Zaftigcherub's Blog

Reflection on Final Project

zaftigcherub — Tue, 04 May 2010 15:57:01 +0000

Foremost, it was very difficult getting to the word count on our Non-profit Organization project. 1,500 words seemed like a lot for each individual to have singularly meet. Divided between the two of us it would have been more reasonable. The Wikipedia entry, however, made it easier. Oscar worked on the pamphlets, but it definitely felt like a mad rush right there at the end to get stuff done along with other projects for other classes. I feel like that pushed us, however, to meet the needs of our organization by having to meet the need in our class. At some point, though, it seems like one is just writing incessantly without getting the basic point across. Having had previously been in Journalism, I’m more used to being terse, telling the entire thing in the first sentence, to keep the attention of the reader. Our attention spans have dwindled due to factors like this. I feel like the content in both of my pieces, the Wikipedia entry and the Food Bank letter, is sufficient although it probably does not meet the word count. And I think the work that Oscar did on the pamphlets was good for the organization as well. Really, I think any help these types of organizations can get is appreciated by them, being of individuals who work to do good without asking for money directly.

Lighthouse: Blog Post #14

zaftigcherub — Tue, 27 Apr 2010 03:48:47 +0000

So, while initially, Oscar and I were having trouble contacting ANY non-profit organization with our free help (and I am confident in our ability as good writers, too, because I know he’s written for many magazines and I was into journalism for a long time), now we have an onslaught of opportunities! The Cattery never contacted us back, but the Food Bank gave us a small assignment, and The South Texas Lighthouse for the Blind wants a Wikipedia page and hopefully a brochure for us to develop. Looks like we’ve got a lot of work ahead of us! I’m eager to see the hard work finished, especially in lieu of all the projects in other classes that I, personally (and I am sure everyone else) are working on, but mostly I am just glad that we found somebody who will benefit from our help. The woman whom we are in contact with is a very nice lady, and Oscar said she offered to give us a tour (we were both going to attend a meeting with her this morning, but I got really lost and on top of that, my phone was dying, but he told me he would just meet with her). She was very enthusiastic about the whole thing. With so many trial and errors, this is a reaction that is making me feel optimistic. I am confident we will have something substantial for her by the end of the week, and work on it vigorously during next class periods.

Collaboration: Blog #13

zaftigcherub — Thu, 15 Apr 2010 03:47:46 +0000

Right now, Oscar and I have made contact with a person involved in the project which I feel we can now officially work on. The Food Bank of Corpus Christi, located on Krill St., is an organization that assists people coming from poverty or virtually any walk of life, and allows them to partake in the joy of eating (dramatic, perhaps, but truth!) It was an organization less ‘controversial’ than the others in regards to how the topics were touchy: everybody has to eat. Our first attempt to contact them, initially, did not go so well (which occurred before this past weekend). Oscar phoned them and we were told that we needed to talk to Debra Bruce, but she was out to lunch. However, yesterday (the 13th), we got into contact with Debra Bruce, who is the head of operations revolving around promoting the Food Bank (as well as coordinating with any individuals, such as ourselves, who are interested in writing about it and for it). When I spoke with her over the phone, she seemed susceptible to the idea of having us write for her, but still needed some time to think about what exactly that would entail, and is going to get back to us. I took the liberty of doing a follow-up e-mail in case she gets too busy and forgets, which I sent off earlier today. Hopefully she responds shortly, although it was later in the day that this message was created, and she was possibly already out of the office by that point. I didn’t want to pressure her too much, since this was a telephone call made yesterday and she said she needed a day to think about it-and I will just assume she will get back with us tomorrow, hopefully with some work, work, work! Unfortunately, between my schedule and Oscar’s schedule, it might be difficult to coordinate a face-to-face meeting in which the both of us can be present, but hopefully we can actually get something off of the ground very very soon.

