use your imagination...

Fantasy vs. Reality

2004-11-15T21:37:00.000-08:00

After reading the article by Gerard Jones about the positive effect of violence in the media, I wasn’t sure that I completely bought his argument. Essentially he is contradicting the current criticism of the “new age” violence in the media by saying that violence will not instigate more violence in children but instead it will become a fantasy based outlet for innate violent tendencies. From his own experience he begins his argument and explains how his exposure to The Hulk let him live out his violent tensions through a fantasy world. As I was reading his personal encounter with violent media, I wasn’t sure that he could make a case by saying that using the violence in the media is good because it worked for him. When he expanded out to other subjects I thought his argument strengthened, but I think that his reason for endorsing violence is not fully supported.

The main flaw I see in his argument pertains to his assumption that children are always able to differentiate between fantasy and real world. His case lies in the theory that people, specifically kids will use characters of violence as a “fantasy –self” and not model their own actions after what they see on TV. Kids often learn through example and if there is an exposure to a violent act there is a possibility that the child will act in a similar manner because at earlier ages, the concept of consequences is much too abstract. The age at which a child is exposed to violence from the media is also a very important factor in this debate. He neglects to mention when he believes to be a good time to expose children to violence. This is a major component of the criticism of violence in the media. Pundits shout that “kids these days” are becoming more violent not only because of the increase of violence in the media, but also because they are starting at an earlier age where kids don’t necessarily comprehend the difference between what is real and what is fake, which I think is a major oversight.

He offers some interesting commentary on the subject and introduces a new perspective of how violence in the media may not be as bad as many say, but I don’t know that his comments are really concrete. He does, however, add a caveat at the end that shows he is aware that violence in the media is not harmless. So, in some respect I can see validity in his argument, because he is not taking his point to an extreme that rejects any logic that works against his view. He recognizes both sides but is taking a more controversial approach that goes against mainstream analysis. Some of his points I find valid, such as his idea that when parents prohibit any kind of exposure to violence this may have an opposite effect on the child. But overall, I need more evidence to support his theories in order for me to buy it completely. I can see the beginning of a substantial argument but I don’t find it full convincing.

blog...

2004-11-08T09:28:00.000-08:00

We have been discussing the use of blogs for the last fourty-five minutes or so, and what I realized at the end of all of this is that we are trying to put blogging in one category or another. We have been asked to write whether we think that the class should use blogging as a tool to facilitate expressive writing or research ideas or directed prompts or as a discussion board. I think the word "OR" is what we are getting caught up with. The internet is a medium with such versatility, and with that said I feel like limiting blogging to only an academic device takes away the very nature of what it is intended to do and what it is used for outside of the class. I think it might be useful to have blogging in different contexts and in different assignments in order to really exploit the funtions both beneficial and maybe sometimes inhibiting. Blogging has a great potential to be a great academic tool, however, it may suffer if it is to formalized.

wiki wiki ...

2004-11-08T03:44:00.000-08:00

Wiki…Def.: a collaborately-edited website created over time. This definition can either be comforting or make you cringe. To me there are different situations where wikis would be appropriate and others where they would be entirely useless. In the article “Common Knowledge” by The Guardian, the author addresses the expanse that this form of information dispersal covers. He addresses specifically the wikipedia site that is used to create a collection of the definitions from several perspectives. He advocates the collectiveness of this dictionary that ideally has the potential to form a complete whole. However, I am not completely sold. This system only works if we assume people know what they are talking about when they add to the site. Since this is a method that doesn’t require a great deal of expertise in computer literacy anyone can contribute, which superficially appears to be more democratic in theory and accessible to the mass public. However, the credibility of authorship then decreases. When dealing with a piece that can be authored by anyone with access to an online computer, precautions must be taken. It may not be as appropriate to use the source in certain instances; however, the use of wikis can also be beneficial in certain settings

I'm always on...

2004-10-31T20:45:00.000-08:00

IM has become such a common place form of communication that instead of walking down a hall to ask my friend a question, all I have to do is simply IM my friend situated 20 feet away from my door. In college, I feel that IM has taken a key role in communication between friends and peers at the same school as well as those across the country, with uses that vary from academic oriented to chit chat. It’s actually difficult for me to imagine what it would be like if IM were not as prevalent as it is currently. As children of the digital age, it seems intuitive to use this method of communication because of the dominance that technology has over us. Arguably, the constant use of internet caused the evolution of our society into a technologically dependent entity, especially in the younger generations. All of this is obvious to some extent, which is why there is so much effort in trying to adjust to this huge phenomenon of IMing that has swept across the younger generations and spilled even into the older ones. Its varied uses give this medium a great potential for information dispersal. I think that many companies, whose target audience is teens, realize the power that IMing holds as an advertising tool. However, as much as it is an asset, the overuse of it is also a bit of a comment on the detriment of society because if it’s potential to carry disinformation.

