1-What are the three transportation media? What is the difference between a transport medium and a transport vehicle?

2-What are the three communication media? Give examples of communication media vs communication vehicles. Email uses which communication medium?

3-What are the advantages/disadvantages of interpersonal communication? of broadcast communication?

4-What are the characteristics of the New Medium? Is a many-to-many communication possible without the new technology of laptop, iphone and internet?

1-"Professor Anne O'Dwyer taught me about cognitive dissonance - the psychological discomfort which occurs when you're confronted with a set of facts suggesting that what you're doing or believing is irrational or stupid. You pay $10 to go to a movie, and the movie is pretty bad. But rather than admit that you wasted $10, there's a tendency to say it isn't wasn't really so bad: the acting was impressive, the special effects looked really realistic - whatever you need to tell yourself to convince yourself that you got your money's worth. You want to feel like you're not a sucker. We paper over the cognitive dissonance in much of what we do - the fact that this clearly isn't the best way to be ordering a society, to be living a life - because we've got an awful lot invested in the route we've been pursuing. To admit that it's flawed would be too much dissonance to handle." Pick an issue which you believe the media has "papered over". Describe how you figured out you were not getting the whole truth. What was the more complex truth & why was it hidden (or more important who benefits from the partial truth & who loses? )What is the cost to you and what can you do about it?

2-In what way have you been encouraged to "sit back, relax, and enjoy the show" and how can you "grab the steering wheel before we go over the edge"?

1-What is changed by the Occupt movement?

2-How is the ccupy movement practicing the use of horizontal power? How does this frustrate the status quo power structures? Is the "People's Mic" broadcast or network (ie new) nedia?

1- WHat is the structure of EMpire? How does this structure relate to Crosbie's definitions of Broadcast vs New Media?'

2-What is the relationship between rampant consumerism and cultural/ecological collapse?

1. Describe the difference between Political Design and Hacktivist Art. Use an example of each and describe how that work fits the category of design or art.

2. What does execution mean? How does it relate to computers (ie .exe files). What are some example of executatb;e art? How is execution different from representation? In other words how does each realte to the media paradigms of one-to-many vs many-to-many?

3. Why do you think Hacktivist artists find themselves hacking capitalist and political structures that most other people revere? What problem or dangers do they see in these forms of power? Use sample projects to answer this question.

4.How do hacktivists confirm McLuhan's prediction that the 'nation-state' wold not survive the advent of electronic media? Do hackitvists challege or question any critical policies of nation-states? Does their practice suggest any alternatives to the nation-state? Or why are they not really concerned about anarchy?

How do games engage our fantasy and why is this important? Who controls fantasy in gaming--creator? user? both? and what are the effects of this control? Is the control exerted by a lone novelist similar or different than that exerted by a multi-million dollar game company?

➡get a dreamhost account

➡Create a web page using w3schools URL: http://www.w3schools.com/ use : Make your own website OR Try it editor to create the first page; then copy/past to a plain text document, or use iWeb or an html editor: make & publish/upload your 206 site with 1 page bio & photo

➡publish your site to your sites folder on dreamhost in a folder called "nmd206"lowercase, NO spaces; your main/home file (with your bio/intro) should be saved as "index.html"

➡your site url then will be:
http://yourname.nmdprojects.net/nmd206/

➡come up with a project idea for code art/hacktivist art by viewing other student or artists' projects

➡for an intent you will need to 1) pick some projects to inspire you, 2) come up with your own idea, 3) write a paragraph or two about the project idea, this includes

➡create an account in The Pool

➡add your intent to The Pool
view "how do I add an intent"
make sure you add "nmd206-2011" to the "Subject" area when adding your intent
then, after login in, go to "jump in-->art pool-->nmd206 to see past student ideas
from here you'll see the "option menu" in upper right and can "add a creation"

➡view all the other student intents before class

➡add a review to two+ projects in The Pool during class as we review them

➡ create an approach or 'mock-up' for project 1. an approach looks like a finished project, but because you can navigate or present the project, you can hide those aspects not fully complete. the project looks complete, but some implementation details may not be fully rendered.this includes

➡revise or change your project 1 intent if necessary; keep all versions on your website and in The Pool

➡background: this gives any info the viewer needs to better understand the project

➡credits: who was involved, or what sources or inspirations you had for the project

➡explanation: while the project should be able to stand on its own, this section allows you to give any brief info for the viewer

➡the project itself: a podcast, a web app, a short video, an origami sculpture, a robot, a physical game etc (these have all been past student projects)

1-What are some of the reasons for a surge in digital autobiograpical production from "home pages" to "wearcams"?

