And It’s a Wrap!

The end of the semester has finally arrived and it has been a long but insightful ride. This class was initially an elective that I took just because it was one of the only classes available. I was a little skeptical about it at first but I am so glad that I stuck it out the whole semester. I learned so many things and became much more tech savvy then I would have been had I not taken this class. There was a lot of things to get through so assignments more stressful then other’s but I still found it all very fun!

One of the many things we had to accomplish was weekly blog posts. This is where we practically vented about our weekly assignments but also where we were able to put our new skills to use and make our blog posts fun. I learned how to link, add videos, and just make a blog site that makes someone want to look at it and where it grabs there attention. Every week whether it was a meme, digital redlining or bots, I was able to use my experience to bring my blog post to life and show my hard work of the week.

Twitter was something that I dreaded in the beginning because I was never much of a twitter fan. When I made one for this class and we started to use it more and more I began to realize all the perks that twitter has to offer. I even learned how to make BOTS! This was so cool because I could actually send out tweets without actually physically doing it myself everyday. For twitter we also had to do out daily digital alchemy tweets. Doing these required a lot of creativity which was fun and refreshing from all the dull work from my other classes.

After having been on twitter throughout the semester, I have evolved in the netnarr twitter space. My analysis of my twitter account has also changed. When I first started everything was blank and there was no information to graph. Now at the end of the semester it shows what time of day I was on twitter the most, all my replies, it has much more information graphed, hashtags, etc. It has changed so much and it is bizarre to think that I was even using twitter that much, but I sure did. We also did a lot of work with the make banks, which were sometimes stressful but very educational. Doing the make banks taught me how to use certain tools and how upload things onto the internet.

Now at the end of the semester when I used the twitter analysis tool. 

The first time I used the twitter analysis tool. 

Overall, I mostly intrigued by the privacy and surveillance topic we did in the beginning of the semester. I didn’t know that we allow ourselves to be watched the minute we get onto a site just because of the simple facts that the site has cookies. I also have a lot of fun with memes and gifs and learning how to make them! It was actually my favorite topic. Also the only topic that I was really challenged by was the bots and the e-lit. They were the only topic where it took me a little bit to grasp and I had to some background research on it, in order to understand it better. I know that going forward I will know how to use different tools which I will also be able to use in my classroom when I become a teacher. I can also use these tools to make my teaching much more fun and interesting.

Also, anyone that is willing deciding on whether or not to take this class, I would definitely tell them to give it a shot! It can be a little overwhelming at first but eventually it becomes such a great class and you really do learn a lot!! I know I will legitimately miss this class!

Close Reading Of E-Lit Text

When exploring through all the examples of E-Lit that was provided, I fell upon one that I really found interesting, which was the Soliloquy. The soliloquy is about Kenneth Goldsmith writing about everything he spoke about for one whole week. He recorded everything and had to transcribe it into an online literature. This text is broken down into what he said the whole seven days of the week. When you click on each day of the week, it is then broken down even more into ten “chapters.” Each chapter is a continuation of what he was saying from the beginning of the day until the end of the day. Every page of this text starts out with an small statement or question and then the rest of the text is hidden. In order to read the text you have to click on different areas of the page for the words to pop up. To understand what it says you have click around to understand what it is saying.

As a digital reader, I get a little lost when reading this text because it is all over the place. It is a little challenging to decipher what it is saying at first. But eventually when you click around and read the little bits that pop up you start to understand what the text or what that page is about. Many times there are some pages where the author doesn’t form a coherent sentence or form a sentence that is grammatically correct. But I found rather interesting to use a form of getting your writing down in digital form.

This piece of writing, I would say, is an animation because the words pop-up randomly when you click on a certain area on the page. The words come to life when you play around with it. With this type of e-lit you can play around with the text and kind of select certain areas and try to figure out what it is saying or you can click in order the way you normally read a text so it can reveal what the next sentence is.

A soliloquy is a way to express what one says in a fun way in the digital form. It is a way to get one’s meaning across in a different way and also as an interactive way. It brings a different meaning and experience to any text when you have to click to figure out what piece of writing comes next. I really enjoyed looking through this type of E-literature and being a style I would want to use.

