kcb201

Chit chat sessions

2006-05-30T23:48:00.000-07:00

The last couple of classes we have been participating in chat sessions. Trying to nut out the issues of the course.

It was fairly helpful- my biggest issue was being able to follow the chat sessions fast enough to participate. I would attempt to comment and before i know it the line i wanted to address was off the screen. It would have been easier had i been able to make screen bigger i would have found it easier i suppose.

But its week 13 and the end of classes
so good luck to all the other students on the take home exam!

Hirokikami

2006-05-23T23:27:00.000-07:00

I have been looking around at a few blogs and in the community chat sessions. There keeps cropping up a story about a girl who died of malnutrition due to playing online games for a huge amount of time.

I am a bit sckeptical about the whole story, for me its verging on urban legend type of thing, but the other day i was reading through an old Q Weekend and came across a story about a group in Japan that have been labeled Hirokikami [if i have spelt that right].

The word translates into english as withdrawn. Basically some hirokikami withdraw from their community and society in general and spend all their time in their bedrooms. For anyone who has ever been to japan you will realise that most bedrooms in japan arent all that large. But it also makes you wonder how does someone live with out going outside?

It seems off point until you ask the question- does virtual cultures and virtual communities in
these circumstances replace or become a surrogate for these people?
A large portion of discussion in this unit goes to the idea that on a personal level most people in our class dont use the internet or other technologies to socialise beyond their existing friendships.

But what if we looked at it in reverse? Could we utilise the virtual sphere to help these people reenter the real world, help them to balance the pressures that have forced them to withdraw to their rooms to come out and be active members of the community.

just something to think about.

Governance and the governator

2006-05-18T19:33:00.000-07:00

At times it seems bizarre the concept of governance in relation to the internet. The idea that its possible to have an iota of control over such an expansive group of internet users is an idea i have trouble grasping.

In truth i think its because i am conceptualising governance in the same manner and form as the physical world and government. Where there are rules made and enforcement of those rules

But in the virtual world this all falls back to nettiquette and protocols. The hardest part of it was understanding how it all can be enforced.

Devious Deviant Art

2006-05-10T20:15:00.000-07:00

If I was to say "art community" would you ask me what the web address was? For some time now new technologies and software have been developing new ways for people- whether artists or of the regular kind, to manipulate, create, develop and correct pictures and design.
The phenomenon has created a new realm of artist-the digital artist. The next logical step for the art community was that using said technologies to communicate with other artists and like minded individuals. One such art-based virtual community is Deviant Art.

The community revolves around the both traditional art types and new forms of art - such as digital art.

Its success as a community stems from the sites ability to provide exposure for emerging artists and a place for all to display their works. But the site is not limited to being just a gallery space, there are forums for artists to seek advice technical, relational or otherwise; and users are able to critique and have their work critiqued by other members.

In terms of measuring its success the site has a constantly updating counter of the number of contributions made.

Its major challenge was navigation, as a new user I spent ages trying to figure out how to move through the site and the community. So far I have managed to submit two photographs and have explored the forums. Until now I had not known what a tablet pc was, but now I can tell you what you can do if your tablet pc is not recognising pen pressure!

Just for fun

2006-05-05T21:00:00.000-07:00

I am slooooooowly working out how to use the DeviantArt website.

I also tracked down my own space on that website, its a little bit different in terms of how most websites set up their navigation, most of my experience has been trial and error.

Here is one of the photos i will be submitting to the site for my personal gallery space, more because i love the photo, which i took by accident, and the fact that i just dont have the artistic talent to put up say an illustration or something like that.

Very grey?

2006-05-05T01:41:00.000-07:00

Copyright, like freedom of information laws, irk me and intrigue me.

Copyright, in my view is an imperfect protection. Its design takes a very archaic stance- what is mine is mine alone. But on the other hand it prevents the rightful owner from all the heartache of some other artist pooping on their parade.

