Avatar Buffer

To be completely honest I don’t really understand how Avatar Dichotomizes gender. To me I see everyone acting their own gender. Men are men, women are women. So I guess I just don’t really get what you want me to see.

Throughout the whole move Jake does put on different personalities much like we do in virtual space. He goes from military man to scientist to a warrior. He is loyal to the military at first then becomes more affectionate to Naavi as he learns more about them. He is learns how to be a warrior for the Naavi and their views and beliefs. One personality change that comes to mind is when he is first out in the wilderness with his avatar. The two scientists are studying how the network of the planet works, and he is playing protector, much like an escort for them. He then wanders off and becomes curious about his surrounding as he stumbles upon some flowers and becomes like a child. I find this to be similar to what we do in virtual spaces. For example when myspace was the social network of choice, I used to change my page multiple times a day. It usually depended on what was on my mind or my mood. Each page I felt showed who I was at that point in time or how I felt. I had a baseball background on there for a little while because I had a baseball game that day. I felt like a bad ass because I was an athlete. Another day I put on a Halo background because I love video games and back then Halo was the shizz, and it showed my nerdy personality.

So Jake showed many personalities throughout the movie, we can still liken it to our own virtual lives. We all use our web pages, or social network sites to present or show who we want people to see us as. I like the word I heard today in class from the presentation about how these are a “buffer” for us in our virtual and non-virtual environments. It gives us a sense of safety because we feel people will accept us more if we don’t have to face them in person. Much like Jake had a hard time facing his commander and telling him he didn’t want to attack the Naavi. It was easier for him to fight back through his avatar and express his feeling that way, than it was in his non-virtual space.

Intergalactic Digital Humanizing? Oh and Old People too.

(" Mac vs. PC Windows 7 vs. Mac Ad: Broken Promises")



Lupton talks about how the computer is marketed as an analogy of the human body. Even though the computer is an inanimate object we seem to give humanistic qualities. She gives an example of a magazine advertisement that showed a pc in the top corner all alone. Then in big bold lettering says " Insecure? Friendless? Alone?" and then the advertisement goes on to say how computers can be networked together. (Lupton, 427) This video is a perfect example of this ideology as well. There are two dudes representing the two major software/computer manufactures, Windows and Apple, if you didnt notice. I find it funny as they go back in time with the windows guy, his cloths get older and older as if computer hardware back then was so weird and out of style much like the clothes were, while the mac guy never changes, as if Mac was always cool and up-to-date. Its these types of ads that make us feel more and more attached to our computers as if they really are humanistic beings, and we cant live without them.


Probably the most important thing that I have learned about and will take with me out in the "Real World" is that of the digital divide and how we need to not just help people by providing the technology but we also need to teach them how to use it and why it is important. I am interning at the City of Kennewick this winter and I will be helping at the Senior Center a little bit. As they were giving me a tour of the building they had this computer room with about 10 computers in it. Now they weren't the newest for fastest computers to date but they were not horrible. Anyways it seemed as though the room was hardly being used. It made me think about the digital divide and how we have the technology to use at our disposal but people don't know or don't care enough to learn how to use it. So because of this I am going to be asking about maybe getting some classes started at the senior center, open to anyone, about how to use these machines. Whether it be Adobe Products, email, word, or just how to surf the internet more efficiently. I just see it as a perfect opportunity to show the wonders of the digital age.


Works Cited

Lupton, D. (2007). The Embodied Computer/User. In D. Bell and B. M. Kennedy (Ed.), The Cybercultures Reader (2nd Ed.) (pp. 422-432). London and New York: Routeledge

"Mac vs. PC Windows 7 vs. Mac Ad: Broken Promises." Youtube.com. Web. 23 Sep 2010. .

Cultural Guildaramous

Most of the communities that I have become involved with have tended to be of virtual nature. Whether it be on World of Warcraft, Xbox Live, or Facebook, you form communities virtually to other people. In Bell’s article he argues that virtual communities are shall I say “real” and substantial communities. This goes against what Bauman says, as he disagrees with that brings to question the legitimacy of virtual relationships and communities. Bell just seems the have the urge to yell “get over it” because all of the these virtual communities are here to stay and there isn't much you can do about it.(Bell, 261)

I am still kind of on the fence about this entire debate. As I am sure you have figured out, I am I huge World of Warcraft fan and I tend to use it a lot as an example, one, because and I know it well, and two, It fits in so many ways to these discussions. So In World of Warcraft you have a guild system where a group of people can band together and do things as a group, whether it be through raiding instances, pvp (player vs player), or just hanging out together and chatting. All of these a perfect definition of community. In class we defined community as “A group of people who share ideas or have a similar understanding of ideology as it pertains to technology and literacy. Those in the community do not have to have the same access or interest, but need to have some sort of common thread that links them into the community itself as well as some level of common sense.” So the people in a guild have similar access or interests and have some sort of common thread or goal. This could be going to win a battleground or to defeat a boss in a raid. So as you are part of a guild you join the “community” which is virtual and you gain new friends and acquaintances along the way.

