Cyberculture Report: DailyBooth, or as some call it "Face Twitter"

Social networking sites are popping up everywhere these days. You can’t go two metaphorical feet when surfing the Web without running into one. There are sites out there that cater to everyone’s particular desires as a user, but a lot of them fall into the two categories of text-based or picture-based. It may seem silly to have a site completely based on pictures, but photoblogging sites are growing in number just as rapidly as anything else. One of the newest and fastest-gaining in popularity photoblogging sites is DailyBooth.

DailyBooth is described on its website as “one big conversation about your life, through pictures.” It is a photoblogging site that allows its users to upload a photo, every day or multiple times a day, with a caption. Signing up is completely free. The goal is to allow people to document and share their lives with others. The DailyBooth slogan is “your life in pictures.” It has often been compared to Twitter and other social networking sites that allow users to follow and be followed in real time. My friend refers to DailyBooth as “face Twitter.” This is because the majority of users post images of themselves photo booth-style sitting at their computers (hence the name of the site) (Siegler). Users of both DailyBooth and Twitter are able to post links on the other’s page, so Twitter actually increases traffic on the DailyBooth site (Martinez). DailyBooth separates itself from Twitter by accentuating its unique feature: the fact that people exclusively share pictures instead of text. This tends to foster a greater sense of community and connection in a more immediately accessible way than other text blogging sites. DailyBooth is also becoming increasingly popular. It has a growth rate of about 35% a month (Siegler). Site creator Jon Wheatley has been quoted as saying that “people find pictures a much more engaging medium than just text” (Martinez).

Whenever a user first accesses the DailyBooth site, they are immediately confronted with the option to sign up. They have their description (“one big conversation about your life through pictures”) as the first thing you see and they promise “you’ll make some new friends real fast.” You can take a picture with your webcam and sign up right then. You can also see the “live feed” at the bottom of the screen. Once you get an account, you are directed to your home page. Once there, you will see several tags at the top labeled “everything” (which is your home page), “booths” (the pictures you’ve taken), “comments,” “likes,” and “follows.” There are also buttons to take or upload a picture onto your page.

The textual literacy on DailyBooth requires users to know how to write and read in shorthand text lingo. Not everyone uses it, but the majority of people do some type of textual abbreviation in their “posts.” Since the main focus of the site is on the photos, it is expected that people write very little to accompany their pictures. Some people choose to write longer posts, but they never go more than a few short paragraphs. The generally accepted amount of text is about a line to two lines, but a short paragraph is not going to result in accusations of spamming the screen. Because it is a photoblogging site, it is also important to be picture/image literate. This means that the user must know how to take and upload digital photos to the site or take a photo from a webcam. They also need to know how to “read” photos and respond to them. Because all you usually get when looking at the Live Feed is a picture someone posts of themselves or something they find interesting, users have to know how to analyze what that photo says about the person. They also have to know how to respond in a way that will facilitate further interaction with the other user if they want to try to build a relationship.  You can't just say something insulting about their picture and expect them to respond to you positively. 

To participate in the site, all users need to do is snap a pic and wait for someone to comment. Because of the live feed, any user might be likely to comment on your picture rather than people you know. There is not a “friend” feature on DailyBooth, but you can “like” or “follow” other users’ Booths. You can also comment on their photos they post by following the live feed or checking in on Booths you are following. DailyBooth is also synchronous: users are constantly uploading pics to the world. As a result, when you are viewing the “live feed,” there is actually a “pause” button so you can catch up with the ones you missed if they were posting too quickly. The instant a user takes or uploads a picture, it’s on the site. However, there is no way to access all the past archives of the live feed. The fleeting nature of the live feed mirrors the users’ desire to have a quick, in-the-moment experience. There is a search bar at the top of the site that will bring up Booths that contain the keywords, but there is no comprehensive database of past Booth’s except on the individual profiles.

DailyBooth users are also (for the most part) reflections of their real world selves. However, users of DailyBooth are much more likely to edit or alter their appearance because it is a site based a lot on looks. You are much more likely to see someone posing in an “attractive” way than making a silly face. Girls especially always make sure their hair looks nice, they have on a cute outfit, and their makeup is done well. DailyBooth affords users with the chance to tweak and perfect their appearance before they put a representation of themselves out into the world, unlike in real life. Quite a few of the Booths posted daily are superficial and tend to be posted by high schoolers. The deeper ones that are artistic, comedic, etc. are posted by older users. The site allows for the continuation of real world friendships onto the site, but the set-up is really more designed to get strangers to interact. Viewing the live feed, you see almost multiple new people per second, and any one of those have the potential to become a new friend.

DailyBooth users tend to only meet up in life if they already knew each other before the site. It takes such a long time to become friends (enough to actually meet what is basically a stranger you met on the Internet) through the little interactions DailyBooth provides that most people never follow up on it. It’s easy to “like” or comment on someone’s Booth, but talking to them and getting to know them is not easily facilitated on the site. The kind of friendship DailyBooth fosters is not the kind of friendship where people meet up in real life, but it does still result in real friendship.

The goal seems to be to have the biggest number of people following you. The people who have the most followers are not outwardly different from other Daily Booth users. The social hierarchy seems to be based on “coolness,” or everyone on the site’s agreed-upon definition of coolness. This usually means the users present themselves as outgoing in some way (whether it manifests itself in their Booths or their text blurbs). The users with the most followers take normal pictures of themselves (although they may have more skill with a camera, i.e they aren’t just using their computer’s webcam). The users with the most followers basically have the power to define what/who is considered “cool” on the site because people look to them for social cues. The people who are constantly campaigning to get followers never have very many at all.  I put in an example here of one user's "steps to popularity" on DailyBooth.

There are so many people using DailyBooth that it is a daunting task to try and categorize them. People from many different countries access the site, so there are many different cultures manifesting themselves on the site in addition to the uniqueness of each individual.  However, you always have your celebrities (movies/TV or Internet), your high schoolers, and your “average Joe.” DailyBooth is home to many unique people, but these are the three groups I’m going to focus on.

