My last blog post was immediately after the birth of our son, Gus. That was just over six months ago. Clearly the timing of my return to blogging couldn’t have been worse.
I am still interested in keeping a blog to collect my media and technology studies thoughts. But it will have to wait until the always-on madness of being a guy in his early 30s—with an infant son, a challenging job, and a house in constant need of repair and upgrade—calms down a little. I’ll leave you with a link to a new media studies syllabus written by Christina Dunbar-Hester and published in the Atlantic. There’s a fantastic reading list attached:
http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2010/09/beyond-mcluhan-your-new-media-studies-syllabus/63061/
Until next time!
Tuesday, October 5, 2010
Sunday, April 4, 2010
Myths and big pictures
I recently finished Roland Barthes’ Mythologies. Early in “Myth Today,” the meaty text that comprises the last third of the book, Barthes gives a rigorous and brilliant semiotic analysis of the unique, multi-layered form of representation that he calls myth.
Mythologies is a thin book at just 159 pages, but it took me five years to read. For most of that time, I had it lying around the house or stuffed in my backpack. If I was bored, I might read one of the book’s numerous short essays, in which Barthes makes all sorts of clever observations about the contemporary world. A couple of months ago, I resolved to work my way through “Myth Today,” where he makes explicit the theory underpinning his critique of culture.
After carefully disassembling the mechanisms of our everyday myths, Barthes does away with restraint in order to make a series of far-reaching Marxist claims about French culture. In the age after Popper, this kind of analysis—presented without so much as an acknowledgment of controversy—comes off as poorly justified, even naïve.
Extravagance is a weakness of Continental philosophy in general. The genius of Hegel was in recognizing that logic is historical: the negation of an idea is a time-bound act that results in a new form of consciousness; it can no more be reversed than the shattering of a glass. The madness of Hegel was in positing that history is logical, that the events of the French Revolution, for instance, were a priori inevitable.
The reaction of the analytic philosophers to Continental philosophy—and to the excesses of Hegel in particular—was to cut to the bone, stripping away speculative reasoning in favor of a rigor and clarity that pretends to the accuracy of mathematics. But if they got rid of the fat, they also git rid of the meat. Analytics write with extraordinary precision but very little consequence.
We must find a way to take the better insights of our philosophers and apply them to broader concerns in ways that don’t come off as silly. I see an opportunity here for naturalistic philosophy. For instance, is there a way to operationalize Barthes’ claim that late-20th century France was a bourgeois society? Or that left-wing political speech tends to be a poor vehicle for mythological linguistic structures?
Barthes the sociologist seems to recognize this potential himself when he laments, near the end of “Myth Today,” the lack of an “analytical sociology of the press” as a basis for exploring the spread of myth.
Mythologies is a thin book at just 159 pages, but it took me five years to read. For most of that time, I had it lying around the house or stuffed in my backpack. If I was bored, I might read one of the book’s numerous short essays, in which Barthes makes all sorts of clever observations about the contemporary world. A couple of months ago, I resolved to work my way through “Myth Today,” where he makes explicit the theory underpinning his critique of culture.
After carefully disassembling the mechanisms of our everyday myths, Barthes does away with restraint in order to make a series of far-reaching Marxist claims about French culture. In the age after Popper, this kind of analysis—presented without so much as an acknowledgment of controversy—comes off as poorly justified, even naïve.
Extravagance is a weakness of Continental philosophy in general. The genius of Hegel was in recognizing that logic is historical: the negation of an idea is a time-bound act that results in a new form of consciousness; it can no more be reversed than the shattering of a glass. The madness of Hegel was in positing that history is logical, that the events of the French Revolution, for instance, were a priori inevitable.
The reaction of the analytic philosophers to Continental philosophy—and to the excesses of Hegel in particular—was to cut to the bone, stripping away speculative reasoning in favor of a rigor and clarity that pretends to the accuracy of mathematics. But if they got rid of the fat, they also git rid of the meat. Analytics write with extraordinary precision but very little consequence.
