DTC #6

Avatar dichotomizes gender in most of the same ways we always see. In the Na'vi, the men tend to lead war and battle. They tend to act with aggression and hot-headedness. The women, more often, act with compassion and reason. They are the leaders of the less violent pursuits like spirituality. Meanwhile, while Jake Sully is the prototypical male hero -- active, aggressive, head-strong, athletic and full of charisma -- Dr. Augestine falls in to many of the supporting female roles: nurturer, teacher, empathizer, naturalist.

When humans enter their avatars, they tend to take the forms we've come to associate with ideal for genders. For a woman like Augestine character, that means becoming slimmer and bustier. For a man like Sully, that meant become built and athletic. I'm not one to claim every movie should be required to buck gender conventions, but many of the gender dichotomy we view in society -- be they inherent or created -- show up in Avatar.

I shy away from the concept of "contradictory identities" as Charles Cheung uses them, because I feel humans are very diverse creatures and few personality traits are necessarily contradictory. He mentions a profile creator who "supports feminism and yet likes Sylvester Stallone's movies a lot" (277). The emphasis in the quote is mine, and I don't think supporting rights for women is inherrently contradictory to liking popcorn movies with a lot of violence and machismo; many are simply able to compartmentalize aspects of reality and enjoy or support them purely for what they are and not how they relate to other aspects.

I digress, however, and do understand what Cheung is getting at with "multiple identities," and I understand even why he uses the term contradictory, if I disagree with the connotation. In the case of Sully, he displays the single-minded "jar head" stereotype, wanting only the advancement of the goals of his superior officer and caring little for nerdy things like the scientific process (like sound record keeping). At the same time, he shows wonderment at the natural world and a genuine interest in Na'vi and their culture when they are the enemies of the Marines and the company. Further, while he's a "cutter" who wants to jump right in and get things done, his ultimate battle is against others for also being cutters, as well, diving in and trying to get to "unobtanium" in less-than-careful ways; his very nature is similar to that he fights against.

Also, I don't think Jake Sully is a particularly deep character, so I don't think he offers many great opportunities for studying multiple identities. He presents himself as a good Marine to his superior officer and presents himself as a good Na'vi to the Na'vi; he just changes which identity he likes more over the course of the movie.

Avatars are like personal web pages in that they can give humans the emancipation to explore Pandora in ways they couldn't otherwise, without breath masks and with the physical abilities to roam the terrain and experience a nature that is beyond human limitations. Unlike personal web pages, however, the operator of the avatar doesn't have the freedom to adjust his "profile" the way he can on a web page. What he has is what's created from his DNA; it's a different creature, but it's still based on himself.



Works Cited

1. Avatar. Dir. James Cameron." Twentieth Century Fox Film Corperation: 2009, Film.
2. Cheung, Charles. "Identity Construction and Self-Presentation on Personal Homepages: Emancipatory Potentials and Reality Constraints." The Cybercultures Reader. Ed. David Bell and Barbara M. Kennedy. New York, NY: Routledge, 2007. Print.

Album Cover of the Day 9.23

This was one of my first attempts at shifting the perspective of writing, something I think could be a nice tool in the future.

This is one of the more interesting and convincing albums this process has come up with for me yet. It just feels like an album cover, right down to the couple in the front wearing headphones.

Unfortunately, dbClifford is a real singer, which makes this actually less fun.

DTC #5

The iFruit series of comics from the strip FoxTrot displays what Deborah Lupton calls “the humanized computer” (426). Lupton primarily references advertising as a location for making computers seem “humanized,” but the same ideology employed by advertisements is employed else where in culture. More iFruit strips can be seen here.

In the case of FoxTrot, the Foxes' iFruit communicates like humans. It talks, it feels and it thinks. In the strip above, it shows emotion by wanting a hug. In the strip below, it expresses its desire to be upgraded. Much like the ads Lupton discusses make computers seem longing for their “new toys,” Bill Amend has the Fox’s iFruit literally asking for its upgrades in the form of a Christmas list. And when the computer is threatened with not getting its Christmas wish fulfilled, it accesses another human trait: blackmail.
It’s never explained why the iFruit can talk and how this computer has emotions, it’s just left to be understood by the reader. And the reason that’s okay is because our society has been conditioned to think of computers as living, thinking, learning things. Human-like machines, not just tools that sit on our desks. Though none of us have a computer that behaves as humanly as advertisements or FoxTrot act, it’s a concept we mostly understand and accept without even thinking. Some of this is due to how fascinating the technology still is to us, and some is from the powers that be that Lupton discusses presenting humanized computers to us. Once you see it enough, it’s just a part of their cultural identity to you.
On a side note, another ideology of Lupton's can be seen in FoxTrot, and that's "the hacker's body" (425). Jason Fox fits the hacker stereotype, purposefully, to the letter. He has thick glasses, unkempt hair, poor social skills, a gigantic intellect and an addiction to his technology. His interests are geeky and his knowledge beyond his years, and yet much of his personality is immature.


