4/27/17 Reflection

My inspiration for creating this video definitely stems from my experience in this class. Throughout the semester, we have been focusing on how technology has changed society. We started off with writing and then expanded into other facets. Throughout my blog as a whole, I have researched, examined, and shared my own opinion on the effects of this revolution. What fascinated me the most was seeing how technology has, in many cases, completely reshaped the way we do anything and everything. For my third portfolio, I wasn't sure at first what to use as my medium or genre. All I knew was that I wanted to entertain the viewer to the best of my ability. This is when I started to think of the entertainment industry and how it too has been transformed by technology. And it doesn't just affect how we watch movies and television. Technology also affects how we make them. What I was interested in most was the storytelling aspect of this. Movies used to be about horses and carriages. Today, they are about robots; which is ironic because technically robots help create movies. At the end of the day, my argument throughout the blog has been that technology has basically sent society into metamorphosis. For better or worse, it has changed everything we do. I wanted to create a visual representation of this change which is how I arrived at this decision. Planet Earth, the documentary that I talked about in one of my recent blog posts, was another inspiration of mine for choosing to make this video. It showed me that a visual argument is much more powerful than something with purely text. I tried to line up the clips with the background music to the best of my ability to make it as pleasing to the eye as possible.

Narrative between my projected audience and I:

Ryan: Technology has truly changed society (shortened pitch) blah blah blah

Dr. Palfai: (no response) 

Hopefully, when Dr. Palfai sees this project, he will respond. In my video, I tried to make it as nostalgic as possible to evoke more of a sense of time. I did this in order to deepen the meaning of my message behind it. Technology has already changed things this fast, what is next? And more importantly, should we be worried? The clips that I used were from movies and TV shows made within the same thirty or so years. However, the technology depicted looks light years different.

Comment:

I really liked how this almost sounded like you were having a conversation with the reader. You could hear your voice actually coming out too, like when you mentioned "season 1, season 2 is a pile of shit." This writing style make your reflection easy to read. 

I chose this comment because it was actually the only one that commented on my writing style. I tried to write in an entertaining/conversational style as much as possible because I know how grueling it is to read something that is written like a 9th grade persuasive essay. Especially since it is a blog, I thought it was appropriate. One place where this comment influenced my writing was in my Planet Earth review where my first sentence was "When our professor told us to watch a documentary in class the other day, I just so happened to be drifting off, with visions of waterfalls appearing in my mind as I daydreamed." Writing in a slightly satirical manner made creating a blog much more enjoyable than an essay or paper.

4/27/17 Technology in Entertainment

https://vimeo.com/214902961

4/13/17 Ruins: a Graphic Novel

This graphic novel by Peter Kuper is about a couple who are on a sabbatical year and they decide to travel down to Oaxaca, Mexico. Graphic novels definitely keep readers more engaged than normal books do. I find that when I try to read long passages in traditional books it is difficult to stay focused. Reading this was definitely more engaging. And this relates to one of the focal points of my thesis throughout the blog. Technology makes things easier. A graphic novel is a form of technology in and of itself, even though it may not seem like it. Going back to Dennis Baron's argument in his article, the pencil may not have seemed like a form of technology either. However, it accomplished the goal of making something easier. In this case, a way of recording speech. Graphic novels make telling a story easier and more innovative. Especially if the author is skilled in an artistic manner, as well as a story-telling one. "Ruins" was about 300 pages long and I was able to read through 50 pages while also staying engaged, which is harder to do with a traditional book. And without technology, I would have never found this novel. Why? Because we had a class online, in which our teacher told us to go find one. The lady in Bird wouldn't have been able to tell me where to find graphic novels without her computer. Finally, the elevator helped me get there. Who needs stairs anymore, right? We're so lazy that we decided stairs were too much work. So we made it easier with technology. Point in case.

4/6/17 Planet Earth: Review of a Review

When our professor told us to watch a documentary in class the other day, I just so happened to be drifting off, with visions of waterfalls appearing in my mind as I daydreamed. When I heard the word documentary, I immediately thought of Netflix because they are no stranger to a good-old fashioned doc. As I scrolled through their site on my computer, I spotted the documentary section. The first option? Planet Earth baby. I was hyped. I always wanted to watch it but the opportunity never presented itself. Until now. It certainly did not disappoint. It really makes the viewer appreciate the world around us and its diversity, as well as the patience and effort that was put into capturing it. I would definitely recommend watching it. However, I am here to review another review of the series. And it comes from the New York Times. It is titled "In the Animal Kingdom, the Wild Bunch Rules" by Susan Stewart. Off the bat, I could tell it was going to be a positive review. It was almost impossible to find a negative review of Planet Earth. I think this is because it is less of a documentary that makes an argument and is more of one that takes you on a visual journey. And this review explained that perfectly, without completely defining what the series is. That's  what a movie review should accomplish in my opinion. Let the potential viewer know what he or she is about to get into but don't let them know too much. Additionally, your opinion is less important than you think. Touch on what it is, then move on to more pertinent information.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/24/arts/television/24plane.html

