Video
December 14, 2011

How Real is Virtual Reality? 

In a world where our interactions are becoming increasingly facilitated through technology, even sometimes more than real-world engagement with others, one most re-evaluate the quality and morality of such new media. For instance, the use of immersive video games like Second Life. In the CBC news piece above, it is evident how the virtual world transcends the boundaries of space and time, even enabling a disabled young man a “second chance” on life by living through the game. Spending countless hours in front of a computer screen, teaching your avatar to fly or purchasing virtual property may seem strange - strangely addicting. Such cyberspaces are growing in popularity and accessibility worldwide, causing social disaffiliation and decreased opportunity to practice real values. While the technology of Second Life does embody ‘real’ communication with instant messaging and the ability to engage with others, it does not substitute the face-to-face interactions of reality - nor will it ever. As technology continues to approximate human interaction with multitude of innovations, such as Facebook or Apple’s FaceTime, no media form can ever replicate the intimacy, eye contact, immediate reaction, response, reading of expressions and tangibility that reality produces for a complete and fulfilling level of interaction. 

Video
November 13, 2011

Viral Videos 

How many viral videos are you subjected to in a day? Numerous videos come across our newsfeeds, are tweeted, posted on our favourite blogs and broadcasted by the news every day. However, which videos are most popular and go viral the quickest? More commonly comedic videos, such as David After Dentist, Jimmy Fallon’s I told my Kids I Ate All Their Halloween Candy, or Justin Bieber’s Baby, come across our media outlets as oppose to political videos, such as the celebrations after the Libya’s dictator, Gaddafi, was killed. It appears that videos that involve humor and innocence receive more hits quickly. It may be suggested that today’s social media and communication tools favour comedy, to take away from our grueling work schedules, rather than political issues. Social media applications and viral videos are therefore, primarily used for entertainment and as comical outlets, rather than spreading political awareness and movement.   

Photo
November 13, 2011
  The Slow Movement on the Rise  While speed is a destructible social force, many are advocating a cultural shift away from the immediacy of fast-foods, instant meals, instant weightloss and instant gratification. This has brought about the Slow Movement. It looks to offset the frenzied pace of everyday life, and has placed emphasis on slowing down our many routines. We are so consumed in our lives and the culture of speed that we often fail to realize the effect it takes on every aspect of our lives – our health, diet, work, relationships, the environment and our community. The Slow Movement is embodied in the notion of slow food, which opposes the fast food culture and encourages the enjoyment of local produce and organic foods. In addition, slow parenting places an importance on parents spending quality time with their children and scheduling fewer activities for their kids in an era where parents are working longer hours and children are placed into endless activities and after-school classes. In slowing down our health, wellness practices such as yoga, pilates and mediation are increasingly becoming popular. These are all aims in slowing down the hurriedness of our lives. Are you slowing down yours? When was a last time you did nothing? Here’s an interesting video surrounding the rise of the Slow Movement.   http://www.ted.com/talks/carl_honore_praises_slowness.html

  The Slow Movement on the Rise 

While speed is a destructible social force, many are advocating a cultural shift away from the immediacy of fast-foods, instant meals, instant weightloss and instant gratification. This has brought about the Slow Movement. It looks to offset the frenzied pace of everyday life, and has placed emphasis on slowing down our many routines. We are so consumed in our lives and the culture of speed that we often fail to realize the effect it takes on every aspect of our lives – our health, diet, work, relationships, the environment and our community. The Slow Movement is embodied in the notion of slow food, which opposes the fast food culture and encourages the enjoyment of local produce and organic foods. In addition, slow parenting places an importance on parents spending quality time with their children and scheduling fewer activities for their kids in an era where parents are working longer hours and children are placed into endless activities and after-school classes. In slowing down our health, wellness practices such as yoga, pilates and mediation are increasingly becoming popular. These are all aims in slowing down the hurriedness of our lives. Are you slowing down yours?

When was a last time you did nothing? Here’s an interesting video surrounding the rise of the Slow Movement.  

http://www.ted.com/talks/carl_honore_praises_slowness.html

Photoset
November 13, 2011

Revolution or Social Boredom?

In class, we recently talked about Twitter as a fundamental tool in organizing the Iranian social uprising that took place in 2009. The use of digital communication media and social networking applications playing an important role in today’s civil resistance campaigns and revolutions.  Such tools represent the globalization of communication. They may bring together a group of people globally in order to facilitate change and empower a social movement; however a revolution did not occur simply because of Twitter’s innovation. The activism and engagement in wanting to change Iran is what fundamentally helped to collect and bring together a large mass of individuals who supported the same ideas. The speed of communication, which Twitter provided, helped to revolutionize the social movement, in transmitting information across vast networks in real time.

