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I emailed soundboard when its site ate our project a couple weeks back. The guy from the site, Mike, emailed me back right away asking for more info, etc. By this time though, my group already had our soundboard restructured. Well, two weeks later on a Saturday morning I receive this email:
Just wanted to follow-up as I hadn’t heard back from you.
I, again, apologize for the loss of your soundboard, we were doing some database work that evening and it may have gotten messed up in the mix. We are still in Beta, my apologies.
Please let me know if I can help - post a fresh board and I’ll feature it, thanks!
Mike
I thought it was pretty cool and admirable for a website to actually follow up on one of its problems, even two weeks later. And, hopefully, our soundboard will now be featured at Soundboard.com, we'll be spreading the message all over the net...the wiki is the medium.
~Peep
P.S. No more anonymity, read more about the Tom Miller here.
Thanks for the fun semester all, but in now way am I abandoning this WiKi, so talk to you all soon.
The problem with technology?
It's roughtly 11:00am on a quiet Thursday morning. I am sitting in the Pasquerilla center on campus, waiting to help a friend with an interview. Suddenly, a sweet vibration ripples through the left pocket of my jeans: a phone call. Who can it be? Call Me Ishamel ...what could he want? "Yeaaahhhh...there's a problem. Our soundboard is gone."
Great. Our whole project up and vanishes in one day. Wonder why? What rule in the longated Soundboard.com Terms of Useage did we violate? A couple here and there, nothing too serious. We mixed some copyright materials together (remixing in the spirit of the Wiki, by God!) with the quotes, Ishamel an Evanescence song, me, a Bright Eyes song. Did the people at soundboard really catch this soo quickly? I highly doubted. Logistically, how can they monitor the thousands of files people upload onto thier site? I wrote soundboard asking for a explanation, and a guy named Mike returned me email asking for more account information, but by this time our new board was up and running, and I figured, what's it matter now?
On a whole, the process went entirely too smoothly. Somewhere, there had to be a snag, had to be a caesura to break in and interupt our fluidity. During the first night working on the board I posted: Sound board success. I could have sworn a battle between me and my computer would have ensued for hours into this night.
This got me thinking, if everything with a certain piece of technology is actually running well, everything working as it should, all functions go, the only thing the system can do from here is malfunction, go downhill, give the user problems. Does anyone else wage wars with their computers when trying to install the latest graphics board, memory, etc? I remember long bouts with the old machine way back during the days of dial-up, struggling for hours just to configure the beast to be able to log onto AOL. Eventually, I always win. I remember so many problems, so many viruses that I just had to fight deep into the night to actually bring my cherished computer back from its digital death. One great result of doing the project allowed me to again consider this property of technology, let me feel the urgency of needing to immediately return to my apartment after I recieved Ishamel's phone call just so I could bring my life back to its previous state, to achieve stability, to reincarnate our soundboard. This definitly interupted the routine of the day, but at least this time, Soundboard seems to be less entropic, as it still remains almost a week later.
Some more Wiki discourse and more on our project:
The idea: By pulling quotes and then recording them, our vision was to create a sort of lasting and remixable sampleing of the course. People wrote very nice insights many places on the Wiki, and we wanted to make sure these insights were heard (if the average browser doesn't have time to read every bit of our comprehensive 2xx page Wiki). The Wiki soundboard does just that...instantly allows a viewer of any Wiki the abilitiy to hear our thoughts.
Did you try this? Go to the The MiXeD uP Board and in the top right hand corner of the player, hit the "Play All" button (it's round). The soundbaord will run through all the mixed up files, providing the user with a Society of Control quotes overload. Light some incense, lay in your bed, relax and listen to what your English 473 peers have to say. The experience is quite relaxing, quite humorous.
The idea behind the remixes...
The remixes exemplify some remix options that audio allows. By using the program Audacity, we were able to mix music with quotes, then able to remix the quotes using various sound effects. The result was a kind of continuous mp3 that provides the listener with a sample of some ideas discussed in the course. This is also a distributable medium, as these files can be played over radio stations, through various Internet sites, and so on.
The process...Creating a soundboard (Twice)
We began our project by scanning the Wikis for any good ideas, fun quotes, anything related to the Society of Control, etc. Every member of our class contributed key discourse, and by again browsing the Wikis, we were really able to see how many quality ideas were flowing throughout this semester. If you haven't already done so, the quotes can be read here: Society of Control: Wiki Words of Wisdom.
