itslit-emac

[itslit-emac]

“BBS users of the past could complain directly to the sysop—maybe even with a phone call—and he or she could act immediately and unilaterally on their behalf. Try that with Twitter or Facebook.” 

- Kevin Driscoll Social Media’s Dial-up Ancestor: The Bulletin Board System

Link: http://spectrum.ieee.org/computing/networks/social-medias-dialup-ancestor-the-bulletin-board-system

[itslit-emac]

All three readings this week featured an early form of the Internet. The possibilities of what the Internet could be now had it been allowed to formed under users will never be known. We can only speculate. But one thing is for certain about the Internet now: it sucks. Users create content for the most popular sites now, like Twitter and Facebook, while the sites become wealthier off our posts. Ads infiltrate our online experience. And online content almost follows the "fast-food" business model. The most upvoted and liked content is featured while items with less publicity remain completely obscure. This article by Traven goes further into the specifics about what makes the Internet so god-awful nowadays.

[itslit-emac]

4/6 & 4/11 Summary

Driscoll discusses the invention of the internet in his article Social Media's Dial-Up Ancestor: The Bulletin Board System. He explores the concept that the internet gives the power for people to do so much, yet it is mainly for social interactions. The internet has technological and social aspects that manifest itself seen in BBS. BBS is Bulletin Board System which was a place for enthusiasts to communicate in chat rooms and exchange files with each other. This lead to a diversity of people and interests or hobbies that could flourish online. To do this there was a lot of coding necessary and happened through calling modems. Hollywood became very interested in this and began to make moves about it, specifically how this new technology could go wrong. To participate in BBS you linked a phone, which means that it charged like a phone causing most interactions online to be local. The interconnect system made connecting more cost effective allowing for long distance and automatically exchanging data. It would store and forward data, software, and encourage collaboration. These small networks became a large movement that allowed more connectivity among the networks. Though there was some limited access to the computer, usually found at large universities or research centers, the internet allowed for information to become more available and expanded to a broader audience. The BBS was a hub for sharing information; there have been lots of technologically advances since, but there is still a huge social aspect in the internet.   Cooper wrote The History of Minitel. It describes the boxy computer which began exclusively for French clients and would allow French hospitality services to save money on expensive printing. The Minitel instead became a popular interconnected device to find information on the news, weather, booking information, and other topics. This too was expensive in the beginning, being billed per minute. It was invented in 1981 and reached its peak in 1994. Many early ideas were tested on this version of the internet. At its peak there were 20 million people using 25 thousand services through 6.5 million terminals. The Minitel “make online rudimentary interactive, real-time navigation a part of French life at a time when few people had heard much about the World Wide Web.” The Minitel was not capable of making fast connections and using multimedia site, and the medium did not allow live video or sound. This did not keep with the social aspects of the technological advances, which is why the last Minitel ended in 2012. It was revolutionary of at the time; 30% of French households had phones that connected to Minitel when 6% of American households were connected online. This caused a “new way of thinking, awareness of power of information and the will to use it”. The use of the internet was a sophisticated ideas at the beginning and has become more social since.   Building on the inclusivity and amateurism of the early Internet, Olia Lialina regales what the Vernacular Web was like. The Vernacular Web catalogs, almost for posterity’s sake, what early webpages looked like through written descriptions and through the layout of the website itself. Much like the BBS system Driscoll writes about, the Vernacular Web’s foundation rested upon user activity to make the Internet worthy of one’s time. Images like “always under construction” on one’s webpage were an unspoken guarantee that someone would be there to update and edit the content on the page. Links provided a way for early Internet users to promote other interesting websites and make it easier for others to access them. The need for a system such as links was necessary at the time because there were no genius, omnipresent search engines like Google to redirect to. The content you found online was up to you. But not only did they serve as an amateur map to the Internet, they were also a demonstration of the connection between users the Vernacular Web was responsible for. Users promoted websites of other users that they liked or were interested in. Lialina also discusses an archaic file format known as MIDI which acted a method of personalization of each website. While visitors looked at your site, a MIDI file would begin playing. The most impressive feature of the MIDI file is that it doesn’t contain a recording of the song, but rather instructions for what instruments need to be played at certain times to replicate that song. Much like the free collections of gifs, MIDIs were also shared online by users. This collection process of user-created based items illustrated the inclusivity of the web. The Vernacular Web was a web for the people, free of corporate control or interest. Much like the BBS and Minitel, the Vernacular Web shows up what the Internet was like before it was in control of large corporations. When user-generated content truly ran the Internet as opposed third party social media sites which encourage posting on their platforms as a form of connection. The Vernacular Web and BBS are examples of truly autonomous forms of the world wide web. While the Minitel answers the question of "what if the Internet was run by the government?"

