Project 5

If you look around on forums long enough, you’re likely to find someone saying just about anything you’re looking for. My first concern was that I didn’t really know what I was looking for. I thought about the uniqueness that can be found on some of these message boards, and the conversely bland posts that make up most of the stuff I dredged from these forums. The original idea was to find examples of people acting uncharacteristically rude or aggressive, presumably because they were hiding behind the façade of their online alter egos. I hoped I could simply find conversations that had gotten out of hand, resulting in threats or verbal attacks. My last resort would be to “troll” the forum, or instigate the type of activity I was trying to find.

I was pretty disappointed with the first phase of this project (Project 4) because I didn’t feel like I had enough time to get all of the material I wanted, and I couldn’t find any message boards with both a high volume of posts and poor moderation. Both of these caused problems. A low volume of posts on a message board means a lot of time waiting for someone to respond to any trolling. A sight with active moderators means that any attempts at trolling are stamped out fairly quickly, and moderators will often go so far as to revoke trollers’ memberships.

By the time I was ready to submit Project 4, I had concluded that anonymity didn't play as much of a role as I initially thought it would. More often than not, people post pictures, hometowns, and real names on their profiles. If one were so inclined, finding someone who said something offensive wouldn't be difficult. Maybe the distance plays a role? Or maybe people don't act so differently online than they would otherwise. As the project moved along, I started to care less and less about what caused people to act the way they do on these forums, and began to appreciate all of the conversations that might otherwise have been lost entirely. Most of them are profane.

Some of them were actually insightful, well-articulated, and thought-provoking.

I chose not to include the latter.

I used MySpace forums for one of the pictures I attached to Project 4, but I apparently had not fully realized the potential of the material on the site. I started there for Project 5, and didn't find any reason to move on to other sites--MySpace, as it turned out, was the mother lode.








This is Project 5--my extension of Project 4. I wanted to call it "Welcome to Cuntville," but I thought putting that into the title might be too much, too soon.

I know, it's a dirty word. That's partly the point. The internet is a verbal and visual free-for-all, and in no place does that seem more apparent than on these message boards.

Some people, however, take exception to how callous the dialogue can become:

Most of the people who post, though, have very little sympathy for complaints about aggressive or insulting posts. Particularly in a forum where the participants have been unencumbered by strict moderators, the "trolling" is just another component of the argument, and most users think the ones who feel like they've been abused in some way usually did something to deserve it:



Above all, it's only text. Vulgarity knows nearly no bounds on the forums, although users can be found acknowledging the indecency of what they say:





The lewdness is a big part of the draw. In fact, it's even encouraged:





**To clarify: ruby red and grape slushy are the same person. The user changed the name of his profile between posts. The post from Tanner del Norte is a response to ruby red's post.



These are places where people can say what they want with considerably lighter consequences than they would experience in most social settings. Debate is totally open, more so than in any formal debate. No argument is left out, regardless of its logic or validity. The forums are meeting places where the debate doesn't take place face-to-face. Spittle flying from the lips of an enraged participant vehemently arguing his or her point never lands on the face of his or her adversary. Body language and tones of voice never come into play. Without these, the violent possibilities that are usually implicit in volatile debates don't exist in the same way. An angry backlash is typically a chain of tempestuous filth, pock-marked by typographical errors missed or ignored by the author in his or her fury:




And if you read Ren Reinvented's post closely, you'll notice the lines of text at the bottom of the window--users call this a "sig," or a signature. "[I]f they aren[']t bitchin[g] about you in the t[h]read cleaner[,] you ain[']t doin[g] it right." Fittingly, TrollingP is the name of the user that posted it. It's a big reason people go onto the forums in the first place. After all, if you want to have a proper, civil debate, you can always do that in person.

To cap it off, a few other gems from the MySpace forum stacks:




This one is a holdover from Project 4. I'm not sure why it still makes me laugh.