Demi Moore and Ashton Kutcher are both on DailyBooth. They are fairly active on the site (and they definitely follow the “rules” of the site, meaning they post Booths of themselves doing average daily activities, not on the red carpet or anything) and obviously have a ton of followers. On her page, Demi Moore describes herself as female from the United States as well as “Wife Mother Woman I am always learning exploring and discovering the silly the absurd the profound. I try to love and give more than I receive. I am dedicated to the fight against modern slavery and human trafficking especially the sexual exploitation of children.” She has taken about 200 Booths, the last one posted last night. Ashton Kutcher is less active, checking in with the site every month or so. He describes himself as a 33-year-old from somewhere in the universe and states that, “I feel I'm on to something here.”

Another type of user that frequents DailyBooth is the high schooler. Chantal Fraser is a good example. She describes herself as a 16-year-old female from Canada and has no “about” section on her profile. She uploads pictures daily and tends to upload pictures that involve her either “looking pretty” or “looking cool” by herself or being goofy with other people. From what I can tell from the site, she is a bright and bubbly girl. Another example of a high schooler is William, a 17-year-old from somewhere in the universe. He always takes these sad pictures that make him look like a little boy with very depressing accompanying text. William is a textbook “angsty teenager,” and everything about his DailyBooth supports that.

Finally, there is the user on this site that is neither a celebrity of any kind or a self-absorbed high schooler. This Boother just uploads pictures on to the site that describe their lives and tend not to be in their teens. “mememeee” is a good example of this type of user. He is a 20-year-old male from Germany, does not have many followers, and has been using the site for a relatively short amount of time. He posts his pictures, a couple of people comment, and he moves on. He doesn’t post a Booth every day, more like every two or three weeks.

On this site, a lot of people steal other people’s pictures. The implications of this on identity are really intriguing: because that’s essentially how identity is manifested on the site (there is an option to add where you’re from and an “info about you” section on your profile, but most people don’t fill it out), stealing someone’s picture is like stealing their identity. This is definitely looked down upon on the site, and people get pretty angry when they find out someone has stolen a picture of theirs. Stealing other people’s pictures on DailyBooth is a great way to instantly lose credibility.

The purpose of the DailyBooth site is pretty clearly stated in all of the site’s literature. The idea is for the user to upload pictures of themselves that describe their life in some way, that way you know everything a user posts is really relevant to them and any comment you make is really going to be taken to heart. DailyBooth’s goal is to get its users talking and participating in the site all at once, so everyone is connected. It does this pretty effectively thanks to the Live Feed. Spending 10 minutes on it can have you interacting with people you’ve never even seen before just because you liked their Booth.

DailyBooth is tailored to our current time. Blogs are a thing of the past when you can type out your feelings in 140 characters or less. DailyBooth follows this trend with an idea that is exactly the in-the-moment type of experience that most users desire today. Lots of blogging sites are starting to charge instead of being offered for free, which also suggests a shift in user preference. DailyBooth already has funding from a number of wealthy investors with others looking into it all the time. It clearly has an effective model (for the time being, anyway).

Another way in which DailyBooth trumps blogging sites is that a lot of people today (especially younger ones) just don’t want to sit down and slog through writing an entire journal entry. These people are used to writing a status for Facebook or Tweeting. Blogging is now way more effort than a large number of young people are willing to expend. They want something they can do right now and be done with it. The constant updating and large number of users afford this in addition to the creative user experience. There is always something new happening on the live feed.

You can go anywhere to find a social networking site that will fit to your needs, so it says a lot that DailyBooth is still growing so quickly. People have really caught on to this idea of tracking themselves day by day through pictures. There are even movie stars using the site. It really seems like DailyBooth is going to usher in a new era in social networking sites. Things are going to move further away from the blogging format and into the more fleeting and in-the-moment style of sites like DailyBooth or Twitter because that’s the amount of time people want to spend on them.

DailyBooth. Web. Feb. 2011. http://dailybooth.com.
Martinez, Jennifer. "Why Is Photo Startup DailyBooth So Hot?: Tech News and Analysis ."
GigaOM – Technology News, Analysis and Trends. 18 Sept. 2009. Web. 9 Feb. 2011.
Siegler, M. G. "140 Characters? That's A Lot Of Writing. Just Post A Picture On DailyBooth."
TechCrunch. 18 Aug. 2009. Web. 12 Feb. 2011.

Making an Imperial Walker?

Article

I found a really great article this week about “How to make an Imperial AT-AT Walker from Star Wars.”  Due to a grassroots movement among fans, attempts may actually be made to construct a real Imperial Walker.  The Imperial Walker is “an elephantine four-legged walker used to attack a snowy Rebel Alliance base in ‘The Empire Strikes Back’ were officially known as AT-AT walkers, for ‘All Terrain Armored Transport’” (Hsu ¶ 3).  People are actually considering all the factors involved in recreating a functioning AT-AT, discussing problems such as structural strength, stress on leg joint (which makes running impossible), and the ease with which they can be knocked down (in contrast to the Big Dog, the Boston Dynamics robot we heard about in class).  Despite engineering issues and intellectual property concerns brought up by Lucasfilms, enthusiasm for the project has not waned.

I think the implications of this project are the most interesting part of the article.  Basically what’s going on here is that people are recreating a fictional construct in the real world.  They are even doing this despite all the difficulties the project is raising, as well as the likely ineffectiveness of an AT-AT.  Supporters have to first convince Lucasfilms to allow them to use their intellectual property, and then overcome the engineering difficulties building such a machine presents, and finally deal with what they’re going to do with the Walker.  Once they figure out what they’re going to do with it, they then have to deal with both its potential ineffectiveness as well as how functionally incapable it is.  I don’t really know what this says about the people that are lobbying so hard to build these AT-AT’s, but it doesn’t look good.  The ability to recreate what we see in movies because our technology has finally caught up to our imaginations may not be such a good thing.

Blogger vs. Celebrity

Article

I found a really interesting article this week on Tech News Daily about how bloggers are surpassing celebrities as sources consumers trust to recommend products.  A new survey conducted by the Nielsen Company found that “20% of women who use social media are motivated to consider products promoted by or with a blogger they know, while only 13% are motivated by celebrity endorsements” (Mulvey ¶ 2).  When these decisions to take blogger advice pay off, the consumers are more likely to return to blogs and other social media for further recommendations.  According to the article, the top three types of products that the “general population” looks for recommendations on blogs are consumer electronics (35%), computer hardware/software (33%), and movies (33%) (Mulvey ¶ 5). 