2-What is the role of autobotography vis-a-vis technology's "narcotic effect"?

3-Jennicam gives us an example of the pleasures of self-disclosure, Mann's WearCams give an example of the dangers of surveillance. Are there dangers in Jennifer Ringley's work (or similar projects)? And what might those dangers be? Conversely, are there any pleasures in Stephen Mann's WearCams?

4-Explain how 2 of the blogging projects reshapes our sense of self, life, or writing.

5-Pick one of the "moving self-portraits" and explain how the project evokes the mystery of our contemporary lives. What kinds of issues does the portrait raise?

6-Katherine Hayles speaks of the "post-human" in describing the cyborgian entities we have become. How do the artists of this chapter create autobotographies of this "post-human" cyborg? Consider, for example Life Sharing and [phage].

7-How do digital artists examine the commodification of the self? How has the self become another consumer good, or how does a human being get reduced to a "consumer"? Which digital projects raise theese questions and how do they do it?

8-Describe the autobotography of "invented selves" or avatars. How do Female Extension and Darko Maver raise questions about the nature of digital selves. Why do they use invented selves and what are the reasons for doing so and the effects of their choices?

1-What is a cyborg, or rather why is thinking about cyborgs useful for exploring identity? Is identity single? dualistic? paradoxical? What rolled does gender paly in cyborg identity vs conventional cultural identity?

2-Give two examples of cyborgs in books, comics, games, or films you have seen. Describe the cyborg, explain its role in the work, then explain what new perspectives it brings to identity.

3-What does Haraway mean when she writes “ the production of a universal, totalizing theory is a major mistake” How does the metaphor of the cyborg undermine the totalizing theories or dualisms that Haraway feels are damaging to our society?

4-How does her cyborg challenge the white, male, heterosexual bias of our culture? (this bias, for example discourages or punishes white males when acting feminine, or wild or gay; or it rewards women who act like men or like heterosexuals; it is not necessarily good for white male heterosexuals, as it boxes them into this role too) How does the 'monstrous' liberate us? How is this like code art "perversion"?

5-What is liberating, and what is dangerous about a human/machine symbiosis?

6-Would you consider yourself a cyborg? Explain how you are or are not a cyborg. Would you like to be a cyborg (sometimes, never, only in play, only when serious)?

1) What's the most sever consequence for Boal of his Interactive techniques? Why does his "interactivity" elicit such a violent response?

2) Why is "knowing the body" so important to the power of Boal's techniques? WHat does "knowing the body" have to do with interactivity? passivity? hierarchy? resistance?

3) Why are Boal's techniques called "The Sims of the Oppressed"?

4) In simultaneous dramaturgy the actors present a local problem to the crisis point, then invite local people to suggest solutions to the scene. The example is an illiterate women who discovers her husband's secret documents are love letters from a mistress. The problem is how is she to get revenge without it hurting her? Now think of a situation of injustice in which you felt a powerful impulse to act, but in which your actions could have hurt you or someone else. Describe this scene. Could you imagine it in a game scene with various solutions?

5)What is image theater and how & why does it work?

6) What are the rules of invisible theater and how does it work?

7) Why is spectator a bad word? In what ways is a spectator less than a man? What is the antidote? How does interactive theater liberate passive spectators and transform society? How is interactive theater (or Occupy) practice for resvolution, and why is revolution necessary?

