CPE Rough Draft

Hello All:

My Critical Photo Essay will be entirely video based, in the form of interviews.  Although I am not filming until Thursday (Nov. 18th), I have included my list of questions that I will be asking each interviewee.  My project will explore the perspectives of the older generation (65+) regarding technology, and whether or not it helps our hinders our progress as a society.  So far, I have 5 subjects to interview, but I suspect that I may not use all of the footage I shoot because for a 10 minute video, it only gives each person ~20 seconds to answer per question.  My intention is to interview each person alone, so that 'group think' is less likely to occur.

To My Group Members:
If there are parts of my rough draft that are confusing, or you can think of another question that I should be asking, I'm all ears.

The Individual VS. The Network

I certainly prefer videos to readings for these blogs, which is not at all surprising considering the generation I'm a part of.  Anderson said that in 4 years, more than 90% of the webs data will be video composition, and although my initial reaction was surprise, the more I think about it the more I think that 4 years may be a lengthy estimate.  I already try to avoid texts by looking up videos that sum up the ideas, and if a video isn't available, I go to the next best thing: audio.  There have been quite a few times in college where I knew that I didn't have the time to read any texts at all, so I buy audiobooks instead so that I can listen while I'm at work, or cleaning the house, etc.  This is an aspect of my life that I'm kind of quiet about, because as a writer it's blasphemy to be open about NOT reading.  The truth is, from what I can remember about reading, I loved it.  It's easy to get lost in a book (especially fiction), and leave the real world behind.  The only problem is that the real world currently doesn't cater to the proper amount of time it takes a person to sit down with a book.  We're too busy responding to texts/emails/voicemails/social networks to really set aside the time to get lost in literature.  All this networking is valuable though, because the more people that are on board a particular train of thought, the faster that train rides into something revolutionary.

But what about our daydreams?  What about our introspective moments that allow us so sort through the sub-par ideas, and reach the really good ones?  When we are in constant 'network' mode, we have the ability to bounce ideas off of each other and make joint decisions about what's worth developing and what isn't, but something about this approach takes away the magic, or "epic win" feeling of hatching an idea.  When you take away the magic, you diminish the desire that Chris Anderson was talking about...at least in my experience.  Anderson also focuses on the positive effects of global recognition that ultimately lead to a spike in passion and desire among the public who generate this recognition, which causes me to think of the different implications this has on an individual vs. a group effort.  Jesus what a boring sentence, I would have stopped reading at 'ultimately' if I were you.  Anyways, when I see a video of a single person being awesome at something, I look at them almost like a mystical creature; someone who does something so incredible that it pushes the boundaries of what I thought our redundant piles of protoplasm were capable of.  In that moment, I want to become a mystical creature too, and believe that I can do it.  On the other hand, when I see a group of people do something amazing, I'm almost completely unmoved.  Something about the collaboration of people to complete a task is common and taken for granted, and I find myself thinking, "Of course you can do this one thing when you string 50 brains together to do it.  Big deal." The fact is, it IS a big deal, but there is something far more appealing and inspiring about an individual instead of a group.

Why the hell is this? Do any of you feel this way?  Shouldn't 10x the amount of 'mystical creatures' result in something truly incredible?
Even the first video we watched in class of thousands of voices recorded via webcam was easy to look past.  Perhaps it's a personal problem, or a case of me projecting, but I find myself rooting for the individual, and hoping that the group effort fails just so it highlights how awesome the individual is.

Despite my bitterness toward social networking and group efforts, I completely agree with Anil Dash's concept that creating as an island will only get you so far, because networking will always get the ball rolling faster.  This notion feeds into my CPE in an interesting way, because as I start to come up with questions for the elderly about technology, I realize that the older generation has a common belief that each person takes care of themselves, and earns their rewards without help from others.  I was raised this way too--if you need help, help yourself so that you don't owe anyone anything.  Can't make rent?  Don't you dare ask your family for help, go out and get another job...two jobs if that's what it takes.  Similarly, if you have a radical idea that could improve the lives of billions, climb that mountain alone so no one can taint your vision.  Of course, doing anything alone takes at least twice as long as it would with help, (not trolling, but...) what's the rush?  It always feels like we are racing toward some final achievement, but none of us know what it is.  As Seth Priebatsch suggests, maybe this race has become a game for all of us, one that we don't know how to stop playing.  We keep trying to level up, but the ground we stand on raises along with us, so it never really feels like we get anywhere.  So we try harder, invent faster, socialize more, as if the final achievement is one complete unified consciousness; we catch glimpses of it and think that's it! that's the ticket! Then we go to class and we all talk about concepts that already came out of someone else's mouth in order to try and come up with a better concept that will be the future conversational fuel for classes to come.  We all try to laugh at the same memes and videos, join the same online games so we can curse similarly, mimic sarcastic vocal inflections so we sound cool, and say things like "obvi" instead of obviously to identify where we stand linguistically in our generation.  Some days I look at all this and think, "Wow, we really do all cultivate each other!" and other days I think, "Have we forgotten how to cultivate ourselves?"