We must find a way to take the better insights of our philosophers and apply them to broader concerns in ways that don’t come off as silly. I see an opportunity here for naturalistic philosophy. For instance, is there a way to operationalize Barthes’ claim that late-20th century France was a bourgeois society? Or that left-wing political speech tends to be a poor vehicle for mythological linguistic structures?
Barthes the sociologist seems to recognize this potential himself when he laments, near the end of “Myth Today,” the lack of an “analytical sociology of the press” as a basis for exploring the spread of myth.
Saturday, February 20, 2010
CHAT 2010: The Art of Gaming
A giant banner of Fruit Fucker greets you as you enter the gallery, setting the tone. This is fun stuff. There are many pieces that fall into the illustration category, including several examples of game concept art and a large mixed media sculpture entitled Snot Rocket. A pair of paintings by Andy Foltz celebrate the LMAOness of online gaming chat.
There are a few contemplative pieces, too. 30 Years of Disappointment by Plastic Flame Press has a “seven ages of man” feel to it: a comic-strip lithograph features a young man maturing alongside his video game systems, before finally returning to Pong in middle age. (Jesper Juul, in his talk this afternoon, mentioned a “standard video game model” by which games were sold on the basis of increased complexity and improved graphics, from around 1980 until the explosion of casual games circa 2005).
The art:
There are a few contemplative pieces, too. 30 Years of Disappointment by Plastic Flame Press has a “seven ages of man” feel to it: a comic-strip lithograph features a young man maturing alongside his video game systems, before finally returning to Pong in middle age. (Jesper Juul, in his talk this afternoon, mentioned a “standard video game model” by which games were sold on the basis of increased complexity and improved graphics, from around 1980 until the explosion of casual games circa 2005).
The art:
- Penny Landing by Penny Arcade
- Environmental Concepts by Adam Capps for Spark Plug Games
- The Gorgon by Adam Capps
- Love the One You’re With by Jessica Fielhauer
- Snot Rocket by Lee Williamson
- The Eyes Have It by Lee Williamson
- Donkey Kong NYC by Paul Frederick
- Game Dogs by Jessica Fielhauer and George Palmer for The Escapist
- Bare Druids by Andy Foltz
- Caterday Nite is All Rite for Fite by Andy Foltz
- Make it Rain by Sean Kernick
- Concept Images from Ratchet and Clank Future: A Crack in Time by Insomniac
- Choose Your Avatar by Marc Russo
- Points by Adam Capps
- 30 Years of Disappointment by Plastic Flame Press
Thursday, February 18, 2010
CHAT 2010: Transforming Narratives
I’ll refer you, first, to a great piece of commentary that has emerged from this talk: Whitney Trettien’s Digital Storytelling, Zola, Experimentalism, and the Scientific Method. Trettien knows literature, and places Michael Young’s work and Katherine Hayles’ thoughts in a historical and theoretical context.
The only thought that I might add is somewhat techno-utopian. Our lives are not intrinsically meaningful or teleological; we don’t have purposes, per se, except insofar as we create our own—a state of affairs that may be satisfactory to the existentialists among us, but one which many people will never successfully come to terms with. One of the many ways in which literature has functioned has been to create the relief of structured narrative: an immersive world where purposeful events take place. Sometimes, we create such narratives by selective remembrance of actual events, creating histories and myths.
Young’s games are designed to anticipate possible user actions and find ways to incorporate these actions while still moving the story to its predetermined narrative conclusion. As people spend more of their lives online, intersubjectively transforming virtual worlds into real ones, I can imagine a future where such systems, augmented with tremendous computing power, will allow people to carry out much of their lives within teleological narrative structures—meaningful existence, delivered by technology.
The accompanying dystopian thought: who will be the meaning-makers for these anti-existentialists, and how can we be sure that these narrative storytellers will have everyone’s best interests at heart?
