HW:15 Blog Posts

Jacob's Blog

Very concise and well written explanation of the text. I could tell that you read this text to get the message but you also took it with a grain of salt. The most interesting idea you have here is this idea that any of these things can develop us further, but only when its distilled or concentrated or when you filter out the "crap" in it.

I like this idea a lot, but I'm not clear on what this "crap" is. What aspects of video games or TV or the internet inhibit our mental development and what aspects of it increase our mental development? What does this "crap" do to people? does it erase the mental development that was gained, or take a step back from it? are there any examples of video games or TV shows that don't have any peripheral garbage that inhibits our mental development?

Even if we could avoid the extra "fluff" would people still enjoy video games and TV etc.? Is there any way to have the mental development without the extra garbage? Does this extra "fluff" exist in books, maybe even people?

This idea you brought up was very interesting and could expand in many different ways and could become a post on its own, although I would have liked to see you expand on this interesting idea, great post though, and keep up the good work

Beatrice's Blog

I like your idea about how "Feed" is a nail and we're the hammer. People tend to be lazy and think that books will change the world for them but you at least have the idea that we have to take initiative if we want to make real change in our world.

I'm curious as to what you want to change in the world and how you would go about doing it, try to expand on your idea more, but all in all good post

"Everything Bad is Good for you" response

The large excerpt of this book covered topics like TV, Video Games and the Internet, saying that they all grew more complex over time and show that people are becoming smarter for engaging in these mediums. Steven Johnson said that video games increased strategic thinking in gamers, teaching them to think in task/reward lines, "If I do this, this will happen, then this will happen" etc. Video Games were also said to be a good way of teaching things, his son who wouldn't have learned about the relationships between taxes and the wealth of a certain neighborhood in classroom, but instead learned it playing "The Sims". TV shows were shown to have more complex plots and make the viewer think about things that weren't shown to get jokes or understand the plot of an episode. Complex TV shows teach their viewers to look past the obvious things and understand the subtext of the plot.

I agree with most of what he says in this text, it all seems to make sense and I understand how each of these mediums can have these different positive effects on us. It's also very refreshing to hear positive perspectives on topics like TV, the Internet and Video Games. I agree with this idea, however he didn't expand on the idea behind the relationship between the complexity of the medium and how the audience develops. People will get smarter in different ways using different mediums, but the medium isn't what makes people smarter, the quality of said medium has more to do with the positive effects than the actual way its distributed. I believe that any medium can convey a complex story, provoke thoughts and engage the audience, likewise it's also possible that the medium has a poorly written story, no new ideas or concepts and is boring and poorly made. The point I'm trying to get across is that anything can be made poorly or made well, the medium its contained in effects the way its shown, with video games the story or idea will be interacted with, with reading it will be absorbed and imagined by the reader etc. People learn from complex things, the way its shown to the audience does matter, but not as much as the complexity of the subject.

Steven Johnson makes points that praise technology which contrasts "Feed" however they don't contrast the specific points that "Feed" makes. "Feed" essentially says that technology sorts people into groups and sell things to those people and destroys their individuality, that same technology makes out culture obsessed with ridiculous fads even if they're stupid or expensive. Steven Johnson didn't make points countering those, he praised technology for its ability to make people smarter as its subjects become more complex. "Feed" states that technology and corporations distract people from what's real and important, Steven argues that people get smarter from technology because the complexity of the subjects represented by those technologies make people smarter. They both argue opposing view points but for completely different reasons.

Feed Art Response

M.T. Anderson made many decisions when he wrote "Feed". Each decision he made was used to get a certain point or idea across. The most obvious of these ideas is the use of Titus' and Violet's contrasting backgrounds, this is used to contrast our modern culture with their futuristic culture. Also it wouldn't make any sense story wise to have Titus go around learning about his world since he's already seen it, he had to show another character around to show the reader his world. The reader is meant to see the world as Violet sees it.

Even though the reader is supposed to view things the way Violet does, Titus is still the main character and the book is written from his perspective. Obviously so we can see how the Feed works for a normal teen but also to see how a normal teen thinks in this world. Titus will say things like "We went to moon to have some fun, but it turned out to totally suck" which put things into perspective. Violet is too relatable since she reflects our time, but Titus is spoiled by his Feed and to get the full effect that the Feed has on the normal person, the reader has to see a normal person with the Feed and how they think.