The end of the article discusses some intriguing implications regarding consumer engagement.  In order to take advantage of this new desire for people to seek out other consumer’s recommendations, marketers must invest more in a “two-way conversation” between producers and consumers (Mulvey ¶ 8).   The article concludes that “marketers must seize these opportunities now or risk falling behind their competitors in the race for online consumer engagement” (¶ 8). 

A change in producer/consumer relationship is definitely occurring as a result of social media.  Marketers are trying to engage with the consumer in terms of what they actually want instead of trying to sell them a product by arguing that they want or need it.   Will this actually result in better products that people actually want to buy, or will the marketers find a way to turn this form of consumer engagement against us?  They have certainly done it before.  After marketers in the 1970’s found that they could divide consumers into groups while still catering to their “individual” needs, we began to slide down the slippery slope that led us to our current consumer culture.  Who’s to say that they won’t find a loophole that will allow them to regain control of the producer/consumer relationship?

"Cause Global"

Cause Global: Social Media for Social Change begins by stating that everyone used to think that the Internet would bring on “a more open and democratic society” (Stepanek ¶ 1).  As the Web has evolved over the years, however, that idea seems to ring less and less true.  Data aggregators, like Google and even Facebook, actually decide what information we see online.  They use filters based on the personal choices we make online, like what ads or links we click on.  Because these data aggregators are filtering what we see without our conscious knowledge, they often don’t show content they don’t think we would enjoy, which can be really limiting in terms of information you receive. 

I thought it was an important observation that “we are not using the social media tools we have to solve problems so much as we are using them to socialize with like-minded people about these problems” (Stepanek ¶ 7).  The article discusses how social activists should be focusing on getting people involved offline instead of just using the “social media” to build a list of email subscribers (¶ 7).  When people are just on an email list, they are likely to skim the text and move on.  They may get upset and want to do something about it, but email alone is not enough to motivate people into action.  This article argues that putting more effort into getting people active offline is a much more effective form of promoting civil engagement.

The article continues further down to say that “we must stop assuming that civic engagement will occur online on its own” (¶ 10).  Because we control our social networks based on our preferences (which usually involve people that share our viewpoints), the only voices that get heard from the various groups are the ones that are the most extreme representatives of each group.  This can make it difficult for people within the group to take action as a result of any statements made as well as prevent new members from joining the cause because they don’t agree with the strength of the statement. 

I think a new level of effectiveness will be reached if we can learn to combine social networking and civil engagement.  At this point in time, what we’re doing is not working.  It is so easy for people to be passive with the social media they participate in because it does not encourage them to step into the offline world and put their ideas into action.  I have to wonder how sites are going to rearrange to better motivate people in to action.  I also wonder if moving civil engagement into the offline world to reconnect people if that can eventually lead to a further movement in all kinds of social media to reconnect everyone.

Augmented Reality

Benkoil describes Augmented Reality as “layering digital information onto the physical world” (Young qtd. by Benkoil, ¶ 2).  The most common applications of AR (augmented reality) today are on “smart” handheld devices like iPhones and Androids.  However, there are a ton of other applications for AR out there today: journalists can use them for restaurant reviews or even to see where bailout dollars have been spent in the neighborhood.  You can also look at real estate or historical data about a building and magazines are even using AR that functions in conjunction with computers. 

I thought one of the most interesting potential applications of AR was the idea of “TV station[s] using AR to let viewers poke around in a scene or get more information about something they’re watching right in the frame” (Benkoil ¶ 9).  This may not be one of the more practical use applications, but it would usher in a new era of entertainment.  Combining television with augmented reality would place the viewer in the show, which blurs the line between reality and imagination.  If you can interact physically with a world that is supposed to be untouchable and make-believe, can you really call something imaginary?

I thought one of the most practical applications of AR technology the article mentions is the U.S. Postal Service’s app.  The post office has the customer hold up whatever they want to mail in front of a computer’s camera.  The camera then shows them the size of the box required to ship it.  Being able to tell what size of box quickly will reduce the amount of time each customer will take in the post office, causing less frustration certainly but also the potential for greater customer volume.  Using this AR app could also potentially increase purchases, because people will wait to box their items until they arrive at the post office. 

There are already a lot of AR applications out there today, with many more potential applications on the way.  However, for all the beneficial applications of AR, there are the creepy invasions of privacy implications.  While Benkoil thinks it may be awhile before the technology progresses that far, I’m not so sure.  He states that “a lot of the apps are still glitchy, require downloads and don’t quite work all the time” (¶ 14).  But he still doesn’t disagree that there are apps out there that can be used for invasion of privacy.  Just because the applications don’t work very well certainly means they don’t exist.  So we have a lot to look forward to in the future of AR, but how much do we need to watch out for?

Daily Booth, or as some call it "Face Twitter"

DailyBooth is described on its website as “one big conversation about your life, through pictures.”  It is a photoblogging site that allows its users to upload a photo (every day or multiple times a day) with a caption.  Signing up is completely free.  The goal is to allow people to document and share their lives with others.  The DailyBooth slogan is “your life in pictures.”  It has often been compared to Twitter and other social networking sites that allow users to follow and be followed in real time.  My friend refers to DailyBooth as “face Twitter.”  This is because the majority of users post images of themselves photo booth-style sitting at their computers (hence the name of the site).  Users of both sites are able to post links on Twitter from their DailyBooth page, so Twitter actually increases traffic on the DailyBooth site.  DailyBooth separates itself from Twitter by accentuating its unique feature: the fact that people share pictures instead of text. This tends to foster a greater sense of community and connection in a more immediately accessible way than other text blogging sites.  DailyBooth is also becoming increasingly popular.  It has a growth rate of about 35% a month.  Site creator Jon Wheatley has been quoted as saying that “people find pictures a much more engaging medium than just text.”  