The Rock the Vote campaign obviously tried to take advantage of this type of media in order to introduce a forum for political discussion. My concern is that people are not wary enough about the credibility of everything that is said… or in this case, typed. I think that it is an effective way to get out information; however we must all go in with somewhat of a sensor that will filter the good and bad. I think that effort put into educating teens about issues of importance is a good idea, and reading the article by the Rock the Vote team makes it sound like an successful way of reaching the masses, but I am still somewhat skeptical about its effectiveness and its appeal to ethos. IM, like many other activities, has both good and bad sides to it. On one hand it is convenient and allows for a line of communication that may not otherwise be open, but it also can be a trap that breeds procrastination and loss of credibility. But in general, I’m in support of IM, I just feel like people should always be cautious in believing what they hear.

Point Number One...

2004-10-18T06:29:00.000-07:00

Introduction
- The use of PowerPoint has grown dramatically
- We must ask ourselves what the consequence of such dependence on using PowerPoint does to the way we present information to the audience…
- Just kidding I won’t actually write all of this out in PowerPoint format

With the myriad of options available to us through technology, it’s amazing that PowerPoint has become the vacuum we have all been sucked into. Despite the harsh criticism of PowerPoint that I gave in the previous sentence, I do not actually have a personal vendetta against the program myself. I must admit, I have used it several times in my academic career, but I do find that it is a limiting program that is often times poorly used. In the article “Does PowerPoint Make Me Stupid?” the author addresses two sources that contribute to the problem with PowerPoint: the over simplicity and generic form of the program as well as the misuse of the program. It seems to me that PowerPoint was engineered to accommodate a vast population with a very large range of computer efficacy. So, to make the program more accessible to a greater majority, it was probably designed on a more basic level with a limited capacity.

PowerPoint can have appropriate uses, where it’s incorporation into a presentation will benefit the effectiveness of the speech. However, the fact that time efficiency is often times the main concern, leads to the decrease in quality. It’s not even that people who create the slides aren’t spending enough time working on the slideshow; it’s that they are not spending enough time on the content and focus, which should be a greater concern over how pretty the font looks. I think people find themselves in the mindset that one has to use PowerPoint now when he/she gives a presentation. I know I’ve found myself thinking that I have pump out a PowerPoint slideshow just because I was giving a presentation, and not because I thought it would help convey my message to the audience more effectively. It’s become a standard now. But then I stepped back and thought about whether having a PowerPoint slideshow running behind me would even add anything to my presentation, and decided that my speech would be detracted from if I were to just slap together a PowerPoint slideshow and have it running in the back.

I am not a vehement hater of PowerPoint like some who think that it has denigrated society by tampering with our forms of communication, but I do think that is a bit overused and used poorly, which makes for a bad combination. Peter Norvig makes a point about the ineffectiveness of PowerPoint for certain circumstances by creating his parody of the Gettysburg Address. His example may be a little over the top, but I think that it shows that a speech cannot simply be translated into a bullet-point format and be just as effective as an eloquent oration. I think that the use of PowerPoint should be used with discretion, because it can be a helpful tool, but it may also be a hindrance if used incorrectly.

and finally inspiration hit...

2004-10-04T03:04:00.000-07:00

I guess I shouldn't be so bold and call it inspiration on the highest level, but as I was sitting at Flicks, dodging wads of crumpled newspaper, a light bulb went off, and I came up with a rough (let me emphasize rough) idea for a research topic. To many, Shrek and Shrek 2 (the featured presentation of the night) are considered great movies, myself included, but my initial liking came mainly from the humor that was cleverly incorporated through the plotline. When I though about it further, I realized that I completely overlooked the fact that it is also an amazing movie because of the technology that is now included in digitally animated movies. We have become so acclimated to computer generated graphics and computer altered images in movies, that in order to keep our attention and interest computers must have been involved in some of the process. Computers allow an expansion of imagination that wouldn't be possible within the limited scope of a pen and paper. Yet, it could be argued that there is something fundamentally essential in the creation of "old-fashion" drawing.

From this thought, I found myself thinking about the effects this has on the younger generations. I had one of those "kids these days..." moments that really dates you back to the times of old fashioned Disney movies and archaic video games like Lemmings. Children are growing up being accustomed to the digital age media, and I am interested with the affects this has on developmental processes of visual stimulation. This of course is only a springboard for my ideas, so it will require some refinement, but I think that essentially what I am aiming for is the discussion of children in the new age and how their constant exposure to digital technology is affecting the developmental stages of their lives in comparison to older generations. It's a fairly broad topic as it stands, but I hope to narrow it down a bit... and that's all she wrote.