3/28/17 Reflection

For my Unit 2 reflection, I decided to make a timeline on Prezi. I did this because, at the end of the day, technology is simply a product of time itself...

http://prezi.com/zazrzh_axyzh/?utm_campaign=share&utm_medium=copy

3/28/17 Project Post

In our writing class, we have explored the complex foundation of technology and how it has influenced institutions such as writing, education, communication, and more. In my first blog post, I decided to investigate various facets of this shift in culture. They ranged from music, to social interactions, to life itself. For my second post, I decided to delve into a pitch that was interesting to me while also relating to my first blog post and the topic of technology itself. I started out by thinking about some of the pertinent points I made in the first post. Sure, the advancement of technology has certainly made us more efficient at doing "things". But what are the side effects? This is when I came up with my pitch. How does technology hinder our relationships? I started exploring intimate relationships mainly, but tech has truly affected the dynamics of all types of relationships. From professional, to friendly, to familial relationships, technology has played a huge part in affecting each one. My argument with regards to this pitch is that it is mostly a negative change that is detrimental to how relationships should work, however there have been some truly groundbreaking inventions because of new technologies.

The first source that I will introduce was one that I actually found when I wasn't even working on my blog. I was scrolling through the Snapchat app and, after flipping through some stories, I decided to read some of the news in the "Discover" tab. The first article that caught my eye was one in the VICE news section. It read: "Long Distance Couples Can Now Use These Robotic Gloves to Do Stuff to Each Other". I thought to myself, wow this definitely relates to my WRT 205 project and I should probably use it as my first source. It was also pretty interesting, so I wanted to start off with it as a hook for the rest of my post. Here is what the snaps read:

When I was in middle school, I was watching the movie "I, Robot" with Will Smith and wondered if fully functioning robots like those would be alive in our lifetime. Reading about robotic gloves made me hearken back to these apparitions. Then I started to think about how far technology has come even since those middle school years with all we have today. If this exists right now, who knows what will fifty years or so from today.

Going back to the article, the company who created the Flex-N-Feel gloves target a consumer market of people in long distance relationships, which are actually more common than I thought. "You can simulate hand holding, touching one's face as a gentle caress, or even a light massage." While the act of touching your partner with robotic gloves when you are not together could be seen as beneficial for faithfulness/non-adulterous reasons, my question that arises is where do we go from here? Are we going to be having sex with robots soon like they do in Westworld? I'm not exactly sure of my stance on this issue, but the implications of this change are certainly there. I'm sure there are plenty of sickos out there who would love to get down and dirty with a robot that looks like a human. The target market is there which is why I believe they can and will exist eventually. But this is where one of the arguments in my first blog post arises. That is technology negatively impacting our human-to-human interactions. If sex robots exist then a lot of people won't even bother trying to make a real connection because they can go home to their robotic girlfriend/boyfriend. It's kind of a depressing thought but its also something that is very likely to happen in the future.

This video called "Her: Love in the Modern Age" by the Creator's Project chronicles reactions to the movie Her by several famous people. The film is about a man who falls in love with an operating system. Some of my favorite quotes from the video that relate to my pitch include:

Q: What does love look like in the modern world?

"Everyone's definition of love is different so whether technology has helped or hindered that probably depends on how you define it in the first place."

"The conversation is often framed to is technology harmful, does it make people more lonely? We don't know. We just understand that it may modify the way we go about meeting our basic human needs but it doesn't change our fundamental human needs."

"Well what does love look like in any world at any time? It is definitely the antithesis of fear."

Q: How do you know when it's time for a relationship to end?

"We fall in love with one version of someone and then we expect them to stay that way but they never do. So I suppose we're supposed to learn to really embrace the unknown, embrace evolution and learn to kind of flow with it as a living organism."

"A lot of people are questioning paradigms that are sort of crumbling around them. I think we live in a moment where basically every illusion, every central illusion in our society is exhausted. Monogamy is another one of those institutions which people are looking at saying this doesn't work."

"I've had long distance relationships which I've come to think of pretty much just a kind of shielding yourself from true intimacy. I felt like I'm missing this really fundamental human experience."

Q: How do you see people connecting and starting new relationships in the modern world?