[itslit-emac]

 I think this is an interesting article and something to think about. Relating it back to the Lialina reading, the internet now defiantly is different from the early internet. The whole aesthetic of the early internet in the 90s felt like a time where people were free to explore the internet and say what they wanted to say. Start their own websites about their hobbies, passions, and interests. It wasn’t commercialized like it is now. YouTube trying to create an algorithm to censor out what they believe to be offensive is I believe unattainable, and goes against what the internet should be. Additionally, I think this article chosen lets us see why trying to make YouTube safer is impossible. The author provides examples and agrees that “We have instant speech, instant communication, and instant cultural change.” In all, I think this article relates to Lialina’s readings and I like how team whoosh explained their relation to it.

The internet has created a space for people with different hobbies to create communities and share experiences. From Lialina’s reading, we learn that this is something that the early internet formed. The sharing of experiences and thoughts is something that YouTube captures. Users can upload videos doing absolutely anything and share it, but now that might not be possible. Something that the early internet did not have is censorship, and YouTube is enforcing that now. Will this change the internet or the humans who use it? In this article by Emma Ellis it is suggested that actual people need to monitor the action on the internet, and not just ‘code.’ Similar to BBSs YouTube serves these communities and interests. Something like censorship would affect those who make a living off of sharing their experiences on this platform. Whether or not YouTube will become successful in this effort to make the internet a nicer place, it displays how there is no algorithm to currently stop all inappropriate actions on the internet.

[itslit-emac]

Summary

Growing Up Tethered - Alex’s Response/Summary In Growing Up Tethered Turkle explains the cultural implications of children growing up with cell phones and access to an “always on” world.­ Whether it’s deciding what to share and what not to share on Facebook, whether or not to check that text/notification while driving down the road, or simply whether or not we’re going to answer when our parents call, kids these days have a lot of anxiety-inducing baggage. ­­            

Given that we’ve grown up with cell phones in our pockets, we have never truly experienced a truly challenging time without the capability to call mom or dad, or as they say on Who Wants to be a Millionaire?, “phone a friend.” Turkle explains that in the urban area where she grew up, moving about throughout the city and finding one’s own way was a right of passage. It was the first true test for the independent individual. No Google, no applications providing direction, no way to contact another person, other than chatting with passersby. Without children having real chances at figuring things out on their own, they are quite literally growing up tethered. Beyond the topic of dependency on tech to get us through our lives, we also have grown up in a world where we are “always” available due to technological advancement.  

With a phone in all of our pockets, there is a certain expectation for one to pick it up when receiving a call or a text regardless of what we’re currently doing or occupied with. Many kids and young adults such as those mentioned in the reading admit to checking every little thing that makes their phone ding, even while on the road. While it is appalling to read these admission accounts, it would be hypocritical for me to pretend I never touch my phone while my vehicle is in motion. That would be a lie. While I do my best to avoid texting while driving, I don’t feel half as bad about picking an album or song out of my library to listen to while the car is in motion. Is this activity any less risky than texting while driving? Probably not.  

As annoying as it can be to be available to others 24/7 via our phones and other devices, we seem to not take issue with seeking out others for acceptance and validation…or simply just attention. As is noted in the reading, many young adults reach out to their friends to “feel” their support via texts/calls. If the person on the receiving end doesn’t pick up, many may become angry as they take the missed communication as an insult or disregard for their feelings. If someone doesn’t pick up, we simply go on to the next person until someone does. Validation seeking at it’s finest. 

When it comes to online presence, many of us have trouble deciding just what persona we will play with our profiles. Whether it’s Facebook or Twitter, a lot of us aren’t sure what sort of “avatar” we would like to build. We want to be the cool people online, but battle with the fact that the bits and pieces we share are not the full picture. It can become a sort of living “double” lives. While things may seem fine and dandy online, there’s plenty going on in the real world that may not have a light shown on it for Facebook to see. And that’s our dilemma! Our social media facades can induce stress and anxiety because we put on a show that isn’t a complete picture of who we are to impress others.