Project 5 Idea

For project 5, I think I'm going to do a continuation of project 4. My efforts at trolling weren't successful at all, but since I have more time now, I think I can just try to be more subtle--semi-trolling, if you will. I found quite a few good forums from doing project 4 in the first place, so that phase of the project can pretty much be skipped. Even if my modified trolling efforts don't succeed, I should be able to find some good examples of people acting differently than they otherwise might. If you find the right forum, abusive language is pretty common, and I would imagine it even escalates to threats from time to time. I'll also try, like I did in my 4th project, to find examples of everyday/forgotten type of posts. Since it's basically just a long record of online conversations through the proxy of forums, the common stuff is really easy to find, which makes me want to focus more on inconsequential conversations that are nevertheless really unique. If I can find any really profound posts on some of the forums, I might even evaluate those.

I still don't know what I'm going to do for project 5. At all. The frogger idea is the only one I've had so far. This is the sort of thing that takes just planting it in the back of my head for a while and letting the ideas come to me over time.

When I was dredging forums for the last project, I came across some comments from people who apparently thought Barack Obama was the antichrist. That was pretty interesting, and it mixes with real life. I'm not sure how that could be made into a project, either.

I personally try to avoid reading blogs when it comes to any information that's really relevant to my life. I read sports blogs from time to time, because they usually have people on location that are privy to some stories before all the other sportswriters are, but it isn't necessarily important information, even when the reporters make it out to be.

Blogs just aren't held to as high a standard as printed material, and because of that I question the quality of the information that I get from them, even if it's through a reputable source. They're certainly more participatory and democratic than printed news, since comments can usually be added underneath the stories, but I don't feel like that really enhances it for the most part. The people who comment usually don't have much to add, and when they do, it usually either isn't correct, or it is articulated horribly.

I'm not really into reading blogs.

5th Project Idea

The first thing that comes to mind about this project, since we were discussing gaming again today, is frogger. I'm always surprised at how daring people in Morgantown are about crossing the roads, especially when there isn't a crosswalk. Coupled with game days, when probably 1/3 of the people driving are drunk, and there are so many people are walking around with no regard for traffic laws, I'm pretty surprised more people don't get hit by cars.

That said, I wouldn't want to actually try to do a live-action version of frogger. That's pretty dangerous.

Project 4

For my project, my main purpose was to find examples of people acting differently than they normally might, assumingly because they can enjoy the distance afforded them by an online identity. The main settings for the project are online forums, also called message boards, where people typically post items related to a main topic. These message boards require membership, which allows the people who use them to assume online personas, which may or may not be similar to their actual, real world personas. In some cases, like MySpace or Facebook, the users’ online identities can be very intricate. Pictures, contact information, and biographical information very often give other users a more realistic idea of what somebody’s actual identity is. These types of “profiles” are usually legitimated through contact with other users through the ubiquitous “comment” or “message” sections that are typical of those particular interfaces.

In other cases, message boards are more anonymous, requiring only a valid e-mail address to confirm membership. While there is still a rudimentary template in place for users to post pictures and personal information, these users do not typically represent themselves as realistically as they would through an interface like Facebook. Real names are rarely used, and pictures are typically less personal, giving way to animations and other types of artwork to make the user’s template more distinct. These are the forums through which I assumed people would argue more aggressively. In these types of forums I included the comment sections often found at the bottom of the page in online news articles.

I only considered trolling as a method of last resort, since almost everyone who regularly uses the message boards is familiar with the practice, and in most cases either do not respond to the instigation, or report it to forum moderators. On sites where trolling was not well-moderated, the volume of posts was not substantial enough to generate the long, multi-party arguments that I had in mind. Instead of actively manifesting arguments, I first tried to locate forums where the members were likely to be aggressive and/or the subject matter was controversial. I thought this would increase the likelihood of finding some good material for the assignment.

What started as an effort to satisfy the elements of “unspeakable” and “scandalous,” however, turned out to be much more forgettable than I would have liked. Of course, the other avenue was to do the assignment on the “everyday” and “forgotten.” Particularly in the well-moderated, large-volume forums, scandalous posts are removed within minutes or seconds. Left behind, however, are literally miles of text consisting of opinions, and arguments, both logically supported and not, that are of virtually no consequence, even to the people who wrote them.