I think the most significant thing I've learned about digital culture in this class so far is the fact that everything is designed for a purpose, but that design is not necessarily the way things have to be or should have been. Further, that design is something that can create a digital divide. An example is from Selfe and Selfe's "Politics of the Interface." They discuss the GUI interface of most computers as a white collar office setting, with a desktop and files and other sorts of things someone from the background that most with computers are familiar with (486-87). It had never crossed my mind this wasn't "the way things are supposed to be" and instead is "the way things happen to be" and an element of digital division. Remembering what's conveyed by style choices may not be appropriate for all current and future intended audiences is something I intend to take from this class.



Works Cited

1. Amend, Bill. FoxTrot. Universal Press Syndicate, 2010. Web. 23 Sep 2010.
2. Lupton, Deborah. "The Embodied Computer/User." Cybercultures Reader. 2nd Ed. David Bell and Barbara M. Kennedy. New York, NY: Routledge, 2007. Print.
3. Selfe, and Selfe. Politics of the Interface. 1994. 485-88.

Album Cover of the Day 9.21

Another album cover for you. I'm seeing this album being a solo male artist with introspective, often depressing, themes. Why his stage name comes from a Sumerian king, I don't know.

Also, I think this album may be from the 80s.

Album Cover of the Day

One of the good things to come out of 4chan is the "random album cover art" pass time. If you're unfamiliar with it, you produce an album cover with these simple steps:

1. Go to Flickr and pick the 5th photo under the "interesting in the last 7 days" category. This is your image.
2. Go to Wikipedia and click random page. This is your band name.
3. Go to Wikiquote and click random page. Use the last 3-5 words in the first quote. This is your title.
4. Combine them in Gimp or Photoshop or something and you have your album cover.

I intend to post the cool ones I come up with in the future here. This is today's.

DTC #4

In Zygmunt Bauman’s theory of web communities as “pegs” and David Bell’s critique, one sentence stood out to me:

(Peg communities are) sites where people can hang their interests or obsessions, their enthusiasms or worries, and around which they can – or might – try to build up something collective, albeit instrumentally and ephemerally.

(Bell, 257)

Bell finds Bauman’s opinion of web communities to be gloomy and looks for a rebuttal, but I focus rather on the word “can” in his description of Bauman. And, frankly, I agree with Bauman: a web community indeed can be a place we temporarily hang a superficial aspect of ourselves, only to take it down when we want to go elsewhere.

On (extreme) example is that of the Internet troll. Consider the posting history of PumbasNakasak of the WDW Magic message boards. An very open troll, his entire purpose the forum is to get reactions out of posters by post intentional controversial – and only occasionally rational – opinions. He reveals very little of himself or his personal life and creates no deep connections with the community. If he ever becomes board, like most trolls, he can leave with likely little if any emotional ties being severed.

The peg concept doesn’t only extend to trolls, of course. Anyone can be who and what they want to be – their partial selves or something completely new – in a web community and then take that off the peg and leave whenever they want. The superficial and transient bonds mentioned from Bauman can apply.

That said, Bell’s arguments against Bauman that online communities are not necessarily “a togetherness of loners” also hold water (258). His belief they can be like Anthony Giddens’ “pure relationships,” where social relation exists for the sake of both (or all) parties to deliver enough satisfaction for both (or all) to stay in can apply, as well. I am a member of many communities where I consider the others dear and close friends on par with those in Real Life, and this is despite having a healthy Real Life social life. Not all use their communities as peg boards, but that doesn’t mean Bauman is incorrect in saying it’s an aspect of web communities. It all depends on what you’re there for.

As far as the web communities I’ll be using for Assignment #2, I’ve chosen Lone Star Ball (www.lonestarball.com), Baseball Time in Arlington (www.bbtia.com), and the Dallas Morning News Texas Rangers blog (rangersblog.dallasnews.com); three different Texas Rangers blogs. I choose these three communities because I have extensive experience with all three, including a very deep understanding of the first as a frequent contributor and writer for other websites from its same network. Their format, style, communities and topic have dominated my recent Internet experiences, making for an easier topic than picking three communities I know little about. Further, while each covers the same topic and have many face-value similarities, they become very different websites and communities as one dives deeper in to their content.


Works Cited

1. Baseball Time in Arlington. 9/15/2010. Web. 16 Sep 2010. .
2. Bell, David. "Webs As Pegs." The Cybercultures Reader. Ed. David Bell and Barbara M. Kennedy. New York, NY: Routledge, 2007. Print.
3. Lone Star Ball. SB Nation, 9/15/2010. Web. 16 Sep 2010. .
4. "Posting History of Pumbas Nakasak." 9/15/2010. Online Posting to WDW Magic. Web. 16 Sep 2010.
5. Texas Rangers Blog. Dallas Morning News, 9/15/2010. Web. 16 Sep 2010. .