In regards to the telephone, it has evolved to be a symbol of femininity. Displayed in movies, television shows, books, commercials even. Before marketed as something so easy to use that “even a young girl could use it!”. Since the phone came about as a way to connect the average housewife to the outside world, a small release from her daily mother and wife tasks, it has been appropriated by females and has become an essential part of female culture. Being biologically more talkative and social beings, it is not strange to see how this came about. This was upsetting to the creators of the telephone who marketed it towards businessmen and companies. It was unfortunate for the creators of the telephone who were seeing their product used widely by an unintended audience.

Now that the telephone had a feminine connotation, the media took that into consideration and it became a widely used form of representing femininity. From chick flicks to daytime soap operas, the girl and the telephone had become best friends. Today, in modern entertainment, we see those who are not only female but even males who are more feminine or want to be perceived as more feminine in the entertainment industry using cell phones. There is something more than just speaking on the phone, now that actually talking on the phone is becoming less and less popular. The way that someone’s nails tap on the phone screen, the way that they scroll through their instagram feed, these are all things that represent femininity today, or have a feminine connotation.

Today, the telephone is not only a representation of gender, but it is also a representation of the way technology has changed through the years. The way my mother interacts with her phone is very different from the way I may interact with my phone. My mother will speak more, call her friends and converse more, while I use my phone to post things on social media, text, or tag my friends in posts that I think are funny or interesting. The way we use the phone and technology can say a lot about who we are as people.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Always On - ...’s Response/Summary

[itslit-emac]

I found this article incredibly interesting. It connects very well to the readings we had over Turkle this week. One part of the article which caught my attention was reading about how Principal Reilly was attempting to use technology as a way to get teenagers to engage more in school. He even pushed back the time school started an hour later because of how tired the students were coming in from staying up late using their tech. It’s clear from this article that our generation really is seeking instant gratification and Principal Reilly is just trying to use it as a means of further education which is a more important use of everyone’s time. The student this article focuses on seems heavily immersed in the online world. It’s concerning how much importance a Facebook status has over his actions. I foresee this becoming a much larger problem as social media and the Internet becomes more integrated in our everyday lives. 

In this New York Times article by Matt Richtel, the effect cell phones have on teenagers is explored through various personal accounts. The article first introduces Vishal who is a 17 year old boy who grew up “digital”. Vishal’s story revolves around how as he grew up he became increasingly distracted by technology. As a young boy he was more focused on his studies, but as time went on he discovered technologies that would distract him from his studies, and adversely affect his life. Vishal mentions that as he grew up he realized that there were choices during school. Homework was not the only thing laid out for him when he could just as easily hop on the internet and be distracted for hours. Turkle mentions how cell phones can serve as a major distraction to young adults, and how they may even risk their lives to check their online interactions. According to Turkle’s talks with these young adults, she finds out that some of the just wait to be interrupted, and that they essentially crave being distracted. Richtel’s article also touches on this subject citing a few studies that show that “young, developing brains and becoming habituated to distraction and to switching tasks, not to focus.” Teenagers and young adults are gradually transitioning to craving for instant gratification, and cell phones and similar technology allow for just that.

[itslit-emac]

This article by CNBC discuses how technology can affect our romantic relationships and how it can become harder for people to be intimate with each other due to technology. It also discuses the immediacy of technology we seek that same immediacy with other people. People are always wanting imitate replies and this can relate back to “Always On” on pages 168-169 where she talks about people’s need to always reply to a text or emails. How those texts and emails can inflict emotion, and make you feel understood. Furthermore, “Always On” also mentions that “...those on the phone mark themselves as absent. (155)” This is can be the reason for “the death of human interaction.”

On the other hand, this article does not mention gender. Instead, it generalizes it by mentioning “people.” Because the first article, “Gender and the Residential Telephone,” correlates around the times 1890-1940, we can see the difference phones have made from the past to today. It might have still some gender differences on the use of the phone and the amount of use of the phone, but this article focuses more on the impact of technology on social interaction.

