Coincidence does not exist, only consequence.

To summarise today and my current thoughts.

In a conversation with Micheal many interesting issues were raised surrounding high and low interactivity. Chris Crawford suggests the more interactive a media experience, the better. Specifically referring to digital media and computer games he argues,

"The more we emphasize interactivity in our designs, the more fully we utilize the true strength of the computer as an artistic medium."

This i certainly agree with, however my hang-up lies with the ungrateful audience. Our spoilt Postmodern society, especially our Generation Text, are far too accustomed to instant gratification. They do not appreciate the formulation of such vast amounts of information that grants them instant entertainment. In my notes from Alister McDonald (Kerb lecturer) i mentioned the paradox fo Flash games and their immediacy to the user, and the time and effort it requires to create and code them. This point is relative to all digital media and recent computer games. Consider the fact that it can take upto 3 years to produce an XBox 360 or PS3 game and yet only 50 hours for the player to complete it. This reminds me of "The Way Things Go" by Peter Fischli and David Weiss, a 100 foot installation of physical interactions and chemical reactions, which inspired the Honda Cogs advert and latest Guinness advert i referred to earlier. They all beautufully demonstrate the idea of causality, but the real relevance is the point that the authors would have taken months to prepare the sequence and yet a mere second of interaction for the reader to trigger the potentially 30 minute cause and effect process, which is a very impressive and captivating spectacle.

Micheal and i also discussed the idea that high interactive media forces the audience to engage with it. Imagine back to the 1930's - 1940's when TV had just become commercially available. During that time of the technology it was a simple case of switch on the 1 channel, sit back and absord the information presented. Now with such cast choice and control of what we watch it is a far more active, participatory, thought-through experience. The viewer is coerced into interactivity without being aware of it, because that is the very nature of digital media. As computer games become more advanced, as does the audiences interaction with them, We are seeing increasingly complex patterns of thought and reaction, problem and solution.

Causality: the relation of cause and effect

OK, continuing the "ephemerality in execution verses the pain-staking time in preparation" theme i mentioned in the previous post, the new Guinness advert sprang to mind. It utilizes the domino cause and effect scheme with objects other than just dominoes, from books to flaming hay bails. This sequential process expresses the above idea perfectly, it takes a single, simple motion from the user to trigger a chain reaction that would have taken days, weeks and possibly months of planning and setting up on the authors behalf.



Honda had a very similar ad a few years back which uses car equipment for exactly the same purpose. I prefer this Honda version of the domino effect because it is mechanized and therefore more in keeping with the feel of the brief. In addition it is also a more intricate setup and so more elaborate once executed.



A second theme i have been exploring is the idea that interactivity is a subtle means of manipulation. I think i would like to exploit this point in my project manifestation. Rather than the user controlling the work, it is the text itself that is actually operating the reader and directing them to an overall goal, all the while the reader believing they are acting independently and of their own accord. The Lev Manovich text "The Myth of Interactivity" was an excellent read in regards to this concept. His arguement that hyperlinks, which form the basis of online interactivity, are pre-determined paths through information and therefore equating the user to follow someone elses thought process, rather than making their own natural associations, fascinated me and has a lot of scope for expansion.

Digital Laurels...

Brilliant, new brief! Lets shed the shackles of Design Futures and play with the possiblilites of interactivity.
"Design boundaries can be thought of as very elaborate systems of control."

I like this quote, it makes me happy, and i'll tell you why. In terms of interactivity, especailly online, power is alluded to through the vast choice the user has. There is an unlimited number of paths the reader can take through the information available. However one is always following a pre-determined route. Lets take the hyperlinks throughout Wikipedia for example. Accessing each of these is immediately taking anothers pre-meditated journey through the data. This is not necessarily a bad thing, the point is that power comes as a system of knowledge (Foucault) and this is best epitomised by the internet and the techniques it employs to give the user an illusion of absolute power (corrupts absolutely).

"The users of new media are becoming the content of the form."
This second quote obviously reminds us of Marshall McLuhan's the Medium is the Message. And it is completely accurate. All Web 2.0 sites rely on their users to create the content. Wikipedia, Youtube and Facebook - the only thing these sites do is provide an excellent platform for the consumers to communicate on and to interact with, and in doing so, they allow an endless amount of content to be generated. The very nature of the Web 2.0 medium necessitates itself and perpetuates itself. I feel that although the medium is the message, this is an easy excuse for contemporary society. Yes our technology is amazing, but despite these complex platforms for communication, our message is banal, vacuous and just plain dull. Take the content of most text messages for example, "im on the bus, where are you?" and Facebook comments, "wicked night last night mate, i was battered!" Im pretty sure this is not how DesCartes came up with "Cogito ergo sum" - "i think therefore i am." In our digital media age we lay back on our lazy laurels and believe that "i surf, therefore i am" will cut it. Well it won't!