Now the million dollar question, do you not do similar things in meat space? For example, I have just started a internship for the city of Kennewick. I am interning as a recreational coordinator, where I help plan and run different programs throughout the year. Right now we are working on Flag Football. We as a community of people working together, have a common interest to get the job done and have a successful program for the year. We have a similar understanding of what needs to be done to accomplish this task.

Now again I ask how is this different from an online virtual community? I don’t have the answer to that other than that I think it is not. I think both communities are part of life and both build relationships, whether good or bad, with the people involved. So by saying one is more real or legitimate than the other is false, they both play a role in who we are. But in that statement there is an ideology that who we are is based on what we do in our communities.


The 3 that i would like to study would be

http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/index.xml
-because i play this game and find it fascinating how people
communicate and act

http://www.mmo-champion.com/content/
-a good community for forums about WoW and upcoming content to WoW

http://www.bungie.net/stats/Reach/online.aspx
-the new and last Halo from bungie, and how people are on xbox live as well
how you can track stats




Works Cited

Bell, David, and Barbara M. Kennedy. eds. The Cybercultures Reader. 2nd Ed. London: Routledge. 254-264. Print.

Yahooooooooooooo....ooo!

Yahoo has changed dramatically over the years as has the web. If you look at the old yahoo website (i.e. 2000), you see there not much use of pictures or icons. It is mostly words linking you to other pages of the website. There are a few icons for you to click on up at the top. Also you seem to get navagation to there own website extensions.

www.yahoo.com


Today the look of the sight is much different. As you can see it has become much more picture heavy. There are links to send you to other websites such as facebook or twitter . They use icons to lead you to their own different pages as well as other sites.

Burnett and Marshall in “The look of the Web”, describe this as applets, referring to Apple Computer’s development of a new computer, the Macintosh, in 1984. This computer began the graphic user interface (GUI) which was a icon driven operating system. When you clicked on an icon (Applet),rather than typing a series of commands, it started a full screen version of the program. This is the architecture of the present day World Wide Web (WWW). (Burnett, Marshall, 82) You have a series of icons or links that when clicked bring you the the interlinked page. Its like a giant “Web” of pages that are or can be linked together to for one large site.
In the end I believe what they say is still true today. It is still an icon driven environment that is all interlinked in some way or another. Things have definetly become more graphically enhanced but in its core you still click the icon to get the “program” page. Also as I said before its not just links or icons to their own site anymore, there are also links to other sites such as you social networks i.e. facebook and Twitter as well as all of the advertisements they have up on the page. The internet is getting larger and even more intertwined with itself every moment.


Works Cited
"Web Theory": Burnett, Robert; Marshall, P. David. "Web Theory: An Introduction". 2003. Routledge

Digitized

The digital divide as we discussed in class is a division of communities and or groups of people that either have access to or dont have access to the digital world and technology. For example I come from a middle class family and we were able to grow up with a computer and the internet, I was able to use, play, and learn in a digital environment. However let’s say my friend, Mike from high school, was not as well off and was never able to use a computer at home. He did not have the access to the money or resources to get access to the digital world. So therefore there is a divide between how I was able to get access and able to learn how to use the technology, and my friend was not able to.

Another good example other than the windows vs. mac would be a person who has and Iphone and one who has lets say a Jitterbug. Now both are a form of technology but look at the divide between the amount of access to information one has than the other. An Iphone is a multipurpose device. You can get on the internet, text, play games, make music, take picture, and even make a simple phone call. Where as the Jitterbug is a literally just a phone with giant buttons. You can text or get on the internet or anything like that. The divide between someone who has an Iphone to one who doesn’t is giant. And I would bet that those who do own a Jitterbug are very likely to not know how to use or what to do with an Iphone. There will always be a divide between the haves and the have nots, and it will only continue to get larger and larger until the digital world can become more affordable and more available than it is already, and people change to want to learn and get access to it.