Lost in Cyberspace – my visual artefact
October 13, 2010 by Noreen Dunnett
This isn’t my whole artefact – it’s just the opening sequence from the full thing.
I realised that if I restricted my visual artefact to Prezi the comments wouldn’t appear in my lifestream – I can’t work out how to embed the whole presentation in my blog but here’s a link to it, so could you comment back here after you’ve watched it guys? Thanks
Thanks for the comment you made in Prezi Jen, which I’ve posted here
“J R: fabulous images, and the adagio is so sad. There is something very wistful about this piece. In the last image I think I can see an eternity symbol, and then all fades to black – not sure if you meant to have the song carry on without images, but it really worked I thought (and perhaps asks us to consider Sterne’s point about the neglect of the auditory!). “
Thanks for this comment in Prezi Martin – I’ve pasted it here as well – hope you don’t mind!
“mg: ‘a common mental geography’ resonated with me for a long time after seeing this – a place where we can all exist, in a variety of ways, through avatars or as ‘ourselves’ (whatever that may be). You make a great point with the concept maps too. Can we ever be just ‘our own person?’ or will there always be an inexorable draw to sythesise or mimic our immediate peers?”
Noreen, I found my way to the Prezi – well detailed, I can tell you. I like the idea of multiple roles/identity – this really came to the fore for me during one of the early modules (I think that we were both on that at the same time…)
Yes, effectively we are mashups – just like sampled music, the apps, websites and social networks that we use – do they make our existing multi-role selves just that more explicit?
I’m experiencing some loss just now, with my Nexus One in at the garage having the dust from behind its screen removed…But all joking aside, I had every ‘identiy’ enabled in one place on one mobile device: EASE access, UWS access, school access, eBay access, my RSS and News feeds….
Yes, I’m a mashup too!
@Jen Yes, I did intend the music to carry on after the little opening clip and throughout the Prezi and carrying on afterwards – it was supposed to be the ‘thread’ that all the images were pegged to. The adagio is a bit sad isn’t it but I thought it was suggestive of the ‘lost’ theme in the title ‘Lost in Cyberspace’! Sometimes being online does remind me of those images of astronauts floating around the space station attached by their ‘umblical cords’! Where are we really – it all goes back to those issues for IDEL of embodied presence and/or the necessity of it for meaningful human interaction.
@Martin It’s a striking phrase isn’t it – ‘a common mental geography’ pinched from Bell, I think!
“Can we ever be just ‘our own person?’ or will there always be an inexorable draw to sythesise or mimic our immediate peers?”
Yes, that’s why I had the quote about teenage girls – didn’t apply to me directly but when I saw the Female Character Flowchart on Twitter, it sparked a train of thought about the idea of building an ideal self with norms and values associated with a traditional female gender role based on these archetypes, both online and offline.
@hugh The idea of multiple roles/identities comes from my teaching background in Communication Studies with Erving Goffman’s book “The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life”. He says we all play multiple roles with different scripts, to different audiences in different contexts. It is our way of reducing the uncertainty in our day-to-day interactions because we come to have expectations of other people’s behaviour too, based on role and context.
What have you been doing with your Nexus One to get dust behind the screen?!! I know what you mean about having everything in one place – I don’t know how I would live without my iphone now – I feel ‘undressed’ without it, it’s become part of me!
Noreen, its really great to see somebody dealing with identity, I think it is so important I the discussion of digital culture. My IDEL assignment was related to identity, but I’ve not been thinking on those lines as yet in EDC. This is a super reminder, and some intriguing quotes I’d like to follow up, thanks.
I think the music is really apt, and sets the pace. Prezi is so good at disrupting the feeling of travelling on a linear path, and I think that fits really well with your ‘lost’ theme, it is almost as if the viewer happens upon each element.
I’m fascinated by the analogy of the ‘mash-up’ in relation to the self as multiplicity. As a mash-up is an amalgamation of found, or previously existing objects, I see your metaphor being perhaps about societal, or familial influences, perhaps even genetic. I’m into that. We are gene mash-ups, new combinations of older material.
The exact position of self in the network is interesting, as you say. Particularly when social software influences our decisions with the collected responses of others. Perhaps we can consider a homogenising force here as collective behaviour in the network becomes culturally important, perhaps surpassing the individual. Economic decision making must surely see the collective as more valuable than the individual. So many themes addressed here Noreen, and great visuals too.
