Chapter 35

1985
Donna Haraway

• created the idea of a cyborg "socialist-feminist" as opposed to the image of the goddess, "the cyborg engages in the here and now"
• Haraway enjoys that the cyborg is not working towards regaining an imagined purity, but can embrace the boundaries of dualism
• her work had a large impact on "progressive scholarship in science and technology"
• "I would rather be a cyborg than a goddess"

It's an interesting idea to use the image of a cyborg for a new form of feminism. I would have to agree that I'd rather be a cyborg than a goddess, but I'm not sure I understand her complete perspective as it relates to feminism. I sort of see her ideas as pertaining to both genders, and I enjoy how she has embraced the dualism. If we can understand black and white but live in the gray I think we can be much more effective in working with society.

Chapter 34

1984
Sherry Turkle

• video games become hugely popular in the 1980's
• wrote The Second Self, which explained how different age groups worked with computers
• approached computer technology from a basis in psychoanalysis (human-computer interaction)
• understood the beginning of the "avatar"
• in her second book Life on the Screen, she explores how our interactions with computers can affect how we see ourselves and the world around us
• considered Dungeons and Dragons to be an important antecedant to many computer adventure games
• discovered that as much as designers would like, gamers are not as concerned with narrative and story-telling in their game-play

I'm sure it may be true for many gamers that the narrative is unimportant, but I feel otherwise. After listening to Noah Wardrip-Fruin talk about video game narrative, I feel like there is still hope. There seem to be many ways to improve the stories and dialogues in a game, and personally, I really enjoy video games with great stories. (This may, in part, be due to the fact that as a child I much preferred to watch my brother play video games, than to play them, so games like Final Fantasy were my favorites.) I'm much more likely to pick up a game with an interesting story line than the hundreds of games that all have the same narrative where you are given a weapon and must kill everyone you can find and steal their belongings, honestly I've had enough of those.

Chapter 33

1983
Ben Shneiderman - Direct manipulation

• proposed that it would be more effective to instruct the computer in a more graphic way, rather than command language
• this idea informed: graphical user interface, visual programming environments, and other systems
• direct manipulation: seems to imitate the outside world via metaphor/representation
• advantages of this system can be seen with graphical applications (Photoshop)
• uses images that we are familiar with to represent mostly equivalent computer programs/commands

Chapter 32

1983
Ben Bagdikian

• new media often over takes old, but sometimes they begin to integrate themselves
• 6 companies now dominate all of US mass media
  
• will all media become integrated into these companies, or will the expansion of the Internet overcome this
• more and more internet companies are preventing users from transmitting too much data, and often prohibiting public servers

This is my biggest fear! This is what my entire concentration boils down to, media is converging, we are losing the freedom and wonderful anarchistic democracy of the internet, what is going to happen to culture!? If I have to, I will work the rest of my life to overcome this ungodly monopoly of power over the media, this is not the way it works in every other country, it does not have to be this way in the US.

Chapter 31

1982
Bill Viola

• Viola is one of the "highest-profile of video artists"
• created "70 millimeter" video art
• video art: began as an exploration of the video medium as opposed to film, "reconfigured public and industrial conceptions of the video image"
• poetic approach to video
• created the Aspen Movie-Map - mapped onto a system that was familiar, with the challenge to create something new and surprising
• questions how we use language

I'm always for artists who question the everyday, who rework familiar concepts to create unfamiliar new ideas. Video art has always really interested me and it was really in its prime with the era of the "Happenings". I took a class at Gallatin where we were able to play around with video art and explore what happens when you stop trying to make a narrative and just enjoy the instrument; it was fantastic.

Trip to Chelsea

Our trip began on the Highline which is a favorite New York treasure of mine. I love that hidden in plain sight all throughout the city are these great cultural monuments and I'm particularly excited to see some of the art installations along the path. We passed the Gehry building on our way towards the first gallery and I was amazed I'd never really noticed it before. Autumn and I decided it should only be allowed for artists' studio spaces because corporate businesses wouldn't appreciate such great architecture. (Some day I hope this is true,maybe we'll at least have our studios there.)
Our first stop was the Postmasters gallery which when you first walk in seems pretty abstract. However, after the curator explained to us the exhibit and the concept of data visualization I was really intrigued. I loved each of his pieces almost purely as opportunities to alter my perspective. I love when an artist asks me to rethink the way I see the world. His piece representing the night sky of the battle of Troy was inspiring; the details that went into its creation were fantastic.
Next we went to see Bitforms, which was opening its new exhibit that evening. I was completely drawn in by its pieces that redefined space, text, and sound, again asking me to rethink my perspective. I was particularly pleased by one of the artist's play with typography by creating the giant vagina with multilingual text.
I think, however, that I was most impressed with the last gallery we went to see, Eyebeam. Especially for our generation which has seen much of our social lives turn into the "screen," it was so refreshing to see people looking for ways to bring it back out again while still maintaining our fascination with technology. It gives me so much hope that a place like this exists to put faith in artists, engineers, and inventors to come up with new ideas and challenge the status quo.

Chapter 30

1981
Theodor H. Nelson

• proposed a universal electronic Publishing System and Archive, similar in function to Bush's Memex device
• give everyone the ability to produce their own documents and connect them to anyone elses public documents, with the ability to edit any version of any text, theirs or others public files
• envisioned a company who would be in charge of running this network and each member of the network would pay a small fee to access each document, in the same way we pay the utilities companies

My first impression of Nelson's text was that he seems extremely condescending. I just wanted to say to him stop blabberng about how we might not understand or want to take the time to read through and just say what you want. If I've taken the time to start reading, why are you trying to deter me? "Suggestions are welcome, if you are sure you understand the design first." This kind of statement made me care so much less about his really intereting archival ideas. What Nelson has come up with is very complex but also complete in that, if this program were fully developed it could easily be implemented.

Chapter 29

1980
Richard A. Bolt

• Bolt created a program called "Put-That-There" which inspired combined speech and gesture input, embedded computing and a computer interface that is more like spoken conversation
• provided a way to view data on two-dimensional screens in a three-dimensional simulation
• developed multimodal interfaces to communicate more effectively with the computer in a more humanistic way
• if voice recognition becomes popular it would change the way we use and understand computers
• he created an entire room "the media room" at MIT instead of simply a desktop that one would sit in front of to apply his multimodal experience
• with voice-gesture conjunction the user can use pronouns

This is an incredible system. I would love this kind of voice-gesture recognition for my own computer, or at least a voice and joystick since I don't have an entire wall to display upon. I still don;t know why voice recognition hasn't taken off because it would be a lot more efficient if the technology were advanced enough.

Chapter 28

1980
Seymour Papert
Mindstorms

• worked to create an environment in which children could use computers as learning tools
• was inspired by the work of Jean Piaget called "constructionism"
• learning in a self-directed, self-motivated way through his programming language LOGO which we began in 1967

I love that the computer can be used as a learning device for kids. Games and interactivity have always been the best way to teach children, at least in my experience, and when children feel like they are in control of the situation they are more willing to actively participate.