[itslit-emac]

“People love their new technologies of connection. They have made parents and children feel more secure and have revolutionized business, education, scholarship, and medicine... There is a sweetness to them. They have changed how we date and how we travel. The global reach of connectivity can make the most isolated outpost into a center of learning and economic activity.” - Always On Turkle (pg 152)

[itslit-emac]

The previous reblog was accidently by my individual tumblr.

The Menace of Mechanical Music

In The Menace of Mechanical Music, John Sousa shares his thoughts on the different music making machines and his fears of cultural degradation for America, and its music. He begins his article by introducing these new mechanical devices as  music playing devices that are “in substitute for human skill, intelligence and soul,” that turn the expression of music into a mathematical system. Sousa warns the reader that the replication of these music machines will have serious affects on American music culture. He then gives some credit to developers of these remarkable devices but then goes on to say that although they can be very beneficial for the abilities of a musical artist, they will not inspire the artist to create music like that of legendary musicians such as Beethoven or Mozart. In his argument, Sousa explains that this ‘menace’ of a machine is assisting the decline of music in Great Britain, as well as replacing the amateurs and professional teachers in the industry. “The child becomes indifferent to practice, for when music can be heard in the homes without a labor of study and close application, and without the slow process of acquiring a technic, it will be simple a question of time when the amateur disappears entirely, and with him a host of vocal and instrumental teachers, who will be without field or calling” (4). As the developers of these devices continue to produce machine music for all occasions they are increasing the poisonous ways of the whole system, according the Sousa. Throughout his article, Sousa include multiple pictures that depict these machines influencing many parts of the readers day to day lives. In one picture he shows a phonograph putting a baby to sleep, a gramophone accompanying a couple on a romantic canoe date. These pictures represent Sousa’s warnings of these devices taking over many parts of the American culture. Another presumption that he makes is a phonograph mounted on a war vehicle, playing music as it leads these soldiers to war.

Sousa then brings up another argument that shows the negative aspects of these devices: the composers of the music reproduced from these machines get no profit because of Copyright laws of the United States. He argues that the decisions made by the court are not fair to authors of these compositions. The new copyright bill that Sousa talks about are focused on the interests of the machines and the composers represented. This new bill allows for the reproduction of these machines to reproduce an entire work, or just part of it. Sousa explains that by having this ability, the machine seizes the artist’s compositions, portraying the owner of that machine responsible for the music played. He then goes on to question how the powerful corporations behind these machines are okay with the moral and ethical issues involved in taking and reproducing an artist’s compositions, then denying them any financial returns, disguising the disk or roll containing the music as their own.

In The Industrialization of Music, Frith writes about music in the form of an industry rather than a commodity in relation to how much money can change a new and fun emerging media into a regulated, normalized, and fetishized cash grab. The importance of this remains in it’s quite obvious relation to Sousa’s  writings mentioned prior. Very similar words and interpretations of the evolving system that has begun to run music throughout American culture, the music as an industry, are used by both Frith and Sousa and both hold very strong merits for this idea. Although Sousa focuses primarily on the machines that reproduce the music into oblivion, and Frith refers primarily to the idea that the industry itself is using popularity and what makes the most money to help define what is considered music, both are very set on the idea that these kinds acts in regards to music (the kinds of acts that attempt to produce music for the sake of producing it rather than for the sake of other’s being able to consume it and be inspired by it) are detrimental to music itself, as well as the society that builds itself  upon and exposes itself to music as much as America does. Money is what has driven this system of what used to be an idea of entertainment and innovation of the arts, into a self-interest driven scheme among men. Whatever makes the most money, or whoever makes them the most money, is who they want to fund. The rest of these creative individuals are left to fend for themselves and hope for some small exposure. However, knowing that they will never be at the top, creates a system of creators who don’t care about the craft any more than those who are at the top. There’s no incentive anymore to pour heart and soul into music, and it shows. Most people who sing, aren’t very good at singing, and most people who learn to play an instrument, aren’t very good at it either. In a world where you can fake performances and be mediocre at your craft and still be at the top, nobody wants to try anymore. Music is losing the aura it has once had, as any form of art. Both Frith and and Sousa would agree that this is in more cases than not,  detrimental to society. Regulation of music and over-production of the same format, producing the same thing over and over for the sake of monetary gain is creating a sense of inhumanity among people, and they don’t even realize it, at least in the eyes of Frith and Sousa.

