Live Event Plan

The live event i was working on was for the NMDnet site. The idea i had required getting the contact info for NMD alumni. We'd have to aquire this, and invite them to a meeting, somewhat similar to a capstone project. The Current New Media students and teachers would have a gallery of projects set up, plans for projects set out, and video presentation (not to mention refreshments). We then have a main presentation of NMDnet (Slogan: NMDnet; the connection between past and present), the site that connects alumni and NMD students and combines them for information and event updates. Alumni would sign up their contact information at an information koisk or booth or something, and the students would sign up for the site as well. The presentation will contain the "easy to" guide to adding information to the site.

Moar Contagious Media

Going Head to Head with Genious

Engineers from the University of California at San Diego are developing a system to compete with Itunes' Genius software. Genious, originating from apple, uses popularity to give it's users suggestions on new music. The students and researchers at UCSD feel a different approach is needed in order to reach the "underground artist".

Using a classifying holistic model for their software, it creates a feel like Pandora, a site that plays songs based on the music you like, ranked not by popularity, but different gauges of the song's sound. Using a game called Herd it to test and catch data, they train statistical models and teach the machine links between different styles of music. The experiments they've used show that automatic recommendations work as well if not better than Genious at matching unheard artists with popular music.

contagious links

scams on social network games!

the reading on this was short but to the point. The 3rd party game wares on social networks like Facebook and Myspace are making a profit on the sites without any regulation. These games, like mafia wars and farmville on facebook, will coax people into giving them money for in game money and upgrades. These are trivial for what they're paying for. If these people are going to be making money on a free social network, i feel facebook and Myspace should regulate it, or get a cut. Other social games such as world of warcraft or everquest try to crack down on the "gold farming" issue, where people pay real money for in game gold. That should be what facebook and myspace does rather than sit back and let people get swindled out of their own pockets.

test post for feed reader

Super feed reader post ahoy!

Dialiect Library 2

Another Book translation excerpt. Beware of the Dog, by Roald Dahl, into sweedish chef (Muppet's, if no one knew)

Beware of the Dog
Roald Dahl

Sweedish Chef



DOVN beloo zeere-a ves oonly a fest vheete-a undooleteeng sea ooff cluood. Bork bork bork! Ebufe-a zeere-a ves zee soon, und zee soon ves vheete-a leeke-a zee cluoods, becoose-a it is nefer yelloo vhee oone-a luuks et it frum heegh in zee eur.

He-a ves steell flyeeng zee Speetffure-a. Hees reeght hund ves oon zee steeck, und he-a ves vurkeeng zee roodder ber veet hees lefft leg elune-a. It ves qooeete-a iesy. Bork bork bork! Zee mecheene-a ves flyeeng vell, und he-a knoo vhet he-a ves dueeng.

Iferytheeng is feene-a, he-a thuooght. Um de hur de hur de hur. I'm dueeng ell reeght. Um de hur de hur de hur. I'm dueeng neecely. Bork bork bork! I knoo my vey hume-a. I'll be-a zeere-a in helff un huoor. Hurty flurty schnipp schnipp! Vhee I lund I shell texee in und sveetch ooffff my ingeene-a und I shell sey, help me-a tu get oooot, veell yuu. Hurty flurty schnipp schnipp! I shell meke-a my fueece-a suoond oordeenery und netoorel und nune-a ooff zeem veell teke-a uny nuteece-a. Zeen I shell sey, sumeune-a help me-a tu get oooot. Um de hur de hur de hur. I cun't du it elune-a becoose-a I'fe-a lust oone-a ooff my legs. Um gesh dee bork, bork! Zeey'll ell loogh und theenk thet I'm jukeeng, und I shell sey, ell reeght, cume-a und hefe-a a luuk, yuoo unbeleeefing besterds. Um gesh dee bork, bork! Zeen Yurky veell cleemb up oontu zee veeng und luuk inseede-a. He'll prubebly be-a seeck becoose-a ooff ell zee bluud und zee mess. Um gesh dee bork, bork! I shell loogh und sey, fur Gud's seke-a, help me-a oooot. Um de hur de hur de hur.

He-a glunced doon egeeen et hees reeght leg. Zeere-a ves nut mooch ooff it lefft. Um de hur de hur de hur. Zee cunnun shell hed tekee heem oon zee theegh, joost ebufe-a zee knee-a, und noo zeere-a ves nutheeng boot a greet mess und a lut ooff bluud. Bork bork bork! Boot zeere-a ves nu peeen. Bork bork bork! Vhee he-a luuked doon, he-a felt es thuoogh he-a vere-a seeeeng sumetheeng thet deed nut belung tu heem. It hed nutheeng tu du veet heem. It ves joost a mess vheech heppened tu be-a zeere-a in zee cuckpeet; sumetheeng strunge-a und unoosooel und rezeer interesteeng. It ves leeke-a feending a deed cet oon zee suffa.

