The Kindle Mediameditation 4

This week in Media and Society I got to take my first look at a kindle, which is Amazon.com's E-reader.
I cannot embed it but here is the commercial for the kindle
Picture from here
First Impression: Is that it?
First seeing it i thought to myself that cant be it, but indeed it is only about 3/5's the size of a piece of paper from note book.
I was never partial to reading books. They never interested me not because I did not find them interesting it is because I cannot read very well. I got my literature through other media for example the Audio Book was one of my constant companions though child hood. Fall asleep listening to the Hobbit or the newest Harry Potter was always great. Listening to the same tape over and over again was essentially re reading favorite passages from books.
With this under my belt I do not view the kindle as an invading force to stamp out the existence of print media. Because having gone outside the normal realms of reading I still think that the media experience you get from reading a book is magnificent. The blanking out of thought the only sensor input is from your eyes, it allows you to imagine what you are reading. This is a parallel with Audio Books because sometimes when you do not have the time to read you can listen and imagine why you do some repetitive task.

iCactus! Media Meditation 3

Image courtesy of 8bitpeoples.com
Recently a friend of mine introduced me to new musician named KHONNOR. Who is actually from Saint J vermont. He has made music under a bunch of different names but the album i have listend too is iCactus.
iCactus was done in 8bit which is the music that old video games generally had. So games from the days of the N.E.S. would have been 8bit.
He distributes music for free because he actually enjoys playing music enough to do it for free.
Here is the link
Its little short but it is definitely worth checking out.
Here is one song off of the album ala youtube

MIDTERM MEDITATION!!!!!11one!

1. After studying 21st century media for eight weeks in this class, what have you learned?
This is an awfully broad question Dubiya

Iv learned that blogging is the way of the future. Each new medium for news lasts until something better comes along. Radio to TV, News paper-News website. Movies to Netflix.

2 What is the most important thing you have learned about yourself as a critical reader, a writer, and a thinker in this class so far?
That i need to improve my reading speed and my writing style. I am a very slow reader. It takes me 3 or 4 views of a video to be able to read all of the text in it. Writing wise I need to remember to cite sources.

3. Whats one thing you would do differently this first half of the semester if you were to take this class again?
I would put more of an effort to use the class blog and to keep up with the blog posts. Maybe analyze the reading a little more.

4. What's one thing you would like me to do differently this first half of the semester if you were to take this class again.?
Less blogging, but this is a blog heavy class maybe increase the amount of media meditations and lower the blogging requirement of reading.

5. Please comment on the usefulness of the power tools, our course blog, your personal blog, our in-class quizzes, our films and our book(s) as learning tools.

The quizzes are great for applying what we learn to real life current affairs and media. The powertools are gods gift to man enough said. The text book is awesome because it is so new with its info. I have never used a text book that was so current. The class blog is less useful. I know its important but i never read it, I find blogging very tedious and boring in all honesty. I do recognize its importance for the new professional generation going through college Being tech savy is a must for every young professional. the films are great especially in conjunction wi the power tools. Its an excellent critical thinking exercise.

ITS DYNAMITE! Media Meditation #2

Recently i watched a movie on Netflix insta-queue which in itself is an amazing invention that no TV loving person should be forced to live without. Netflix costs 8.99 a month. this a steal to be able to watch almost anything you want instantly Unwinding after a tough Saturday me and my friends came across a movie called Black Dynamite. It came out last year to a good reception it was nominated for two awards and won best film at the Seattle International Film Festival. The premise of the movie was to make a Blaxploitation film and have the movie be very self aware. Making fun of itself and the genre it is portraying by pretending to have a small enough budget that they cannot even afford to do retakes. The blaxploitation genre came out in the late 70's and was aimed at urban African Amerians. They usually had an incoherent plot mixed with a sound track that had hip hop, funk, and soul music.

I highly recommend this movie to anyone that can appreciate it. From the one liners to the scripted re takes. Here is the trailer

Thumb it up. Media Meditation #1

Stumble Upon is the greatest modification to my tool bar I have ever had the pleasure to use. I have stumbled upon so many cool websites. It builds a cookie on your likes and dislikes and with that cookie it brings you to websites that have been thumbed up by people. You can even discover new websites that you feel must be shared with the whole wide world of stumblers.
I stumbled upon a comic about left 4 dead. If you have been living under a rock for the last two years, or you do not care about video games left for dead redefined the co-op survival horror FPS genre when it came out in in November 2008. Now after 2 years we finally start getting some back story on our favorite survivors.

Also with stumble upon i found quiet possibly the funniest video i have seen in a long time. Remember Lloyd Chirstmas from Dumb and Dumber. If you remember him there is no doubt you remember the most annoying sound in the world.
Warning lower your volume before watching


So get on Firefox and get stumble upon, and never get work done again.

('_') Creativty is not my strong point.

1. KEY CONCEPT: I never realized how important the printing press was to the modern western ideal of nationalism and indeed all nationalism. China invented the printing press around 1045. which means if the printing press began nationalism it may explain China viewing itself as the middle kingdom. They had a 400 year head start in nationalistic beliefs.


2. KEY TERM: Selective Exposure: "The phenomenon whereby audiences seek messages and meanings that correspond to their preexisting beliefs." The dictator used selective exposure to gain the support of the people during his coup.


3. FIVE FACTS:
1. The printing press was invited in China 400 years before the Europeans.
2. In the 1880's 80% of Americans lived on farms or in small towns.
3.in the last 10 years use of consumer Internet has gone up 138 hours. compared with just 47 in television viewing
4. in the last 5 years only video gaming and Consumer Internet use has risen in hours per person per year use of the media.
5. The average age of a gamer is 35

4. PERSONAL STORY: I have been playing video games for most of my life. It all started on valentines day 1997 when my parents for reasons never fully explained bought a Nintendo 64 for me and my 3 siblings. We loved playing games like Mario party and golden eye. My parents were sucked into the whole if you play violent video games you will emulate the acts in real life. So they would usually not let me play golden eye or perfect dark which were two famous first person shooters on the n64. As i got older about 10-11 i began to play games on the computer. My favorite genre of video game is still the first person shooter. I have played most of them.( the good ones anyway). I think that its a crock of shit that violet video games cause violet actions. maybe it does if the child in question has awful parents that do not give their child enough attention and try to buy their happiness with material possessions to be proper role models. So they look to Niko Belic(GTA4)to learn their morales.

LOLOLOL

My first blog post.

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