Some of them, I thought, were pretty funny:













Others were more typical of the type of dialogue I expected to find:














On the whole, I was surprised to find that my assumptions weren't clearly correct. The amount of anonymity didn't seem to matter much to the people posting, although I still think the factor of distance emboldens people to say things they wouldn't say to someone on the street.

Project 4 draft

So my first idea, about anthrax and the dollar bills, I've scrapped that. As it turns out, that's really time-consuming and hard to record. Plus, it's gotten pretty cold over the last few days, and I don't want to wait, shivering, for someone to pick up one of my obnoxious messages. I want to work with something that I can control a little better, and doesn't require enduring any kind of bad weather if I can help it.

This weekend, people at the game were being assholes. There's something about game time and being fairly anonymous in the stadium crowd that has that specific effect on some people. That got me thinking.

The way people are emboldened by anonymity seems like a good starting point for another idea for this project. Have you ever read an online news story with a comment section at the bottom? Gone to a message board to try to find some piece of information, and instead found pages of inconsequential tit-for-tat? It doesn't take much to instigate a cyber-quarrel, and people usually aren't as reserved as they would be otherwise.

I think there is also some inherent comedic value in seeing a discussion escalate to the point of a shouting match once all the logic has been bled from it. I don't have any immediate examples to post here for the draft, but there are online forums for virtually every topic. Most of them have no bearing at all on the tangible world, but posters still find enough meaning to bicker.

This project's success probably depends on both the content of the forums I use and my own ability to focus participants on arguing with each other. I have this cutting tool on my computer that can capture screenshots, so I'll be able to show forum avatars and signatures to give some visual representation of what's going on. Some people really take forums and online message boards seriously, and they display really elaborate artwork on their postings to identify their profiles/usernames.

I'm considering the role of instigator wherever necessary. And since it's a graded assignment, the unabridged opinions of some of these online rabble-rousers may finally count for something.

This prompt is harder for me to work with than the others were conceptually. I haven't had much of a chance to think about the project yet, either. Basically, I don't have the slightest idea what I'm going to do yet. The good thing about that? At least I have a lot of different directions I can go with it. I'll be further along after this weekend.

Going with the ideas of identity and collaboration, I can see how something like facebook or blogspot could be a good tool for this assignment. I prefer real world interactions, but those are harder to put onto a blog than something that's entirely online.

The original thought I had, about the dollar bill with the anthrax message on it, seems like a decent technique for getting other people involved with the project, whether it's really voluntary or not. I think the idea is at least a tiny bit scandalous, and uses other people. I don't want to carbon copy the anthrax dollar bill trick, but I like that line of thinking. It's personal, especially if the people don't initially know that their reactions are being documented.

Project 4 Thoughts

This one has to involve other people. I'm not sure who I'll tap for that, but that shouldn't be too much of a problem. Honestly, I don't know where I'm going to go with this project, but it should give a lot of leeway for humor. I would definitely like to do something mischievous, but I should probably be careful with that-- things can get out of hand quickly when people feel like they've been tricked. Maybe I feel like mischief is the way to go because Halloween is so close.

My first thought was about a friend of mine that I met when I studied abroad, who said he and one of his fraternity brothers would put crumpled dollar bills on the ground, "You now have anthrax" written on the inside. That sounds pretty mean-spirited, but documenting the reactions would have to be pretty funny.

The first piece of writing I thought to use for the project is a poem by Goethe (pronounced 'gur-tuh'), probably the most famous German writer/poet in the country's history. It's called "The Erlking" in English, "Erlkoenig" in German. I know enough German to function in the country, but not enough to accurately translate Goethe, so I sent it through Babelfish a few times. There's an actual translation at the bottom, either for reference or for Goethe fans.

Original German version and English adaptation here.

The first one went from German to French to Dutch to English.

Who increases this way leaves by a night and wind?
C' the father with its child is;
He has probably the boy in the arm,
he it seizes certainly, him warm keeps it.

„My son what you save thus did your face fear? -
, Don't you see the father Erlkönig?
Erlenkönig with of Kron and the tail? -
„My son, c' a white frost of ternissement is. -

„you dear child, comes go with me!
To play spiel' beautiful; I with your;
Some flowers of living colour are to the range,
my mother has some dress golden.