At times copyright laws seem ridiculous because i cant understand how the writers of copyright laws viewed creativity. Take for example Australian copyright only allows free republication of a great piece of literature [dont quote me if i have the amount of years wrong] some fifty years after the death of the writer. Any republication prior to this date is subject to paying royalties. But to republish a great work for a profit it makes sense for some royalties to be retained- starving artists and such would roll over in their graves if they knew the publisher was getting a free ride.

Applying this to another scenario take eh- Nikki Webster [sorry she was the youngest australian musician i could think of], any part of the music she has created had another artist wished to use it without having to pay royalties and jump through the negotiation hoops her record company will inevitably pull out would have to wait until well a long time.

What i suppose i am getting at is that creativity shouldnt have to wait, be paitent or negotiated. It should just be allowed to be.

But there is the counter argument that artists who sample music etc are not being creative or original and are i suppose cheating. But its not necessarily like that, you have created something from a unique viewpoint or unique experience, sampling music could be likened to sharing a relative experience and changing the perspective.

Dj Danger mouse was onto a great thing with the grey album, i wouldnt have thought of the beatles and Jay-z in the same sentence.

Fandom- the new black?

2006-05-02T19:47:00.000-07:00

I am a closet fan. Whenever we have shout outs in class about what television shows etc we are watching or really into i rarely say what i am deeply devoted to.

[Well as devoted as i think you could get to a television show really]

But there are many more people out there now who are going beyond the average "i watch/play/follow/read/listen and buy all the merchandise etc".

In an earlier post i mentioned MMOGs, perfect example of fans and their participation.

Marshall says it much better than i do- the fan is part of the experience. But it makes perfect sense, when i go to concerts its not enjoyable if the room is filled with people who have a negative viewpoint. It sounds ridiculous that someone would spend a handful of cash to go somewhere they would rather not be.

A constant in this equasion is that people would not be able to have such scope to participate in their favored subject without the expansion of media technologies. I love how this seems to revolve back to the technology.

Catch up

2006-05-02T19:21:00.000-07:00

Every year i say i am going to get a flu shot but never do. I hate needles, but i hate the flu even more. No point to that last sentence just putting in my two cents.

We [as in my group for this tutorial presentation] did our presentation on friday last week.

We took on the idea of creating an online space for QUT students to socialise in.
Similar to say Hi5 or friendster. Applying this to sort of online space to QUT didnt seem to go over too well with the audience.

Their feedback-

Such a space wouldnt really work if it was connected to QUT
They couldnt see how you could create such a space and not have it facilitate academic dishonesty
They didnt want to share a space with tutors and other staff as either the space would need to be heavily moderated or it would cause personal upsets as people seem to have a tendancy to bag other people out.
They wouldnt and couldnt see themselves using the space.

Issues [that i am having to work in their feedback]

The core concept is that the online community would be for QUT people [staff and students] to the exclusion of other people. Other communities such as MySpace do not have such a restriction on them. So how do you clearly define a space but not have it aligned or linked to an institution? Possibly changing the identity of the site would help?
Academic dishonesty- we addressed this area possibly on too small a scale. The intention for the site is not for it to be too academic but be a social meeting place, in saying that there is scope for academic material to be exchange either dishonestly or inadvertently. There are two ways to deal with it moderating or employing tools that stop "cut and paste" or uploads of word documents. Not a perfect solution but an idea
Disputes and other ettiquette issues- the audience raised this issue that the site would have issues balancing moderation and people's treatment of others. Two things firstly a user agreement to help people be mindful of what sort of actions are appropriate. But the moderation issue, I personally dont mind having a referee in place but many people are not like minded and see moderation as infringing on their freedom of speech. Really well and truly stuck on this one until i opened my inbox. This is going to sound odd. But i use gmail and i have noticed that in my inbox- particularly when i open up an email there is a little banner down the side that has advertising- that is matched to keywords in the email that i am reading. According to a Time article about Google they have introduced technology that remotely matches advertising to keywords in the body of your email. Where i am going with this is- if Google can use this technology to advertise then why not modify or create a program that does a similar thing except scan and moderate forums remotely? But that is a huge idea way out from left field.
Usage.... let me think about it

But otherwise i liked our idea, i thought we worked in the concept of community and virtual fairly well.

