Processing Power

Every now and then I read a few comments on YouTube and every now and then I question the survivability of the world and almost collaps into my own conciousness. The comments there provide a higher concentration of stupidity ever imaginable by anyone in any galaxy at any time ever. EVER.

A very quick word on “prosumption”

I think it is interesting to look at web 2.0 applications under the notion of “prosumption”. Prosumption is an economic model, “where capitalist subjects produce what they consume, turning consumption in to a form of production” (Boellstorff 2008). This idea is elaborated in Toffler’s book “The Third Wave” (which I have yet to get) (Toffler 1980). In his very, very recommendable book “Coming of Age in Second Life”, Tom Boellstorff puts the “prosumer” (In “Second Life”) in a bigger framework of “creationist capitalism”. Production and consumption conflate – to fully participate in second life’s culture you have to create something.“In creationist capitalism it is persons who create, not God” (or the companies). The theme of the mood in which such ideas subside is nicely captured by Purdy’s article “The God of the Digerati”, available here (Purdy 1998).

The model of prosumption is not only applicable to “Second Life”, we can easily see how it fits networks like YouTube (or this blog post). But what does it mean that consumption becomes a form of production?

First and foremost it sounds like a manager’s dream. Not the company has to create the products the user consumes, users create their own products. The only task that is left, is to provide the infrastructure (Sounds great, but apparently YouTube still doesn’t make any profit).

Secondly, this might denote bigger cultural developments and since it is social interaction which is happening in these networks, it sets the frame for these interactions. Maybe this is the more interesting question. What does it mean that people participate in a culture where consumption means production, and what is it that they are producing? Posing this question presses us inevitably in a marxist tradition. The first and obvious answer is that people are selling themselves, their personality (in the widest sense) to the potential audience. They create a certain personality for display (might as well be their everyday character), and in the act of creation they are consuming this very portary. Now, I won’t try to elaborate further on this topic since it will probably only lead me to wild fantasizing, but I think the question alone is worth entertaining.

Literature Abused:

Boellstorff, Tom. Coming of Age in Second Life : An Anthropologist Explores the Virtually Human. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2008.

Purdy, JS. “The God of the Digerati: Wired Magazine Says with New Technology We’ll All Be Like Gods and Should Get Good at It.” American Prospect (1998): 86-90.

Toffler, Alvin. The Third Wave. 1st ed. New York: Morrow, 1980.

Facebook features Easter Eggs

Who knows how long it will still be active? Click on a facebook page and press “up, up, down, down, left, right, left, right, b, a, enter”. Amazing results will show! I really wonders who implemented this and what they were thinking. “Hey Chris, I just made this beta for this crazy visual effect. It’s all like, bubbly when you scroll and flashy when you type! And also man, I just made like, a really complicated secret code so that other people can’t try it. Like the good old times! LUL”. But it has this retro charme of the easter egg which somehow got lost at the turn of the century.

Puny and other Peoples

I just wanted to quickly share this terric piece of lore from the 18th century, a talbe displaying nationalities and their qualities. It’s taken from John Goody’s book “The Domestication of the Savage Mind”. Be warned though, it’s 3MB (This kinda sounds silly, but maybe, some people don’t want to attempt to open a 3MB document).

Supplement

The Onion nailed it.

Space Weed

I was carrying this blog as some kind of abandoned bastard child in the back of my head since quite some time. I normally want to write more meaty articles, but then again, sometimes I just want to voice my elaborate opinion. Most of all, I wanted a graphical overhaul of the page before I started blogging again. So, in total, my ideas were just a big mess that would go no where. But my pragmatistic self took control now, and I will start blogging again, making this thing an unconceptualized collection of stuff. On the other hand, I was taking Computer Science classes in the last year and am currently learning Ruby, so maybe I will write my own blog software and turn the cold shoulder on wordpress. Judged on my past progressions this is not very likely though.

OK, so I was watching Star Trek today. The movie itself had me a little skeptic because of all its praise (And because the writer of the movie also wrote Armageddon, or at least I thought so). But, what can I say, it was pretty good. There were very few really ridiculous scenes – and I mean Die Hard 4 I jump a bike in the helicopter ridiculous, or depiction of the dwarf in Lord of the Rings ridiculous. Neither were there any too cheesy love or self revelation scenes. OK, there was this one scene where young Kirk almost runs step daddie’s car off a cliff and jumps out of the speeding car to stand up unimpressed and give a cool comment; but that’s also the worst it gets.

The action was to the most degree captivating. The scenes and their placement often reminded me of Star Wars, like a fight on an elevated platform. The three main heroes, Kirk, McCoy and Spock have all been depicted as rebels in their own context, which struck me as a little too cool, but what the heck, maybe we all are Easy Riders nowadays? Another remarkable thing to me was the racial stereotyping. The federation featured all kinds of colorful aliens, but from all the different nations and species the only one with a dialect was the Russian (Checkov) and the Scot (Scotty) whereby both dialects had been ‘exploited’ humorously. Apart from that, I got heavily reminded of Galloway’s argument that stereotypes always have to reside in a realm of fantasy before they actually can become real (because of their abstract being – think of Star Treks different factions). I would definitely advise watching the movie, it’s a well crafted thrill ride (although the hand to hand combat was shot with my favorite quick cut, wiggly camera technique) and doesn’t feature the insane amount of stupid dialog like the recent Watchmen or unmotivated over the top action like the last Die Hard and Indie Jones. I think J.J. Abrahm’s also did a decent job putting a butt load of series references in the movie (as far as I can tell), but I would bet that the diehard Star Trek fan would still be dissatisfied with it’s atypical pace and narration (for a Star Trek movie, that is).

As you might have recognized, I started writing in English. I shall keep it like that until someone gives me a friendly little nudge, telling me that it sucks.