Woah, Thompson.

Thompson's book is pretty much composing my questions for me for the Critical Photo Essay.  Since my focus has shifted to elderly perspectives on technology, and whether or not this technology is beneficial or detrimental to our progress as a society, I've become interested in the question of are we getting dumber?  This question evokes another area of inquiry, which is do we value memory in an age where it isn't a necessity?  Thompson has some quotes that pertain to these question pretty well.
(Also, apologies for not having page numbers, my kindle version only has locations)




"If we remembered every single detail of everything, we wouldn't be able to make sense of anything." (Thompson)

How can this be? I'm reading this as "if we have all the information possible, we wouldn't know how to use it."  This seems absurd, because I think that with more information, the more sense you can make.  Perhaps this quote is assuming that you have a normal brain until you're 25, and one morning you wake up with every memory from the womb to the present moment.  Sure, that would be pretty overwhelming.  But if our brains functioned like machines from the very beginning, never forgetting a single piece of data, I think we could make sense of everything.  So...I don't buy this.

"The real power of digital memories will be to trigger our human ones." (Thompson)

This is a pretty important statement, mostly because this is already in effect.  Using machines as triggers instead of 'actors' for lack of a better term seems like a possible way to maintain a balance between machines NOT taking over, and humans remaining in control.  I realize this comes off as a little paranoid, because I don't have a lot of trust in technology, or privacy, so in an effort to combat this fear I've tried to see the collective consciousness system (the internet) as a harmonious balance between humans, instead of man vs. machine.  For example, the biggest fear in using machines as memory triggers is that it might not be the machine at all, but some government agency using the machine as a catalyst for some form of mind control.  Holy shit I can't believe I typed such a batshit crazy sentence.  Anyways, the important thing to remember with this specific kind of paranoia is that most networks tend to correct these types of discrepancies.  For each Big Brother-ish nefarious government movement, there is an equal and opposite reaction where the hackers/geo loggers/bloggers/twits derail the government plan.  So, it's a cool thing to have internet vigilantes.

Lastly, I'd like to touch on the concept of ambient awareness.  This was really cool to see fleshed out, because it's a phenomenon that we all experience.  It made me realize that I am less ambiently aware than all of my classmates, because I don't social network.  However, I still experience some amount of this awareness through things like email and texting (sorry Alex, gotta use you as an example).  For the first month of the semester, Alex was a static character in my classroom fixture.  We'd discuss readings when prompted by Doug and participate in large group discussions, but once class was over, the character(s) disappear, at least for me.  One day Alex and I decided to exchange numbers, in an effort to kick each other's ass when motivation levels got low and one of us contemplated not going to class.  As soon as she was entered into my phone, she became a fixture in my mind instead of just the classroom.  Each Tuesday and Thursday morning, there's some minor degree of acknowledgement that both Alex and I might be toying with the idea of not coming to class, and this awareness prompts a motivational text message.  Another example is with Ian, who I've known in previous classes, but never interacted with as a human, only as a student (you guys all know they aren't the same thing.  Nobody says shit like "it struck me as particularly interesting that bleh bleh bleh and the implications are fairly extensive in terms of theoretical perspectives" in conversation, and if you do, nobody enjoys talking to you.)  Ian and I exchanged numbers this semester also, and through our occasional texts an image of his life started to emerge for me.  Whether this image is accurate or not is irrelevant, it's the fact that the technological action of inserting a number into a phone suddenly makes a person more tangible.  Personally, I find this equal parts spooky and cool, and I can't help but wonder what other awarenesses I experience.  Overall, Thompson gave me a ton to think about, and helped me start my CPE, so right the fuck on.