CRDM 701

dawn--week 12 blog

In "Traumas of Code," Hayles writes "This intricately coded work, with its interactive animations, accompanying sound files, and complex screen designs, testifies through its very existence to the extent to which code has become indispensable for linguistic expression" ("Trauma," p. 26).  I found this statement striking, and it prompted me to think of the character of my "linguistic expression," specifically in the contexts of communication technologies.  Of course, as I type now MS Word has underlined in red "Hayles" and in green "writes" in my first sentence, as it 1) does not recognize the author's surname and 2) believes that the word ending in -s (Hayles) preceding the verb (writes) requires the plural, not singular, form.  This actualization of the code only heightens my awareness of it, and I reminded of our readings on simulation, and specifically of Baudrillard, but first I would like to go back to Hayles's (2005) idea of intermediation, as developed in My Mother Was a Computer.  Building on Grusin and Bolter's concept of remediation, Hayles's intermediation "denotes mediating interfaces connecting humans with intelligent machines that are our collaborators in making, storing, and transmitting informational processes and objects" and is "faithful to the spirit of multiple causality in emphasizing interactions among media" (p. 33).  Hayles notes that, unlike remediation, intermediation does not locate the origin of an instance (if that's not too simplistic a way to think about these complex "feedback loops") of remediation in a particular space or mediated by a particular technology.  By doing that, it seems that Hayles is able to emphasize the indivisibility of human communication, linguistic production (and even thought) from code.

This brings me back to my linguistic expressions and my current situation.  In some ways, as a graduate student who lives alone, I am fairly physically isolated.  Like my classmates (I would imagine, though I don't like to speak for others), I spend most of my waking time engaging in school-related activities.  These activities are generally mediated, though I find the ways that we choose to engage in them interesting.  (For example, whenever we have a class reading delivered electronically, I choose to print it out in order to read and annotate it.  Others choose to read onscreen, using highlighting and commenting functions in Acrobat or Preview for that purpose.  In addition, during class sessions, I use a spiral-bound notebook and a pen for note taking; others choose to use word-processing software on their laptops instead.)  The one consistent, unmediated component of this graduate school experience is the weekly seminar. You may have noticed, but I like the seminar.  Engaging in spoken interaction is an important part of the way I learn and make meaning.  I use the modifier "spoken" here because I've tried to do this using IM, but it doesn't work for me.  I find that it can't achieve the immediacy, and a small nod to Grusin and Bolter's meaning here is intentional, of face-to-face interaction for me for this purpose.  But even when we are not using technology to communicate with classmates or guest speakers, the seminar is mediated.  The contents of the room, the laptops, the printed PDFs, my notebook and paper, they all inform the interaction.  I know this is a simple observation, but I wanted to make a small point about the presence of technology, even in seemingly unmediated interactions because I think the prevalence of digital media is important in the context of "technological nonconscious" (Hayles, "Trauma," p. 5).

Code impacts more than linguistic expression.  According to Hayles, "Just as code is at once a language system and an agent commanding the computer's performance, so to it interacts with and influences human agency expressed somatically, implemented for example through habits and postures.  Because of its cognitive power, code is uniquely suited to perform this mediating role across the entire spectrum of the human extended cognitive system" (Hayles, Trauma," p. 6).  Hayles uses a discussion of trauma to illuminate this issue, but clearly the implications for human thought can be extrapolated beyond that.  She notes that the technological nonconscious has influenced our thought since long before the computers were invented, and I wonder if this idea of the technological nonconscious might be a way to frame a discussion of relationship among privacy, technology (printing press, digital media), and history context.

This brings me back to the reference I made earlier to simulation. In his discussion of Menard's Quixote (and the replicated Mona Lisa), Peters (1999) notes, "[T]hings cultural derive meaning not solely from what can be reproduced?formal patterning, semiotic suggestiveness, or power of statement?but from a tissue of relationships with history, time, and place.  Identical objects are never identical.  Repetition, as Kierkegaard noted, is impossible.  The births of the two works, contra Turing, are part of their possible interpretations, even in their essence.  The one work is haunted by a whole texture of historical ghosts and legends, the other needs to have that aura supplied" (p. 240).  Of course, the mention of aura is a reference to Benjamin's work on art, but I wonder if these ideas can be pushed beyond "things cultural."  Metaphysics has been referenced in our class meetings and readings this week, and I wonder if there is something inherent (and this probably leads to a discussion of materiality that I am not prepared to write at the moment, but perhaps will come up in class) in "things" (works of art, furniture, the body) that cannot be replicated.

Posted at 07:53PM Nov 14, 2007 by drshephe in General  |  Comments[0]

Week 12--Jayna

I think I?ll start with the last quote I typed in my review of the reading this week.  ?Words mean what people have made them mean, but people mean nothing that words have not taught them to say? (Peters, p. 258).  To me this quote brings the semester?s readings full circle? we communicate in the way that we have created over the millennia.  We express our thoughts, feelings, ideas through speech and writing, photography, music, and (other) digital means. Still, it is what we have dubbed it to be.  As Peters points out, the evolution of communication also limits us?but if it is true that communication has become disembodied (and I think we?d all agree with that to some extent, ie: conference calls with researchers who are only a voice to us and not a body), then perhaps there are no limits to how we can continue to take the evolution of communication.  Maybe I will be able to one day have conversations with my dog that are of the two-way variety, where she shares her feelings, and not just her nonverbal reactions to my tone of voice and body language.

Code, as discussed by Hayles, is much the same?while she argues that it is not its own language (or perhaps that was another theorist she was quoting), it to is limited by the capabilities of its writers, and is undeniably linked to language/writing, as the intent of the code must be translated from the desires of the humans creating it.  So, likening it to the Peters quote, code means what humans say it means, and code?s capabilities are only limited by what the humans can (dream to) develop for machines to carry out.  As Hayles says, ??a computer program has only one meaning: what it does?.Its entire meaning is its function? (p. 48).  As a result, those writing the code must be very clear in their intent, otherwise the code will not function correctly.

Hayles makes a number of connections that I feel relate to my topic of the perception of typography.  Here are two that I made specific note of: ??clearly it matters that print has now become a particular kind of output for digital text?. Print books in general have moved toward the visual and away from straight text?. It is also true that any book, conventional or not, participates in the rich historical contexts and traditions of print that influence how books are designed, produced, disseminated, and received? (p. 32-33).
?[1997-2004] have seen remarkable growth in the visuality of electronic media and the accelerating digitization of all media? (p. 37).

Both quotes speak to the importance of visual communication. It seems that although our communication has become more and more disembodied, we still desire the images to go along with our written messages.  Peters seems to agree: ?Our faces, actions, voices, thoughts, and transactions have all migrated into media that can disseminate the indicia of our personhood without our permission. Communication has become disembodied? (p. 228).  Here, I feel that Peters acknowledges the digital evolution and also gives a nod to digital?s visual representation.

Random thought inserted here? Most of us don?t know code. We use extremely user-friendly web-page creation software or simply type directly into discussion boards.  The code is there, interpreting our intent, allowing the page to look and feel the way we want, helping us to use fonts, colors, text attributes, photos, sound clips, to communicate our message in our way?Hmmm? with that I must run?my apologies for the brevity; too much to do and too much mucus in my head to allow me to do it efficiently.  Now there?s your disembodied visual!

Posted at 05:23PM Nov 14, 2007 by jrjackso in General  |  Comments[0]

Week 12 - Kathy

Hayles and Gannon argue that digital media have "reinforced and extended the ways in which human intelligence is enfolded together with machine cognition" making compositional practices "fluid transformative processes " influenced by humans and machines (forthcoming, p. 4). Further discussing this enfolding, Hayles and Gannon use the example of the book "House of Leaves", arguing that the novel "suggests that postmodernism has not so much disappeared as been swallowed up ? or better, engulfed ? by the flood of data, associations, information, and cross-references unleashed by the World Wide Web" (p.21). Humans may be at risk of being swept up in the digital since we are, as Haraway notes (1991) "nowhere near so fluid, being both material and opaque" (p. 153).

In order not to be overwhelmed by this information, humans might have to find ways to better deal with an increasingly digital world. Hayles (2005) notes that "strategies can emerge from a deep understanding of code that can be used to resist and subvert hegemonic control by mega corporations, ideological critiques can explore the implications of code for cultural processes...  code is increasingly positioned as language's pervasive partner" (p. 61). This quote in particular made me think about where the enfolding of people and digital technology can be most productive - and (surprise) got me to thinking about hackers again. As the Internet is increasingly moving toward being a tool for mega corporations rather than thriving as a democratic and expressive space, we are going to need help from all kinds of people who have a deep understanding of code -- even hackers.

