Being networked together

The internet connects everyone together and because of this we are networked together. Without people using the web in order to communicated or share information with each other, web 2.0 has no meaning. An example would be having a laptop but having no battery in order for it to run, you need one in order to support the other.

Norbert Weiner created the term, cybernetics which uses "computer technology as a means to extend human capabilities" (http://www.livinginternet.com/i/ii_wiener.htm). This shows the connection between both humans and technology and how the are so closely related (human beings communicating through technology like a vessel).

Computer technology can be related so closely to artificial life as it stereotypically uses the idea that comes to our minds when we think of aliens or life that is literally out of this world.  Technology such as the Nintendo Wii or Microsoft Kinect make us believe that such advancements in technology are unreal. Controlling what occurs through the television are extremely similar to that of sci-fi films that use communicational methods that are beyond their time and as we pick up how to use this technology so quickly, it can result in questions such as 'are we technology?' Marshall Mcluhan describes us as being the " the sex organs of the machine world" (Understanding Media, 1964).

As we all generally live life in a particular way, (birth, school/learning, working, retirement, death) it is possible that we are also machine like as we live life in a pattern/structure that we rarely control. In being machine like we can therefore see ourselves as being cybernetic organisms which is a term "put forward by Manfred E. Clynes and Nathan S. Kline in 1960 to describe a self-regulating man-machine system, supposed to be more flexible than the human organism thanks to the fusion of orgnic and mechanical parts.” (Dani Cavallario,  Cyberpunk and Cyberculture page 45).

A remix manifesto

A remix manifesto is a documentary discussing the use of mash ups and how they have lead to lawsuits due to copyright infringements.  It shows people that have been sued as a result of copying original material without understanding that what they are doing is illegal although they are taking samples in order to create something new.
As intellectual property means that if you did not create it your are not allowed to use it, is now being closely watched, it can result in creativity of an individual not being shared or restricted so that information is no longer shared which goes against what web 2.0 stands for in a whole.

As the internet shares information and allows access to everyone in most websites it can change the way people view looking at other information in general. When people browse through websites, they never really look to read the terms and conditions that certain websites may have, they just tend to go straight to the information they are looking for. A result of this could potentially change people off the World Wide Web and continue their habits of looking straight into the information they want in real life without really thinking about the consequences.

Napstar (1999) was a on-line peer-to-peer music website which let people share music to each other and download music tracks. Napstar faced lawsuits as the songs from music groups were let free to download which meant that the record label of the songs were not making any profit through CD sales. Rock band Metallica and Dr. Dre were noticeable by the media for suing for copyright infringement.

An advantage and disadvantage of intellectual property is that once you create something, others are not allowed to use it while it means that if another individual makes an idea for themselves that is similar to another persons, they can be seen as copying it and trying to make it their own regardless of if it is innocent or not. Although there are loop holes such as creative commons which allow you to use another persons material as long as they do not claim it to be their own work.

A remix manifesto (part1)
A remix manifesto (part 2)
A remix manifesto (part 3)
A remix manifesto (part 4)
A remix manifesto (part 5)
A remix manifesto (part 6)
A remix manifesto (part 7)
A remix manifesto (part 8)
A remix manifesto (part 9)
Napstar lawsuits 
Creative commons

Web 2.0

Web 1.0 was primarily about connecting people together around the world. Web 2.0 is based more upon the sharing of information and data through networking. Sites that have come up through web 2.0 such as Wikipedia, Youtube, Myspace and Facebook are so popular, not just because they connect people together, but they can share a large amount of data that anyone with internet access can altar to a certain extent.

Wikipedia, is a free on-line encyclopaedia that anyone can edit. It is user-generated and relies on trust that the information being shares by others is in fact true and not misleading. As the existence of web 2.0 is information sharing, Wikipedia is semi-protected and protected, depending on the importance of the subject. The Wikipedia page of Elizabeth II would have a protected profile due to her high status and the information that is edited would only be able to be done by someone that has a good history of publishing correct information on the site. Semi-protected pages such as a profile based on a sport can be edited by anyone but once the information has been seen to be not true or misleading, it will automatically be deleted and restored to the way it was previously.