Bot Life for life

Well this week was definitely an interesting but odd week all together. I learned that you can create a bot that can send out tweets or information in general for you without me having to type it up myself. I learned that bots are basically a whole different entity that sends out its own information. All I had to do was set it up and it did everything on it’s own. I find it really weird because it acts like a actual person would when sending out tweets but no one is actually typing it, the bot it. This just shows how much technology has advanced and also how dangerous the internet world can be. You never really know if you are talking to a real person or a bot.

When do the bot poetry detention, I did ok. There were some that you could tell it was said by a bot by the structure and the way it written but then there were some that were created in an odd way but it was done by a person and not a bot. So I thought that it was a little difficult to tell whether something was written by a bot or a person. I didn’t do that well but I learned how to decipher some, so that’s a step in the right direction.

So after this activity, we had to create twitter bots. I felt that it was actually one of the assignments we’ve had thus far in the semester that was a little confusing and challenging for me, but I was so relieved when I was finished setting it up. When creating it I had to make sure I set it up in a way that it made sense. So when giving it a voice, I had to keep in mind that I had to usual proper sentence structure because I wanted to make it sound like it knew was it was talking about. I wanted to try to not make it as noticeable as possible that it was a bot. Also, it interacts with my twitter communication by asking my classmates on twitter their thoughts on games. I also engaged in botversation by answering the questions that were asked of me by the bots that my classmates set up. I think that with the set up of these bots, it influenced not only myself but my classmates to look at everything we did this semester in a different perspective. When doing this, I did really interact with any other bots besides those created by my peers.

This is the one I did in the beginning of the week. 

This second one is from after sending all my bot tweets. 

The difference wasn’t really much. It still shows that I am not a bot, so maybe I’m doing this bot thing all wrong hahah!

I think that there are positive uses of bots because it can get information out that maybe a regular person might not write about. It is creative because bots can do or be about anything. They can also be used for entertainment. I am not really crazy about this whole bot thing so I am not really sure how I would use it, but I do enjoy reading other different types of bots.

Audio Audio Audio and Some Redlining too

This week’s class and activity was definitely something different but interesting all the same. We discussed redlining, which deals with different companies discriminating and denying services to people of certain geographical areas. I find that something to be very unfair because everyone should have access to the same types of services regardless of where they live. When doing my make bank based on transportation, I realized that the low income area I focused on how multiple ways for transportation and I believe it has to do with the fact that many people in low income areas don’t have cars and it is cheaper to take public transportation.  Also even though it wasn’t an entertaining “game” by any means it does have some elements of gaming. For example when trying to find a service to compare with the redlining area we had to work with is an obstacle we had to overcome to get our end result which is the same as in a game. In a game you must overcome obstacles. The redlining activity also requires strategy just like in a game, which does show that this activity had elements of a game.

When it comes down to the audio project, I actually had a fun time creating this. I had posted my questions practically last minute and I was able to receive a response. But I only got a response to one question which was kind of odd that they didn’t respond to all three, but for the 2 questions I just responded and what I thought how they might respond. It was very fun listening to the whole thing come together and actually sounding like an in person interview! This link provides my audio that I created with my questions.  It has been a long week but I am glad that I am all caught up and audio was fun, but I think I’m ready for something else lol!

Getting Lost In Gaming

It’s been a hectic few weeks for me and playing catch up is stressful but I’m almost there. This week I wasn’t able to make it to class because I had some personal things that came up. So when it comes down to the discussion of game play types and the elements of games I am a little on the confused. But from trying to understand the post of this week 10 weekly break down for what was done in class that games can be classified by Plan, Practice and Improvise. From watching the clip I learned that every game has these aspects if not all. Playing games has the same overall concept of trying to win and get the end. Every games has obstacles in which one has to plan how to overcome it. Sometimes when one loses, we try again until we get it right. Every game has rules to follow and an end goal. So that is what I understand when trying to play catch-up this week.

Also, when the playing the Internet Archive game I found it pretty cool when I learned all the background history of the game, the reasoning behind the set-up and why it was created. Pac-Man was a game that has been around for many years. It is an old game that was popular and is now a game people enjoy playing from time to time. When growing up I would just play Pac-Man at a pizzeria or at a restaurant when having to wait for food to kill time but I never put much time into thinking more about the game then just trying not to get eaten. But when do this assignment I have I have learned the name of the ghosts, why they are a certain color and why they change color. It was really interesting learning more about something that I never paid much mind too. This has made me look up information on games that I play on a regular basis to understand the whole concept behind the games!

