found out that her story was false. Community, even an online community where folks don't necessarily meet in person, is strong. Folks have an emotional bond.
Another blog I read is called, "Noah Steven 'Crowned in Peace'". Adrienne is another young mother who has gone through a harrowing experience. Her son died before he was a year old, and the Dr's had no idea why. He simply stopped being able to process nutrients in his body, and he slowly passed away. Adrienne and her husband are amazingly strong folks. They have blogged about their experience from Day 1, sharing it with the world.
This blog is a bit different because I know Adrienne personally from about 15 years ago. She and I served at the same organization together, though I don't think we ever had a f2f conversation. I was connected to her blog through some mutual friends. Peruse her blog if you're interested.
Both of these blogs are examples of blog 'communities'. Those folks that read their blogs on a regular basis have prayed, banned together to raise money, supported the blog authors and each other in times of need. Blog readers have connected with each other in a very unique way, creating a very strong community.
The article "A Virtual Death" was a hard one to read, only because I am so involved in blogging communities outside of my online classes. I feel a connection to the blog authors, and the blog communities at large, and can't imagine how the folks felt who had prayed for hours on end, who had invested time to comment on Kaycee's (Debbie's) blog. Shocked - yes! Betrayed - yes! Hurt - yes!
The article brings up a lot of good points, and I hope you enjoyed reading through it as much as I did. It brings to light the length's that some folks will go.
Showing posts with label Instructor Wrap-Up. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Instructor Wrap-Up. Show all posts
Thursday, July 26, 2012
Wednesday, July 25, 2012
Instructor Wrap Up - The End of Books - Coover
Loved, loved, loved this article. Did you?
I find it interesting that we are having a similar conversation in 2012, that we were having in 1992. Here are some of my favorite quotes from this article:
Page 706......
...you will often hear it said that the print medium is a doomed and outdated technology,, a mere curiosity of bygone days destined soon to be consigned forever to those dusty unattended museums we now call libraries.
But true freedom from the tyranny of the line is perceived as only really possible now at last with the advent of hypertext, written and read on the computer, where the line in fact does not exist unless one invents and implants it in the text.
You will often hear the proclaim, quite seriously, that there have been three great events in the history of literacy: the invention of writing, the invention of movable type, and the invention of hypertext.
Page 707.....
There are no hierarchies in these topless (and bottomless) networks, as paragraphs, chapters and other conventional text divisions are replaced by evenly empowered and equally ephemeral window-sized blocks of text and graphics - soon to be supplemented with sound, animation, and film.
Writing students are notoriously conservative creatures. They write stubbornly and hopefully within the tradition of what they have read.
Page 708.......
"The great thing", as one young writer, Alvin Lu, put it in an on-line class essay, is "the degree to which narrative is completely destructed into its constituent bits. Bits of information convey knowledge, but the juxtaposition of bits creates narrative.
In hypertext, multivocalism is popular, graphic elements, both drawn and scanned, have been incorporated into the narratives, imaginative font changes have been employed to identify various voices or plot elements, and there has also been a very effective use of formal documents not typically used in fictions - .......
However, as all of us have discovered, even though the basic technology of hypertext may be with us for centuries to come, perhaps even as long as the technology of the book, its hardware and software seem to be fragile and short-lived; whole new generations of equipment and programs arrive before we can finish reading the instructions of the old.
And my very favorite....
Page 709......
Print documents may be read in hyperspace, but hypertext does not translate into print. It is not like film, which is really just the dead end of linear narrative, just as 12-tone music is the dead end of music by the stave.
I find it interesting that we are having a similar conversation in 2012, that we were having in 1992. Here are some of my favorite quotes from this article:
Page 706......
...you will often hear it said that the print medium is a doomed and outdated technology,, a mere curiosity of bygone days destined soon to be consigned forever to those dusty unattended museums we now call libraries.
But true freedom from the tyranny of the line is perceived as only really possible now at last with the advent of hypertext, written and read on the computer, where the line in fact does not exist unless one invents and implants it in the text.
You will often hear the proclaim, quite seriously, that there have been three great events in the history of literacy: the invention of writing, the invention of movable type, and the invention of hypertext.
Page 707.....
There are no hierarchies in these topless (and bottomless) networks, as paragraphs, chapters and other conventional text divisions are replaced by evenly empowered and equally ephemeral window-sized blocks of text and graphics - soon to be supplemented with sound, animation, and film.
Writing students are notoriously conservative creatures. They write stubbornly and hopefully within the tradition of what they have read.
Page 708.......
"The great thing", as one young writer, Alvin Lu, put it in an on-line class essay, is "the degree to which narrative is completely destructed into its constituent bits. Bits of information convey knowledge, but the juxtaposition of bits creates narrative.
In hypertext, multivocalism is popular, graphic elements, both drawn and scanned, have been incorporated into the narratives, imaginative font changes have been employed to identify various voices or plot elements, and there has also been a very effective use of formal documents not typically used in fictions - .......
However, as all of us have discovered, even though the basic technology of hypertext may be with us for centuries to come, perhaps even as long as the technology of the book, its hardware and software seem to be fragile and short-lived; whole new generations of equipment and programs arrive before we can finish reading the instructions of the old.
And my very favorite....
Page 709......
Print documents may be read in hyperspace, but hypertext does not translate into print. It is not like film, which is really just the dead end of linear narrative, just as 12-tone music is the dead end of music by the stave.
Thursday, July 19, 2012
Instructor Wrap Up - Navigating Technomedia - Sam Han
Chapter 1 of Sam Han's book is titled, of all things, Technomedia! (You can click on the link to lead you to a web version of the book. It's not a complete version, but more extensive than what I have provided on D2L.). Cool huh? Google books is awesome!
The chapter starts out by describing something near and dear to the hearts of quite a few folks: The gap distance between the "have's" and "have-not's". Page 2 offers a good quote: "On top of concerns such as AIDS, poverty, and political unrest, postcoloniality, it seems, necessarily involved a technological oppression, taking form in a structured lag. Hence, for those for whom the promise of globalization had yet to be realized, new media technologies became an integral part of not only the discourse of modernization, but of global justice."
Can the internet really have such a powerful presence? If you have been reading the news lately, and I know you have because of the requirement of one of our discussion questions, the internet and programs contained within, have helped start revolutions. Not just 'virtual' revolutions, but real, tangible revolutions! Libya ring a bell? Page 2 goes onto say, "The Internet, specifically, brought glimpses of hope for global democratization, in the form of a "true" public sphere that would circumvent traditional political channels. By facilitating more efficient communication among the citizens of the world usually laden with failures of bureaucracy, the usual stoppages characteristic of bureaucratic institutions could be circumvented." Wow, just wow! The power of technology never ceases to amaze me. I will leave you to ponder this idea.
We are then brought back down to earth a little on page 3, where it states, "Nevertheless, the liberal dream of progress espoused by Friedman and other did nothing but rearticulate the false hopes of modernity under the guise of technological advancement." But don't lose all hope yet. :) Read a bit further down: "Against such optimism, I see the power of information technologies and new media as challenges to these notions altogether." Isn't that what this is all about? Challenging ideas? New thought? Expanding our knowledge? Bridging the gap between the have's and have not's? Or the folks who have access and those that don't? Page three goes on to say, "The Internet not only acts as a forum to disperse knowledge but transforms it, hauling into question the certainty of what constitutes knowledge as such." Yes, yes and yes!
Page 4 starts out by reinforcing ideas we covered at the beginning of the semester: McLuhan!!! "...the content of one medium always involves another." (Don't skip over the box about McLuhand on Page 5). The Medium IS the Message. Enough said!
One thing to pay attention to is the explanation of Hot and Cold Media. This idea was briefly brought up in the McLuhand piece, but it did not expand much on the idea too much. Some students have been confused about hot and cold media in the past, but the book provides some good insight, as does the link I provided.
After the discussion about McLuhan, and a discussion about how "specific media are not tied down to a corresponding technology", the chapter moves into a history of media. There are three eras:
1). Mechanical
2). Electric
3). Broadcast
While this information is review because we have already covered a chapter in media history, it's a great thing to be able to read the history from another authors perspective. Especially where Han asserts that we are on the verge of a fourth era: Virtual! Of course, this book was written in 2008. How much has changed since that time? Quite a bit! If you read further in the book, provided you are interested in purchasing the book (which I recommend if you are at all interested in new media), it discusses a great many things including censorship in other countries, space and time as common place, and a plethora of other ideas. Great read!
I will not recount all three areas of history that Han covers, but be sure to read through it. As mentioned previously, it includes some repetitive information (repetition helps with retention of information, right?) but it also brings up some other great ideas and relationships we have not previously covered.
I hope you enjoyed reading this chapter as much as I have. If you are interested in the book, it's not incredibly expensive and a great read if you have the time. Of course, this is coming from a communication and new media geek, but I recommend it nonetheless.
Thanks for letting me geek out about yet another reading.
The Blogging Prof.
The chapter starts out by describing something near and dear to the hearts of quite a few folks: The gap distance between the "have's" and "have-not's". Page 2 offers a good quote: "On top of concerns such as AIDS, poverty, and political unrest, postcoloniality, it seems, necessarily involved a technological oppression, taking form in a structured lag. Hence, for those for whom the promise of globalization had yet to be realized, new media technologies became an integral part of not only the discourse of modernization, but of global justice."
Can the internet really have such a powerful presence? If you have been reading the news lately, and I know you have because of the requirement of one of our discussion questions, the internet and programs contained within, have helped start revolutions. Not just 'virtual' revolutions, but real, tangible revolutions! Libya ring a bell? Page 2 goes onto say, "The Internet, specifically, brought glimpses of hope for global democratization, in the form of a "true" public sphere that would circumvent traditional political channels. By facilitating more efficient communication among the citizens of the world usually laden with failures of bureaucracy, the usual stoppages characteristic of bureaucratic institutions could be circumvented." Wow, just wow! The power of technology never ceases to amaze me. I will leave you to ponder this idea.
