Posts Tagged ‘ network ’
So we’ve been interested in identity and its implications in the digital age. In fact, a lot of our work has been a version of the analog investigation of avatars.
Here’s a link to an interesting article from WIRED about what happened when one man tried to disappear without a digital trace – into an entirely new identity.
We were babysitting my 12 (soon to be 13) year old niece this weekend, and I couldn’t help but watch and wonder at her communication forms and habits. She was generally texting and on facebook at the same time, but she only used the telephone as a phone (a live voice transmittal device) twice: once to ask her babysitter for the week if there was more baloney, and once to let her friend know that she was leaving the house and would see her in about 5 minutes (said friend lives about 3 blks away).
Anyhow, it’s got me to thinking a lot about the way that we will communicate in the future – will any of our communication be technologically unassisted? Is a voice-conversation turning into a nostalgic event? (This is also something we’re exploring as part of the UPP) Anyway, here’s a quote from an interesting article in the NYT:
“But the children, teenagers and young adults who are passing through this cauldron of technological change will also have a lot in common. They’ll think nothing of sharing the minutiae of their lives online, staying connected to their friends at all times, buying virtual goods, and owning one über-device that does it all…”
Read the full article here.
Sent email appeal #2 today. So far, we’ve had about a 7% response rate. We’ll see how this one goes. Click to see all the latest…
A lot of our work lately has been involved with looking at the human:digital interface. Is that the same as the human:machine interface? What are the differences that I am interested in exploring? How does our work in Performing the Self (the avatar as the real), as well as our work with the digital (trying to perfect our way of speaking to a camera by interviewing ourselves, editing, memorizing and repeating), etc. open up these ideas – but on the other side of the machine equation?
This guy Graham is a new media artist doing some interesting work – just learned about him from the Media Modes symposium being held at the School of Visual Arts, NY in November. Check him out.
What does it mean to be someone’s friend?
The dictionary on my dashboard says it’s “a person whom one knows and with whom one has a bond of mutual affection, typically exclusive of sexual or family relations.”
My facebook says that I have 337 friends. Some of them are family. I have had sex with at least 2 of them, and there are probably close to 100 that I have nothing that even imitates a “bond of mutual affection.” In fact, many of them I have never met. They are friends of friends, organizations that have facebook pages, “friend collectors.”
So what does it mean, in this digital age, to be someone’s friend?
I feel like there are all kinds of connotations that go with the word: someone you can turn to when you need something, someone that will help you, listen to you, go see a movie, have coffee…in other words, someone that you would feel comfortable spending time with in the flesh. Someone that’s more than just an acquaintance. Someone who would be there for you.