The only thought that I might add is somewhat techno-utopian. Our lives are not intrinsically meaningful or teleological; we don’t have purposes, per se, except insofar as we create our own—a state of affairs that may be satisfactory to the existentialists among us, but one which many people will never successfully come to terms with. One of the many ways in which literature has functioned has been to create the relief of structured narrative: an immersive world where purposeful events take place. Sometimes, we create such narratives by selective remembrance of actual events, creating histories and myths.
Young’s games are designed to anticipate possible user actions and find ways to incorporate these actions while still moving the story to its predetermined narrative conclusion. As people spend more of their lives online, intersubjectively transforming virtual worlds into real ones, I can imagine a future where such systems, augmented with tremendous computing power, will allow people to carry out much of their lives within teleological narrative structures—meaningful existence, delivered by technology.
The accompanying dystopian thought: who will be the meaning-makers for these anti-existentialists, and how can we be sure that these narrative storytellers will have everyone’s best interests at heart?
Wednesday, February 17, 2010
CHAT 2010: The Bathysphere
Perhaps I would not have been as underwhelmed by the Bathysphere if I had not seen Robert Bach’s demonstration of Project Natal yesterday. The two projects invite comparison: each attempts to translate real-world motion into virtual motion. While Natal uses the body itself, the Bathysphere tracks the motion of three objects—a geodesic “beach ball,” a fishing rod, and a multicolored umbrella—and translates the user’s interactions with these objects into the movements of computer-generated sea life projected onto the walls of the exhibit.
The octopus, ray, and school of fish mimic the movements of their respective controlling objects, but do not allow the user to interact any more deeply with the virtual environment. Effectively, they are cursors, with the ball, rod, and umbrella functioning as novelty trackballs. Building this system must have been a tremendous technical challenge; hopefully, more will be done with it with time.
Edit: HASTACer Adam Rogers has a more positive take, including a video of the Bathysphere here.
The octopus, ray, and school of fish mimic the movements of their respective controlling objects, but do not allow the user to interact any more deeply with the virtual environment. Effectively, they are cursors, with the ball, rod, and umbrella functioning as novelty trackballs. Building this system must have been a tremendous technical challenge; hopefully, more will be done with it with time.
Edit: HASTACer Adam Rogers has a more positive take, including a video of the Bathysphere here.
CHAT 2010: User Driven: Does Size Matter?
Panelist Paul Jones took control of the discussion early, and didn’t let go. Seizing on moderator Paolo Mangiafico’s contrast between “lean back” (large screen: broadcast consumption) and “lean forward” (small screen: conversation participation) modes of media interaction, Jones pointed out the awkward middle space that the panel discussion itself occupied: a simulation of a small conversation being shown to a large audience. Jones stepped down from the stage in order to address the audience more directly.
Two of the panelists, Russ Pitts and Ross White, followed him down. Panelist William Shaw and Mangiafico stayed behind on stage, creating a visual contrast that corresponded roughly to the positions that the panelists took on new media. Jones, Pitts, and White all seemed open to the value of audience participation and social media; Shaw emphasized that the William Blake Archives, the project on which he works, is a “large screen” project designed to provide high-resolution tools to the lone scholar, whether professional or amateur.
Here are a few of the many points Jones made in his near-total domination of the talk:
The paradox of the mobile internet is that it doesn’t matter where you are, but it matters more where you are. The Internet closes distance and levels geographical distinctions, but because you’re accessing the Internet on a mobile device, the people you’re communicating with can’t assume that your physical body is tethered to your office or home. People on the mobile Internet spend a lot of time talking about where they are and what’s going on around them.
Print has a reputation for stability when compared to online media, but in fact print is highly unstable—multiple revisions, versions, and translations of most texts exist. [As I’m interested in text as a visual medium, I would add printings, layouts, type settings, etc.]
