Hi all, this is Mildred and Kathy. Tomorrow we will have a presentation on the topic of resistance. We will mainly focus on the relationship between culture jamming (a form of digital activism) and resistance. At first, we will explain the term: Culture jamming: Culture jamming is a form of activism and a resistance movement to the hegemony of popular culture; culture jamming is also a form of media activism that incorporates the use of advertising language and imagery to subvert the expected advertising messages. Culture Jamming incorporates political and cultural criticism with the conventions of advertising. Culture jamming is also called 'semilogical guerilla warfare'. It has become a wide spread and popular form of media activism, it is eye catching, effective and is possible for anyone with a sense of humour and a spray can or computer.

We also quote the statement from Harold (2004) to help us explain culture jamming: “Jamming need not be seen only as a damming, or stopping of corporate media….It may be more useful to consider jamming as an artful proliferation of messages, a rhetorical process of intervention and invention, which challenges the ability of corporate discourses to make meaning in predictable.”

Prank, as a term that always related to culture jamming, is also another form of activism, sometimes, the prankster refigure logos, fashion statements, and product images to challenge the idea. The pranksters, who resists less through negating and opposing dominant rhetorics than by playfully and provocatively folding existing cultural forms in on themselves.

In the presentation, we will use Adbuster as the first example to talk about the culture jamming. Adbuster, a activism magazine, known for its parodic “subvertisments” and scathing critiques of consumer culture, launched its most ambitious anti-branding campaign yet.

We would like to use the example from Harold’s article as well. The second example we chose is about the “INKFT Truth” campaign which held by American Legacy Foundation. This example is one of the most successful models of media pranking comes in the form of institutionally sanctioned public service campaign. Here are some features of the campaign: 1.the campaign used modern graphic design to raise public attention rather than telling kids not to smoke directly; 2.the truth campaign does not just tell kids not to smoke; 3.Truth encourages young people to become culture jammers, or pranksters, themselves, and even provides them with the tools to do it; 4. 2-page spreads in magazines in orange and white screaming messages: “CIGARETTE SMOKE HAS ARSENIC” and “AMMONIA IS ADDED TO CIGRATTES”; 5. Truth provides stickers in the shape of blank conversation bubbles as in a comic strip. Next to the free stickers is a picture of a Marlboro Man advertisement “augmented” by one of the stickers; 6. Truth launched its bubble campaign, folding Tobacco’s enthusiasm for the rhetorical power of comic book imagery over on itself and, in doing so, allowing kids to participate in the construction of a new narrative. From this, we can realize that the current INFKT campaign experiments with a mode of rhetoric that is not grounded in the proclamations of any individual speaking subjects. It promotes a kind of word-of-mouth dissemination of arguments against the tobacco industry. As such, it capitalizes on what may be two favorite pastimes of many teens: rebellion and gossip.

Next, many local and foreign examples of culture jamming will be presented as well: pranking on Starbucks, Dove and iphone. Moreover, we will talk about the changing in culture jamming that it is no longer just challenge the consumer and popular culture, but also challenge or criticize the current social/political issues/phenomenon.

See you guys tomorrow, thank you!!

Love,

Mildred

Kathy

CRITICAL ANNOTATED WEBILOGRAPHY

Question 4: Is a cyborg queer? Discuss critical thinking on the intersections between sexuality and technology.

1. Lykke, Nina. “Are Cyborgs Queer?”
http://xoomer.virgilio.it/raccontarsi/presentazioni2006/LIANA.pdf (accessed 11 March 2011).

In the traditional sense, our society is developed and maintained by the biological determinism which emphasizes in naturalization and normalization of essential links between biological sex, sexuality, reproductive capacities, gendered subjectivity and hierarchical gender system. However, in the last decades, the biological determinism was attacked by the new scientific reproductive technologies, which separate the reproduction from sex, causes desexualization and deconstruction of cultural imaginary process, and brings along the social problem on identification. Since the cyborg and the queer are regarded as the wealth of feminist theorist, that they have played an important role in sustaining the concept of feminist theory. Therefore, they are used as the framework of the reference for the discussion on the deconstruction of biological determinism. In writer’s points of view, the sex and sexuality are the products of cultural imaginary which are constructed by the socio-cultural and historical power. However, due to the introduction of the new reproductive technologies, the cultural imaginary of “natural” and “normal” reproduction is broken as the children of the cyborgs and the queer can be “made” in a laboratory by using the advanced reproductive technology without natural sexual encounter between a female and a male body. Although the cyborgs and the queer as well as the infertility couples are benefit from the technological reproductive development, the writer thinks that the “cyborg-babies” will become another controversial social problem because of their uncertain identities due to the collapse of the “natural family” which is supported by the biological determinism.

2. Miyake, Esperanza. “My, is that Cyborg a little bit Queer?”

http://www.bridgew.edu/SOAS/jiws/Mar04/Miyake.pdf (accessed 12 March 2011).