Chapter 27

1980
Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari

• introduced rhizomatic writing - which they did not intend to feature a specific medium or even style, only to describe certain texts
• challenged readers to "reconsider dualism" and according to Foucault, "to be radical without being sad"
• a book is an assemblage of lines articulated and divided with various rates of flow
• attempted to quantify literature "There is no difference between what a book talks about and how it is made. Therefore a book also has no object"
• literature is about dichotomy and reflection it branches out like a tree

It would be hard for me to agree completely to the ideas in this article that I can ascertain and the rest is mostly a blur. I don't feel that all literature can be interpreted without meaning, doesn't that disrespect the author in some way? I can see where they're going with this idea, as a way to make all mediums connected by their innate structure and composition, but I'm not sure how interested I am in removing all meaning from a given work, I would feel cheated.

Chapter 26

1977
Alan Kay and Adele Goldberg

• envisioned the importance of the notebook computer with their Dynabook vision
• understood the computer from a totally different perspective than their peers - believed it would one day be a device used by "educators, business-people and poets" alike for computational and creative purposes
• their ideas were used to create the Star computer by Xerox Systems Development Division
• the interface designed for the Star was later incorporated into Apple's Macintosh
  
• helped to create the Ethernet cable, the mouse, the laser printer, and WYIWYG printing standard for today's computers
• Dynabook: handle all information-related needs (Iphone : check), a programming and problem solving tool, interactive memory, text editor, medium for expression
• the dynabook would allow for human-computer interaction, for the medium to be affected by the user; to be responsive
  
• imagined that there would be no delay in response time
• imagined that children should also be able to use this device

It is incredible that these people had the foresight to envision today's laptop or iphone-like device. They sought to create a computer that could literally be used by everyone, and that everyone's specific needs and wishes could be met. At the time, this would have been incredibly far-fetched but I'm glad they pursued it so that we can have this kind of technology today.

Chapter 25

1977
Myron W. Kruegar

• considered the "father of virtual reality"
• first rejected by and then later accepted by the art community for his innovations which seemed purely technological at the start
• his "aesthetic concerns" were not as easily accepted by the computer world
• believed that "response is the medium"
• meaning is created through interaction with the specific computer system
• technology can be used, not just as a problem solver, but to generate and inspire ideas
• encouraged scientists, artists, engineers to work together

It's true that we still don't often see the connection between technology and aesthetics but I think that we are definitely working towards that goal. There are more and more fields, and types of new media that are incorporating all of these ideas, which we saw very clearly in the exhibits we visited in Chelsea where art, science, and technology come together.

Chapter 24

1976
Joseph Wizenbaum

• discussed the negative consequences of his own technological designs
• urged other scientists and technologists to "take responsibility for the use of that which they discover and develop
• created the "Eliza" system from 1964-1966, which ran a set of scripts called "Doctor" which impersonated a psycho-therapist
• Wizenbaum feared that applications like his that would employ human language would blur the aapropriate functions for technology in a negative way
• the Eliza program inspired others to create other psychiatric simulations lie Kenneth Colby's Perry and Depression 2.0

As Turkle described, I do not believe that programs like Eliza distort our view of humanity because it did not possess enough variability to actually fool someone, but I wonder if a program was created today to act as a therapist would we be able to make a believable one? How would this affect us if we could actually treated and diagnosed by a computer?

Chapter 23

1975
Nicolas Negroponte
Soft Architecture Machines

• shows direct relationship between architecture and human-computer interaction
• some of the most influential architects in this field were: Michale Benedikt, Marcos Novak, William Mitchell, and Nicolas Negroponte
  
• architecture proved the need for virtual reality to see visualizations of physical buildings
• use of architectural knowledge about space and design have inspired work with computers
• users should be empowered by computers
• computers should have certain levels of awareness about its programs and users
• Negroponte opened the MIT Media Lab in 1985 to conduct research into technology applications

It's sad to think that we have all these great intuitive ideas about computer software, written over 30 years ago, and we still don't (not that we can't) put them into practice. When he mentions the movie program that turns on the screen saver 5 minutes in, I was reminded of all the times that has happened to me, and how simple a code that would be to withhold turning on a screen saver when the movie application is open; this seems like a no brainer. There are many other awareness issues with technology we have today, and perhaps we need to be taking more advice from the founders of these tools.

Chapter 22

1974
Augusto Boal

• went to jail for practicing his interactive techniques in performance.
• encouraged opressed peoples to take on the "cops of the street" and the "cops of the mind" holding them back (which is why the Brazilian military was so against him and those working with him)
• for one of his performances he decided to run for office, but actually got elected and used his theatrical techniques to put forth legislation to help the people without a voice.
• discusses the question of embodiment, which is often forgotten in discussions of new media
• techniques for overcoming the spectator/actor divide could help Baudrillard's quest to overcome the producer/consumer divide

It's amazing how so many people with progressive ideas throughout history have been treated as treasonous and sent to jail, or executed, or assassinated. It's always the ones that want peace and equality that are put down. How sad.

Chapter 21

1974
Computer Lib/ Dream Machines
Ted Nelson

• apparently the most important book in the history of new media
• Janus-life codex that joins two books
  
• Computer Lib predicted personal computers, and challenged what the fundamental use of computers would be from when he was writing
• meant to argue against Central Processing
• claimed that the importance of the computer would not be its computational skills, but its ability to generate new media
• wrote some of the founding documents in the field of human-computer interaction
• stressed the importance of design and having it be open and interchangeable
  
• predicted the explosion of knowledge that has occurred today with the Internet

Nelson was hugely influential and ahead of his time in this field. I would like to at some point actually read this dual-book and see how spot on he really was.

Chapter 20

1972
Raymond Williams

• one of the first to critically approach the medium of television
• discussed the importance of "flow" in the experience of TV watching
• TV remains a touchstone for the discussions of the relationship between technology and society
• once a technology is in place it operates as a life factor
• discusses the importance of collectivity in decision making over technology (specifically the Internet, whose standards are set by anyone with the time and interest to be involved)
• the problem today is that the government wants to privatize the Internet, and it has created a select few to monopolize
• the Internet was not created by one man, it was and is being created by everyone who participates because of the social processes interacting with scientific.technical processes

I worry that the Goverment will succeed in permanently privatizing the Internet and the whole beauty of its public-ness and democracy will be ruined. Hopefully we can get enough users to speak out against it and retain public control.