Confessions of a DJ explores the stark reality of what it means to be a DJ in the modern world. DJs are often considered relatively small-time musicians who often go about their business unnoticed. This is due to a various reasons, but a large part of the reason is because it is harder to market mixes created by DJs than it is for completely original artists. That is not to say DJs do not create original work, rather they take bits and pieces from other artists’ work to create something that is unique in a different way. Intellectual property laws play a big part in what a DJ is able to accomplish because making their music legal can become very expensive very quickly. However, DJs still manage to become sponsored by companies to perform in exotic locations just for the sake of performing. The venues generate revenue from the sheer volume of people they are able to attract.Once a DJ has become known well enough it is not uncommon for them to receive offers from other artists to remix their songs. The quality of the music is not always the main focus of the remix, rather the artists just want “to attach a DJ’s name to theirs”. DJs perform to make music for the sake of making music, so the revenue is not always the artists’ priority. “The overall movement is toward more ways to share music (and ideas) with like-minded individuals”, instead of trying to market their music to everyone. Those who want to find a DJ’s music will do so some way or another, so a DJ might as well make their goods easier to obtain.

[itslit-emac]

“Home taping was thus the first truly global, piracy paradoxically enough and it was global precisely because of its domesticity... In many places casual copying eclipsed commercial piracy.” Pg. 461 Pirate at Home and at Large

These series of piracy memes demonstrates what we discussed in class about how people who are doing the piracy do not consider it to be piracy. For example, the people from Nigeria, they are not okay with piracy thats from Nigerian Films but it is okay to pirate other films from outside Nigeria. Additionally several of our classmates gave stories of parents doing it as a business, which makes this commercial piracy.

[itslit-emac]

This article is about the underground Western music scene in Russian after World War II. All Western music was banned but it did not stop Russians from trying to get the newest Rock N Roll records from America or the UK. What the Russians did with their “bone music” mirrors the pirates Adrian Johns writes about in “The Pirate At Home and At Large” in many ways. Both followed a code of moral piracy, with the Russians rebelling against an overreaching censorship while the Jazz afficionados were attempting to build a public archive. Both used whatever means necessary to pirate. The recordings of opera were made available via magnetic tape and the bone music was made via old x-rays. Similarily, there was often a possibility of the recording being bad quality.

[itslit-emac]

Summary

The history of piracy holds many important stories that tell us more about how piracy has come to be the causal crime we have today. Nearly everybody has pirated some form of content, whether it be illegally streaming a movie or show, to illegal music downloads or copies. It does not hold the weight we associate with crime, which allows for us to engage in piracy on a daily basis.

The original purpose behind piracy held a bit more of a moral value than “not wanting to pay for it”. As those who had a strong appreciation for certain types of music wanted it to be accessible in newer formats so that they do not become lost over time. As they were enthusiasts and required entire collections of music due to their dedication to the genre of music whether it be opera or jazz. Yet even at the birth of piracy the motive has almost always been money. Making more if it usually being the case. Many record manufacturing companies had made ‘underground’ arrangements where they would print a smaller amount of copied records that would be sold for a smaller amount of money as pirated copies.

There were ‘good pirates’ and ‘bad pirates’ but when it came to the law, there was no difference. The idea of authority holding the power to arrest someone for doing something in their own home was new and unsettling to most. This comes across as ironic today considering everything we do that comes in contact with technology is tracked, logged, and stored in one or many databases nationally or sometimes even internationally. By studying the origins and history of piracy, we can also see a change not only in the way people saw technology but also in the way companies and governments used technology and how that usage affected the way consumers interacted with it.

------

In the same vein of wishing to have a form of media in another format, the ROM/emulation community is a great example of “grey area” piracy. This community typically acquires ROM or ISO files to play classic/abandoned console games from platforms such as the Nintendo Entertainment System, SNES, N64, Sega Genesis, Sega Dreamcast, GameBoy, and the like. One could argue that piracy in this sense doesn’t necessarily hurt the developers because the content being “taken” is no longer supported by current hardware and/or isn’t available in stores other than resale shops. But on the other hand, companies like Nintendo and Sega have made a serious push to ensure that their old games are brought forward onto newer platforms at the very least in digital form for fairly cheap prices, typically between $5-10. With the porting of classic titles to modern hardware one could say that piracy of the old games is no longer an arguable decision to make, but not everyone has the money to buy new systems or repurchase old games they already own just to play them again. Fortunately enough, there are LEGAL ways to make copies of games you own in order to play them on your computer in an emulator. For older cartridge-based titles (think Sega Genesis, Nintendo 64, etc), there is a ROM-ripping device called the Retrode. Using this device to connect the cartridge to your computer, you may either play the old title(s) straight off of the Retrode in an emulator or make a copy of the ROM for storage on your system to play the game without the device connected. 