Because computer hackers have knowledge of systems that seems to range from clever to some kind of communion with code, they can find ways to work around systems of control. For instance, ISPs are beginning to look at packet flow and packet inspection technologies that would classify information in order to identify what customers are doing with the bandwidth. If you use Skype rather than your provider's VoIP service, for instance, the ISP may choose to degrade or block your Skype service. With a true understanding of the way that these systems work, hackers can find ways around such issues - in this instance, the solution involves re-assigning ports (VoIP has a port it generally uses - but since port 80 is HTTP, you can make the info look more like a website than a phone call - clever indeed).

Of course, individuals with this level of understanding are working on all sides ? for themselves, the consumer, the government,  big business -- sometimes no one. It seems to have more to do with a relationship to the technical that Wajcman (1991) points out with a quote from Oppenheimer: "when you see something that is technically sweet you go ahead and you do it and you argue about what to do about it only after you have had you technical success" (p. 138). I would argue is part of the hacker way of being - the desire to (following Wajcman?s argument) "give birth" to something technological.

In Traumas of Code, Hayles argues that code is a resource that could potentially mediate the human cognitive system, opening up new channels of communication "between conscious, unconscious, and nonconscious human cognitions" (p.6). Thinking about trauma as stored sensorimotor experience rather than language was interesting, particularly as I thought about the final stages of writing my thesis. I remember being stressed out (pretty badly) and often without a lot of time to eat. As a fix for that, I started packing in 4-5 of these wonderful double cocoanut eggs a day to get more fuel. Long story short, when they started showing up again last spring, I bought a few and went home to enjoy. I started to chew, and soon got sick in the stomach and started "freaking out" from stress. Doesn't seem like a big deal when I write it down here, but I assure you, it was not fun to bite into stress.

Peters (1999) writes that "If the fear of the Lord is the beginning of all wisdom, or if all philosophy is learning how to die, then machines will have difficulty sounding the strength humans call from their imperfections" (p. 236). If computers are not able to "freak out" in the sense that we can, how will they know when they have finally reached an understanding of something? If they can think, do we want them to take credit for our work since they were there the whole time we were working? Think about it - "Future Dissertation" by 00012C4JAX445Z45 and Kathy O (authors listed alphabetically). yikes.

See you all tomorrow!

Posted at 05:15PM Nov 14, 2007 by kfoswald in Week 12  |  Comments[0]

Week 12 - Christin

OK, you all already know that I?m a programmer.  I know C++, I wish I knew Java, and that?s probably why Hayles? discussion on code both intrigued and frustrated me.  First of all, a point that I have to make because it always frustrates me to no end: Hayles writes about HTML as if it is a programming language.  It?s not and many hardcore computer programmers out there will get quite upset if you try to treat it as such.  There is a very big difference between a markup language (which is what HTML is) and a programming language and Hayles actually talks about one aspect that sets the two apart ? compiling.  HTML does not need to be compiled.  It?s part of the reason why, I think, that HTML can be taught so easily and learned so quickly and why it?s no longer considered an ability restricted to computer experts but relegated to any semi-power user of the Internet.  Most individuals nowadays who are online on a fairly regular basis know enough HTML (or could learn it in less than an hour) to build a simple website by themselves.

Enough of my ranting though.  I thought that Hayles? discussion of whether or not a programming language was a language in the sense that it could be compared to English, French, German, etc. was interesting given her approach, and I especially liked her clarifications about where they differed. On page 50, she discusses the important point of code as an executable language (2005).  The byproduct of such a classification is that we must think about code in a different way than written or spoken traditional language.  I seriously struggled learning Italian in high school and college and found learning C++ a whole lot easier. I think this is because we utilize a different part of our brain when we code versus when we write or speak.

We must, in essence, think like a machine when we code ? think mathematically, laying out how we need to program something so that the computer understands what we need to do, and without any ambiguity.  If I were to mistipe a word like I do in this sentence, you still understand what I mean.  If I mistype a single character in a line of code, the computer will not understand what I am meaning to tell it to do.  This black and white line of thinking requires us to approach this language very differently than approaching everyday communication.

What intrigues me, however, is that we can program a computer in this black and white manner, but then the computer can evolve to understand the grey areas.  Computer understanding, their intelligence so to speak, is what the Turing Test is all about.  Both the Peters and Hayles? the Mood Swings readings discuss a Turing Test and so here?s a link for everyone to go look at: http://www.loebner.net/Prizef/loebner-prize.html  It is for an award, the Loebner Prize for artificial intelligence for a Turing Test, lists the winners and available links back to 1991.  If you?re new to Turing Tests, you should definitely take a look.

We were discussing in the other class the idea of whether computers can trust or not, and although I don?t want to reopen that discussion if no one wants to, I do wonder why so many people are so apprehensive towards even the idea of a computer not being capable of trust (or a variety of other so-called emotions).  Peters brings up some very good points.  ?The key question for twentieth-century communication theory ? a question at once philosophical, moral, and political ? is how wide and deep our empathy for otherness can reach, how ready we are to see ?the human as precisely what is different.? (230)  Later, he writes ?It is human frailty, rather than rationality, that machines have difficulty mimicking.? (237)  I see in society a growing move towards the natural, towards the spiritual and I wonder if part of that isn?t our desire to find that thing, that part of being human that sets us apart and above machines.  If computers will one day be capable of doing everything a human can do, thinking as a human can, acting as a human can (as the Turing Test and cellular automata, which by the way if you want to play with a good example of see http://psoup.math.wisc.edu/Life32.html and Conway?s Game of Life), without the knowledge of inevitable death, where does that leave human beings in the order of things?  It would imply that a machine could be a more perfect human, a meta-human so to speak, which then forces us to seek out and strengthen what sets us apart and what makes us better than a machine that we, ourselves build. 

Posted at 05:08PM Nov 14, 2007 by caphelps in General  |  Comments[0]

Week 12 - Nick

Code, code, code, we are surrounded by code!  Or rather, code is the most recent metaphor for how we conceive of our lives which is, as usual, based in the technology of the times as Hayles points out.  These metaphors are part of the endless feedback loops that lead to socially constructed reality.  Once we collectively have a technological metaphor for the way something in life works, it seems we begin to apply it far and wide and the new technologies that result are created within that system and thus bear its markings.  I am reminded of the 'kid with a hammer' analogy I have heard in relation to new scholars with a favorite theory; all the world becomes a nail.  At what point does such a metaphor become hegemony, I wonder?  Certainly, such a worldview empowers some while disempowering others; when a metaphor is based on a technology then it must inheret the issues and weaknesses involved in that technology.  We have witnessed the technological divide and discussed this problem, but this has been a divide which has existed since there has been technology.  Thus, every technology of communication, from speech to print to code, has caused some kind of divide.  Can those who do not have access to the technology still be affected by the metaphor?

Something I found interesting, regarding metaphor, was when Hayle's pointed out that Derrida could be an underlying theoretical 'code' every bit as restricted to a priestly class of the few who understand it as computer code.  That really resonated with me, as someone who has struggled with Derrida every time I have encountered him.  To 'get' Derrida, I usually require a friendly 'interface' in the form of a mediating article that uses Derrida and explains his work as it relates to something I do understand.  Hayle's second chapter was one such mediating form, but even this was fairly dense and theory laden.  The real 'user friendly interface' that mediated this week's readings for me was her 'Trauma's of Code' piece.  Through that article and her examples of current literary/cinematic works, I came to grasp the concepts she was speaking of all along in a much better way.  And, ironically, I read all of this week's readings by Hayle's on my laptop.  That makes me, what, at least four steps removed in mediation from the 'real' language I was staring at? (Her text to Adobe's software to the alphanumeric coding that composes it all the way to the base binary 1's and 0's that compose that code) 

This work relates to my work on Google bombs in an interesting way.  Google bombers are utilizing and abusing the code of the organizing algorithm.  This is an method of organization that is entirely new and unique to the coded internet environment.  In days of old, the organizing method was in print (Library of Congress, Dewey Decimal system) and in days of ancient it was organized through rhyme and meter in people's heads.  People intrinsically trust the code behind the software to find the most relevant links to information that they request; bombers manipulate that code (again, through interfaces where they don't even see the code) and shove what they want to see up to the top of the heap.  They do this all without truly understanding the code they are manipulating due to their addiction to the interface. (How can they understand it when the designers don't even fully grasp it???)    We have moved into a world where the priests of the guarded language no longer understand the whole of the language but instead only grasp parts of it.  Has code brought us (again?) to a semblance of collective knowledge?