There are three populations happy with Kindle: 1. people who need large print books; 2. people who travel a lot; 3. people who do a lot of book editing and reviewing (so they don’t have to carry a bunch of books and manuscripts around). These are not necessary the audiences that Amazon imagined. We don’t know what people will do with the iPad until they’ve had a chance to do it.
Small-screen talk is more important than large-screen talk. People listen to their friends rather than to authorities; studies have shown that intimate settings and peer status create trustworthiness. By being aware of these tendencies, we will be able to make the truth stick in a world with too much information and no recognized experts.
Editor's note: I was unable to find an online presence to link to for William Shaw.
Two of the panelists, Russ Pitts and Ross White, followed him down. Panelist William Shaw and Mangiafico stayed behind on stage, creating a visual contrast that corresponded roughly to the positions that the panelists took on new media. Jones, Pitts, and White all seemed open to the value of audience participation and social media; Shaw emphasized that the William Blake Archives, the project on which he works, is a “large screen” project designed to provide high-resolution tools to the lone scholar, whether professional or amateur.
Here are a few of the many points Jones made in his near-total domination of the talk:
The paradox of the mobile internet is that it doesn’t matter where you are, but it matters more where you are. The Internet closes distance and levels geographical distinctions, but because you’re accessing the Internet on a mobile device, the people you’re communicating with can’t assume that your physical body is tethered to your office or home. People on the mobile Internet spend a lot of time talking about where they are and what’s going on around them.
Print has a reputation for stability when compared to online media, but in fact print is highly unstable—multiple revisions, versions, and translations of most texts exist. [As I’m interested in text as a visual medium, I would add printings, layouts, type settings, etc.]
There are three populations happy with Kindle: 1. people who need large print books; 2. people who travel a lot; 3. people who do a lot of book editing and reviewing (so they don’t have to carry a bunch of books and manuscripts around). These are not necessary the audiences that Amazon imagined. We don’t know what people will do with the iPad until they’ve had a chance to do it.
Small-screen talk is more important than large-screen talk. People listen to their friends rather than to authorities; studies have shown that intimate settings and peer status create trustworthiness. By being aware of these tendencies, we will be able to make the truth stick in a world with too much information and no recognized experts.
Editor's note: I was unable to find an online presence to link to for William Shaw.
Tuesday, February 16, 2010
CHAT 2010: The Future of Entertainment
Robert Bach, Microsoft President of Entertainment and Devices, started his talk with a bounding run up the steps to the stage (must be a Microsoft thing). We found out that his favorite movie is the Shawshank Redemption. He likes Star Wars, too, but didn’t seem to want to talk about Avatar. He came bearing commercials for Microsoft, which he described as “not commercials for Microsoft.”
That’s okay. One of his commercials, for a new Xbox add-on called Project Natal, was jaw-dropping. Microsoft’s crimes against the creativity of humanity are legion. They include plague after plague of poorly designed fonts, the quashing of non-Microsoft technological innovation, and software interface styling that feels like the electronic equivalent of a blue ballpoint Bic writing on a manila envelope, forever. But in the last few years, Microsoft has been turning out some truly forward-thinking products. The Surface table was one such head-turning moment; Project Natal is sure to be the next.
Natal, the result of what Bach calls “deep research” in interface design, combines a camera and microphone with motion capture, facial recognition, and voice recognition technology. The device tracks points on the player’s body and translates this into on-screen motion. Stand in front of your television and kick; your on-screen avatar will kick. Motion through the virtual space of a video game—historically, heavily mediated through the pushing of arbitrarily meaningful buttons—is about to become much more like moving through real space. You will move your arm to move your arm.
Natal also recognizes voice commands, and it can identify individual players from session to session, using facial recognition software. Lots of smart guys with PhDs and James Dysonesque British accents worked on it.
I can’t help but see this as an answer to the Wii. Natal turns it up a notch on Nintendo, finally delivering a completely unencumbered, gesture-based gaming interface. Bach hinted that this technology may be under development for PC and mobile platforms as well. While it’s harder to imagine using something like this with a phone, putting Natal on the PC could open up a whole new world of software interaction.