When it comes down to the interview questions, I was late with posting them on the padlet, so I am not sure I will get a response in time but I still haven’t even received a response from when I gave them feedback. I also had requested permission to view their prototype last week even though I didn’t do the interview questions but I never received permission and I have tried again recently and nothing. But when coming up with my questions I tried to center it on their reasoning why and if they could have changed anything if they had the chance too. Also, having to do this project has given me a chance to get familiar with audacity and it has become a little easier.

Let’s hope I get a response!

Trying different games, woohoo!

For my internet archive game I chose to do pac-man because I feel as though that game is something that many people are familiar with, but don’t really know the background on it. When researching pac-man I learned about what it means when the ghosts turn blue. i knew that when they are colored it means that they can kill you but I didn’t know that when you get to the energizer balls the ghosts turn blue so you can try to eat them and try to not get yourself killed. There is a lot about Pac-Man that I didn’t know and that I learned doing this assignment.

Pac-Man was originally called Puck-man, which originated from a Japanese name. In the beginning when it was first created the snack pellets were originally cookies before it changed. Also, the names of the ghost both had Japanese and English names. In Japanese it is fickle, chaser, ambusher, and stupid. In english it is inky, blinky, pinky, and clyde. It was also created as a cute game to include good and bad characters. Each of the ghosts is responsible for a different behavior. It also has a Guinness World record of “The Most Successful Coin-Operated Game.”

 Also based on Plan, Practice, and Improvise I would classify this game as something where you need to plan and practice in order to get it right. In order to not die you need to figure out which way you would want to go so you can avoid the ghosts. It also takes practice to be able to get all the coins, while avoiding the ghosts and not dying.

When Audio isn’t life

I am just a little behind of this blog post because of a chaotic and hectic couple weeks I’ve had recently but I finally am able to get this blog post. This week has been the beginning of a crazy ride in gaming as well as audio and audio editing.

This week started off with the discussion on serious/empathy games. There was a lot to look at and understand about the pro’s and con’s of certain games. During class we had a chat on our thoughts of this topic. As mentioned in the first question by Katherine we had to gain some experience by playing games to fully understand. Once we did that we moved on to the topic of con’s in games that evoke empathy and whether or not games can teach us empathy. When participating in this chat, I felt that certain games do evoke a sense of empathy is the game is constructed properly. For example, in class my group played Syrian Journey and I felt that in the beginning I felt empathy because it had to do with the struggles of immigrating and the tough decisions individuals have to make. But once I continued playing and we realized that there is no winning the game, I became frustrated and no longer seemed to care about the point of the game, I was just trying to figure out how to win, if there is even a way to win. If a game is structured properly, individuals will lose interest quickly.

Once we concluded with that, we had a discussion on audio and audio editing for our make bank assignment. It took me a while to get to this assignment but once I was able to complete it, I was completely lost at first. It took me several youtube videos and multiple tries to even create something that made sense, somewhat. I didn’t think it was going to be as challenging but it was. When creating my assignment, I made sure I took everything off of freesound because I didn’t want to get confused using another site. I came up with my idea for the assignment when I was looking through examples and in the background my brother was listening to a video on facebook that had to do with instruments and I though maybe I could use something doing that! I first wrote down all the instruments I had in mind to use from the softer sounding instruments to the louder ones and I was going to use that as a way from trying to describe someones frustration playing games in the beginning to how hard a game can get towards the end. It was one of the hardest assignments I’ve had to do so far and I still think I did it wrong but at least I now have somewhat of an idea on how to use audio on audacity.

 

This was my notes/outline, editing screen and the outcome.

Also, to the referencium I added on article on how games can teach your brain fight depression. I chose to add this article because I felt like it was important for people to know that gaming isn’t all bad. It not only is fun but it can also be beneficial to your mental health. Games can changes people’s mood and allow them to take their mind off things that upset them and allow them to focus on something they enjoy and that makes them happy. So when I saw the article, I thought it was interesting to share.

As for the University of Cairo’s student game prototype, the ones that I was most interested in were taken so when I saw the one on animal abuse, I chose that one right away because I felt that is topic that is a big issue here in the U.S as well. I felt that it would be an interesting game to bring awareness and bring out empathy in people when they see the struggles/cruelty that animals go through.