We are then brought back down to earth a little on page 3, where it states, "Nevertheless, the liberal dream of progress espoused by Friedman and other did nothing but rearticulate the false hopes of modernity under the guise of technological advancement." But don't lose all hope yet. :) Read a bit further down: "Against such optimism, I see the power of information technologies and new media as challenges to these notions altogether." Isn't that what this is all about? Challenging ideas? New thought? Expanding our knowledge? Bridging the gap between the have's and have not's? Or the folks who have access and those that don't? Page three goes on to say, "The Internet not only acts as a forum to disperse knowledge but transforms it, hauling into question the certainty of what constitutes knowledge as such." Yes, yes and yes!
Page 4 starts out by reinforcing ideas we covered at the beginning of the semester: McLuhan!!! "...the content of one medium always involves another." (Don't skip over the box about McLuhand on Page 5). The Medium IS the Message. Enough said!
One thing to pay attention to is the explanation of Hot and Cold Media. This idea was briefly brought up in the McLuhand piece, but it did not expand much on the idea too much. Some students have been confused about hot and cold media in the past, but the book provides some good insight, as does the link I provided.
After the discussion about McLuhan, and a discussion about how "specific media are not tied down to a corresponding technology", the chapter moves into a history of media. There are three eras:
1). Mechanical
2). Electric
3). Broadcast
While this information is review because we have already covered a chapter in media history, it's a great thing to be able to read the history from another authors perspective. Especially where Han asserts that we are on the verge of a fourth era: Virtual! Of course, this book was written in 2008. How much has changed since that time? Quite a bit! If you read further in the book, provided you are interested in purchasing the book (which I recommend if you are at all interested in new media), it discusses a great many things including censorship in other countries, space and time as common place, and a plethora of other ideas. Great read!
I will not recount all three areas of history that Han covers, but be sure to read through it. As mentioned previously, it includes some repetitive information (repetition helps with retention of information, right?) but it also brings up some other great ideas and relationships we have not previously covered.
I hope you enjoyed reading this chapter as much as I have. If you are interested in the book, it's not incredibly expensive and a great read if you have the time. Of course, this is coming from a communication and new media geek, but I recommend it nonetheless.
Thanks for letting me geek out about yet another reading.
The Blogging Prof.
Wednesday, July 18, 2012
Instructor Wrap Up - Personal Dynamic Media - Kay and Goldberg
I'm not going to go into too much detail about the Kay and Goldberg piece because it was a fairly easy read.
The introduction to this piece brought up some very good ideas, and explained some pertinent things to the article. A couple of things to read over are NeXT, Dynabook , PARC, Smalltalk Language, and the Squeak project. Briefly reading through these links will give you further understanding about the reading.
Page 393 covers what the article is about. It says, "In it, we explain the Dynabook idea, and describe a variety of systems we have already written in Smalltalk language in order to give broad images of the kinds of information-related tools that might represent the kernel of a personal computing medium".
Here are some additional quotes I liked for various reasons:
Pg. 393 - "Although thinking goes on in one's head, external media serve to materialize thoughts and, through feedback, to augment the actual paths the thinking follows."
Pg. 394 - "Imagine having your own self-contained knowledge manipulator in a portable package the size and shape of an ordinary notebook. Suppose it had enough power to outrace your sense of sight and hearing, enough capacity to store for later retrieval thousands of page-equivalents of reference materials, poems, letters, recipes, records, drawings, animations, musical scores, waveforms, dynamic simulations, and anything else you would like to remember and change."
Pg. 394 - "If the 'medium is the message', then the message of low-bandwidth timesharing is 'blah'". Holy cow - I love love love this quote!
Pg 395 - "Different fonts create different moods and cast an aura that influences the subjective style of both writing and reading."
Pg. 396 - I loved all of the conclusion section, but this really takes the cake: "For educators, the Dynabook could be a new world limited only by their imagination and ingenuity". The only thing I will say about this quote is that I completely and wholeheartedly agree. I'm using my 'Dynabook' to type out this blog post. But I digress......
The way the article is set up is kind of neat. It starts out with the editors introduction, then proceeds to the authors introduction. It then covers the following sections:
*Background: Humans and Media
*A Dynamic Medium for Creative Thought: The Dynabook
*Design Background
*An Interim Dynabook
*Remembering, Seeing and Hearing
*Different Fonts for Different Effects
*Editing
*Filing
*Drawing/Painting
*Animation and Music
*Simulation
*An Animation System Programmed by Animators
*A Drawing and Painting System Programmed by a Child
*A Hospital Simulation Programmed by a Decision-Theorist
*An Audio Animation System Programmed by Musicians
*A Musical Score Capture System Programmed by a Musician
*Electronic Circuit Design by a High School Student
*Conclusion
Most of these sections were very interesting to read, especially since the article was written in the late 1970's (around the time I was born, so it was interesting to read about 'new innovations' at this time). But one of the other sections stood out to me: A Hospital Simulation Programmed by a Decision-Theorist . This section struck me as interesting because the small town I live in has a health center that is switching over to an electronic charting system. They have spent quite a bit of money installing this system that can easily network with other systems in the area. This idea is just now becoming widespread.
The other idea, and main focus of the article that interested me was the Dynabook. Right after I graduated high school, I worked for a company called General Magic. While I did very basic things at General Magic, it was interesting to see the link between this article, and the company I did some work for right out of high school. The company has since gone under, as a lot of new media companies do, but it was intriguing to read about the company again from the perspective of historical 'new media'.
A personal note: I vaguely remember the day that the product was finally released. The company threw a huge party because the release date of the product kept getting pushed back incrementally, and the engineers were under a deadline. I even more vaguely remember when the company started to lay off folks due to poor market performance. I recall the stock prices plummeting, and depression around the company setting in. It was a hard time for the folks at General Magic. Such is life in the 'new media' business. :)
The introduction to this piece brought up some very good ideas, and explained some pertinent things to the article. A couple of things to read over are NeXT, Dynabook , PARC, Smalltalk Language, and the Squeak project. Briefly reading through these links will give you further understanding about the reading.
Page 393 covers what the article is about. It says, "In it, we explain the Dynabook idea, and describe a variety of systems we have already written in Smalltalk language in order to give broad images of the kinds of information-related tools that might represent the kernel of a personal computing medium".
Here are some additional quotes I liked for various reasons:
Pg. 393 - "Although thinking goes on in one's head, external media serve to materialize thoughts and, through feedback, to augment the actual paths the thinking follows."
Pg. 394 - "Imagine having your own self-contained knowledge manipulator in a portable package the size and shape of an ordinary notebook. Suppose it had enough power to outrace your sense of sight and hearing, enough capacity to store for later retrieval thousands of page-equivalents of reference materials, poems, letters, recipes, records, drawings, animations, musical scores, waveforms, dynamic simulations, and anything else you would like to remember and change."
Pg. 394 - "If the 'medium is the message', then the message of low-bandwidth timesharing is 'blah'". Holy cow - I love love love this quote!
Pg 395 - "Different fonts create different moods and cast an aura that influences the subjective style of both writing and reading."
Pg. 396 - I loved all of the conclusion section, but this really takes the cake: "For educators, the Dynabook could be a new world limited only by their imagination and ingenuity". The only thing I will say about this quote is that I completely and wholeheartedly agree. I'm using my 'Dynabook' to type out this blog post. But I digress......
The way the article is set up is kind of neat. It starts out with the editors introduction, then proceeds to the authors introduction. It then covers the following sections:
*Background: Humans and Media
*A Dynamic Medium for Creative Thought: The Dynabook
*Design Background
*An Interim Dynabook
*Remembering, Seeing and Hearing
*Different Fonts for Different Effects
*Editing
*Filing
*Drawing/Painting
*Animation and Music
*Simulation
*An Animation System Programmed by Animators
*A Drawing and Painting System Programmed by a Child
*A Hospital Simulation Programmed by a Decision-Theorist
*An Audio Animation System Programmed by Musicians
*A Musical Score Capture System Programmed by a Musician
*Electronic Circuit Design by a High School Student
*Conclusion
Most of these sections were very interesting to read, especially since the article was written in the late 1970's (around the time I was born, so it was interesting to read about 'new innovations' at this time). But one of the other sections stood out to me: A Hospital Simulation Programmed by a Decision-Theorist . This section struck me as interesting because the small town I live in has a health center that is switching over to an electronic charting system. They have spent quite a bit of money installing this system that can easily network with other systems in the area. This idea is just now becoming widespread.
The other idea, and main focus of the article that interested me was the Dynabook. Right after I graduated high school, I worked for a company called General Magic. While I did very basic things at General Magic, it was interesting to see the link between this article, and the company I did some work for right out of high school. The company has since gone under, as a lot of new media companies do, but it was intriguing to read about the company again from the perspective of historical 'new media'.
A personal note: I vaguely remember the day that the product was finally released. The company threw a huge party because the release date of the product kept getting pushed back incrementally, and the engineers were under a deadline. I even more vaguely remember when the company started to lay off folks due to poor market performance. I recall the stock prices plummeting, and depression around the company setting in. It was a hard time for the folks at General Magic. Such is life in the 'new media' business. :)
Thursday, July 12, 2012
Instructor Wrap Up - From Computer Power and Human Reason - Weizenbaum
Joseph Weizenbaum wrote the book From Computer Power and Human Reason: From Judgment to Calculation (both clickable) in 1976. The excerpt from our text seems to be a bit of a response/discussion about some folks perspectives of his computer system ELIZA, and ultimately the program called Doctor. He also discusses a number of other ideas in this excerpt, mainly the idea that computers lack human qualities, such as compassion and wisdom. He brings up a good number of logical conclusions based on his knowledge and observations, both of computer systems, and human qualities.