This would question how reliable Wikipedia is because anyone is capable of editing, deleting, adding or replacing the entry but no previous history for a certain amount of time. It could then question how much of the data is actually used and which is overlooked as a person looking for information could believe anything that is put in front of them.

Mash ups are also information sharing and are used to combine two or more mediums together. It has been done for films or television programmes but are most popular for its use of music. By combining two or more completely different songs together to create a new one is called a mash up. It has come under a lot of criticism as the original songs used to combine are property of record labels and without the permission to use them come under a breech in copyright. Although a new song has been created, it still used the notes of the original songs and that is enough for a record label or music artist to sue the creator of the mash up. They are usually non-profit but increase the reputation of the creator of the mash up songs.
Another example of a mash up would be 'UK snow map' which is a combination of both 'Google Maps' and 'Twitter'. It works by tweeting your location through the Twitter site and Google will find your location through its the maps. This does not come under copyright infringement as both companies have agreed to do so in order to create something new.

The web has now become something that relies heavily on user generated products, although it will cause problems along the way such as if it is illegal or not. Web 2.0 has become a lot more open as we are able to do more with it such as edit information by the audience and not just by the creator of the site. 

What is Web 2.0
Mash up website
Example of a mash up
UK snow map

Identity and representation

Through cyberspace we create represent ourselves with characteristics that we wouldn't normally do in real life. As it is a world where you do not have to show your true identity or personal information, people are likely to feel a lot more at ease if they distance themselves personally and choose an identity which portrays how they would like to be seen by the audience.

Depending on the audience, different users may want to publicise different information as the response they are likely to recieve due to the nature of the site will differ from one another. Sites that involove a love for music such as 'Myspace' might have the user describing their love for music and a list of artist they may enjoy but might not put that on a site such as 'Facebook' where they might find photos shared to be more relevent to the type of response they believe they would get.

"Goffman suggest that there are many ‘sign vehicles’ that are widely recognized as expressions given off unintentionally by people, by which others can evaluate how successful or sincere the self-presentation is. Some sign vehicles, like sex, age and race, are extremely difficult to conceal or manipulate in face-to-face interaction. Although the rest – such as clothing, posture, speech pattern, facial expression, bodily gesture and intonation – are relatively more manipulatable” (Charles Cheung, Presentations of Self on Personal Homepage in web.studies page 47). Profile pictures usually posted on 'Facebook' represent the type of person the user want others to identify them, clothing, facial expression, bodily gesture will present a person in a way that they set out to, even if this given identity is false. An individuals interests in reality and cyberspace may merge and come under both as they might want to be viewed to have some of the characteristics that they might have in the real world, such as name and interests. 

Multi-User Domains (MUD) are online role-playing games, where the virtual world is the real world. Both worlds become completely merged and users represent their avatars (World of Warcraft) how they wish. Real money can be used to change the characteristics of the avatar which is what makes both reality and the virtual world become one. 

People then can change from reality to cyberspace in the lightest or most drastic way depending on the viewing audience. The reason for some people changing could be due to the reason they want to stand out among other users or to fit in, which also depends on their life in the real world and how much they want to be represented in a different or a similar light. 

 Multi-user domains

The birth and death of cyberspace

Cyberspace can be viewed as a place where people generally go to in order to escape reality and enter a world where they can enter a world a become anyone or anything they wish. It is a world where people are able to create an identity they wish to go by. Generally people that are unhappy with the reality they live in tend to spend more of their time in cyberspace than in real life. This could also what is reality and what is virtual. Millions of people a day enter the cyberspace world to socialise with others, gaming or on-line  banking,. it could be said that the difference between both reality and virtual worlds depends on the individual and as not something that can be put under the category of reality is being in the real world and cyberspace is being in the virtual. 