Whenever a user first accesses the DailyBooth site, they are immediately confronted with the option to sign up on the site.  They have their description (“one big conversation about your life through pictures”) as the first thing you see and they promise “you’ll make some new friends real fast.”  You can take a picture with your webcam and sign up right then.  You can also see the “live feed” at the bottom of the screen.  Once you get an account, you are directed to your home page.  Once there, you will see several tags at the top labeled “everything” (which is your home page), “booths” (the pictures you’ve taken), “comments,”  “likes,” and “follows.”  There are also buttons to take or upload a picture onto your page. 

There is a similar textual literacy to Twitter required on the site, i.e. you need to know how to write and read in shorthand text lingo.  Not everyone uses it, but the majority of people do some type of textual abbreviation in their “posts.”   Since the main focus of the site is on the photos, it is expected that people write very little to accompany their pictures.  Some people choose to write longer posts, but they never go more than a few short paragraphs.  The generally accepted amount of text is about a line to two lines, but a short paragraph is not going to result in accusations of spamming the screen.  Because it is a photoblogging site, it is also important to be picture/image literate.  This means that the user must know how to take and upload digital photos to the site or take a photo from a webcam while on the site.  They also need to know how to “read” photos and respond to them.

To participate in the site, all users need to do is snap a pic and wait for someone to comment.  Because of the live feed, any user might be likely to comment on your picture rather than people you know.  There is not a “friend” feature on DailyBooth, but you can “like” or “follow” other users’ Booths.  You can also comment on their photos they post by following the live feed or checking in on Booths you are following.  DailyBooth is also synchronous: users are constantly uploading pics to the world.  As a result, when you are viewing the “live feed,” there is actually a “pause” button so you can catch up with the ones you missed if they were posting too quickly.  The instant a user takes or uploads a picture, it’s on the site.  However, there is no way to access all the past archives of the live feed.  There is a search bar at the top of the site that will bring up booths that contain the keywords, but there is no comprehensive database of past booth’s except on the individual profiles. 

DailyBooth users are also (for the most part) reflections of their real world selves.  However, users of DailyBooth are much more likely to edit or alter their appearance because it is a site based a lot on looks.  Quite a few of the Booths posted daily are superficial and tend to be posted by high schoolers.  The site allows for the continuation of real world friendships onto the site, but the set-up is really more designed to get strangers to interact.  Viewing the live feed, you see almost multiple new people per second, and any one of those have the potential to become a new friend. 

The goal seems to be to have the biggest number of people following you.  The people who have the most followers are not outwardly different from other Daily Booth users.  The social hierarchy seems to be based on “coolness,” or everyone on the site’s agreed-upon definition of coolness.  The users with the most followers take normal pictures of themselves (maybe a little more artsy).  The people who are constantly campaigning to get followers never have very many at all.

Many people participated in the “Day of Silence” a few days ago – national youth movement protesting the silence faced by gay, lesbian, bi, and transgender people and their allies; deliberate silence echoes the silence they face.  A lot of people were doing this, which was interesting on a photoblogging site (the pictures featured the users making some mime of not talking, usually holding their hands in front of their mouths).  I noticed that half if not more of the people participating were just “supporters,” meaning they just were friends with or were in support of gay/lesbian/bi/transgender rights.

On this site, a lot of people steal other people’s pictures.  The implications of this on identity are really intriguing: because that’s essentially how identity is manifested on the site (there is an option to add where you’re from and an “info about you” section on your profile, but most people don’t fill it out), stealing someone’s picture is like stealing their identity. 

The purpose of the DailyBooth site is pretty clearly stated in all of the site’s literature.  The idea is for the user to upload pictures of themselves that describe their life in some way.  That way you know everything a user posts is really relevant to them, so that any comment you make is really going to be taken to heart.  DailyBooth’s goal is to get its users talking and participating in the site all at once, so everyone is connected. 

DailyBooth is tailored to our current time.  Blogs are a thing of the past when you can type out your feelings in 140 characters or less.  DailyBooth follows this trend with an idea that exactly the in-the-moment type of experience that most users desire today.  Lots of blogging sites are starting to charge instead of being offered for free, which also suggests a shift in user preference.  DailyBooth already has funding from a number of wealthy investors with others looking into it all the time.  It clearly has an effective model (for the time being, anyway).

Another way in which DailyBooth trumps blogging sites is that a lot of people today (especially younger ones) just don’t want to sit down and slog through writing an entire journal entry.  These people are used to writing a status for Facebook or Tweeting.  Blogging is now way more effort than a large number of young people are willing to expend.  They want something they can do RIGHT NOW and be done with it.  The constant updating and large number of users afford this in addition to the creative user experience.  There is always something new happening on the live feed.

S/R 1 Revision

Convergence Culture is a book by Henry Jenkins that discusses his ideas on the collision of modern culture with technology.  In his introduction, he states that the book “is about the relationship between three concepts – media convergence, participatory culture, and collective intelligence” (2).  Jenkins then goes on to define convergence as “the flow of content across multiple media platforms, the cooperation between multiple media industries, and the migratory behavior of media audiences” (2).  He describes the example he uses for media convergence, the film The Matrix, as “entertainment for the era of media convergence, integrating multiple texts to create a narrative so large that it cannot be contained within a single medium” (95).  He begins his book by establishing that there is a major shift occurring in the relationship between producers and consumers and follows that by discussing the implications of this shift in reality television.  Using the example of the “spoilers” of the show Survivor, Jenkins demonstrates his point that collective intelligence is causing some definite tension between producers and consumers.  He states that “collective intelligence refers to this ability of virtual communities to leverage the combined expertise of their members” (27).   Participatory culture refers to the recent ability of the consumer to interact with and help create in some cases a media text that used to have a one-way path from producer to consumer.  Jenkins uses the examples of Star Wars and the Harry Potter franchise to demonstrate his concept of participatory culture.  Jenkins states that “in both cases, these grassroots artists are finding themselves in conflict with commercial media producers who want to exert greater control over their intellectual property” (21).  He also uses the implications he draws from these examples of popular culture to analyze politics.  Jenkins states that “in each case [referring to Star Wars and Harry Potter], entrenched institutions are taking their models from grassroots fan communities, reinventing themselves for an era of media convergence and collective intelligence.  So why not apply those same lessons to presidential politics?” (208).   