Posted at 04:06PM Nov 14, 2007 by nmtemple in General  |  Comments[0]

Week 12 - Kelly

While reading Hayles? writing this week I continue to draw connections between her ideas and my experiences as I navigate my way through Second Life. Hayles points out that ?underlying code surfaces at those moments when the program makes decision we have not consciously initiated? (forthcoming, p. 2). As a newbie to the Second Life virtual environment it was almost kind of creepy when my avatar would begin to perform tasks that I didn?t really feel like I had any control over and wasn?t expecting. I had almost a voyeuristic experience with my avatar when I would begin typing on my keyboard (to communicate with another avatar) and then I would notice my avatar was air-typing - I didn?t know what it was doing at first. I felt like I was observing an interaction that I wasn?t wholly a part of especially when my avatar would make appropriate facial expressions and filler motions that I had in no way prompted.

Though Hayles later argues that higher level of complexity can emerge from different mechanisms including analog in response to Wolfram and Fredkin, I don?t think this disputes the novelty of Fredkin?s major thesis: ?That the universe is digital all the way down and, moreover can be understood as software running on an unfathomable universal digital computer? (Hayles, 2005, p. 23). If we conceive that the actual universe is digital ?all the way down? then does that imply that the virtual environments like Second Life aren?t really that ?virtual?? Maybe they are more like subsidiary or sister environments. Second Life could just type of ?new kinds of environments in which human and machine cognitions are deeply entwined? (Gannon & Hayles, forthcoming, p. 36). In my research paper I am looking at how the visual culture of Second Life extends outward and possibly influences actual lives ? especially in regards to how the visual communication of avatars reflects Second Life values and changes how we conceive of our none-screen bodies. Gannon & Hayles (forthcoming) take this idea further by illustrating an actual physical extension of the digital into our bodies:

It seems eventually programmers will develop ways of allowing aspects of Second Life (or another casually immersive world) to become part of our actual world where we might not have control, like Whalen?s ?cognisphere?. In Heidi?s presentation last week she mentioned an example where nano particles implanted in a physical body would work on their own to kill cancer cells ? and they would be able to differentiate between good and bad cells because they will have been programmed accordingly. Her paper was discussing how ?the mind? was the last frontier for nanotechnology and I feel like this can also be connected to Second Life. Many people feel that Second Life is all about sex which is weird to think about at first since the physical aspect of sex seems crucial. In Turkle?s (1995) interviews with people who engage in netsex she found that ?They are constantly surprised by how emotionally and physically powerful it can be. They insist that it demonstrates the truth of the adage that ninety percent of sex takes place in the mind (p. 21).

One difference between literature and code that Hayles (2005) reminds us about is that code is not so easily understandable with the passing of time. ?Although they can still produce documents using these versions, they are increasingly marooned on an island in time, unable to send readable files or to read files from anyone else? (p. 51). This seems even more disturbing for those poor avatars who might eventually be left ?marooned? in an inactive world. I thought about this when I was investigating other virtual environments that are becoming less and less popular with the success of Second Life. I wonder if people feel any worse about abandoning an avatar or persona in a social world than they would about abandoning word processing programs?

One (of many) things I would like to discuss during class time is the Weizenbaum example Hayles (forthcoming) illustrates on pp. 27-28. Hayles writes that, ?In brief, it [the computer] possesses the kind of cognitive state that psychoanalysts train for years to achieve? (Hayles, forthcoming, p. 28). I wonder to what extent psychoanalysts really hope to achieve this. I am thinking now about when designers and writers says that when they are looking for critique of their work they try to separate themselves emotionally from their work so that can accept criticism and not take it personally. On the one hand this would help them remain more objective and prevent hurt feelings but would a complete emotionally sever from work have other negative effects as well?

Posted at 01:22PM Nov 14, 2007 by klnorris in General  |  Comments[0]

Week 12 - Jon

Something I have been grappling with in my paper is the idea of the "screen" and the space it creates between viewer and artifact. By using the term "screen," I am referring to both physical and imaginary screens. In the context of my paper, I discuss largely physical screens, such as that of a computer monitor or the separation between a museum exhibit viewer and the artifact being viewed. Screens not physically tangible would be those that we use to navigate and make sense of our surroundings.

These readings helped me to think about this topic. For one, I was glad that Peters's "Machines, Animals, and Aliens" reminded me of the Walter Benjamin article from earlier in the semester. Prior to this gentle nudge, I was, for reasons tied up in the roughness of my draft, extremely downgrading the power of, what I might term, the "museum screen." In a comparison to the computer screen, I was greatly privileging the digital, and I now consider this somewhat of a mistake.

What these readings did, primarily, was blur the screens that we use when we think about, broadly, different types of communication. For example, Hayles's description of the movie Avalon merges reality with simulation. Towards the end of her discussion of the film, Hayles describes Ash's place in a world known as "Class Real": "When she emerges, she finds herself not in the war-torn game world but, significantly, back in her own apartment" (p. 19). Thus, the screen through which Ash views the world, the VR helmet, reconstructs and places her into a simulation of reality. The screen thus serves as a mirror. Importantly, this is a mirror that leads us to question everything about reality, the "reality" of reality. Given that Ash remains in "Class Real" at the end of the movie, we are lead to believe that this is a screen that is more than just peered through. I wonder if this is a feature unique to virtual reality. There is no question that individuals become entrenched in MMORPGs, which, seemingly, become their priority, their reality. Where is the line between presence (in reality / virtual reality) and absence (from virtual reality / reality)? Or is there no line at all? In the terms of museum exhibits, I suppose, Ash has crossed the red velvet rope and made her way into the glass, becoming, in some way, part of the slice of virtual reality that is a museum exhibit.

Gannon and Hayles's "Mood Swings" discusses House of Leaves, a unique text that seems to redefine the act of reading. We have a tendency, I think, to read texts in particular ways, such as through different theoretical lenses, our experiences, etc. House of Leaves seems to challenge all traditional ways of thinking about the idea of a book. Specifically, the space that exists between reader and text in the case of House of Leaves and a traditional text seems different. Where a traditional text is interactive in the sense that encourages the reader to visualize the text, House of Leaves appears to engage in a more direct, physical interactivity -the book is as much something to read as it is an artifact to be examined. The great variety of medias present in this one text makes me wonder if our world will ever become so intermediary that there will no longer be a need for separation between different medias. Why should going to a movie and reading a book be two separable activities when they can be combined into one multi-mediated experience? Will all of the screens that we are presented with, such as video game, movie, book, and museum, become one?

As I was reading the Peters chapter, I kept thinking of Miguel Nicolelis's experiments on mind control at Duke University. I think his experiments blur the boundary between machine, animal, and alien communication. For one research project, he attached electrodes to a monkey's brain and taught it to play a video game with a joystick. Over time, the monkey learned that it didn't have to physically move the joystick in order to play the game. From that point forward, the monkey controlled the game with its mind. Thus, the monkey is able to escape the boundaries of its body. Peters mentions the significance of the animal body in regards to how it constraints communication with humans:"If a lion could speak, we couldn't understand him. . .We would need to live in a lion's body and experience the lion's form to understand the lion's speech" (p. 244). The implications of Nicolelis's research suggests that humans and animals may be able to meet out of body and communicate with one language - the language of the brain. However, as Nicolelis demonstrates, the language of the brain is only static at this point, literally and figuratively. Peters indicates that communication with aliens is in a similar situation, a desire to sort through the noise of space: "SETI seeks a true signal amid an infinity of noise; thus by far the most effort has been put into listening rather than sending" (p. 251). Unlocking the codes of these different types of static will continue to blur the boundaries between machines, animals, aliens, and humans.

Posted at 11:29AM Nov 14, 2007 by jtburr in Week 12  |  Comments[0]

Week 12 - Karla

Hi everyone.  I have chosen a few points from the readings to raise in this post, making some connections to my research on text-based e-therapy and how its dependence upon disembodiment has positive implications.  Part of my entry is not completely cohesive with the rest, but as I was reading that part of the assignment I had a personal connection to it (through my 101 class) and wanted to mention it.  So, here goes, and happy last blog entry to everyone!