The introduction written by the editors of The New Media Reader (the book that I required in a previous semester, but did not assign this semester because of the variety of articles I wanted you all to read) starts out by explaining that new media has been criticized by a great number of people who have little to no knowledge of the subject. Weizenbaum on the other hand, has knowledge about new media, computer systems, and the inner workings of one of the first conversational computer programs called ELIZA. After all, he created the program. (Click on the name to go to the wikipedia page describing ELIZA).
At the start of the excerpt, Weizenbaum recites some 'history' as he calls it. He describes an interaction that includes the Chair of Physical Chemistry at the Victoria University of Manchester, England, and Nicolai Bukharin, a leading theoretician of the Russian Communist party. He recounts this bit of history for two reasons:
1). "The first is to illustrate that ideas which seem at first glance to be obvious and simple, and which ought therefore to be universally credible once they have been articulated, are sometimes buoys marking out stormy channels in deep intellectual seas."
2). "...I recite this history is that I feel myself to be reliving part of it. My own shock was administered not by any important political figure espousing his philosophy of science, but by some people who insisted on misinterpreting a piece of work I had done."
In short, he is defending and explaining his computer program ELIZA, and the subsequent application/experiment, Doctor. Doctor was a simulation of a Rogerian Psychotherapist. See the article for a short interaction between the system and a person typing into a computer. The system (Doctor) responds, and is in the BOLD FACE type.
What interests me is Weizenbaums discussion about how folks, actual psychotherapists (not just one, but a number of folks), believed that this computer system could be developed to reach a large audience. The author proceeds to talk about 3 reason why he was shocked. He states, "The shocks I experienced as DOCTOR became widely known and "played" were due to principally three distinct events:"...
1). "A number of practicing psychiatrists seriously believed the DOCTOR computer program could grow into a nearly completely automatic form of psychotherapy".....
2). "I was startled to see how quickly and how very deeply people conversing with DOCTOR became emotionally involved with the computer and how unequivocally they anthropomorphized it."
3). "Another widespread, and to me surprising, reaction to the ELIZA program was the spread of a belief that it demonstrated a general solution to the problem of computer understanding of natural language."
Each of these reasons is very interesting, but being that we are in the field of communication, let's camp in #3 for just a second. The author goes on to mention that language is contextual, or "the importance of context to language understanding". Wow - even when we are talking about computers do we have a conversation about how language is contextual. How different is a computer than a human? Does it lack reasoning? Compassion? Wisdom? Weizenbaum, a little further down in number 3 explains, "This reaction to ELIZA showed me more vividly than anything I had seen hitherto the enormously exaggerated attributions an even well-educated audience is capable of making, even strives to make, to a technology it does not understand." Do we still do this today?
The author continues on and concerns himself with a list of questions and explanations. The questions he asks are wonderful, and very much worth reviewing. There is talk of 'plausibility', 'emotional ties to machines' and how humans have begun to rely on 'autonomous machines'. Relevant today? What do you think?
He then goes on to chat a bit about professors, or leaders in his field, and students at MIT. A quote that really spoke to me says, "They (students) sense the presence of a dilemma in an education polarized around science and technology, and education that implicitly claims to open a privileged access-path to fact, but that cannot tell them how to decide what is to count as fact." So true! Even today, this statement rings true!
The author then moves to a deeper issues than just ELIZA. He discusses two sides of a computer debate. They are:
1). Computers should and will do everything
2). Computers should have limits
Have we passed this point of debate?
Weizenbaum then moves to a discussion about knowledge and science, likening science to a drug, and even referring to science as a 'slow-acting poison'. For someone in the scientific community, he sure is stating his opinion here. Or is it fact? We're not sure (read the article to get that joke).
I will leave you with two snippets from the excerpt:
"Scientific statements can never be certain; they can be only more or less credible".
"When I say that science has been gradually converted into a slow-acting poison, I mean that the attribution of certainty to scientific knowledge by the common wisdom, an attribution now made so nearly universally that it has become a commonsense dogma, has virtually delegitimized all other way of understanding. People viewed the arts, especially literature, as sources of intellectual nourishment and understanding, but today the arts are perceived largely as entertainments."
In short, I loved Weizenbaums discussion in this excerpt. I think he brings up a number of great ideas, especially when it comes to computer programs, and the limitations. He points out some great ideas throughout the piece, things that are still relevant in today's 'new media'. I'm not just talking about social networking, but rather, larger scale media. Some of the discussions that he confronts are still going on in our time, and I do not see those discussions coming to an end anytime soon.
I hope that you have enjoyed this article as much as I have, and it is my hope that you grab a hold of the larger meaning involved. Advances in technology bring up a great number of issues, and those issues, especially when mixed with human interaction, will not cease.
The introduction written by the editors of The New Media Reader (the book that I required in a previous semester, but did not assign this semester because of the variety of articles I wanted you all to read) starts out by explaining that new media has been criticized by a great number of people who have little to no knowledge of the subject. Weizenbaum on the other hand, has knowledge about new media, computer systems, and the inner workings of one of the first conversational computer programs called ELIZA. After all, he created the program. (Click on the name to go to the wikipedia page describing ELIZA).
At the start of the excerpt, Weizenbaum recites some 'history' as he calls it. He describes an interaction that includes the Chair of Physical Chemistry at the Victoria University of Manchester, England, and Nicolai Bukharin, a leading theoretician of the Russian Communist party. He recounts this bit of history for two reasons:
1). "The first is to illustrate that ideas which seem at first glance to be obvious and simple, and which ought therefore to be universally credible once they have been articulated, are sometimes buoys marking out stormy channels in deep intellectual seas."
2). "...I recite this history is that I feel myself to be reliving part of it. My own shock was administered not by any important political figure espousing his philosophy of science, but by some people who insisted on misinterpreting a piece of work I had done."
In short, he is defending and explaining his computer program ELIZA, and the subsequent application/experiment, Doctor. Doctor was a simulation of a Rogerian Psychotherapist. See the article for a short interaction between the system and a person typing into a computer. The system (Doctor) responds, and is in the BOLD FACE type.
What interests me is Weizenbaums discussion about how folks, actual psychotherapists (not just one, but a number of folks), believed that this computer system could be developed to reach a large audience. The author proceeds to talk about 3 reason why he was shocked. He states, "The shocks I experienced as DOCTOR became widely known and "played" were due to principally three distinct events:"...
1). "A number of practicing psychiatrists seriously believed the DOCTOR computer program could grow into a nearly completely automatic form of psychotherapy".....
2). "I was startled to see how quickly and how very deeply people conversing with DOCTOR became emotionally involved with the computer and how unequivocally they anthropomorphized it."
3). "Another widespread, and to me surprising, reaction to the ELIZA program was the spread of a belief that it demonstrated a general solution to the problem of computer understanding of natural language."
Each of these reasons is very interesting, but being that we are in the field of communication, let's camp in #3 for just a second. The author goes on to mention that language is contextual, or "the importance of context to language understanding". Wow - even when we are talking about computers do we have a conversation about how language is contextual. How different is a computer than a human? Does it lack reasoning? Compassion? Wisdom? Weizenbaum, a little further down in number 3 explains, "This reaction to ELIZA showed me more vividly than anything I had seen hitherto the enormously exaggerated attributions an even well-educated audience is capable of making, even strives to make, to a technology it does not understand." Do we still do this today?
The author continues on and concerns himself with a list of questions and explanations. The questions he asks are wonderful, and very much worth reviewing. There is talk of 'plausibility', 'emotional ties to machines' and how humans have begun to rely on 'autonomous machines'. Relevant today? What do you think?
He then goes on to chat a bit about professors, or leaders in his field, and students at MIT. A quote that really spoke to me says, "They (students) sense the presence of a dilemma in an education polarized around science and technology, and education that implicitly claims to open a privileged access-path to fact, but that cannot tell them how to decide what is to count as fact." So true! Even today, this statement rings true!
The author then moves to a deeper issues than just ELIZA. He discusses two sides of a computer debate. They are:
1). Computers should and will do everything
2). Computers should have limits
Have we passed this point of debate?
Weizenbaum then moves to a discussion about knowledge and science, likening science to a drug, and even referring to science as a 'slow-acting poison'. For someone in the scientific community, he sure is stating his opinion here. Or is it fact? We're not sure (read the article to get that joke).
I will leave you with two snippets from the excerpt:
"Scientific statements can never be certain; they can be only more or less credible".
"When I say that science has been gradually converted into a slow-acting poison, I mean that the attribution of certainty to scientific knowledge by the common wisdom, an attribution now made so nearly universally that it has become a commonsense dogma, has virtually delegitimized all other way of understanding. People viewed the arts, especially literature, as sources of intellectual nourishment and understanding, but today the arts are perceived largely as entertainments."
In short, I loved Weizenbaums discussion in this excerpt. I think he brings up a number of great ideas, especially when it comes to computer programs, and the limitations. He points out some great ideas throughout the piece, things that are still relevant in today's 'new media'. I'm not just talking about social networking, but rather, larger scale media. Some of the discussions that he confronts are still going on in our time, and I do not see those discussions coming to an end anytime soon.
I hope that you have enjoyed this article as much as I have, and it is my hope that you grab a hold of the larger meaning involved. Advances in technology bring up a great number of issues, and those issues, especially when mixed with human interaction, will not cease.
Wednesday, July 11, 2012
Instructor Wrap Up - The Technology and the Society - Williams
The Technology and the Society. Wow, this was an interesting read considering the state of our society, and how television currently fits into our collective daily lives. You can read more about Raymond Williams by clicking on his name. Wikkipedia gives a nice overview of Williams, and even describes in a sentence or two the background of this chapter (hint: it includes McLuhan). This was a chapter out of Willams's book titled Television: Technology and Cultural Form, published in 1972.
