Applicable to our Adbuster unit
http://laughingsquid.com/ron-english-badvertisments-at-the-welling-court-mural-project-in-queens/
Monday, June 14, 2010
Thursday, June 3, 2010
fearroyo on Reingold's SmartMobs
From Reingold’s perspective in terms of changes in the media I can say that I have been slow to adopt newer forms of popular technology and media. What I have seen however are quick shifts in norms in terms of how individuals within my age group interact with one another.
I definitely noticed differences in people that own smart phones versus those that did not during my orientation as a prospective student at UC Davis. I noticed young individuals with smart phones tended to preoccupy themselves during opportunities to interact directly with new individuals that I am sure many of the other prospective students were seeing for the first time. I was eating in the Tercero dining commons and I stood next to a girl waiting for a restroom to become available, and I was curious about the self-distracting phenomenon that I have been noticing. As I stood next to her, I recall feeling a bit awkward because I wanted to say hello, but I took the opportunity to see how she would behave in a socially awkward situation by fumbling around my pocket for my cell phone. As I reach into my pocket to grab my phone, she mirrored my actions and grabbed her smart phone and began fiddling around with it for some time. From that experience, I definitely felt partially isolated from the other prospective students because everyone else felt as if they may have been too preoccupied with their phones to initiate a casual conversation.
In another instance, I recall recently questioning one of my friends about their desire to purchase an Ipad. I had trouble at the time understanding the concept of essentially having a massive flash tablet that cannot be stored in one’s pocket. She was telling me she wanted to purchase the Ipad because with it she would be able to access thousands, upon thousands of applications and use it as a media gateway to browse through music and keep up with her online persona. I had trouble understanding the logic in one purchasing the Ipad because from what she told me, the capabilities of most recent generations of Ipods and Iphones already have these capabilities. I felt as though she wanted to purchase the Ipad for the sake of keeping up with the next major shift in popular items that are anticipated to be desirable within the next few years. I could not understand the use value of an Ipad because most of the capabilities sound too similar to what typical netbooks, and laptops are capable of handling.
I often find that I have trouble understanding the incentives other individuals have in purchasing the latest technology when improvements are likely to come thereafter the initial release.
I definitely noticed differences in people that own smart phones versus those that did not during my orientation as a prospective student at UC Davis. I noticed young individuals with smart phones tended to preoccupy themselves during opportunities to interact directly with new individuals that I am sure many of the other prospective students were seeing for the first time. I was eating in the Tercero dining commons and I stood next to a girl waiting for a restroom to become available, and I was curious about the self-distracting phenomenon that I have been noticing. As I stood next to her, I recall feeling a bit awkward because I wanted to say hello, but I took the opportunity to see how she would behave in a socially awkward situation by fumbling around my pocket for my cell phone. As I reach into my pocket to grab my phone, she mirrored my actions and grabbed her smart phone and began fiddling around with it for some time. From that experience, I definitely felt partially isolated from the other prospective students because everyone else felt as if they may have been too preoccupied with their phones to initiate a casual conversation.
In another instance, I recall recently questioning one of my friends about their desire to purchase an Ipad. I had trouble at the time understanding the concept of essentially having a massive flash tablet that cannot be stored in one’s pocket. She was telling me she wanted to purchase the Ipad because with it she would be able to access thousands, upon thousands of applications and use it as a media gateway to browse through music and keep up with her online persona. I had trouble understanding the logic in one purchasing the Ipad because from what she told me, the capabilities of most recent generations of Ipods and Iphones already have these capabilities. I felt as though she wanted to purchase the Ipad for the sake of keeping up with the next major shift in popular items that are anticipated to be desirable within the next few years. I could not understand the use value of an Ipad because most of the capabilities sound too similar to what typical netbooks, and laptops are capable of handling.
I often find that I have trouble understanding the incentives other individuals have in purchasing the latest technology when improvements are likely to come thereafter the initial release.
SmartMobs: A Living Legacy
As soon as I read the introduction article SmartMobs, it made me reflect on my experience with the surveillance media experiment I did a couple weeks back. I remembered how the use of my phones and computer became less frequent because of my new knowledge that everything I was doing, saying, and viewing was all being recorded in some computer, somewhere else unbeknowingst to me. But ironically, the use of cell phones and computers are more useful now than ever. You can now talk to people across the world via skype, aim chat, or ustream. iPhone apps connect me to facebook, twitter, and myspace among many other social sites to keep me connected with everyone anytime of the day. I can only imagine what 2020 will look like in terms of technology and the way we use it. Smartmobs will only grow more powerful and readily available to the newest generations to continue this new legacy of technology.