In order to maintain the legal status of a ripped ROM, one must maintain possession of the original work that was copied (which is your license to own a copy of that media in a new format). If one was to rip their old cartridges and then sell them all while maintaining possession of the ROMs it would definitely be ILLEGAL, as one no longer owns rights to that content. It is legal to rip ROMs of games you possess, as you have a legal right to back up media you retain ownership of. Only when you have a ROM and no legitimate copy can you run into legal trouble if a company wishes to pursue you. 

Essentially, if you want to play ROMs on your computer legally, you must rip them yourself and keep the original copy to justify the possession of a ROM. ROMs downloaded from the Internet are NOT legal, even if you own a copy of the game, because they are not a backup of your own content. It’s someone else’s rip, to which you have no legal rights to.

[itslit-emac]

When it comes to underground music vs. the mainstream, or any entertainment award for that matter,  there tends to be the argument of whether or not something is authentic or true to what it is representing. This applies to actors portraying people in film, musicians receiving awards for a genre created by those of a different ethnicity, etc. 

Authenticity is important, as it allows for a common ground to be formed on what can and cannot be categorized into a genre. When it comes to hip hop, there are some very definite roots and clear icons of the genre. It has a rich and deep historical and cultural meaning although it is relatively new. Does this new “mumble rap” count as hip hop? Some of these artists are being awarded under the umbrella of a genre that their music does not truly represent. Or is this a new genre that will branch out to become its own industry as was seen with house, disco, and hip hop? Or the bigger argument...is it deserving of recognition at all?

[itslit-emac]

Week 6 Music Summary

“I foresee a marked deterioration in American music and musical taste, an interruption in the musical development of the country, and a host of other injuries to music in its artistic manifestations, by virtue -- or rather by vice -- of the multiplication of the various music-reproducing machines.” (Sousa).

Sousa did not like the innovations of how music was spreading on new machines, it took away from the real way music should sound and should also be appreciated. It was thought that if music was able to be mechanically produced then the art of listening to it would depreciate and less people would play musical instruments. Not only was this bad for the talent of the average, middle-class citizen, but it would be bad for those who made, distributed, and taught a musical instrument. He predicted that music economy would suffer and was right. This would definitely hurt America because he speculated that all the music talent came here because it was so supported and enjoyed as a classic pastime. He makes both logical and emotional arguments for the promotion of live music, from the economy to mentioning the good of the children. We can also see the want to copyright an idea or a thought coming back. Sousa felt that composers should have the right not to let their music be reproduced, we see that the ownership to a more abstract subject is still being fought for.

Firth also discusses the effects of the new technology in the music industry and comments on how records will change music. He goes more in depth into the economical effects on live music, records and radio put a dent in the live music industry and it did not rise again until a big star (Bing Crosby) could draw the attention of the pubic back to classic preforming ways. Records were still dominant and brought about popular music and other categories to organize what people wanted; this changed the music culture. Live music could not complete economically or conveniently with this new music form.

 Flash-forward to this century, and a completely new form of musical performance has been created from the remains of disco and scratch, the art of DJing. Jace Clayton, aka DJ /rupture, reveals through retelling a story of one of his first gigs in North Cyprus that DJing is the art of the opposition.

While most hubs of development for DJing are great cities and developed countries, one of the ways DJs make a living is by going outside these borders to spread their form of music. They must do this in order to seek out their main audiences. In here, a contradiction lies which Clayton expresses, “DJ music is now the common art form of squatters and the nouveau riche; it is the soundtrack both for capital and for its opposition.”

This is especially true when you look at DJ culture in America versus Europe. Clayton has played corporate events where guests eat sushi while music plays in the background and he has played parties full of hundreds of people in a squatter micro-community in Spain. Clayton believes that the reason Americans are so unreceptive to DJing is because they “like to see the artist expressing inner joy or channeling demons (or at least dressing up and dancing)”. They seem to be unaware of the new “totality” DJing brings to music. The elements work together which maintaining their individuality. Europe has seemed to embrace this idea and even uses taxpayer’s money to fund exploration into these DJ events. Clayton mentions, “arts funding in Europe is like magic dust.”