The issue of literacy is something Jenkins brings up a lot in this novel.  It is of particular concern in chapter five in both conflicts surrounding the Harry Potter franchise.  In the first case (with the fan writers online), we can see that the issue of literacy is no longer just about being able to read and write.  It now requires that an individual create and express themselves through other media.  Jenkins also argues that participating in fan fiction improves the other two components of literacy.  This occurs mainly through the writing, because there are many ways that authors get feedback on the sites: through other writers on the site or through systems set up to help critique newer writers and get them on the right track.  The second issue is mostly concerned with students’ ability to read.  Teachers think the Harry Potter books should be allowed in school because they know kids will read them, and anything that gets kids to read is good.  It is also easier for kids to go deeper into the analysis of something if they are interested in it.  I think both pro-Potter sides need to converge: by applying the methods used by online fan fiction communities, teachers can not only improve children’s literacy but allow them to have fun while they do it.  If schools were to model some aspects of learning how to write after fan fiction forums, kids will have some control over what they create, they will have an easier time evaluating their peers’ work, and they will gain a sense of independence in their writing that will make them better writers.  Teachers could create safe online groups for their students to interact in a forum-type setting, but instead of fan fiction they could work on school assignments.  Another tactic might be to assign students to participate in a fan fiction community for homework so they learn the skills that way.  Using this technology early on in the classroom will also help students to learn how to work with digital information. 

Machines are Watching

Article

I know a lot of people already know about this, but I thought it was an interesting topic to put up for discussion.

Even if you did know that machines watch you surf the web, by the time you found out it was already too late.  The technique called machine learning “affects the kind of Internet advertising you see on Amazon.com, but most people don’t realize that is the underlying technology” (livescience).  The ads we see online are often put up by machine learning systems to “learn” how people use the Internet.  By comparing your activity with other users, the “agent” targets what ads you are most likely to respond to.  Then, every time you click on an add, the host site (usually Google or Facebook) charges the advertiser.

So how do machines learn?  They start out at the level of a child and have to learn more to progress further in “intelligence.”  For example, the article mentions that “like school children learning arithmetic from a teacher, some agents can use simple examples and feedback to learn how to approach more complicated information.”  Other agents rely on experience: using the responses from their past “decisions” to deal with similar situations.  What is most important to notice is that these machines figure out the patterns in the data they receive.  The downside to teaching a machine to learn is that they are doing so based on a model of human learning.  This causes some issues because we don’t fully know how the human brain works.  So for now, these machine learning programs can only process a limited amount of information. 

So, what does this mean for us?  It probably means that advertisers are going to get better and better at reading the individual’s wants, so that everyone is constantly being barraged online by things they really want.  It took decades for advertisers to hone their methods to personalize ads, but machines are already able to do it faster and more efficiently.  When the technology is perfected, consumers’ only option will be to “just say no.”  Watching a commercial for something is awful, boring, and frustrating.  Ads placed on websites are hardly notices because you’re focusing on whatever else you’re doing.  If you do click on those, you certainly don’t feel like you’re saying “yes” to purchasing something, but you totally are. 

I’m sure other (and much creepier) implications can be drawn from this too.  It presents a great “Big Brother” opportunity for everyone from the ad agencies to the government being able to monitor what has become a pretty crucial part of our consumer culture: what we want.  Professionals can build complete personality profiles based on what ads you respond to, and who knows who they would be willing to sell those to?  Anyone?

SR/3 - eXistenZ

eXistenZ is a movie that challenges the distinction between actual and virtual existence.  It begins by introducing a new game, eXistenZ, and the woman who designed it, Allegra, who someone (later revealed to be a realist) tries to assassinate just as they are starting to play the game.  Allegra and her appointed body guard Ted go on the run and eventually play eXistenZ to make sure it didn’t get damaged in the shooting.  The whole movie can be organized by levels of reality.  It begins in what the audience first believes to be reality, but we find out later that it was the first level of the game transCendenZ (the "real" game they were playing that is revealed at the end of the movie).  Then there is the sort of in between level Ted and Allegra go through before they actually start “the game,” when they are in the gaming store receiving their new identities.  The second level occurs when Allegra and Ted port in to play eXistenZ (the game in the first level of “game reality,” set at a trout farm that harvests mutated amphibians for components in the game pods).  They have a series of adventures within the game, all surrounding the theme of game designing and the realist underground movement.  eXistenZ is full of betrayal and double agents, and Allegra and Ted are stumbling around blindly the entire time because there are not really rules or even free will to a certain extent.  Ted has an outburst at one point when they are on the trout farm about how little free will there is in the game, and Allegra responds by saying “like real life, there's just enough to keep things interesting.”  The final level of the game transCendenZ is a sort of combination of the other levels: it has the setting and antagonism towards Allegra of the first level mixed with the characters and vocabulary of the second level (the realist underground movement).  Finally, the characters all “wake up” from playing the game transCendenZ and are discussing it when the final scene culminates with Ted and Allegra shooting Nourish, who is the “real” game designer.  The movie ends with Ted and Allegra pointing their guns at the man who played their waiter while he asks them if they’re still in the game.

eXistenZ plays with gender roles quite a bit.  Throughout most of the movie, Ted is presented as hesitant and weak.  He doesn’t want to get a port, play the game, or even kill anyone (which is his job as her bodyguard).  Allegra is always the one to coax him to do something.  Their reversal can be seen throughout the movie, but is especially prevalent when they are discussing and acting with the bioports.  Allegra is the one directing Ted during his “first time” porting in to a game pod, with the movie makers even going as far as having her prime his bioport and insert the game cord into it herself.  Allegra is also the one who pushes them to get together when they realize their game characters “are supposed to have the hots for each other.”  Ted is hesitant and Allegra has to talk to him and calm him down even though she clearly just wants to have sex.  This is a joke poking fun at how girls behave before they will have sex with someone and how the guy always has to reassure them and sort of coax them into it.  Allegra is also the one that kills most of the people in the game (Ted only kills the waiter at the Chinese restaurant).  However, when they exist the game transCendenZ, Ted's character is clearly in control , as he is directing his and Allegra's actions to kill Nourish.  eXistenZ also plays with the line between the virtual and reality. It is impossible to tell after finishing the movie exactly where the game ends and reality resumes, the last line cementing how unsure the audience is whether the characters were back in reality or whether they were ever there in the first place.  The whole point of the movie is that you never know what’s real.  It plays on the human desire to separate what’s real and what’s not by asking you to contemplate whether there is a difference between reality and the virtual if they are indistinguishable.  eXistenZ asks the viewer to examine their own lives to realize that we could all be part of a game and just haven't "unported" yet.  