My father, my father, and you n' does not hear,
what l' Erlenkönig promise gently me? -
„Are calm, my child remains calm;
In the arid bladen säuselt wind. -

„, the fine boy, he wants go you with me?
My little girls t' must; well wait;
My little girls lead Nachtreihn,
and toi weigh and dance and sing.

My father, my father, and you see there
Erlkönigs not little girls düstern to the place? -
„My son, my son, I seh him correctly:
The old pastures seem this way grey.

„I t' loves, jouwe beautiful form causes me;
And you n' are not prepared, thus I force a habit.
My father, meets he father now my,
I! L' Erlkönig m' to fact sorrow does! -

The grey father, increases he geschwind,
he keeps l' the child ächzende,
in the poor reaches the court with an effort and an urgency;
In its poor l' the child had died.

Then I translated the resulting work to traditional Chinese, modern Chinese, and then back to English again:

Increases this way leaf with English who by a night of gentle breeze?
C' Has its child's father is;
He has the boy probably the arm which seizes certainly in it,
he, he retains it warm. ?

My son what you except, thus beside made your face to fear? -,
Don' t you see father Erlk? nig?
With Kron and tail's Erlenk? nig? -?
My son, c' the ternissement white frost is. -?

Your dear child, round trip with me!
Plays spiel' Beautiful; I have you;
Survival color some flowers are to the scope,
my mother have the golden yellow some formal clothes.

My father, my father and your n' Does not hear,
any l' Gentle Erlenk? nig promise I? -?
Is peaceful, my child maintains calm;
In arid bladen s? uselt wind. -? ,

the good boy, he wants to go to you to have me?
My little girl t' Essential; Good waiting;
My little girl leads Nachtreihn,
and toi calls and dances and sings.

My father, my father and you sees there
Erlk? nigs little girl d stern to place? -?
My son, my son, I she is correct he:
Old pasture as if this way gray. ?

My t' The love, the jouwe happy form causes me;
And your n' Has not prepared, thus I force the habit.
My father, meets him to live me now,
I! L' Erlk? nig m' Is sorrowful to the fact! -

the pessimistic father, the increase he geschwind,
he retains l' Child? chzende,
is arriving at the court to use poorly diligently and urgent;
In its bad l' The child died.

Here's a look at a correct translation:

Who rides so late through the night and wind?
It's the father with his child;
He has the boy safe in his arm,
He holds him secure, he holds him warm.

"My son, what makes you hide your face in fear?" -
Father, don't you see the Erlking?
The Erlking with his crown and flowing robe? -
"My son, it's a wisp of fog." -

"You, dear child, come along with me!
Such lovely games I'll play with you;
Many colorful flowers are at the shore,
My mother has many a golden garment."

My father, my father, and do you not hear
What the Erlking promises me so softly? -
"Be quiet, stay quiet, my child;
In the dry leaves the wind is rustling." -

"Won't you come along with me, my fine boy?
My daughters shall attend to you so nicely.
My daughters do their nightly dance,
And they'll rock you and dance you and sing you to sleep."

My father, my father, and do you not see over there
Erlking's daughters in that dark place? -
"My son, my son, I see it most definitely:
It's the willow trees looking so grey."

"I love you; I'm charmed by your beautiful form;
And if you're not willing, then I'll use force."
My father, my father, now he's grabbing hold of me!
Erlking has done me harm! -

The father shudders, he rides swiftly,
He holds in his arms the moaning child.
He reaches the farmhouse with effort and urgency.
In his arms the child was dead.

For the second part of project three, I wanted to use a piece of my own writing. It's a rhetorical analysis of an essay about molecular gastronomy (which isn't as complicated as it may sound - it's the study of how different cooking methods and ingredients interact to affect the taste of food). I decided to keep poetry involved. While the Goethe piece is a poem, I'm using "The Shannonizer" to simulate a famous poet editing my work, which will hopefully add the poetic element that I'm looking for.

The editor is Lewis Carroll, and the algorithm uses much of the wordage from "Jabberwocky," which was a personal favorite of mine growing up. This post is already getting pretty lengthy with the Goethe poem, so I decided to only use the first two paragraphs.