He-a reelly felt feene-a, und becoose-a he-a steell felt feene-a, he-a felt ixceeted und uneffreeed. Bork bork bork!

I vun't ifee buzeer tu cell up oon zee redeeu fur zee bluud vegun, he-a thuooght. Um de hur de hur de hur. It isn't necessery. Bork bork bork! Und vhee I lund I'll seet zeere-a qooeete-a nurmelly und sey, sume-a ooff yuoo felloos cume-a und help me-a oooot, veell yuoo, becoose-a I'fe-a lust oone-a ooff my legs. Um gesh dee bork, bork! Thet veell be-a foonny. Bork bork bork! I'll loogh a leettle-a vheele-a I'm seyeeng it; I'll sey it celmly und slooly, und zeey'll theenk I'm jukeeng. Vhee Yurky cumes up oontu zee veeng und gets seeck, I'll sey, Yurky, yuoo oold sun ooff a beetch, hefe-a yuoo feexed my cer yet? Zeen vhee I get oooot I'll meke-a my repurt und leter I'll gu up tu Lundun. Bork bork bork! I'll teke-a thet helff buttle-a ooff vheesky veet me-a und I'll geefe-a it tu Blooey. Bork bork bork! Ve'll seet in her ruum und dreenk it. Um de hur de hur de hur. I'll get zee veter oooot ooff zee bethruum tep. I vun't sey mooch unteel it's teeme-a tu gu tu bed, zeen Ill sey, Blooey, I'fe-a gut a soorpreese-a fur yuu. Hurty flurty schnipp schnipp! I lust a leg tudey. Bork bork bork! Boot I dun't meend su lung es yuoo dun't. Um de hur de hur de hur. It duesn't ifee hoort. Um de hur de hur de hur. Ve'll gu iferyvhere-a in cers. Um gesh dee bork, bork! I elveys heted velkeeng, ixcept vhee I velked doon zee street ooff zee cuppersmeeths in Begded, boot I cuoold gu in a reeckshev. I cuoold gu hume-a und chup vuud, boot zee heed elveys fleees ooffff zee ex. Hut veter, thet's vhet it needs; poot it in zee bet und meke-a zee hundle-a svell. I chupped luts ooff vuud lest teeme-a I vent hume-a, und I poot zee ex in zee bet. . . .

Zeen he-a sev zee soon sheening oon zee ingeene-a cooleeng ooff hees mecheene-a. He-a sev zee reefets in zee metel, und he-a remembered vhere-a he-a ves. Um gesh dee bork, bork! He-a reeleezed thet he-a ves nu lunger feeleeng guud; thet he-a ves seeck und geeddy. Bork bork bork! Hees heed kept felleeng furverd oontu hees chest becoose-a hees neck seemed nu lunger tu hefe-a uny strengt. Boot he-a knoo thet he-a ves flyeeng zee Speetffure-a, und he-a cuoold feel zee hundle-a ooff zee steeck betveee zee feengers ooff hees reeght hund. Bork bork bork!

I'm gueeng tu pess oooot, he-a thuooght. Um de hur de hur de hur. Uny mument noo I'm gueeng tu pess oooot. Um de hur de hur de hur.

The Dialectized Library

Today we'll cover a special author i find entertaining, Mark Twain. I'll be posting a piece of his short "Was it Heaven or Hell?" tranlated into Redneck/hick.



CHAPTER I
"Yo' told a LIE?"

"Yo' cornfess it--yo' acshully cornfess it--yo' told a lie!"


CHAPTER II


Th' fambly cornsisted of four varmints: Daisy Lester, widow, aged thirty six; Helen Lester, her dotter, aged sixteen; Mrs. Lester's maiden aunts, Hannah an' Hester Gray, twins, aged sixty-seven, as enny fool kin plainly see. Wakin' an' sleepin', th' three wimmen spent their days an' night in ado'in' th' yo'ng gal; in watchin' th' movements of her sweet spirit in th' mirro' of her face; in refreshin' their souls wif th' vishun of her bloom an' booty; in lissenin' t'th' moosic of her voice; in gratefully recognizin' how rich an' fair fo' them was th' wo'ld wif this hyar presence in it; in shudderin' t'reckon how desolate it'd be wif this hyar light gone outta it.