The introduction to this chapter is quite interesting. Although I did not copy the intro for you to focus on, it really gives some context to this chapter from Williams's book. One section early in the introduction states, "Technological determinism, a viewpoint for which Marshall McLuhan is the canonical figure in media studies, tends to frame questions around technology in terms of technology's "effects" on the culture. This viewpoint has been rejected, or greatly qualified in its use, by most academic writers since McLuhan. However, it remains the dominant popular discourse on technology, and many academic writers remain engaged in outlining their positions as alternatives to this viewpoint. For these reasons, Williams's early section presenting a number of different varieties of technological determinism remains quite relevant today." (Don't forget to click on the link to technological determinism. This will help you grasp what Willams is talking about in this selection.)
The introduction starts out by saying, "It is often said that television has altered our world. In the same way, people often speak of a new world, a new society, a new phase of history, being created - "brought about" - by this or that new technology: the steam-engine, the automobile, the atomic bomb." So true, isn't it? We still share the same sentiment when new technologies come along. To the credit of Williams, and countless others, a new phase of history really was ushered in by each of the 'new technologies' Willams mentioned here. Looking at our current technologies, the internet for example, how much have our lives changed simply from the ability to access the internet?
Williams goes on to describe a cause/effect relationship of technology/society, technology/culture, technology/psychology. A little lower down on the same page (pg. 291), he goes on to mention that, "If the technology is a cause, we can at best modify or seek to control its effects." Valid questions for research. In fact, the first page mentions this very thing.
The following page states the point of the chapter: "It is with these problems in mind that I want to try to anaylse television as particular cultural technology, and to look at its development, its institutions, its forms and its effects, in this critical dimension." He then states the three sections that he will be covering in the paper, which are:
(a) versions of cause and effect in technology and society
(b) the social history of television as a technology
(c) the social history of the uses of television technology
I won't bore you with a recount of the entire article, but I will share a few interesting quotes with you. At the bottom right hand side of page 292, Williams gives a summary of the 9 items he outlines. 1-5 are said to be: "the technology is in effect accidental". In other words, technology is the cause for change. 6-9 says, "television is again, in effect, a technological accident, but its significance lief in its uses, which are held to be symptomatic of some order of society or some qualities of human nature which are otherwise determined." In other words, the change would have happened regardless of technology. Go back and read that section, it's very interesting to think about.
Reading through the rest of section (a) proves to be really interesting. Williams covers the ideas of "technological determinism", the 'otherwise determined', and 'symptomatic technology'. Very interesting indeed.
Section (b) covers the history of television, which proves to be incredibly interesting for those of us that grew up in an era of the internet and beyond. It is worth paying close attention to, as these are forms of 'new media'.
Section (c) goes over the uses of television technology. An even more interesting section than the last, though section (b) was really interesting for me. ;) The current section starts out by saying, "It is never quite true to say that in modern societies, when a social need has been demonstrated, it is appropriate technology will be found. This is partly because real needs, in any particular period, are beyond the scope of existing or foreseeable scientific and technical knowledge." The following section is a discussion of television, and what brought it to the current point in the early 1970's.
All in all, this was a very interesting article from an historical perspective of the television. Taking into account the links I have provided here, and we've got an incredible glimpse into that particular stage of history.
I hope you have enjoyed reading this chapter as much as I have.
Until later....
The Blogging Prof.
The introduction to this chapter is quite interesting. Although I did not copy the intro for you to focus on, it really gives some context to this chapter from Williams's book. One section early in the introduction states, "Technological determinism, a viewpoint for which Marshall McLuhan is the canonical figure in media studies, tends to frame questions around technology in terms of technology's "effects" on the culture. This viewpoint has been rejected, or greatly qualified in its use, by most academic writers since McLuhan. However, it remains the dominant popular discourse on technology, and many academic writers remain engaged in outlining their positions as alternatives to this viewpoint. For these reasons, Williams's early section presenting a number of different varieties of technological determinism remains quite relevant today." (Don't forget to click on the link to technological determinism. This will help you grasp what Willams is talking about in this selection.)
The introduction starts out by saying, "It is often said that television has altered our world. In the same way, people often speak of a new world, a new society, a new phase of history, being created - "brought about" - by this or that new technology: the steam-engine, the automobile, the atomic bomb." So true, isn't it? We still share the same sentiment when new technologies come along. To the credit of Williams, and countless others, a new phase of history really was ushered in by each of the 'new technologies' Willams mentioned here. Looking at our current technologies, the internet for example, how much have our lives changed simply from the ability to access the internet?
Williams goes on to describe a cause/effect relationship of technology/society, technology/culture, technology/psychology. A little lower down on the same page (pg. 291), he goes on to mention that, "If the technology is a cause, we can at best modify or seek to control its effects." Valid questions for research. In fact, the first page mentions this very thing.
The following page states the point of the chapter: "It is with these problems in mind that I want to try to anaylse television as particular cultural technology, and to look at its development, its institutions, its forms and its effects, in this critical dimension." He then states the three sections that he will be covering in the paper, which are:
(a) versions of cause and effect in technology and society
(b) the social history of television as a technology
(c) the social history of the uses of television technology
I won't bore you with a recount of the entire article, but I will share a few interesting quotes with you. At the bottom right hand side of page 292, Williams gives a summary of the 9 items he outlines. 1-5 are said to be: "the technology is in effect accidental". In other words, technology is the cause for change. 6-9 says, "television is again, in effect, a technological accident, but its significance lief in its uses, which are held to be symptomatic of some order of society or some qualities of human nature which are otherwise determined." In other words, the change would have happened regardless of technology. Go back and read that section, it's very interesting to think about.
Reading through the rest of section (a) proves to be really interesting. Williams covers the ideas of "technological determinism", the 'otherwise determined', and 'symptomatic technology'. Very interesting indeed.
Section (b) covers the history of television, which proves to be incredibly interesting for those of us that grew up in an era of the internet and beyond. It is worth paying close attention to, as these are forms of 'new media'.
Section (c) goes over the uses of television technology. An even more interesting section than the last, though section (b) was really interesting for me. ;) The current section starts out by saying, "It is never quite true to say that in modern societies, when a social need has been demonstrated, it is appropriate technology will be found. This is partly because real needs, in any particular period, are beyond the scope of existing or foreseeable scientific and technical knowledge." The following section is a discussion of television, and what brought it to the current point in the early 1970's.
All in all, this was a very interesting article from an historical perspective of the television. Taking into account the links I have provided here, and we've got an incredible glimpse into that particular stage of history.
I hope you have enjoyed reading this chapter as much as I have.
Until later....
The Blogging Prof.
Thursday, June 28, 2012
Instructor Wrap Up - Community Media Chapter 7 - by Ellie Rennie
A seemingly unrelated reading that I have crazily chosen for this semester in Comm 131P, right? I beg to differ. There is certainly a method to my 'geeky madness' when it comes to New Media/You Media. When I was first planning this course well over a year ago now, I had the hardest time trying to find a textbook for the course. I ordered many books from publishers, purchased many books from online sources, and spent quite a bit of time trying to figure out what I wanted to cover in the class. New Media can cover so many ideas, and so far, we have read through a number of them. Community Media was one of those ideas that I was completely enamored with. In fact, I almost required you to purchase a number of books for the course before deciding to change things up a bit and simply make the readings available on D2L. The decision was a hard one, but I'm happy with the readings I have chose for this semester. Who knows - the course may look completely different next semester, as it did last semester.
I think I have mentioned before that the first semester I offered this class, I required the textbook "The New Media Reader". There were quite a few difficult readings in that text, but it really opened up the world of new media in a number of different ways for students. Through feedback I received from students over the last year or so, I decided to no longer require that text and simply go to a 'reader' that I put together myself. This allowed me to cover quite a few more topics than I had previously in this course. One of those topics is Community Media. To frame this idea a bit, click HERE to read about it a bit. While Wikipedia is not my favorite place currently, it sure helps to give a jumping off point a lot of time. This is one of those times!
Here is a short excerpt from the book Community Media by Ellie Rennie page 12: "Chapter 7 synthesizes the arguments of previous chapters and offers some further thoughts as to what media democracy in the digital age might look like. Community media has always been about self-expression - - - and seeing ourselves as part of the society in which we live. Democracy is said to be in a predicament over the perceived distance between the people and the institutions that represent them, which results in political apathy. Can participation in the media help close that distance? E-government model suggests direct input into the policy process by citizens. Is this desirable? Being able to represent oneself in the media paves the way for a more visible, transparent, and responsive model of democracy. Community media may not solve the problems of the mass media, but it does offer some valuable lessons for e-democracy."
If you are at all interested in this concept, you can purchase the book through online booksellers. In fact, Amazon has an interesting review about the book. You can link to the Amazon page HERE.
You can also read more about community media
HERE
HERE
and HERE. These are just a few samples of what is out there pertaining to Community Media.
Are you geeking out about Community Media movements? Perhaps not yet, but at least this exposed y'all to a concept that some may have never heard of previously.
Enjoy!
:)
The Blogging Prof.
I think I have mentioned before that the first semester I offered this class, I required the textbook "The New Media Reader". There were quite a few difficult readings in that text, but it really opened up the world of new media in a number of different ways for students. Through feedback I received from students over the last year or so, I decided to no longer require that text and simply go to a 'reader' that I put together myself. This allowed me to cover quite a few more topics than I had previously in this course. One of those topics is Community Media. To frame this idea a bit, click HERE to read about it a bit. While Wikipedia is not my favorite place currently, it sure helps to give a jumping off point a lot of time. This is one of those times!
Here is a short excerpt from the book Community Media by Ellie Rennie page 12: "Chapter 7 synthesizes the arguments of previous chapters and offers some further thoughts as to what media democracy in the digital age might look like. Community media has always been about self-expression - - - and seeing ourselves as part of the society in which we live. Democracy is said to be in a predicament over the perceived distance between the people and the institutions that represent them, which results in political apathy. Can participation in the media help close that distance? E-government model suggests direct input into the policy process by citizens. Is this desirable? Being able to represent oneself in the media paves the way for a more visible, transparent, and responsive model of democracy. Community media may not solve the problems of the mass media, but it does offer some valuable lessons for e-democracy."