Neuromancer, 19-24

Neuromancer ends with Case and Molly respectively breaking into the Villa Straylight.  Case finally meets the other AI and gets sucked into his all too real world, where he reconnects with a ghost of Linda.  Meanwhile, Molly has been captured by the only awake member of the Tessier-Ashpool family and Riviera has switched sides.  When Case comes to rescue her, 3Jane decides to join them and help unite Wintermute and Neuromancer.  Thanks to Case’s and the Flatline’s skills, they successfully get past the Turing security measures and unite the two AI’s. 

One question I want to pose about the last section of this novel is why isn’t anyone asking themselves if it’s a good idea to be freeing and merging these artificial intelligence units?  I would even settle for considering any possible effects uniting the two might have.  Even after they find out what Wintermute is trying to do, neither Molly or Case questions the consequences such an action inevitably has.  The end result doesn’t even reassure their actions.  When Wintermute returns to Case one last time after he has been merged with Neuromancer, he says “I’m the matrix,” and in response to Case’s question regarding where that gets him he replies “Nowhere.  Everywhere.  I’m the sum total of the works, the whole show” (259).  Personally, that does not sound very reassuring.  Neither does the other AI unit Wintermute claims to have found.  I am really worried about the future of that world with all of those unregulated AI’s running around (purposeless !).  Have they not seen the movies about how bad that can go? 

Neuromancer, 6-9

The section of chapters 6-9 in Gibson’s book I found the most intriguing was the one that talked about the Zionites.  The people on Zion were “workers who’d refused to return, who’d turned their backs on the well and started building” (101).  They live completely separated from technology except for what they require to survive because they believe that technology can only lead to destruction.  Case describes Zion as smelling like “cooked vegetables, humanity, and ganja” (102). 

Why does Case think the Zionites are so strange?   Why would anyone in that future think they were weird?  Because they are so anti-technology.  Everyone in this future world is so wrapped up in technology they can’t even fathom how anyone could live without it, much less why someone would want to.  Most people are either jacked into the matrix or a simstim, and all the youth have some kind of crazy techno-body modification.  The Zionites are an important alternative perspective that Gibson presents in contrast to the majority of the characters he sets up in this world.  They show the reader that it is in fact possible, even in this crazy future world where you can have and be anything you want, that some people see the dangers of living like this.  When Case makes one of the Zionites jack in on his deck, all Aerol will say when Case asks him what he saw is “Babylon” (105).  It is important to raise the question of whether or not living this entwined with technology is okay.

S/R 2 - Neuromancer

William Gibson’s Neuromancer is a novel chiefly about the future and the technology it holds (along with what ethical and philosophical questions technology like that raises).  The story follows Case, a down and out hacker trying to get killed by living the street life, who gets recruited by a team that is attempting one major hack.  The first team member is a girl named Molly who has had many “enhancements” made to her natural body (like razors that shoot out from underneath her fingernails and mirrored lenses that attach directly to her face around her eyes).  Case and Molly form an alliance to figure out just what their secretive boss, Armitage, is up to.  They find out through their side investigation that Armitage is taking his orders from an AI (artificial intelligence) unit named Wintermute.  Eventually, they find out what Wintermute is trying to do: it is one half of an AI that was unlawfully too smart and independent to exist together under the Turing code of law.  Wintermute was built with the burning need to reunite itself with its brother, Neuromancer.  Wintermute is a ROM construct, meaning “read only memory.”  This AI is very intelligent, but it can’t create its own personality and has to communicate through images of other people.  Neuromancer, on the other hand, is a RAM (random access memory) construct, which allows it to have its own personality.  The team begins their adventure by recruiting the next team members, a legendary hacker named Dixie Flatline whose consciousness has been copied onto a ROM disc and Peter Riviera, a man who is able to project perfectly realistic holograms from his mind.  The book culminates in the chapters where they are finally on their real mission: breaking into the Tessier-Ashpool (the company that created and now houses Wintermute) mainframe to set Wintermute free so he can join with Neuromancer.  The mission is a success, they are all paid, and Molly and Case go back to their separate lives.  Wintermute/Neuromancer comes back to Case one more time, though, to tell him that he has now become the matrix.

One of the most interesting points Gibson addresses in Neuromancer is the people he calls the Zionites.  They are people that worked on a space station and refused to come back down when they were finished.  People from Zion believe that technology leads down the path of destruction, aligning it with the ancient city of Babylon.  They spend their time listening to music dubs, smoking pot, and generally taking their time to appreciate life.  The Zionites are an important contrast Gibson makes to the rest of mainstream society in his future world.  No one else he mentions can even think about living without some kind of technology.  The only bits of technology the Zionites use, on the other hand, are the parts of the space station that keep them alive.  The contrast is especially vivid when the main characters visit the Freeside space station.  While the people on Earth have built their new world around technology, incorporating it into their everyday life, the people on Freeside use technology to recreate what life was like before the big technology boom that changed everything.  There isn’t really a lot of nature left on Earth, but on Freeside there is vegetation and evidence of landscaping everywhere.  They even have a fake sky that “looks” sunny and has a “sunset” and “sunrise.”  The people there are as fake as the scenery.  The Zionites might appreciate the appearance of a place like that, but they would never try to recreate that environment on their space station.  They chose to remove themselves so completely from the situation on Earth because they genuinely believe it will lead its inhabitants down the path of Babylon.  This is such an important alternative perspective in this novel, because Gibson presents society at this date as completely extolling the virtues of technology.  The Zionites are the only ones that took a step back and thought what was happening was wrong.  It appears that removing themselves did help them retain something that the rest of society does not have, whether it is a greater appreciation for life, a lack of dependence on superfluous technology, or the camaraderie that looks so rare back on Earth. 