Throughout the book Violet teaches Titus how to think outside the box and evaluate his culture. Violet is the voice of reason who reminds Titus that his culture is flawed. Titus also teaches Violet about the convenience of the modern (futuristic for us) world. This is to illustrate that technology has two sides to it. The culturally detrimental side which spoils our culture and makes us obsessed with consuming and following fads, and the productive entertaining side of it. The majority was the bad kind in the book but Violet seemed entertained by the new technology.

Violet's death symbolized how people who don't catch up with technology are ultimately left behind, everyone depends on technology, specifically new technology. Whatever phone, TV, gaming system etc. has to be new, Violet's Feed was an older model that was implanted late in her life, her failure to catch up to the technology of the times killed her. The overall message of the book was that excessive use of technology will destroy (or already has destroyed) our culture, and our dependence on technology makes it impossible to go back unless we question the effect it has on our culture and if that's something we really want.

Feed Response

"Feed" being a science fiction novel has many exaggerations, and in some cases exact parallels, to modern society mainly in the case of teen life and technology. The Feed itself is used to represent the convenience of modern technology. The Feed is an allegory for phones, internet, video games, television, instant messaging, and online auction sites like Ebay. The Feed allows people to communicate telepathically (through "m-chatting"), buy anything online, watch movies, research anything and even share memories.

The obvious parallel to this is the internet and tv, the most "Feed-like" electronic out there today is the iphone, with its thousands of Apps it can do virtually anything, on top of that it has internet, phone, music and a camera. In my own personal life I don't have an iphone, or sidekick so I can't IM people constantly like they do in "Feed" (IMing being a downgraded version of M-chatting) nor can I play games whenever I want etc. The phone I do have I use mostly to text and call, which I don't do as often as most people and not nearly as often as the characters in "Feed" do. However I do mimic the technology by IMing when I'm at home, watching movies on my laptop, playing video games and using the internet a lot.

Like anything there are positives and negatives, with the Feed the user sacrifices their individuality for convenience. This is mainly because the Feed effects the users thoughts with constant advertisements, corporations sell things based on what people are like, they reflect what they buy and so and so on. Because he Feed users lose their individuality they follow ridiculous fads. The obsession with something thats stupid yet entertaining, in Feed the fads that people follow, in real life pop culture, comes from an over stimulation of media. When teens can talk about the same stupid thing at the same time they're more likely to. While the majority of teens specifically exhibit this behavior there are a minority of teens who question this, mainly our class since we do this in school. Weather or not this is because society hasn't collapsed yet or technology isn't as socially detrimental as it seems has yet to be seen.

Digitalization Experiment

For my experiment I chose to have no digital stimulation at all, in my case this would include, internet, TV and video games. Instead of watching TV, going on the computer and playing video games, I read comic books, snacked a lot and cleaned out and organized my desk and back pack.

Most people would see this behavior as a way of "filling" the time i used to occupy with digital entertainment, which is technically true. But I didn't feel all that bored during my experiment, I just knew I had extra time and should clean out my desk. This behavior isn't specific to the exclusion of digital entertainment though, if I excluded a non-digital activity from my day and had time where I wasn't doing anything I'd do something that was productive but not necessarily mandatory.

I learned that, at least for me personally, the digital world isn't that addictive. If you have a non-digital activity to pursue instead. However people get too attached to TV and face book and their video games that they forget what to do when its gone. If there's anything I've learned from this experiment it's that you should never be too dependent on anything, computers can crash and internet can go out, but non-digital activities are much more reliable. While digital entertainment is fun, people shouldn't depend on it, entertainment should be a mix of physical and digital stimulation (for the majority of us that enjoy digital entertainment)

Video Post Comments on Comments

Beatrice's Comment

Thanks for the comment, Based on your summary of my work I can tell I was clear with my ideas and I'm glad I made you think a new thought, it feel good when someone can build off of my work and create their own thoughts and extend them etc. However I felt as though you could give a bit more criticism, you were able to summarize my ideas well but you didn't tell me what I had to wrk on. Thanks for the comment though