In this essay, the writer, Esperanza Miyake, tried to investigate how the cyborgqueer idea embodies feminism by comparing the queer theory in different aspects. She used a journey to Cyb(que)erland as the opening that inviting the readers to join her to introduce “the Cyneria” and “the Queerdonia”, which represent the theory of cyborg and queer respectively, and look into the related issues on feminism. In the journey, her spacecraft will take the passengers (readers) to three main areas, where are the themes and issues of this essay focuses on, to understand and find out the concepts behind. The first area is the “conceptualization of sexuality which sees sexual power embodied in different levels of social life, expressed discursively and enforced through boundaries and binary divides”. It is the cyber area which is body-power interrelated. It claims all the power, including the production, sexuality, knowledge and discourse, are the energies come from the body. However, in this area, technology is the premium. It gives us freedom and power over our bodies to create our ideal identities which help us to live another bodily reality. After that, we move to the second area: “problematization of sexual and gender categories, and of identities in general. Identities are always on uncertain grounds, entailing displacement of identification and knowing”, that highlights the vagueness of gender. In the cyberworld, we are all queer cyborgs as gender becomes fluid, that everybody can reconstruct another racial and ethnic identity which is different from the reality anytime. Through the practice of identity creation, it made the class of “men” and “women” disappear altogether. Finally, we landed on the last area: “the rejection of civil-rights strategies in favor of a politics of carnival, transgression, and parody which leads to deconstruction, decentering, revisionist readings, and anti-assimilationist politics”. It is the place about the breakdown of three boundaries: human/animal, organic/machine and physical/non-physical. It suggested the growing technology makes the distinction between private and public become more and more blurred which means we are in a position to embody the outside power, and also empower the outside body.

3. Chess, Shira. “The C-Word: Queering the Cylons.”

http://shiraland.com/Work/bsg_sample.pdf (accessed 11 March 2011).

In this article, the writer tried to look into the theory of cyborg and queer in order to investigate the possibility of legitimizing form of queer and alternate reproductive practices. It gives a brief introduction of Donna Haraway’s “Cyborg Manifesto” which suggested the breakdown of three boundaries made possible the cyborg to become the representative of feminist theories as the social norms and ideology are deconstructed and liquidated by technology. In the writer’s opinion, we are in the age of cyborg, that we combine ourselves with technology, blurring our own lines between ourselves and our machines, in order to improve ourselves and make our bodies more efficient. Nevertheless, the writer raised technological reproduction as an example to state that the implement of technology will become a secret concern as it may affect the traditional ideology and brings social problem. Since we heavily rely on technology nowadays, it has changed us into the hybrid of human and machine, and made us to become queer. The heterosexuality is eventually deconstructed that gender no longer necessarily dependent in sexual reproduction as cyborg-babies can be produced asexually and technologically. The practice of technological reproduction came up with some social problems: the legitimating of the identity of “queer-babies” and the reproductive practices. As the “queer-babies” are the product of reproductive technology which are produced unnaturally in laboratory, once their identities are legitimized, it means the alternate reproductive practices are also legitimized, that strengthen the feminism, but destroyed the heteronormative society.

4. Russo, Julie Levin. “NEW VOY ‘cyborg sex’ J/7 [NG-17] 1/1: new methodologies, new fantasies.”

http://j-l-r.org/asmic/fanfic/print/jlr-cyborgsex.pdf (accessed 10 March 2011).

Through analysising the characters presented in the J/7, a popular TV drama about cyborg hybrids, the feminist and queer theories are explored and examined. The “Cyborg Manifesto” of Donna Haraway and the “Sex in Public” of Berlant and Warner are used for suggesting how the social discourses, including gender and sexuality, are changed progressively associated with these mutations. In the writer’s view, she thinks that the cyborg is the transformation of “sex” into “genetic engineering”, which is a metaphoric figure for resistance from within terrifying new dominations; while public sex is a challenge to the foundation of patriarchy, that hierarchical dominations are founded in large part on the constructed private space of heterosexual intimacy. She put them together to make cyborg sex, which represents non-sexual reproduction and non-reproductive sex, to emphasize and provide the understanding on current cultural transformations, as well as undermine and recast modern oppressions.

5. Franklin, Sarah. “The Cyborg Embryo: Our Path to Transbiology.”

http://tcs.sagepub.com/content/23/7-8/167.full.pdf+html (accessed 12 March 2011).

Sarah Franklin, the writer of this article, is a social scientist with an interest in reproductive technology and has written numerous of books and articles on related topics. In this research essay, she mainly focuses on the transbiology, as issue about how a cyborg embryo is made and born through advanced reproductive technologies, which based on the idea of Donna Haraway’s “Cyborg Manifesto” to reveal how the social values, systems and aspirations are being engineered and constructed. In her opinion, she negates the human values on biologization and thinks that it is outdated. However, she recognizes transbiology is a moral practice and has its own specificity which facilitates the coding mechanism.

By HO Wai-sze, Charlotte (10382282)

3rd tutorial presentation - Summary of Week 7 Self.info II: Virtual Ethics

Hi all, this is Jodie and Michelle. We are going to present you the second reading of week 7, which is about the ethics of pornographies on the Internet by Albury Kath.

The writer first defines what pornography is. She thinks it is understand in term of morality. And people always link it with sexual activity because it depicts non-reproductive sex acts. Generally, people agree that porn is immoral as we agree that sex is a matter of procreation, - an expression of private ‘married love’ and it should not be public or profit. And porn we can find in the society is totally different opposite with these norms.

There are 4 criteria makes Albury thinks that pornography is widely considered to be immoral. In Albury’s view, porn makes something ‘public’ that should be private. People think sexual activity should be the intimacy of a married couple. Thus, sexual intercourse cannot be shown to the others. Also, it encourages people to exchange sex for money. As the sexual activity is ultimate for reproduction, it should not be a trading activity. Moreover, it exploits women by representing them as being sexually active and available. In traditional value, women should protect their bodies by not showing their nudity. In addition, women should play a passive role. At last, porn represents a limited range of body types as sexually appealing because only perfect and ideal women’s bodies are shown in the porn.

