Brett Gaylor's documentary I found to be an interesting argument between those who believe their "creations" are sacred and those who believe art based upon other artists work is still art. First of all I want to say that the notion of original ideas is ridiculous. Original ideas no longer exist even things we perceive as original ideas probably were inspired by things that came from a time long forgotten. Though I myself have copyrighted things in my time personally I believe copyrighting something is just a way for people to make more money off of an idea that is already making them a lot of money. This belief was made much more prevalent while watching this documentary. One story that really stood out to me was one of a pastor who was being sued by a company because he has one computer in his home which is the family computer. The man had never downloaded music in his life but he had his entire family plus friends of his kids who may have unintentionally downloaded music illegally and as a result he was sued. I like what Girl Talk did, I found his creativity to be extensive in that he used songs everyone knows and loves and put them together in his own style and vision to make something incredible. That is what I believe art is about taking things from the world around you and using them to create something of your very own.

The concept of good ideas, in my opinion, lies in the eyes of the beholders for the most part. When I am presented with something that I feel is a good idea it is typically something that solves problems many people have, solves many different problems at once, entertains a wide variety of people, or provides a wide variety of entertainment. Personally whenever I am trying to come up with a good idea of my own I have a period where i brainstorm and write down all of the ideas I come up with then I go over the list and the ones that stand out to me I explore and try to work with. I like to see connections between many different points and love thinking outside of the box. Ways I might improve upon my idea process would be to bring in another viewpoint. I feel that by having another person to work with would provide different ideas and opinions that would cause my own creativity to spark up bigger and better thoughts. Getting feedback on my initial ideas I feel would allow for further development or realization that perhaps the idea is not as good as initially thought. Research is also a thing that can never hurt if one understands about the current needs and wants of the world around them coming up with an idea that will solve these issues would be most beneficial. Moving on I have decided to go into making a sort of youtube channel in collaboration with my colleague and fellow actor and together with this youtube channel we hope to document our education at UNCSA as well as showcase our talent through various skits and short films. We hope to cover the social aspect and learn what we can from it as there are many working actors and artists today who were discovered or began their career on youtube. We have not worked out the specifics but we are on our way in terms of brainstorming ideas for the channel and what direction we want to take it. 

After reading about and observing various new media artists and their creations and goals I am beginning to see how big of an impact on the world new media art can have. Before learning about these individual artists and how they started for example JR and Bansky I did not conceive that two teenage graffiti artists could come so far and become so influential and well known throughout the world. Not to mention all the other artists with their own respective art fields. Another interesting example is Paul Vanouse who combines science and art by creating unique computerized images. Two new media artists that caught my attention were JR and Bansky. JR started off as a teenage graffiti artist who was more interested in literally making his mark on society rather than being an influential figure. He later began to portray photos of his work all over and eventually his illegal postings were made official when Paris started putting his portraits up on the walls of buildings. JR believed that by putting his works in the street he could reach people who couldn't or wouldn't go to museums. He refers to himself as a urban activist as he portrays social economic and moral issues in certain parts of the world and posts them upon the walls and rooftops of cities. The second is Bansky who combines dark humor with graffiti in a distinctive stenciling technique. Apparently he uses stenciling because it takes less time to complete and he discovered it while hiding from the police. One of the most interesting things to me about these two artists is that even though they are largely known their true identities are not most likely due to their artwork being graffiti. The reason I like these two artists is because I myself really admire graffiti art and those who can pull it off. even though it is illegal these two artists show that their work can be used to send messages and spread awareness of problems in different parts of the world. Nowadays with so much technology at our disposal it is now more simple than ever to create complex works of art. You can make and edit together entire films you can create complex digital murals and collages and compose beautiful music with a few keystrokes. I myself have drawn many different cartoons and pictures by using software like Microsoft paint or sketchbook express and not to mention the short sketches I have put together using imovie.

The Language of New Media by Lev Manovich got me to think about the true value of new media and what new media essentially is in my opinion. In his work he breaks new media into five different "forms" Internet,websites,computer multimedia,computer games,DVDs and CD's. When I think of the Internet I think of a tree with infinite branches sprouting from one another which is probably the reason Internet is sometimes referred to as the world wide web. The Internet is much like the universe to me in that it expands further than I care to comprehend and I have no idea of everything that I may find. But how is the Internet considered new media? I like to think of the fact that because of its infinitely expanding nature more and more information is becoming easily accessible. I am the type of person who believes that one could lean all he ever wanted to know with a few key strokes and some dedication. Next is websites which if we were to think of the Internet as an ever expanding tree or the universe websites would be the leaves or planets. I see websites as a way of taking all the wanted or unwanted information and organizing it providing for users with the ability to know what they are looking for, but that is an obvious thing for me to say. Why are they considered new media? Well, there was a time when the written word overthrew the power of speech thereby claiming a time for itself to be considered new media. Now with all of our technological advances the use of the printing press is becoming obsolete in many ways. Next I am going to talk about video games because I personally feel very strongly about their role in new media. For me video games are more than something you do on a weekend with your friends that your mother tells you will rot your brain. Video games are modern art. Not only that but the production of a video game encompasses hours upon hours spent working by many different types of artists. You essentially have moving paintings or drawings that are voiced by actors, have music composed by musicians, stories written, etc. I feel movies could fit into this category as well, well not all movies depending on your personal opinion but my point is that yes separately the arts are celebrated and appreciated but only in video games and some films do really all arts come together to make something beautiful, and that is something that I as an artist can truly appreciate. Personally I have always wanted to be a voice actor in a video game, kids movie, or television show and being the type of person who grew up with all three it is something that just calls to me.  

