Readings for April 3

For April 3, I’d like to combine the planned discussion of Henry Jenkins’ “Photoshop for Democracy” and the series of articles on YouTube scheduled normally. In addition, I’d like to talk about some of the following videos:

• Kiri Davis, “A Girl Like Me.”
• ParkRidge47, “Vote Different.”
• JibJab “What We Call the News.”
• Jib Jab, “This Land.”
• Amanda Baggs, “On Being an Unperson.”
• Amanda Baggs, “In My Language.”
• Tony Blair, “Should I Stay?”
• George Bush Imagine (warning: some profanity)
• Cowboys are Secretly, Frequently Fond of Each Other-Trek
• Bush Flash “I Ain’t Gonna Study War“

Update: For some reason, the end of this post disappeared, but basically I was going to suggest that you start by viewing the Kiri Davis, Amanda Baggs, and the “Vote Different” videos and then follow that up with JibJab and maybe the Tony Blair video. George Bush Imagine is fun but briefly features John Lennon going on a profane tirade against the Vietnam War, so you’re welcome to skip that video. The “Cowboys” video is a good example of a slash video, and maybe we’ll talk about that as well.

Photoshop for Democracy is a good Technology Review by which we can get lots of information about everything braodcost. This topic is mainly talking about the voting process in the election 2004 and we can see that how imoprtant it has been in capturing the attention of the people in to the elections.  On the other hand, this would very much help who want to know about the platform of the candidates and the opinions of other politicians about the candidate. So, these vedios are very much helpful now adays as people can see a lot of things that they were not able to know about in the past.

“Photoshop for Democracy”

Unlike traditional radio, television, and print media, the relationship between new media (i.e., internet networks) and democracy in the article “Photoshop for Democracy” demonstrates a 21^st century media that provide unrestricted media channels to ordinary people like you and me to market and distribute anything imaginable in the form of voice video and data.  In this case, a home made video was developed using, possibly, Microsoft Photoshop and distributed across the internet with a purpose of rallying democratic support for the 2004 elections against the Republican Party as represented by President George W. Bush.  The use of the popular Apprentice Show video footage edited together with video newscast of President Bush was imaginatively clever in design and well purposed in terms of connecting the “Your Fired” Apprentice Television Show catch phrase to the overall negative political performance of George W. Bush.  It was also witty in attracting 300,000 potential democratic voters to the fold of an Internet based website.  In contrast, these voting numbers could never have been established by using old media channels, for example, television and radio because the access is never at the hands of ordinary people.  In general, the internet has turned out to be a potent mechanism for makeshift media and political persuasion among the masses of mixed voters, which perfectly symbolizes the basic tenets and freedoms that bear the roots of democracy.

Is “Play” An Escape from Reality? A Closer Look at “Reflections about Interactivity”

Living in a world where life is serious 90% of the time, people, even adults, sometimes need an escape from reality! This is what I believe. In “Reflections about Interactivity” characteristics of an interactive perspective are discussed. The second characteristic discussed is the stimulation of “play.”  Arata uses the works of Huizinga and Hesse to  describe “play” as free activity deliberatey outside the ordinary life, something originating inside the mind.  I agree with this definition, however; I do not agree with what Huizinga goes on to say in the article.

It is argued in the article that reality is full of change and growth, and that by being in a state of “play” this will not occur. My point is that children are always in a state of “play” and they grow, in fact they recognize reality or what’s real with no problems, usually. So why must adults be viewed as “behind” if they choose to venture into a new thought process from time to time. Now by no means am I saying that it’s okay for adults to always be in a state of “play,” because as adults we do have responsibilities. But it is okay for adults to escape the harsh realitites of life from time to time.  In the article Jean Piaget described play as a type of adaptive action understood in contrast to imitation. I think that “play” is simply an adults desire to venture back to their childhood which is mandated by innocence and happiness! I “play” or “pretend” sometimes that I was somewhere else or someone else, don’t you?

YouTubers

Before I watched Youtubers, its name made me curious about how a nine-minute video can describe or show the “Youtubers.” After watching it and several of its response videos, I think this short and beautiful video justified its name. Different people’s faces, smiles, words, lives, their kids and their kitties are recorded intactly from their real lives. Though without any sound effects and fancy pictures, these episodes are recording the real life and world which is the most melodious and colorful things. Most importantly, people are saying what they want to say spontaneously, but not reciting from a script.

Come back to Chaudhry’s discussion of the reasons of posting comments or uploading videoes. Though there are some people who post just to get fame, it’s not true to me, and I believe to many others. I’ve found many videos about their pets, about their families and about their common but real life. These subjects can never be fancy enough to attract many public’s attentions, but why do they post them and why people are watching them?

Wanting to be seen on the web does not equal to being eager to become famous. Some may post a video just out of curiosity of seeing themselves from the screen, or may want to say something to some one, or simply want to record what had happened and share with others. And the YouTube facilitates us to raise our own voice and have our own show. Being on the screen is not confined to the actors and actresses. That’s the reason why YouTube came out and became so popular.

However, like some bloggings recording the hits, I found the videos on YouTube also have the ratings. Though the ratings can help people to quickly find what’s hot and good, these judgements are what make people care more and more about their videos. Driven by getting higher ratings, people will make some fancy things to get the inflated evaluation from others. If the videos are not given any rates and evaluations, but just comments, and the videos are not classified by the different ratings, but by the content, can the YouTube become even more  “self-expressing” of ourselves and our life and more “democratic”? I hope so…

List of Necessities: Food, Water, and a Sprint PCS Phone? “Click This…..”