Apart from the traditional porn, Internet porn provide a room for women to explore desires which are taboo, embarrassing or dangerous for offline life and feel safer and more confident in their experimentation with alternative sex practices. The major reason is that they do not need to show up in the public when they purchasing pornography. Also, Internet porn blurs the categories ‘publisher’, ‘distributor’ ‘performer’ & ‘consumer’. And we will discuss more about it tomorrow.

We found that it is hard to define what is moral or immoral. According to Foucalt, moral value is something that bases on our various beliefs and value systems and it is set by dominant people in the society.

Here’re some discussion questions that we will cover tomorrow.

1.What is porn? Is porn only defined by showing female nudity or some sexual intercourses scenes?

2.If female show their body with some seductive postures, can we define this as porn?

3.If you discover two of your friends are sitting in front of computers, one is watching porn with sexual scene, one is watching seductive video (just like the example), and will you think they are immoral?

- Why & why not

- if yes, which one is “more immoral”?

Critical Annotated Webliography by Wu Hiu Tung, Jodie

*Question 2: 'The machine/organism relationships are obsolete, unncessary' writes Haraway. In what ways have our relations to machines been theorised?

1. Whitehall, Rand (2010)’ Cyborgs and Androids: What is the Difference?’
http://www.articlesbase.com/computers-articles/cyborgs-and-androids-what-is-the-difference-3638313.html (accessed 13 March 2011)

The writer of this article discussed the relationship between cyborg and robot. He mentioned that there are a clear boundary between cyborg and robot. He mentioned that ‘cyborg’ needs an organic brain to be a cyborg and robot just a machine with an automated sensor device. According to the Donna Harraway’s cyborg theory, cyborg is a thing that to break down the categories of animal, human and machine. Therefore, in my point of view, if there is no boundary between animal, human and machine, we do not have to define which object is cyborg or which object is robot in a specific way. In our daily life, we cannot live without machine such as mobile phone and computer. These are the technology that we used in everyday. These machines are part of us. We can therefore been called cyborg.

In my point of view, robot is not a machine that will automate has its action. Even they looked or spoke like human, what they appear or speak is based on the machine formula set by human. In other words, robot can be said as a combination of a precision machine and formula that contain human thought and experiences. It’s actually a cyborg too. Therefore, it is unnecessary to straightly define the boundary between cyborg and robot since they are close and overlapping.



2. Jackson, Dinah (2010)’ Here Come The Cyborgs.’
http://www.articlesbase.com/information-technology-articles/here-come-the-cyborgs-3544219.html (accessed 14 March 2011)


Up to now, the technology in our world is growing at a speedy rate. Many scientists are developing technology similar in the science fiction years ago in which people did not believe the fiction can come to reality nowadays. In this article, the author mentioned that the cyborg age had already come. Artificial arms for replacing body parts and chips inside our body are typical examples of combining biological and technological structure. The bionic body created is no longer only for the health and replacement reason, but also for strengthening ourselves.

After reading this article, the writer suggested that we do not need DNA to retain our humanity anymore, but the replacement of bionic ones could be the answer. DNA is the unique identity of every person on the earth. It may still stands after someone had been transformed into a cyborg. I agree what the writer said. If all the people become cyborg, there is no longer a unique person anymore. It is because we could transform to anyone we like, create any personality that we wanted. People’s identities are become flexible. Human could transform to animals too. All the categories about human, animal and machine would break down. Therefore, DNA is no longer a element to define human body.



3. Marshall, Gary (2009)’ Meet the real-life human cyborgs’
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/03/21/1047749931869.html (accessed 14 March 2011)

In this article there are few examples of cybrogs were identified. There were men that has ear growing out of his arm, has a video camera hidden in his false eye, one’s finger is a detachable USB drive and connecting himself to a robot arm. As we all know there’s lots of cyborg exsist now in all over the world. With the fasten growing of technology development, people not only use the machine to replace some parts of human’s broken body, but also want to expand the possibilities of the human body to break down the boundary and categories of animal, human and machine.

However, the writer raise the question that do human really need to be a cyborg in future. In my point of view, technology is indivisible to human life. It wasn’t an issue about point out the boundary between human and machine. In fact, machine are now expanded to used in different field. We need machine and technology everyday to make us have better life. Therefore, sometimes we are actually controlled by the technology. For example, people could done nothing without any technology. I disagree there are some people such as Stelios Arcadiou, who mentioned in the article said that technology is an appendage of the body. I think it is unnecessary to set boundary of body and machine since if someone has some pieces of machine in their bodies, we properly won’t know. The fact is, we are always surrounded by cyborg.



4. Smith, Caspar Llewellyn (2010)’ 50 years of cyborgs’
http://www.guardian.co.uk/theobserver/2010/oct/03/50-years-cyborgs (accessed 15 March 2011)


Cyborg is always become a staple of science fiction and it is people’s imagination of future world. In this article, there are some ‘cyborg’ talking about their experiences of being a cyborg. From now, the biggest reason that make lots of people want to become cyborg in future life is because they want to have a faster communication with others. Being a cyborg can make them experience communicates nervous system to nervous system. As there are people said in century ago: "The purpose of the cyborg... is to provide an organisational system in which... robot-like problems are taken care of automatically and unconsciously, leaving man free to explore, to create, to think, and to feel.”

In my opinion, cyborg is not only an imagination of future, it is also a liberation of anything. Cyborg could break the categories of animal, human and machine, it could also break the limitation of people’s communication. Being a human, we basically need to see, hear and speak to communication with others. However, with the combination to the technology and machine, human could exchange thought through becoming cyborg. When the cyborg time comes, I believe there is no longer any limitation between everyone.