If you are at all interested in this concept, you can purchase the book through online booksellers. In fact, Amazon has an interesting review about the book. You can link to the Amazon page HERE.
You can also read more about community media
HERE
HERE
and HERE. These are just a few samples of what is out there pertaining to Community Media.
Are you geeking out about Community Media movements? Perhaps not yet, but at least this exposed y'all to a concept that some may have never heard of previously.
Enjoy!
:)
The Blogging Prof.
Wednesday, June 27, 2012
Instructor Wrap Up - Uses and Grats Article
Hello Folks!
This was a fairly easy read, so I will cover only some minimal things, and highlight some ideas I thought were interesting.
First off, when you write your Social Media Paper (based on your data-gathering project) you will need to incorporate some outside sources (see assignment sheet for more detail). The Uses and Grats article is a great place to find other sources to support your ideas. Use the "Literature Review" section and the Reference page from this article to help you find other sources.
Here are some quotes from the article that I thought were pretty interesting:
Pg. 217 "Dye (2007) points out that this new medium has created a new generation of individuals whose identities are defined by their connections and the content they produce online". Think about this for a second...... Think about how YOU used to define yourself before social networking. What were your definitions? What did you connect with? Who? This is a very interesting concept! What about folks how are not as connected online? How do those folks define themselves?
On page 217 the idea of 'instant gratification' is brought up. How does this idea, or how has this idea (or process) shape our society? Connect this idea to pagers back in the early 1990's before cell phones were wide spread. Go further and connect this idea to drive through restaurants. Even cell phones, DVR's, internet - - - do you get the point? Instant gratification! There is no waiting.
Side Note: My SIL just had her first child, and I have been thinking a lot about babies, kids, families, etc... Babies are on demand, right? Kids are taught patience through growing up. We sit in classes for hours and hours at a time through primary education, then in college our time is divided up even more with hour long classes, then work, then friends, then family, etc... Now throw into the equation this idea of instant gratification and what do we have? I will stop here and let you make the obvious link, but what are your thoughts on this? What are the implications of social networking when taking into account where we have come in just 10-15 years?
Moving on.....
It is interesting to read on pages 217 and 218, the start and spread of Facebook. Pay attention to that section, because it is fairly easy to breeze by it. Also pay attention to process gratifications and content gratifications.
Page 218 states, "According to the uses and gratification perspective, media use is determined by a group of key elements including "people's needs and motives to communicate, the psychological and social environment, the mass media, functional alternatives to media use, communication behavior, and the consequences of such behavior" (Rubin, 1994, p. 419)."
Page 218 - "Gurevitch (1974) defined that the uses and gratification perspective as focusing on the "social and psychological origins of needs, which generate expectation of the mass media or other sources, which lead to different patterns of media exposure resulting in need gratifications and other consequences" (as cited in Rubin, 1994, p. 419)."
One last thing - page 223 talks a bit about the idea of 'convenient communication' and how some folks sent their profiles to 'private'. This idea is one that I hope to cover soon, but setting your Facebook profile to 'private' is key for a lot of folks. The privacy issue on FB is an important one because of accessibility on the internet. FB changes their privacy issues so frequently that it's hard to keep up. However, if you are careful about keeping up your privacy settings (news articles are published frequently about 'how' to keep up your privacy settings), social networking can be a useful tool for satisfying interpersonal needs (keeping up with friends, networking with folks, etc..). It can also be a decently safe place for folks to 'hang out' if they watch their content, who they allow to be their friends, and certainly keep up with privacy settings.
It is my hope, that through the way I have planned the class (reading 'new media', 'old media' and the Social Selves text), that folks will come out of the class with an arsenal of new media experiences along with learning some incredible things from the past/present and even future projections about new media and what this means to you as a media consumer.
How's that for a tangent? ;)
Until later.....
The Blogging Prof.
This was a fairly easy read, so I will cover only some minimal things, and highlight some ideas I thought were interesting.
First off, when you write your Social Media Paper (based on your data-gathering project) you will need to incorporate some outside sources (see assignment sheet for more detail). The Uses and Grats article is a great place to find other sources to support your ideas. Use the "Literature Review" section and the Reference page from this article to help you find other sources.
Here are some quotes from the article that I thought were pretty interesting:
Pg. 217 "Dye (2007) points out that this new medium has created a new generation of individuals whose identities are defined by their connections and the content they produce online". Think about this for a second...... Think about how YOU used to define yourself before social networking. What were your definitions? What did you connect with? Who? This is a very interesting concept! What about folks how are not as connected online? How do those folks define themselves?
On page 217 the idea of 'instant gratification' is brought up. How does this idea, or how has this idea (or process) shape our society? Connect this idea to pagers back in the early 1990's before cell phones were wide spread. Go further and connect this idea to drive through restaurants. Even cell phones, DVR's, internet - - - do you get the point? Instant gratification! There is no waiting.
Side Note: My SIL just had her first child, and I have been thinking a lot about babies, kids, families, etc... Babies are on demand, right? Kids are taught patience through growing up. We sit in classes for hours and hours at a time through primary education, then in college our time is divided up even more with hour long classes, then work, then friends, then family, etc... Now throw into the equation this idea of instant gratification and what do we have? I will stop here and let you make the obvious link, but what are your thoughts on this? What are the implications of social networking when taking into account where we have come in just 10-15 years?
Moving on.....
It is interesting to read on pages 217 and 218, the start and spread of Facebook. Pay attention to that section, because it is fairly easy to breeze by it. Also pay attention to process gratifications and content gratifications.
Page 218 states, "According to the uses and gratification perspective, media use is determined by a group of key elements including "people's needs and motives to communicate, the psychological and social environment, the mass media, functional alternatives to media use, communication behavior, and the consequences of such behavior" (Rubin, 1994, p. 419)."
Page 218 - "Gurevitch (1974) defined that the uses and gratification perspective as focusing on the "social and psychological origins of needs, which generate expectation of the mass media or other sources, which lead to different patterns of media exposure resulting in need gratifications and other consequences" (as cited in Rubin, 1994, p. 419)."
One last thing - page 223 talks a bit about the idea of 'convenient communication' and how some folks sent their profiles to 'private'. This idea is one that I hope to cover soon, but setting your Facebook profile to 'private' is key for a lot of folks. The privacy issue on FB is an important one because of accessibility on the internet. FB changes their privacy issues so frequently that it's hard to keep up. However, if you are careful about keeping up your privacy settings (news articles are published frequently about 'how' to keep up your privacy settings), social networking can be a useful tool for satisfying interpersonal needs (keeping up with friends, networking with folks, etc..). It can also be a decently safe place for folks to 'hang out' if they watch their content, who they allow to be their friends, and certainly keep up with privacy settings.
It is my hope, that through the way I have planned the class (reading 'new media', 'old media' and the Social Selves text), that folks will come out of the class with an arsenal of new media experiences along with learning some incredible things from the past/present and even future projections about new media and what this means to you as a media consumer.
How's that for a tangent? ;)
Until later.....
The Blogging Prof.
Tuesday, June 19, 2012
Instructor Wrap Up - The Medium IS the Message - McLuhan
Although I am not a big fan of Wikipedia because of it's current lack of internal and external control, THIS page talks a bit about McLuhan, and may help to clarify the reading.
First off, let me mention that McLuhan was criticized a bit for his ideas. You can easily search the internet for some opinions about McLuhan, but let's skip over the for now, and focus on who McLuhan was, and his ideas as presented in the present piece.
The article starts on page 203 with an explanation of how and why McLuhan thinks the medium really IS the message. The rest of the article goes on to support this idea by bringing up a number of examples. He also throws in some other ideas here and there, but he is pretty succinct in asserting his idea throughout the writing. Here are some excerpts that stood out to me:
*pg. 203 - "This is merely to say that the persona and social consequence of any medium - that is, of any extension of ourselves - result from the new scale that is introduced into our affairs by each extension of ourselves, or by any new technology". After this statement, the author goes on to explain job elimination and a creation of roles, etc.... After this, McLuhan states, "Many people would be disposed to say that it was not the machine, but what one did with the machine, that was its meaning or message".
*pg. 203 - "For the "message" of any medium or technology is the change of scale or pace or pattern that it introduces into human affairs".
(I'm backtracking a bit here)
McLuhan is brilliant in explaining the electric light. You might be thinking, "I already read that, and he lost me pretty quickly". that is understandable. Go back and read the parts on page 203 about the electric light - just those parts, and see what you can extrapolate from his explanation. This short description of the meaning of the electric light, or lack thereof, is the essence of the reading. McLuhan states, "The instance of the electric light may prove illuminating in this connection. The electric light is pure information. It is a medium without a message, as it were, unless it is used to spell out some verbal ad or name. This fact, characteristic of all media, means that the 'content' of any medium is always another medium". Brilliant! (am I geeking out again - sorry!). :) But then if you keep reading he comes back to the electric light and explains, "Let us return to the electric light. Whether the light is being used for brain surgery or night baseball is a matter of indifference. It could be argued that these activities are in some way the "content" of the electric light, since they could not exist without the electric light. This fact merely underlines the point that "the medium is the message" because it is the medium that shapes and controls the scale and form of human association and action". If you keep reading a couple of sentences beyond this excerpt, it says, "...it is only too typical that the "content" of any medium blinds us to the character of the medium".
As an aside - I am looking through my notes on the McLuhan article, and if you can get past some of the wording, the meaning is incredible!
Here are some other brief quotes. I will try to limit my commentary so that you can simply absorb what McLuhan is saying, and the implications it has for us today in our current 'media state'. I suggest that you read these in context, that is, have your book/the reading close by so that you can follow along and really absorb what is being said and implied. It may take a second to simply sit there and think about the concept for a few seconds before the light bulb (pun intended) flashes on and you 'get' what he is saying.
