NetDynam 2.0

Cooper, S. D. 2006: Watching the watchdog: Bloggers as the fifth estate. Spokane: Marquette Books.

Levinson, P. 2009: New new media. Boston: Allyn & Bacon.

O’Neil, M. 2009: Cyberchiefs: Autonomy and authority in online tribes. London & New York: Pluto Press.

Rettburg, J. W. 2008: Blogging. Cambridge & Malden: Polity Press.

I’ve recently read these four books dealing with different aspects of the web 2.0 world, the common thread through all of them being that they each either touch on or concentrate on the place of blogging in the current netspace. It’s difficult to compare them in terms of content and reliability, because they each have something to offer in terms of content, however my own point of view and personal areas of interest render at least two of them worthy of steering the gentle reader well clear of.

It is these two which I will deal with first.

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What has the internet done to us?

K.I. gate, originally uploaded by eldon2042.

after all this time, i’ve just signed up to flickr. so far i am having a lot of fun. hmmm. it is simple and easy to use, and has a lot of features i want to use for organising photos.

this shot was taken as we were speeding back to catch the ferry to return to the mainland on our last day on kangaroo island. i had to hop out of the car and quickly take the shot, so i used the IXUS. it performs OK in most circumstances i think.

it’s one of my favourite shots – mainly because the composition works, and the grass looks good. also, i did not notice those two stones when i took the shot originally, but now i think they make the picture.

i used picasa to gather a few related shots into an ‘album’, and exported the album contents to the desktop so i could easily upload them. the export facility, by default, makes the images smaller, so a lot of the information is lost, but i’ll try out a non-reduced image shortly just to see whether any difference in quality is noticeable.

“I can see this thing being marketed to adults.”

[future iPads] “…less of a giant iPhone for old people.”

Well…somebody’s kid; publishing their review–574 views and counting.

Another millenial’s view.

Comment. Them younger peeps want me some robust gadgets and they want it all now! 

iPad will be a big hit. However, as an Apple user for 25+ years, and as a casual observer of Apple, I know enough to wait for the second generation to arrive. This will happen in 12-18 months. I haven’t checked out the full specs, so I’m hoping that its flash drive storage can be augmented via USB. The only other requirement for me personally would be that it can display Adobe Acrobat. This would allow me to read scholarly papers while horizontal. I don’t know why Apple hasn’t licensed Adobe Flash, although I could go and find out. Maybe some combination of dollars and security figure into this odd deficit.  

iPad connotation?

The scene used here has been redeployed many times in other parodies. Still, this works for me and is headed to viral heights.

Whereas the following video has already made rounds years ago.

posted recently on the CITASA list, what looks to be a work of interest to some of us. i’ve added the link to the downloadable file below – haven’t read it myself yet, but if the abstract is anything to go by….

“As if nobody’s reading’?: the imagined audience and socio-technical biases in personal blogging practice in the UK”

David Brake. (2009) PhD thesis, London School of Economics.

Abstract

This thesis examines the understandings and meanings of personal blogging from the perspective of blog authors. The theoretical framework draws on a symbolic interactionist perspective, focusing on how meaning is constructed through blogging practices, supplemented by theories of mediation and critical technology studies. The principal evidence in this study is derived from an analysis of in-depth interviews with bloggers selected to maximise their diversity based on the results of an initial survey. This is supplemented by an analysis of personal blogging’s technical contexts [what i've been wont to call 'affordances' -el] and of various societal influences that appear to influence blogging practices. Bloggers were found to have limited interest in gathering information about their readers, appearing to rely instead on an assumption that readers are sympathetic. Although personal blogging practices have been framed as being a form of radically free expression, they were also shown to be subject to potential biases including social norms [that's us! - el] and the technical characteristics of blogging services ['affordances' again]. Blogs provide a persistent record of a blogger’s practice, but the bloggers in this study did not generally read their archives or expect others to do so, nor did they retrospectively edit their archives to maintain a consistent self-presentation. The empirical results provide a basis for developing a theoretical perspective to account for blogging practices. This emphasises firstly that a blogger’s construction of the meaning of their practice can be based as much on an imagined and desired social context as it is on an informed and reflexive understanding of the communicative situation [sounds as if he has been reading us all this time?]. Secondly, blogging practices include a variety of envisaged audience relationships, and some blogging practices appear to be primarily self-directed with potential audiences playing a marginal role [and, i feel we may be framed here again]. Blogging’s technical characteristics and the social norms surrounding blogging practices appear to enable and reinforce this unanticipated lack of engagement with audiences [indeed]. This perspective contrasts with studies of computer mediated communication that suggest bloggers would monitor their audiences and present themselves strategically to ensure interactions are successful in their terms. The study also points the way towards several avenues for further research including a more in-depth consideration of the neglected structural factors (both social and technical) which potentially influence blogging practices, and an examination of social network site use practices using a similar analytical approach

well, i’m convinced that the work will be worth reading, and very interested in what david proposes.

available with this link

discussion is invited on the blog at: http://groupblog.workasone.net/archives/00389.html

Materiality is the main factor in the difference in affordances between screen and page.

Reading online is becoming quite common and required for many research projects and in academia. Dissertations submitted for marking at many universities are done electronically and sent to markers in PDF form. Amazon has been offering books in Kindle format for some time. Yet paper-based books continue to be published and sold.

‘Materiality’ here pertains to the discrete object which is the tactile and separate artefact having printed text and diagrams on the surface of separate pages. It is distinct from the published or written or graphic work which can be saved in a file in a computer. Although laptops and computer hardware in general are artefacts and material objects that can be transported, their affordances lie in the amount or quantity of files and texts which can be stored on the one hard drive. At the time of writing these are still somewhat heavy and unwieldy so that they are difficult to read in bed or put in one’s pocket for example. However, even with advances in technology that allow small lightweight personal readers such as Kindle to be manufactured and thus easily transported, there are still differences in the affordances of each modality that lend the book and paper magazine their continuing allure.

Now we have the prospect of Apple releasing their iSlate, a small transportable mobile phone enhanced reader – and one might also guess (hope) further enhanced with the capabilities that Han earlier introduced, that is to say, touch screen interfacing.

Here’s one of the latest rumour milling-abouts from Wired: [btw, sorry, but the taped interview is in french - the article tho is in english]

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