Twitter, Facebook and other social networks may speed up communication and increase the magnitude of information among masses, but they are equally as much strategies for slowing down the relentless pace of the day (Best, 2011). Following your favourite celebrities, updating your status with a new song lyric, sending “tweets” to friends and uploading your photos from Thursdays pub night is, moreover, a strategy of wasting time. Depending on the way these communication devices are used they may ignite ideas in promoting social change when supported by a large group or they are just a way to pass through yet another boring work day. 

Video
October 17, 2011

After acquiring more thought about the authenticity of today’s culture, I couldn’t help to realize the lack of original idea. It seems as though everything is a re-make, a remix - putting forth effort to improve, change and integrate the work of copyright holders. This not only applies to media culture - where musical artists take snippets of old songs, including Kanye’s and Jay-Z’s use of “Try a Little Tenderness” in their rap collaboration “Otis” (seen in the video above) or Tyler Mederios’ pop re-make of the 1979 KC and the Sunshine Band’s single “Please Don’t Go” - but even within our own lives. We not only remix music in an amateur way through our iPod’s shuffle playlist, but also in our academic careers. In writing essays and research papers, we are constantly sampling a variety of academic opinions and their copyrighted journals in order to support our own believes and generate further analysis. Nothing is necessarily original in today’s world. What hasn’t been remixed? 

Video
October 16, 2011

Remixing: The Hybridity Culture 

As many of us our familiar with, the popular mashup artist known as Girl Talk, has stirred up much controversy concerning his use of sampling various artists to recreate remixed, upbeat tracks. By blending “Elton John, Notorious B.I.G., and Destiny’s Child all in the span of 30 seconds,” the artistic integrity of his music is left questionable.  However, in the day and age where it is socially accepted to instantaneously download songs onto our PCs for personal use, the topic of his copyright infringement doesn’t seem like that big of a deal.  He is simply using old media – dissembling, reproducing and individualizing it in order to represent today’s culture using modern tools. Girl Talk’s Gregg Gillis further states, “I can manipulate these sources more than people ripping off chord progressions. Its just different musical tools.” It is the new hybidity of culture where everything exists in combinations, with no authentic or pure forms. Consequently, the new ‘remix’ generation will require changes to the copyright law as no art will be entirely original. With the ability for Internet users to create cultural content using existing media, remixing must not be considered theft, but rather creativity. 

Text
October 02, 2011

Techno myths?

It seems as though every time I watch TV, a new ad appears for the latest gadgets - whether it be through a BlackBerry product placement or a commercial for Ford’s state of the art Active Parks Itself technology. Recently, catching my attention is one of Apple’s latest products – the iPad 2. According to its television commercials (video posted below), not only is this new tablet ‘faster, thinner and lighter’, but it is also going to make our lives ‘delightful’ and even ‘magical’.  However, coming from not one of the most tech-savvy individuals, I am left to question what void this device will fill in my life. As its many advertisements demonstrate, the iPad 2’s design is not only an improvement from its first installment, but its features are said to enable better communication for our social lives, career motives and for our personal learning experiences. Yet, I can’t help to believe that it’s a necessity in order to perform these tasks. Last time I checked children were still able to learn to print using paper and people learned to play the guitar through an actual guitar. Admittedly, the tablet does have a wow factor and appears cool; however, the fact that its ‘magical’ is nothing more than a myth.

The iPad 2 device exemplifies the myth of perfect communication. With its portability, speed, convenience and connectivity, it is believed to naturally integrate into our lives. In fact, the Apple website states “it makes surfing the web, checking email, watching movies, and reading books so natural, you might forget there’s incredible technology under your fingers.” It furthermore establishes how technologies are becoming an extension of our bodies in accordance to Donna Haraway’s Cyborg Manifesto theory. Such devices continue to blur the division between human and machine. When will we, as consumers, separate ourselves from these devices or machines and put an end to these myths? 

Video
October 02, 2011

The iPad 2 - Magical? 

Quote
September 30, 2011
"All of the biggest technological inventions created by man - the airplane, the automobile, the computer - says little about his intelligence, but speaks volumes about his laziness. ~Mark Kennedy"