Apps Culture

While searching for an article to do this week’s blog post, I discovered the Pew Internet article on “the rise of apps culture.”  I found it especially intriguing because it went into so much detail regarding the users of cell phones in general as well as users of wireless Internet and apps.  The article discusses the number of (over 18) adults that use apps in great detail in relation to age, gender, race, education, and income.  The number of apps average users have, how often they download apps, and how often they use those apps are also topics explored in this article. 

I think it says a lot about our culture that 35% of adults with cell phones have apps.  As the purpose of cell phones has gone from voice calls to texting to Internet access and beyond, apps have arrived to flesh out the cellular world.  A whole host of new software has arisen that is designed specifically for your mobile phone.

The part of the article that I found the most intriguing was the section discussing how frequently users downloaded apps.  According to the article, the most frequent apps users were not the 18-24 group (29% of this group user their apps multiple times a day) but 25-34 year olds (44%) and those 35 years and older (44%).  The younger apps users were much more likely to say they used their apps for less than half an hour a day.  This was very surprising to me, because I would have expected younger groups to use apps more often than older groups.  Further down in the article, however, it states that 25 and up adults are more likely to use apps to improve what they are currently doing, finding a place to eat, shopping, and at work.  Young adults are more likely to use them while socializing with friends or while they are at school.  Older adults use apps for more practical purposes, while younger adults use them for more recreational or social purposes.  I think this must be why adults use apps more often during the day.

Picture Test

Testing inserting pictures into my blog...

Also testing linking them to a website...

S/R 1 - Convergence Culture

Jenkins begins his novel with an introduction to the concept of “convergence culture” and establishing that there is a major shift occurring in the relationship between producers and consumers.  He continues by discussing reality television and the tensions it creates between these two groups.  First, he discusses the “spoilers” of the show Survivor.  He details both what the process is and uses it as an example of collective intelligence and the changing relationship between the producer and the consumer of media content.  Then he examines American Idol mainly from the viewpoint of the media industry, with a focus on their thoughts and method of changing their relationship with the consumer.  Continuing from there, Jenkins looks at the movie The Matrix as an example of transmedia storytelling.  Jenkins defines transmedia storytelling and shows how it is a product of the redefinition of the relationship between producer and consumer.  He then moves on to discuss how producers deal with their consumers adopting their intellectual property as their own, like how Star Wars fans tinker with George Lucas’ fictional universe to realize their own fantasies.  This section of the novel also shows how fans revitalize older folk culture through new mass culture.  Jenkins then looks at the two struggles surrounding the Harry Potter phenomena.  The first struggle is between the fans, who think they have the right to modify and create content related to Harry Potter, and the studio (Warner Brothers).  The second is the struggle between conservative Christian critics and teachers who want the books in school because they think the books will help kids learn.  He then shifts from popular culture examples to political examples about how convergence culture has affected politics, with a focus on the 2004 presidential election.  In his conclusion, Jenkins returns to his main claim that 1) convergence culture represents a shift in our relationship with the media 2) that shift is reflected in popular culture 3) the skills we gain here can help us in many areas like school, work, and politics.  In the afterward he addresses further how the political process is merging with popular culture by talking about the 2008 election. 

The issue of literacy is something Jenkins brings up a lot in this novel.  It is of particular concern in chapter five in both conflicts surrounding the Harry Potter movies.  In the first case (with the fan writers online), we can see that the issue of literacy is no longer just about being able to read and write.  It now requires that an individual can create and express themselves through other media.  Jenkins also argues that participating in fan fiction improves the other two components of literacy.  This occurs mainly through the writing, because there are many ways that authors get feedback on the sites: through other writers on the site or through systems set up to help critique newer writers and get them on the right track.  The second issue is mostly concerned with students’ ability to read.  Teachers think the Harry Potter books should be allowed in school because they know kids will read them, and anything that gets kids to read is good.  It is also easier for kids to go deeper into the analysis of something if they are interested in it.  I think both pro-Potter sides need to converge: by applying the methods used by online fan fiction communities, teachers can not only improve children’s literacy but allow them to have fun while they do it.  If schools were to model some aspects of learning how to write after fan fiction forums, kids will have some control over what they create, they will have an easier time evaluating their peers’ work, and it gives them a sense of independence in their writing that will make them better writers. 

Downsides to a Digital Democracy

In the last chapter of the novel, Jenkins comments on more recent events that occurred since the book was published, mainly the upcoming 2008 election.  It discusses how politics and cyberspace have continued to interact in new ways, like the CNN/YouTube debate and political parodies, as well as many “downsides to a digital democracy” (290).   I was very interested in this section of the Afterward because I enjoy investigating the negative effects of things that are usually considered largely positive.

Jenkins begins this section by reiterating some themes from this chapter, like the validity of more “informal” forums and participants for political debate and the use of parody as a serious means of political discourse.  He then goes on to say that while the potential is strong for a participatory culture to “serve as a catalyst for revitalizing civic life,” we still fall short of realizing those ideals (290).  The first reason he gives is that an open platform, like YouTube, has no guarantee of diversity.  Sure, in a best-case scenario, everyone is going to work on their own to top what the collective group has come up with.  However, there is highly likely chance that the “mechanisms for user-moderation” obstruct the expression of minority perspectives and hide content that is “unpopular” or “unconventional” from view (290). 

The second reason Jenkins gives for his argument is that the speed with which these videos are put on the Web can undermine both pedagogical and activist goals.  As a result, consumers who are always “looking over their shoulders for the next new thing” are having short and superficial conversations instead of serious political discourse.  In other words, “the user comments posted on YouTube fall far short of Habermasian ideals of the public sphere” (291).  Then Jenkins reproduces a blogger’s parody of the CNN/YouTube debates that associates YouTube with, “mangled syntax, poor spelling, misinformation, and fractured logic” rather than politically self-conscious or an appropriate form of citizen discourse (291). 