Bach was bullish on the future of the entertainment industry, and sees a future populated with hybrid multimedia objects: books, movies, music, and games combined into one. This will come about through changes on three fronts: consumers, who increasingly have multiple screens and expect content to be available everywhere; creators, who will conceive of and develop new kinds of content; and the “canvas” itself, as new technologies afford new opportunities for creation.
Notably, he predicted that the artistic creative process will adopt characteristics of the software development cycle as a new generation of digital artists emerge. Would-be creatives were advised to learn as much math and science as possible to take advantage of the opportunities this new entertainment landscape provides.
That’s okay. One of his commercials, for a new Xbox add-on called Project Natal, was jaw-dropping. Microsoft’s crimes against the creativity of humanity are legion. They include plague after plague of poorly designed fonts, the quashing of non-Microsoft technological innovation, and software interface styling that feels like the electronic equivalent of a blue ballpoint Bic writing on a manila envelope, forever. But in the last few years, Microsoft has been turning out some truly forward-thinking products. The Surface table was one such head-turning moment; Project Natal is sure to be the next.
Natal, the result of what Bach calls “deep research” in interface design, combines a camera and microphone with motion capture, facial recognition, and voice recognition technology. The device tracks points on the player’s body and translates this into on-screen motion. Stand in front of your television and kick; your on-screen avatar will kick. Motion through the virtual space of a video game—historically, heavily mediated through the pushing of arbitrarily meaningful buttons—is about to become much more like moving through real space. You will move your arm to move your arm.
Natal also recognizes voice commands, and it can identify individual players from session to session, using facial recognition software. Lots of smart guys with PhDs and James Dysonesque British accents worked on it.
I can’t help but see this as an answer to the Wii. Natal turns it up a notch on Nintendo, finally delivering a completely unencumbered, gesture-based gaming interface. Bach hinted that this technology may be under development for PC and mobile platforms as well. While it’s harder to imagine using something like this with a phone, putting Natal on the PC could open up a whole new world of software interaction.
Bach was bullish on the future of the entertainment industry, and sees a future populated with hybrid multimedia objects: books, movies, music, and games combined into one. This will come about through changes on three fronts: consumers, who increasingly have multiple screens and expect content to be available everywhere; creators, who will conceive of and develop new kinds of content; and the “canvas” itself, as new technologies afford new opportunities for creation.
Notably, he predicted that the artistic creative process will adopt characteristics of the software development cycle as a new generation of digital artists emerge. Would-be creatives were advised to learn as much math and science as possible to take advantage of the opportunities this new entertainment landscape provides.
CHAT 2010: Entrepreneurship & Collaboration
Two of the major themes of this year’s CHAT—gaming and electronic music—were presented as business interests. The talk’s raison d’être seemed to be demonstrating, for the sake of those who might find these subjects insufficiently serious, the existence of corporations that can and do make money in these spaces. The subject matter was to be the role of collaborations in entrepreneurship, but that topic gave way to general entrepreneurial advice as the ninety minutes went on. All of the companies were founded on innovative premises, and the panelists were intelligent and well-spoken:
Steven Aldrich (the geek: plaid shirt, Carolina blue jacket), President/CEO of Posit Science. Posit creates software to encourage brain fitness. Brain performance begins to decline after the 20s and drops sharply after the 60s. Aldrich’s company uses established science to develop games to help people improve their memory, focus, and mental agility. He emphasized the importance of using customer narratives, not just facts, to promote your brand.
Kip Frey (the suit: tasteful purple shirt, navy jacket), President/CEO of Zenph Sound Innovations. Of the three, Zenph is the easiest company to Google, but the hardest to describe. Their software can analyze a musical piece recorded in any time period and translate it—including, supposedly, every nuance of performance—into a data profile. That profile can then be used to exactly reproduce the performance, or it can become a starting point for re-interpreting the piece by manipulating performance style, instrumentation, or any of a number of other variables.
