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Think back to our subject’s elements, there are two which are very adamant in your case; both Power and Exchange.
“The distinction between social groups, especially classes, in their tastes for food and other commodities may become a badge of their identity” (PETER ATKINS, 2001). The power behind this is that after a long period of time on the virtual network, you’re going to be hungry, and what better ways to full fill that then with a fast food craving! This is the power behind Myspace’s advertisement. If you are faced with something often enough, you just may fall into temptation, this then become a sourse of your identity. Secondly, exchange, Myspace is making money from these advertisements, so there is an exchange of money. There may be a large amount of persons, whom log onto Myspace every day, and therefore many will see an inviting advertisement for a fast food store, equalling profit for these stores. Have you been tempted to go out and get fast food after your encounter with these advertisements?
shae
Yi-fu Fuan (1991) suggests that it is the difference between what we see and what we hear, that we become instinctive. It is in the idea that I begin to wonder if this is where stereotypes play their role. When I see something that I believe is out of the norm, I tend to judge it, therefore on virtual networks such as, Tumblr, I find myself flicking through profiles after profiles judging. Perhaps if I could hear their voice or their story, my judgments would be much few.
“Both writing and speech can invite fantasies of presence.” (Game, Metcalfe. 1996)
When you talk to someone, you can hear the emotion behind the voice, and you are able to make a judgement on which way the conversation is heading. However, a written text can lead to a world of assumptions. In a written text we are aware of our punctuation and sentence structures, and if successful, can lead to the assumption of intelligence. Although Tumblr is not formal, is it all written, therefore meaning we are able to edit before we post anything. In the end what we post on Tumblr is not what we would say in real life, whether it’s the whole sentence or just the style of the sentence.
shae Mahoney
Hi Glenn
I love your comments about age and not caring what people think. If you have read my latest blog you would have seen that I used the same assertion from Lovelock, but in regard to myself. One thing I enjoyed about this virtual network experience was the ability to engage in discussions and sometimes, even disagreements, and not really care if others made negative comments. the first time I answered a thread on my network, it was a little confronting; as I have mentioned earlier. Now I look back on that experience and see that my difference in age to my fellow bloggers, has probably made my experience a little different. I do not get swayed by peer issues, have no interest in gaming sites, and see social network sites as a good way of seeing how others view the world, otherwise, they have no bearing on my life. The topic of week 8 is food, and I show the same not caring attitude in my selection and trying of new foods.I love trying new tastes. When I was growing up, we had basic home cooking, fish and chips was the most exotic take away food, and eating out at a restaurant never happened. All these things have changed dramatically, an amazing choice of foods and food outlets are available, and with it tastes have changed. Are you willing to try new foods? what is the most exotic thing you have ever eaten? Does your family encourage eating different cuisines? Can you relate food to your network experience?
cheers
Allison
MySpace connects all users with the natural world. MySpace is about music and artists promotion, which is related to real events and people in the world. With users commenting and posting about there lives, what they listen to, what artists they like, etc; all link to the real world, the natural world.
Of all the prizes that come from surviving more than fifty years the best is the freedom to be eccentric. What a joy to be able to explore the physical and mental bounds of existence in safety and comfort, without bothering whether I look or sound foolish. The young usually find the constraints of convention too heavy to escape, except as part of a cult. The middle’ aged have no time to spare from the conservative business of living. Only the old can happily make fools of themselves” (Lovelock, J.).
This quote by Lovelock is key to my blog this week. I don’t believe that age is what gives people freedom to be eccentric, but the bravery and the lack of caring about what people think when you grow up. With age people become more confident with whom they are and don’t care if people accept them for who they are or not; they are being true to themselves. With age the fear of being judged or not accepted fades, while younger kids rather stay with the group and not be different because of fear of being rejected by others.
Reference: Lovelock, J. ‘Introductory in The Ages of Gaia’
In MySpace this week, the social network which I have been part of for a month, a quote from Tuan came to mind; an individual’s words and sentences impart emotion and personality… (Tuan, 1991). This quote came to mind because the only way to talk to other users is by words, words on a computer screen, so the words and sentences users write imparts the user’s emotions, background and personality. This gives people there own identity and other users can have a sense of what others are like in real life.
When writing posts and comments on MySpace I have realised that I write the way I talk, non-formal and with lots of abbreviations. This I believe allows MySpace users to see who I really am, my personality, the way I talk and my persona. I don’t put on fake representation of myself because it is unjust to who I am and what makes me.
The way I write and what I write about constructs a virtual avatar of myself. With the way I talk and what I chose to discuss or comment my opinion, creates an image of what other uses see me. So if I write formally or with abbreviations, it constructs my virtual avatar.