Chapter 19

1972
Jean Baudrillard
Requiem for the Media

• response to Enzensberger's "Constiuents of a Theory of the Media"
• views the media more in terms of social reaction and response to the media than the structure of the technology or the content
• the solution to the problem of our media is not to make everyone a producer, but to change the model of communication which is currently, a "simulation" that forgoes actual interaction
• Baudrillard wants to transgress the producer/consumer relationship, mass newspapers and video networks are only a start in his mind

I would like to see what Baudrillard imagines as an actual transgression of the producer/consumer relationship; when will we have gotten to that point? I can certainly see the importance of having more public interaction, but we live in a society of consumption and it will be difficult to rid the media of this idea entirely.

Chapter 18

1970
Hans Magnus Enzenberger
Constituents of a Theory of the Media

• new media is forward-thinking, action-oriented, away from tradition
• criticized media business - "operates to perpetuate an unjust society by convincing us t accept that society (similar to McCluhan)
• work with media to fix the problem
• media is not just for consumption, but a means of production
• proposes a new organization of media, not just mass distribution, if an organized campaign of videotaping were in place, it would have been more effective than the original Rodney King video

William S. Burroughs

I like William S. Burroughs for the same reason I like John Cage, because he was willing to think outside the box, to take something traditional and use it in an innovative way. Even though it was simple, to cut up writing and paste it together, it was considered unheard of, and we needed people like that to shake things up and pave the way for even more out of box ideas that just cut-and-paste.

John Cage

I was able to learn a lot about John Cage in another class I took at Gallatin with Leslie Satin, and he really was the essence of the happenings movement. He felt very strongly in the process of making art over the product created and often used chance operations to create compositions. In the video we say was one of his most famous creations, the prepared piano, which as the speaker explained, is really an instrument of its own. I got to see one of his pieces played on a prepared piano in an exibit at Lincoln Center, and it was bizarre, but it was great to hear the piano, the most classic instrument played in such an unconventional way.

Microcosms

As we talked about in class, I've loved all of the recent Earth documentaries, and this one on insects was particularly cool. I'm not usually into bugs, but this film gave them real personality and such a great perspective on them because of how close the camera could get. With the addition of the sound and music it really told a story about "le peuple de l'herbe" which would literally translate to the population of the grass (which doesn't sound as nice in English but I think the sentiment suits the movie better than microcosms). I was surprised to hear how long ago it had been made considering how advanced the camera was that they were using.

Chapter 17

1970
Software - exhibition at the Jewish Museum, organized by Jack Burnham

• visitors were being asked to interact/operate computers in several contexts
• the actual exhibition went really poorly, but the implications remained important
• Ted Nelson created a catalogue of information called Labyrinth, the first publicly-accessible hypertext - readers decided what to read and in what order and the computer would store this information to be printed out for each reader at the end of their visit
• Nicholas Negroponte headed the Architecture Machine Group which presented Seek - a series of metal blocks creating an environment inhabited by gerbils. the blocks were moved by a computer controlled robotic arm that reacted to the movements and alterations of the blocks caused by the gerbils
• broadcast poetry via AM radio using the glass windows as low-grade speakers
• goal was "to focus sensibilities on the fastest growing area in this culture: information processing systems an their devices."
• before Software, computers making art were mainly trying to imitate alredy existing artforms, but this was an exploration of computers rather than trying to create finished products - express ideas and art propostions

Ted Nelson made a comment about the Seek display in which he felt that perhaps the gerbils presented a danger in this kind of human-computer interaction in that he "had a sense that [the gerbil] was worshiping it." I wonder if we see this kind of "worshiping" today, and if we are, do we notice? Clearly this exhibition was ahead of its time in terms of ideas and desires for the use of computers.

Chapter 16

1968
Douglas Engelbart and William English - ARC

• introduced the use of demos to prove the importance of their research
• 1968 Fall Joint Computer Conference in San Franciso presented their most famous demo of interactive computing - pre-Internet
• ARC was creating tools to express and share concepts -> led to WYSIWYG layout tools
• creation of tools for expert computer users like any other craft -> led to more "user friendly" systems that first-timers could operate
• users would use tolls to create better tools -> software with its vast gulf between users and creators, working against piracy of software
• allow peopel to work together to solve problems with computers ->a network of communication to share resourses -> arrival of the ARPANet ->the Internet

It's cool to hear about the beginning of these large computer demos after we've been watching so many TED conferences. I have no idea what WYSIWYG is, or what exactly it is that they presented at their famed 1968 demo but it must have been amazing.

Chapter 14

1961/1972
Billy Klüver
"The Garden Party"/ The Pavilion

• if a scientific experiment cannot "fail" neither can an artistic experiment
• Jean Tinguely worked with Klüver to create "Homage to New York"
• a machine in which "jean supplied the energy to create the freedom and was ruler over the chaos" a work of chance and of the moment - much like the city it was paying respects to
• the machine created and destroyed itself to present us with an ephemeral moment
• "creative masters of changing reality"
• the pavilion was a massive collaboration of artists, scientists, engineers, and participators
• the goal was to give he visitors "choice, responsibility, freedom, and participation" so that the work was not complete until they had been involved
• emphasis was on the visitors relationship to the environment rather than on the object itself, it was a giant experiment in human behavior
• each collaborator was involved in a specific aspect of the project, so all are equally authors of the work
• the fog and mirror involved were incredible feats of science and technology that would later have many practical purposes besides its original artistic one
  

1966-7
E.A.T.

• founded by Klüver, Rauschenberg, Whitman, and Waldhauer
• first project was a collaboration between Klüver, a research scientist at Bell Labs, and Jean Tinguely, artist
• engineer was no longer an artist's assistant, but collaborator
• group takes off when Klüver met Wiggen who was organizing the festival of art and technology
• EAT created a variety of events and pieces that went beyond art or technology by fusing the two
• "eliminate the separation of the individual from technological change and expand and enrich technology to give the individual variety, pleasure, and avenues for exploration and involvement in contemporary life."

I love the idea of the pavilion because I have always enjoyed interactive art. Walking through a standard museum, asked to stare at painting after painting, after sculpture is boring, and lifeless. An interactive art/science/technology enviroment is alive and constantly changing as we are is way more exciting. There is a small modern art museum near my parent's house that this reminded me of because each few months a new artist gets to take over the space and rebuild it however they see fit. Usually it involves a certain amount of interactivity, but the fact that the space itself is constantly changing is why its so fun to go back.

Chapter 13

1962/1964
Marshall McLuhan

The Galaxy Reconfigured:

• media extend human abilities and the human body itself
• culture was moving backwards toward tribal configurations
• "electric" or "new" media was causing a shift in western thought
• sense ratios change when "any one sense or bodily or mental function is externalized in technological form"
• popular press offers no single vision, no point of view, but a mosaic of the postures of the collective concousness
• "In opulent and commercial societies to think or to reason comes to be, like every other employment, a particular business, which is carried on by a very few people, who furnish the public with all the thought and reason possessed by the vast multitudes that labour."
• best means of communication with the unconscious is through myth and symbol
  

The Medium is the Message:

• popular media should not just be treated as unimportant entertainment, but deserves to be studied on its own terms
• consider the medium on its own, separate from content
• change in media will bring both positive and negative consequences; "print caused much trash to circulate, but it had also disseminated the bible and the thoughts of seers and philosophers."
• the medium shapes and controls the scale and form of human association and action (ie, IBM realizes it is in the business of information processing, rather than just office equipment)
• the content of any medium is always another medium
• argues that typography created cultural uniformity and continuity. 

