Final Powerpoint Structure

For my final powerpoint presentation, I wanted to focus on a activity or hobby that I do myself and can research from the inside using the techniques and reading from class. I have chosen to focus on video game networks and culture and how they are increasing their reach throughout society. Like many 20 year old guys, I enjoy playing video games in my free time like others watch TV or surf the web. What I find particularly interesting is how games now incorporate a sense of community into almost every title. From World of Warcraft, to Xbox Live, and even to what some would think of as a more casual game, the music game Rock Band. Each showcases how our social relations are moving onto the internet. I will choose to overlook the impact of MySpace and Facebook as they actually became popular after many video game online communities were well established. Also, the relationship between users is different in video games because they are centering their experiences around a virtual world, and their character interactions. Users on Facebook relate everything back to the real world.

The structure of my presentation cannot be shown just in slides. After watching the Dutch Flash video in class, I decided that I would like try to create a presentation that takes the same form. Nothing with distinct slides, but rather something that reads and plays more like a movie with subtitles, photos, some video, and music.

Mark Dery talks about online virtual worlds, and how they are spreading throughout society. His work will be a major source of information for my product. Our discussion of the Matrix and what is truly real will be another source. Plato's cave is particularly applicable as well. In World of Warcraft there is an entire industry built around the farming of virtual gold within the game. People are payed cents and hour in some Asian countries to earn gold in the game. After hours in front of a screen, though, could they begin to forget what is real and what is virtual? I know that personally, after a long time in front of a game, I begin to think in the game's language. In the real world actions are thought out in one's brain as "what button combination would that be." Gold farms are one of the best modern virtual representations of Plato's Cave.

I also hope to incorporate other concepts from our readings as well such as culture jamming, and the creation of memes. With gaming's strong foundation online, there is a wealth of knowledge from ad campaigns, to user created phenomenons. I look forward to creating my presentation and hope that it will not play as a powerpoint, but more of an opinion/research piece.

Cuture Jamming Photoshop

In this image, my main culture jamming message is that hybrid cars are not the solution to climate change, like so many politicians try to say. Hybrid engines, when used with smaller, lighter, more economical cars can certainly reduce our fuel consumption, but some American auto manufacturers are starting to produce hybrid SUVs. I think this is absolutely asinine and completely counter productive. These cars barely get better mileage than their standard counterparts. However, most importantly, they give their drivers the piece of mind that they are "going green" when in reality, the pollution from the battery plants offset the emissions the car will save on the road.

I had seen that sad polar bear, and a different penguin superimposed on a melting glacier, so I don't take credit for that. However, I chose t ad a smirking Dick Cheney in the corner, and a constitutionally impossible "Bush Cheney '08" sticker at the bottom.

The SUV and text in my ad is very similar to a series of culture jamming "commercials" back in 2006. Chevy decided to create a website for their new Tahoe where people could go and piece together their own ad for the truck. You were given 20 images, a few songs, and the ability to put in text. Of course, jammers from all over the internet started flooding the site with hilarious ads that mocked the Tahoe's poor gas mileage, disregard for the environment, and unnecessary size. My image kind of plays off this, but I was only reminded of the ads after I came up with my idea. Overall, I feel that my image takes other culture jamming messages and pieces them together in a humorous way.

My Meme Ransom Note

For my meme ransom note, I went around and took photographs of store and brand signs in New York. It says "Welcome to my meme nest. Won't you be my neighbor." I don't have any artistic philosophical reasons for choosing this; instead I wanted to use my ransom font write the last thing you would expect to be written as a ransom note: a Mr. Rogers quote. The "meme nest" refers to Daniel Dennett's quote, "The brain is a meme nest." I thought this quote was very interesting and translates well into a freaky font like the one I have created. It almost seems like something one would read on a Lolcat image. My choice of Mr. Rogers' famous line, "Won't you be my neighbor" is really just to be creepy, and put something once thought to be harmless into this odd context. Overall, I had a hard time coming up with a meme, mainly because I am so familiar with many internet memes already, so it was hard to separate myself from them.

About memes in general, I was very intrigued by Blackmore's concept of our body as a collection of giant memes. It really makes sense because our best, most popular and successful traits are passed on during the evolutionary process. It really opened my eyes when it comes to some of the stupider, but very popular internet memes out there, and that an overwhelming amount of people must find them funny in order for them to be passed on

Video Bar ---->

I added the video bar module to blogger, but I'm kind of disappointed by how bare the options are. It only lets you display videos by keyword, most viewed, most popular, or recently viewed, which limits my options. You can sync it to a Youtube channel which I might do, but for the time being, I have it set to display videos with the tag "meme." Let's see what it comes up with.

Photoshop Practice Collage

The Red Pill

With the ease at which video can be captured, uploaded, and shared across the world today, there is a veritable buffet of red pills ready for our consumption. As discussed in class, though, many of these red pills just bring you into a different blue pill state of mind where you just believe something else even though it may too be biased. The first obvious example for me is the 911 truth movement “documentaries” on Google Video and Youtube. The most famous of these is Loose Change which tries to convince its viewers that the September 11^th terrorist attacks were planned and orchestrated by the US government even though the video ends without giving many real reasons as to why they would want this to happen. I can think of many, but one wonders why the filmmakers wouldn’t come to a more convincing conclusion.

Many people promoting the video and the movement urge us to “wake up” and see the truth. When I first saw the video three years ago, I was 16 and rather impressionable so I took the sided with the filmmakers. Having given it more thought now, though, I see that while many facts don’t line up it just isn’t plausible to think that this administration could pull off a cover-up of this magnitude without something leaking out. With as many scandals that have been exposed over the few years, how could this have been kept secret?

