Notes from lesson: 17/11/10

• Realism is an aesthetic construct (a created 'look') put together by conventions that are agreed upon at any one time. This 'vision of the future' was an 80's-based sense of realism...
• There is no single 'realism', different cultures and contexts produce different forms.

Key terms:

• Photorealism- creates a realistic photo by using computer technology and can be created by using parts of real footage.
• Actuality - what you often get in police documentaries, actual footage of car crashes, and public violence taken by CCTV cameras.
• Realistic Violence - things that would usually not have a big impact is exaggerated to give the maximum effect. These can be enhanced by computer technology.

What do these studies on realism tell us?

• That realism can be faked and we should not mistake it for authenticity.
• That styles of realism, which are often the result of technology change according to their period in history.

Second Life:
Is second life hyper real? In other words, is it more real than reality?
Something that is hyper-real might be a better expression of a thing than its real form. This is something that is argued by the philosopher Baudrillard who is a well-known postmodern philosopher.

The Hyper-Real:

• The idea of a simulacrum has existed since the Greek philosophers. It's direct meaning is 'a copy of something that doesn't exist' and is something that we have known has existed all along but that we have not expressed it sufficiently yet.
• There are two kinds of image making. The first is a faithful reproduction, attempted to copy precisely the original. The second is distorted intentionally in order to make the copy appear more correct to viewers.

What do these studies on hyper-reality tell us?

• That many of the most realistic media we know are embedded with commercialism eg. virtual games come with hidden advertising.
• That commercialism invades our reality since they only tell us what they want us to know?
  

Testing cultural inversion.

Cultural Inversion:

Express:
Individualism
Independence
Commercialization

Value:
Community
Relationships
Authenticity


What does the word community mean to you?
People coming together from all different ages and ethnic backgrounds to do something. There can be a community within a town or village, where people who wouldn't normally be friends, meet up and get to know each other. The government talk a lot about communities because they are trying to get people to come together. Community wardens/community service seem to be not so nice. Community service would be given to someone who has committed a crime and a community warden is someone who has authority to help their community but aren't as powerful as the police.


Social Networking sites are the main online communities, some of them are:
Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, Tumblr, Bebo.
There are also video sharing sites, the most famous one of course is Youtbue, there is also Photobucket, Flickr and Tinypic where you can upload videos but you can also upload your own pictures and screen savers too.

EPIN COW iGUN

Evolution
Prosumers
I
Convergence
Collaboration
Old media
Wikinomics (inc. LongTail theory)
Image (power of)
Generation gaps
Unification
Narcissism (or flattery)

David Gauntlett

^^^ David Gauntlett hard at work. ^^^

David Gauntlett was born in 1971 is a British sociologist and media theorist. He specialises in the study of contemporary media audiences, the everyday making and sharing of digital media, and the role of such media in self-identity and self-expression.

In 2007, Gauntlett published online the article Media Studies 2.0, which created some discussion amongst media studies educators. The article argues that the traditional form of media studies teaching and research fails to recognise the changing media landscape in which the categories of 'audiences' and 'producers' blur together, and in which new research methods and approaches are needed. Andy Ruddock has written that Gauntlett's "ironic polemic" includes "much to value", and acknowledges that the argument "is more strategy than creed", but argues that audiences still exist, and experience mass media specifically as audience, and so it would be premature to dispose of the notion of 'audience' altogether. The inaugural issue of the journal Interactions was dedicated to a discussion of 'Media Studies 2.0', with contributions from a number of experts and a response by Gauntlett.

What is media in the online age?

Convergence.

· Youtube, people are becoming producers of the Media.

· 25% of the total marks for this year.

· Global media.

· Written exam.

· Online age, is it a bad thing for the industries?

· How are the different media changing?

· Will it change how we profit from the media?

· Where is it taking us?

· Set schedule, they were told when they could watch what, no on demand shit.

· Big things (camera buildings) Now there are lap ops and mobile phones

· Web 2.0 (Myspace and Youtube.)

· On demand on the Internet, less time watching TV.

· These days consumers of the media can become producers.