This week I had the pleasure of witnessing two very intriguing and thought provoking videos. The first was titled the The Empathetic Civilization by Jeremy Rifkin and it was about the concept that all human beings are born with the ability to empathize with others and how empathy is an important feature for human beings to have in order to thrive as a civilization. The video began with a study done in the 1990’s where scientists scanned the neurons in the brain of a primate while he was opening a nut. After the primate had finished a human walked into the room saw the bowl of nuts and without noticing the primate began to try and open the nut himself. The interesting part is that while the primate was watching this stranger open a nut like he did earlier the same neurons in the primate’s brain became active. I found this to be a fascinating example of empathy at the most basic level. I personally think that human beings are not born with such negative things such as intolerance or hate and the video supports this by giving the example that if a baby starts crying in a nursery then other babies will too and they don't know why its just human nature. However, like many other natural human behaviors empathy is sometimes beaten out of us by outside forces and as a result the oppression of human kindness and understanding is spread. The second video I watched was called Will Mankind Destroy Itself? by Michio Kaku and it was about how the world is moving along two different possible paths, one is the path to a brighter future the other is a path to our own self inflicted demise. Mr. Kaku speaks in his video about three types of civilizations, there is type one which is the planetary civilization, type two which is stellar, and type three which is Galactic. Mr. Kaku goes on to explain that type two civilizations are immortal the planet is united all the diseases have cures and we are able to deal with and survive all natural disasters from erupting volcanoes to super novas. He then goes on to explain that the most difficult task is getting from type zero to type one and that is where human beings are, type zero. I wont ruin the whole video I would just like to say that this is a very interesting concept to me, that within the next one hundred years humanity will either flourish or crumble, and if we manage to flourish the possibilities will become endless essentially not even the sky will be considered a limit. But we as a species must first come together and no longer acknowledge the differences that have caused us to war and divide for millennia, if we don't then I fear we will bring about our own end.

This week I read the short graphic book The Medium is the Massage by Marshall McLuhan and Quentin Fiore. This book discusses the effect of technology and Digital Media's effect on society, culture, and communication. It brings up many different and interesting points on the evolution of humanity's creations. The style of this book is very artistic in its format and has many interesting images to go with its points and messages. One of the points that was made which interested me the most was the concept that all media and technology is an extension of human faculties both psychic and physical. For example cloths are an extension of the skin, the book is an extension of the eye, and electrical wiring is an extension of the central nervous system. I find this to be an interesting idea that the human race in a sense has created in order to better themselves and make survival easier. I mean the average life expectancy in the U.S. used to be no higher than late forties early fifties, if you were luck, but with the advances of medicine people are now living up to their eighties and nineties. The book also talks about how advances in media and technology have effected our society and culture. To be more specific the book talks about how the number of jobs has decreased because jobs that were once done by men are now done by machine. This makes me wonder about what jobs in the future will no longer require men and women to complete them. There is certainly a specific set of skills that have become obsolete over the past few decades and because humanity is all about fixing problems and progress I can only imagine what jobs will be self automated or at least greatly altered to the point where human presence and guidance is much more limited The final point made in the book I would like to discuss is the idea that television has made our community more unified. Certainly today there are those who would say that television destroys our sociability and distracts us from the world around us. The book however, makes the point that because of television we know instantly what is going on where and we are able to know about things that otherwise we never would have heard about. it is almost like a window to the world. I highly recommend this book even if you don't agree with it, it is worth perusing.

This week I read two articles concerning digital media in our society. The first is The Media Education Revolution by Len Masterman which discusses the development of media education across the world and its effect on society in the past decade. The second is Critical Media Literacy, Democracy, and the Reconstruction of Education by Douglas Kellner and Jeff Share which talks about the importance of our education system teaching media literacy to students so they can adapt and survive in in our increasingly digitized society. 

First off, I found it interesting that all throughout history people continuously questioned the benefits of media progression. I certainly recall my mother telling me countless times that staring at a screen rots my brain and now everywhere I look nowadays I see almost all of the people around me glue their eyes to a smart phone or computer screen. However, what I found even more interesting was  a point that the first article brought up which was that media education has changed the student teacher relationship by putting them on the same educational level. With infinite and quickly learned information only a few mouse clicks away the students often know just as much as the teachers making the traditional classroom setting more difficult to uphold. It is because of this that I believe it is the teachers job to then incite a general interest in the study of media so the student will want to use it to investigate,explore, and grow absorbing as much information as possible. I myself have two siblings that are a few years younger than me and it's true that they know more than I do. Their education started on a totally different level than mine, a more digitized level with more information readily available and as a result they are having to be challenged in school more than I ever was at their age. I can only imagine the possibilities for future generations using digital media and the types of digital devices and information hubs that will be available.