Module 1: Introduction

Sunday, 4 January 2015

Module 1: Introduction

Update: The sound for the Sonic Postcard (which did not upload in my moodle powerpoint) is this:

Monday Jan. 5, 2015 - Sunday, Jan. 11, 2015

First Day of Class (January 5th)

1) Join Twitter

2) Follow instructor: @JessL

By Jan. 5th send an introductory tweet with the

class hashtag: #NMN

By Jan. 9th:

Be sure to send me your preferred e-mail address so that you may author on the class blog due on or before end of day
Class Blog: Add a comment on my Module 1 post – introduce yourself and share with us
your thoughts on the readings for Module 1. Remember to critically analyse the readings and your reaction; a simple “I agree” won’t suffice

By Jan. 11th:

Watch the 33 second video: 51 Keywords of Digital Literature”: http://glia.ca/2010/ELO/51keywords.html
Send me @JessL, at least 3 tweets with your findings, remember to include the class hashtag: #NMN

Digital Literacy Assignment DUE by 23:59 Jan. 11

12 comments:

Anonymous7 January 2015 at 17:04
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Anonymous7 January 2015 at 17:09
Introduction: My name is Adela Popescu and I am in the MACT program, Cohort 2014. Glad to join NMN class and I am looking forward to learn more about the new media topic. My Twitter name is @popescuadela11. Follow me!  I am not really a Twitter user as Facebook already consumes lots of my time, however, I will use it for this course.
I’ve caught up some of the articles on Twitter so I guess I have to post my thoughts here?
Thoughts about the readings:
“Welcome to the Future of Reading” seems to me that can be named as well “Welcome to the Past”: Ancient people used pictographs and other visual forms to record their memories and express their creativity. It seems that we prefer to go back in time sometimes.
The New York Times article, “Life in Canada, Home of the World’s Most Affluent Middle Class”, indicates that literacy is directly proportional to social wealth. It makes sense that people first worry about housing, health, etc. and only after they acquire them, they think about education: Faculty is facultative, after all. This reminds me of Maslow’s pyramid -- education (self-actualization) is the last thing people worry about if the other needs are not fulfilled. The article “Some Questions about Fiction-Reading, Occasioned by Wilkinson & Pickett's Equality Theory” only strengthens the Maslow’s theory. Moreover, the authors point out that human relationships are affected if human needs are not satisfied : “[this] prevents cooperation. Relationships deteriorate because there is always the social status elephant in the room, a room in which inclusiveness and empathy have no place.”
Bottom-line: education depends on the individual social status. Sad but true!
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Dr. Jessica Laccetti7 January 2015 at 17:22
Hi Scott,
Jessica is fine. Thanks for asking.

The request for the findings is in relation to the module: the readings, the videos, our comments on the blog etc. So, tell me three things you've found out or perhaps have questions about.
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Unknown7 January 2015 at 21:09
Greetings from Lethbridge! I am Jaylene Ulmer, MACT cohort 2014. I am looking forward to this course from both a personal and professional perspective.

In the What is New Media reading I found the concept of asking “what isn’t new media?” quite thought provoking. When reflecting on this I had to consider what my definition of new media would be and found my initial thoughts quite limited to digital communication, production and social media platforms. Socha and Eber-Schmid say “New media has had a profound effect on three of the most essential categories of society in the twenty-first century: economics, politics, and the exchange of ideas”. This is a fundamental shift in the way I think about this term, but completely relevant to much of the learning we have undertaken thus far in the program.

The Battle Between Old and New Media certainly explores the shift from the success of the traditional newspaper to both its decline and the adoption of the digital format. I agree with the setiment that ‘good journalism costs money’ and worry that their has been, and continues to be, an erosion in quality of reporting and writing due to new media and real time journalism. I also wonder what newspapers and the journalism profession in general will look like in ten years?

I also enjoyed The Creative Process slide share. For me the lesson is that the creative process is different for everyone. And, perhaps even different depending on the type of work at hand. I kind of get the idea of percolating….(as opposed to procrastinating) in terms of needing to spend some time with my thoughts before starting something new. At least that is what I am going to call it from now on :)
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Anonymous9 January 2015 at 17:25
Hello, everyone, my name is Lisa Slywka (SLOW-kuh for those of you scratching your heads…it is a tricky one), and I am excited to be on this New Media Narratives journey with you. I am a relative neophyte in this regard, so I anticipate quite a learning curve this term. However, I am looking forward to learning more about using and applying new media at work teaching Business Communications students at NAIT in Edmonton.
I was intrigued with Jessica’s point on her Module 1 PPTX (fun stuff that Ho City!) especially with the point that new media “content creation isn’t so much about creating new narratives as it is about creating new environments” (slide 25). I appreciate that because, as a student, I know that the more involved I get with the learning, the more I retain and apply to my life. I try really hard to do this with my students currently, but I would like to facilitate this for them in future face-to-face classes. I’d also like to see, from a student perspective, how NM can make online learning a more dynamic, fully participatory environmental experience – like that which Thomas defines as a “transliterate space” (2013, slide 29). I’d like to then apply this when developing online transliterate learning spaces of my own for my students.
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Anonymous9 January 2015 at 17:39
With regard to this week’s readings, it’s obvious that new media has affected change in multiple areas of humanities. Socha and Eber-Schmid (n.d.) refer to the origins of layering information via hyperlink organization in the emergence of footnotes during the French Enlightenment - a version of nesting and linking information.