5. Stonehouse, David (2003)‘The cyborg evolution’ http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/03/21/1047749931869.html (accessed 15 March 2011)
In the article titled ‘The Cyborg Evolution’, the writer tells a true story about the combination of human and machine. Kevin Warwick is a cyborg who is also a scientist. His experimented himself that injecting a chip into his wrist to record the nervous signal generated by his brain. He succeeded to transmit signal into computer and later he also placed a chip into his wife’s arm. When her arm moved, signal will transmit to the computer and the computer will read the message and send to Kevin at the same time. Eventually, he sense the movement of his wife and this experiment did tell him that the possibility of ‘communication by thoughts’.

The linkage of human and machine is becoming more and more closely. In 2000, Kevin implemented chip in his body and connected with the controlling computer of his laboratory. The computer will automatically open the door and turn the lights on when he walked close to his laboratory front door. The obstacle between human and computer is being weakened and diminished over time. This suggested that Kevin Warwick, the cyborg, can communicate and interact with computers by the nervous signals generated by his body and this signal transmission path is just like the nervous system of brain to limbs in our body. So, the computer that Kevin interacted with has the same functions of his limb.

Annotated webliography by Li Ho Yin(10380140)

‘Why should our bodies end at the skin?’ asks Donna Haraway. Discuss the idea of skin in relation to how we might imagine our future embodiment.

REFERENCE 1 REMOTE BODY

Voyd.com. My viewing body does not end at the skin [online] ;available from http://www.voyd.com/ttlg/textual/ballardessay.htm; accessed 5 March, 2011

Susan Ballard, who is Lecturer in Otago Polytechnic in New Zealand, wrote an article to response to the question of ‘Why should our bodies end at the skin?’ by Donna Haraway. His view is that body cannot end at the skin. The discussion included the idea of Avital Ronell suggested in 1989 was applied that the invention of the telephone as a hearing device actually break the boundaries of body. Human voice can transmitted from one place to and other geographically distant spaces.

Although voice is not a physical organ from body, however it as a physical wave forms present human personal characteristics and identity. The voice was encoded into data and re-decoded as a virtual form of human voice. This is an interesting topic that response to the concept of cyborg. The human voice from the telephone is actually the outcome of the collaboration between human and machine. The process not only need human voice as a source, but also electricity supplies and signal transmitter as a communication channel. These forms of virtualized communication were widely applied in nowadays communication pattern.

With the sophistication of wireless transmission, virtualization of im­ages is a popular practice. People can see each other’s facial expressions and direct responses with a webcam or 3G internet devices, when they are not in same physical spaces. The advancement of technology breaks the traditional way of definition and boundaries of concept of body.

REFERENCE 2: FIRST CYBORG

BBC News. ROBOT MAN[online] ;available from http://www.bbc.co.uk/insideout/westmidlands/series2/robot_man_cyborg_machines.shtml; accessed 5 March, 2011

"I have one goal in my life. I want to be a cyborg ... I want to be the world’s first half man half machine." Kevin Warwick, Professor of Cybernetics at Reading University.

I was attracted by this single quote from the article from BBC website. It is about the story of a professor who has already taken the first step to make him in form of cyborg. Microchips and other electronics component were installed in his body so he can control robot arm when he makes electrical impulses from his brain. With the help of internet infrastructure he can even control other robot arms in distant places.

The professor also claim that he is doing researches on transmitting messages from one brain to another so people can communicate without actually speaks. But this idea has been criticized as inhuman. Some scientists worried these kinds of silent communication forms will destabilize the relationship within some intimate groups like family.

The effect of these experiments should never be underestimated. This is a pure case of original concept of how a cyborg should look like. Although microchips are tiny pieces of metal but it is the representative of the machine side. The interesting part will be the application of the chips.

Cyborg can be dangerous when it were misused or incorporate into illegal practices and war. When human can remotely initiate mechanical changes to remote machines, lot of explosions and spread of terrorism is predictable.

REFERENCE 3 KILLING MICROCHIPS

Global research. The Human Tracking Microchip [online] ;available from http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=13900 ; accessed 5 March, 2011

People implanted with tracking microchips in their body and he got killed when somebody press a button remotely. It seems like a scenario from James Bond movie. But German scientists actually make it workable, theoretically.

The “Killer Chip” is able to locate the targets, who with the chips implanted, anywhere around the world by the Satellite GPS systems. Scientists clams that the chips can be implanted into the body of fugitives, terrorists, illegal immigrants and criminals. When they were classified as harm to the security risk, the chips could release poison into the carrier in order to stop their dangerous action.

However these killer chips are not yet pass the German law. It does violate the paragraph two of the German Patent Law, which does not allow inventions that transgress public order or good morals.

Implantation of chips is always a debatable issue. Sometimes it’s not about the nature of the technology that mixing human and machine, but about the application and morality issues.

Is it a good practice of tracking of geographic location of a person? It does touch the issues of human right. In addition to the “remote killing” function, the case becomes even more complicated. Who is responsible to define a person as the national security risk?

The idea of cyborg is always interesting when our body does not end at the skin. In this case our life is even controlled remotely from our skin by some unknown body.

REFERENCE 4 SURVEILLANCE COUNTRY

BBC News. Britain is 'surveillance society [online] ;available from http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/6108496.stm; accessed 7 March, 2011

“The UK was "the most surveillance country comparing to other industrialized Western states”, Dr David Murakami-Wood commented the situation of Britain as a highly surveillance society after the 28th International Data Protection and Privacy Commissioners' Conference in London.