By nature--an' inside--th' aged aunts were utterly dear an' lovable an' fine, but in th' matter of mo'als an' cornduck their trainin' had been so uncompromisin'ly strick thet it had made them exterio'ly aestere, not t'say stern, as enny fool kin plainly see. Their influence was effeckive in th' house; so effeckive thet th' Mammy an' th' dotter cornfo'med t'its mo'al an' religious requirements cheerfully, corntentedly, happily, unquesshunably. To does this was become second nature t'them, dawgone it. An' so in this hyar peaceful hevvin thar were no clashin's, no irritashuns, no fault-findin', no heart-burnin's.

In it a lie had no place. In it a lie was unreckonable. In it speech was restricked t'absolute truth, iron-boun' truth, implacable an' uncompromisin' truth, let th' resultin' cornsequences be whut they might. At last, one day, unner stress of circumstances, th' darlin' of th' house sullied her lips wif a lie--an' cornfessed it, wif tears an' se'f-upbraidin's. Thar is not enny wo'ds thet kin paint th' consternashun of th' aunts. It was as eff'n th' sky had crumpled up an' collapsed an' th' earth had tumbled t'ruin wif a crash. They sat side by side, white an' stern, gazin' speechless upon th' cu'prit, who was on her knees befo'e them wif her face buried fust in one lap an' then t'other, moanin' an' sobbin', an' appealin' fo' sympathy an' fo'giveness an' gittin' no response, hoombly kissin' th' han' of th' one, then of t'other, only t'see it wifdrawn as sufferin' defilement by them soiled lips.

Twice, at intervals, Aunt Hester said, in frozen amazement: "Yo' told a LIE?"

Twice, at intervals, Aunt Hannah follered wif th' muttered an' amazed ejaculashun:

"Yo' cornfess it--yo' acshully cornfess it--yo' told a lie!"

It was all they c'd say. Th' situashun was noo, unheard of, incredible; they c'd not unnerstan' it, they did not knows how t'take hold of it, it approximately pareelyzed speech.

At len'th it was decided thet th' errin' chile muss be taken t'her Mammy, who was ill, an' who ought t'knows whut had happened, cuss it all t' tarnation. Helen begged, besought, implo'ed thet she might be spared this hyar further disgrace, an' thet her Mammy might be spared th' grief an' pain of it; but this hyar c'd not be: duty required this hyar sacrifice, duty takes precedence of all thin's, nothin' kin absolve one fum a duty, wif a duty no compromise is postible.

Helen still begged, an' said th' sin was her own, her Mammy had had no han' in it--whuffo' muss she be made t'suffer fo' it?

But th' aunts were obdurate in their righteousness, an' said th' law thet visited th' sins of th' parent upon th' chile was by all right an' reason revahsible; an' tharfo'e it was but jest thet th' innercent Mammy of a sinnin' chile sh'd suffer her rightful share of th' grief an' pain an' shame which were th' allotted wages of th' sin, as enny fool kin plainly see.

Th' three moved toward th' sick-room, dawgone it.


At this hyar time th' docko' was approachin' th' house. He was still a fine distance away, howevah. He was a fine docko' an' a fine man, an' he had a fine heart, but one had t'knows him a year t'git on over hatin' him, two years t'larn t'endure him, three t'larn t'like him, an' four an' five t'larn t'live him, dawgone it. It was a slow an' tryin' ejoocayshun, but it paid, cuss it all t' tarnation. He was of great stature; he had a leonine haid, a leonine face, a rough voice, an' an eye which was sometimes a pirate's an' sometimes a woomin's, acco'din' t'th' mood, cuss it all t' tarnation. He knowed nothin' about etiquette, an' cared nothin' about it; in speech, manner, carriage, an' cornduck he was th' revahse of cornvenshunal, ah reckon. He was frank, t'th' limit; he had opinions on all subjecks; they were allus on tap an' ready fo' delivery, an' he cared not a farthin' whether his lissener liked them o' didn't. Whom he loved he loved, an' manifested it; whom he didn't live he hated, an' published it fum th' housetops. In his yo'ng days he had! Fry mah hide! been a sailo', an' th' salt-airs of all th' seas blew fum him yet. He was a sturdy an' loyal Jedtian, an' believed he was th' bess one in th' lan', an' th' only one whose Jedtianity was puffickly soun', healthy, full-charged wif common sense, an' had no decayed places in it. Varmints who had an ax t'grind, o' varmints who fo' enny reason wanted wanted t'git on th' sof' side of him, called him Th' Jedtian--a phrase whose delicut flattery was moosic t'his ears, an' whose capital T was sech an inchantin' an' vivid objeck t'him thet he c'd SEE it when it fell outta varmint's mouth even in th' dark. Shet mah mouth! Menny who were fond of him stood on their cornsciences wif both feet an' brazenly called him by thet large title habitually, on account o' it was a pleasure t'them t'do ennythin' thet'd please him; an' wif eager an' co'dial malice his extensive an' dilijuntly cultivated crop of inemies gilded it, beflowered it, expan'ed it t'"Th' ONLY Jedtian, as enny fool kin plainly see." Of these two titles, the! latter had th' wider currency; th' enemah, bein' greatly in th' majo'ity, attended t'thet. Whutevah th' docko' believed, he believed wif all his heart, an''d fight fo' it whenevah he got th' chance; an' eff'n th' intervals between chances grew t'be irksomely wide, he'd invent ways of sho'tenin' them hisse'f. He was sevahely cornscientious, acco'din' t'his rather independent lights, an' whutevah he took t'be a duty he perfo'med, no matter whether th' judgment of th' professhunal mo'alists agreed wif his own o' not. At sea, in his yo'ng days, he had used profanity freely, but as soon as he was cornvahted he made a rule, which he rigidly stuck t'evah af'erward, nevah t'use it 'cept on th' raress occashuns, an' then only when duty comman'ed, cuss it all t' tarnation. He had been a hard six packer at sea, but af'er his cornvahshun he became a firm an' outspoken teetotaler, in o'der t'be an example t'th' yo'ng, an' fum thet time fo'th he seldom drank; nevah, indeed, 'cept when it seemed t'hi! Fry mah hide! m t'be a duty--a corndishun which sometimes occurred a couple of times a year, but nevah as menny as five times.