Toward the beginning of his chapter "Machines, Animals, and Aliens:  Horizons of Incommunicability" Peters writes, "Communication suggests contact without touch.  To talk on a telephone is to identify an acoustic effigy of the person with an embodied presence.  In 'communication' the bodies of the communicants no longer hold the incontrovertible tokens of individuality or personality.  Our faces, actions, voices, thoughts, and transactions have all migrated into media that can disseminate the indicia of our personhood without our permission.  Communication has become disembodied" (228).  I was interested in Peters' reference to "without our permission" and the various possible ways to read that claim.  Do we think of disembodied communication as "without our permission" only because it enables a way to penetrate bodies without physical contact with those bodies?  Or, do we conceive of it in this way because given the increased and increasing use of communication media other than face-to-face, there seems to be little choice whether we participate in disembodied communication?  Is it in part because we realize that nonverbal cues enable us to express ourselves in certain ways that we cannot necessarily replicate without the face-to-face interaction, so that there is some sense of a loss of control over communication when we have to rely predominantly or only on communication lacking those visual cues?  In terms of text-based Internet therapy, a central concern is the lack of nonverbal cues and the implications the absence of such signals has on the development of the counselor-client relationship.  How can the communicants truly communicate in an effectively therapeutic way when they only have written messages to use to express thoughts and feelings?  When discussing Turing later in the chapter, Peters comments, "The presence of the speaker's body is no guarantee that genuine interiority is being tapped" (236).  I think this statement raises an important point about the privileging of face-to-face communication and the belief that physical presence ensures an authentic exchange between the minds/souls.  Embodied communication (including face-to-face therapy) does not automatically equate to such a connection to "genuine interiority."

Referring to Hans Moravec, Hayles mentions in her prologue the idea of the "postbiological" future in which "the expectation that the corporeal emdodiment that has always functioned to define the limits of the human will in the future become optional, as humans find ways to upload their consciousness into computers and leave their bodies behind" (2).  *I can imagine how Dawn responds to this idea.  I wonder about the possibility of the "postbiological" future in terms of how realistic it is to completely separate the consciousness from the body.  Even though chatting online allows disembodied communication and people clearly are willing to accept this, there is still a desire for the body, whether by asking questions about it (age?  sex?  hair color?  etc.) or requesting pictures.  Not having a picture available almost seems a faux pas, as though you are a novice to computer-mediated communication if you lack the resources to provide physical "proof" of your body.  I have never used online dating, but I have friends who have, and they often either passed over the profiles that lacked pictures or else requested those pictures almost immediately after initating contact.  In terms of e-therapy, often patients who have never been face-to-face with a counselor (for various reasons) are willing to try online therapy, and after doing so, sometimes pursue more embodied forms of therapy, including telephone, videoconferencing, and face-to-face, demonstrating both a desire for and greater comfort with physical presence in sessions.

Although not really related to what I have been discussing so far, I liked the point Hayles makes in Chapter 1 regarding how electronic literature is understood.  She discusses the "tendency to apply to electronic literature the same reading strategies one uses for print, while underappreciating or perhaps simply not recognizing the new strategies available to electronic literature:  animation, rollovers, screen design, navigation strategies, and so on.  Whereas Aarseth faces forward and reads print literature through a matrix developed in the context of computer games, McGann faces backward and reads electronic literature through a matrix developed in the context of print literature" (38).  I have not read the McGann piece she refers to, but I have read some of his work, so I am a bit surprised to learn about his "[facing] backward."  Hayles' claim reminds me of the discussion I had with my English 101 students on Monday about analyzing and evaluating online sources, particularly how relying upon established print-based critieria is not adequate or advised.  My students seemed to understand why it is problematic to use print-based strategies, but also a bit uncertain how to proceed, which, I think is reasonable.  I agree that looking backward by placing electronic literature in a print context is problematic, but, particularly with regard to teaching, I wonder if/when we will develop an established way of reviewing electronic literature?  Shifts in the electronic appear to occur at a more rapid rate than those in print, so how do we confront this challenge?

Near the end of her second chapter, Hayles writes, "These dynamics make unmistakably clear that computers are no longer merely tools (if they ever were) but are complex systems that increasingly produce the conditions, ideologies, assumptions, and practices that help to constitute what we call reality" (60).  The idea that computers help shape what we understand as "reality" seems almost strange given discussions of the actual versus virtual, but at the same time, not really strange at all.  We have come to rely on computers for so much of our daily interactions and activities that to view them as just "tools" seems irresponsible.  As we have incorporated computers more and more into our lives to the point that they "help to constitute" our reality, how have we changed our understanding of what is real and what is not? 

In "Traumas of Code" Hayles states, "The modification highlights a principal difference between humans and intelligent machines: humans have conscious self-awareness, and intelligent machines do not. Along with the capacity to feel emotions, self-awareness remains a distinctively biological characteristic. Nevertheless, contemporary computers perform cognitions of immense power, complexity, and sophistication" (5).  Hayles' comments reminded me of the discussion in CRD 702 yesterday about the anthropomorphism of computers and whether or not computers can trust.  I cannot say that I think computers can trust, though the conversation was interesting.  I think the understanding of emotions and self-awareness as "biological characteristic[s]" is important to take note of, particularly in light of the anthropomorphism of computers/machines.  If technological advances were to enable a robot to feel emotions and to demonstrate self-awareness, would we still make the biological distinction?  Understanding that those are biological processes, even if they are attained by something unnatural, would we simply say that the machine is mimicking what it means to have emotions and self-awareness because it has been programmed to have those abilities?  Hayles writes in "Mood Swings," "In particular, humans seek meaning while computers execute commands" (27).  Whereas humans use emotions and self-awareness to help make sense of the world around them, would robots with similar capacities for feelings and self-awareness do or need to do the same, or merely use them to determine what actions to take next?

Posted at 10:13AM Nov 14, 2007 by kmlyles in General  |  Comments[0]

Week 11--Jayna

?Speech? is not so much possessed as active in community life?[when] advanced forms of communication are created? a more complicated division of labor is created and it becomes appropriate to speak of producers and consumers of knowledge? (Carey, p. 167-68).
??by the end of the fifteenth century?Commercialism of the publisher began to displace the craft of the printer? (Innis, p. 53).
??the goals of ensuring the safety of an auto-mobile population and the efficiency of the automobile system demands that driving subjects become highly normalized and self-disciplined? (Packer, p. 370). 

These three quotes show a clear lineage of the ?technology= power? tendency of our readings.  This week?s review of communication history pointed out that moving from oral societies to literate ones began the clear distinction of class separation, later promoted capitalism at its finest example, and moved us into current trends in communication technology being used as a means of cultural/human protection.  We saw the transition from leaving ?space? behind when transmitting messages, to bringing ?space? back into view as a means of security.

Packer addresses the electronic highway for automobiles and the AHS (automated highway system)? recently (have any of you seen this email?), a woman sued the manufacturer of her newly purchased RV because it wrecked when she set the cruise control and went to the back of the vehicle to relax.  She must have thought she was on/part of the AHS?even more outlandish, she didn?t only sue?she WON the case? that?s probably another blog for a different class.

Does all of the technology Packer speaks of to develop AHS and, as we currently use the GPS and On-Star technologies mean that we are bringing technology back to the confines of geographical space?  In order for Homeland Security to truly secure the highways and other transportation systems, wouldn?t they need to know where every vehicle, train, and plane are at any given moment? Now there?s a frightening use of technology?and in my mind, it seems like a step back.  A great technological advancement in the telegraph was the removal of space from the message, and with AHS and GPS, suddenly the space, or location of the vehicle?and our ability to communicate with it?becomes priority.  I suppose every cell phone in each car is already monitoring location to some extent, as we all have a positioning device in our handset.

Speaking to Packer?s identity of mobility, more and more cities across the world have surveillance cameras on the streets monitoring the comings & goings of individuals as well as the vehicles at intersections (and whether or not they?re stopping at red lights).  Break the law and you conveniently receive your ticket in the mail a couple of weeks later.  Hmmm? did you even remember you?d been at that intersection?  Maybe not, but the ticket clearly shows your car, your tags, your face at the steering wheel.

So this next thought is a bit random, but I?ll include it anyway and close with it? If communication is seen in terms of space and time, does that mean that the Internet negates the concern for space when it comes to preserving history?  Storage of papyrus, clay tablets, and books has always been a necessity and priority, but is space a non-issue now that images can be ?stored? in (Kathy?s Tubes of) the World Wide Web, and essentially remove the need for the space/container?

Posted at 07:03PM Nov 07, 2007 by jrjackso in General  |  Comments[0]

dawn--week 11 blog

I'd like to start with a short aside.  I have begun to use my continuing unwillingness to settle on a topic as a teaching tool in my ENG 101 class.  I've used it as an example in a couple of our class meetings.  It seems to help me connect with them, and I think they just like seeing me squirm.  As it is, I think my ideas are getting closer to crystallizing, and as each week's readings has built upon the previous (and I'm reminded of Innis as I write that), I am developing a sort of trajectory to my thinking that increasingly relies on discussions of time and (especially) space.

Since the project proposal, I've been talking around the issue of space, thinking about the idea of privacy as the ability to be apart from others.  That interest in privacy has become (what I am not afraid to call) an obsession with the space between bodies, the ability to be discrete.  I am beginning to think that a discussion of space is the best way, or at least an interesting and valuable way, to get at this.  Sorry to talk about me and my process here, but I am trying to use this forum as a way to think about my topic.  Enough about me.