Collaboration: Blog #12

zaftigcherub — Thu, 08 Apr 2010 03:17:39 +0000

Currently, I’d have to say that although my partner, Oscar Gomez, is a great partner (very helpful, adamant on getting the job done, good at taking initiative, and full of continuous ideas), we are having trouble finding an assignment that seems stable enough to actually work on. We have encountered a few blunders in our search for one. Bikers Defending Children sounded like a great project, and seemed like it was definitely an interesting topic in comparison to most, because not many people had even heard about it and it broke the barriers of stereotypical behavior that biker gangs are known for. I was very interested because I have always had a curiosity about biker gangs, and it was not part of the typical “we’re tough, we harm, we pillage” kind of mentality that some of them seem to be well-known for. Members emerged, coming from broken homes or abusive families themselves, and decided their purpose was to identify with children in schools, and become the voice for these children who perhaps may have lost something in a rough family life. But we discovered that the website was down, and the program apparently no longer in existence. Oscar had some other good ideas, and we were thinking about the AIDS foundation. We started e-mailing and calling but that seems to also have been to no avail, and we found that Laurie, who was the main person Oscar had been in contact with (an AIDS survivor, who had first contracted it in the 80′s from her then husband who was a closet homosexual and also having an affair, allegedly, with an altar boy, only to be alienated when she tried to join the forces), is alive but no longer with the organization. We are currently still waiting for more information on the latter choice, but I’m worried that it won’t be successful either. I really would like to be able to offer our skills to somebody, for a good cause, and these were all very interesting organizations that would have certainly needed our help. But perhaps the timing has just not be so good. Anyway, that is the update as of tonight.

zaftigcherub — Thu, 25 Mar 2010 17:02:33 +0000

There are plenty of news worthy subjects, such as the Healthcare plan, which I seem to have an infinite opinion on, which is consistently fluctuating and causing me inner turmoil. But since it can only be presented to me a certain way, based on the media view, or party view, I am not sure I can offer a real opinion on it as being unbiased and true. Mostly all media resources were taught on the fundamental basis of being objective, but they’re not-collectively, there is still an agenda that usually shines through. Even CNN is starting to develop that one, just as Fox is predominantly Republican, and even local channels have their own party lines defined clearly. I do know that healthcare is insane. My Dad recently got a hospital bill for three thousand dollars. Three thousand dollars for three stitches. A thousand dollars each for a stitch? The doctor never even saw my dad, this was done by a nurse, and probably required maybe a half hour, at best, for her to learn how to conduct the procedure (I do not know for sure, so this can only be speculation, but how hard could it be, really?). Without insurance, to get wisdom teeth pulled (if you were to get four of them pulled), it’s about 2,000 bucks. The anesthesia alone is about 400 bucks. I really don’t think it’s worth that much. Maybe. Anyway, so Healthcare is not the topic I would be willing to choose—it’s an outrage. I will talk about a trivial outrage in itself: Lady Gaga. She is strangely fascinating, but she gets much of her fame from the ideas of others, others who were often looked down upon, such as Marilyn Manson. The ideas she expresses, while interesting, are not new. Manson had the same crazy outfits, the same bizarre videos 10 years ago, and it was received in an entirely different way. Whereas he is brilliant, and she seems less brilliant. I say this because he came out with that book, Long Hard Road out of Hell, in which he eloquently related personal stories from his childhood, and included symbolism from the occult/Qabbalah, and discussed subjects of the esoteric kind in a profound way. He is very intelligent, which is apparent from his writing, if not so much the way in which he is perceived through his persona. The point is that Lady Gaga makes the news, she sells, and she has already been done before. And that is sad. Nothing truly important, such as Healthcare, can be received well, but Lady Gaga can. Nice.

An Unobvious Importance: Blog #9

zaftigcherub — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 08:25:29 +0000