Another red pill on the web today is the internet phenomenon, presidential candidate Ron Paul. I frequently visit the site Digg.com for news, tech, and offbeat stories, and over the last year Ron Paul supporters have been spamming the social news website with stories and "inspiring" videos. He’s a radically conservative (in the economic and foreign policy sense) republican who believe in more freedom and liberties for citizens. His message is good, albeit a little too radical for my liking, but it is the spamming of Digg that has made me never want to vote for him. I almost feel like a patient in a hospital with crazy doctors (Paul spammers) trying to force the red pill down my throat.

These two examples, with videos on Youtube and elsewhere, show that people can be convinced to wake up, but the reality that they are waking up into may be just as opinionated and skewed as the one where they were fast asleep.

The Matrix and Virtual Space

The Matrix brings up many philosophical questions of being and existing and does it in a way that is entertaining and keeps your eyes fixed on the screen. The film discusses issues of an ontological nature in that everything in the matrix is a dream and the “omnipotent deceiver,” the machines, is leading on humans. Descartes’ quote, “I think, therefore I am,” can be applied to Neo’s (and the rest of the farmed humans) concept of reality before he was “freed” as well as his abilities after. Once you are aware of the matrix, your concept of what is physically possible within the reality of the matrix becomes almost infinite.

Since Plato’s time, humans have continued to develop new ways to create virtual spaces within the real world. Some of the first that come to mind are the 360 degree murals in the 1600s which captivated audiences and made them believe that they were actually at a location. At circuses and carnivals in the 1800-1900s, theme rooms traveled the country and made you feel like you were visiting a different place. Then Disney Land was created and introduced animatronic technologies to make figures even more convincing. But these don’t bring up serious emotional feelings like Plato’s cave or the Matrix do. I believe that a very influential virtual world is the one created by the stories told in popular books. Advances in technology in the early 1800s allowed books to be mass produced and reach a much wider audience. With such a large readership across the country, this meant that many fans were living the same story within an alternate reality, their minds. It’s not like Plato’s cave or the Matrix in the sense that it’s an reality we are tricked into believing but it is significant because for the first time, masses of people were imagining the same story collectively.

Another, more modern example of virtual space being created within our own mind is Orson Welles’ reading of The War of the Worlds on the radio in 1938. Many people believed that his broadcast was real and freaked out thinking that aliens were invading. For a brief time, those who believed what they heard were living in a different world, not because of actual events taking place but because they all believed that those things were happening. Welles can almost be compared to the puppeteers in Plato’s cave, or the machines in The Matrix. He was changing his audience’s perception of reality by playing with their minds.

"The Medium is the Message"

For me, reading “The Medium is the Message” is very helpful in learning where the bulk of today’s media studies began. McLuhan’s concept that it isn’t the art created that is the message, but the actual technology that allows that art to exist is very interesting. He references electric light saying, “Whether the light is being used for brain surgery or night baseball is a matter of indifference.” I understand his point and see how at the time his work was considered revolutionary for discussing this topic, but to me, this argument seems weak. I envision a Russian doll scenario when talking about this. If the “electric light” displaying the images on TV is the message then that would mean that the photon gun in the TV that creates the electric light is the actual message. But metal and other materials make up the photon gun, so are they the real message? I could keep going on, but a line has to be drawn. I believe that the development of electric light has had a great impact on our ability to transmit messages, but it is not the message itself. The first videos of Neil Armstrong walking on the moon, a moment of national pride and togetherness, and ones of Hitler dominating the stage carry two different messages. To say that because electric light allows these images to be shown to so many people, it is the real message, oversimplifies the discussion.

Later in the chapter, McLuhan cites David Sarnoff, who said, “We are too prone to make technological instruments the scapegoats for the sins of those who wield them. The products of modern science are not in themselves good or bad; it is the way they are used that determines their value.” McLuhan seems to disagree, sarcastically saying that Apple pie, smallpox, or guns could be seen as either good or bad. I agree with McLuhan in the sense that there are certain things in life that are inherently good or bad, but Sarnoff’s statement absolutely “bears scrutiny.” There is a large middle ground where a message can be shaped and have a completely different effect on the viewer.

I feel that while the medium is very important in determining how the viewer will absorb material, it is not the most pressing issue anymore. The ease at which anyone can get information from the internet means that the media itself is the most important message, not how it gets delivered to the viewer.

Introduction

I'm a sophomore at Lang, from Greenwich CT. I'm an avid user of all forms of media. TV, movies, the internet, I use it all. I don't go to any specific blogs on a regular basis, but I do visit the site Digg.com as well as VWVortex.com (for VW/Audi news) regularly. Digg features posts from blogs all over the internet and allows users to vote on them. My favorite topics include anything tech related, gaming, and offbeat news.
According to Gitlin, I would classify myself as part ironist, secessionist, and abolitionist. I'm critical of the media and recognize a lot of the crap that gets fed to us, but I still watch it and enjoy it for what it's worth. I mentioned the newest version of American Gladiators in class. I know it's total trash TV, but that doesn't stop me from watching it but not taking it too seriously. On the other hand, sometimes I actively avoid certain media and even try to convince others to do the same. For example, the recent coverage of Brittany Spear's meltdown really bothered me. Why was it headline news on CNN? Every time I saw my sister and mother watching a story on her I went and turned off the TV. In this respect, the abolitionist/secessionist in me comes out, but there are some gossipy stories in the news that I probably enjoy as much as they do the stories about Brittany Spears.