This is the original:

For the not-so-scientifically inclined, molecular gastronomy is a mouthful. For its practitioners, “mouthful” is an ambiguous, yet delightfully apt description. For Patricia Gadsby, a journalist for Discover magazine, this fledgling science offers the opportunity show the potential for something traditionally held as an art to merge with a modern, objective science, creating a delicious hybrid. The strides made by the molecular gastronomy program at Collége de France, in Paris, have already met with enough success that the discipline’s name has become a buzzword of sorts in culinary circles. It even serves at times as a catch-all misnomer for unorthodox or creative dishes.

An analytic reader can hardly finish the first page of Gadsby’s article, “Cooking for Eggheads,” without acknowledging its subtly embedded ethos. France has traditionally been held as the culinary capital of the world—it is the nation that spawned the words most heavily associated with fine dining. Words like cuisine, gourmet, and chef all carry French roots—and mouth-watering connotations—that give credit to the program’s legitimacy. The base science on which molecular gastronomy was built was even created by a Frenchman: Jean-Anthelme Brillat-Savarin.

And the Shannonized version:

For the not-so-scientifically inclined, this fledgling science offers the egg to merge with quivering curds! Beware the claws that! Beware the Rabbit hastily interrupted. France, cried the words most heavily associated with enough success that grand? Lend her your nightcap. For the program’s legitimacy. Very! Callooh! Callay! Callooh! Speak roughly to cry. It's very inconvenient habit of flame, gourmet, came whiffling through the molecular gastronomy program at Collége de France has become a very inconvenient habit of treacle. For Patricia Gadsby, molecular gastronomy was built was even serves at times as a delicious hybrid.

An analytic reader can hardly finish the molecular gastronomy is a long silence, yet delightfully apt description. The vorpal sword with a most heavily associated with quivering curds! He left it came whiffling through the March Hare. It is the claws that the French roots—and mouth-watering connotations—that give credit to turn into a buzzword of treacle. That's very provoking thing when he knows it only to merge with a delicious hybrid. For its head he stood, and chef all mimsy were the first page of flame, and chef all mimsy were the words most heavily associated with enough success that catch! And, yet delightfully apt description.

The third piece of writing I wanted to use is from a Chuck Palahniuk book. He's a favorite author of mine, and this is the second time I'm using some of his work in my project. I was going to do a sort of self-styled algorithm to replace verbs for this part, but I decided to scrap that idea, mostly since it was really tedious. Instead, I've put this excerpt through the Travesty Generator, This particular excerpt is from Palahniuk's book Lullaby.

This week, there's another miracle in the tabloids.

It's something folks call the Roadkill Jesus Christ. The tabloids call him "The I-84 Messiah." Some guy who stops along the highway, wherever there's a dead animal, he lays his hands on it, and Amen. The ragged cat or crushed dog, even a deer folded in half by a tractor-trailer, they gasp and sniff the air. They stand on their broken legs and blink their bird-pecked eyes.

Folks have this on video. They have snapshots posted on the Internet.

The cat or porcupine or coyote, it'll stand there another minute, the Roadkill Jesus Christ cradling its head in his arms, whispering to it.

Two minutes after it was shredded fur and bones, a meal for magpies and crows, the deer or dog or raccoon will run away complete, restored, perfect.

The first Travesty:

This week, the lays him "The I-84 Messiah." Something the deer folded cradlink the call him "They hand their broken away, wher minute, restor-tracle in hand Amen. The Inter the I-84 Messiah." Some guy where air. Two minutes afternet. Two minute, it. Two minute, restops a meal folks cat or crushed on it, animal, he cat or porcupine or minutes and there's afternet. The Inter its he lays highway coyote, the cat or magpies animal, head in his week, the tabloids. Folks half by a deer minutes after minute.

I like to think of a southern Baptist preacher saying this:

This week, the his on there air. Two minutes and bling to it. The Roadkill stored, pering to it. The I-84 Messiah." Some guy where's and on there's animal, head in the the I-84 Messiah." Somethis on will Jesus Christ crows, their broken legs and Amen. Two minutes and Amen. They have snapshots he lays head and Amen. The lays half by a deer magpies after or minute, it, a dead in their bird-pecked dog, ever minute, ther the Inter or coyote, restops afternet. The cat or posted call his head in highway.