The final way in which Jenkins supports his argument is through discussing the often racist, sexist, and xenophobic humor online parodies often embrace.  He states that the inclusion of this kind of humor “further discourages minority participation or conversations across ideological differences” (291).  In doing this (and in a much more explicit way than television ever could), the people that produce the parodies are falling short of the “ethical spectacles” advocated by Duncombe: “A progressive ethical spectacle will be one that is directly democratic, breaks down hierarchies, fosters community, allows for diversity, and engages with reality while asking what new realities might be possible” (292).  Many of the videos on YouTube do the opposite of what Duncombe advocated: they promote traditional authority, they preserve gender and racial hierarchies, they fragment communities, discourage diversity, and “refuse to imagine any kind of social order other than the one which has long dominated American government” (293).

I agree with Jenkins that the current state of affairs falls far short from those idealizations set forth by people like Habermas and Duncombe.  The ease and speed with which people can upload content onto the Internet causes lots of problems similar to the parody of the YouTube comments.  Several of Duncombe’s ethical spectacles might be met on some fronts, but not on others.  Sites like YouTube do allow for diversity, but that could be any degree of diversity.  Most of the content is still going to be controlled by the most dominant social group, no matter what site you’re on.  These sites also engage with reality, but not always in the right ways.  The CNN/YouTube debate comments parody is an example of this: these people are engaging with the real world, but misinformation is common and they are only spreading it.  In order for these sites to meet the goals set forth by Habermas and Duncombe, they must focus their effort on creating a truly diverse community, engage with an accurate reality, and fosters a community by not alienating minorities with racist, sexist, or xenophobic humor. 

Cybersubculture Report

For my cybersubculture report I really wanted to compare one of the newer blogging site with sort of an "old standard."  So I'm going to study Live Journal along with Daily Booth, a photoblogging site where the user takes a picture of themselves and adds a caption every day to share their lives with others in the community.

Convergence Culture: Chapter 5

Chapter 5 of Jenkins’ novel deals primarily with the “Potter Wars” and the various beliefs and viewpoints of the proponents of each side.  It also deals with the overarching theme of the novel of the recent struggle between producers and consumers over individual rights in a time when it is easier than ever to both consume and create media.  The part of the chapter that intrigued me the most was the section titled “Rewriting School,” which argued that (if you couldn’t just say definitely) the potential is very high for young writers in fan fiction communities to both improve their skill more than they would have been capable of doing in a school setting and to genuinely enjoy writing (187). 

There are several different areas of the fan fiction sites that support Jenkins’ argument, the first of which has to be the fan community’s informal instruction of new writers (188).  The example given in the book is the Sugar Quill “beta reading,” a process which involves fans submitting rough drafts to the testers so they can “smooth out bugs” and “take them to the next level” (188).  They emphasize their offer of GENTLE constructive criticism and technical editing to give the authors more confidence.  The Sugar Quill also provides genre classifications of how different readers might want to engage with the text, like “what ifs” and postulations about what happens during the summer (190).  They do, however, hold writers to a “strict literal interpretation” of Rowling’s text (190).  Jenkins also argues that by building on media that already exists, kids are able to devote more attention to learning and mastering their writing and communication skills (191).  Writers on the fan fiction sites have also said that writing about someone else’s characters rather than drawing on their own experience allows them a certain critical distance to “reflect on what they were trying to express” (191). 

I have to say that I disagree with half of Jenkins’ argument in this section of the chapter.  I do not think that it is very likely that writers in fan fiction communities are improving more than they would in school.  It also does not seem very likely that school is actually detrimental to these fan fiction community kids because it is limiting their feedback and exposure to things they like (which in turn causes them to devote more attention).  While these communities are helpful in some ways, they are harmful in more important and significant ones.  Critical feedback is an integral part of becoming a better writer.  The processes described by these “beta readers” (188, 189) are too watered down to be of much help to someone who was already lost or not motivated enough to put forth the effort to figure out what they did wrong.  

Writing in fan fiction communities is also detrimental to a school environment because it detracts kids’ attention from what is going on in class.  This sentence at the top of page 193 really illustrates this point: “Some teens have confessed to smuggling drafts of stories to school…and editing them during class.”  The last sentence in the paragraph states that the fans can’t wait for school to get out so they can focus on their writing, but who’s to say they are even practicing the right things?  They may not even be trying to have their stories edited, so they may have no idea what they’re doing wrong. 

Chapter 1 of Convergence Culture

One of the things I found the most interesting was the spoilers’ attitude toward knowledge and information.  Before ChillOne, virtually all of the spoilers were sure they wanted to know all they could.  However, when ChillOne came along, spoilers were faced with a dilemma about whether having the knowledge was what they valued about the spoiling experience, or if it was more about something else.  Jenkins argues that, for most spoilers anyway, spoiling is not just about acquiring the knowledge.  It’s about the community and the process of finding things out individually and putting them together with what everyone else learned.  It is the process of acquiring information that holds these knowledge communities together (54). 

ChillOne’s process of just dumping his information onto the message boards “ruined” the season for many spoilers because he had already done a lot of the work of acquiring information that so many people in the spoiling community enjoy.  At one point in the chapter, one of the spoilers says ChillOne finding out so much before the season had even begun was like someone sneaking in and opening all your Christmas presents while you weren’t looking.  Before, spoiling had been a goal: something to work toward achieving.  After ChillOne, people could see that spoiling was more about the process: a community (with individuals boasting different and specialized skills) working together toward a common goal.  ChillOne ruined the season because he “won” the spoiling game (51).  He got all this information before the show eve started.  Because of ChillOne’s ultimate spoiling, the other spoilers were able to see that spoiling wasn’t about getting the answer but about getting to the answer. 

My question with the modern day implications of Jenkins’ argument lies in the quote given at the bottom of page 56 about how dead the message boards were before the 7^th season of Survivor.  It was clear there that the spoilers were tired of the game they had been playing.  I wonder whether spoilers of different shows are having similar problems now that reality shows are on the decline.  How long could it have taken for the boredom with Survivor, one of the most fun and interesting shows for spoilers, to have spread to other shows?