Technologised Bodies

Film: I'm a cyborb, but that's OK

"To what extent are we already experienceing a man-machaine symbiosis that has turned us into cyborgs [or posthuman bodies]?" Christine Paul (Digital Art, p.166)

To a certain extent, we have already experiencing a man-manchine symbiosis. We can see nowadays we always depend on many technologies. Glasses may be a good example. It is an object independent with our human bodies. But after using the glasses, we can have a clear eye sight when our eyes have some problems like short-sighted or long-sighted. Also, the technologies used on medical is also helpful. When people lose their arms or legs after an accident, there are some technologies to help them to repair their arms or legs. This technologies have already added to our lives and eventually turned us into cyborgs.

Whar are some pros and cons of becoming a cyborg?

Pros:

• we can have longer lifespan
• our live standard will be better
• many problem can be solved easily
• our working efficiency will be improved
• we will not get hurt easily

Cons:

• less interaction between human
• less feelings
• less expereience of solving problem
• less expressions
• less emotion

What do you think of Stelarc's work?

Stelarc's work (from Stelarc's website, http://www.stelarc.va.com.au/)

"Stelarc is an Australian performance artist whose works focus heavily on futurism and extending the capabilities of the human body." (from Wikipedia, on Stelarc, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stelarc)

Actually, I think it is quite disgusting when I saw some shots that showed he has done some action upon some organs like stomach. It is hard to accept those action and I can not imagine how he can do such work on his own body. When I see his work, I may think that he is challenging the limit of the human body. As the reference above said, he is focusing his work on futurism, he may tend to have different challenge towards the human body. Although his work is quite outstanding and can have many attention, it cannot be accepted by everyone.

How many online identities do you have?

I have 4 email accounts including yahoo, hotmail, gmail and one come Lingnan University(LU). And I have asked 3 classmates about their online identities.

Carol:

• 7 email accounts (yahoo, hotmail, gmail, LU, PolyU, hellokitty, my melody)
• 1 facebook account
• 1 xanga account
• 1 yahoo blog

Anna:

• 4 email accounts (yahoo, hotmail, gmail, LU)
• 1 xanga account
• 1 facebook account

Ching:

• more than 10 email accounts (abount 5 yahoo accounts, hotmail, gmail, etc.)
• 1 xanga account
• 1 facebook account
• 1 my space account
• 1 yahoo blog
• 1 nevigator blog

Ching has so many online identities.

Unusal Stop Motion

Share a funny video with you:)

The favourite networked digital art of today's lesson

Jonah Brucker-Cohen and Katherine Moriwaki

Umbrella-net

What are some challenges digital art presents to the art world (ie galleries, exhibition goers, art critics and scholars)?

• digital art is difficult to be classified in the form of art and the range of art is very wide
• it will change in a very fast speed, it may hard to follow
• difficult to set up the exhibition, because many software and equipments will be needed
• the cost of setting up the exhibition is also high
• some digital art may not need gallery but on the other hand it will be less known by others
• the work may need more time to understand, it require more complicated understanding, it takes time
• digital art need the technical skills like computer skills or other skills of using specific software assist with the practical art skills
• the circulation of digital art may limited to only those who can access on the internet
• digital art may not be suitable for all ages group, teenagers may be the focused group for appreciating digital art
• it is easy to have the problem of copyright as it is too easy to find resources online and materials will be easy to be converted into another thing

"Mission to Earth"

It's the first time to watch digital cinema. The first impression of the film must be so special that there are not just one scene at the same time. The composition is different from the traditional cinema. I think this film, "Mission to Earth", has a different way of story telling when compared with thr traditional cinema. Besides the main scene which is showing the journey of the girl, there are also some small boxes associated with the main scene. Those small boxes are some paintings, designs, or just some colours...etc. This presentation is new for me. Sometimes, I can't concentrate on only just one scene. I can't follow the main story when I just put my focus on the small scene.

In my won opinion, I may think that the voice over is the main focus of the film and those scenes showed on the screen assist to tell the story. The voice over throughout the whole film is with the same tone. But I think he is just telling me something but not a story because it seems that he didn't put his own feeling in it. But with the association with the scenes, it help me to think more about what he is talking about. Although those scenes may not be exactly the samen with which he is talking, it help me to have more focus on the film. Otherwise, I will not continue to watch it. Furthermore, some small scenes are quite interesting, but some of them are difficult to understand. Sometimes, I will feel confuse because I will focus on one scene and try to think about what it is going to present.

For the music of the film, honestly, it is boring. But it quite match with the film or specifically match with the narrator. It creates a calm atmosphere. However, it will make people fell asleep easily.

After watching this digital film, I will still choose to watch traditional cinema because it is more interesting for me. I would like to search for other digital films to see whether I will still choose to watch traditional cinema.

Review: Youtube

Quote 1
“Environments supporting mass collaboration and social production such as annotated collections (GenBank), media sharing (Flickr, YouTube), wikis (Wikipedia), folksonomies (del.icio.us), and virtual worlds (Second Life) are other examples of social creativity. The diverse and collective stock of scientific content and artistic or stylistic ideas that individuals and communities share, re-interpret, and use as a basis for new ideas and visions constitutes the vital source of invention and creativity.”
(Fischer, G. and Giaccardi, E. (2007) Sustaining Social Creativity, Communications of the ACM, 50:12, pp. 28-29.)

• This quote is quite positive. Just like my feeling towards youtube. Youtube encourage many creative productions. It is a platform for gathering creative videos. We can find how creative the people are. And this became a culture of putting video online throughout the world.