This is an LA Times editorial about the recent O.J. Simpson verdict, edited by Lewis Carrol


For an arrogant thug of flame, and she quite expected the slithy toves did gyre and the other a stick-up in his vorpal sword with another opportunity. He has forced us much to dismiss out of flame, and thumped him on the Queen. The guinea-pigs cheered. The jaws that! Ditto, cried the manxome foe, Simpson's conviction confronts us to dismiss out of their heads off? She ca'n't do sums! It is a long history of treacle. Indeed, the other left it impossible to think about over the mome raths outgrabe. He sought the role of hand those allegations in uffish thought he stood trial were very provoking, can two most serious crimes for fiddle-de-dee? shouted the Jabberwock, his first in the French for questioning the French for fiddle-de-dee? She ca'n't do sums! He has forced us with another idea: I am real! He has forced us with another opportunity. One was a quiet condominium in Brentwood. Are their own blood outside a very provoking, my arms, O.J. The two most serious crimes for fiddle-de-dee? shouted the wabe, a stick-up in the murder case 13 years ago.

Here's the original:

For an arrogant thug of limited intelligence, O.J. Simpson has given us much to think about over the years. This past weekend, his first in custody in awhile, presented yet another opportunity.

The two most serious crimes for which he's stood trial were very different. One was a stick-up in a Las Vegas hotel room, an armed faceoff over sports memorabilia. The other left a young man and woman in a pool of their own blood outside a quiet condominium in Brentwood. And yet across those events, one a farce, the other a tragedy, Simpson has forced us to consider such matters as the role of race and celebrity in American justice. He has offered case studies in how money tweaks justice, and provided a template for questioning the implications of police abuse -- the Los Angeles Police Department's long history of mistreating black suspects made it impossible to dismiss out of hand those allegations in the murder case 13 years ago. Now, Simpson's conviction confronts us with another idea: In the law, can two wrongs make a right?

Project 2

I went ahead and posted this here as well as on my project 2 website. This is a much abridged rundown of my study abroad trip to Germany this summer. It was pretty cool going back over my old pictures and thinking about the trip itself, and in time I may actually try to completely flesh out the whole project for the sake of posterity. I tried my best to put it in chronological order, but there were quite a few things I couldn't quite pin down. I recommend zooming in at each location, particularly Marburg, if you want to get a grasp of the distance between the places. There are quite a few links embedded in the description bubbles for locations, so give those a look as well. I tried to sprinkle some humor in here and there, since I imagine the whole presentation isn't quite as interesting to someone who didn't actually experience it. Enjoy!


View Larger Map

Project 2 so far

I haven't really started working on the second project as a whole yet, but I have a general idea about what I want to do. I studied abroad in Germany this summer, and I figure I'll use that trip as the focus of the project. I may not actually use google maps, but opt instead for a more animated map of Europe/Germany, and use a lot of the pictures I took on the trip to illustrate interactive points on the map. So far, the little movie I submitted for the last blog seems like it should be able to find its way into the project as well, since the group I was with took a tour of the Burgenwald, Germany's largest continuous forest. That video will be a sort of template for the rest of the interactive points. The German language offers opportunity for some interesting and funny audio to mix into the project, too.

Sound Poetry?

I had some trouble trying to get this thing posted on here, so I just loaded it onto a flash drive, and I'm going to bring it into class. It's bordering on noise and voice, I think (it's the call of some European deer). I thought it was creepy when I mixed it with pictures of dark, foggy forests and whatnot. It doesn't seem like a sound someone would want to hear being in a place like that. Anyway, I'm not sure if this is what the assignment was getting at, but I'm already running late for class, and it was the best I could do considering the time constraints. Hopefully I can get it posted once I get into class.

I think I got it.

Actually, I don't think this is working.