*pg. 205 "In other words, cubism, by giving the inside and outside, the top, bottom, back, and front and the rest, in two dimensions, drops the illusion of perspectives in favor of instant sensory awareness of the whole. Cubism, by seizing on instant total awareness, suddenly announced that the medium is the message."
*pg. 205 "Before the electric speed and total field, it was not obvious that the medium is the message. The message, it seemed, was the "content", as people used to as what a painting was about. Yet they never thought to ask what a melody was about, nor what a house or a dress was about. In such matters, people retained some sense of the whole pattern, of form and function as a unity".
*pg. 205 "...He understood the grammar of gunpowder". Think about this for a second. I mean, really think about this statement. What does this statement say to you? Does it not explain in 6 words what McLuhan is trying to convey?
*pg. 206-207 "But with electric media Western man himself experiences exactly the same inundation as the remote native. We are no more prepared to encounter radio and TV in our literate milieu than the native of Ghana is able to cope with the literacy that takes him out of his collective tribal world and beaches him in individual isolation. We are as numb to our new electric world as the native involved in our literate and mechanical culture".
*pg. 207 "Our conventional response to all media, namely that is how they are used that counts, is the numb stance of the technological idiot. For the "content" of a medium is like the juicy piece of mean carried by the burglar to distract the watchdog of the mind".
*pg. 208 "Today when we want to get our bearings in our own culture, and have need to stand aside from the bias and pressure exerted by any technical form of human expression, we have only to visit a society where that particular form has not been felt, or a historical period in which it was unknown".
I can go on with quotes from this piece that would be great conversation starters, especially the last couple of pages, but I will stop here. As I mentioned earlier in the post, many folks did not agree with McLuhan's assertions, and if you do not agree, explain your position in your post. You certainly do not have to agree with the folks who have written the articles we will be reading throughout the semester. I simply ask that if you do not agree, or even if you do agree for that matter, that you state your position clearly.
Each of the pieces I have selected for us to read throughout this class will confront a myriad of issues. I find Lickliders piece relevant for a completely different reason than McLuhan's piece. McLuhan brings up a completely different set of issues and ideas, and that is the exact reason why we will read through a number of different pieces. Simply because I would like the class to be exposed to a number of different perspectives, focuses, etc... throughout the semester. Licklider was a forward thinker, as was McLuhuan, but McLuhan brings up some controversial ideas.
I hope you enjoyed this article as much as I did, and I hope this post helped to clarify some of the ideas from McLuhan.
First off, let me mention that McLuhan was criticized a bit for his ideas. You can easily search the internet for some opinions about McLuhan, but let's skip over the for now, and focus on who McLuhan was, and his ideas as presented in the present piece.
The article starts on page 203 with an explanation of how and why McLuhan thinks the medium really IS the message. The rest of the article goes on to support this idea by bringing up a number of examples. He also throws in some other ideas here and there, but he is pretty succinct in asserting his idea throughout the writing. Here are some excerpts that stood out to me:
*pg. 203 - "This is merely to say that the persona and social consequence of any medium - that is, of any extension of ourselves - result from the new scale that is introduced into our affairs by each extension of ourselves, or by any new technology". After this statement, the author goes on to explain job elimination and a creation of roles, etc.... After this, McLuhan states, "Many people would be disposed to say that it was not the machine, but what one did with the machine, that was its meaning or message".
*pg. 203 - "For the "message" of any medium or technology is the change of scale or pace or pattern that it introduces into human affairs".
(I'm backtracking a bit here)
McLuhan is brilliant in explaining the electric light. You might be thinking, "I already read that, and he lost me pretty quickly". that is understandable. Go back and read the parts on page 203 about the electric light - just those parts, and see what you can extrapolate from his explanation. This short description of the meaning of the electric light, or lack thereof, is the essence of the reading. McLuhan states, "The instance of the electric light may prove illuminating in this connection. The electric light is pure information. It is a medium without a message, as it were, unless it is used to spell out some verbal ad or name. This fact, characteristic of all media, means that the 'content' of any medium is always another medium". Brilliant! (am I geeking out again - sorry!). :) But then if you keep reading he comes back to the electric light and explains, "Let us return to the electric light. Whether the light is being used for brain surgery or night baseball is a matter of indifference. It could be argued that these activities are in some way the "content" of the electric light, since they could not exist without the electric light. This fact merely underlines the point that "the medium is the message" because it is the medium that shapes and controls the scale and form of human association and action". If you keep reading a couple of sentences beyond this excerpt, it says, "...it is only too typical that the "content" of any medium blinds us to the character of the medium".
As an aside - I am looking through my notes on the McLuhan article, and if you can get past some of the wording, the meaning is incredible!
Here are some other brief quotes. I will try to limit my commentary so that you can simply absorb what McLuhan is saying, and the implications it has for us today in our current 'media state'. I suggest that you read these in context, that is, have your book/the reading close by so that you can follow along and really absorb what is being said and implied. It may take a second to simply sit there and think about the concept for a few seconds before the light bulb (pun intended) flashes on and you 'get' what he is saying.
*pg. 205 "In other words, cubism, by giving the inside and outside, the top, bottom, back, and front and the rest, in two dimensions, drops the illusion of perspectives in favor of instant sensory awareness of the whole. Cubism, by seizing on instant total awareness, suddenly announced that the medium is the message."
*pg. 205 "Before the electric speed and total field, it was not obvious that the medium is the message. The message, it seemed, was the "content", as people used to as what a painting was about. Yet they never thought to ask what a melody was about, nor what a house or a dress was about. In such matters, people retained some sense of the whole pattern, of form and function as a unity".
*pg. 205 "...He understood the grammar of gunpowder". Think about this for a second. I mean, really think about this statement. What does this statement say to you? Does it not explain in 6 words what McLuhan is trying to convey?
*pg. 206-207 "But with electric media Western man himself experiences exactly the same inundation as the remote native. We are no more prepared to encounter radio and TV in our literate milieu than the native of Ghana is able to cope with the literacy that takes him out of his collective tribal world and beaches him in individual isolation. We are as numb to our new electric world as the native involved in our literate and mechanical culture".
*pg. 207 "Our conventional response to all media, namely that is how they are used that counts, is the numb stance of the technological idiot. For the "content" of a medium is like the juicy piece of mean carried by the burglar to distract the watchdog of the mind".
*pg. 208 "Today when we want to get our bearings in our own culture, and have need to stand aside from the bias and pressure exerted by any technical form of human expression, we have only to visit a society where that particular form has not been felt, or a historical period in which it was unknown".
I can go on with quotes from this piece that would be great conversation starters, especially the last couple of pages, but I will stop here. As I mentioned earlier in the post, many folks did not agree with McLuhan's assertions, and if you do not agree, explain your position in your post. You certainly do not have to agree with the folks who have written the articles we will be reading throughout the semester. I simply ask that if you do not agree, or even if you do agree for that matter, that you state your position clearly.
Each of the pieces I have selected for us to read throughout this class will confront a myriad of issues. I find Lickliders piece relevant for a completely different reason than McLuhan's piece. McLuhan brings up a completely different set of issues and ideas, and that is the exact reason why we will read through a number of different pieces. Simply because I would like the class to be exposed to a number of different perspectives, focuses, etc... throughout the semester. Licklider was a forward thinker, as was McLuhuan, but McLuhan brings up some controversial ideas.
I hope you enjoyed this article as much as I did, and I hope this post helped to clarify some of the ideas from McLuhan.
Friday, June 15, 2012
Instructor Wrap Up - Be Who You Want to Be - Ellis
From last week's assigned reading........
When someone thinks of 'media', a few things usually come to mind: the internet, and news. Am I right? Rarely do we think about older forms of media, and even more rare do we think of self-representation in newer forms of media. This brings us to the Ellis article.
Be who you want to be: The philosophy of Facebook and the construction of identity
It's interesting to sit back and simply ponder the title of this article, isn't it? Without reading the article, one can wonder how 'they' have constructed themselves on the internet, specifically when it comes to social networking. We have a number of different camps to consider:
1). Those that simply do not engage at all.
2). Those that engage completely, meaning everything on FB is public.
3). Those that engage in social networking but have 'tried' to limit public information (by keeping a close watch on FB's ever changing privacy settings).
4). Those that engage in social networking but have failed to keep up their privacy settings appropriately to block others from seeing what they don't want them to see.
It is my assumption that some people fall into category #3, but unknowingly fall into category #4. In either case, along with #2, we should be concerned with self-representation or our social identity. Here's where Ellis' article becomes quite important to think about.
Ellis starts out the article by talked a bit about identity and social behavior. She then justifies how she will consider FB an example of 'communicative identity'. I have read over many articles of folks losing their jobs because they posted something inappropriate on FB. Folks simply aren't aware of how they portray themselves on the internet. This representation does not stop at social networking, but can be applied to many other areas of media as well.