I thought it was really interesting what McCluhan said about thinking/reasoning becoming an occupation of few people. I would be curious to hear him go into more depth on this issue. I think this is probably true today, but I wonder who society would consider to be the "reasoners" since everyone's idea of rational is different. In terms of the medium, we definitely see this idea that the medium is the message in our class as we examine new types of media and their potential impact on "human association."

Marshall McCluhan

What a strange character he is! I was immediately reminded of Antonio Rutigliano, if anyone else has had him as a teacher, because of his unconventional teaching style and unique ideas about popular culture (although I wouldn't say he's totally against it as McCluhan was). It was interesting to hear about media from a more philosophical standpoint. He had a really interesting quote when he said, "a pervasive environment is almost beyond perception," and I really feel like this is what has happened with popular media. It's everywhere, affecting everything we do and we don't even realize how we are being brainwashed, and he was only referring to the billboards everywhere, imagine if he saw how advertisements are being used today.

Scott McCloud

I think I can officially say that I'm a comic book nerd, or at least dangerously close to that line because I thought this was a really cool perspective on the future of comic books. McCloud's emphasis on maintaining the "comic-book-ness" in a digital comic is really important for someone who actually follows comic's. The entire idea is that there is still enough room in between frames for your imagination to be activated. Once it becomes too fluid it turns into an animated show, and then there's no longer any brain power involved (although I'm sure many will argue that there's not much brain power involved in reading a comic book either, but I would debate that).

Life-logging

Is this considered self-stalking? Is the assumption that we are not paying enough attention in our lives? I would probably agree to that, and that's why I think this continuous photography idea could be interesting for a day, but to record your whole life this way seems obsessive, and not practical. As we discussed in class, it might be fun to use at a party to catch some candid shots that you might have otherwise missed or forgotten. Maybe it could be passed around between party members to catch more action, but it's pretty much just that, a good party trick. However, in the video that we were watching with James May, it seemed as though it got cut off right before they were going to explain some kind of software that would recognize specific patterns, and potentially (although I may be over-speculating) determine specific traits in a person or use this information to perhaps diagnose someone. I'm not sure what that data could be used for, but until I hear some of the possibilities, I'm not willing to wear this day in and day out.

Scots with Lasers?

I like lasers as much as the next guy, but it's hard to get super excited about this. I like the idea of 3-D models made from photographs better than of lasers, although I see how it might be useful, and of course any time we get closer to actually recreating star trek technology, I'm for it. Obviously lasers are much more precise and create better accuracy for surveying a building/object, but I don't think this is really new technology.

Erin McKean's Wordnik

I just want to start this post by saying, I'm now totally into TED. I watch every TED video that I come across now because it's just so fascinating. There really are people out there with incredible ideas and it's great to find that they're all getting together to cheer each other on. Erin was a great TED presenter, and she gave a great argument for the importance of a better system of dictionaries. It's something that no one ever thinks to improve upon because, as she said, everyone has this awful connotation of the dictionary. I keep thinking about times when I was really young and any time I asked my parents what a word meant I had to look it up in the dictionary (all while my dad claimed that he once read the dictionary back to front...there's no way) and how grateful I was when we finally got the Internet and I could just type it into Google. The interesting thing about that is, it really was better to type it into Google, other than it being faster and more convenient, because I would end up with more results from various sources, and sometimes even a Wikipedia page to give the word some context. This is why I love Wordnik so much, because it compiles all those results for you and gives you the context you need to actually understand a word aside from a stiff, unrelatable definition (as I'm typing, blogger is telling me unrelatable is not a word, but I'm going to throw caution to the wind and use it anyway because Erin said I could...)

Piano Stairs

These piano stairs make me smile. I would love to have those installed in more places, although I'm sure that would be fairly expensive. Who doesn't want to have more fun doing mundane activities, especially when it could be good for you, such as walking up stairs. I loved seeing the reactions of the people who experienced the stairs, and how generally gleeful it seemed to make everyone feel. I have to walk up 5 flights of stairs every day to my apartment, and part of me feels like this would make it more bearable, and another part of me thinks that it would definitely become annoying when the neighbor comes home at 4am. I want more ways to make my daily life more fun, maybe I can think of a better final project that would involve more fun.

Eric Rosenthal

Eric Rosenthal's lecture was a little too biologically specific for my taste, but when he started to discuss the implications of archiving I definitely perked up. So for my sake, I'm not going to bother to discuss the human vision system, accept that I think it would be great for a camera to work more in line with how our eyes work. I would love to see some of the test shots that he did with the technology he came up with, I can't even imagine how much better a camera image could look (I've been so impressed with the Red camera lately, but a camera like the one Eric describes sounds like it would blow it out of the water).
As for archiving, it's something that I unfortunately haven't thought much about in my life, but hearing him talk about it I suddenly feel this great sense of urgency to start printing everything I find (although that seems like a terribly un-environmentally friendly option). I can't believe this is not a bigger issue for our government, and in general for the world, but it seems like no one has yet to discover a way of keeping information in perpetuity. Certainly the options we have in place now don't seem to have been given much forethought, and I wish there was an easy answer. For now I suppose I should just try to be more mindful of the information I store on my computer and remember that my laptop is not infallible. I have recently learned the importance of external hard-drives after having two laptops stolen, but I wonder if I should consider keeping a written log of important stuff somewhere (who am I kidding, I'm way too lazy for that).

Ken Perlin: Where the Wild Things Are

I love his account of how Pixar came to be, I had never heard that before. I always felt that Pixar had much better graphics, and ultimately better films as well, but I love that it developed because the people at Disney didn't want to go in the digital direction, how ironic. Go Ken for being the instigator that started Pixar.
As for the actual animation, I was interested to hear Ken's description of how they did the lighting. I like that they really thought about making it both real and fantastical so that the effect would be a realistic storybook world. Today we keep trying to make graphics look more and more like reality, but I think for some things, and definitely animated kids movies, that there should be an effort to maintain the fantasy. However, when he started to discuss the actual software, I became pretty confused. I'm not sure what "divide by the blurry silhouette..." means, or even how the smearing works, but I think I'd need to take some more tech classes for that.

Ken Perlin's Lecture/NaNoWriMo

Ken Perlin was a great speaker. I was almost surprised (though I shouldn't have been after reading some of his blog) that he was so personable. I guess I had a preconceived notion of what a computer genius would sound like, and Ken was more of a philosopher/psychologist than anything else. I love that his main concern was in understanding human behavior through computer representations. The facial expression program was ingenious for this exploration, and I was pleased to see that it was actually being used for behavioral purposes with autistic children. I can see how many of Ken's games would become excellent teaching tools, but I was disappointed to hear that he thought many of the educational games we used to play as kids were ineffective. I used to love Mathblasters and a myriad of typing games.