Researchers suggested that the modern surveillance system not only capture peoples motions by CCTV cameras but also by collecting data about the use of credit card, consumption pattern, mobile phone usage as the "dataveillance". Statistics shows that there are up to 4.2 million of CCTV cameras in Britain, one of the greatest modern cities.

Some scientists predicted that by 2016 parents can bring in cards in schools to monitor what their children ate. Employers may even say no to job applicants who have health problems.

Surveillance camera gave us the concept of extending human vision by remote camera. One can observe distant object by CCTV camera with zoom in function. The extension of human vision shows body does not end at the skin in our daily life. In addition to the concept of dataveillance, our daily habit like consumption pattern even was under surveillance. I think the legislator have to do something on it regards to the privacy issues.

REFERENCE 5 NINJA CITIZEN

Dailyonigiri. HAL robot suit helps disabled move [online] ;available from http://www.dailyonigiri.com/2010/06/hal-robot-suit-helps-disabled-move/ ; accessed 5 March, 2011

This is not the robot appear in Japanese Cartoon or the poster of the terminator 5. The Japanese called it cybernetic HAL robot suit. It was created to enhance physical abilities of disabled people with simple daily life action of walking and lifting heavy objects.

The inventor said the users of HAL doesn’t feel heavy when they wear the suit because it is kind of exoskeleton supporting its own weight. In the future, it will be widely used in rehabilitation support and other medical fields, heavy labor support in factories and rescue support at disaster.

The improvement of technology always surprises us with bringing human one step closer to what we seen on sci-fi movies. This HAL suit must be one typical example of our body does not end at the skin. The exoskeleton give users extra energy and body strength. One day no one could underestimate the strength of disabled people with the external support of the suit.

Annotated webliography by Jess Lau Kar Yan(10381486)

“Why should our bodies end at the skin?” asks Donna Haraway. Discuss the idea of skin in relation to how we might imagine our future embodiment.

Morse, Margaret. "Sunshine and Shroud: Cyborg Bodies and the Collective and Personal Self." . http://www.medienkunstnetz.de/themen/cyborg_bodies/kollektive_koerper/scroll (accessed 12 March 2011).

The author of the article suggests that our bodies have gone beyond the skin. Human bodies is no longer bounded by the flesh or skin, it has extended to the space. Margaret further illustrated her view by examples such as pens, forks and computers. Take computer cursor as an example, we use our hand in order to control it on the computer screen, the cursor is an avatar in cyberspace and we have embodied ourselves into cyberspace. We use tools in daily life, ourselves are embodied in the machines or the mediums and become a cyborg as Donna Haraway’s defined that the combination of organism and machine. I agreed our bodies are no longer bounded by visually skin, we are able to extend our future embodiment into space and which is a more conceptual and imaginational ‘body’ to us. We can virtually embodied ourselves into machine, for instance, when we are using mobile phone, our bodies are not visually being seen, however, we are embedded ourselves in machine, we are therefore end at the machine but not our visual skin.
Sandra, Seekins. "The Monstrous Future." http://tributaries.thecapilanoreview.ca/2008/02/20/the-monstrous-future(accessed 14 Mar. 2011).

From our preservative and culture, we defined bodies into categories; human, animals, female, male, flesh or mental. However, due to technology development, bodies cannot be sharply separated. Mechanical development blurred and extended the possibility of future embodiment. When we mention future embodiment, images of cyborg, biological creatures are representational as we saw in the science fiction films. I support author’s idea that future embodiments will be no boundary among gender, sexuality, races. What is more, in my opinion, future embodiment will also lessen the boundary of human species and other creatures or even machines. Because of the technology development, nowadays we already used machine to assist disable for daily functioning, without the machine, people in needed cannot live normally. The reliance on machine and the integration of organism and machine made us become cyborg or in author’s word it is a stage of transhuman. The meaning of transhuman is which using technology to achieve physical capacity. Furthermore, I find the word – ‘post-human’ enlightening, in future our body embodiment rely on technology and might develop into blur in various way, we are not able visually identify gender, ethnicity, robot, animals or human. Therefore, ‘post-human’ is applicable when the word human are no longer the best description of our living species.

"Cyborgs in Science Fiction Movies." Web. 15 Mar. 2011. http://www.explore-science-fiction-movies.com/cyborgs.html#axzz1gmwplvea

This article indicated how cyborg images are presented in films, the concept of future embodiment is inspiring. Cyborg is explicitly a mixture of organism and mechanism, cyborg is highly relying on the machine for living. The visual image of cyborg can go beyond normally human skin. In this article, it demonstrated a few of possibilities. For example, the layer of cyborg can be made of titanium or metal, meanwhile, the inner structure is no longer flesh and blood but high technology mechanic structure. With the artificial characteristic of our possible future embodiment, we are no longer bounded by our natural skin. Meanwhile, we are able to choose from skin color, ethnicity and even the body part we wanted to become machine (hand, head or legs). The high autonomy is one of the crucial characteristic of our future embodiment, we can intervene our nature, born bodies/ skin and transform to the ideal presentation of oneself.

Ballard, Susan. "My Viewing Body Does Not End at the Skin." . http://www.voyd.com/ttlg/textual/ballardessay.htm(accessed 16 March 2011).

