Sherry Turkle's "Tinysex and Gender Trouble"

In the article, Tinysex and Gender Trouble, the author, Sherry Turkle, discusses how many people in the virtual world are changing their genders when MUDing to “see what it would be like”, because it might be impossible or very difficult for these people to change their gender in real life. Turkle states, “On one level, virtual gender swapping is easier that doing it in real life. For a man to present himself as a female in a chat room, on an IRC channel, or in a MUD, only requires writing a description. For a man to play a woman on the streets of an American city, he would have to shave various parts of his body; wear makeup, perhaps a wig, a dress, and high heels, perhaps change his voice, walk, and mannerisms”. One reason the author believes that this is occurring so frequently in MUDs is because people are intrigued by having the ability to change their gender without the fear of consequences in real life. Some of the other reasons people have stated that they are creating new gender identities is to experiment. In real life their is no way for a man to experience life through a woman’s shoes without the fear of what their friends, family or even life partner might think or say, but in the virtual world you can be whoever or whatever you want within the privacy of your own computer.

Turkle’s article is a very hard topic to relate to the real world. This is something that only happens in the virtual world because of people’s fear of the persecution that would occur if they decided to change their gender in real life. One example of this would be drag queens or cross-dressers. When a man who is dressed as a woman walks down the street, he is stared at, talked about or even laughed at behind his back, but if a man describes himself as a woman in a MUD no one knows who they actually are and therefore they do not have to fear any harassment from others and are more open to experiment with their gender identity.

Howard Rheingold's "Multi-User Dungeons and Alternate Identities"

In the article Multi-User Dungeons and Alternate Identities, the author, Howard Rheingold, discusses multi-user dungeons or “MUDs”. He describes “MUDs” as “imaginary worlds in computer databases where people use words and programming languages to improvise melodramas, build worlds and all objects in them, solve problems, invent amusements and tools, compete for prestige and power, gain wisdom, seek revenge, indulge greed and lust and violent impulses”. In the article Rheingold discusses the many ways these “MUDs” are used, but one of the main reasons he believes that these programs are being used is to help individuals escape reality or change their identity to become a whole different person. Rheingold states, “Similar to the way previous media dissolved social boundaries related to time and space, the latest computer-mediated communication media seem to dissolve boundaries of identity as well…( people) pretending to be somebody else”.

When thinking about Rheingold’s article in relation to something that is more commonly known among the general population, the idea of chat lines comes to mind. When someone calls a chat line they are calling to speak to a complete stranger, neither the caller nor the called has any idea of the other persons true identity. This means either person can become anyone they want, a teacher can become a millionaire entrepreneur or a housewife can become a sexy model. This is very similar to Rheingold’s definition of MUD’s, both of these things help people escape the reality of their day to day lives without truly leaving that life.

Andrew Keen's "The Noble Amateur"

In Andrew Keen’s article, The Noble Amateur he discusses how he feels about the idea of citizen journalists or journalists that have no formal training or expertise, but offer up their opinions as fact. Keen very much dislikes this idea and also websites such as Wikipedia and blogs that are widely read as factual information. He states that, “we are undermining the authority of the experts who contribute to a traditional resource like the Encyclopedia Britannica”, he goes on to say that the more these free, user-generated sites are used the more it threatens the core of our professional institutions. Keen believes that because of these types of websites, we, the people are suffering because we are not finding the correct information when researching because these sites are coming up and not sites that were written by experts in that area.

I would say that I disagree with the author because I believe that without some of these blogs and citizen journalists, we, the people would suffer because we would miss out on some first hand experiences of actual events that these “journalists” are witnessing and then writing about. Like for example during Hurricane Katrina witnesses that actually were experiencing the horrible devastation in New Orleans were able to capture what was truly happening there. They were able to let the rest of America know how they were feeling and what was actually occurring, compared to some news anchor in Indianapolis just telling us about the hurricane.

Also, just because an expert is giving us the information does not mean that it is always trustworthy. Another example would be the events that led up to the Iraq war. All the information we Americans received about Iraq and the impending war was gathered by experts. We later found out that all the information the “experts” gave us was not completely correct.

Keen states in the article that these citizen journalists “lack not only expertise and training, but connections and access information”, but I ask you who has more access someone who is actually there blogging about something they have or are experiencing or some prestigious, “expert” news journalists.

Henry Jenkin's "Get a Life"

In the article “Get a Life”, Henry Jenkins makes a reference to textual poaching which he states that Michel de Certeau defines as “an impertinent raid on the literacy preserve takes away only those things that are useful or pleasurable to the reader.” Jenkins goes on to state that “De Certeau’s ‘poaching’ analogy characterizes the relationship between readers and writers as an ongoing struggle for possession of the text and for control over its meanings.” This quote very much reminded me of the novel Misery, by Stephen King. In the novel author Paul Sheldon crashes his car on a snowy road. He is found by Annie Wilkes, his "number one fan" who is obsessed with Paul’s novel heroine Misery Chastaine. Annie is “helping” Paul back to recovery when she discovers that the author has killed off her favorite character. She becomes very upset then forces Paul to write another book bringing Misery Chastaine back to life, while she watches over him.