 

Everett made a very interesting and accurate point in her article “Click This:  From Analog Dreams to Digital Realities” when she discussed the Sprint PCS phone along with all advanced cellular devices and their rapid growth and popularity.  Sprint PCS phones do allow their users to view “LIVE TV,” which includes the news, sports, and music videos.  As a user of the Sprint PCS phone I must pose this question, “Is this necessary?”  

Everette goes on to reference Jean-Francois Lyotard’s essay, “Can Thought Go on without a Body?,” to challenge the reader to determine if the post digitial material body dominates the thought process of humans or vice versa. Ultimately, she decides that it would  be quite difficult for thought to continue, because humans have allowed digital technologies to dominate normal functions, meaning that humans have become extremely lazy and dependent on digital technology. I must agree! Sure, I have a digital phone, but by no means do I use it to watch “LIVE TV,” that’s what a television is for!

However, I am guilty of using my digital service to pay bills, and download music, which seems a bit lazy now that I think about it. I can’t speak for other digital customers, but in defense of myself, I don’t allow my phone to dominate my thought process. I continue to read books, write poetry, and listen to lectures as efforts to expand my intellectual thought process, and this is NOT LAZY!!! For those who believe that all of their problems can be solved and their questions answered, by the use of a cell phone, I feel sorry for you….really I do.  What will you do if Sprint, Verizon, Alltell, Sun Com, and all other digital phone providers went bank rupt? I hope that you have a serious back up plan!

The Selves in the Mirror

While the Time chose “you,” individuals who are the engaged citizens of a new digital democracy as the 2006 Person of Year and regarded it “a story about community and collaboration”, and while losts of people are fascinated by the self-expressing and democracy facilitated by the technology development, Lakshmi Chaudhry published an article titled ”Mirror, Mirror On the Web” to argue how the medias have quickly evolved into tools for individuals to get fame. She is worried that the self-expression has glided effortleslly into self-promotion. The media culture made people, escially the young people’s hunger for being seen and gettig famous become stronger than ever before.

It is true that some people writing in blogs and uploading videos just to catch the public’s attention. Since just coming to this country for less than a year, I’ve few ideas of what’s going on on the web here. However, as a netizen who browse the Chinese sites and blogs everyday, I quite understand and agree with Chaudhry’s argument and concern. To attract more hits, some entertainers always post about their personal lives and some fancy pictures; to attract people’s attention, some will post celebrities’ personal affairs or just post some unexisting scandals of the famous ones.  To fully make use of the web tools expressing themselves, some just put their abnormal and silly pictures or comments to get fame. There are lots of notorious stars in the cyber world. Of course, the technologies do not take any responsbilities, it is the public’s interests that makes the cyber world filled with these people’s narcissistic behaviors and words.

As Chaudhry said, this democratization fo fame, however, “comes at a significant price.” Though there are more and more faces being seen everyday, their fame is transistory. The meaning of fame is reducing to only being seen by the public. In the future, can these cyber-selves, cyber-fame and the cyber culture subsititute the real ones?

Nevertheless, not being too pessimestic about the cyber world, we can also see the power of the collective action of the cyber communities. There are numerous blogs all around the world report, send their wishes, help and even donate after the Indian Ocean Tsunami; there are thousands of blogs undergo the dicsussions of our society, politics, economics, diseases, nature and debate for the truth. Thus, the democracy of self-expression ensured and facilitated by the fast-developing web tools can never be denied.

At the time of “I post, therefore I am” age, Chaudhry’s article is a good reminding to all of us. Every coin has two sides. While people are excited about the magic internet and is hooked to spend day and night on it, they lose the time with the family and friends. While people are facsinated by getting fame through bloggings and Myspaces, they may lose their true self by wasting too much time asking the mirror on the web. 

“Mirror, Mirror On the Web” and “Fame, narcissism and MySpace”

These two articles “Mirror, Mirror on the Web” and “Fame, Narcissism and MySpace”explain the reasons why people, especially young people are so eager to become famous.

   The self-esteem and individualism based education they received might be the core cause. Young people are raised with the idea that they are always the center and focus of the world, they are special and they can be anything they want to be. So they are yearning for the attention and fame from the public. Another reason is their passion for freedom. With fame in hand, they can do whatever they want to do without restriction. They are free. In addition, people are immersed in a media-controlled world in which they are told that becoming celebrity is not a fantasy.

   To cater to the mass desire for fame, numerous online spaces are designed. Such as MySpace, LiveJournal blog, and YouTube video. They provide a platform for people to seek attention. However, net celebrities feel the fatigue of attention and irritation much faster than the real world celebrities do. “It is a lot easier to burn out quicker and before reaching that mass scale of fame.”   

Fame! I Want to Live Forever…

I also find two interesting posts, Fames! I Want to Live Forever…and Is Technology Ruining Your Morals? responding to Lakshmi Chaudhry’s “Mirror, Mirror On the Wall.”

Fame, Narcissism and MySpace

Interesting post from apophenia on some of the issues we’ll be discussing this week.  Also check out her discussion of Twitter, one of the hip, new web tools.