I found Carey's (1989) discussion of Innis's work helpful in thinking about this in terms of space.  He points out "Innis argued that changes in communication technology affected culture by altering the structure of interests (the things thought about) by changing the character of symbols (the things thought with), and by changing the nature of community (the arena in which thought developed)" (p. 160).  We've discussed the development of communication technologies as creative of the individual.  It seems, then, that a community becomes a collection of discrete individuals.  With technologies like the printing press, cultures became increasingly space bound.  In a "space-binding culture," communities are situated "not in place but in space, mobile, connected over vast distances by appropriate symbols, forms, and interests" (p. 160).  If  "structures of consciousness parallel structures of communication," (p. 161), what does increasing mobility mean for construction of identity?  And what does it mean for embodiment and communication?  And what does it mean for human individuals, their ability to be apart, and for community?

Packer's (2006) discussion of the move from a safety society to a security one, and the privileging of technology solutions (under a model of communications, command, and control networks) over behavior modification, has interesting implications for these questions.  For some reason, I am struck by the relationship between embodiment, control, and "access to space" (p. 383).  There is a connection between Adams's (2005) point that bodies are still good for the basics, like pain and pleasure, and controlling behavior through limiting mobility (but I'm not exactly sure what that connection is).  Packer notes that as recognition technologies are used to identify particular automobiles in service of risk reduction, "[m]obility itself has now been given an identity" (p. 392).  In fact, "[t]he identity of the driver is of no consequence; traditional identity categories come not to matter, only movement" (p. 392).  What, then, is the implication for embodiment?  Can this be extrapolated onto other technologies?

Posted at 06:53PM Nov 07, 2007 by drshephe in General  |  Comments[0]

Week 11 - Christin

America has always touted our belief in freedom ? the freedom of expression, the freedom of thought, the freedom of the press, and so forth.  Does the move to a security society necessarily equate to the abolition of freedom?  I certainly hope not, but it appears to seem that at least somewhat this is holding true.  For a very long time the second amendment was believed to be crucial for the freedom of US citizens.  Yet, in this society where our government is engaging in ?homeland security? more and more, controlling our daily lives more and more, Americans in droves have begun to oppose in some form the second amendment.  Did the events of September 11 trigger such a fear in Americans that many are now willing to give up certain (if not all) freedoms in order to feel safer, regardless of if they are or not?  Almost my entire extended family lives about an hour north of New York City, and almost all of them seem to feel that way.  They?re afraid because the space they inhabit lies so close to the City that they?re at risk ? even though the towns they live in hold less people than even the smallest town in Wake County.

Packer states on page 383 that, ?One element of the model of the control society is the management of access to space.?  Space, for Packer here, literally means geographic physical, ?real-world? space.  But an analogy could be drawn here to another type of space.  Innis discusses how those who have had control over knowledge throughout history have had the power in society.  Knowledge has now begun to be disseminated literally through space (Wi-Fi, Cellular telephones, Satellite TV, etc.).  I wonder how many cars of the future will have wi-fi capabilities that the government can conveniently connect to, giving them more power over the virtual space (both in it?s embodiment as bits of data traveling through the air and the information it contains) as well. 

I haven?t really discussed lately the connections my readings have had to my paper, but this week?s readings kind of made it impossible not to.  Carey writes, ?Innis believed that the unstated presupposition of democratic life was the existence of a public sphere, of an oral tradition, of a tradition of public discourse as a necessary counterweight to printing.? (165)  He later states that ?The strength of the oral tradition in Innis?s view was that it could not easily be monopolized.? (166)  If Innis were alive today, I wonder what he would think of YouTube?s effect on democracy?  I would argue that YouTube is monopolizing a small subset of our oral tradition (and making a nice profit in doing so).  It is changing, slowly, what is needed and what it means to participate in a democratic society.  If you miss a debate on TV, you can watch it online over and over again until you understand exactly what each candidate stands for (or claims to stand for).  No longer must we read what happened in a debate in a newspaper if we missed it. 

Posted at 05:54PM Nov 07, 2007 by caphelps in General  |  Comments[0]

Week 11 - Kathy

About a year ago, I began to notice large grey poles along my normal driving routes, which upon further inspection had cameras attached to them. They must have been put up overnight, since I never saw the people who put them there. Yes, things are different after 9/11. Yes, I want to feel safe. I wonder, though, if a massive deployment of cameras along the roads of a suburban community with virtually no crime is a little excessive. Is this an indication of something more than simply "montoring traffic"? After reading Becoming Bombs: Mobilizing Mobility, it is making more sense - perhaps it is a symptom of the shift from a logic of safety to one of security, in this case, "activated through a particular mode of mobility, the automobile" (Packer, 2006, p. 380).

Talking about the shift to a security society, Packer notes that with the development of communications, command, and control networks (C3) "rather than being treated as one to be protected from an exterior force and one?s self, the citizen is now treated an always potential threat, a becoming bomb" (p.382). What immediately came to mind was the Matrix (1999), and the idea that at any time, an average citizen in the Matrix could become an Agent, posing an insurmountable threat. The Matrix could instantly become a dangerous place for those on the side of the resistance, and so needed to be constantly monitored from the Nebuchadnezzar -- a mobile command unit -- to ensure the safe movement of Morpheus and his crew.

The discussion of mobile command units - the Ford prototype and the Hummer Militia (scary thought) - made me think about Carey's (1989) discussion of the expansion of European Empires via the printing press*. With the printing press, Carey highlights the centralization of authority as well as the decentralization of national administration (p. 158). When any vehicle can be a bomb, it makes sense that any other vehicle should become an extension of the State, like an Agent in the Matrix. The idea of making truck drivers and commuters or an assemblage of electronic devices and software a decentralized extension of the centralized State at first seems like a logical choice - until, that is, we take into account what constitutes "suspicious activity." If, as Packer writes the recognition is dependent on "risk assessment algorithms of mobilities" (p. 392), there is a lot of wiggle room on what could be "suspicious". In a world where C3 networks could also track credit card purchases, phone calls, and library records, a simple run to Target for cleaning supplies and a stop at Lowes for some plywood could be suspicious - maybe more so if said vehicle has also been located at a Green Peace meeting. Maybe you aren't spending the weekend cleaning and doing a little home fix-up - maybe now you are explaining your patterns of automobility to the feds.

I am also interested in another kind of mobility - virtual mobility. What web sites you visit, your virtual mobility, could indicate a future threat. As someone who did research on hacking, I can't help but think that my Internet histories could be seen as having interesting future trajectories - perhaps as a L337 H4X0R? While I would be flattered, I certainly lack the skills. I still wonder sometimes if my patterns of virtual mobility will ever compel someone to ask me politely to change my research topics, or to come to different conclusions.  

Something that I would like to discuss more in class is the move from disciplinarily to control societies, and I am interested in learning more about the idea of control societies in general. Packer (2006) cites Deluze as calling for us to "see into and before the dawning of this control society in order to prepare modes of resistance" (p. 384). Effective resistance to the control society is more than sabotage, but (again, citing Deluze) to "create vacuoles of noncommunication, circuit breakers, so we can elude control" (p. 396). I'm thinking lately about re-visiting my thesis topic (hackers) and feel like this might be an interesting way to pick up where I left off, and perhaps look at hackers as a circuit breaker.

Switching gears real quick: At the point that Innis discusses the format change from papyrus roll to parchment codex and the "system of censorship" involved (1951, p. 48), I was reminded of how changes in format can leave valuable information behind, deliberately or not. In that case, it was a ban on secular learning - these days, what gets lost seems to have a lot to do with profitability. As in, don?t trash those LP's, VHS tapes, and books - not everything makes the cut, and the move to digital means a lot of things might get lost. There are a lot of cool preservation projects out there - check out this one that asks people to send in all kinds of moving images for archiving: http://www.archive.org/details/movies.

See you all tomorrow!


*for you, Dawn.

Posted at 04:45PM Nov 07, 2007 by kfoswald in Week 11  |  Comments[43]

Week 11 - Nick

I am a bomb!  This is most certainly news to me, but it is not surprising.  Why, when I was going to SSCA this past spring, I was surprised by the fact that I had to take my shoes off in the airport.  Also, it was mildly annoying to me as it was early in the morning and I am not terribly coherant early in the morning.  "Wha?  Bomb in muh shoo?  Huh?  But now my feet're cold.  Bastard."  I think that was the extent of what ran through my mind.  Then I had to put my shoes back on and...yeah.  Kelly can attest to how NOT a morning person I am; she was there.