Misery is an example of textual poaching. Annie Wilkes is such a fan of Paul Sheldon’s novels that she has become obsessed with the characters and almost cannot survive when she finds out her favorite character has been killed off. She then forces Paul to write another book even though he wants to finish the Misery series so he can go on to write different novels. This shows the relationship between Annie as the reader and Paul as the writer and their struggle for possession of the text.

Annie shows the strong differences that can occur between the authors meaning for a text and what meaning the "fanatic" wants to get out of the text. Annie as the "fanatic" wants Paul to continue writing his Misery novels even though his meaning was for Misery Chastaine to die in the last book and for the series to end.

Although, in Misery the misinterpretation of the authors meaning is almost deadly for Paul Sheldon that is rarely the case. In most instances readers can interpret the meaning of the authors text anyway they want making for a more interesting read for the "fanatics".

Flickr Assignment

http://www.flickr.com/photos/23693505@N03/sets/72157603903998965/

In preparing for the Flickr assignment my group was able to work together quickly and efficiently while accomplishing our goal for this project. We met in class and discussed possible stories we could tell with the pictures and mutually decided to tell a story of “Going Green”, urging people not to litter. Because of our proficient group meeting, we were able to start taking our photos for the project right away during the next class. After we finished taking our pictures we uploaded them to Flickr. With this being the first time anyone in my group had used Flickr we found it very easy to understand and maneuver. With only a few questions for our professor we uploaded the pictures and were able to tell our story within minutes of taking the photographs

I feel that Flickr could be a good tool for creating user-generated content and sharing that content with others, but it does not have enough recognition yet to be completely effective. I was not even aware of Flickr until this project and I think many of my peers are equally as unaware. If more people do not learn about Flickr then all of the photos, stories, and information on there will disappear. With Flickr, people have the ability to see first hand points of views from these photos that you may not be able to get elsewhere, making this device very useful and necessary for learning more about world happenings.

I also feel that Flickr has a large possibility of becoming a photojournalism tool in the future. With more people becoming aware and using things like YouTube, Flickr should be soon to catch up. Like the author of the articles commented, “ I don't know what tools could make it this easy for other kinds of journalists to assemble a compelling story in pieces, but clearly Flickr has made something possible for photographers that was not possible before”.

Henry Jenkins "Photoshop for Democracy"

In the article “Photoshop for Democracy”, one of the main points Henry Jenkins discusses is how our political culture is being “Photoshopped”. He believes this is occurring so American citizens will believe what these political activist groups want them to believe. He discusses several instances in American politics when political leader’s ideas or images have been “Photoshopped”, to look a certain way, positive or negative, to citizens.
This is very similar to the idea of political comedy shows like The Daily Show or The Colbert Report. These shows are made for pure entertainment, but are portrayed to look like legitimate news shows. The hosts of these shows take bits and pieces from real news sources and “Photoshop” the information to give it to the viewer in a certain light.
One example of this “Photoshopping” would be on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. He took clips from each news station, CNN, MSNBC, Fox News, etc, of all the news channels claiming to be the best news source for the ’08 election, but then he shows a clip of Fox News saying they were the best news source ever. This makes Fox News appear as arrogant and almost not as reliable as other news sources. Although some people may agree with this, we are not getting the whole picture of that statement. This could have been a joke for all we know, yet it was “Photoshopped” to look how the writers of the Daily Show wanted us to think about Fox News.
There are many other examples of ideas or images being “Photoshopped” in these entertainment shows, yet people take these entertainment news shows as reliable sources for actual news, making it hard to get all the facts straight in the information world today.

Howard Rheingold’s "Smart Mobs"

The use of technology is so new to our society, in the last 10 to 15 years or so, and yet most people do not even think twice about pulling out their cell phone or looking a phone number up on the internet instead of using a phone book. This is because all of these technologies have been fully integrated into our culture, so much that we even use this technology for social activism and protests.
In Howard Rheingold’s article on smart mobs he discusses how mobs have now become “smart”, meaning that they are using these mobile devices or other technologies to organize groups, meetings and even their protests.
Although, it is not only mobs using these devices for arranging meetings or group activities, parents and police forces are using these devices to help track missing or stranded people. This is able to work because these “mobile devices constantly let cell towers and the mobile switching center, which is connected to multiple towers, know of their location. The mobile switching center uses the location information to ensure that incoming calls and messages are routed to the tower nearest to the user”.
In using this technology the “mobs” are being smarter because they are able to find these stranded or missing people much faster then they would if they were not taking full advantage of all the technology available.