As for the Novel in a month contest, I think it's an interesting idea. I like that Ken started a blog to force himself to write everyday. I wish I had that kind of discipline, because I used to love writing, and I used to write all the time, anywhere. I'm not sure if I really want to write a novel this November, but it definitely might inspire me to start writing more. I'm also curious to see how his joint-creation will come out, it could be very interesting.

Chapter 12

Intro / Cent Mille Milliards de Poèmes
1960
Oulipo (Ouvroir de Littérature Potentille)

• formed to explore the potential of literature through various constraints in vocabulary, syntax, novelistic or dramatic conventions, poetic meter, for, etc.
• types of Oulipo experiements include: lipograms, palindromes, algorithmic tecniques - hypermedia, and others
• founded by François Le Lionnais (original members:Jean Queval, Raymond Queneau , Jean Lescure, Jaques Duchateau, Claude Berge, and Jacques Bens)
• Jean Queval was often banned from their meeting place and then readmitted, and would later attempt to ban himself and be stopped by the group on several occasions
• the failures of language led them, and others before them, to "reflect on this strane tool which one would consider, which sometimes commans consideration, without reference to utility."
• one goal was to bring together texts for an anthology of experimental literature
• 
  

1961
Raymond Queneau

• created the famous book of poems in which each of 14 lines is interchangable with 10 others - Cent Mille Milliards de Poèmes
  
• helped to define a new type of computer-mediated textuality, gives the reader an enhances role in the process of literary creation
• computer can be used for more than just creating infinite variations from a set of materials, it can also narrow them down and make decisions, but Calvino Argues that this will never create literature on its own.

1981
Paul Fournel

• the Centre Pompidou experiment
• use of computers to aid in reading select combinatory or algorithmic works (ie. Queneau's Cent Mille Milliards de poèmes or his A story as you like it)
  
• computer can help with editing, or fine-tuning a text
• different types of relationships between author, work, computer, and reader: 1- Author>Computer>Work (creation is aided by the computer, author inputs information, computer makes selections), 2-Author>Computer>Work>Computer>Reader (the computer helps both the author make selections, and gives the reader clues to solve enigmas created by the author), 3-Author>Computer>Reader>Computer>Work (author creates material, reader choses what material to use, computer creates a product)

Italo Calvino

• created a short story or novel to explore the necessity of a computer for the creation of literature
• by writing a detective story with hundreds of possible scenarios, a computer is helpful in organizing and presenting what those scenarios are given the information provided
  

This is such a great committee. Of course the french created an organization whose mission was the explore the possibilities of literature; to create new and exciting ways to use text. I'm all for this kind of exploration and I'd love to play with this principle of constraints to see what I can create. One of the definitions that I liked the most for Oulipo was "rats who must build the labyrinth from which they propose to escape." This is a great metaphor for the work that they do.

Chapter 11

1965
Theodor H. Nelson

• coined the term "hypertext" as 'a body of written or pictorial material interconnected in such a complex way that it could not conveniently be presented or represented on paper.'
• proposed that there were several specific types of hypertext; in this essay he describes on as a complex, reconfigurable, linked structures of information, which can be manipulated at a granularity much smaller (or larger) than the page.
• his vision was a precursor to making "personal information managers useful platforms for thinking and working in a networked world"

Chapter 10

1964
Roy Ascott

• "remade art (and art education) in view of Wiener's cybernetics"
• Ascott saw a connection between cybernetics/science and art (arguably the first to discuss new media art)
  
• used art "as an investigation of behavior, of creating situations for exploring behavior"
• created an entire system of art education that would include art, design, and science, and also require its students to find their own personal artistic identity
• Art should ask questions and find new answers
• Artists should be encouraged to use science as a tool and a reference and to integrate the two fields

Ascott definitely has an interesting idea for an art education curriculum. I really like the idea of students taking on personalities opposite from their "normal" selves and have random handicaps so that they must become interdependent and broaden their own experiences of personal behavior. That seems like a fascinating social experiement to me and I would be curious to see if it could really be implemented and whether the results will be as Ascott claims, that the students will then be able to create their own "special creative identity."

Chapter 9

1963
Ivan E. Sutherland

• created the Sketchpad System - a program developed for designers to draw geometric shapes on the first direct-manipulation interface using constraints.
• it allowed designers to communicate with the computer via picture/image rather than text alone.

Alan Kay

• created the object-oriented programming language Smalltalk and Dynabook
  

Chapter 8

1962
Douglass Engelbart

• outlines several ideas for the future of computers and computer technology
• imagined and created the word processor
• invented the mouse, the window, mixed text/graphic displays, the hyperlink
• helped to establish the Internet
• worked to "augment human intellect"

I applaud Engelbarts efforts to make it easier to solve more complex problems as our societies have evolved, but I can't help but think that it is this philosophy that has led us on a race towards what's most efficient and easy, but maybe not what's best.

Chapter 7

1959
Brion Gysin

• cut newspaper articles into sections ad rearranged them at random to create a book called Minutes to Go
• inspired Burroughs to write about the cut-up method

1961
William S. Burroughs

• the cut and paste method that he describes is used today in "many aspects of new media in computer literary practice as well as game theory
• oulipo was insipired by this technique
• cut-ups can be used by anyone, universal participatory way to utilize art and create new and more interesting game situations.
  

This is an interesting experiment with chance operations, and it can wield some pretty interesting results, or it can be kind of unitelligable. I definitely think this is worth trying, but I'm not super excited about it.

Chapter 6

1961
Allan Kaprow

• One of the many who organized a number of spontaneous, interactive performances
• Happenings blurred the lines between audience and artist, and between genres and mediums.
  
• the form is open-ended and fluid
• there is no obvious purpose or goal; the process is what's important
• they are ephemeral
• creates an organic connection between art and its environment
• the act of chance and spontenaity are of utmost importance, happenings are generally unscripted or very sparsely thought out
• no need for the patronage system that is corrosive to art, and are thus ultimately liberating

The creation of happenings calls into question authorship and allows for a more open, participatory definition of art.

Chapter 5

1960
Joseph Carl Robnett Licklider

• promoted computer science education
• head of Advanced Research Projects Agency
• encouraged computer networking
• imagined a man-computer symbiosis in which computers help us to make decisions and solve problems.

I wonder if our PDA devices are something like he might have imagined or would he want us to go much further?