Part of why this contradiction of capital and opposition exists is because at its very core, DJing is in large part illegal. DJ’s uses bits of other popular tracks or bootlegs which would be such a legal mountain to license and distribute, that DJs often resort to a method of “word-of-mouth buzz and bootleg mixes… [where] gigs provide the cash”. This often works in favor of the DJs. Clubs when hosting a certain DJ’s performance at their establishment are left with a much smaller bill than a band would cost.  

Jace Clayton now runs his own homemade label, where having realized the paradox between capital and opposition, he encourages the other artists to chose between believing in the “music” or the “money”. The most important thing is pushing the “sound into the world”.

 Side note, Clayton also briefly references the “aura” attached to DJs when others request remixes for their songs. Interesting word choice, given our Walter Benjamin reading.

[itslit-emac]

I also found this article very interesting to read because it goes against what Sousa was arguing for. The decrease of people playing an instrument became true but people’s feelings towards instruments changed. Having the perspective of a mother gave a good insight on how we as a society value learning to play an instrument. It was also interesting how she brought up playing an  instrument as a child showed her your class status. While during Sousa’s time learning to play an instrument was necessary if you wanted to hear the latest song at the time. In all, it surprised me how instruments and recorded music are now grouped in the same thing because like Sousa I would think of them as separate and different.

Personal thought: I think that maybe enforcing a class during high school to learning about music would increase the percentage of people playing instruments because some kids can find it amusing and want to be a part of creating it. However, on the other hand, playing an instrument should be something someone really wants to do because they love it, not because they are being forced. This article though, does make me comprehend that kids should not be forced to play music. Who knows maybe in the future the percentage of people playing instruments will increase again, not because people are being forced to but because they want to.

I found this article very interesting. In Sousa’s The Menace of Mechanical Music, he discussed how the rise of recorded music will lead to a decrease in the number of people learning to play an instrument. If music can just be listened to with a phonograph, why should people, particularly housewives, have to go through years of lessons? Sousa brought a valid argument to our attention. I think this article also adds more validity to his point. Much of society would argue against the idea of enforcing learning of an instrument on a child, referring to it as “pointless” when music can be readily accessed with a simple switch. The main point in the article, is that learning an instrument has no effect on whether “they’ll always enjoy listening to music more”. I find that word choice very intriguing. That Oppenheimer and others associate playing an instrument with listening to music more. His research also concluded with the different genres of recorded music his participants listen to regularly. Playing an instrument and recorded music are now being grouped into being the same thing, is really interesting since Sousa argued that they would be grouped as separate and different.

[itslit-emac]

Pic + Quote

This photo was taken on an iPhone 7 Plus as I went on an evening walk a little over a month ago.

“When you put an image on Facebook or other social media, you’re feeding an array of immensely powerful artificial intelligence systems information about how to identify people and how to recognize places and objects, habits and preferences, race, class, and gender identifications, economic statuses, and much more.” 

- Trevor Paglen, “Invisible Images (Your Pictures are Looking at You)”

http://thenewinquiry.com/essays/invisible-images-your-pictures-are-looking-at-you/

[itslit-emac]