I remember the days when I used Napster, and it was commonplace for others to use it as well. Why Napster Matters to Writing is thereby an interesting topic, because teachers, whom may have also been parents suggesting their kids not use file sharing networks, have given it a second look. I thought it was especially interesting how, apparently, “from a rhetorical perspective, Napster represents a crisis in delivery,” because I have recently been learning about the elements of Rhethoric and have never viewed Napster in such a light. Also, when you think about it, Napster broke through barriers that gave way to a universe, if you will, on the internet of file-sharing, which occurred whether or not people like Lars Ulrich of Metallica wanted it to. The transitioning from printing press to internet has broadened the world in which we live, and where once the printing press or “hand-written copies of sacred text” might have been considered to be unconventional, so too Napster was, and so will future occurrences that push the very limit of the world in which we know. Another medium on the internet that either broke barriers or attempted to break barriers is the well-known Facebook, which was altered by Mark Zuckerberg, according to Brave New World of Digital Intimacy. Hard to believe that this occurred years ago, because I can remember a time where Facebook changed drastically, and I was just as baffled as everyone else who saw the change, and was scared of it initially. Zuckerberg refers to this old Facebook that we were used to as “primitive,” and I guess that it was in retrospect, now that I have a basis of comparison, and since it altered according to other, competing sites. I do agree that Facebook could be the Big Brother of the internet, and have to “unactivate” mine from time to time, because it cannot actually be deleted; all of my information is forever preserved and maintained on the internet, whether I want it to be or not. And it’s interesting how we have become untrusting in this regard. Even upon reading Free! Why $0.00 Is the Future of Business, I was certain it was either sarcasm or something similar to that form of deception. This article is great at the use of enargeia in that it paints a perfect picture of the process of invention. The history of Gillette is certainly something I was unaware of; I see them almost every day at my job, people shopping at H.E.B. “By giving away the razors, which were useless by themselves, he was creating demand for disposable blades” is a crazy concept which baffles me: although it’s obvious that coupons of this nature are as fundamental as the idea that went behind King Gillette’s tactic, because they give people the comfort of feeling that they are saving, when they actually buy other things they wouldn’t normally buy or need to “save.” Ah. How interesting to see where such things originated! Priced to Sell brings about a concern in the arena of novels, or the printed word, which I know is now going to become entirely digital. The other day, I visited Barnes N’ Noble, and it seemed alive and well, even heavily populated. Allowing a site to create electronic reading is both horrifying and useful simultaneously, and I have mixed feelings about it. To say that “information wants to be free” is an idea which I would have agreed upon, but the idea that people who worked hard, for years and years, all for nothing, to get no beneficial profit from it, scares me. If the world were devoid of money, it would be understandable. But humans fundamentally want to trade, even in Second Life! I think Anderson’s idea of “when prices hit zero extraordinary things happen,” it’s got elements of Fight Club in it, but obviously not to everyone-and therein lies the problem.

Opticons: Blog #8

zaftigcherub — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 05:29:02 +0000

The characteristics Facebook uses as a means to advance themselves by exploiting their users frightened me, and has frightened me about Facebook in the past. I deleted, or rather, ‘deactivated’ my account after reading . Is Facebook unethical, clueless, or unlucky? I don’t think it’s ethical at all to avoid the personal consideration of customers: the definition of having a company is supposed to be to value the customer, consider the customer, and put the customer’s interests first, after the company’s own. Yet, having a prospering company seems to forget this as a means or motto. Naked in the Non-opticon gave me a minor sliver of hope in the chaos: the fact that users would be thoroughly annoyed at the prospect of having their information public, but with the knowledge that it hasn’t helped much through protest is still disheartening. Facebook is getting a lot of attention, is ever-expanding, and is trying very hard to be like Twitter, according to the article and also according to my own experience and focus on the matter, but it’s hard to understand why, when other social networking sites haven’t displaced the value of their users entirely to be successful. The universe is expansive, but that doesn’t mean we are expendable to unintentionally and indirectly sharing our information by clicking through annoying ads and avoiding reading the fine print. We stay true to our word-do social networking sites stay true to theirs? On the notion of universes, the Universe interactive website was mind boggling. I clicked ‘Watchmen’ in the search bar and was able to see what Watchmen is projected into various mediums, and could pretty much see anything I wanted to see about it: stars, shapes, stories (copious articles devoted to the subject). Under snapshots, for some reason I am not sure has anything to do with Watchmen, but certainly was captivating, was a photograph of sky lanterns released as a representation of Chinese celebration; it was absolutely beautiful. I didn’t understand some of the things, such as those located under the category of Time, but the majority of it was original and interesting. The hypertext article, You Say You Want A Revolution (http://www.scribd.com/Moulthrop-Hypertext-1993/d/25228007) by Moulthrop was also somewhat difficult to understand initially, discussing the natures of reality. But then it started discussing the interesting topic of simulation. The article seemed to definitely have various sources, cited throughout, to share some very eloquently expressed ideas. I loved the line: “The American tomorrow will be a heyday of nostalgia, an intensive pursuit of ‘lost’ and ‘forgotten’ values.” This statement was excruciatingly true, to great magnitudes, and that is definitely what will occur in the future for me. I was really excited at the mentioning of Gibson later on in the article as well; his cyberpunk visions weren’t incorrect estimations. My boyfriend said he knew graphical representation data shared by users, in his opinion, before it happened; we’ve both read Neuromancer. Gibson has influenced generations of people, and was well aware of the world in which we now live in, sometimes suffering in, sometimes prospering in.

