Wendy Chun – Programmed Visions, (book, pp. 1-2, and optionally pp. 3-10)
Introduction: Software, a Supersensible Sensible Thing questions the global picture of new media. Chun asserts the grandiosity of the internet and the intangibility of new media that brings difficulty in constricting it into one idea/concept. As a solution, Chun asserts that the public gravitate to software in order to bring clarity to new media through the creator of. Chun compares culture to software and nature to hardware. Software is used as a cultural metaphor that brings clarity to ideas/concepts otherwise difficult to understand. By agreeing that the concept has a system of truths, any concept (like new media) is less intimidating. But Chun also implies that this may disregard the actual complexity of New Media by categorizing it as a linear system. Through this disagreement, Chun attempts to ground the idea of uncertainty that New Media actually holds.
Matthew Fuller – How to be a Geek (book, pp. 12-14, and optionally pp. 63-71)
“Equally, much of the work here operates with
the concepts of computer science as fundamentally cultural and
political, as something core to contemporary forms of life and thus as
open to theoretical cultural exploration as much as architecture,
sexuality or economics might be.”(pg 12, para 3).
People are so tied to their entitlement/ownership of technology that they forget to question the effects that coincidentally occur and shape it. Viewing technology as unfamiliar and open-ended brings new ideas of its inner mechanics to the surface. Treating it as a social science, as opposed to a strict technical science, allows us to think critically.
If technology is political and cultural, how/where can we begin to unpack it? Do we all have the same perspective to critique contemporary technology? Can there be a over arching understanding of tech?
Geert Lovink – Sad by Design (podcast w/ Douglas Rushkoff, 60m)
This podcast was really interesting to me because Lovink questions who the audience is and how this plays into contemporary technology. Despite the grandiosity of new tech, it’s drastically underused because of a lack of complete knowledge accessible for the users. He brings up how smart phones have so much potential, but the general public might not fully understand all the inner workings of the device. This idea bounces back to the last article, both relating knowledge to power.
On another note, Lovink also elaborates on how technology and the internet have shifted into a quantitative communication. People enjoy numbers that reflect their social identity because of how straightforward/assertive they’re presented. I think that it’s easier to understand how we fit into a society if we’re given these quantitative measures rather than if we consider a nonlinear relationship. To what extent is there truth to numbers?
Soren Pold – New ways of hiding: towards metainterface realism (article)
This article talks about technology and how the interfaces have steered toward minimalism in order to convince the user of it’s realistic appeal. By hiding 1)complicated interface mechanics and 2)physical motor control, contemporary tech likes to make things as realistic as possible for the viewer. It is interesting to point out that the “reality” they try to replicate is a reality that hides information from the user. But does creating a system that will go unnoticed by the viewer, makes the system less “real”? To make something so “realistic” by taking out the users control of it (in a way) kind of promotes a artificial reality. I started thinking about The Truman Show because it also manipulates tech in order for the user (Truman) to live their life unaware of the system that surrounds him.
I think all the artist and their projects were very inspiring to see. From stripping a software to its machinery or bringing global political communication into one space, they all are very exciting to hear about. The way they take a stance in new media and the variety of spaces, tactics, and methods they do opens the range of art that I can imagine doing.