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"There is no progress in art, any more than there is progress in making love. There are simply different ways of doing it." Man Ray

Media/Communication - Anthroblogogy

hey it's rachael ray!

April 11th 2007 02:16
one of the past times that you can do in south korea is watch tv. they loooove their tv here, that's for sure! we have a television in our apartment and it allows us to watch any of the 77 channels that are provided through the cable connection (this is the first time i have ever had this many channels). however, as with any television, there is rarely anything of quality on, and we are limited even further as we can't understand korean completely yet, so we have to watch the 6 english channels.

needless to say in the past few months i have watched some fairly average programs -mainly of american descent. i caught myself the other day watching csi miami and actually concerned with the plot! i think i was really just waiting for that red headed guy to put his glasses on and say some tough guy comment that is also exceptionally witty and intelligent. sorry i regress.


rachael ray
image from wikipedia
i saw what would have to be the worst show ever the other day. it is a cooking (if you can class tuna mornay as cooking) program hosted by a woman by the name of rachael ray. and 'oh my god! (god said with a pitch inclination)' she loves the sound of her own voice!! it is basically a lifestyle type of program where they get a guest in to cook some dish and talk hollywood dribble.


the program that i saw had joan cusack on as the guest. now i really respect her as an actor and as a person, but even she seemed stupid in the program. she may have been playing it up for the camera a bit, to sort of fit in with the set, but it still wasn't flattering to watch. what most struck me however was rachael ray's constant pattern of ask question and then answer it for the guest. there were so many instances of uncomforable moments where the guest didn't know when to try and talk. it was really unsettling.

i did a little research into this show and it turns out that it is owned by harpo productions, which is oprah winfrey's 'little' thing. so that explained a whole lot as to why she is why she is. i then spoke to my wife about this show and she told me that she has seen a program of the two of them together. no one found out anything about the other as they were both talking at the same time, and answering for each other. all the while looking to the white, middle class audience for approval.

this is definately a program to run from, and one that i definately don't recommend. for a giggle check out her website. i really want her 'too cool for school mix tape'.

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milo goes to 'wikipedia' college. what do you think?

April 2nd 2007 15:05
the never ending debate is always raging as to the quality of the information that is available on wikipedia. the onlline information encyclopedia that is for wikipedians, written by wikipedians. it is hard for me to take an un-biased opinion of this as i am a firm believer that wiki is all good, however i will attempt to be diplomatic in this discussion of the world's coolest information resource.

wiki is good because:
>it allows open input into the content which allows diversity of this content,
>the content is forever evolving - as the more people research and discover, the more that is added to this database,
>the content is allowed to be edited by whoever, ensuring that there is a natural police system to control any misinformation,
>the history of the edits are accessible to all so it can be seen how the information has been contributed,
>it has a never ending hypertextual, rhizomic form to it that encourages the reader to access multiple sources for any information,
>it is working on all media formats,
>oesn't pretend to be something that it is not.

these are some substantial reasons as to why i believe it is a credible source of information, and why i continue to use it as such. so it makes me wonder why there is such a scared attitude out there to this information? this opinion is one that is expressed by the same person that would pick up the newspaper in the morning and believe that it is a coincidence that david hicks' trial has been shifted to after the next australian election. wouldn't it be fair to say 'exercise caution' when consuming any form of information? i think wikipedians are more likely to adhere to their own set of conduct when moving about the pages and pro/consuming information.

this is why i feel angry when i hear about schools such as middlebury college in the uk having banned the use of citing wikipedia as academic sources. i thought universities were supposed to be a place where intelligent people lurked? somewhere that was designed to expand one's mind into other thinking dimensions and not implode it on itself? why then would they do this?

if you read this article from a research project into the affects of digital media on youths, it places wikipedia into a more suitable context to be used. i can't help but think of that telstra add. the one where the little boy asks his dad about the great wall of china. "to keep the rabbits out" is his worldly and wisely retort. if we only have one source for anything, don''t we become completely one minded?

in this sense, i also believe that it is impossible to rely solely on wikipedia for your information, but it is something that can be used as a starting point or for reference. apart from that it is useful to gain knowledge on things that be more of a 'folksonomy' rather than something that is in the oxford. what does oxford say about 'crackheads'? well, this is what wiki said about it....

what does other people think about wikipedia and using it as a source?


too many rabbits!
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does google own the world?

March 30th 2007 19:59
google g-string logo
your searching stops here?
is there no end to what google seem to have their fingers into? off the top of my head i can think of the almighty google search engine, google earth, adsense, and youtube. not to mention the multitudes of spin offs like google scholar, froogle, gmail, and blogger. without a doubt they are the world's largest search engine that i would dare say the majority of the world uses, and to be fair, it is a search engine that rarely lets me down in my never ending persuit for information. even as you read this blog entry, it is being endorsed by google adsense which is attempting to pay me with advertising money for my journalism efforts. they certainly are a force to be reckoned with and have established themselves as a super power within the information super highway. however as with all monopolies, it can't be a good thing all together.

one issue that springs to mind is the idea of censorship in one form. for example, when one does a search for a particular item, the search returns with an enormous amount of results and who is to say that is the best selection of information that is available? the potential sources are selected through a process of recent activity on the many webpages that the information is available on, along with the highest amount of links that correspond to this webpage. for a useful explanation of this refer to this blog post. so in a sense, it is popular information that is found and could potentially not be the best source for this information. not to mention that you, depending on your research skills of course, have to traul through possibly 20 000 000 internet pages. i would really like to meet anyone that has done this.