‘It is our way of reducing the uncertainty in our day-to-day interactions because we come to have expectations of other people’s behaviour too, based on role and context’
I rather liked this idea of behavioural adjustment. It seems to require external society, yet only our internal, subjective perception – interesting, thanks.
hi noreen,
thanks for your reply, here’s the comment i posted on Prezi…
‘a common mental geography’ resonated with me for a long time after seeing this – a place where we can all exist, in a variety of ways, through avatars or as ‘ourselves’ (whatever that may be). You make a great point with the concept maps too. Can we ever be just ‘our own person?’ or will there always be an inexorable draw to sythesise or mimic our immediate peers?
Hi Noreen I really enjoyed your presentation. For some reason I could get no sound however so must be doing something wrong – perhaps I need to be logged into prezi?
I agree with you about the floating and umbilical cord also felt like I was leaping from lily pad to lily pad with the prezi presentation. The images are fabulous and I particularly liked your references to:
What am I ….. bytes or bones – this reminded me of sharon’s artifact too!
and
‘impression management’ pertaining to identity online and our true self being that which we feel we need to express most – these are perhaps polarized positions always in tension?
Although the presentation was storyboarded and sequenced the movement in and around the presentation made you feel this wasnt the case, like buying a luckydip lottery ticket or playing the fruit machines it felt like an element of serendipity had been sewn into the fabric of your tapestry.
Hi Noreen
I managed to pick up the sound via the youtube videos which I could not run previously. Music added a further sense of ongoing contemplation which is ‘in tune’ with your points about identity being incomplete I think.
Also interesting that we both felt we need to put in blank screen with sound/activity happening behind it to represent cyberspace. I added mine at the beginning of my sequence and you at the end.
I added this as a sort of curtain behind which an imaginary cyberspace exists. I also wanted to add sounds without image to give a similar effect to radio, stimulating the imagination through sound effects and hopefully prompting the listener to come up with their own visions before my visuality took over and began to steer the proceedings. I particularly wanted to impart a rumaging, haphazard effect which is in contrast to your more serene visuality
Noreen, I love the way it felt like I was jumping into the virtual world with you, and returning at the end, and I love Alison’s image of “leaping from lily pad to lily pad” – definitely a good description of Prezi!
The adagio was an inspired choice, and the contemplative feel and I agree with Alison’s term of a “serene visuality”
Brilliant!
A really inspiring presentation. I really got a sense of the multiple roles and identities you inhabit in the real life and your digital life, and the questions that this can prompt regarding selfhood. I feel that your visual artefact has let me peep into your world in all its richness, which acts as a microcosm within the macrocosm of digital culture your artefact presents.
[...] in the first four weeks of the course) which stood out most for the creator. Being mindful of Noreen’s artefact on identity in cyberspace – does this give us an insight into the identity of each creator, [...]
@jeremy As always you picked up some of the key things I was aiming to do with the Prezi. However, I was interested in how many people mentioned the music and Jen has given me a whole load of references about the role of sound which I will be following up later.
I worry that I’m a bit stuck in the area of identity because I too did an assignment in IDEL on it and it is a big interest of mine. The idea of the mash-up and how it works as an element of self-presentation follows up aspects of my background in communication studies but in ways I hadn’t thought of until now.
@Alison Glad you thought there was still an element of serendipity – I was a bit worried that I’d over-scripted or marshalled the presentation. I was always being criticised for being overly directive in my online learning materials and sometimes in the classroom as well! The whole idea of sound and how it works on us has sparked my interest so will be following this up.
@Sharon Glad you enjoyed the music and the feeling of being on a journey with me – that’s what I was aiming for. Not as amazingly visually creative as yours – I think you conveyed a lot of what I was trying to say in 5 pictures and loads of text in one image!
@Linda – I did worry that the presentation was a bit ego-centric but I did have the most visual material on myself!
Noreen, I found my way to the Prezi – well detailed, I can tell you. I like the idea of multiple roles/identity – this really came to the fore for me during one of the early modules (I think that we were both on that at the same time…)
Yes, effectively we are mashups – just like sampled music, the apps, websites and social networks that we use – do they make our existing multi-role selves just that more explicit?
I’m experiencing some loss just now, with my Nexus One in at the garage having the dust from behind its screen removed…But all joking aside, I had every ‘identiy’ enabled in one place on one mobile device: EASE access, UWS access, school access, eBay access, my RSS and News feeds….
Yes, I’m a mashup too!
This certainly shows the apicilatpon of technology to literature. One might even go a step further and embed visual data to reference setting, characters, links between film and novel, etc. Great program, and keeps interest through “movement”.