The author has a clear view point that she thinks our bodies do not end at the skin. The writers using a interaction approach to explain her view point. She indicated that we have already participated in a techno-sphere which communication technologies are highly situated in our daily life. The technologies we experienced, as telecommunication, break through the boundary of body. Voice are not tight to body and skin were not barrier anymore. With the increasing frequency and intensive technology involved in our daily life, I agree that the truth is that our bodies are no longer bounded by our skin. The further example of “Cyberflesh Girlmonster” in the article is much closer to our daily use of technology – the Internet. Girlmonster scanned her bodies’ parts and made them become CD-ROMs. Viewers by clicking the mouse, images are able to response by sounds. Therefore, Girlmonster is obliviously a cyborg and her body is not bounded by the skin, it divided into parts and interactive with viewers.

Schick, Lea. "Unfolding and Refolding Embodiment into the Landscape of Ubiquitous Computing." http://escholarship.org/uc/item/7t5741s0;jsessionid=d229a2a75f9028fc58c1fd0e4816edb4#page-3 (accessed 15 Mar. 2011).

This article proposed possible future embodiment when human meet technology. Schick seen clothing as a second skin of human and the security function of it has already embedded clothing in the part of our life. Due to the rapid of technology development, the author thinks that an interactive textile or technological skin will be established in the future. Such interactive skin was imitating human natural biological skin. However, it has the function of interaction between the environment and other bodies, the focus of this article is not how the technological-skin transmitting emotions or feelings but the interaction of human and technology. The technological-skin unfolds human skin and blurring the boundary of human/ machine, inside/ outside. The interaction between environments extends our body possibility. For example, our technological-skin can transform automatically without our notification, therefore, when temperature changes we no longer feel that, as our technological-skin automatically transform it. The interaction with other bodies is also transformative, when interactive built; we can regard our bodies as a whole, no physical interactions needed. The shared embodiment, writer suggests it is not only bounded between human to human, it can also interact with non-human species. The unfolding of human skin support human is no longer bounded or end at the skin, it is only an envelope of body, and the future embodiment is unlimited with the assist of technology.

Critical Annotated Webilography by Titus

(5) Blogging is a practice that is mundane and yet radical in its potential to transform individual and collective agency and activism. Discuss.


(1)Blogging as Social Activity, or, Would You Let 900 Million People Read Your Diary?
by Bonnie A. Nardi, Diane J. Schiano and Michelle Gumbrecht (2004)
http://home.comcast.net/~diane.schiano/CSCW04.Blog.pdf

This article is about the idea of wider ‘blogophere’, which is the Relationship between bloggers and unknown reader. For the bloggers, blog seems to be the radio on the internet, which they use it for presenting their idea or comment to daily life, besides to be the secret of a dairy. Blogging is a new form of Internet communication. People could express their feeling and comments through their blogs.

The scholar argues that there are three level of security in most of the blogs, which is (1) the password- protected, (2) the unlisted blog and (3) the publicized blog. For the first one, the writer concern about his security, his blogs is not opened to the public. And the second one, there is only the URL of blog, it is unlisted by the blogging service’s directory, the blogs is not easier to be researched on internet. And for the publicized blogs, it allows for comments, this makes it to be well-known and attract more of viewers.

Besides this, the scholar finds out that there is the phenomenon of linking blog to blog. After viewing their friends’ blog, most of the viewer would click to the hyperlink and link to another blogger’s blog; it is a kind of linking of friendship and human relationship.

Moreover, to some extent, bloggers is affected by their viewer. If someone asks them to write the blogs, they began in response to a direct social request. Also, bloggers gain momentum when they realized that others actually reading their blogs. It comes to a result is: Blogs is role as a social activity: the communication through the writing and reading of blogs.



(2)Corporate Blogging: Building community through persistent digital talkby Jackson, Anne. JoAnne, Yates and Wanda, Orlikowski. (2007)
http://seeit.mit.edu/Publications/Corporate%20BloggingHICSS_final.pdf

This article suggests that the ‘BlogSite’ was originally built as a “self-publishing” platform. For the heavy users, they derived the most benefit from blogging. They have the strongest sense of what they would get out of blogging and then received the most benefit.

Problem solution and feedback require social interaction with others on the system. There are several of benefits through using blogs. The scholar divides it into three categories, which is (1) Informational, (2) Social and (3) Other. For the informational, bloggers can get and share information, getting/giving feedback and also the problem solving. Besides, the bloggers can build up a community, communicate with others and develop the reputation through blogging. Also, blogging may help them in self expression and work more efficiently.

The real benefit of corporate blogging is to create an informal mechanism that links disparate of the organization into constructive contact. People from worldwide can contact with everyone in the other countries. Blogs becomes a tool for communicate without boundary and distance.



(3)WAG THE BLOG: HOW RELIANCE ON TRADITIONAL MEDIA AND THE INTERNET INFLUENCE CREDIBILITY PERCEPTIONS OF WEBLOGS AMONG BLOG USERS
by Thomas, J. Johnson and Barbara, K. Kaye. (2004)
http://iris.nyit.edu/~aobrien/COMM%20620%20Sample%20studies/survey%20blog.pdf

This article focuses on the credible of blogs at nowadays. Anyone can create a blog, and bloggers are not bound by ethical and professional standards of trained journalists. Weblogs do not sustain the gatekeeping or editing to cull misinformation, and ensure what is written is fair. Bloggers write for their stand, their comment and feeling to any of issues.

Mainstream media always contains the bias in reporting. User can select for their choices in visiting the blogs. They can find information easier besides to mainstream media; discuss to political issues can be allowed in their own blog. “Users view blogs as a new and better form of journalism than the mainstream media, one that is opinionated, analytical, independent, and personal.”