Here are some quotes from the article with some commentary where appropriate:
pg. 37 "A decreasing level of anonymity brought about through social networking has led to the adoption of different strategies depending on the individual's goal for social interaction. Communication via Facebook is changing the face of social communication on an interpersonal level." There are a few things going on in this quote. I will focus on the phrase, "...different strategies depending on the individual's goal...". It is worth us asking ourselves, "What is my goal with having a FB profile?". Really, what is your goal? Is it to keep in touch with folks from your past/present? Is your goal to keep family in the loop of what is going on in your life? Is FB a replacement for f2f social interaction? A social networking participants, we all have different goals, right? It's worth it to ask yourself why.
pg. 38 "On Facebook we take our own name and seem to be willing to part with our personal information than were previous net generations." (emphasis mine) Yikes! I will let this quote speak for itself.
pg. 39 "Although I really enjoy my Facebook friends and feel a strong connection and a sense of community with many of them, most of the time these people are little more than objects of entertainment." We can debate all day long about FB and 'real friends', etc... but think about this quote for a minute. Are most of your friends on FB entertainment for you? Do they serve as a community? Support? Act as 'real' friends would? Honestly, this can be debated until the cows come home, but the point of this quote is to critically analyze your FB interactions.
pg. 39 "When Facebook users communicate 'what's on [their] mind', of update their status, they are offering a representation of the self or a 'me' based on socialization they have already experienced." Representation of the self is something to critically evaluate - thus the first journal entry in this course.
pg. 39 - Ellis then goes on to explain Mead's three step process. You can read that on your own.
pg. 40 "The idea the Facebook users can no longer differentiate between representation and reality has led to calls for people to go offline. Communication overload has inspired a teen movement of 'switching off':..." I'm sure we can all agree that how we 'represent' ourselves is quite different than who we really are, or 'reality'. Think about how different our social interaction is now then it was perhaps 20 years ago. Folks did not need to worry about how they were representing themselves so much online, though they did have to answer the A/S/L question as Ellis writes on page 38. That was the extent of representation. Now, however, there are a myriad of things to consider when representing yourself online.
So the question remains, how do YOU represent yourself online through social networking? I thought the journal assignment would be an interesting one because folks rarely ask the question How or Why? Critical evaluation of self-representation happens in small micro-bits when we ask ourselves, "Should I put that on FB?" or "Will someone take this the wrong way if I post this to my status update?". We rarely take a look at the whole of our self-representation. This is the very reason for the journal assignment. I want you to look at how you have represented yourself, report on that without changing your Facebook page at this stage, and come to some conclusions. Do you need to change your page? Un-tag some photos? Remove photos? Watch what you are saying on your status updates? Watch your 'side' conversations with folks on FB? It is the evaluation that is going to lead to some eye-opening things. At least that's my hope.
Until then......
The Blogging Prof
Be Who You Want to Be
When someone thinks of 'media', a few things usually come to mind: the internet, and news. Am I right? Rarely do we think about older forms of media, and even more rare do we think of self-representation in newer forms of media. This brings us to the Ellis article.
Be who you want to be: The philosophy of Facebook and the construction of identity
It's interesting to sit back and simply ponder the title of this article, isn't it? Without reading the article, one can wonder how 'they' have constructed themselves on the internet, specifically when it comes to social networking. We have a number of different camps to consider:
1). Those that simply do not engage at all.
2). Those that engage completely, meaning everything on FB is public.
3). Those that engage in social networking but have 'tried' to limit public information (by keeping a close watch on FB's ever changing privacy settings).
4). Those that engage in social networking but have failed to keep up their privacy settings appropriately to block others from seeing what they don't want them to see.
It is my assumption that some people fall into category #3, but unknowingly fall into category #4. In either case, along with #2, we should be concerned with self-representation or our social identity. Here's where Ellis' article becomes quite important to think about.
Ellis starts out the article by talked a bit about identity and social behavior. She then justifies how she will consider FB an example of 'communicative identity'. I have read over many articles of folks losing their jobs because they posted something inappropriate on FB. Folks simply aren't aware of how they portray themselves on the internet. This representation does not stop at social networking, but can be applied to many other areas of media as well.
Here are some quotes from the article with some commentary where appropriate:
pg. 37 "A decreasing level of anonymity brought about through social networking has led to the adoption of different strategies depending on the individual's goal for social interaction. Communication via Facebook is changing the face of social communication on an interpersonal level." There are a few things going on in this quote. I will focus on the phrase, "...different strategies depending on the individual's goal...". It is worth us asking ourselves, "What is my goal with having a FB profile?". Really, what is your goal? Is it to keep in touch with folks from your past/present? Is your goal to keep family in the loop of what is going on in your life? Is FB a replacement for f2f social interaction? A social networking participants, we all have different goals, right? It's worth it to ask yourself why.
pg. 38 "On Facebook we take our own name and seem to be willing to part with our personal information than were previous net generations." (emphasis mine) Yikes! I will let this quote speak for itself.
pg. 39 "Although I really enjoy my Facebook friends and feel a strong connection and a sense of community with many of them, most of the time these people are little more than objects of entertainment." We can debate all day long about FB and 'real friends', etc... but think about this quote for a minute. Are most of your friends on FB entertainment for you? Do they serve as a community? Support? Act as 'real' friends would? Honestly, this can be debated until the cows come home, but the point of this quote is to critically analyze your FB interactions.
pg. 39 "When Facebook users communicate 'what's on [their] mind', of update their status, they are offering a representation of the self or a 'me' based on socialization they have already experienced." Representation of the self is something to critically evaluate - thus the first journal entry in this course.
pg. 39 - Ellis then goes on to explain Mead's three step process. You can read that on your own.
pg. 40 "The idea the Facebook users can no longer differentiate between representation and reality has led to calls for people to go offline. Communication overload has inspired a teen movement of 'switching off':..." I'm sure we can all agree that how we 'represent' ourselves is quite different than who we really are, or 'reality'. Think about how different our social interaction is now then it was perhaps 20 years ago. Folks did not need to worry about how they were representing themselves so much online, though they did have to answer the A/S/L question as Ellis writes on page 38. That was the extent of representation. Now, however, there are a myriad of things to consider when representing yourself online.
So the question remains, how do YOU represent yourself online through social networking? I thought the journal assignment would be an interesting one because folks rarely ask the question How or Why? Critical evaluation of self-representation happens in small micro-bits when we ask ourselves, "Should I put that on FB?" or "Will someone take this the wrong way if I post this to my status update?". We rarely take a look at the whole of our self-representation. This is the very reason for the journal assignment. I want you to look at how you have represented yourself, report on that without changing your Facebook page at this stage, and come to some conclusions. Do you need to change your page? Un-tag some photos? Remove photos? Watch what you are saying on your status updates? Watch your 'side' conversations with folks on FB? It is the evaluation that is going to lead to some eye-opening things. At least that's my hope.
Until then......
The Blogging Prof
Thursday, June 14, 2012
Instructor Wrap Up - The Quality of Online Social Relationships
What a neat article! When I read through this the first time, I felt like there were some relevant things for the class to learn.
As we move towards more and more media, issues about the quality of online relationships will always be talked about. This article is no exception! I will give a brief wrap-up of this article, posing some questions for you all to think about.
Page 2: "The evidence is clear that interpersonal communication is an important use of the Internet, if not its most important use." Is this still the case? This article was written in the year 2000, so take that into consideration when making your decision if interpersonal communication is the MOST important use. How does this idea relate to Facebook? How interpersonal is FB?
Page 3: "However, when asked to compare their online friends with others from their offline life, respondents felt less close to those they met online." Wow - interesting! With the advent of online dating websites, online gaming (which the article does address a bit), I wonder what folks who participate in those things would say?
Page 3: "The impact of the Internet is likely to be very different if it supplements communication with already established friends and family or if, instead, it substitutes for more traditional communication and traditional social ties." I think this sentence is key to our class, and the analysis of FB. Would you agree?
Page 9 - the section titled, "Comparing Internet versus non-Internet social partners" was highly interesting. You should read through that section pretty carefully to get the full affect of what that section is getting at. How does this relate to our current use of social networking websites?
Page 12: "In either case, by using email they are not getting as much social benefit as they could from their communication activity." This is important to remember as we move forward with different types of media. Do you think that engaging in media, as a supplement to F2F (face-to-face) relationships can go too far? If so, what is too far? Is it different for every person?
Page 13: This section refers mainly to online groups (listservs), but can apply to a number of other applications when we really look at the function of the medium. A quote directly from this page states, "Are active, tightly knit electronic groups, in which people from personal relationships and develop a sense of belonging, the norm or are the cases reported in the literature interesting exceptions?" Read through this section to get a clear picture of what the authors are referring to.
Page 14 points out that listservs are not like traditional small groups. For those that have taken small group communication, I'm sure you can figure out why.
Page 19 - Conclusions: This section obviously summarizes the findings the paper has covered. Try not to skip directly to the conclusion section to save time. This article has some relevant information that we can use, even in our media advances today with social networking websites, such as FB.
As you can see from this article, social interaction online or F2F is quite complex. There are many things to consider when trying to assess the quality of online social relationships in different types of online settings. Could one argue that Facebook has made social interactions more fulfilling to some? Perhaps. What do you think?
As we move towards more and more media, issues about the quality of online relationships will always be talked about. This article is no exception! I will give a brief wrap-up of this article, posing some questions for you all to think about.
Page 2: "The evidence is clear that interpersonal communication is an important use of the Internet, if not its most important use." Is this still the case? This article was written in the year 2000, so take that into consideration when making your decision if interpersonal communication is the MOST important use. How does this idea relate to Facebook? How interpersonal is FB?
Page 3: "However, when asked to compare their online friends with others from their offline life, respondents felt less close to those they met online." Wow - interesting! With the advent of online dating websites, online gaming (which the article does address a bit), I wonder what folks who participate in those things would say?
Page 3: "The impact of the Internet is likely to be very different if it supplements communication with already established friends and family or if, instead, it substitutes for more traditional communication and traditional social ties." I think this sentence is key to our class, and the analysis of FB. Would you agree?
Page 9 - the section titled, "Comparing Internet versus non-Internet social partners" was highly interesting. You should read through that section pretty carefully to get the full affect of what that section is getting at. How does this relate to our current use of social networking websites?
Page 12: "In either case, by using email they are not getting as much social benefit as they could from their communication activity." This is important to remember as we move forward with different types of media. Do you think that engaging in media, as a supplement to F2F (face-to-face) relationships can go too far? If so, what is too far? Is it different for every person?
Page 13: This section refers mainly to online groups (listservs), but can apply to a number of other applications when we really look at the function of the medium. A quote directly from this page states, "Are active, tightly knit electronic groups, in which people from personal relationships and develop a sense of belonging, the norm or are the cases reported in the literature interesting exceptions?" Read through this section to get a clear picture of what the authors are referring to.