Overall it’s been hectic trying to catch up and overwhelming but it’s also been a really big learning experience!

It’s Game Time!

The last week of class before spring break was a pretty easy going class, which was nice because we’ve been moving at a fast pace since the beginning of the semester. When discussing games, at first, I thought I wouldn’t have much to contribute because I am not a “gamer.” But then as we talked more about it I realized that the games I play on my phone counts! I always had this notion that a gamer is someone who plays on an Xbox, playstation, WII, etc. Every game has rules and regulations. They also provide challenges which is what keeps many people wanting to play. I know that, thats what it does for me thats for sure!

Based on the game sharing  convo, I learned that everyone plays different types of games and everyone has different interests. Also, everyone plays games in some way, shape or form. Steph was the one who commented on my game of choice, which was 8 pool ball on my phone.

Then when I played the games in class, it was a bit odd at first because I didn’t understand why we were playing those games, but then I realized it related to the fact that this class is called alchemy. I noticed that at first I was a little hesitant when playing the games but once I got the hang out it, it was cool to play! In order to negotiate a new environment, you have to put things together that make sense. It was interesting and something different.

Creating audio that is different from text is that with audio you can add emotion, different sounds, music, etc. Which is something that you can’t do in writing. In order to get an audiences attention or get emotion out of them in writing is formatting everything  according and using proper punctation to emphasize things that need to be emphasized. But when doing a podcast, it is much easier to get the message across. To be honest, I don’t really listen to podcasts at all aside from maybe the radio in the morning when they talk about things, but other than that I don’t really listen to podcasts, so I don’t have a type of podcast to listen to.

After listening the to the RadioLab episode on games, I noticed that different types of people would talk at all different times. They would share stories about sports, but then go on different tangents about other topics. The pace of the show is kind of slow but it has moments where it’s a little quicker. It was difficult for me to focus because I could only listen, I couldn’t see what was happening, which was challenging for me, but it was also an interesting experience.

 

Can’t wait for GAMES GAMES GAMES!

It’s time to Gif it all up together!

This was the last week for digital art and I am kind of bummed out. I really enjoyed this part of the semester on digital art because we were able to do a lot of fun stuff. Making of  the memes and the Gifs was the best part. It was also cool learning about privacy and how anything you do online is watched. The internet has very little privacy because in order to go on some sites we have to allow cookies and agree to the terms, which allows those sites to watch you and know what you are doing. I also learned that, that is one of the many reasons why sometimes when on a site, the ads have items of things I likes because of other sites monitoring what I do online. It is ultimately a little nerve wrecking to see how advance technology is becoming and the lack of privacy.

Also this week I completed my weekly DDA’s. Typically when I complete them I usually try to think about my interests so I can incorporate them in my DDA’s. I try to take my time with them because I don’t them to be corny or as if I rushed them just to get it done. I try to relate them to the class or what we are learning or have learned.

Thus far in the semester we have done a lot of make banks, daily digital alchemies, and a few blog posts. Below will have all my links to all the work that I have completed so far in the semester:

Twitter DDA’s

Make Banks that are completed

My weekly blog posts

My in TAGSExplorer

In doing all of this I have learned that digital art can mean and be anything. Everyone has a different perception of what that is but it has a widely spread meaning. When I think of digital art I think of pictures, painting or images created online, and memes/gifs. But I have from other individuals in my class that some believe it is online games, photoshop, etc. Everyone sees things in a different way and thats why this topic was so fun because we got to explore that and create our own stuff. I have and will continue use digital art as posting pictures online or sending/creating memes and gifs.

Also, I never really stopped and thought about my experience online or my digital life but when taking this course and completing all these assignments, I realized I am more connected to the digital world than I thought. I was familiar with almost everything that was mentioned in class and I am easily able to maneuver my way online without much difficulty. But I also learned that there is much more out there in the digital world that I wasn’t aware of such as the privacy topic and apps that are related to digital art but on the bright side, I got the hang out them pretty quickly and I will be using them in the future. There is so much to explore and I can’t wait to do so. Can’t wait for this next segment in class.

Let the games begin!

 

Photograph a Process

I did my process on how I make my amazing cup of coffee every morning before work or before running errands. Coffee is something I can’t live without and I make a minimum of 2 cups of coffee everyday, so I figured why not photograph my process of my daily coffee. It is something that I am good at and is essential for me.