"I think technology has obliterated boundaries so we're all sort of unified and accessible in a way that we haven't been before. Emotionally, it makes it trickier."

"Technology changed the availability of sexuality. When I was a teenager, I had no outlet to go online, get into a chat room, meet someone, and drive over to there house to have sex with them. Those options were just not available to me."

"Sex has become so profoundly technologically transactional."

"Technology is a great thing to help enhance, maintain, and protect the relationships you have in normal life but I don't think it can be a substitute for the real life interaction."

"My first conversation with Spike was about relationships. All we talked about for several hours was relationships. How they worked, how they function, and how they fail, what makes them fail, and what makes people behave the way they behave. How relationships disintegrate and turn and change and how they're still kind of amazing regardless."

Originally, I was going to use the actual movie as my source. A man falling in love with a computer and having an actual relationship with it/her is hugely relevant for my blog. However, as I was searching for the movie trailer to insert into the post, I found this video. The topics that were talked about aligned pretty much completely within my pitch/inquiry. Essentially, they talked about the complexity of the relationship between love, technology, and relationships. In the movie, the main character falls in love with a new technology that is actually a conscious person in every sense of the word, without the body. This is how he developed an emotional connection to her. Their relationship was very real in the movie in that it had its ups, downs, and eventual ending. It was ironic in that the operating system he loved left because they were all getting upgraded, much like how smart phones are nowadays. He fell apart when she went "offline".

All in all this movie definitely has implications about our future, much like the robotic gloves. Could artificial human consciousness be a thing of the future? If so, are people going to be falling in love with them like this guy? If too many people did, it would be pretty unhealthy and sad in general. However, as the Creator's Project put it in the first quote I included, "Everyone's definition of love is different so whether technology has helped or hindered that probably depends on how you define it in the first place." The same goes for what happens in the future. Everyone is different at the end of the day. If someone wants to be in a relationship then more power to him or her. Another quote that I picked was "I think technology has obliterated boundaries so we're all sort of unified and accessible in a way that we haven't been before. Emotionally, it makes it trickier." We all have our phones on us 24/7; we're expected to respond to others right away and if we don't there are sneaking suspicions such as do they not like me? Are they screwing with me? Why are they ignoring me? Did I do something wrong? It is certainly a peculiar world we live in.

Citations:

https://broadly.vice.com/en_us/article/long-distance-couples-can-now-use-these-robotic-gloves-to-do-stuff-to-each-other

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZSfUcWw9zto&t=82s

• Jonze, S., Ellison, M., Landay, V., Lupi, D., Farrey, N., Barnard, C., Phoenix, J., ... Warner Home Video (Firm),. (2014). Her.

3/7/17 Lit

You may be wondering why there is only a single picture in my photomontage of me "interacting" with the item I checked out from Bird Library. Well, almost checked out. The incident that occurred last class when we took that field trip to Bird made a lasting impression on my spiteful relationship with libraries. Technology itself was the reason I could not check out this item, or any item for that matter on that day. Long story short, a couple weeks ago I checked out a math book from Carnegie library to do my homework. What they failed to inform me before renting the book was that they would charge me two dollars for every hour it was out. They decided to inform me of this a week later when I decided to return it. Essentially, I was charged about $350.00 by the library system, a system that is built by technology. Going back to our field trip, I found this book that was unlike anything I had ever read. I literally spent the whole class period reading it. It changed my life. It told short stories with actual thoughts rather than written words. As I realized I needed to start heading to my next class, I was only halfway through the book. I decided to say fuck it and walked downstairs to check it out, completely forgetting about the 350 dollars I apparently owed these people for checking out a math book and bringing it back a week later in impeccable form. I walked up to the check out table, where two girls about my age sat in conversation. I stood there for about a minute. They noticed me but had to finish their conversation about some sorority bullshit. I handed over Lit. "Just checking this out" I said. As she took it from my hand I thought maybe she won't notice the fine or, even better, won't care. As she shifted toward her library computer, I knew I had no hope. I knew what was coming. As she looked at the screen, she insisted, "You owe literally so much money. There's no way I can let you check this out or anything for that matter. Get the fuck out of my face." Obviously these were not her very words, but I decided to use some dramatization for entertainment purposes. All I had left to do at this point was take a picture of it and tell my story. I hope the library system can let me check out an item one day when I somehow pay off 350 dollars, although I don't plan on doing so. Imagine if the technology we had nowadays didn't exist. She would've had no idea I owed so much money. With what we have now, they can always keep tabs on us to make sure we don't have a book out for more than two hours, god forbid. Then, they can charge me every hour and take more of my money. Well done Syracuse, well done.