Blogs is a kind of collective platform. People go together by the same stand and idea to the issues. “If a user fined a blog which its stand to a political issue is the same to him, this may lead to a great use of blog and judge it to be credible.” 634 Users may trust the information they receive from Weblogs because they believe the hosts do not hide their biases.



(4)Who blogs? Personality predictors of blogging
by Guadagno, R. E. et al., (2007)
http://osil.psy.ua.edu/pubs/GuadagnoOkdieEno_CHB07.pdf

This article is about the effectiveness of blog, how it affects to human personality. Weblogs has changed the nature of human social interaction in a way that allows us to connect with many individuals, whether they are strangers from the other side of the world.

Blogs is one of the newest forms of online self-presentation and self-expression. There can be the hiding of secret or lying in their blogs. For example, when individuals interact with others online, they may choose how much or how little information to reveal about themselves.

Bloggers are experiencing a “sense of depersonalization and deindividuation” . Through blogging, you can role as another person besides to the reality on internet. No one would know who you are. They only get the information from your blog, so the self-identity can be constructed by blogging. Also, the linkage of blogs constructs a community, which you can interact with others by your blog. You are no longer being yourself; you are belonging to the community of huge number of bloggers in the world.


(5)Why we blog
by Bonnie A, Nard. Diane J, Schiano. Michelle, Gumbrecht. and Luke Swartz (2004)
http://www.darrouzet-nardi.net/bonnie/pdf/Nardi_why_we_blog.pdf

This paper is about the blogging, it is a form of personal communication and expression, with a specific interest in several of domain. “Bloggers sometimes poured out their feelings or ideas and sometimes struggled to find something to say.” Blogs is a platform for them to act and express on internet.

The scholar argues that there is several of usage of blog to people. Firstly, “Blogs to ‘document my life”. Blogs were used as a record to inform and update others of their activities. Secondly, “Blogs as commentary” . Blogger express their opinions freely in their area. Blogs turn to be a point of view; it is not only for chatting. Thirdly, “Blogs as catharsis” .
Blogs gave people a place to “shout,” or express themselves by writing to an audience of strangers, or sometimes their best friends and family members.

Fourthly, “Blog as muse” . Most of the bloggers are writing by their own self, they can train of their mind and develop idea through writing blogs. It means ‘Thinking by writing’. It is the case of ‘thinking with computers’. Also, having readers helped bloggers to keep moving, as they knew their readers expected new posts.

For the Fifth, “Blogs as community forum” . Blogs can help to construct a forum which contains the same interest with each other. It devoted to a “collective” of people who exchanged political opinions.
Moreover, the community generated “peer pressure” to post regularly because people regularly checked the blogs for new posts. It encourages everyone to get forward.


REFERENCES:

Bonnie A. Nardi, Diane J. Schiano and Michelle Gumbrecht (2004) ‘Blogging as Social Activity, or, Would You Let 900 Million People Read Your Diary?’ ACM, New York, USA.
http://home.comcast.net/~diane.schiano/CSCW04.Blog.pdf
(accessed 15 March 2011)

Jackson, Anne. JoAnne, Yates and Wanda, Orlikowski. (2007) ‘Corporate Blogging: Building community through persistent digital talk’ In Proceedings of the 40th Annual Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences. ACM, New York, USA.
http://seeit.mit.edu/Publications/Corporate%20BloggingHICSS_final.pdf
(accessed 15 March 2011)

Thomas, J. Johnson and Barbara, K. Kaye. (2004) ‘Wag the Blog: HOW RELIANCE ON TRADITIONAL MEDIA AND THE INTERNET INFLUENCE CREDIBILITY PERCEPTIONS OF WEBLOGS AMONG BLOG USERS’
http://iris.nyit.edu/~aobrien/COMM%20620%20Sample%20studies/survey%20blog.pdf
(accessed 15 March 2011)

Guadagno, R. E. et al., (2007). ‘Who blogs? Personality predictors of blogging’, In Computers in Human Behavior, doi:10.1016/j.chb.2007.09.001
http://osil.psy.ua.edu/pubs/GuadagnoOkdieEno_CHB07.pdf
(accessed 15 March 2011)

Bonnie A, Nard. Diane J, Schiano. Michelle, Gumbrecht. and Luke Swartz (2004) ‘Why we blog’. In Communications of the ACM - The Blogosphere. ACM New York, NY, USA.
http://www.darrouzet-nardi.net/bonnie/pdf/Nardi_why_we_blog.pdf
(accessed 15 March 2011)

Self.Net: Carman's Webliography

Q5: Blogging is a practice that is mundane and yet radical in its potential to transform individual and collective agency and activism. Discuss.

Having a search of the bibliography in the web is not easy as searching in the library. The most important and essential of doing webliography is the keyword. What we are trying to search in the search engine can affect what kind of result for us to collect. For the question that I choose about blogging, when seeing the guiding question, I already have a brief concept in what to search. In the question, it mentioned about the blogging, agency and activism, therefore I followed this track to search what I need. Also, Blogging is also related to the personal identity, therefore searching materials is also can help when I do my essay question.

