Persuasive Games

My computer does not run the games, so unfortunately I was not able to play them. Still, I explore the website and I liked some of their games idea.

Windfall is a strategy game that makes you create wind farms. The game consist in be able to recognize the most favorable places to harvest energy without altering residents life. This is an actual pretty idea, because we do not have to just place the wind farm, we also have to place it in a good location, and we cannot upset the residents that could be living there. There is also some risk taking in this game, that could help you win the game since it is not just about avoiding this places, but to place in place that you believe that are profitable and will not cause alot of turnmoil.

Debt Ski is also a pretty good concept. I think that it is an awesome idea to make college people realize that debt is not a good idea. Even though the game does not have nothing to do with manage your money, it could make the player aware of seriousness of the topic.

Elemental, I wish I knew this game while I was taking chemestry with old good sister Caroline.  I think that the hardest part of high school chemestry is to make students familiar with the topic. Sincerely, high school chemestry is difficult at the beginning because kids are not familiar with the field. It is a whole new world, then as time passes we become more familiar with the course.  

Sights

The movie was actually interesting, and the message was very clear for me. When is the limit? I mean with technology going out of control, when do we know it is enough? Today, Spencer mentioned before class that the smartphones keep track of our location, and it could be hacked. This is a very big concern for me because in my country, people can kidnap you by just knowing were you go to eat lunch. I personally would not like to live in a world Sights portrays. For me computers are just machines, but we are the decision makers. Computers will not kidnap, steal, or rape, is the people. Still, computers make our task easier and give more power to people, even the bad ones. The movie Sights also portrays that we are missing human skills like dating, get to know people (You cannot know people by reading their facebook profile), and many other things. Having a software that helps you to date might be great to get laid, but you will not really develop or increase your dating skills. You will be mindless following orders, instead of being yourself and grow from the failures.

Golan Levin

Interview
Some of the thing that I agree with him is about computer skills, the value of a degree, and that computers cannot be more intelligent than humans.  As he said, computer is a big area, that have space for everyone. As we learned in this class, computer began with military purposes then expanded into businesses, education, and science. Who could have predicted that computers are now used for art.  We are experiencing a whole new change in society as we were used to when we grow up.

In my opinion, we cannot put a price in education.  The degree is just a prove of your capacity in the field you chose to study. The college experience is about helping to grow and stimulate the new decision makers. It is not just to make you a kind of big shot professional that drives a Lamborghini, it is to create an environment to help you grow as a professional and adult.

I agree with Golan that computers are never gonna be more intelligent than man. People sometimes forget that the machine is a tool and not a living thing. It makes better operational things without mistake, but computers lacks of abstract reasoning, system thinking, collaboration, and ability to experiment skills that according to the former secretary of labor, Robert Reich are the key ingredients to attain job security in the XXI century. Before computers we used to rely heavily in people to handle a lot of the operations like keeping of track inventory, sales, purchase orders, etc... This people had life, and were not a 100% committed to the operations they were in charge. That is the reason why processes in the past were not as effective and efficient as they are today. Still I do not discard the possibility, but as is today. Computers are dumb, they just create information to us, the human to use.

Ursonography:
It reminded me of what dada said about how to create the most beautiful poem. To grab pieces of letter and mix them around, and with the mix create a whole new words so the appreciation of the poem can be in the dramatization, rather than the power of the words.

Messa di Voce
If difficult to think that this is art, but as Mr. Echeverry said, "What this mean in those time, does not mean the same in this times." For me this is art because it tries to interact with the new technologies and mix it with stage performance. Just another way to help artists to express.

Opto-Isolator
It is a very cool concept, I kind of find similarities with Juan Carlos Delgado's sculptures. Since Juan Carlos Delgado's sculpture interacted with the audience. It brings and redefine sculpture into a whole new level.

Two Sides of Life - Video Art

Presentation V.S. Representation

As I was doing my research about presentation and representation, I read that presentation is the authors purposes while representation is the audience perspective of the author's meaning. This made me think about Plato's Allegory of the Cave from the Republic. The story began with Socrates telling a story to a friend about 3 men that were raised in the shadows, and everything they knew was about living in the shadows. One day, they went out to the real world and they did not like it. They decided to return to the cave and would not want to go out to the world.  This is a classic because it remarks the different perspective, and how often people react to things that they do not understand.

Massive Attack

Massive Attack is a very interesting group, it is outside my field of knowledge. I find kind of interesting that there song focus more on instruments sound than the voice. The voice is more to enhance the the instruments' sound. What I am used is normally the singer as the main focus and the instruments to enhance the voice. It is also interesting than even without the singer, you kind of feel their music. It makes you think for a while and reflex what is the mean of the song.

UK Underground Music + Smiths

While watching the video, I remembered what Mr. Echeverry said about underground music and popular music. While popular music might be considered trends, underground music is usually ahead. This is because underground music creates the perfect environment for experimentation, while in popular music is more likely music already developed and approved for the masses. In my opinion, things like hip-hop, rock, electronic, etc... in their moment were considered underground, and it was not until those young adults transform into decision makers that those type of music were considered popular music.

Smiths for me were the results of a society full of uncertainty.  I think first was developed underground, and then became famous by the Smith at the right place and time, Manchester. Once the heart of the Industrial Revolution was facing a lot tension and they will no listen to lies from the current pop in the media that try to spread that everything was alright. The Smith were able to win the people's heart by telling the truth and making a connection with the real things that are happening in society.

Graphene

Graphene might be the solution to the limitations of silicon. I remember read about an article that the reason technology get cheaper is because we build the technology in order to have more output out of silicon, but that there will be a breaking point were we will not be able to increase that output. That is the reason every year there are faster and small computers.

If the technology can be develop to exploit this material, it would be wonderful. We would not longer depend on silicon, and we would get more output out of our dollars than the traditional silicom base computer give us. But still is kind of scary were technology will take us. If the U.S.A. is already able to store and process most of the things that happen in the digital world, I fear for what they would be able to do with the next generation computers.