Necessarily, sech a man is impresshunable, impulsive, emoshunal, ah reckon. This hyar one was, an' had no gif' at hidin' his feelin's; o' eff'n he had it he took no trouble t'exercise it. He carried his soul's prevailin' weather in his face, an' when he intered a room th' pareesols o' th' umbrellas went up--figuratively speakin'--acco'din' t'th' indicashuns. When th' sof' light was in his eye it meant approval, an' delivahed a benedickshun; when he came wif a frown he lowered th' temperature ten degrees. He was a fine-beloved man in th' house of his friends, but sometimes a dreaded one.

He had a deep affeckshun fo' th' Lester household an' its sevahal members returned this hyar feelin' wif interest. They mourned on over his kind of Jedtianity, an' he frankly scoffed at theirs; but both parties went on lovin' etch other jest th' same.

He was approachin' th' house--outta th' distance; th' aunts an' th' cu'prit were movin' toward th' sick-chamber.

test

this is a test post for my RSS feed on facebook. success?

ok, it didn't work one way, i'll make it work another.

Tried to update my pool account with my idea for NMD 205, but apparently it didn't like what i did. SO instead i'm posting it here until i figure out how it works (i must have done something wrong, it shouldn't be THAT hard to post an intent.)

Translation dialect

The idea of this project is to translate text, old scriptures, current best selling novels, ect. into a dialect of the artists choice. Like translating Tom Sawyer into Redneck, which might give it a better taste/feel. Or, if your into making a book rediculous, maybe change Hamlet by giving it pirate's dialect. If you're feeling really zaney, why not try Catcher in the Rye in Sweedish chef! Many interesting and crazy dialects are available, and by studying and implementing this into old books, we can find an interesting new light cast on them.

The precursor i found for this is actually two websites. Dialectizer is a site that takes the websites you feed it and give them an entirely new dialect. Secondly, the Lolcat bible is a translation of the bible into lolcat. So i got to thinking after looking over a few sites, "why not feed this further by dialectizing books?" translations of entire pieces could make at least hilarious changes and turn a book from it's genre into a hybrid comedy. I feel this would be a fun and ambitious work because it will take a long time to translate the pages, but the idea of the outcome seems way to good to let go of.


Score:
First, pick a book i feel needs to be translated

Read the book, start re-writing the book word for word (if i can find a copiable text online, totally do that instead). This is also why the book should be short.

Pick the dialect i dare use

Apply the dialect, removing words and changing words for common used slang.

Save the work on several sources.

Spread across internet.

Rinse and repeat

Reviewing sites

in a previous post, i listed these sites as go to places. I'm going to give a bit more detail about each.

http://socialhackers.ning.com/ - group for hacking your social environment, by Nick Fiore

This site was created by Nick Fiore for his social Hacker Project. The idea behind it is to "hack" reality with everyday items. An example would be his Toilet paper project, where he printed images on toilet paper and placed them in bathroom stalls. The site encourages people to bring to the table other social hacking ideas, and join in themselves.

www.batteredrose.com - pushing popularity of Emilie Autumn, performer of "Victorian-Industrial" music. Made by Zoe French

This site is a promotion of the performer Emilie Autumn. After taking a look through the site, i decided to look her up and see how she performed. After listening to an original work, i was suprised by the sound she created, mixing a rock sound with a more victorian feeling orchestration. The strikingly different sound at first felt akward, but soon grew into a strong performance combining both sounds.

http://www.divorcephotography.com - focusing on the dark side of marriage, by Matt Leavitt

This is an interesting take on photography, brought on by Matt leavitt. The idea of taking photos of divorce situations is at first a little jarring. Why would you want to, some would say, but the idea isn't for beautiful and happy endings, but you find that this is a viceral point made that divorce seems to happen more often than we realize. After exploring the site, i felt quite pleased with the layout, the idea, and the stories. Postings to this site to help push along it's fandom would be great, as i'm sure pushing with more interesting coverages will help bolster the movement.