Eric Peterson (the hipster: green/gray argyle sweater, soul patch), President/CEO Vicious Cycle Software. Vicious Cycle is a major video game publishing house, one of many headquartered in the Triangle. They create console games for adults and for children, under their imprint Monkeybar Games. Peterson emphasized the importance of networking and forming well-rounded teams to succeeding in the games industry.
The subject matter of the talks fell back too frequently onto business advice platitudes: the importance of managing risk, having a well-researched business plan to attract capital, allowing time and fostering internal competitiveness to encourage innovation, being passionate about what your company does. But I can see the talk being helpful to a person from an arts, humanities, or technology background who is interested in capitalizing on their ideas.
Steven Aldrich (the geek: plaid shirt, Carolina blue jacket), President/CEO of Posit Science. Posit creates software to encourage brain fitness. Brain performance begins to decline after the 20s and drops sharply after the 60s. Aldrich’s company uses established science to develop games to help people improve their memory, focus, and mental agility. He emphasized the importance of using customer narratives, not just facts, to promote your brand.
Kip Frey (the suit: tasteful purple shirt, navy jacket), President/CEO of Zenph Sound Innovations. Of the three, Zenph is the easiest company to Google, but the hardest to describe. Their software can analyze a musical piece recorded in any time period and translate it—including, supposedly, every nuance of performance—into a data profile. That profile can then be used to exactly reproduce the performance, or it can become a starting point for re-interpreting the piece by manipulating performance style, instrumentation, or any of a number of other variables.
Eric Peterson (the hipster: green/gray argyle sweater, soul patch), President/CEO Vicious Cycle Software. Vicious Cycle is a major video game publishing house, one of many headquartered in the Triangle. They create console games for adults and for children, under their imprint Monkeybar Games. Peterson emphasized the importance of networking and forming well-rounded teams to succeeding in the games industry.
The subject matter of the talks fell back too frequently onto business advice platitudes: the importance of managing risk, having a well-researched business plan to attract capital, allowing time and fostering internal competitiveness to encourage innovation, being passionate about what your company does. But I can see the talk being helpful to a person from an arts, humanities, or technology background who is interested in capitalizing on their ideas.
CHAT 2010: Electro-Acoustic Sound Exhibition
My ability to enjoy this piece was diminished by what must be a frequent hazard of public ambient music consumption: a couple conversing loudly in the exhibition space. But I was able to listen for several minutes to “Dance of Fire,” a composition by Erdem Helvacioglu made up entirely of samples of fire whooshing, crackling, and sparking.
My knowledge of electro-acoustic music is limited, so I’ll just observe that the piece reminded me of listening to Curtis Roads’ Point-Line-Cloud, an album created by entirely synthetic means. Despite the electronic origins of the pieces, the effect of listening to either feels deeply primitive, even organic—inducing a feeling of excitement verging on foreboding.
My knowledge of electro-acoustic music is limited, so I’ll just observe that the piece reminded me of listening to Curtis Roads’ Point-Line-Cloud, an album created by entirely synthetic means. Despite the electronic origins of the pieces, the effect of listening to either feels deeply primitive, even organic—inducing a feeling of excitement verging on foreboding.
Saturday, February 13, 2010
Blogging from C.H.A.T. 2010
This week I’ll be attending the C.H.A.T. Festival (Collaborations: Humanities, Arts & Technology) at UNC-Chapel Hill and blogging on what I see. Serious gaming will figure prominently in the festival this year. A few of the events I plan to attend, with descriptions from the C.H.A.T. site:
User Driven: Does Size Matter? Audience expectations are driving trends in technology, and size is one area feeling the impact: What is the ideal screen size for a device, for content, for literature, and more? Wednesday, 11 a.m.