Inhibiting Factors: Blog Post #7

zaftigcherub — Sun, 28 Feb 2010 06:34:06 +0000

I considered Bound by Law to be a very informative piece, written in an easy to digest format. Even the way it was both introduced and closed was absolutely entertaining. Comics always pass by as quick reads and their use of imagery assists in making the words memorable: for instance, the way Bound by Law provided examples of the topic, which was Copyright/Trademark laws, was through incorporating actual imagery-that is, actual pictures, actual paintings, and so forth-to convey meaning to the dialogue as well as to provide the visual. And sometimes it was drawn in a different way for particular instances of explanation as to why ideas could remain intact but had to be altered for copyright purposes. The way in which the comic was done, through the use of having a young girl working on a documentary, asking questions to a man and a woman about these laws, was a bright and original way of presenting this information. To share the essential information in an even more generalized way, and since I usually make note of good quotes that exist in novels, poetry, and even comic books, I thought there were two in particular that echoed in time and that are fairly reflective examples of what the book is about: the first being from Judge Kozinski, “Overprotection stifles the very creative forces it’s supposed to nurture,” (33) which is a dangerous concept that exists in copyright, because many owners want to have as much protection as possible, which in outputting that information ends up also creating inhibitions that could be used otherwise beneficially. The other quote was from the girl doing the documentary of New York who said that “The idea that creativity is going to flourish in a world where everything is controlled just doesn’t ring true to me” (62) was definitely something I felt I could relate to an understand, and was also kind of disheartening simultaneously. Documentaries, to me, are a lot like photography, in that when you take a photograph in a public setting, it’s considered fair game. Documentaries should be considered fair game in that same context, because they are meant to portray reality, not to create something fictional or rooted in fantasy. But that isn’t an actual reality because of the way the law is constructed, which I can see from both views as a type of double-edged sword: it can be both a useful practice as well as a protective tool, but can sometimes create unnecessary barriers that don’t make sense in regards to the construction of creative works. Finally, there were also certain topics and people discussed whom I considered to be of great importance, but wasn’t aware had had prior encounters with problematic lack of circulation of their works. Terry Gilliam, for instance, was mentioned. I always loved the movie 12 Monkeys, but apparently it was prevented from circulation after the discovery of having had used a copyrighted logo of the monkey as a main element in the story. I didn’t realize how much these things may be considered as distractions, or even become an obstacle to the work. Also, various expiration creating problems for producers in allowing good works to remain in circulation seems almost unfair. All in all, wonderful information shared in a very wonderful, enjoyable way. Protection is important in other settings besides copyright, however; it’s also important when using the internet, such as in the case of Abrechtslund’s Online Social Networking as Participatory Surveillance. The other day my boyfriend was urging me against being so involved in social networking because of many of the debilitating factors in can create. Using the mention of MySpace in this article as an example, which “is according to ratings (Alexa, 2008) among the most popular Web sites in the world” (1), since it requires that certain information is filled out and revealed, and although their can be an altering of settings to perhaps make it more secure, anything on the internet is pretty much fair game to hackers and access, and that’s a scary thought. As an invention by Tim Berners-Lee, according to Understanding Net Neutrality, the internet has afforded us copious opportunity, and it’s hard to imagine the excitement and dismay this fellow and his assistants had upon realizing that computers to “talk” to one another and connect to each other, ultimately leading to one of the most widely useful tools in technology that influence our culture today. Even the language has changed, which is reflective in the article by Carr, Information Wants to be Free, My Ass and his use of internet lingo. I actually did ROFLAO. Our subscriptions to various technologies which in certain regards have advanced humanity (as well as inhibited us), such as Netflix, TiVO, etc., is staggering. I thought this was a very impacting statement, that “we begrudge the folks who actually create the stuff we enjoy reading, listening to, and watching a few pennies for their labor, and yet at the very same time we casually throw hundreds of hard-earned bucks at the saps who run the stupid networks through which the stuff is delivered. We screw the struggling artist, and pay the suit,” because it’s unfortunately very true. Thinking about these things are definitely things that need to be thought about, and we want to believe that such things are free, but at the same time they aren’t and we have to realize it every day.