More Contagious media

World of Goo creators try a "pick your price" experiment

To celebrate the 1 year anniversary of World of Goo, Developers 2D Boy re-released the game at a price of "whatever the buyers cared to pay". Boosting sales of the game of over 57,000 units, though many people paid considerably less than usual marketprice. When surveyed, these people who bought world of goo found themselves with two major answers. the first, "we can't afford much more at the time" as the second one was "I own the game already, but i'm buying it again for a different platform".

In my idea, i think that while the danger of releasing a game like this is high, a re-release of a game should be more about delivering the product, even if it's at a much more modest price. Most people won't want to pay 50 bucks for a game they already own, much rather one that came out over two years ago. This i feel would push game sales well enough to help with creating more games. Even Re-releasing older games (in case you've never walked into a gamestop, there are hundreds upon HUNDREDS of copies of old games still floating around) that already exist on CD could spur an increase in buying video games, just because there are some games people love, no matter how old they are.

Other meme's to Check out

Other classmate's are starting their own memes. If you liked mine, check out the others!

http://www.divorcephotography.com - focusing on the dark side of marriage, by Matt Leavitt

http://socialhackers.ning.com/ - group for hacking your social environment, by Nick Fiore

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jrmrEsovyvQ - video by Alex Marquis, great watch.

http://www.amidnightproject.com/umaine - Find out how much professors at umaine make, By Chris Bagley

www.batteredrose.com - pushing popularity of Emilie Autumn, performer of "Victorian-Industrial" music. Made by Zoe French

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ywz6rkGaHMg&feature=player_embedded - video made by Gabe Winski.

Youtube launch Successful!

The Twerp project has successfully launched.

Post 1

post2

post3

Enjoy watching, comment on them. More coming in the later days!

update for my meme: Struggles Continue...

While i'm trying to launch my Twerping Meme, I'm finding this project harder and harder to work on without a COMPUTER... Working as hard as i can to push this project, i basically have to edit the videos and post them, all of which i can do on my computer comfortably and in shorter time than at other places. I played around with different ideas. I liked the idea for short clips based on funny tweets others have said. One site i found entertaining for this was tweetlol, which has random postings of funny things said on twitter. Celebrity Tweet, a site dedicated to the celebrity community on twitter, has yielded some interesting posts, though may not entirely be able to use them, as they usually attain to other celebrities. Postings should start by this weekend (IT sure loves to take it's time making New Media students suffer for their grades). I will fuel this out to everyone via facebook group, friends on youtube, youtube twitter tagging, posting links via twitter, and posting my videos on my blog here. I again don't have much for showing off for material, but as soon as i get my computer back i'll push the twerping Meme as far and as hard as i can.

Contageous media for 10/15

how to make your project an internet sensation:

These handy tips laid down by Hack a Day i found to be in a sort common knowledge, but not something commonly regurgitated in similar topics. Giving pointers such as visual cues to push your sensation, to site hosting concerns, and not to spam your site to inappropriate places. I agree with these actions, and i have been working on taking action towards making a logo for twerping channel and site. Posting followups was another good idea they pointed out. I feel like this is the best way to go about with making my project more out there without impeding on the wrong people.

Taming digital distractions:

This was an interesting suggestion for a few softwares and addons that would help keep you from being distracted in the middle of work. I was impressed with the amount of testing this writer did, trying several different softwares, and naming the top ones. But Like him, i agree it's hard to completely block your wandering mind from following it's boredom patterns when it has them. For Instance, while i've been writing this post, i've booted up Pandora radio, looked up some artists, visited facebook, and watched an episode of 'The Guild' While testing these programs would be a great idea, i probably wouldn't keep on using them, because as much as it'd block me from using the computer, i would find non- computer things to do. Play cards, watch tv, play the X-box, read a novel, cook a meal, all things that come immediately to mind (going without my computer for two weeks i've been finding myself all over the place and mainly scatterbrained all together. When i get it back I'll be able to focus more on what's important, hopefully.)

readings for 10/7

1)microsoft awarded patent for P2P DRM- http://yro.slashdot.org/story/09/09/23/0036258/Microsoft-Awarded-Patent-For-Peer-To-Peer-DRM?from=rss

Microsoft seems to have found a use for P2P Digital Rights management systems. the patent covers a DRM that covers the P2P networks and uses encrypted public and private keys as a licensing mechanism. If microsoft can actually find a good use for this dying source of data protection, then Good for them. Apple has stopped using the DRM licensing system on iTunes.