The fluidity of new media has had an effect on how we interact with narratives and literature, as Hayes points out. Hayes (2007) argues that “the place of writing is again in turmoil… [with] the emergence of electronic literature” (para. 9). I would disagree – I think that the very fact that literature is being disseminated electronically is a reflection of its currency, strength, and endurance. It is not literature that is in turmoil, but the monopoly of power that established organizations and “committees” (para. 11) that may be in danger. Hayes indicates that it is the medium that needs to be focused upon, that “Electronic literature tests the boundaries of the literary and challenges us to re-think our assumptions of what literature can do and be” (para. 12). As Hayes notes in Section 2, electronic literature is more interactive and reflects the layering to which Socha and Eber-Schmid (n.d.) refer.

However, Hayes notes that “Even where multiple reading pathways exist, many interactive works still guide the user to a clear sense of conclusion and resolution” (para. 27). This may also affect change in the writing-related industries - Jeff Bezos’ intent for the Washington The Morris article stirs up issues related to Bezos’ monopolization (1) of the print news world via a Coasean model (2) which has reduced professional writers to working for donations Longreads-style (3). This is a concern, yet if the hub-and-spoke theory is realized, it will be an archetype of the very theoretical process of layering that Socha and Eber-Schmid (n.d.) detail.

Hayes also addresses the correlation between human and machine-based information processing: “the complex hybridization now underway between human cognition and the very different and yet interlinked cognitions of intelligent machines” (2007, para. 41) Finally, Hayes points out that the fluid nature of the medium can facilitate revisions, perhaps meaning that deconstructionist literature’s prime medium is and will always be electronic – echoing O’Rilley’s “perpetual beta” status of open-system software (2005, p. 14) (4) and Manovitch’s assertion that new media, by nature, is “programmable” (p. 10). However, I cannot see myself mastering Kirschenbaum’s “deep print reading strategies already in effect with scriptons (letters on the page, in this instance) to the textons (here the code generating the sceenic surface)” (Hayes, 2007, para. 46)

I would also like to argue that the language level of electronic literature differs from that of traditional: it is more audience-friendly as the frequency of outdated and multisyllabic words has been reduced. This grade-level/language-level shifting has disseminated into academic literature as well – I have noted that the journal articles I’ve sourced for my research assignments are much more readable than in the past. Overall, this deconstructionist approach, having disseminated rapidly, invites a wider audience, thus virtually guaranteeing its success. However, it doesn’t mean that writing for new media is any easier - Taylor Mali does bring up several good points in his slam poem “The the impotence of…”. Proofing and revising are continually frustrating aspects of the writing process; it’s no wonder many would like to just leave it to the computers to resolve. Mali’s message is timeless, nonetheless – and reflective of human nature – we know what’s right, yet we seldom make a practice of doing it. Personally, it reminded me that I will never misspell hermeneutical again, especially in a title. Of a final paper. For a grad-level course (groan–facepalm).

References to follow.
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Anonymous9 January 2015 at 17:39
Supplemental References

(1) http://adage.com/article/the-media-guy/brutal-truth-jeff-bezos-buying-washington-post/243521/
(2) http://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2014/03/lets-not-count-out-jeff-bezos-and-the-washington-post.html
(3) http://us2.campaign-archive2.com/?u=1854296747731744c923a33ef&id=211af0517e&e=c134522f0b
(4) http://www.learnos.com/vbaxi/What%20Is%20Web%202%20point%200.pdf
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Anonymous10 January 2015 at 07:28
Hi everyone, my name is Tess Burke and I am joining you from St. John’s, NL. Obviously the grace of technology allows me to be thousands of miles away and join you in this class. I am actually finishing up my master’s degree from MSVU in Halifax, also online, but chose to complete this course as part of my elective requirements. I feel this area is critical to understanding modern public relations and I am very happy to be joining you.

I attended Vancouver Film School in 2001 and completed the New Media program so the question ‘What is new media?’ has been near and dear to me for some time. To me convergence was always the term that was key to explaining what new media is but this week’s readings helped me expand on this.

Socha and Eber-Schmid summed it up nicely including ideas such as the “catchall term used to define all that is related to the internet and the interplay between technology, images and sound” or “on-demand access to content anytime, anywhere, on any digital device”. The democratization, digitizing and non-linearity all ring true. I fully agree with all aspects of this and have often thought of new media in these very terms. Yet it is important to remind ourselves that it is only democratizing to those who can afford to access it. In the BBC article that explores the battle that seems to be playing out between old and new media I really identified with the quote by Ben Morris that,
"The internet is transforming almost every element of the news business: shortening news cycles, eroding long-reliable revenue sources, and enabling new kinds of competition, some of which bear little or no newsgathering costs.”
Of course it is changing how we receive our news but it doesn’t necessarily mean less value, it just changes how we report and receive. The beauty of new media is it has allowed the citizen journalist to exist.

I was very happy to see biolphilia brought up in Thomas’s piece as I have been a longtime fan of E O Wilson. I also happen to like Bjork but never made the link before with her Biophilia work. In fact Technobiophilia, defined as the ‘innate tendency to focus on life and lifelike processes as they appear in technology’ is an interesting way to see new media, as an almost organic form.

I will freely admit that I know little about electronic literature and spent an entire afternoon getting through the article because I continually had to google the references in the piece. What did strike me about this piece was the transcendent nature of the work and how important preservation and archiving are to preserve work created electronically.

In the end I come away with a better, richer definition of new media but also with more questions.
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