Tuan, Yi Fu (1991) Language and the Making of Place: A Narrative-Descriptive Approach
In my virtual network I have found that the ones that are able to enjoy the freedom, abundance and choice are those that have a greater military force or presence in an area; they are able to acquire this choice by pure military force and strength. Even in todays society the larger the military force the more power is wielded America for example has a lot of military prowess and hold the power; it isn’t a recent idea though. In the 17th Century “French kings increased their power by centering… food as a means of competition” (Aitkins and Bowler, 2001) by centering food as a means of competition wars were then fought to provide the country with the freshest and diverse types of fruit, vegetable and meat. The stratagems is not under corporate control and it avoids it by allowing the players of the game to purchase certain items with money. Whether they then change from player to consumer is debatable but allowing players to purchase items keeps the servers running and prevents corporate control and advertising to the site.
Aitkins, P.,Bowler, I. (2001). ‘The origins of taste’. In Food in society: economy, culture and geography. pp 272-295
My behaviour as an individual participant can threaten the survival of my alliance. If I were to repeatedly go on the world chat and talk ‘smack’ (rubbish, just trying to start a fight) after a while I will have upset or annoyed other players that will repetitively attack me until I quit the game or move to a scarcely populated area. Drawing that much attention to myself and the alliance my alliance over may believe it is in their best interest to kick me from the group so that fewer casualties will be sustained by other players in the alliance. If members of my alliance were to all come from a wide variety of backgrounds and previous alliances we would all have numerous weak links to other players. Theoretically this is better for the alliance because we are linked with a greater majority and it should stop attacks on each other. Whereas, if we were the same group of players from the beginning with no connections to outside players we would have strong links to each other but it would make us vulnerable to attacks from the outside without any external links to others. So the alliance is better off being a complex community (many weak links) rather than a simple community (few strong links) because a simple community would “more easily upset, more subject to destructive oscillations in populations, and more vulnerable to invasions.” (Buchanan, 2002)
Buchanan, M. (2002). ‘the tangled web’. In Nexus: small worlds and the groundbreaking science of networks. 139-145.
My virtual identity has remained the same as my physical identity because I haven’t given myself a new name; the name I go by on my virtual network is my nickname in the physical world. Therefore it could be said that I have retained and strengthened my old identity in a new telling. I feel that the other people in the virtual network are extremely real, although there are some that talk themselves up to be the next Winston Churchill or Adolf Hitler when their world ranking is far inferior to those that are on top of the rankings; this make me view them in a negative light because of the words that they use. This is similar to words that we use to describe virtual space and activities on the internet; if I were to hear words such as: trolling, phishing, spam, cybercrime, click jacking, and cyber bullying it leads me to think that the virtual space is a bad place to go where nothing good can come from it but if words similar to: online, upload, information superhighway, cyber security, info Sumer, and firewall were shown I’d be lead to believe that the virtual space is a safe place to enjoy and partake in. The stratagems limits the way that you can communicate to a large group of players as no-one has a page of their own like on Facebook but it makes up for it in the online play where players are able to communicate with each other in the chat bar. The chat bar allows players to voice their opinion among world chat (everyone can see it), alliance chat (only alliance members), and private chat (team members that you invite.) The chat bar is good because “without speech humans cannot even begin to formulate ideas, discuss them, and translate them into action” (Tuan, 1991) so it allows greater co-ordination for an attack. Tuan, Y-F. (1991). Language and the making of place. Annals of the association of American Geographers, 81, 684-696
In my virtual network the Stratagems wester forms of communication are prioritised in the game, forums and my alliance. It is hard to prove that there is a single form of western communication used although there are some forms that are preferred or more dominant depending on how communication can be achieved. The Stratagems only allows us to communicate through writing which can be sometimes be interpreted differently by certain members. To eliminate this problem members are opting to try another form of western communication – speech. By using skype we will be able to freely speak to each other and clarify any misunderstandings that have occurred, which allows us to be more unified because we will have the potential to have a greater understanding of the tasks that alliance officials would like completed. Therefore my alliance can be considered as a tribe as “a tribe is usually a… dialect group which thinks of itself having a certain unity of common speech and shared customs.” (Stanner, 1979) Members of the tribe are not all from the same cultural background but we do all have the same goal to protect each other and expand our military dominance across the map; making it a relatively fictional account of World War II because of this the network doesn’t rely on any modern day myths.
Stanner, W.E.H. (1979), the Dreaming (1953), White Man Got No Dreaming: Essays 1938-1973
“Of all the prizes that come from surviving more than fifty years the best is the freedom to be eccentric. What a joy to be able to explore the physical and mental bounds of existence in safety and comfort, without bothering whether I look or sound foolish.” (Lovelock, 1988, p.3) I understand Lovelock’s statement but I think that on the internet and especially The Steampunk Empire we are free to be as eccentric as we want being separated from reality by the computer screen. On the internet we are severed from social convention, with a few exceptions of course, and are free to act like eccentric old fools. Any criticism or negative feedback can usually be safely ignored by deleting comments or shutting off the monitor. The internet is a fantastic playground for the creative mind but for those who choose to put themselves forward and treat the internet like the real world it can create multiple conflicting perceptions. Conflict can arise from those who treat the internet as their personal little world and those who view the internet as a realistic representation of the real world although each has good intentions.
Lovelock, J. (1988). The Ages of Gaia: A biography of our living earth. Oxford, NY: Oxford University Press