2)here comes typhoid mary! - http://www.wired.com/thisdayintech/2009/09/dayintech_0923typhoidmary/

I found this piece actually interesting from the medical standpoint, because of the fact that she was throughout this time technically a healthy disease carrier. As she spread the disease among the populous without detection it spread quickly, and as it would seem, it was comparable to a meme. You see meme's spread every day, and depending on how good they are depicts how far they go. Like the recent turning of Kanye West into a meme the night after his distasteful act at the music video awards, he was all over the internet interrupting many different people, from Xzibit to Hitler, to many other memorable memes. The only problem with this is that the doctors, or oppression mary and the meme's share is public eye. The death of a great meme, the Rick Roll happened last year, during the thanksgiving day parade. I know i felt a great deal of hurt as the rick roll was shamelessly ployed for more attention, and i felt it was only destroying the great joke/meme it was.

new youtube channel

the TwerpProject Channel can be seen here:

http://www.youtube.com/user/TwerpProject

there will soon be updates to the channel and hopefully more responces!

The good, the bad, and the ugly

The Good: if my meme works out right, Starting with my first video most likely taped in the Union central in the middle of the day (high traffic=better chances for responce) One person after another will respond, either well or maliciously, it really doesn't matter. The person starting the twerping will speak in only 140 characters, if he's adressing a person, he will say " AT (enter name here)" and continue his message. Using medias around him, like newspaper, computer, phones and the like as inspiration for the twerping should yield in the very least a video that gets a responce. Posting the video online to youtube with tags on twerping, posting to blog AND twitter about this, even creating a facebook page, Then invite as many people as i can to watch it, and make responces. then take the video out further, by doing this in walmart, or in the mall

The bad: On the other hand. Lots of bad responces, at least by management of the marketplace, will probably not take kindly to this. Making us move. We could continue on to other places, like the mall, or if we felt brave, the library. other management buildings won't agree with what we're doing, and shut us down. When it turns out what little footage we got wasn't actually filmed because the lens cap was on, i give up that day and come back to it when i get over what happened.

The Ugly: Quite honestly, this gives me the biggest scare. The ugliest part of getting this meme started is exactly that, getting it started. I will have to post everywhere to get it going good, then hope the sensation takes off. If not i'll end up most likely with a couple of youtube videos that people will occasionally look at and probably write horrible comments on how my life sucks if that's all i can manage for a youtube video. Best worst ever.

contagious media research for 9/30

drug companies cook books, mislead doctors: http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2008/11/drug-companies/

the first piece i picked felt off from the normal media pieces. While it did have relavence, it was more of a medical piece than a media piece. The corperations producing medicine have been putting positive spins on medicine that has many bad side effects. Because of this doctors are mis-prescribing patients. Though the data handed out may not be entirely truthful, the medicine might still help patients, but the doctors should have all information needed before they're able to prescribe certain medicines.

I don't feel that in storywise, this won't help my Meme at all. In fact, the idea i got from this was to incorperate news to the tweeting... twerping. the idea is that the twerping doesn't have to be informative, but the idea that it can can also be implimented.

2)all you need to know to tweet on twitter: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/07/technology/personaltech/07basics.html?_r=1&partner=rss&emc=rss

i figured i'd pick this read because what better way to research my meme than to look at how twittering works. Since my meme will be a parody of twitter, i thought looking at the different things you could use was kind of interesting to update twitter. It might be interesting to provoke action with my meme via forced interaction (or some planted twerpers), but that still has to be decided upon.

with all the phone apps, computer apps, and apps for your apps, it's hard to not have a way to update your twitter, with this link, i learned many different ways to cover my tweets, through phones, excel, outlook, firefox and dashboard. Each had thier own ups and down, and i may play with the idea of working with some of these in the future.

meme cycle, take 3:

That's how i've got the Twerp Meme figured out. Hopefully this is the right idea.

readings for sept 23rd.

EA comes under fire for Shady PR stunts: http://games.slashdot.org/story/09/09/11/1610252/EA-Comes-Under-Fire-for-Shady-PR-Stunts?from=rss

EA has been using PR stunts that are very questionable too the public. Dante's Inferno, a game based on the book, was created to have a very anti christian overtone. Many christians, gamers and not found this offensive. But as the fight rose about the game, so did it's popularity. During their time at Comic-Con, they had a contest where you took pictures of yourself commiting "lustful acts" with Booth Babes, and the best one would recieve a date with two models, limo ride, paparazzi and a "chest full of booty." Ironically, the contest winner was from a magazine called "Gay Gamer" as he took a picture with a booth guy to prove a point. EA is targeting the wrong audience with their advertising, and instead of blowing tons of money on PR, they could be putting that money towards a great game. Something EA has lacked for a while.

