The readings for next week (Manovich and Hayles) are available online. Ignore the message on the library website that says “in process.”
January 31, 2007
Internet as a study source
In fact I know little about medium, especially its theory before our class, after today’s dicussion, I got more ideas, but still I have difficulty in understanding some issues. I am thinking, as internet which is one of the main electronic media becomes more and more important in our life, there appears some questions that we need to think about. Here I want to say something in terms of internet as a study source.
It is not hard to find that more and more students, when doing research, consult more online sources than original books in library stacks. When searching online, we can get a large number of materials, but how can we know whether the materials are academic enough? How can we know which are accurate and which are not? This makes me think about the Wiki which we are going to start, because I have these questions in mind and I am not clear about the answers, I have no idea where to find the entries we need. And also if I am not informed of Middlebury College hsitory department’s being against using Wikipedia whose information are not totally right (later I learnt), I will probably use it as a source. I know the online journals if they are referie journals, then they are academic, how about others? It seems that I always have a lot of questions:-), and sometimes it is only I who don’t know the answers. So thank you for helping me get the anwers, my dear friends.
“The Medium is the Message”
This article reminds me of the word “reflection,” and what prices we are willing to pay for progress. In this case, the price is the cost for technology in regards to the media and the effects it has had and remains to have on our culture. The word that really got my attention in this article was the term amputation(s) in the context of things lost such as quality time with the family due to viewing a production on television. Amputation to me means separated, cut -off, and detached. I find Marchall McLuhan’s statements true, but my accepting them is challenging. It’s disheartening enough for marriages broken up due to a third wheel like another man or another woman. Just imagine families and their relationships broken due to a mechanical-electronic device, a television and its counterparts —media! I may be at times looking at the world and its events through “rose-colored glasses.” I find this statement awesome, “We have become people who regularly praise all extensions, and minimize all amputations. He believed that we do so at our own peril.” Marshall McLuhan, you really had insight for future events forthcoming that we now experience. The Medium really is the Message!
January 30, 2007
Remediation-Understanding-New-Media
The article Remediation-Understanding-New-Media is a little bit difficult for me to understand, but after reading, I still got some useful and important concepts.
When I saw the word “hypermedia”, I think it might be the same as “multimedia”. Then I looked up them, I found that they are quite different. In my understanding, “hypermedia” is a intertwining of various medium of information— graphics, audio, video, text and hyperlinks, so it is not a linear presentation of information. Multimedia, on the other hand, is a much broader term, which make use of a range of forms of information content and information processing, such as text, audio, video, graphics, and animation, with the purpose of providing information or amusing the audience.
The difference between “multimedia” and “hypermedia” is that the former is “linear and non-interactive”, while the latter is not linear but very interactive.
For example, TV shows and films are multimedia since it lacks the hyperlink and not interactive. While the World Wide Web is an example of hypermedia because it is hyperlinked to various other sites. I’m not sure whether my examples are correct or not, I’m here to listen to your comments. Thank you.
In order to get the meaning of the terms like remediation, hypermediacy and immediacy, I find two sites undergoing similiar discussion with us. Hope they can be helpful.
The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction
After reading this article by Walter Benjamin, I’m guessing that his whole view was a minor insight into “remediation.” I mean, isn’t he in some aspect discussing the refashioning of media such as painting, photography, television and film. He seems to take us on a journey through history, briefly explaining the road from paintings to film. It seems that he would say we are fortunate today, because with the use of mechanical reproduction, many people can view things they may never have gotten the chance to see otherwise. We are fortunate enough to be able to view things through film, because it is meant for many people, rather than be at the unfortunate disadvantage of people who were only able to view paintings, intended for a much smaller audience. However, I still feel that we are at a disadvantage because as he noted in the article nothing is better than being able to view something with the naked eye; it’s not until such time that a real life experience occurs. On the other hand, I guess we will have to settle for film and the internet to view paintings in the form of reproduction, because the “naked eye” thing for great paintings in history, is just not an option!
Extensions and Amputations
I find Mcluhan’s article “The Medium is the Message” quite helpful for me to understand the effects of technology on our culture and life, and especially the relationship between the “medium” and the “content.” And the two terms extensions and amputations are what impressed me most after reading this article and the other two. As he said, the invention and development of any medium is the extension of ourselves, which results from “the change of scale or pace or pattern that it introduces into human affairs.” For instance, the automobile can be regarded as the extension of our feet. They help people to travel wherever we want faster and easier. The television is the extension of our eyes and ears, it helps us to see and hear stories from all around the world and breaks the barrier of time and place. With the help of these technology and medium, our scopes are widely extended. However, while people pay most of their attention to the extension these medium brought, they always ignore the accompanying amputation. The extension of the automobile will “amputate” the joyful time of walking, body-exercising and the fresh air we breathe in. The television extends our vision and horizon, it also amputates the time of getting together with families and the chance of experiencing and exploring the real world. Thus, although undoutedly, the technology had extended the human body, the dangers and negative effects of the over-extended technology should be given more attention.
Strange Days Trailer
In support of our discussion of Jay Bolter and Richard Grusin’s Remediation, here is a copy of the trailer to Kathryn Bigelow’s 1995 film, Strange Days.
Remediation: Understanding New Media
After reading Remediation: Understanding New Media, I’m not sure if the title fits the reading. I say this because after reading the article several times, I’m not sure if I really understand “new media.” Fortunately, a classmate was able to provide a site that gave some defintions of terms found in the article, but even after visiting the site, I’m not sure if I understand the terms. What I did get from the article was that the “wire,” and I’m assuming this is media technology in general, is like virtual reality for its users. Meaning that all this “new media” stuff is designed to help its users have a real experience through the use of things such as computer graphics, the world wide web, television, etc. I also came to the conclusion that for the sake of competition, digital media borrows from each other. In today’s growing world of technology, I guess digital media has no choice. Television seems to compete with the world wide web daily. What we don’t see on t.v., we can see on the web or vice versa. All of these things simply borrowing from each other and passing themselves off as an improved version of the other. I personally think it’s kind of neat to be able to view television shows on the computer or to be able to interact with television shows as they are being watched live on t.v. I guess we have come a long way in the use of digital media. Then again, have we, since it seems to be only a replica of what already is, according to “remediation.” Now, this is what I got from the article, but I’m not sure if this certainly defines “remediation.” What did everyone else get from the article?
Veni Vidi Wiki
In addition to our discussion of Benjamin, McLuhan, and Bolter and Grusin, I’d like to get the class started on the wiki project tonight. If you haven’t already, go ahead and click the link below and create an account by clicking the link in the top right-hand corner of the page. If I remember correctly, you can register as a “user” rather than an administrator, which will allow you to bypass the larger registration form, but will also allow us to track the edits to the wiki a little more carefully.
So far, I’ve only created two or three pages, just to illustrate the basics of how a wiki works, and I will address those issues with you in class later tonight.
If you’re interetsed in working with your students on creating a wiki, I’ll discuss those issues with you as well.
Here is the link to our wiki: http://fsumedia.wiki-site.com/
Wiki-site is a free service that will host your wiki and is one of the more popular and user-friendly wiki services, so again, it’s a cheap way of incorporating technology into the classroom.
Update: By the way, here’s another useful resource on the debates about using blogs in the classroom.