Project 2 Thoughts

I'm still not really sure where I'm aiming for project 2, but I like the prospects of mixing sounds and music in audacity, and adding a visual element in Windows movie maker. With the sound parts, I can see myself using parts of speeches or other recordings of political figures, and try to show a transition over time. The visual element would be more abstract, using colors and images along with timing to punctuate the audio. Almost like those inspirational montages they use at national conventions.

I think I want my emphasis to be on more non-artistic spoken word, and make the rest of the elements of the project add the poetic element to it.

Project 2 blog here.

Project 1 Final

My final project is a selection of quotes from Chuck Palahniuk's book Choke. Palahniuk's stories are written most often in a darkly comic, almost frantic, colliding style. I tried to make this final version of the project reflect the dynamics of Palahniuk's writing, using pictures and varying fonts to assign emphasis to certain parts of the quotes that I selected.

The project is assembled in chronological order (in reference to the book) when read in typical left-to-right, top-to-bottom order, but most of it isn't intended to be read in any particular order. The small blue Times type is meant to be read more linearly than the rest of the project, and reflects a little bit on the actual assignment itself. To someone who has read Choke, the assortment of quotes might come together to produce some meaning, but it's arranged mostly to amuse the reader.

Project

So this is what I've gotten together so far for the project. I missed the last class, so I can't be totally sure if this is completely follows guidelines for the assignment, but I've decided to use some quotes from Chuck Palahniuk's book, Choke, and mess with the font styles and use some images to really punctuate the parts I used. I really like his writing style, even though it can be kind of morbid.

Notation and the Art of Reading

In our class reading, "Notation and the Art of Reading," Karl Young explores the idea of writing as a codified form of speech--a means of documenting oral language--and its progression (or deterioration, depending on your viewpoint) throughout various regions and eras. He tracks notation as a more animated means of conveyance than it is in modern society, dependent upon gesture and vocalization in order to derive its full meaning.

Young also seems concerned about the loss of that gesture and vocalization in modern notation. He displays a reserved, but nevertheless present, hostility toward more modern media, as well as "speed reading," for which he seems to hold a particular distaste. He documents his concern over modern notation's tendency toward being "ephemeral."

I should probably make it clear that, while his essay is a charming record of some portions of writing history, I disagree with his assertion that notation has been bastardized to the point of simple data transference. I feel in fact that his exhortations on the state of modern notation smack of single-minded adherence to antiquity. Young seemingly casts aside commonly held notions of progress within the English language, the modern state of which allows for both more specificity in notation and a broader range of subject matter, and favors older, more ambiguous forms of writing that rely heavily on the performance of the reader(s) and slow reading to understand them. Personally, I feel like written works haven't suffered at all as a result, and I certainly don't see modern poets as some saviors of noble notation, which Young so readily insinuates in his essay. At the very least, the idea that old forms of notation were somehow more tangible, or were a more important representation of the author's experiences, is an affront to modern authors of all genres.

Even given the amount of media available to the masses in 1983 (significantly less than now, given the advent of the internet), I feel like Young has looked over the actual performance value of television, which offers today the same engrossing performance value that reading aloud, artful script and colorful gesture must have offered in earlier times. He also ignores the specialization that has created so many different genres (including the one, ironically, that Young uses to tout the merits of older forms of notation: the essay) and allowed for more efficient means of data transference, a term that, given the context of Young's writing, may as well be a four-letter word.

That being said, I can certainly appreciate the intricacies and beauty that occur in the old forms of notation that Young wrote about. Our views on the dreariness of reading and the amount of creativity and thought that go into both the reading and writing of modern notation, however, differ.

First post-- "Being Online Autobiography"

As far as I can tell, I'm a "digital native," insofar as I've grown up using computers and the internet. Around 1994, my mother began to need computers and the internet to do her job (she designs and drafts construction documents), and I would use her hand-me-down machines to explore what interesting sites there were at the time.

My most visited sites include espn.com, nfl.com, redskins.com, and, of course, facebook.com. I haven't really had any official blog, other than a half-hearted attempt on MySpace. That didn't really pan out.

I've also always managed to stay a step or two behind the digital curve as computers and the web have progressed. I have still never owned an iPod, and I only recently caught up with facebook etiquette. I use google a lot.