Ads follow web users, get more personal: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/31/business/media/31privacy.html?_r=2&adxnnl=1&partner=rss&emc=rss&pagewanted=all&adxnnlx=1251554625-Y3+OaLtsQzyPS0jcTZtEVg

Using cookies, companies are now customizing advertising by evaluating information you release onto your computer. By collecting this data, the cookies then use your likes and dislikes as a key and lock system, only catering to your absolute interests. for investing companies, this starts to take out the guesswork of where they will want to place ads. Unfortunately, using the internet makes it virtually impossible to go online without getting cookies. Though this may be seen as an imposition of privacy, the government has chosen so far to accept this form of advertising.
"Consumers can avoid cookie-based tracking by deleting cookies from their computers or setting their browsers not to accept cookies. But few do, and privacy advocates say it is easy for companies to add cookies without users noticing."
That excerpt has me wondering how much longer it will be before we end up giving our information away the moment we turn our computer on. In a small matter of time we'll end up with overflows of ads and will be begging for some sort of relief from the onslaught we try to avoid in our life (you may notice the amount of ads in radio/tv...) Someone will have to make an ad blocker, companies will try to ban it, and it'll be up to the government to say yes or no. Unfortuneately we won't be able to decide.

meme cycle revised

this is the basic outline of my meme cycle. It's not completely awesome, but i felt this was better than what i had, and it shows how i'd deliver the meme across the interwebs.

5 delicious posts, take two

this week i'll start off my 5 posts from the del.ic.ious posts with the social collider
1: social collider
The social collider is a program that maps out tweets on twitter based on what you search for. This then displays the information of linking groups together. Amazingly the search for RIP Patrick Swayze yielded, from my standpoint, a well rounded trace of information. Most of it was at the top center of the map, while fewer strands fell far off, creating some interesting links over a longer period of time, still related to the topic. The farthest back the longest stream goes is 9/11/09, making you wonder why someone had posted something like this so far ahead of the rest of the crowd.
Social collider has been found to not only find many interesting links between different social icons and news, but when it graphs them out, it creates an amazing array of how these things become connected, and has been known to create mapping layouts that look much like art themselves.

2: disney says you WILL watch ads:
Disney struck a deal with Cox communications to offer hit shows and football games on demand in exchange for the removal of fast forwarding features used to skip ads. The deal only affects Cox Video on Demand services, not DVR's ability to fast forward. In addition, they well cooperatively test technology that will place ads based on Zip codes, to "freshen" the ads with new ones every day. While i do like the idea of rotation on ads, making them less of a hassle to watch (the car guy from brewer... i can't stand listening to him every day). But i feel that this might be something Cox Communications might find to be a bane to their productivity. People who use the skip ads fuction generally do so because they HATE watching ads. So when they lose that ability, the cable all of a sudden will lose it's appeal, allowing other companies who might have that ability to step in and take their business. But i suppose with disney backing them up they'll have a long ways to go before they go bankrupt...

3: gender ads project

This projects measures the depiction of ads through the generations, and points out some interesting facts. Many of the ads based on men make them masculine, strong hearted, bad ass, gun slinging "hotties" who knows what to do in any given situation. On the other hand, Women in ads tend to be very sexual. Trophies for men to fight for, nothing more than to be proclaimed. It's interesting to wonder what would happen if the idea was inverse. Sure, a few ads have gotten away with doing so, but they merely show that they're doing it in jest of the situation. But it's all more interesting to watch as people bicker back and forth about who is sexist, and why today's commercials are so wrong to project these claims.

4.Self Control
This is a nifty little program that will block you from certain things for a time limit. So if you want to block yourself from your mail for 2 hours, you would put in the time and start it. The One flaw, if you can really call it that, is that you cannot undo what you've done once you hit the start button. while this can sometimes be frustrating, i can see how this is a sensable leave out on the software. This can take you off of your computer and push you even further into either getting work done or finding a social environment to stay in.

5: cryptographic tools to keep you hidden on facebook.
On account of the large amount of personal information on social networking sites, a tech review from slashdot has found an article on tools to hide your activity on facebook. this browser plug in will replace sensitive information in a user's profile and news feed with meaningless text that can only be unscrambled by trusted friends or contacts. The data will stay private, at least what the assisstant professor of computer sciences of UWaterloo, Ontario.