➡Find an example of autobotography online

➡post the URL, with a brief annotation (a 1-2 sentence description of what the project is and why it interests you and how it is an autobotography) on your website

➡come up with a project idea for autobotography

➡an autobotography is a self-portrait in which the tools and techniques of new media influence the kind of self that emerges (is self as hard drive--'life sharing', self as web-cam--'jennicam', self as what can/ccan't be bought/sold--'shop mandiberg' , self as cultural neuroses--'hooggebrugge's work, etc)

➡add your intent to The Pool by monday 5 pm

➡add a review to three+ projects in The Pool after monday 5 pm but before class on tuesday (post these reviews on your website under 'my peer reviews' section; be sure you give a short description of the project you are reviewing--either yours or the creators' )

➡ create an approach or 'mock-up' for project 1. an approach looks like a finished project, but because you can navigate or present the project, you can hide those aspects not fully complete. the project looks complete, but some implementation details may not be fully rendered.this includes

➡revise or change your project 1 intent if necessary; keep all versions on your website and in The Pool

➡background: this gives any info the viewer needs to better understand the project

➡credits: who was involved, or what sources or inspirations you had for the project

➡explanation: while the project should be able to stand on its own, this section allows you to give any brief info for the viewer

➡the project itself: a podcast, a web app, a short video, an origami sculpture, a robot, a physical game etc (these have all been past student projects)

1. Clifford Geertz says "every culture loves its own form of violence." In what way do video games confirm this? What forms of violence do they represent? Geertz says the forms of violence are not always the actions that are bloody, but rather the unequal systems and structures that are created by violent means and then perpetuated. Pick a game that reveals not the superficial violence but the deeper structural violence of our culture and explain that form of violence.

2. What is arrest and why is it important to art and specifically to game art? Can you describe a momnet of arrest in any kind of game you have played?

3. What happens when a game breaks out of representations of violence (Grand Theft Auto) and actually engages (executes) violence (Tekken Torture Tournament)? In what way does representation sensitize or desensitize us to violence vs in what way does play (real enactment) resensitize us? When children play do they ever resort to violence? Can you describe its possible uses?

4. In what ways to some games reinscribe (ie make it seem natural by so much repetition) rather arbitrary gender roles? Why do games geared to adolescent boys have such strong gender stereotypes? What biological phase are these boys going through? What is the danger if they do NOT adopt gender stereotypes but pursue alternate gender definitions for either women or men? Pick a game that begins to questions gender roles for women and for men (these can be two different games) and describe how they challenge stereotypes.

5.Why do US Army recruiters use games to both recruit and train soldiers? What is being trained or learned? Why is it effective, or is it?

Alex Galloway quotes Bruno Reichlin when describing a kind of realism applicable to games:

"A surgical examination of matters of society, an almost documentary attention to the everyday, an adherence in thought and language to the social origins and personalities of the characters, a more-or-less direct criticism of current society and morals."

• social analysis
• documenting everyday
• character development (and background)
• critique of current culture

Pair up with a buddy in the class. Each of you pick one game that you find "realistic" and one that is "fantasy" and describe each of these 4 characteristics from each game. Take notes on your partner's descriptions trying to keep them on track for the 4 traits. Then come up with a few insights about how games shape our perception of our living reality. Exchange and post notes.

Explain how games lure you deeper into someone else's reality. How does "identification through action work"? Can you explain a few instances here your identity is shaped by the choices to act in a game? ie in an army game, how often do you question your superior officer? in a stealing/violence game, how often do you share? In what ways are certain behaviors held up as normal and others as impossible?

In what ways do games promise satisfaction by creating both the reality and illusion of character agency? In other words, games give you the impression that you can act, choose, be in control--a deep human need that we often take away during schooling and training for the job market. How do games tease and then either satisfy or trick this need?

Explain how the computer game environment helps to create a second self. IS this helpful or narcissistic? Is this alternate reality an escape from or a help for coping with the material reality in which we live? Could different types of games affect this?

coming...

➡Find an example of an alternative game or game concept online

➡post the URL, with a brief annotation (a 1-2 sentence description of what the project is and why it interests you and how it is an alternative to current game culture) on your website and in FC "game example"

➡come up with a project idea for game art

➡your game art project should in some way incorporate a critique of some of the more shallow game environments and narratives, or in some way improve on what is currently available; while you cannot build a digital game world with hyper-realistic environments, you can construct either a more sophisticated board game (what actions does it make you ponder/take), or you can design a game concept with some visuals, an explanation of game play (possibly levels), goals, and a description of the behaviors your game will train. See A More Powerful Force, or Big Picture Small World, or Sept 12, for some options to conventional games.