Jacob's Comment

Thanks for the constructive comment. I mainly thought about how the same behavior can be linked to non-digital activities, but you said that some non-digital activities might be better for us. This flips the assignment around, we were asked to study our behavior when immersed in digital activity, implying that our behavior is different from normal, your extension of my original thought makes the behavior constant but the activity varied. The behavior we exhibit when immersed in something will always be consistent. The purpose of these comments is to expand on each others ideas and create new insights, which I think we've been doing very well, nice comment, I look forward to reading your new posts

Internet Research on Video Games

The main question I asked in my research was, what effect do Video Games have on people, mentally and physically.

1) http://serendip.brynmawr.edu/exchange/node/1742

This source studied the effect that video games had on the brain and body, video games were reported to make people less reserved about their emotions, people would physically hurt each other in competitive gaming or damage the controller or gaming system when playing alone, this behavior was also seen in public at arcades, which indicates that not only are gamers more aggressive, but they also have less ability to retrain themselves even in public.

I've seen some of this behavior personally but I think the basis of this behavior is frustration, which can be experienced towards almost anything, if you get frustrated to a certain point you won't care if you're in public. If people could restrain their frustration before then there wouldn't be any fights. Video games don't invent frustration, although they do increase it, this behavior isn't invented by video games, but the difficulty of them makes frustration more common.

2) http://www.betanews.com/article/Study-Violent-Video-Games-Affect-the-Brain/1164746751

This source specifies the differences between violent and non-violent video games. The violent video game decreased brain function in the areas of self control, focus and concentration, whereas these functions in the brain of someone who played a non-violent game weren't effected.

In my own experience of playing violent games, very rarely will these games make you think, most of the time they rely on aiming skills ( as most of these are first person shooters) and quick reaction time, neither of which requires any thought. While there are some violent games that force players to think, mostly in the stealth action or strategy genre, most violent games are based on war, where the player assumes the role of a soldier who follows orders and doesn't think about what they're doing. This article listed "Call of Duty" as the game used in this experiment, had they chosen a strategy game that was still violent they would have gotten more brain stimulation in the thinking and logic areas.

3) http://www.cyh.com/HealthTopics/HealthTopicDetails.aspx?p=243&np=295&id=2375

This site listed the positives and negatives of violent video games and being immersed in virtual realities. Like the two previous sources, it said that violent games made people more aggressive, it also stated that the risk in violent video games of death stimulated the "'fight or flight' response" and gave the gamer an increase in adrenaline, much like real life risking situations. The article stated that being immersed in a virtual world caused people to do poorly in school and gain weight, since they aren't moving. It listed positives for video games included social interaction and enjoyment, some games increased problem solving abilities and mental stimulation in gamers and increased hand-eye coordination.

I think all of these things are true but video games can't be broken up into just violent and non-violent, they should be studied according to genre, as I said before violent video games contain more than just the shooter genre, they can consist of stealth action, strategy, role playing, fighting and adventure games. People tend to just use violent video games as a scapegoat, but not all of these games are mindless killing sprees, some require thought and strategy. The gamer becoming immersed in these violent worlds isn't the fault of the game of itself, but the fault of the gamer who may not have a great life in the real world, or the parents who ignore their children and let this kind of behavior happen.

4) http://www.tastyhuman.com/10-benefits-of-playing-video-games/

This source is a blog that lists positive effects video games have on gamers. It listed benefits like creative stimulation, hand-eye coordination, empathy for other players and more accurate vision. The blog cited a study that tested the dexterity and hand eye coordination of surgeons who played video games and surgeons who don't, the surgeons who did had better hand eye coordination and performed more successful surgeries.

This blog gave evidence that video games offer some sort of physical health benefit through coordination, meaning that all video games, not just the wii, have some sort of health benefit in the form of hand eye coordination.

I agree with some of these ideas, but most of the articles I've seen have cited experiments and tests that use the basic grouping of violent and non-violent, I'd like to see these tests done with a wider variety of genres and games tested. I'd also like to see the effects on different subjects, who have a variety of different physical activities they pursue and social lives in and out of these digital worlds.