Chapter 3

Who: Alan Turing

When: 1950

What: Turing establishes a test for philosophers and computer engineers to create computers/programs that could imitate the non-physical actions of a human. "Can a machine fool someone into thinking it is a human?" Of course there were many objections to this test, because people were afraid that someone would develop computers with advanced systems of artificial intelligence that would outsmart a human, and that the lines would be blurred between human and machine. Turing establishes that of course computers can think, albeit in a very different process than humans, and wanted people to be more interested in how closely a computer could imitate a human.

Chapter 2

Who: Vannevar Bush

When: 1945

What: He invisioned the "memex" and essentially the idea for the modern day computer. This man was clearly ahead of his time, as he imagined many advances in technology that was yet to be established because of lack of funding. He imagined a camera using "dry photography" in a similar way to how the television works, and he imagined compressing books and information to make more accessible to scientists, and looked into new ways to call up this information and link it all together the way a brain works. Surely, Bush would be pleased by the innovations today that have made his ideas, realities. One of his innovative ideas that we haven't really seen much of today is the voice to type device. We have the technology for this today, and programs that use it, but it doesn't seem to be as prevelant, and I wonder why that is. Another is the device the piece of the Memex that would automatically photograph notes and sketches that the user would write/draw onto the machine. Again, we have this technology but it's not commonplace yet and I think it could be very practical.

Digital Dirt/Google Wave

Digital dirt, to me, is just the next step in hyper-surveillance in the age of the Internet. Everything we type into the Internet is being saved and stored somewhere, often in several places, and it's being used by everyone. Information is being used by employers, advertisers, the government, you name it. Just yesterday my friend's roommate used one of those tracking services to get someone's full name, date of birth, address, phone number, cell number, credit score, etc. and all he had to do was pay 10 bucks and presto, there it is. We, and at least I, don't think about it nearly often enough and are pretty careless about posting our information on the web, and in some instances it has become unavoidable. These days, in our generation, if you don't have a facebook account, or even just to make these blog accounts, personal information is required everywhere. I'm not sure what we can do to combat this besides throwing away our computers, but I'm pretty sure that's not going to happen.

The Google Wave program is intriguing. I like the idea of having my live chat incorporated into my email, but only if I can use it with as many people as I can use ichat with, otherwise it won't be worth it. I think it could be useful in terms of organization and saving things, but it's just more information that's being saved on the Internet for you. I guess I can't really say much else about this until I get a chance to try it and check out the features.

Ken Perlin

His website is pretty interesting. I wish I understood more about how he was creating these little games/programs. I tried to play the sheep one and the crossword/maze, and I guess I'm just not technologically inclined enough to understand how they work. I enjoyed his blog a lot more because he's asking some really interesting questions. I was particularly curious about this blog entry on developing a computer that could have the computational skills of a human brain. The thought that if we could develop something with a power of a brain, what happens when we go beyond that, will these brain computers be able to outsmart us, will they no longer have a need for us? I know this day is far into the future but who knows how far, and what the implications will be.
It's clear that Ken is extremely advanced in his understanding of computers and how to manipulate them. The program he created to create textures with "Noise-Turbulence" is amazing, however, I have no idea how it works. I'm not even sure why it's called noise-turbulence, so this will definitely be something I ask about when we meet him at his lab. Nevertheless, the output of this program is amazing, especially the liquid textures. I thought it was great that the inspiration came to him at 4am drinking coffee.
As for the PAD technology, I had no idea that this was created so long ago. I don't know why I haven't really seen it used until the IPhone/IPod Touch, but perhaps I just haven't seen where it was used before that. The idea is genius, to give us infinite space by playing with depth, I see it as a really practical piece of software and I wish we could use it for text documents (as a college student I see this as a cool way to take notes, so that I can add little pieces of information or links to specific notes I take).

Class # 5 viral videos

Create your own Font: I really like this idea. I don't have a lot of use for it in my everyday life, but the idea is pretty cool. I think I'll definitely try to use it just for fun when I have access to a scanner. I would love to go one step further with this program and use it to recognize my handwriting as font and then I could scan any handwritten papers, etc. and have it converted to a text document. I usually prefer to hand write essays and other assignments so that would be a great feature to use this kind of technology for.

Photosketch: As with the font creator, I don't have much use for photosketch, but I think the idea is interesting. I think the program involved could have a lot of other, possibly better, uses for it because the sorting technology seems very advanced. I hope this program makes people more, rather than less skeptical about the images that are being presented to us everyday.

Augmented Earth: I'm not sure how I feel about this program yet. It seems that the technology is nothing new, it's just making it easier for surveillance purposes, which has its pros and cons. Obviously I'd rather not have everyone able to find me no matter where I am, but this is already possible with Google Earth and government/police cameras, which are becoming even more omnipresent. In fact, I think I've decided that I'd really rather not have all of this surveillance, screw Big Brother.

Music Sites: Today music is increasingly accessible because most music can be easily downloaded, and if not it can probably be streamed online somewhere. I'm not sure what this is doing to the music business, but I'm usually for art/music that is democratic and accessible to all (although I understand that money has to be made somehow, it seems that most sales are from merchandise and concert tickets today anyway, and we're not going to be able to convince people to buy CD's anymore; digital music is the future). I happen to be one of the people who gets all their music through downloading, and I use a torrent program to get all the files. If you're interested in using torrents (torrents are compressed files that are shared peer to peer and through a torrent downloading program that decompresses the files into regular music/video files) you need Vuze for mac's, and for PC's it's bittorrent or utorrent. Then you can pretty much find whatever you're looking for, music, tv shows, movies, video games, etc.

Cyberpunk/Steampunk: I'm not sure what else to say about these subcultures. I think it's interesting to see people get so involved in an aesthetic, which I can understand, I definitely love aesthetics, but I probably wouldn't ever get as particular about it. My interests are too varied to focus my attention the way these people do, but more power to them, there are certainly more destructive obsessions out there. I think the fact that they involve the word punk is very fitting. The term punk to describe the music sub-culture of the 1970's-80's came from a magazine that was created to present the sub-culture to the world and give those people involved in it a common ground and a type of validation to a group of outsiders. This idea totally applies to cyber and steampunk as minority groups who bond around common interests and aesthetics. I see that steampunk is really taking off today with the Way Station and Steampunk month, but I just hope it doesn't become another commodity the way punk did.

History of the Internet: This was a great documentary about the creation of the Internet. Today the Internet has become incredibly vast and it's easy to forget that it only began 30 or so years ago and it began as a network between two, then three, then four, and so on computers. It's incredible to see that the people working on it were mostly grad students not much older than us, with an interest in communicating through computers, so they just set out to figure out a way to do that, with almost no precedent. What they created is a phenominal feat, and probably the most important invention of the century. What may be even more important is the fact that it was designed to be ultimately democratic by not giving the authority over its expansion and access to anyone person/group/country. Without that distinction we would lose so much community and information that we now have access to through the Internet.