Scientific Method and Narrative Form. What happens when you combine an electronic literature expert with a computer scientist who uses algorithms to generate narrative? This conversation will explore the intersections and the opportunities. Wednesday, 1:00 p.m.
Serious Teaching and Learning in Serious Games. Gaming has taken a serious turn in many classrooms as educators discover the effectiveness of games as teaching tools. In this discussion, experts in K-12, higher education and industry discuss how pedagogy is embedded in serious games. Thursday, 2:00 p.m.
Changing Forms of Publication. New technologies have made possible mass publication on a scale never before encountered in our culture, breeding new possibilities for—and questions about—authorship and form. This panel examines how technology has transformed the practices of publication. Friday, 11:00 a.m.
Game as Medium. Game engines, the software systems designed for the creation and development of video games, have made their way into a variety of uses and fields. This panel will discuss some alternative uses of game engines, as panelists present their current game engine research in art, art history and mobile computing. Keynote speaker Jesper Juul will join the discussion, offering his theoretical perspective. Friday, 4:30 p.m.
User Driven: Does Size Matter? Audience expectations are driving trends in technology, and size is one area feeling the impact: What is the ideal screen size for a device, for content, for literature, and more? Wednesday, 11 a.m.
Scientific Method and Narrative Form. What happens when you combine an electronic literature expert with a computer scientist who uses algorithms to generate narrative? This conversation will explore the intersections and the opportunities. Wednesday, 1:00 p.m.
Serious Teaching and Learning in Serious Games. Gaming has taken a serious turn in many classrooms as educators discover the effectiveness of games as teaching tools. In this discussion, experts in K-12, higher education and industry discuss how pedagogy is embedded in serious games. Thursday, 2:00 p.m.
Changing Forms of Publication. New technologies have made possible mass publication on a scale never before encountered in our culture, breeding new possibilities for—and questions about—authorship and form. This panel examines how technology has transformed the practices of publication. Friday, 11:00 a.m.
Game as Medium. Game engines, the software systems designed for the creation and development of video games, have made their way into a variety of uses and fields. This panel will discuss some alternative uses of game engines, as panelists present their current game engine research in art, art history and mobile computing. Keynote speaker Jesper Juul will join the discussion, offering his theoretical perspective. Friday, 4:30 p.m.
Friday, January 29, 2010
There’s nothing we’ve all been waiting for, and the iPad isn’t it
Why not resume my tech commentary blog in the days after a major Apple product announcement?
Collectively, we seem to be in the midst of inventing something. We know that it will be portable and electronic, and that it will do a lot of stuff. Other details remain in a state of flux as emerging device classes appear, multiply, and set about consuming each other like amœbæ. Perhaps it’s more accurate to say that we’re breeding something: producing a proliferation of gadgets with varying traits, mating the successes to each other and consigning the failures to oblivion. For now, r-selection seems to be the rule.
We began this process with the multifunction desktop computer on one side of a divide, and an array of single-function portable devices—music players, communicators, cameras—on the other. In the 80s and 90s these two worlds took their first tentative steps toward each other, with the laptop computer and the PDA respectively.
Then, suddenly, there was a frenzy. As electronic components grew smaller and cheaper, portable devices merged one-by-one, hinting at a future with a single, pocket-sized device to rival the power of the desktop computer. Meanwhile, laptops grew smaller in an effort to satisfy the demand for ubiquitous computing (but also larger, as if to fill every possible niche in the power–portability continuum).
It becomes tempting to take this mælstrom of invention—seemingly moving toward an inevitable telos—as evidence of technological determinism. As we near the apparent endpoint, we’ve even taken to describing our devices with logocentric language: the iPhone becomes the “Jesus Phone” and the iPad the “Moses Tablet.” (A Google search on the second phrase returns iPad-related sites among the top 10 hits, intermingled with results related to the other well-known tablets that might be associated with Moses.)