➡add your intent to The Pool by monday 5 pm before the tues class, so classmates can review your idea/concept

➡add a review to two+ projects in The Pool after monday 5 pm but before class on tuesday (post these reviews on your website under 'my peer reviews' section; be sure you give a short description of the project you are reviewing--either yours or the creators' )

➡ create an approach or 'mock-up' for project 3. an approach looks like a finished project, but because you can navigate or present the project, you can hide those aspects not fully complete. the project looks complete, but some implementation details may not be fully rendered.this includes. This is not a "sketch" but a first version or real design for the project. For a game, this might include a website with all the game data and some sample visual game environments, as well as goals, missions, background, play, and/or a short video--consider machinima. In other words, even if the game is not built, I should feel like your concept is clear enough with text and visuals to present the game in robust terms.

➡revise or change your project 3 intent if necessary; keep all versions on your website and in The Pool

➡background: this gives any info the viewer needs to better understand the project

➡credits: who was involved, or what sources or inspirations you had for the project

➡explanation: while the project should be able to stand on its own, this section allows you to give any brief info for the viewer

➡the project itself: a podcast, a web app, a short video, an origami sculpture, a robot, a physical game etc (these have all been past student projects)

Two readings have been assigned for this section. Comp and Bower

➡For this series, your task is pick a quote from each from Bower & Comp that you need to tackle in order to deepen your understanding of the articles. Reread the quotes & then any part of the article that will help you understand them. Do any outside research on terms or ideas that can assist you. You will be using these quotes to a) generate your reading questions, and b) present some of these points along with your ecotech examples--try to make them overlap in topic or issue.

➡Next, make up your own questions (3-4) about the two readings and answer them. Pick questions that allow you to explore aspects of the quotes/readings that you may not fully understand but would like to. You can then post notes/responses to your website for these two readings for this eco-tech art section.

➡Find an example of an eco tech project online that addresses an ecological issue of concern to you--especially one that is relevant to your own bioregion.

➡Next, create a web page in which you post the URL, with a brief annotation (a 1-2 sentence description of what the project is and why it interests you and how it is relevant to your bioregion) on your website and in FC "ecotech example"

➡On this same webpage, add your quotations from your readings followed by a list of key issues/questions/responses that you can use for your class presentation. Your goal is to promote understanding of the art projects and readings and stimulate discussion among other class members. You can keep it brief and pointed--just what you need to touch on key aspects. Each of you will have 5 minutes to present followed by about 5 minutes to respond. Remember that a long rambling presentation is often the sign of poor preparation. If your presentation points (art project, reading quote, key issues/questions are clearly listed on your web page, and you give yourself a chance to rehearse, this should be easy). The best presentations should elicit the most interesting and engaged responses

➡Create a digital collage of the all food items you have consumed during a 24-48 hr period. Your goal is to create a visual record of your habits of consumption.

➡Use the best camera you have access to, and try to photograph your items on a neutral background--white, gray, or black etc so that the collage will be easier to stitch together.

➡Keep your image small enough to see easily on the web-- a 72 dpi image that will fill a 600X800 screen. Keep image size below 500kb (use jpg compression in photoshop, save for web).

➡You can link to the full size image if you wish to provide a printable version (set the image to a URL which is the URL of the image itself, eg: media/mycollage.jpg; whereas your smaller 500kb image can be media/mysmallcollage.jpg)

➡Use this assignment to find a way to expand or re-establish your "deep interactivity" with the natural world. Use it as a source of inspiration, materials, collaboration if you can.