Ringmar, Erik. 2007. A Blogger's Manifesto: Free Speech and Censorship in the Age of the Internet. <http://ia600401.us.archive.org/12/items/ABloggersManifestoFreeSpeechAndCensorshipInTheAgeOfTheInternet/ErikRingmarABloggersManifesto.pdf> London: Anthem Press. Retrieved on 10^th Mar, 2011

First of all, to start with, in the introduction part of the essay, it should be explaining what Blogging is and stating the definition which is essential. There are many books on blogging, not least by legal scholars. Since “Blog” is the subject of the question, therefore I chose this book A Blogger’s Manifesto (Ringmar, 2007) particularly enlightening and which had clearly gives a chapter about “What is a Blog?” on explaining what a blog is in chapter 2. The author had also criticized the definition of defining blog which is an interesting issue while he has another concept of viewing blog. This book is a good introduction for me to explain further and clearer while some good and interesting examples are found in this book. Besides, it also mentioned about the history have having weblog in the Internet, like the first blog site was built on 1999, the history could help us to understand how it developed in such a short years but have became popular and leads to people criticized becoming a mundane practice.

Marlow, C. 2004. Audience, structure and authority in the weblog community. <http://alumni.media.mit.edu/~cameron/cv/pubs/04-01.pdf> Presented at the International Communication Association Conference, May, 2004, New Orleans, LA. Retrieved on 14^th Mar, 2011.

In this piece of journal, Bloggers, Beware: What You Write Can Get You Sued (McQueen, 2009). It mentioned about the copyright in blogging. The reason why I found this journal useful is because when answering about the collective agency, it could be explained how blog changes the using of personal blogging lead to illegal consequence. As blogging is no longer personal only but also affect the public issue. For instance, the article has stated a strong evidence arguing that the copyright infringement. Therefore it somehow affect how individual seen blogs and their agency of using blogs to express themselves. The passage have listed some examples of how blogging lead to some social aspect which jeopardize their future, it stated that posting some pictures could be harmful that some people might find themselves are suffering the right of privacy, which endanger the use of bloggers to break the law because of posting something in their blogs. These examples could further develop an argument towards collective agency in weblogging, which help me to understand the possible change of their agency in using blogs when relating to some legal prospects.

Marlow, C. Audience, structure and authority in the weblog community. <http://alumni.media.mit.edu/~cameron/cv/pubs/04-01.pdf> Presented at the International Communication Association Conference, May, 2004, New Orleans, LA. Retrieved on 14^th Mar, 2011.

In this paper Audience, structure and authority in the weblog community (Marlow 2004) has explained the community in weblog. As weblog is a form of community in the net world, therefore I think this paper could help the essay to explain how the community formed in weblogs, and it could show how the individuals group together and transform the personal blogs to a community blogs. The content is about how an innovation in personal publishing blogs could engender another form of social interaction in the Internet, which how the people who have the same interest in a particular and specific topic could gather around and formed a community group. Such behavior leads to the collectivism in blogging community. Besides, the paper contained several useful chart and statistics showing of which citation is the most popular among blogs. This could estimate which sites and topic could attract bloggers to browse and search. This information could help me to analyze the popularity and the habit of bloggers in using blogs.

Russell, Adrienne & Nabil Echchaibi. 2009. International blogging: identity, politics, and networked publics. NY: Peter Lang Publishing, Inc. <http://books.google.com.hk/books?id=NY7vM8ZwgPkC&printsec=frontcover&dq=blogging+identity&hl=zh-TW&ei=NACBTdLeAo6ycZbitesG&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CC8Q6AEwAA#v=onepage&q&f=false> Retrieved on 14^th Mar, 2011.

The forth article that I would search is about identity. As blogging is related to personal identity, this book had use one chapter to talk about the identity in using weblog. It focuses to the identity in some countries like China, Australia, France, Russia, etc. How people communicate in the advance technology in their own national and cultural context. Such International blogging could link people from different world can lead to the global village where people exchanging their own piece of information and share to public. Also, how America democracy affect the politics in changing of other countries which are less democratic. This could explain how great impact could bring to people who saw the American spreading the idea of Democratic Party in their blog. Blogging could be effective as a political tool that such kind of transform could not be neglected and is not mundane anymore but a change from individual to collective, we can revive tradition, explore identity, conduct public relations as in the book mentioned in chapter one. This could provide argument of the bloggers having the activism in political prospects. For instance, the people could have the action of fighting democracy for their country when they realize the importance of having a democratic party.

Langellier,K & Eric E. Peterson. 2004. Storytelling in daily life: performing narrative. USA: Temple University. <http://books.google.com.hk/books?id=UITMWHj967gC&printsec=frontcover&dq=Storytelling+in+daily+life+:+performing+narrative&source=bl&ots=LiaOCFfu21&sig=TA5HIkmMIrM3VhlC9M77IIM8FaE&hl=zh-TW&ei=NK9_TZKzMILRcavj9PQG&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=3&ved=0CC8Q6AEwAg#v=onepage&q&f=false> Retrieved on 10^th Mar, 2011.

The fifth material that I would use is talking about the practice of how bloggers write blogs as their daily activity. In Storytelling in daily life: performing narrative (Langellier & Peterson, 2004) I will focus on Chapter 5 which is regarding “storytelling in a Weblog: Performing Narrative in a Digital Age”. The author of writing the essay was aimed to find out the daily practice of how bloggers type narrative in their blog as a kind of common behavior. By analyzing the content and context of the certain blogs, the writer describes them as telling a story, which normally people like to type something related to daily events such as interaction with their friends, romantic partners, drinking party, foods and drinks, currently hot music, movie or book, etc. I can explain in how bloggers used to act as an individual in a practice of blogging, which can prove bloggers treat blogging is an individual behavior but is actually not. I find this useful to compare and contrast the transformation of individual and move to the collective.