In that instance, until I was processed by the system I was seen as a potential 'bomb'.  Naturally, I define this term loosely as well as literally as Packer likely meant it.  A bomb is a threat to the system.  In a control society, as he stated, you are either the cog that makes the system run more safely and smoothly or the cog that has the potential of sproinging and ruining the whole thing.  (Well, he used different words, but you get the idea.)  Safety or Security.  That's what it comes down to.  Which do we prefer?  Which do we get?  According to Packer, we get both and become schizophrenic for it.  We are told to be good little cogs and cogettes in order to make things flow more smoothly, but at the same time we are told to take our shoes off in airports to make sure we don't have Weapons of Mass Destruction hidden away acquiring a nice foot odor.  And you know what?  I go along with it.  Why?  Because a control society runs on fear - the fear of the unknown, the fear of potential threats to my safety, etc.  I let them cause me a bit of inconvenience and a few cold feet so that if the guy behind me is a crazy SOB that wants to take the plane down with a stinky shoe bomb, they'll catch him and I'll be safe.  (Also, if I don't, they won't let me get on the plane.  And I've got a paper to present!)  I could fight back by avoiding surveillance technologies and practices like Packer says, and in many areas I do.  But at the same time, sometimes you've got to play by the rules of the system to get something accomplished.  It is very hard to fight a control society, which is part of why it works so well.  And you have to ask yourself...should we fight it?  Why?  If it keeps us safe...  Well, good old Ben Franklin has a great answer for that, my friend: "They who would give up an essential liberty for temporary security, deserve neither liberty or security."

The rest of the readings have their roots in the Innis reading.  Once again, we are presented with a comprehensive view of communication through the ages exposing the bias inherent in communication technology.  However, this is by the great granddaddy of them all who started it, Innis.  Carey picks up Innis's work and runs with it, citing him as the pre-eminate communication history scholar.  I find it interesting that the 'thinking with him' theme pops up a lot (well, twice, but still)  Many texts are things to think with, and yet this is a high compliment as many other texts are things that we just read.  That Carey achieved the same compliment that he paid to Innis shows how great both are in their illumination of communication technology history.  Carey pulled out the interesting tension between time and spatial organization and how the US became organized spatially in large part due to its geography.  Also, the Northeast cooridor became the most highly trafficed information highway.  Such primacy defined the US, it seems, and one has to wonder if things would have been different had it gone some other way.  Of course, now with the internet the information cooridor is online and traverses the wired world.  The playing field has been somewhat leveled and 'the world is flat' as Friedman would say.  Now we just have to worry about that pesky technological divide.

I would relate the readings to my topic, but at the moment I am drawing a blank.  I have narrowed my focus a bit to something known as 'Google Bombing' and how this has implications for how people take charge of structuring their knowledge through search engine algorythms, but the only real way that connects is through the fact that I am discussing yet another 'bomb'.  It is a disruptive influence, to be sure, and yet one outside the realm of a control society.  Indeed, it is a deviant act perhaps making a parody of a control system, and as such Google has explicitly shut down a few such bombs already.  The question is, of course, what are the implications of THAT? 

Posted at 02:26PM Nov 07, 2007 by nmtemple in Nick  |  Comments[0]

Week 11 - Jon

Jeremy Packer opens "Becoming Bombs: Mobilizing Mobility in the War of Terror" with an extension of the battlefield proper to the homes and streets of Americans: "In the US?s new war of terror a specific formation of the war machine has been turned upon its own citizenry. Citizens and non-citizens alike are now treated as an always present threat. In this sense all are imagined as combatants and all-terrain the site of battle" (378). Post 9/11, many individuals have willingly accepted restrictions on certain freedoms in exchange for a sense of safety and security. Supporters of giving unrestricted power to Homeland Security must rationalize the presence of an "Empire 'based on a state of permanent exception and police action'" (380). Images of what might happen without such a symbolic entity of security ? film clips and audio from overseas, simulations both realistic and virtual, and media speculation ? all seem to be contributing factors to why one would make sacrifices for a sense of safety.

Despite such fears, there is certainly a fascination with the potentiality of war in the streets. Many video games, for example, provide the imagery of monuments and skyscrapers as the ultimate battleground. For example, a student of mine is writing a paper on an advertisement for a video game, "World in Conflict." The ad, a two page spread, features planes engaged in a hyper-real air battle. The planes are surrounded with explosions, some of which mirror the mushroom cloud of the atomic bomb. The setting for the missile exchange is a national monument: the Statue of Liberty. At the top of the page are the words, "America the Battleground." Thus, it seems like many Americans fear a terror attack and look to Homeland Security for protection, but are, at the same time, strangely fascinated with the idea of war in our country. Of course, regardless of who is purchasing these games and simulating a virtual war in the streets, every citizen is seen as a threat: "Citizen?s become bombs, not simply by choice or through cell propaganda and training, but by Homeland Security itself" (381).  It seems the virtual allows our fears to become interactive fantasies. 

I was also interested in how, in a control society, mobility is limited through access to space. For one, obviously, I can only go where the road will take me (unless I'm off-roading in my Civic). So, I am protected from driving off of a cliff or into the ocean in Looney Tunes-esque fashion. However, mobility controls are beyond just the network of roads to which our cars seem to be affixed. Packer describes other restrictions on mobility: "the ability to be mobile, to move from one place to another, can be governed at the level of the individual" (383). These restrictions exist, but, even in the post 9/11 era of increased security, they seem to be lax, which, I assume, is a result of prioritization. There are speed limits posted everywhere, yet few people follow them. Drivers even have an assumed rule with police that 5ish mph over is not considered speeding. And, I am not going to lie, I drove my car with an expired inspection sticker for two months. So, we are constantly trouncing upon mobility restrictions and experiencing no consequences. As technology and its use for control continues to evolve, it seems we will have less and less control over mobility and will move toward what Packer terms "the dystopic vision of a control society future; all individuals fully remotely controllable" (384). The idea of remotely controlled mobility reminds me of a toy I had as a child that was a "remote control" car attached to a wire. So, the car was always grounded to a central authority, never truly mobile beyond an arm's reach. What was termed ?remote? wasn't really remote at all. Moreso in the post 9/11 era, the wire between our means of mobility and bodies of control seems to be tightening.

In "Space, Time, and Communications," James Carey provides an interesting discussion of Innis's groundbreaking interdisciplinary research. The following quote seemed particularly useful in the context of the Packer article discussed above: "Even if society were like an organism, there would be some controlling element, some centralized brain in the body, some region and group that would collect the power necessary to direct the nerves of communication and the arteries of transportation" (152). Thus, the organism, our means of mobility, the remote control car, are always being controlled and manipulated by an outside force. The means of this direction and its purpose are determined by historical and theoretical contexts. Packer and Robertson's introduction to Thinking with James Carey: Essays on Communications, Transportation, History puts the inseparable bond between history, communications, and theory nicely: "Communications theory is never to be ahistorical and communications history is never to be atheoretical" (3). Given the difficult situation surrounding resistance outlined in the conclusion to Packer's essay, how do we resist control society? Do individuals and groups of resistance run the risk of being labeled as terrorists?

Posted at 02:23PM Nov 07, 2007 by jtburr in Week 11  |  Comments[0]

Week 11 - Kelly

A few concepts in the readings this week I think are interesting to discuss in regard to our class and the CRDM program.  Privatization of education through writing and buying into security are both ideas that are thoroughly interwoven in the process of our education, in the intellectual history of communication and what we aspire to research and even teach. Just like it is problematic that when discussing visual communication (other than written text) we use written text, it seems problematic that Innis and Carey spend so much effort articulating their arguments for print and then write, ?speech is the agency of creative thought; printing of dissemination?. And though this quote is referring specifically to ?printing? and not only writing, the issue was that knowledge grows out of speech and dialogue and is active instead of possessed. I agree that during some moments writing is private but I?m not sure if it prevents active information or the formation of democratic groups. We spend a lot of time on the 701 blog trying to come up with creative thoughts and then reading our classmates? ideas. This writing seems active, it supports the discussions later in class but even if we did not meet we could respond to one another?s posts or enter a chat room.