Second life is a virtual world where people literally live a natural life, in terms of shopping, meeting people and making money. People would put their real money in order to upgrade their avatar and the world they have become apart of. This has become more of a place of how people wish they could live rather than a virtual game. By having spent more time in this world than in the meatspace, it questions if we ever leave the virtual world if we are always using virtual technology or which world do we actually define as being the real one as they both merge together the way they do.

Social networking sites such as 'Facebook' is becoming more like a virtual world we live in as we create images of ourselves which reflects on how we want others viewing our profiles to see us, such as posting certain pictures to gives impressions of being an extrovert and socialising with friends when the user is actually an introvert that doesn't go out much, but only posts pictures that say otherwise. The same applies to the user names people apply to themselves, it is not generally their name but the type of person they are or the type of person they wish to be, such as 'peterlikestoparty123' when they hold no characteristics of the name but what other users to believe that they do.
This would suggest that in most occasions, people may be living in a virtual world but it becomes more of a reality as they work harder to create an image of themselves than they do in the real world.

Cyberspace was originally a place where people could literally go, but with technology developing like it does we are able to take the cyberspace with us on our mobile phones or PDAs. We no longer escape the real world to go into another but are now able to mix the two together how ever we want. As we are always connected to the virtual world it is possible to be living two very different lives as two different identities of us no exist.

Issues over interface

Interface is a means of output that allows users to manipulate the system or to interact with a particular machine or a program run by a computer. Graphic interfaces are slightly different but still allow us to manipulate computer programs. The information that is run by the programme are shown on screens which makes it easier to access files or further programmes. The first graphical interfaces were the sketchpad which was a computer program run written by Ivan Sutherland in the early 1960s.

Since the `1960s, improvements more programs have been made so therefore improves to the graphical interface also had to be made. The WIMP model (windows, icons, menus and pointing) allowed a user to use a mouse to literally click on a window and drag it to the side, this also let users use more than one program at a time. 

Software developers such as Apple Macintosh and Microsoft Windows were the first to use the WIMP model and to modernise it to something we still use today. This consists of visual design of the interface, information design, interaction design, functional specifications and, user needs and site objectives(information or user orientated). This is everything that is needed in order to make a software interface attractable to its user. 
These interfaces have been improved to the point where we can use it on our mobile phones and access programs through it, such as applications and the ability to access the internet. 

Modern social networking sites such as Facebook have used the ability to use graphic interfaces and extend their site from being computer based to being accessible through PDAs (personal digital assistants) which has also been done for a lot of modern websites that want to expand to other platforms. By doing this, information design as well as interaction design will have to be suited to a mobile phone as important information is likely going to be the only things used on the mobile site. However this could change the orientation of the elements of the user experience from user to information, meaning that the overall purpose of the site could potentially change.




The elements of user experience 

WIMP model

Doug Engelbart

History on the sketchpad

News and technology

News contains, political, cultural, economical, social information that is of interest to a local, national and international audience.

The development of technology in news is extremely important as it can determine the audiences interest in the information given to them. By having up to date technology on news institutions such as the BBC, the technology used to distribute the news has to be equally as important in order to get its point across. News is something that has thrived on technology, as gathering information from around the world as well as broadcasting twenty four hours a day is the primary objective for all news institutions, they rely on it in order to get as detailed information as possible.

Developments in the internet has allowed us to access in depth information that is not always on the television or in the news paper. This would mean that more people are likely to access information at a time that suits them, as well as being good for the news company.

Questions have been asked on the reliability of the news and weather the information that is initially given is correct. An example would be the 2000 US presidential election where to wrong result was given by the media before the result was made official. Other questions have been made about the reliability of citizen journalism, this being citizens that record events as they occur, such as the mobile phone recordings of the 9/11 bombings. As it is such amateur material, some would ask if it is something that can be used as proof of an event that should be accessible to people on a international level. Overall citizen journalism is something that is incredibly important to the BBC and other major news industries as they can be first to spontaneous news and therefore get the loyalty of the audience. In saying this, the future of citizen journalism is looking strong as most breaking news originates from photos or videos taken for citizens, which are then made public through the internet, magazines or through television.