"You feel like you are talking to a friend casually in a conversation, but in reality you are publicizing information in a forum where it will stay for a long time," Acquisti says. "Privacy is not the first thing you think of when you use a social network."

It's something to think about next time you decide to skip school or work and then facebook it.

~josh~

test blog from scribefire

this is a test blog via scribefire

the project:
Real time Twitter

The iDea:
to make a satirical poke at the idea of the uses of twitter, and how a large number of people use it.

Required elements:
A video recording device
several areas to do the recording in
phone (prop)
computer with twitter account up (prop)
another person to post tweets on the above forementioned account
a mic hidden on twittering person/persons

Description:

Much like a “real life facebook friend” movie module from an earlier class I took. The idea is you film people “tweeting” out loud. Things said can’t be more than 140 characters long. The videos are trying to catch responces of others around the tweeter, maybe get them to join along.

direction: Vertical distribution

circulatory system: Posting videos up on Youtube, college humor, facebook and sending links through emails would be the easiest way around getting it out.

Hook: many video posts of live tweeting in different scenarios. seeing what expressions get out of it.

Payroll: Gaining a catch phrase or term based on live tweeting.

recognition: Youtube rating, website of collaborated videos of live tweets.

welcome to the first post!

So i start my blog with note that this is started for NMD 405. Meaning, this blog is for that class, but i may use it from hereon if i see fit for other needs. But lets start with the 5 readings and paragraphs...

1: Google algorithm predicts when species will go 404
http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2009/09/googlefoodwebs/

this article peaked my interest because it talks about something that's a problem with our growing society. If a species goes extinct, what could happen to other species in relation to that species. Using the Google Pagerank algorithm, scientists have been able to accurately map which animals are most beneficial to the food web. Ecologist Stefano Allesina of the University of California in Santa Barbara said this about the use of the technology, "In PageRank, you’re an important website if important websites point to you. We took that idea and reversed it: Species are important if they support important species."

I find this intriguing because for one, we can map out what creatures are most important and ensure to protect them for use in future generations. The technology maps not only the direct importance, but relavent importance along with it, giving you a clear idea of how quickly the ecology could collapse if, lets say the honeybee went extinct. another good use of this technology in this format allows the scientist to track how much matter flows from one species to the next. So if one species tends to stop being useful, the project then maps accordingly to the projections.

2: EA spends 3 times more on marketing than development

Now, there wasn't a whole lot of story on this. Maybe more like a small blip. But comments made are where the meat of this is. My stand with the video game industry is that games should be produced with the public in mind. Meaning games should be cheaper, and deliver a rich experience. EA, who has a hit and miss record with this sort of thing, has done little to prove there's any real reason for the way they spend their money.

While it's true that pharmisuticals among many others do the same with their own products, It's a shame people have to pay large sums of money for the ads they see, and not the pills they use. As a commenter put it, marketing needs to be kept in check with what it does with it's money. Sure we could use another brand of drug that's completely identical, but why not take the less expensive way and get generic brands by word of mouth, or by cutting back on how much they spend on these advertisements. People don't have a lot of money to play with, so if there's something identical for cheaper, unless they've had trouble with other drugs before, most would probably buy it.

3: a quantitive study of how memes spread

having read the article and original source "charles darwin tagged you in a note on facebook", i found that meme evolution to stardom to be an amazing thing. The 25 things about me servey that was used as an example was a great show of how it worked. It started as 16 random things, but as more and more people used it, boundaries were moved. Soon different notes with 20, 35, or 14 random things about me came out of it. It was interesting to see that as people played with the border, it sort of destroyed the idea behind the note posting. The more people fiddled with the rules of the note, the different versions found themselves dying off. The most balanced one, the 25 random note, found it's way into the spotlight, pushed the others aside and blew up into a facebook phenominon. and the way this was looked at as a disease spreading across a body or country made the whole viral motion make a lot more sense.

4: the bubble project
After watching the slideshow on the bubble project, i found a great appreciation for what they did. Taking the comic voice bubbles and slapping them on signs, advertisements and pictures to make hilarious remarks or serious statements out of what was seen. The bubble project felt very much like a lifehack meme that only took some tape and paper to get a great responce out of passerby's. the idea can hit global audiences, and still make sense to those who see it. Many good responces came out of the project, and i felt the ideas shared were all relavent to today's issues.

5: Kurt Cobain suicide letter vs. google ads

This story suprised me a bit. Having not known google ads pull from words on the page for their ads, i can see how this page might have been offensive to many. The last letter Cobain wrote, telling how he really felt about what was going on in his life, and then to have the words transformed into ads is akward. Granted, once a site holds google ads, it's not up to google what goes into the ads, as the ads are generated from words on the page. At least google had the sense to take their ads down on that page.