Smart Mobs: Who Owns the Media
This article immediately brings to mind the iphone, as it a phone that boasts continuous connection to the internet. It tracks everything; there is an application for nearly any type of tracking. Which restaurants you’ve been to, what locations you’ve visited, etc…All of this can be easily logged and tracked. There are so many ways to create smart mobs with the amount of connectivity each person has, as well as the various pieces of technology that promote the creation of these smart mobs. Facebook itself is probably one of the largest creators of smart mobs. Simply joining a “facebook group” or ‘liking” something immediately categorizes the person, placed amongst individuals who share similar interests. The quickly advancing technology is shifting cultural norms, compensating for the increased connectivity with greater categorization of individuals.
Tuesday, June 1, 2010
Blog 13 Smart Mobs Who Owns Media
The article Smart Mobs: The Next Social Revolution definitely supplied an awareness to my own technological consumption practices. I never really thought about the actual social changes that are occuring as a result of the shifts in media technology. I now know that there is a certain power in the knowing of these changes since there are many advantages to the connectivity of the new media. Being aware of "Smart mobs" and taking advantage of the power of being able to organize oneself with many others, despite not knowing them personally, and further making social/economical/political changes as seen necessary. Two instances in my life where I could use this advantage of smart mobs would be when trying to gain awareness for a charity that I feel should be exposed to the world. Just like posting up a sign, I can text and message random people to see my message. Another example would be political activism and trying to get the candidate I want voted to be made aware of by the public.
Monday, May 31, 2010
Smart Mobs and smart phones
Though you can't actually click on Habit Burger in Davis commons and leave a met/data, tag infused opinion on the restaurant itself, YELP and plenty of other user generated review site, all accessible from a smart phone, easily change my decision of whether I actually patron the establishment. I don't have to vocally hear from a friend that they recommend the restaurant, or have to suffer through the poor service on my own. These aren't even my close friends posting these virtual bills of (dis)approval, they are relative strangers but, their opinions, and the hundred of concurring ones, all accessed within seconds, can't be that far off.
Another example of the constant connection to the vital data that drives my life is between public transpiration and my cell phone. Unitrans has employed NEXTBUS, a service that tracks every bus via GPS, and using its location and speed on it's route, I can text my bus stop number to NEXTBUS to get an exact time of arrival. While my phone dose not have GPS capabilities, I have MacGyvered a gps bus tracking devise, the microprocessor of my phone's texting capability communicating with NEXTBUS' GPS data.
Another example of the constant connection to the vital data that drives my life is between public transpiration and my cell phone. Unitrans has employed NEXTBUS, a service that tracks every bus via GPS, and using its location and speed on it's route, I can text my bus stop number to NEXTBUS to get an exact time of arrival. While my phone dose not have GPS capabilities, I have MacGyvered a gps bus tracking devise, the microprocessor of my phone's texting capability communicating with NEXTBUS' GPS data.
Friday, May 28, 2010
Blog 13--Who owns the Media
After reading SmartMobs introduction, Reingolds perspective on changes in media is very apparent in my own current life. For example my brother right now is over in South Korea, and before leaving he was informed that his American cell phone would not work over there, because they are on a higher frequency for cell phone, and essentially his cell phone was too “old” to run off of it. However, because of computers my brother although without a cell phone for the time being has been able to skype with me via our computers. Reignold discusses how intercommunicating devices are becoming increasingly useful to individuals. Ten years ago, this type of communication was probably non-existent, and now it is as easy as checking email. This change in media has helped me stay in touch with my brother on a daily basis, where before it wouldn’t have been this easy.
Another is example is when Reingold discusses how in Japan he witnesses an interaction among five people, while the younger people share a text message amongst themselves, they do not with the older people. I can relate this back to my own current life by when I am out to dinner with older people (my parents, their friends) they find it very rude when I take my cell phone and text message, but when I am with people my own age, people not only don’t mind, but don’t even seem to notice it. This demonstrates that over the ages how much technology is more accepted upon a younger generation because we don’t know much else.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)