Project Natal/Augmented Reality

Look, I love the Wii as much as the next person, but my god people, can't we just go outside! I thought it was the most ridiculous thing that some kid with an actual skateboard, scanned its image into the game so that he could "ride around" on his carpet. If you want to play a video game, play a video game, but if you want to do real sports and jump around your living room pretending to do them, then why aren't you motivated enough to just go do it. This program, in combination with the Augmented Reality program really make me feel like we're all going to turn into computer zombies and never leave our house.

However, I'm a little more inclined to accept Augmented Reality as a positive advancement in technology. There seems to be a lot of interesting uses for it like the AR system of the F-35 Lightning II. According to wikipedia (so of course this may or may not be the case):

The F-35 Lightning II has no Head-up display because all targets are tracked by the aircraft's situational awareness and the sensor fusion is presented in the pilot's helmet mounted display system that provides an augmented reality system that allows the pilot to look through his own aircraft as if it wasn't there.

As with the brain scan technology, I'm not sure how far we can go with this, on one hand, our whole world becomes a video game, on the other, we become hyper-informed (we're already heading this way with Iphone/Blackberry technology) citizens and possibly function better, or at least more efficiently, in our everyday lives.

Brain Scan

Brain scan technology is the craziest advancement in science that I've seen in a long time. The actual image of a woman literally being plugged into a computer was astounding. I had no idea we were already at this level of technology that we can now understand the impulses of the brain so specifically, that we can tell what a person intends to do moments before the body responds. I'm not sure how much farther we can go with this, if we can eventually know what someone is thinking or seeing. If we ever got to that point, we would have some serious ethical questions on our hands (I imagine our government would use this as a tool to force information out of people), but for now I see this as an incredibly useful tool to people who have lost control of some or all of their body.

Steampunk

Steampunk is an interesting new(ish) "lifestyle" that has emerged to incorporate an old-world, industrial age aesthetic to our modern, technological age. I really like the idea of juxtaposing old and new, the costumes particularly are great. I've seen this style on Firefly and Serenity, but I didn't realize that it had taken off as an entire subculture. I'm interested in anything that has people making their own stuff, especially things as elaborate as these people have done, like the car the man was making in the Youtube video, or the huge elaborate dresses some of the women were wearing. There has been a lot of borrowing from different eras in the current styles today, and I wonder why we haven't really come up with a new aesthetic to define this age, or if it's just that we're in the age of "remixes."

Garden of Forking Paths

The Garden of Forking Paths by Jorge Luis Borges
Buenos Aires 1941
This story is important to New Media because it introduces the idea of parallel universes, which is the precursor to hypertext.

Hopscotch by Julio Cortazar
Argentina 1963
Hopscotch is considered the first "hypertext" in that it allows the readers to decide in what order they would like to read his book.

I absolutely loved Borges' story of the Garden of Forking Paths. His writing is beautiful and intricate, and although the idea of the "forking paths" didn't come into the story until near the end, I enjoyed the entire piece. I've always thought about what an interesting concept it is that there may be an infinite universes in which each decision we make opens up new possible worlds with different outcomes. The Internet seems to be a great example of this ever-expanding universe as it continues to grow larger with every person who logs on, and every word I type.

Rich Rodriguez

It was cool to have Rich come in and talk to the class about his project from last year, and video games in general. I really love the idea of Little Big Planet, the gaming platform he was using, because as Rich was saying, it's definitely taking us to the next level in gaming where we have become such experts in playing video games that we can actually understand how they work and make our own. I always find that there's nothing more satisfying than making your own anything, food, clothes, art, and now video games. The game that he created, Owl Collector, was pretty neat, basic, but to be able to see how all the levers are switched and how each action has a trip wire was a really cool experience. I'm by no means an intensive gamer, but I enjoyed seeing how it all worked.

Dr. Horrible's Sing-along Blog

I love Neil Patrick Harris, and I love Dr. Horrible's Blog; it's totally genius. Dr. Horrible's blog shows us what a high quality web series can be, without pretension, and without trying to be like a television show. It maintains its web series format and length, and although the characters and the acting/singing are great, like The Guild, it is meant to be seen on the computer in short bursts, and probably would not make it as an actual television show. It captures our attention completes a dramatic arc in each short episode and still leaves you wanting to come back later and watch another episode. I definitely think that half of the reason this show is so good is because of the music composition, which is apparently done by the brother of Joss Whedon. The music is clever, catchy, and very much in line with great musicals of today. Of course it also doesn't hurt that the lead character is played by Neil Patrick Harris who does an incredible job of being sincere in a ridiculous role.

The Guild

I know this web series is supposed to be ridiculous, but I can't help but see several of my friends in these characters. I think that may be what made the Guild so successful, because it was being made in a medium that people who would relate, are watching. Nevertheless, this show isn't only entertaining for people who play RPG's (I've never actually tried one) because it's genuinely hilarious and kind of heart-warming. The characters in the guild are nerdy, but they're cute, and particularly Felicia Day's character who is so likeable but also incredibly socially awkward, which makes for a good web series. It's interesting to think that a character like that may not have been as successful on television, but it works perfectly as a web series, perhaps because it reflects so many socially awkward Youtube video blogs that the show is based after.

New Media Reader (Intro 2)

The second introduction of the New Media Reader by Lev Manovich begins with a more sociological history of new media compared to the more technological time-line of the first introduction. Manovich attempts to explain why the United States has been so far behind on the new media trend with it mainly coming down to the lack of government funding. The culture of commercialism in America has established that the new media being created in this country will be made mostly for commercial means, funded by advertisers. The problem with advertisers funding art pervades throughout American film, television, and new media and causes artists to work like robots in set formats and dumb down their content to appease their patrons. Because of this motivation behind most new media here it was easy to see how the "art world" took so long to recognize it as an equally creative and artistic medium. As Manovich explains, "This resistance is understandable given that the logic of the art world and the logic of new media are exact opposites." While the art world is based on individual authorship, the uniqueness of the piece, and control over how it is distributed, the new media realm praises work that goes "viral," for the work to exist in several forms, and a sense of collaborative-authorship (Manovich, 14).
New media called into question the entire idea of authorship and distribution; it worked on an entirely new set of principles that took advantage of the community network of the web looking to connect with one another. This is why Manovich argues that there needs to be a separate field of new media art apart from art made with the use of digital programs.
In addition to this cultural history, Manovich discusses the cultural importance of new media and computer science and attempts to define it in several ways. He explains how all of our culture today is being filtered through the computer in some way or another and deserves to be discussed as a historical phenomenon, which makes new media ever-harder to define. First it is separated from the idea of cyber-culture and the social aspects of the Internet, and then it is separated from any kind of finished products and instead describes new media as the digital data that is created to be used in multiple forms. New media is also, according to Manovich, "the aesthetics" of digital media and computer interfaces, as well as the "language" of the computer. It is clear that the definition of new media is ever-changing and extremely widespread.