Web Frustration

zaftigcherub — Thu, 18 Feb 2010 17:10:31 +0000

When a new technology is introduced, initially, it can have a frustrating outcome. In fact, even before that technology has actually been used hands-on, the anticipation of having to deal with learning about it can even cause some trouble; at least that has been my experience on the matter. Out of the frustration, a great deal of knowledge can emerge, however, which allows our lives to become easier or more enveloped with excitement. Google Wave is an instance of something that becomes the unknown. H.P Lovecraft said “the greatest kind of fear is fear of the unknown,” which is absolutely true, because we have no idea what to expect in the event of first discoveries. When DVDs came out, I was afraid to buy into it; I wanted to stick with oldschool VHS, because that was something I knew, even though it is clearly not better. There are other mediums on the internet used for collaboration that I’ve known of prior to Google Wave, which thus causes actually venturing into that world as not really necessary. It will provide me with tons of useful insight in the future, though.

News and War (Blog #6)

zaftigcherub — Thu, 18 Feb 2010 06:29:28 +0000

The World Wide Web was, personally, fairly difficult to understand. A few days ago, I watched my boyfriend trying to “decode packets” in one of his Computer classes; I had no earthly idea what that even meant. Of course, I understand the purpose of collaboration, and the incentive/decisions made behind wanting to use the internet, but the coding and the HTML aspects are a little different. I think few people actually understand the underlying aspects, the innerworkings of the net which we use on a daily basis, or just how much goes into it. The spreading of viruses, for instance, has evolved over time; the virus is now the Spyware itself. Everything written down, programmed, or coded into a computer, or a webpage on the internet is practically carved into the databased, scarring time, staying there forever. It can be “erased,” but it never is erased from the memory of the actual computer. And that’s interesting. The W3 world is enormous and foreboding; so vast that there are really no limitations.

I really liked what Shirky had to say for Chapter 3 of Here Comes Everybody, particularly because in the past I’d had a great interest in journalism. To know that someone was influential enough to “change the dynamics of press coverage,” just as Hunter S. Thompson had done with Gonzo journalism, is very interesting in the sense that the news can be brought to the public, or to anyone, in a variety of ways. I thought the part about the news meaning two different things: being the opinions of the press, and the other being what is actually newsworthy, was quite interesting, because we hear so much topic wise, and events are occurring across the globe, and yet our frame of reference is very limited, and not as objective as journalists claim it should be (as this is one of the fundamentals in which they live by!) However, I suppose it does what it can; at least it has the capabilities to do so.

I’m glad somebody finally said it: I’ve been saying it for years; but to see that the writer, Vannevar Bush, agreed with me in writing As We May Think, I feel a whole lot better about it, as though it could actually happen. If we could only use our vast scientific capabilities that are currently used for weaponry expansion, and put it into expanding technology to be beneficial for the world, we would understand, fundamentally, how not to deplete our resources, but instead, how to renew them continously and how to also create jobs in doing so. I think what this text illuminates is what the Zeitgeist movement which Jacque Fresco has been trying to bring attention to for the past few decades with his innovative ideas on how to construct a world that would be founded on the principles of a resource-based economy. To think that scientists have been pulled from the field which they sought after initially, to do plant experiments, or to develop cures for various diseases; instead, we are aiding in more destruction than could even be thought of by a single person. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve watched Futureweapons, the show, and found it particularly interesting; but I’ve also seen man and woman fighting in a device that would, yes, “[make] it possible to turn back the enemy.” Is that really something to proud of? Or is it something to be afraid of? We ourselves should be afraid of it, because it shows to what great lengths we have gone in the name of the unknown; we don’t know what it is we’re fighting for, or against, and we most certainly do not know why, but we think there is an agenda. What is that agenda? To find the resources from other countries because we have depleted our own? To just take it with force and say it’s for a good cause to the general public? I don’t really know. But I know that I don’t know.