Also, Carey (1989) points out that ?once advanced forms of communication are created ? writing, mathematics, printing, photography ? a more complicated division of labor is created and it becomes appropriate to speak of producers and consumers of knowledge? (p. 168). This issue seems so complicated to me because I feel that the roles of producers and consumers change for each individual depending on the context of a situation. Eventually I think we all hope to be producers of information about communication, rhetoric and digital media but we will still be consumers of information/entertainment about black holes or why honeybees are vanishing. Carey says ?people become consumers of communication as they become consumers of everything else? (p. 169) and that ?the very existence of a commodity such as ?information? and an institution called ?media? make each other necessary? (p. 168). I definitely agree. But I am confused about his reference of ?people? being dependent on the ?journalist, the publisher, and the program director?.  What does he mean by ?people?? Anyone who is not in those positions he listed at the time? It?s possible those consumers could be the program director some day. And just because people are consumers of the information provided by a program director I?m not sure if that automatically makes them dependent. Again, I?m thinking about this in regards to our program and how I?m not so sure by attending a class and waiting to be informed/educated we ?lose the capacity to produce knowledge for ourselves in decentralized communities of understanding? (p. 169). Maybe we feel like we are producing knowledge since our classes do take place in an oral setting (but then again more time is spent with writing outside of the classroom).

So my understanding of the ?public? is that the Chicago School saw the mass media as bringing the public into existence and then later threatening the possibility of rational discourse and enlightened public opinion (p. 145); and Innis saw the existence of the public sphere (dependent on an oral tradition of public discourse) as a necessary counterweight to printing (Carey, p. 165). I thought the mention of Nerone?s concept of moving the debate of the public sphere away from access to representation provided another interesting viewpoint when trying to understand a media that creates and both inhibits a public sphere. Packer & Robertson (2006) explain that Nerone ?argues that ?sad histories? about the decline of participation and the rise of spectacle need to be rethought ?merely? as changes in an ongoing system of representation (p. 8) since the ?public? has always been mediated the people and the public is always represented. I hope we can discuss this idea more in class.

And again, I thought the idea of a resistant strategy against surveillance was another relevant topic in regards to our 701 class. Dawn mentioned in 702 something about the CRD 701 blog popping up with Google searches (I can?t remember exactly what she said but the word ?beware? was involved). The idea of surveillance has come up quite often in our class discussion but it never really seems to concern any of us. We continue to post publicly to the class blog and many in the class not only participate in Facebook, personal blogs, but promote /sell the importance of them. I?ve had students say to me, how can you be a serious communication student and not be very active (not only a member) on Facebook? If we feel like our discipline consistently supports networked systems how can we ?have the capacities to become non-active members? (p.396)? These might not be the technologies Packer was specifically referring to but I think there is a strong connection. Critiquing a network power may not only be seen as threatening from a terror perspective but also as an attack against our own discipline (even though our discipline also spends much time illustrating how these technologies do control us).

Posted at 01:29PM Nov 07, 2007 by klnorris in General  |  Comments[0]

Week 11 - Karla

Hi all.  I will try to keep this entry from becoming too lengthy and unwieldy, focusing on just a few of the points/quotes that were particularly significant to me.

In "The Bias of Communication" Innis traces development of communication technology across geography and time.  As he states, "The relative emphasis on time or space will imply a bias of significance to the culture in which it is imbedded? (33).  Innis demonstrates through his research how various cultures throughout history used means of communication to confront issues of either space or time, depending upon factors such as politics or economics to determine which necessitated greater attention.  Are the current methods of communication in the U.S. more focused on space or time?  Obviously, the country is part of a global network community that exchanges information and ideas on a regular basis, and, therefore, bridges the spatial gap (at least to an extent).  However, the quick pace at which everyday life moves requires communication that can link people together despite temporal distances.  Is there a greater balance on the emphasis of time and space now, or can we still see a leaning toward one more so than the other?

Innis later writes, ?We can perhaps assume that the use of a medium of communication over a long period will to some extent determine the character of knowledge to be communicated and suggest that its pervasive influence will eventually create a civilization in which life and flexibility will become exceedingly difficult to maintain and that the advantages of a new medium will become such as to lead to the emergence of a new civilization? (34).  The amount of time required to be considered "a long period" presumably extends beyond a couple/few decades, but assuming that online communication continues/increases far into the future, how may we expect it to affect "the character of knowledge to be communicated"?  What signs do we see now (if we see any) of how online communication is shaping information and what such changes may indicate for the information we later value and the ways in which we value it?

Carey asserts in "Space, Time, and Communications:  A Tribute to Harold Innis," ?Even if society were like an organism, there would be some controlling element, some centralized brain in the body, some region and group that would collect the power necessary to direct the nerves of communication and the arteries of transportation.  There would be no transformation of the great society into the great community by way of disinterested technology but only in terms of the ways in which knowledge and culture were monopolized by particular groups? (152).  We have discussed power dynamics a lot throughout the semester, and I like that Carey inserts "[e]ven if" in his reference to society as an "organism" because the interest in conceiving of society in such a way seems, at least in part, driven by a desire to emphasize the interconnectedness of different groups and how individuals work together.  Nevertheless, as Carey suggests, despite cooperation, there is still some "centralized brain" that directs the other constitutive parts and that, in this way, exerts control over the others, as it may determine the means and access to the means available.

Building on the power implications, Carey later writes, "In granting freedom of the press, the Constitution sacrificed, despite the qualifying clause, the right of people to speak to one another and to inform themselves.  For such rights the Constitution substituted the more abstract right to be spoken to and to be informed by others, especially specialist, professional classes" (163).  Further, "even though literacy can give rise to a form of democracy, it also makes impossible demands.  Literacy produces instability and inconsistency because the written tradition is participated in so unevenly" (164).  Innis believed in an oral culture that enabled a greater sense of democracy, as the oral tradition "could not be easily monopolized" (166).  An oral culture may perhaps be better able to ward off the compulsion of people to "become 'consumers' of communication as they become consumers of everything else" (169).  There would still be the problem of some being better speakers than others, however, whether due to having more knowledge of a specific subject or more eloquence when speaking, and, as a result, perhaps having greater value as communicators than others. 

In their introduction, Packer and Robertson state, "Carey, a Deweyan, writing against the dominance of a transmission model, refuses to detach community from face-to-face interaction; whatever the scale, democracy depends on the foundations of group life" (7-8).  Because so much interaction/communication has shifted to forms other than face-to-face, and the groups of people who interact through those means (such as by online chat or audio) are arguably communities, do we modify our understanding of community as a result of the changes in communication or do we do so to open up the way for those advancements in communication?  Basically, do we grant "community" an elasticity because of a felt need to do so given that much communication occurs through means other than f2f, allowing us to avoid seriously restricting how we conceive of community in a time when some people are only connected by the digital?  Or, do we privilege other reasons for modifying the way we perceive of community?

Referring to Packer's work, the introduction notes, "First, transportation has become increasingly dependent upon communications at the behest of safety and security.  Second, this linkage depends upon a conceptualization of how to use transportation and communications technologies to 'govern at a distance' - that is to ensure the smooth flow of power relations across increasingly vast distances through the exertion of as little direct action as possible" (6).  Packer's "Becoming Bombs:  Mobilizing Mobility in the War on Terror" of course speaks to this subject of "govern[ing] at a distance," as he writes, "Safety as a set of practices and a legitimizing discourse has been both a goal of biopolitics and a means for ensuring discipline and implementing a control society" (379). 

Packer later argues, "When life is not equally invested as a desired ends by state and citizen alike, life is no longer only that which must be groomed and cared for, but rather it becomes a constant and immanent threat which needs diffusing or extinguishing" (381).  The ability of individuals to become bombs and to use their means of mobility to threaten the lives of others contributes to the fear of movement and the effort to use transportation as a method of governance.  As Packer states, "It is not who is a threat, but what vehicular movement can be used to predict a threat" (392).  I think the issue of mobility is particularly interesting in terms of identifying the "other" and establishing an agenda of "us" against "them" in relation to international warfare.  If we look toward the "movement" rather than the "who" to anticipate future threats, how may this impact our creation of the "enemy"?  Packer comments, "The identity of the driver is of no consequence; traditional identity categories come not to matter, only movement" (392).  I am reminded here of comments I hear people sometimes make about suicide bombers and how those statements pertain more so to the use of mobility to harm others than necessarily to the perpetrators of the violence themselves (For example, claims a suicide bomber is cowardly for using a car to blow up others as opposed to walking up to someone and killing him/her with a gun).  There is still a judgment about the person who enacted the violence, but it becomes directly linked to the method used to kill, rather than purely a reflection on how that person is perceived for wanting to destroy another. 

On a not especially connected note to what I have been saying, the reference to the "driverless automobile" (385) is really striking given that there are now vehicles that park themselves, or at least that is how they are marketed.  However, the driver still assumes responsibility to an extent, such as by being responsible for mashing the accelerator or brake.  The push to remove the driver from the vehicle seems particularly interesting in light of discussion about VR attempting to remove the creator from the program, or even negating the necessity of physical embodiment in a virtual world.  The move to extract the physical/human body from the technology opens up much room for research, and with my own paper topic about online therapy I see this to be the case.  Material I have come across argues for or against disembodiment as helpful for therapeutic communication, and, of course, there were past computer programs that users became so attached to (even though the users realized they were speaking to computers) that they continued to communicate with them as though they were "real."  How necessary is physical presence to the technology and/or to communication? 