Noah Wardrip-Fruin

I don't know much about video game design or programming but I still found Noah's lecture interesting. His interest in the relationship between the game designer and the player is a topic that I had never really thought about before. I was particularly interested in the idea that the game designer could, in essence, be having a conversation with the gamer as he showed with the example of Sim City. The idea behind Sim City is that there is an ultimate city construction that would run smoothly and efficiently and be self-sustaining and in order to do that the player must continue to learn through trial and error the rules of the game. It was also cool to see how some defects are created with his guided tour through the Star Wars X-Box game. I've seen these types of problems occur in some games that my brother used to play, and always enjoyed the games with the most elaborate plot lines so it is interesting to see the method behind creating the story lines. Noah made game design seem a lot less foreign to me and may have peaked my interest in playing some new video games to try to understand more about the inner workings.

Bingo/Ryan

The animations by Chris Landreth are really innovative. I don't know very much about animation but it seemed like the style of this kind of animation was totally different than anything I've seen before. The fact that the short Bingo was created to demonstrate the capabilities of a new animation software makes perfect sense because it was an excellent visual display of the variety of animation the software could create. Landreth used a similar animation style for his animated documentary, Ryan, to an even more creative extent. I didn't fully understand the meaning behind some of his animation choices but I did feel like the style he had chosen really accented the documentary and give it more gravity rather than a typical animation which tends to make the world look childish. For example, I couldn't understand why the presumed restraints around the characters were so colorful while the rest of the "world" was in gray tones, although it was nonetheless visually very interesting. I would love to see more of this type of animation in the future, it reminds me of the semi-animated film Waking Life.

Sand Beasts

Theo Jansen's sand beasts are incredible creatures. When I first saw this video I couldn't help but think that these creations are really alive, and that maybe, we need to expand our definition of life to include things like this. Maybe it doesn't need to eat, but it is fueled by the wind, and maybe it doesn't have a soul, but it does crawl around all on its own. Perhaps it was the way that the beasts moved that made them seem so lifelike and at the same time, so completely futuristic. I would love to understand more about the mechanics of these creations to know how they are actually moving.

Water Printer

I love technology like this water printer. I love when the calculated, analytical precision of computers and programming come together with something organic and beautiful. This water printer is the epitome of that juxtaposition between the digital and the organic. As I watched the youtube video of this fountain for the first time I kept thinking of it like the beading loom I used to have as a kid. With the loom I could create really intricate designs one line of beads at a time the same way that the water printer creates designs by dropping each line of water with a different pattern of water droplets and no water. These kinds of devices help to push the idea that technology and computers can create something beautiful and artistic.

The New Media Reader

When I signed up for this course I had very little understanding of "new media," but the very first sentence of The New Media Reader helped me to clarify this field as the use of "the computer as an expressive medium" (Murray, 3). The introduction of this textbook starts to paint a picture of the vastness and potential power of "the digital medium" as both a tool for understanding, communication, and organization, but also as an incredible means of self-expression and collective-expression. The use of the world "new" reflects its ever-changing nature and the fact that we are still unsure of its full potential and uses; it requires an entirely new way of thinking about the arts and creative expression. As Murray explains, "the right instruments organize not just the outer world but consciousness itself," (Murray, 4). It becomes a self-perpetuating system as we are able to further complicate technology, we must learn to think in more complexity, which will in turn require more advanced technology. This idea is displayed in the chronology that Murray presents us from the invention of the pen to the rise of print, to the creation of the computer, the internet and all of the applications that were designed for it. She explores through this time line both the advancements in the actual technology and also in society's perspective of the technology and how it could be used. Murray completes this part of the introduction with an important conclusion as to why humans would struggle to use something as cold and mechanical as a computer system to express ourselves and her answer is that we "are drawn to a new medium" as humans have been throughout history. We must constantly look for news ways to communicate and understand one another as our access to the world and information expands.

As I was reading, one of the ideas that struck me the most was our "desire to get everything in one place," (Murray, 6). I have been witnessing this phenomenon for years as I first complained about the isolating dangers of the Blackberry (or Crackberry). Devices were being designed to replace the need to interact with people face-to-face more and more, because utilities were being compressed and added to one mobile device. Years ago, skeptics of the computer shared my fears believing that it would "amplify the destructive powers of television (for example, in exercising even greater holding power over consumers, further alienating them from the "real" world)," (Murray, 7). Today, an individual with a blackberry or an iphone has the power of a phone, a computer, the internet, entertainment, navigation, and more without ever having to look up at the world in front of them. I've found that often, people with these devices, can no longer hold full conversations and instead sit, eyes glazed, staring at a mini-screen, interrupting your discussion with instant messaging and research on Wikipedia and Facebook. Obviously there are huge benefits to these tools, but I am most concerned that the overuse of them will lead us each to be completely isolated in a very Wall-E-esque type of world.

The Magic Wall

The creation of the magic wall was revolutionary, to say the least. I remember first seeing it in the Minority Report and thought wow that looks cool, but I never expected that it was real and functioning. I recently got an Ipod Touch and discovered how incredible this touch technology is. Even my mother, who can barely turn on her desktop computer, found the IPod Touch easy to use and was even amused by it. It actually made technology fun for her, which may not have been the purpose of the technology, but it's a great bonus. The scale of the actual wall makes it an incredible tool for organizing a lot of information at once. The daily show episode that jokes about the magic wall illustrates, albeit totally exaggerated, the potential power of a technology like this. It seems these days that technology allows us to do almost anything so who knows how far it could get. I'm sure there were plenty of other people who never expected something like this to be created in our lifetime so perhaps one day there will be an all-powerful super computer (although I imagine it won't be controlled by John King).

Flute/Beatboxing

I officially want to work for Google. If it means getting to see performances by Beardy Man and Nathan Lee the flute-boxer, then I want in. I'm always looking to see someone do something original and innovative and the idea to use a flute while beat-boxing is ingenious, and although beat-boxing has been around for awhile, Beardy Man's ability to imitate the sounds of an actual computer-generate techno song are mind-blowing. I sometimes feel like technology is going to surpass human ability, and perhaps already has in many fields, but to see a person capable of making those sounds all by himself, simultaneously has restored my faith in humanity.

Danyl Johnson - X-Factor

What a voice this guy has! I literally had goosebumps listening to Danyl Johnson sing for this X-factor audition, which for all intensive purposes, was really a huge concert performance. I see that reality TV has become even more of a spectacle when they start shoving in huge audiences in expensive venues for the first round of auditions. I think this means we're spending too much time watching X-factor if they can afford to do that. Nevertheless, if X-factor could find Danyl Johnson in the see of fame-obsessed Americans, then perhaps I should give it, and other performance based shows like it, another chance. Don't get me wrong, I've always enjoyed the idea that a little old housewife or school teacher from England could be discovered as the next big thing (this is a very American fantasy that seems to have infected much of the western world), but usually the winners from these competition shows have one hit single, if that, and then fade away again feeding into the 15-minutes of fame phenomena.