DTC #3

This was the first time I'd been to Yahoo! in a while, and I immediately remember why: overload. Consider just this 500x500 screenshot of the home page.
In this little snapshot of what Yahoo! greets us with, you have no less than five different elements competing for your attention, none flowing with eachother with any sense of cohesion or visual flow. You have a seemingly random assortment of videos, news links, "Trends" and an ad. Brunett and Marshall are accurate that the goal is to pull users along to the next location, my reaction to Yahoo! is more one of frightened retreat (100). Opening such a noisy website that requires actual effort for me to figure out what is actually being linked to is certainly no invitation to me. Certainly Yahoo! is successful, but when we compare it to Google's home page, maybe we can get an idea for why Google is more successful.
I liked the wording Burnett and Marshall had for one particular feature of a website like Yahoo!, however:

Augmenting these techniques of providing interconnection among users of Yahoo! are teh accordion-like hyperlink extrapolations of stories from a single site. The accordion-efect is not so much driven by linearity, but a wider reach of potential interconnection (101).

I'm focusing on the discussion of what they call "the accordion effect," which is a phenomena I definitely recognize from the internet, something that can keep me on Wikipedia or IMDb or ESPN for hours chasing links. It's not something that I think Yahoo! does particularly well, however.

I see "What Not To Buy At Target." I don't shop at Target, but I'm mildly curious as to what I shouldn't buy there. Now on most websites that would keep me moving, they would have a clear list of related links somewhere. The have "More From CBSMoneyWatch.com," but there are a mere three links, only one of which particularly relevant to the article at hand (and they all take me away from Yahoo!). The links within the text are merely citations, rather than being used for the purpose of creating a next net space to read through. At the bottom, we have the most popular stories on Yahoo!, but they are unrelated to this link. So, once I've gone in to "What Not To Buy At Target," it would only be sheer coincidence that would get me moving along to another website. Other websites provide a wealth of links, either by connecting them to words in the primary text or linking to related websites and stories, but Yahoo! presents me with more of a dead end, making it more likely my mouse pointer will wander towards the URL bar to head towards another website.

Far be it for me to give Yahoo! business advice, but there webpage is and always has been, for me, uninviting and poorly designed in regards to keeping me around if I give it a chance.

Works Cited

1. Burnett, Robert, and Marshall P. David. Web Theory: An Introduction. 1st ed. New York, NY: Routledge, 2003. 81-104. eBook.

I'd Forgotten How Much School Saps Time

I don't have the will to write anything here lately because I don't have the free time to think for myself.

DTC #2

Mark Warschauer makes argues, “a digital divide is marked not only by physical access to computers and connectivity, but also by access to the additional resources that allow people to use technology well,” (par. 21). In this case, the digital divide is the gap in access to and ability to competently use technology between different cultures, groups and people. He further argues the divide, “is not a binary division between information ‘haves and "have-nots,’ but rather a range of access and ability; there’s a gray area to the divide, not simply the blacks who can use computers and the whites who can’t (par. 22). By this definition, which I find wholly reasonable, the digital divide can be found between just about any group you find. My neighbor who shares a computer with his family that he doesn’t really know how to use on a dial-up internet has less access to a form of information technology than I do with my brand-new laptop I’ve conformed to do what I want on my high-speed wireless internet. When discussing the digital divide, it seems to me, someone just beginning to learn of the concept in some depth, that the degree of the divide and how much the specific gap in question matters is important to find, rather than merely stating where there is and is not a divide and treating all divides as an equal problem.

In Selfe and Self discuss a disconnect created with the common desktop interface designed around professional office symbols and materials (486). I’m not readily sure of what sort of metaphors would work better for an operating system, however, for two reason. The first is that I come from a fairly white-collar background and grew up around computers, so the interface is natural to me and thinking of anything different is difficult. The second is that many changes would mean making a massive change to computer norms from the ground up, such as eliminating the idea of “folders” as a very basic term.

One that could work in the interest of being creative, however, might be a building. “Windows” (not to borrow the term from Microsoft) could represent windows in to the building, and you choose the window for the “room” you want, or what sort of use you plan to make of the computer. Inside the individual rooms could be a simple chart displaying the programs available, with stored information simply in scrollable, sortable and searchable list formats. This may well be over-thinking it and is certainly likely missing some of the issues, but a building is something just about everyone has experience with in their lives, and the idea of going inside of buildings to get to what is inside is intuitive. There could even be a prompt when the system is first started asking what sort of “look” the interface inside the “rooms” could have as far as reflecting areas of work, following the ideas presented in Self and Selfe of kitchen counters and fast food restaurants if such a thing would be successful (486-7).


Works Cited

1. Selfe, and Selfe. Politics of the Interface. 1994. 485-88.
2. Warschauer, Mark. "Reconceptualizing the Digital Divide." First Monday 7.7 (2002): n. pag. Web. 2 Sep 2010. .