At the current moment in the dialectic, we have had two devices facing each other in a state of uneasy tension. The netbook is a fully functioning computer that, despite its advantages in portability over larger machines, is still too bulky to carry with you at all times. The smartphone fits in your pocket but is just too small to provide the full computing experience we desire. The first is awkward in space, agile in cyberspace; the second is ready-to-hand but proves to be a tiny window onto a sprawling world.
So we’ve begun the next round of our breeding experiment. The goal is to create a device with the portability of a smartphone and the versatility of a netbook. It is this space that the iPad tries to negotiate, but fails:
Instead of a single device, there will continue to be a range of devices covering the power–portability continuum, each appropriate within a certain context of use. Perhaps your particular needs call for a smartphone and a desktop machine; perhaps a netbook and a larger laptop fit the bill. Individual and social needs will always confound the tyranny of the one-gadget-fits-all final solution.
Collectively, we seem to be in the midst of inventing something. We know that it will be portable and electronic, and that it will do a lot of stuff. Other details remain in a state of flux as emerging device classes appear, multiply, and set about consuming each other like amœbæ. Perhaps it’s more accurate to say that we’re breeding something: producing a proliferation of gadgets with varying traits, mating the successes to each other and consigning the failures to oblivion. For now, r-selection seems to be the rule.
We began this process with the multifunction desktop computer on one side of a divide, and an array of single-function portable devices—music players, communicators, cameras—on the other. In the 80s and 90s these two worlds took their first tentative steps toward each other, with the laptop computer and the PDA respectively.
Then, suddenly, there was a frenzy. As electronic components grew smaller and cheaper, portable devices merged one-by-one, hinting at a future with a single, pocket-sized device to rival the power of the desktop computer. Meanwhile, laptops grew smaller in an effort to satisfy the demand for ubiquitous computing (but also larger, as if to fill every possible niche in the power–portability continuum).
It becomes tempting to take this mælstrom of invention—seemingly moving toward an inevitable telos—as evidence of technological determinism. As we near the apparent endpoint, we’ve even taken to describing our devices with logocentric language: the iPhone becomes the “Jesus Phone” and the iPad the “Moses Tablet.” (A Google search on the second phrase returns iPad-related sites among the top 10 hits, intermingled with results related to the other well-known tablets that might be associated with Moses.)
At the current moment in the dialectic, we have had two devices facing each other in a state of uneasy tension. The netbook is a fully functioning computer that, despite its advantages in portability over larger machines, is still too bulky to carry with you at all times. The smartphone fits in your pocket but is just too small to provide the full computing experience we desire. The first is awkward in space, agile in cyberspace; the second is ready-to-hand but proves to be a tiny window onto a sprawling world.
So we’ve begun the next round of our breeding experiment. The goal is to create a device with the portability of a smartphone and the versatility of a netbook. It is this space that the iPad tries to negotiate, but fails:
Just yesterday I was looking at my iPhone thinking “Hmmm, I wish this thing didn’t fit in my pocket and couldn’t make phone calls.” Then I looked over to my netbook and couldn’t help but feel it would benefit from losing the keyboard and being made of 50% glass. —Reddit user FrankehIt is difficult to see how the tension between smartphone and netbook can ever be resolved. Any device larger than an iPhone will require a bag to tote around; any device smaller than an EEE PC will prove inconvenient for web browsing or word processing. There is no “God device,” no sweet spot where portability and power can both be maximized. Technological determinism is shown, once again, to rest on an oversimplification.
Instead of a single device, there will continue to be a range of devices covering the power–portability continuum, each appropriate within a certain context of use. Perhaps your particular needs call for a smartphone and a desktop machine; perhaps a netbook and a larger laptop fit the bill. Individual and social needs will always confound the tyranny of the one-gadget-fits-all final solution.
Thursday, January 7, 2010
Rebooting
Well, the home renovations have never really settled down, and probably never will, but this blog has laid dormant long enough. Perhaps I'll even get around to creating an original design for it someday, but for now I'm using one of the standard Blogger templates so that I can focus on the writing.
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