Sekula vs. Palgen

In “On the invention of photographic Meaning”, by Allen Sekula discusses how photography communicates messages and how photos can’t standalone without a text. Photography is readable and we learn how to read photography. But because photography appears to be natural or a portal to reality. Sekula explains why we accept that photography comes naturally, and not as photographic literacy. To explain how photographs are something we are taught he gives the example of a woman “learning to read” a snapshot of her son. “This is a message or, “The photograph stands for your son”, is necessary if the snapshot is to be read” (4). Sekula is trying to explain why we don’t look at a photo and see it as message because we have made a relationship with photography, and we have created a visual culture. Made by cheap photo reproduction making it available to the mass media. He relates Walter Benjamin’s ideas of reproduction and how reproduction allows artwork in this case photography to reach the “unprivileged”. “As a vehicle for explicit political argument, the photograph stands at the service of a class that represents the press” (11). Sekula also argues that photographs are meant for historical contexts. To be used as a tool to capture an event, or to document. He uses two photographers work Hine and Stieglitz to explain both historical contexts and social contexts, although he leaned more towards photography being used for historical contexts. In Hine’s “Immigrants going down gangplank, New York” where two immigrant women are going down the gangplank and you see a silhouette of a man in the background. Sekula describes Hine’s photo as straight forward capturing a historic time. Hine shows the historic value in his photography. Adding who is in the photo, where the photo was taken, and what it is in his photography. Stieglitz was the opposite to Sekula. Stieglitz believed photography should be abstract and be taken as a respectable art form. This lead to “Camera Work” a book where he presented his photos to argue they were real art. Sekulla disagreed that photography shouldn’t be all abstract but still retain its historical value and that Stieglitz was fetishizing photography. Fetishizing took away from political problems, it oppressed the subject in the photo. This is why he agreed more with Hine. Hine gave dignity to his subjects, and he made them real and told the background story of the people he photographed.

The article “Invisible Images (Your Pictures Are Looking at You)” by Trevor Paglen,  discusses the concept of “invisible images,” which is divided into five sections. The first section introduces the concept of “invisible images,” in which one of the main points of “invisible images” is that they “are actively watching us, poking and prodding, guiding our movements, inflicting pain and inducing pleasure.” The following section talks about how much information a digital image carries. To understand this, he talked about Facebook’s “DeepFace” algorithm, which recognizes individual’s faces from an uploaded picture. One of the things I feel that most people were unaware of or naive to is the fact that: “When you put an image on Facebook or other social media, you’re feeding an array of immensely powerful artificial intelligence systems information about how to identify people and how to recognize places and objects, habits and preferences, race, class, and gender identifications, economic statuses, and much more (Section II).” Additionally, the third section discusses how the images that are fed to networks such as CNN (Convolutional Neural Networks), are classified into groups of similar things. The example he says was to feed an image of the Olympia painting to CNN, and CNN will be quite sure that they are looking at a “burrito.” Another example, one I found pretty mean, was how Google used to classify African Americans as apes. Gladly, they deactivated the class for “gorillas” so that it did not classify African Americans as apes. Furthermore, the fourth section discusses how companies benefit from the information an image provides. For instance, Vigilant Solutions provided police with ALPR systems and access to Vigilant’s database and in return Vigilant received records of warrants and overdue court fees. To elucidate in detail, if a police car stopped a car with a flagged license plate, the driver is given two options: to pay full amount with credit card (with a 25% service fee that would go to Vigilant Solutions) or get arrested. Another instance he mentioned was an insurance company raising its premium based on a picture of a woman underage drinking that was uploaded to Facebook. Basically, two operations have to occur: “the first move is the individualization and differentiation of the people, places, and everyday lives of the landscapes under its purview... The second move is to reify those categories, removing any ambiguities in their interpretation so that individualized metadata profiles can be operationalized to collect municipal fees, adjust insurance rates, conduct targeted advertising, prioritize police surveillance, and so on  (VI).” Lastly, the last section discusses the developing strategies that can defeat today’s machine vision algorithms. When talking about these strategies he also says one not only has to think of the present but also the future of these machine vision algorithms. One of the main points I believe we should take from this is “we must begin to understand these changes if we are to challenge the exceptional forms of power flowing through the invisible visual culture that we find ourselves enmeshed within (V).”

While in the first article Sekula talks about photograph being a type of art form, and having a deeper meaning, Paglen, on the other hand, sees photography as an advancement of the present, for the capabilities it has now been given. If Sekula were still living today, I think he would’ve been amazed by how the meaning of photography shifted. Since he passed away in 2013, he still was able to see some of the advancements software has created to identify and classify pictures on the internet and in surveillance cameras. However, I also believe he would of still preserved the idea of photography having a powerful meaning. Paglen on the other hand would probably think that photography already lost its aura since he believes “we no longer look at images–images look at us. They no longer simply represent things, but actively intervene in everyday life (V).” In all, it was interesting to read both of these articles and see how pictures have come a long way, although it is pretty scary to think that now pictures “are looking at [us].”

Sources: 

On the Invention of Photograph Meaning by Allen Sekula

Invisible Images (Your Pictures Are Looking at You) By Trevor Paglen