Page 14 points out that listservs are not like traditional small groups. For those that have taken small group communication, I'm sure you can figure out why.
Page 19 - Conclusions: This section obviously summarizes the findings the paper has covered. Try not to skip directly to the conclusion section to save time. This article has some relevant information that we can use, even in our media advances today with social networking websites, such as FB.
As you can see from this article, social interaction online or F2F is quite complex. There are many things to consider when trying to assess the quality of online social relationships in different types of online settings. Could one argue that Facebook has made social interactions more fulfilling to some? Perhaps. What do you think?
Wednesday, June 13, 2012
Instructor Wrap Up - Man-Computer Symbiosis - Licklider
Pre-Wrap Up Note: When deciding on what to focus on in this course, I chatted with a few people from the department as well as a few outside of the department. One of the things that consistently came up was the idea of self-representation on the internet, among other things. In your readings last week, specifically the article Be Who You Want to Be, you can see that this will be a focus of the class. If you haven't already, please go back and read the articles I assigned for last week.
In this class we will focus on a few things:
1). Self representation on the internet
2). Social Selves
3). How media has taken shape over the last 40-50 years (thus some older readings are in order)
4). Different types of media (blogging, twitter, facebook, you tube, etc...)
5). Philosophical ideas of media (McLuhan.....anyone......anyone......Bueller......)
So as you can see by the focus of the class we will be taken in many different directions over the course of the class. Hold on tight, you're in for a fun and exciting ride.
Switching gears: Every week I will post an Instructor Wrap Up to my blog. Sometimes it will be earlier in the week, sometimes it will be a bit later in the week. However, I will talk about a good majority of the articles required, by posting to my blog. So please check my blog often for updates.
I will admit it early on in the class - I'm a bit of a geek! Yep, that's right, I'm geeking out about the Licklider article. There are so many things I would love to discuss with each of you, and these are the times I wish I taught f2f classes. However, I am particularly glad this class is online due to the nature of the subject.
Without further ado, I will geek out on you a bit about the Licklider article.
At first glance, one can assess the Licklider article as dry, boring or outdated. I beg to differ. Considering the year that the article was written, this guy was far ahead of the times. First off, in the introduction, the editors give some detail about Licklider and his accomplishments.
The article starts out by talking a bit about the idea of symbiosis. Early on it talks about how a fig tree can only be pollinated by a specific insect (Blastophaga grossorun), and that symbiosis is, "living together in intimate association, or even close union, of two dissimilar organisms". The article then goes on to explain the difference between the "Mechanically Extended Man" and "Artificial Intelligence" - very interesting stuff!
Licklider then goes on to explain what the objective is of man-computer symbiosis. There are two ideas that Licklider explains. He then covers the idea for Real-Time Thinking, which was an interesting idea. Apparently in 1957 Licklider conducted a personal experiment and recorded what he did (noted as a 'moderately technical person') during the hours he regarded as 'devoted to work'.
He then covers 'Separable Functions....', and 'Prerequisites for Realization of Man-Computer Symbiosis". The latter is where I want to camp for a little while. In this section there are a number of interesting ideas, ones that I found amusing, interesting, and downright amazing, considering the time it was written. Keep in mind that this article was written 50 years ago. How far have we come since then? And how far do we still have to go to fulfill the ideas presented in this paper?
I had an interesting conversation with my husband about sections 5.2, 5.3, 5.4 and 5.5. I won't bore you with all the details, but I will highlight some.
5.2 - "When we start to think of storing any appreciable fraction of a technical literature in computer memory, we run into billions of bits and, unless things change markedly, billions of dollars". Let's think of a typical computer we use today, or perhaps an iPhone. These devices can store billions of bits, yet comparatively, we pay very little for them. Things have come a long way in 50 years! It makes me think about where technology and media will be in another 10, 20, or even 50 years. The possibilities are limitless.
Licklider goes on to talk about books. I found this section amusing for obvious reasons, but what struck me the most was the phrase, "Books are among the most beautifully engineered, and human-engineered, components in existence...". Think about that phrase for just a second. Think about the implications of that. Wow! I'm almost speechless.......almost.
Section 5.4 highlights the language problem between man and computers. This language problem still exists today. But the most interesting aspect of this was when Licklider noted that there is a huge difference between human languages and computer languages. While chatting about this article, I mentioned how ironic it is that computer speak such a different language, yet humans are the ones who give computers the language to speak. I can go on and on about this, but I will stop there!
Section 5.5 goes on to discuss Input and Output Equipment. This section was, by far, the most entertaining to me. There are so many things I would love to talk to you all about such as:
*"Nowhere, to my knowledge, however, is there anything approaching the flexibility and convenience of the pencil and doodle pad or the chalk and blackboard used by men in technical discussion."
*"How desirable and how feasible is speech communication between human operators and computing machines?" (pg.80).
*"Yet there is continuing interest in the idea of talking with computing machines." (pg. 80).
*"It seems reasonable, therefore, for computer specialists to be the ones who interact directly with computers in business offices".
I can go on and have hours of discussion about this article. I was initially drawn in by the idea of symbiosis between man and computer, but found many more interesting sub-ideas contained within the article. I truly hope you all had a good time reading the article and have taken just a bit of time to ponder what Licklider foresaw. There are many wonderful aspects that you can discuss in your blog post this week about Licklider, and I can't wait to see what you all come up with!
Look out for another post later this week about the other required article for this week's discussion.
Until then, The Blogging Prof (a.k.a. geek), signing off!
In this class we will focus on a few things:
1). Self representation on the internet
2). Social Selves
3). How media has taken shape over the last 40-50 years (thus some older readings are in order)
4). Different types of media (blogging, twitter, facebook, you tube, etc...)
5). Philosophical ideas of media (McLuhan.....anyone......anyone......Bueller......)
So as you can see by the focus of the class we will be taken in many different directions over the course of the class. Hold on tight, you're in for a fun and exciting ride.
Switching gears: Every week I will post an Instructor Wrap Up to my blog. Sometimes it will be earlier in the week, sometimes it will be a bit later in the week. However, I will talk about a good majority of the articles required, by posting to my blog. So please check my blog often for updates.
I will admit it early on in the class - I'm a bit of a geek! Yep, that's right, I'm geeking out about the Licklider article. There are so many things I would love to discuss with each of you, and these are the times I wish I taught f2f classes. However, I am particularly glad this class is online due to the nature of the subject.
Without further ado, I will geek out on you a bit about the Licklider article.
At first glance, one can assess the Licklider article as dry, boring or outdated. I beg to differ. Considering the year that the article was written, this guy was far ahead of the times. First off, in the introduction, the editors give some detail about Licklider and his accomplishments.
The article starts out by talking a bit about the idea of symbiosis. Early on it talks about how a fig tree can only be pollinated by a specific insect (Blastophaga grossorun), and that symbiosis is, "living together in intimate association, or even close union, of two dissimilar organisms". The article then goes on to explain the difference between the "Mechanically Extended Man" and "Artificial Intelligence" - very interesting stuff!
Licklider then goes on to explain what the objective is of man-computer symbiosis. There are two ideas that Licklider explains. He then covers the idea for Real-Time Thinking, which was an interesting idea. Apparently in 1957 Licklider conducted a personal experiment and recorded what he did (noted as a 'moderately technical person') during the hours he regarded as 'devoted to work'.
He then covers 'Separable Functions....', and 'Prerequisites for Realization of Man-Computer Symbiosis". The latter is where I want to camp for a little while. In this section there are a number of interesting ideas, ones that I found amusing, interesting, and downright amazing, considering the time it was written. Keep in mind that this article was written 50 years ago. How far have we come since then? And how far do we still have to go to fulfill the ideas presented in this paper?
I had an interesting conversation with my husband about sections 5.2, 5.3, 5.4 and 5.5. I won't bore you with all the details, but I will highlight some.
5.2 - "When we start to think of storing any appreciable fraction of a technical literature in computer memory, we run into billions of bits and, unless things change markedly, billions of dollars". Let's think of a typical computer we use today, or perhaps an iPhone. These devices can store billions of bits, yet comparatively, we pay very little for them. Things have come a long way in 50 years! It makes me think about where technology and media will be in another 10, 20, or even 50 years. The possibilities are limitless.
Licklider goes on to talk about books. I found this section amusing for obvious reasons, but what struck me the most was the phrase, "Books are among the most beautifully engineered, and human-engineered, components in existence...". Think about that phrase for just a second. Think about the implications of that. Wow! I'm almost speechless.......almost.
Section 5.4 highlights the language problem between man and computers. This language problem still exists today. But the most interesting aspect of this was when Licklider noted that there is a huge difference between human languages and computer languages. While chatting about this article, I mentioned how ironic it is that computer speak such a different language, yet humans are the ones who give computers the language to speak. I can go on and on about this, but I will stop there!
Section 5.5 goes on to discuss Input and Output Equipment. This section was, by far, the most entertaining to me. There are so many things I would love to talk to you all about such as:
*"Nowhere, to my knowledge, however, is there anything approaching the flexibility and convenience of the pencil and doodle pad or the chalk and blackboard used by men in technical discussion."
*"How desirable and how feasible is speech communication between human operators and computing machines?" (pg.80).
*"Yet there is continuing interest in the idea of talking with computing machines." (pg. 80).
*"It seems reasonable, therefore, for computer specialists to be the ones who interact directly with computers in business offices".
I can go on and have hours of discussion about this article. I was initially drawn in by the idea of symbiosis between man and computer, but found many more interesting sub-ideas contained within the article. I truly hope you all had a good time reading the article and have taken just a bit of time to ponder what Licklider foresaw. There are many wonderful aspects that you can discuss in your blog post this week about Licklider, and I can't wait to see what you all come up with!
Look out for another post later this week about the other required article for this week's discussion.
Until then, The Blogging Prof (a.k.a. geek), signing off!
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