➡PONDER:
Henri David Thoreau in the mid-nineteenth century, wrote in his Journals that he was continuously struggling to meet nature in its elementary directness, unmediated by conventions, categories, concepts, and scientific knowledge. To really understand something, he believed one continuously had to approach it as if it were completely strange. "If you want to learn of the ferns, you have to forget your botany. You have to get free from what commonly is regarded as knowledge of them." In its essence, ecological perception is about perceiving the dynamic relationships between distinctions such as the self and the other, and spirit and matter. By orienting one's personal artistic responses to the sensuous natural environment, one has an opening to embrace our living connection to the world. Through art we can see and approach the outside world afresh.
Art also has a capacity "to stop us in our tracks". An important function of art is estrangement or de-familiarisation. It helps us to review and renew our understandings of everyday things and events which are so familiar to us that our perception of them has become routine. Furthermore, art can open us up to the presence of ambiguity. In all these meanings, art has the potential to offer new ways of coming to terms with the present human condition, which includes coming to terms with living and surviving in the technosphere.

➡Develop a project that uses any tools or idea from New Media to help you explore and express the wilderness in both yourself and the natural world. For example, develop a series of time elapse photos or recordings of some natural phenomenon and remix it into something evocative of the original context; create and document a piece that belongs in its natural surroundings; or co-create--find a way to collaborate with some natural being or force--birds, rocks, earthworms, wind, sun, etc.

➡Be sure you notice and report on what you learned about the distinction between self and environment--does it still hold? is there a separation? if so, what does it consist of? If not, why do our words suggest there is a divide?

➡Remember to give feedback to 1-2 fellow student projects.

➡ create an approach or 'mock-up' for project 4. Be sure to include on your site: background, credits and explanation, as usual.

➡revise or change your project 4 intent if necessary; keep all versions on your website and in The Pool

➡Produce one fully revised, fully functioning final project from one of your four approaches.

➡Be sure your website has a link to this project, as well as all documentation of previous stages, credits, background and explanation, as well as any resources used (ie inspiring artworks, articles or quotations, class discussion ideas etc.)

Galaxy Reconfigured

1-What does "the medium is the message" mean? Cite the text, then describe with an example in your own words.

2-How does McLuhan describe "imagination"? Cite the passage, then explain what it means. What is "closing itself as in steel"? What has been gained/lost?

3-What is "the grotestque" and why is it important? How does it relate to "symbolism"? And how do both relate to New Media?

4-Who pointed out that "truth is a ratio between the mind and things, a ration made by the shaping imagination"? Give an example of something "true" and something "false" according to this definition. What is true in nature vs what is true in media?

5-What "puts the mythic or collective dimension of human experience fully into the conscious wake-a-day world"?

6-How do humans, via their technology,"become what they beheld"? How do we "become" our technology? Why is this the same as hypnosis and who.what is hyptnotizing whom? What is the effect of this hyptnotism?

7- Follow the many allusions to "tribe" and "tribal man." Why does "tribal" keep recurring in McLuhan's essay? What causes a "return" to tribal man and how/why?

Medium is the Message

1-What does McLuhan mean by "the ways in which the machine altered our relations to one another and to ourselves"? Which machine(s), and how did they alter human realtions/perceptions?

2- Explain this statement "it is the medium that shapes and controls the scale and form of human association and action." And why is the 'content' or uses of such media ineffectual in shaping the form of human association"?

3-How does media create the Narcissistic moment, in which one is "hypnotized by the amputation and extension of his own being in a new technological form"? Describe one way in whcih we have been "hypnotized"? How do we wake up?

4- How does cubism break up a single unified "perspective" view in painting? How does YouTube do it?

5-How has our mass media contributed to the claim that 'our Presidency has become very much more personal and monarchical than any European monarch ever could be."?

6-McLuhan quotes Jung's on the danger of becoming a slave if you live in an era of slavery. What is the kind of slavery does the media offer (mass and/or new media) and how and to what are we becoming slaves? (ie consider some of our addictions--oil, energy, material goods, entertainment, etc) What are our alternatives? How do we break the shackles of this slavery?

➡Adorno & Horkheimer, The Culture Industry

➡Benjamin, Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction

this URL highlights Benjamin's 5 points, then provides flash movies to illustrate--great to critique & discuss

➡You may choose to work in pairs or in a group for any of the class projects.

➡You may combine projects, as long as the scope and effort matches work done for 2+ individual projects

➡Please note in your portfolio any help, collaboration or assistance on other student projects, as this earns you extra credit for the class