I'm not sure which is more interesting, the assigned reading or reading the blog. There are so many directions to take and questions to ask. I have to agree with some of those who've expressed their frustrations with the work required to achieve much in SL (I have little patience for or interest in building things given how precious time is to me in the RW), BUT, that's why we're an interdisciplinary class -- I hope. I'm counting on team members who love to build! I'm trying to keep the perspective of potential. Take for example the following Powerpoint presentation (I hope the link opens for you)! I haven't checked its stats for accuracy, but the point is made...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ljbI-363A2Q
Along the same lines, there's a wonderful book out there by Henry Jenkins from Compartive Media Studies at MIT called Convergence Culture. (I know a few of you have had this as assigned reading for an MMC class) I most highly recommend it! It will make you think about how all the current traditional media are beginning to incorporate new media in their distribution mix in order to be competitive (think CSI/New York in SL). Also, given the current writer's strike in Hollywood and the debates surrounding their future, especially given the options now available online for entertainment, I don't think we can ignore the impact of VW technologies on our future, for information, entertainment and commerce. Just look at what the internet and blogs have done to the news industry!
As for the question of addiction, it's HUGE and a study all its own. I can't help but think that video game/MMOG addiction is no different than any other addiction. It's always about escape, and as long as people feel they must escape their reality (even if for a brief amount of time), they will find a way, whether through drugs, alcohol, television, exercise, food, sex... well, you get the picture... I'll go back to what we discussed last week. There's GOT to be balance!
Then, finally, perhaps many of you saw the post in the Slrl Digest listserv regarding the conference at Emory. Any interest in a possible roadtrip? Pre-registration is required... and there's no cost for registration. The link to the event is:
http://www.events.emory.edu/Output/FewDetail.cfm?EventID=21592&TheDate=to%5Fdate%28%2722%2DJan%2D2008%27%2C%27DD%2DMON%2DYYYY%27%29
6 comments:
Donna,
A roadtrip to the Emory Conference would be fun! I'll bring it up in class today.
As for VW's being an escape from reality, you are then saying that RL is their reality. Yee's studies have shown that many users of VWE's give their VW address as their permanent address, and say they are citizens of that VW. So for them, maybe RL is the escape, or perhaps its just a necessary place to go to infrequently to acquire food, money, etc.?
Indeed, you've got to be able to eat and keep the power on in order to keep your body and the machine on, which requires RL activity. I recently wrote an explication of "digital social capital" arguing that it is in fact possible to build social capital in a digital world, something Robert Putnam (Harvard, "Bowling Alone)and many others would argue is impossible. Do we give up one for the other or can it be possible to have a healthy dose of both?
Donna,
I like to ask where the line is concerning addiction. Despite my grumblings about second life, and the fact that i have few friends i talk to in game (Im mostly interested in building things because of the nature of my degree being a digital artist and a game developer...), Im still kind of obsessed with SL. I hate the tools and how crappy it runs on my shit laptop but it def has potential.
Hi Javahawk,
I was actually responding to several addiction references in the blog (including your Wendy ref)as well as what I question in the Castranova reading. After discussing the number of hours people spend in a typical week in Noarrath, Castronova wrote, "To a large and growing number of people, virtual worlds are an important source of material and emotional well-being" (p.3). If they find emotional support in VW's that they don't find in RL, who's to say that's bad? However, when it replaces RL relationships (including children and marriages as we also heard in class today), that can't be a good thing. But as I think it was you who mentioned, it's not VW's that create the problem, it's people. There have always been RL issues that have seperated people.
And, I certainly didn't mean to suggest that everyone who spends all their time in a VW is addicted to it, although clearly that can be a problem for some. I spend an inordinate amount of time on my work (including school work -- including exploring SL), because I find great pleasure in it (perhaps a bit of escape as well) from the perspective of someone who's on an exploration... or adventure... thus the title of my original post. Hopefully that will yield a very productive outcome!
On the question of balance that Donna mentions, i found an interesting French site which is like a round table for discussing just that. If you speak or read French there is a lot more info, if not click the "your language" button and at least you can read a description of their position:
www.lafabriquedufutur.org/TablesRondesduFutur.html
One of the interesting threads that runs through the blog is that of "reality" vs. whatever. I would like to point out that whether you are wasted by an overdose, mesmerized by Halo or the game du jour, watching a movie or TV etc. THAT is reality. When you are walking or flying around in SL for a couple of hours, it is 2 hours of your life that you have lived "in reality". THe same holds true with dreams, which are the perfect "virtual reality" but also a full third of your entire life! can't get more real than that. No matter how you parse your life, in years, or heartbeats etc. the fact is that no matter what you do you are spending your most precious capital, that of your own life, something we fail to take into account way too often.
That is why these conversations are so valuable. We are here not to "sell" SL to anyone, but to discuss critical issues that have to do with our life, our world and what we are leaving behind as ancestors of the next generations for centuries to come.
THe time we live in is radically different form anything the human race has experienced before, and like the video you linked says, we are living in exponential times, (Kurzweill would says that it is in fact double-exponential and has a lot of data to support it). What that means (and the video makes that painfully clear) is that nor we or anybody has enough time to even consider what is happening because we are in fact riding an avalanche or a wave so big and fast that we are unable to comprehend it or even notice it and therefore we just go about our business like if nothing is happening.I just thought of how a tsunami wave like the one that caused so much destruction (and which we seem to have forgotten already since it is not in TV anymore) cannot even be felt by a ship at sea, because of the scale or length of the wave. Only when it encounters land do we realize too late that we are doomed.
We should be able to step back, get away from the keyboard and the mouse, take a trip, do something we have never done before, and think...is this the best we can do?
We cannot avoid the technology, since it already exists, but what we can do is decide, one person at a time, the same as in politics, what are we going to use it for. Is it even possible to take control of these technologies? or is it too late since they are already in the hands of those who would not mind the destruction of the entire planet just to make a trillion bucks?
And yes, a trip to the Emory Conference would be fun.
One more thing, can we ask ourselves, if what we do or create, if the resources and materials we utilize (or tools or technologies) create in fact a net-worth value from an ethical, environmental point of view. If not is our responsibility any less because a billion people don't seem to care, or are unaware of the implications of their own actions?
Buckminster Fuller, that extraordinary American visionary, inventor, designer, poet and what not, asked himself: "Does humanity have a chance to survive lastingly and successfully on planet Earth, and if so, how?" and made that the principal driving force of his work. Everything he did or designed was for the good of the most, considering of course the methods, materials and all the ethical and environmental considerations mentioned above.
We will talk about his work in relation to your projects and how to approach and consider these all important questions when you embark in any kind of design.
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