with this in mind, people that are uploading information really play on this, as is the trick of any web developer or online content manager. an industry in itself has been created around this practice and this could be seen as further distorting what could be conceived as the correct information. it must then be said that both the media producer and consumer should be wary of the information that they develop/consume, and must always keep an open mind to other avenues of information technology.

as we all instantly go to google for our information fixes, we have to be aware that there are alternative research options available to us that should be utilised from time to time. one fantastic example of this is the social bookmarking network of del.icio.us. as a creative online community, they utilise the importance of metadata and tags to link people together with what has been bookmarked.
screenshot of del.icio.us
an example of a del.icio.us blog summary

for example, i might find a website on bettie page. i can then go to del.icio.us and create a post on bettie page, save it, and it will then tell me who else in the del.icio.us network have also bookmarked this website. instantly i have access to an entire network of people that have a similar interest to bettie page and might have further information that i would be interested in.

i actually just did this and google simply gave me pages of information related to bettie page and her photos. del.icio.us said it was bookmarked by 26 other users, which then directed me to other areas such as 'pinups', 'burlesque', and 'dancers'. when i clicked on that it directed me towards another network which opened up into 'art' 'dada', and 'deco'. so furthering my initial availability of information again.

it might not be the style of research for everyone, but it is an alternative and could possibly take you to places you would never have previously gone before. free information. information for everyone.
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Posted By: Jonathon - Category: Language, Media/Communication
   


tagging, blogging, network socialising anyone?

March 24th 2007 08:35
i was just passed on this excellent link for a group calling themselves imaginini. they are yet another media group to have a crack at the creative community thing, however i think this one is quite fun and seemed to hit the nail on the head of the bird in the bush (so to speak).

the link to really try is this one, as it takes you through the process of registering, only in a ay that is involving. as compared to most of the exhisting creative communities (youtube, flickr, myspace, etc.), this one is really simple. before you know it, you are registered and are part of a network of other cool(?) people. the entire process that you go through on registration adheres to interactive, hypertextual theories, which i love, and challenges your regular thought patterns at the same time


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you down with ucc?

March 8th 2007 12:13
as the world is engulfing the craze that is ucc, or user created content, it appears that corporations are also standing up and taking notice of what this new breed of media producers have to say.

sony's launch of the ucc marketed camera
which one is the author?
south korea is being used as a test dummie for sony to market their six new high definition camcorders to the would be creators of user created content. similarly, microsoft has also implemented a marketing statergy aimed at the youth of singapore, taiwan, hong kong and south korea, creatively titled 'what's wrong with u


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communicating in south korea

February 11th 2007 13:57
in a country that has the highest amount of connectivity, it is funny to walk around and see sites like this:
wirey
high speed internet!

and the funny is, while i was taking this photo a truck nearly collected one of these wires and bought down all of them! and it wasn't even a very high truck! so i think the high speed internet is there, but they do have to do some work on the infrastructure. interestingly enough, this picture isn't just at one location, it is a common site throughout the entire city


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a few seoul snaps

February 11th 2007 07:24
i just went and had a walk around a few parts of seoul today. so here are some snaps of what it looks like:
temple
one of the many temples

toilet time
why is the man happier than the woman?

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seoul searching...

February 10th 2007 07:18
goofy characters
welcome to seoul!

after an 18 hour trip from melbourne we finally arived at kim's guest house, seoul, which was to be our residence for the next two days. and what a journey it was to get this far. we were prepared partially for the language barrier, as everything that i read said that koreans could all basically speak english. i had the basics down and was well confident that easing into the culture wouldn't pose that much of a problem. i think that was my biggest mistake!

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words of wisdom

January 12th 2007 08:09
i had the pleasure of attending the farewell to the ashes dinner last night at the mcg. the guest of honour was past australian cricket captain mark waugh, who was also part of the entertainment, in the form of a live interview between main course and dessert. i now have a different attitude toward sports journalism....

during the interview, which i must add was entertaining and flowed well on mark waughs' behalf, he mentioned something that annoys the hell out me. how often do we see it, when a person/team wins a sporting event, only to have some sport journalist run to the victor and enquire 'how do you feel?'. as if the entire audience, along with the competitor and journalist, doesn't know how they feel. 'yeah mate i feel pretty low at the moment, and can't wait for all of these people to stop clapping


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hello and welcome!

November 20th 2006 07:06
as this is the first post in my new blog, i think it is appropriate to explain what the concept behind it is. i want to compile an on line journal that studies culture and cultural practices, and relies upon the network and creative communities for its distribution. this is reflective in its title 'anthroblogogy', a folksonomy of juxtaposing the word anthropology with word blog. it will be a look at our communities through my eyes, as i attempt to understand better the cultures and habbits that we seem to live by.

i feel that most of our cultural habbits can be understood better through basic philosophy and cultural studies. by examining theories as early from socrates through to a more modern philosopher like descartes, one can start to understand how we function as a community. it may also be split into eastern and western cultures, and split further down into four main areas: values, norms, institutions, and artifacts. this style of study might then be looked at through techniques such as semiology - one of my personal favourites within culture and communication


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