In the same vein but in no way an insult to our guest lecturer today, we had Alister McDonald from Kerb, who designs online viral games. The guys an obvious pro, multimedia acronyms were hitting me from all angles and he talked about code like it was bread to a baker. However it's not to me and although the cute little games looked slightly entertaining for a few minutes i remained suprised as to why a company would invest significant amounts of money into this particular form of marketing. It appeared to me to be just another way to waste time online and subtley subject us to advertising. Another thing that struck me, the extremely ephemeral nature of web content, the immediacy of these games to the user, verses the time and patience it requires to action script and create these viral interactive games in their entirety. It is ideas surrounding this last point i would like to develop towards our current interactive brief.

A picture says a thousand words.

After talking to Mike Blow last Monday we discussed the possibility of using icons rather than text for the menu options of favourites, search, play etc. These symbols are universally accepted and understood and i think in the future we will see this type of representation replacing writing as much as possible. I almost feel our society is becoming lazy, relying on visual communication rather than textual material because it is easier and quicker to decifer. Now it could be argued that this is more a product of Bauhaus Modernism, that aimed for efficient design, "a simplification of forms by a reduction of ornament" for example the iPod. However think about our younger generation compared to the elder, our children's attention spans are decreasing rapidly with more and more kids being put on Ritalin every day. So today ive been reworking my interface and designing some such icons in a Web 2.0 style; translucent, reflective, liquid like surfaces.

To be, or not to be... that isn't a question, it's a necessity.

Ok it's 10.09 am on Monday the 12th of November, that gives me around about 100 hours until the dealine at 4.00 pm Friday. Sketch book wise, I have to consolidate my research and document my idea and aesthetic development. Practically i have to push on with my After Effects animation, rehearse my physical movements to sync with that of the demonstration, and i must carefully consider the commercial package i will be presenting the concept as - BBC Netvision's design, promotion, product etc etc. It's going to be an interesting 5 days, i generally like to believe that i thrive under pressure...

ZoeMode - Games Design and Development

ZoeMode - Games Developers based in Brighton under the umbrella corporation of Kuju. They mainly work on casual lifestyle games for social occasions for friends and family e.g Dancing with the Stars... Anyway, lets not dwell. It was a very informal presentation which was a welcome relief. Rather than show us what they were working on at present, they described their education and careers upto and including their positions at ZoeMode. From Jon Taylors' pitch i got an impression of the volatile nature of the industry and the narrow minded but ruthless attitudes of EA and the like. The frequency that games companies open and close was shocking, and so many projects with potential and promise that will never transpire to see the light of day. He talked with an almost bitter realism, a man who had a dream but has already accepted a lesser fate. Well this is the nature of the business, producers want games built on generic templates that fit the popular demographic, and in that sense he was happy to be working on games like Singstar. These are a more challenging thrill because it is a fresh format still in its infant stages and outside of his comfort zone.

From Ste's presentation i gathered his name is infact Ste, not Steve, it's STE. I hope i spelt that correctly... I liked the fact he was initially a games journalist, reviewing for Edge in a pretty top-cat postion. This was early Nineties when games were not mainstream reading material. It was encouraging that he seemed to naturally fall into this role after sending out a Fanzine to many a music magazine. After an undisclosed GTA walkout he got a producing job at Sony, however it wasn't all it was cracked up to be. I think Ste described it as "thankless" as he had no creative input in the development of the games and his quirky dreams were being crushed. Which reminds me of "Crush" a game based on an insomniacs repressed memeory. Because of the story it allowed the two creatives to design some very interesting subconscious environments, with puzzle solving tasks and a dark gothic undertone. Now i think he has his fingers in as many pies as the Creative Director of ZoeMode and enjoying the job immensely due to the variety and influence he has on the creative process.


-> a few things i took away with me: The competition vs collaboration issue of creativity and coporations. They seemed opposed to the idea of Wikinomics, and taking the more fundamentalist perspective of Andrew Keen, favouring competition over collaboration.
Be aware of the should-be obvious difference between East and West games nature and players attitudes. The East sounds more promising, with more scope for narrative structure and general artistic interpretation.

Read More Books

Found a couple more articles on the Guardian website, the first http://www.guardian.co.uk/drugs/Story/0,,2207210,00.html is about brain enhancing drugs, which is an area i neglected when considering my genetically engineered Superhuman concept. These drugs are much like Ritalin (subsequently known as "kiddie coke" a nick-name which both worries and amuses me) but they are for aimed at students and young professionals working in highly stressful and pressured environments, people who could benefit from mentle agility, hightened alertness and short term memory enhancers.
This second article http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2007/nov/05/mondaymediasection.comment is in relation to the Wikinomics theme we have been discussing recently, the short feature mainly focusses on advertising revenue in the media, which is apparently going to run out sooner rather than later. Thanks to the rise of the amateur and the availablility of free information in blogs, wikipedia and citizen jouranlism, the media are getting paid for their content less and less and are therefore relying more heavily from the cash money advertising brings in.