So, I did not manage to limit the length of this post too effectively . . .

Posted at 12:41PM Nov 07, 2007 by kmlyles in General  |  Comments[0]

dawn--week 10 blog

I am becoming increasingly fixated on the body (and now the nature of humanity), and this week's readings give me additional ways to talk about those things.  Just as the Wiley and Hillis readings did last week, Adams's (2005) "The World of the Extensible Self" directly addresses the problem of the body for discussions of self and the virtual.  Adams writes, "The self is less and less a direct outgrowth of the body or the conditions of one's family or birthplace.  It is more and more a product of the intricate path a life has etched through space" (12).  He acknowledges the importance of the body in punishment (imprisonment, death) and as a "source of pleasure in occupations," but "the potential to maintain disembodied relationships is constantly growing" (12).  And, most strikingly, "New media such as the Internet (and older ones such as the telephone) provide an increasing range of ways to communicate without being an embodied actor" (12).  It seems that the body--beyond our senses of sight and hearing--is still good for the most basic of things (pain and pleasure, acting as a sort of life-support system for the self), but the mind is privileged over the body, and the work of communicating is privileged over physical work.  I think that is what strikes me most, the idea that communicating is being, that being able to communicate without embodiment further marginalizes the need for an actual body.  I understand that this is all theoretical, that there is no self without the body, but I think it has some interesting implications, implications that make me feel a little uneasy.  My uneasiness at this is strange, as a disembodied world probably serve me well.  My body is aging, and my physical strength is waning.  In a disembodied world, these facts are insignificant (except that severe arthritis runs in my family and I already suffer from discomfort while typing for extended periods of time).  In addition, I am no longer tied to my physical sex.  In my previous work life, I held a director-level position with a small company.  While in meetings with people who did not know who I was, I was asked (on more than one occasion) to retrieve coffee or set-up A/V equipment for the group.  Onscreen, this is not an issue.

So why the uneasiness?  I think it's rooted in the definition of humanity.  If so much of what it means to be human is increasingly tied, and I am borrowing from this week's 702 readings here, to social action, then what does it mean if social action is a mediated, and increasingly networked, activity in which "we are the new networks" (Adams, 2005, p. 10).  I think one more important question raised in "Network Topologies" (Adams, 1998), and continued in "The World of the Extensible Self" (Adams, 2005), is the issue of sensation, in Adams's words, "what importance, if any, we can attribute to the sensory differences between direct experience and computer-mediated experience" (Adams, 1998, p. 99).  He points out that our (American) experience is one of "sensorial impoverishment," reminding the reader that our experience of the world is primarily visual (p. 100).  So, if even our experience of the physical world is primarily visual, and most of the "work" of being human is conducted through the act of communication, perhaps making our selves more and more performative, then (to complete a poor segue)  what separates the sociologist from the door closer? 

Latour (1995), in his discussion of the "anthropomorphic," points out that the groom is 1) a human construction, 2) a substitute for the human actor, and 3) prescriptive of human action.  The groom acts as a nonhuman lieutenant, standing in, and acting, for the human actor.  I am reminded here of Adams's discussion of "cycling through," "a person's ability to alternate quickly among several identities" (1998, p. 100).  Through computer mediation, we are able to assume multiple identities simultaneously, blurring the lines between personal and public selves, almost acting as our own lieutenants.  As these lines get blurred, and bodies become less important, the concept of humanity becomes increasingly problematized.  We could point to morality as a human construction and a mark of humanity, but as Latour notes, "In spite of the constant weeping of moralists, no human is as relentlessly moral as a machine, especially if it is (she is, he is, they are) as 'user friendly' as my computer" (p. 263).  In some ways, it is as if technology created our selves (provided us with the ability to self-analyze, to historicize, to be discrete) and that new media, especially networked technologies, are recreating us.

Posted at 08:02PM Oct 31, 2007 by drshephe in General  |  Comments[0]

Week 10--Jayna

I'll start of like Nick usually does--with a quote: ?We are entering an era of electronically extended bodies living at the intersection points of the physical and virtual worlds?? (Adams, p. 88). That one quote could perpetuate hours of conversation among us (perhaps it already has!).

And, I must include this ANALOGY?communication system: communicators :: place: inhabitants (Adams, p. 89) (yay!)

Adams ?nodes? and ?links? used to create topologies of communication can be likened to James Grunig?s public relations research on excellent communication. Grunig addresses the one-way, two-way asymmetrical, and two-way symmetrical views of communication.  Two-way symmetrical efforts are most effective and beneficial to the parties involved, according to his discoveries. (Grunig, Excellence in Public Relations and Communication Management, 1992)  I was surprised that I didn?t see Grunig in the reference list of 1998 Adams piece, and would be curious to see if there are references in the 2005 book.  Symmetrical (using research to manage conflict and improve understanding) and Asymmetrical (using research to persuade) are used ?to describe the purpose of public relations as striving for balanced rather than unbalanced communication and effects? (Grunig, p. 287)  Later, Grunig says that the asymmetrical  should not be perceived as unethical or as an ineffective means to persuasion (p, 310).  However, it may not be the most direct route to persuasion either. 

The File Search, Computer Bulletin Board, and Computer Forum as described by Adams could be both persuasive and informational (except the file search, that would focus on the informational). The notion of designating topographical models (p. 91-93) for each of the social spaces is interesting perspective to me.  The sense of place, especially from a geographer?s perspective, is one that I?d not given any thought to before the last couple of weeks.  Adams puts it pretty directly, ??nodes can, and often do, move from location to location without affecting the topology of the ?virtual place,? and often cyberspace?s ?occupants? interact with no idea of each other?s locations?? (p. 98). To me, the social space diagrams are another variety of communication models, but emphasize the advantages to the interdisciplinary nature of communication. When we can take a look at our field?s natural topics from another perspective we can gain a great deal.

Similar to last week?s discussion, we see in Adams a recognition of priority on the visual sense, and adds an interesting comment, ??in everyday life, nearly all of what is apprehended in one sensory mode is taken to be real without resorting to other modes for verification? (p. 99).  He goes on to emphasize that we are even encouraged to only focus on a single sense at a time?I think of my research topic of typography here.  What we see provides us will all sorts of connotation, feeling, and even judgment. Type becomes part of that in cyberspace, as in many interfaces, type (and the words they create) is the visual we have to build our perceptions.  I also love the notion Adams brings about that in cyberspace we can be many different personalities, if you will, at once?but in physical space we can really only ?be? one at a time (p. 100). I?ve really got to put some more thought into linking the Castells and Latours pieces to Adams?s work that we examine this week. I pulled several quotes that I found to be food for thought, and I will share those merely as quotes in case others note the same ones and we can discuss in class. 

I?ll bring my others tomorrow, but here are a couple:

Latour mentions the necessity of physical place in order to contribute to the cyber-place??As for the computer user input, the cursor might flash forever without the user being there or knowing what to do?? (p. 272). Latour also recognizes the importance of delegation in our lives with nonhuman as will as the need for each other in communication with these two gems? Walls are nice, but the door is the miracle of technology. We delegate the door?s work to the hinge. (p. 258 & 259)
??humans, nonhumans, and even angels are never sufficient in themselves and because there is no one direction going from one type of delegation to the other?..? (p. 269)
Castells stresses the importance of technology?s role in communication as well as the link between technology and power??Economies throughout the world have become globally interdependent?new relationship between economy, state, and society, in a system of variable geometry? (p. 1).  ?Environmental consciousness has permeated down to the institutions of society? won political appeal, at the price of being belied and manipulated in the daily practice of corporations and bureaucracies? (p. 3).  And of course, ??technology expresses the ability of a society to propel itself into technological mastery through the institutions of society, including the state? (p. 13).  I look forward to our discussion and teleconference, and will have a few questions prepared.

Posted at 06:12PM Oct 31, 2007 by jrjackso in General  |  Comments[0]

Week 10 - Christin

Latour writes ?Do this, Do that, Behave this way, Don?t go that way.  Such sentences look very much like a programming language.? (263)  Whether you consider this as a set of instructions given to a human user/worker or a nonhuman groom, as he calls them, it?s an interesting thought.  Machines must engage us as machines in order to understand us, we must program machines with a set of instructions to try and simulate humans.  An interesting dichotomy we seem to have going, and I wonder which goal comes first?  Do we need to think like machines in order to create machines or did we need to create machines to