I still believe that such a community would be useful for QUT students, not everyone is able to participate and socialise whilst on campus and some students totally miss out on the whole university lifestyle by because of their course - like external students and or by their own personal situtation.

Plain language

2006-04-27T17:17:00.000-07:00

I had to add this article to my blog.

Not really subject related, but the other part of my study is law and i can tell you- codes or just hard to read judgements are not something new. Long, tedious judgements are a very big part of our inherited legal culture.

A highcourt judge with a sense of humor?

Read the couriermail article here

mental note

2006-04-11T23:52:00.000-07:00

I have thought about it and thought about it.

tick tock....ding! the community i want to look at for the purposes of assessment for this subject is DeviantArt. At first glance not exactly a community [in my mind] as i keep thinking of it as merely a gallery space for digital and traditional artists to put up their work. But that has since grown to include forum and blog spaces.

Now to go through the ritual of signing up to it. and can my stick figure drawings make the cut or will they draw me abuse hehe?

design/divine rights?

2006-04-06T19:54:00.000-07:00

This week the topic in virtual cultures is Massive Multiplayer online games.

I have to start by saying i dont think i have played a game online in ages. And the last time i spent ages playing any sort of electronic games was quite possible grade nine in highschool. on the other hand my little brother spends every other waking minute online playing counterstrike or WOW [World of warcraft]

It is always a question of whether the publisher of these games should be allowed to have the ability to control the content that the game's users have created on their own time or ultimate discretion about your participation. Catch is to be a participant or to access the tools that will allow you to make custom content you need to agree to the end user agreement. Its almost a "chicken or the egg?" debate about interests and rights. I am all for balance to be honest, as hard as it can be to achieve.

What do you do? How does a single end user negotiate their rights with a huge multinational corporation who have their eye on the bottom line.

At this point it seems that this issue is hit upon because the space is evolving but the practices of the businesses behind it is lagging.

The truth lies in that it is not really in the commercial interests of the publisher to change their mode of business right now. Would you, if you knew that the loss of players who get ticked off is miniscule compared to all the other happy consumers who are paying for the privilege. Would you really wish to relinquish your control over a massive pet project that is the biggest investment on your books?

Ethically there should be some recourse for gamers to even up the power imbalance. In the real world a power imbalance would be addressed by an advocate or a lobby group of ticked off people. Companies and gamers alike would benefit greatly from a change to the end user agreement, something that would work more like a creative commons agreement perhaps.

whose rights do you wish to protect? whose rights carry more importance?

et moi

2006-03-30T19:50:00.000-08:00

There has to be something about blogs that makes me want to put in a little "about me" entry. I have had a look around at other blogs, with the exception of some more "technical" blogs to me i get this overwhelming sense that despite all the anonymity the internet can provide, people still want to show who they are and provide insights into their personal worlds.

Whole blogs that show their family photos and their gorgeous children or talk about their therapy sessions.

Well i want to do that too. Except for maybe the therapy session part and having children part.

I dont particularly know why, sometimes they can be really boring or over share. It seems like there is has to be an entry on a blog that spends time talking about yourself. Almost mandatory- or maybe its just the feeling i get about blogs?

For example:

I want to tell you that i am studying a dual degree in Law/Media Communications. But that is a very standard, almost resume-like type statement.

I want to tell you that I haven't decided which direction i want to take with all that knowledge. It really depends on the day of the week and the amount of caffiene consumed that day. In a similar boat to what i hope is thousands of other people.

I want to say that my interests involve ice hockey, snorkeling, and reading everything but the set texts at uni. But it seems to simplistic a way to let you know my likes or dislikes just to put it all into a list form like that.

I want to tell you that i have spent the last 20 minutes editing my life into three main statements. who does that?

Launch

2006-03-30T19:13:00.000-08:00

I have lost my blog!

Actually i have started a new blog as i wasnt to keen to link up my personal blog with my University assessment, I am just trying to catch your attention.

I have in the past had to do many types of assessment items for uni subjects. this one will mean i cant leave it to the last minute!