On the whole Wikinomics tip, as ive already mentioned more than enough, check out Andrew Keen's book The Cult of the Amateur. This book assaults the whole Web 2.0 user created content ethos, arguing that it is destroying our culture and economy. It directly attacks all websites involved in this second Web-revolution. Now this guys opinions are pretty extreme and although he raises some good points i don't agree with a lot he has to say. What did make me laugh out loud is when i checked his website, notice the links to Amazon.com to buy his book, a site that he directly critisized in the very same book.

Hype, hype, gimme the funk, gimme the funk!

Below is my first dissertation proposal i wrote as part of our critical and cultural studies in May 2007. It's a bit of a rant but you get the gist.

TO WHAT EXTENT HAS GLOBAL CAPITALISM SUPPORTED/CONFIRMED BAUDRILLARDS THEORY OF SIMULACRA AND SIMULATION? HOW MUCH RESPONSIBILITY SHOULD THE MEDIA ACCEPT IN THE CREATION OF MEANING?

In our current world of hyper-reality, if the real no longer exists, are we (as a New Media society) living a lie? When direct meaning has been replaced by signs, codes, metaphors etc how do we define the real? It's almost as if we have to frequently prove and reaffirm our existence with imagery, photographs and short films of family and friends and the great times we all shared. Now these can constantly be displayed on Web 2.0 sites such as FaceBook. We can regularly upload documentation of our memories and exhibit them to the entire online community. Rather than simply living we must record our existence to repeatedly remind ourselves and others that we are in fact, alive.
Postmodernism has perverted basic reality. Existentialism is dead. Commercial advertising and communication media now dictate reality with hyper-mediation. We are no longer free agents, we have become walking, talking billboards. Individualism is impossible, our responsibility is not to ourselves, but to TopShop and H&M. Human existence is not defined by personal experience but by which stereotype we best fit. We are categorised and regergitated into another commodity. In a recent Argus i had a look through the personal ads, one read as such. "Arctic Monkey loving Vegan female looking for a non-smoking mid-twenties male to share world-cinema and soya milk with." Is pigeon-holing people now completely inescapable?
In an authentic-fake world how do we distinguish the real? If there's no need to refer to an original but just reproductions and representations of the real, then what is really true and what is false? And more importantly, how do we define true and false in contemporary society? The simulated copy has superseded the original object by the signs of its existence rather than its actual physical presence. How can we trust copies? Are we the donkey, instinctively following the digital carrot of invented meaning, dangled before our eyes by the all powerful Media?
Adverts and design in general manipulate meaning and mold the publics perception of the world. Traditional moral values are brought under the microscope by contemporary media. Ethics are being reshaped by modern technology. In a hyper-real society people no longer have to think for themselves, their opinions are governed by headlines.
Much of modern design and architecture is illogical. Should not every new Postmodern apartment block have solar panel roofs? New media isn't just working in conflict with the natural environment, it's striving to provide an alternative hyper-real environment - virtual reality.

Death of the Author, Birth of the Amateur

Yes ok ok i admit i have neglected my documentation duties over the last couple of weeks and must get stuck in again. However in my defence i blame our theorizing. I have delved deep into the dark realms of the dissertation. After our Wikinomics article last week i did a bit of research and found an anti-Web 2.0 manifesto called "The Cult of the Amateur" by a bitter ex-Silicon Valley rep Andrew Keen. He claims we are sacrificing trustworthy information for a quick-fix of cheap empowerment. Now i don't agree with everything he has to say as his arguments are quite extreme at times, but it was certainly a good book to read at present, when everyone seems so blindly besotted with this user-created content movement. I have also been dabbling in some further reading of Marshall McLuhan's "The Medium is the Messege" and "The Rebel Sell" by Andrew Heath and Joseph Potter, which critiques culture jamming activists such as AdBusters magazine and analyses the hipocrisy of such texts and how they simply fuel the fires of capitalism they are fighting so avidly against. So lots of diligent dissertation reading going on but the deadline is creeping up from behind like a paedo in speedo's so i must fix up and look sharp.

Anyhoo, stop living in the past. Now i need to focus, i need to do some industrial cutting and pasting in my sketchbook and i need to prepare my final presentation and figure out the best medium and method for demonstrating my ideas. I plan to produce an After Effects animation of the Netvision menu and applications, to which i will carefully choreograph a set of movements that sync with the actions of the Netvision menu on the screen resulting in what appears to be a movement-sensitive interface - much like the Wii controller and the overly referenced Minority Report. Sounds a bit too ambitious ey? Well, it probably is but i believe it to be the best way of displaying my future-of-TV-meets-the-internet concept.