The next step was to find some medium that allowed us to easily share these words. Enter Soundboard.com, the infamous site that devoured our first soundboard and provided us the need to resurrect a new one. This site, despite its need to destroy our work, really is a quality and easy-to-use site. Soundboard.com provides the user with 50mb free space, which is a lot, especially when working with the mp3 format (the only format Soundboard allows). So we signed up for an account and started recording all the quotes using the aforementioned Audacity program (another really quality program that I stumbled upon during this course). Soundboard.com has very easy directions that allows the user to transfer files straight to the mp3 formal (as soon as you set up an account at Sounboard, a top tab reads MP3 Recorder...click that tab, and if you are computer savvy at all, and we all are, because we are all capable of using Wiki, then you will have no problem following the directions).
From there it was a simple matter of embedding a code (that Soundboard generates for you at the click of a button) into our Wikis. And, this code is transferable (obviously) to any Wiki, to any site that allows you to post html in order to remix it. This means our ideas can be spread to any other Wiki just by editting this page and transferring the code.
Sound board success. I could have sworn a battle between me and my computer would have ensued for hours into this night. Grand.
~Peep
Hey peep. Just wanted to let you know I listened to the remix this morning and I think it's fantastic! I'd love to save a copy of it somehow...any way to do that? GREAT JOB. I think we're supposed to be grading each other's projects, so if that's the case, I give you an A+! -Ceridwen
Ceridwen , thank you for the kind words, just wanted to make sure the class knows our project is a group collaboaration consisting of myself, Call Me Ishamel and PrincessPizza. I am sure we could give you a copy (prob through email or cd) of any sounds found in our project. The project is really presenting us with many great remix options, and in the spirit of wiki, we'd encourage anyone to remix anything have going. ~Peep
April 30th
While creating the Society of Control: Wiki Words of Wisdom page for our final project I was able to go back and thoroughly read and re-read a bunch of Wiki. We wrote good stuff this semester. Fantastic. ~Peep
Peep, I think you have really expanded our idea to incorporate soundbites on the wiki. I especially liked your idea to aid second language learners and or people with speech impediments. Actually, last week I spoke to the principal of the school I have been student teaching at about implementing a new Spanish program there in the fall. He was really enthused about the idea even though my background is in English education. For the most part, these kids have never been introduced to Spanish or any other language, and won't be until high school. So the program would be extremely elementary. I would love to do something with the wiki/wikiwav with this new program. I am thinking that even including soundbites of how letters/words are pronounced would be extremely helpful to the students. Thanks for putting this proposal together, I went home for a funeral. We'll talk more in class. -Princesspizza
WikiWav? WikiWalk? Peep, your ingenious mind is currently tapped. I'll get some stuff together when I get back from teaching and class this afternoon.Call Me Ishamel
Created another pbwiki in order to get some file space! I originally wanted to use a place with lots of disk space (Tried hosting through google, as the wav indicates, but that was pw protected.) Think I got it now though.
Tonight I went to a panel discussion where the topic at hand was religion and the question of global warming. The main argument the panel suggested was religion is a good medium (and they were using the book of Genesis especially) to try to persuade this certain group of people that the world must be saved. The next panel (it's a series) is going to discuss the question of the apocolypse being directly related to global warming. When I heard this connection, I couldn't help but immediately think "Humanity will find a way" because we always do, and somehow technology isn't going to allow our race to be destroyed, and for a long time the human race thought its end was surely approaching. I have to agree with Wilson in thinking that we as humans are heading towards immortality and life extension. ~Peep
April 8
My whole wiki is back! Call Me Ishamel , you think this is a good idea for a O Captain! My Captain! suplementary lesson? The day before we're doing qualities of good captains. I was thinking of kind of making it a leadership lesson. Check it out:
Good Captain / Bad Captain Skits
Bad Captain, Situation 1
You are in the last inning of the championship baseball / softball game. Bases are loaded, and you need one run to cross that plate to win. One of your weakest hitters is now up. What happens? Make sure to show the consequences of your characters’ actions. Oh, and you have to have at least one character use the phrase, O Captain! My Captain!
Good Captain, Situation 1
You are in the last inning of the championship baseball / softball game. Bases are loaded, and you need one run to cross that plate to win. One of your weakest hitters is now up. What happens? Make sure to show the consequences of your characters’ actions. Oh, and you have to have at least one character use the phrase, O Captain! My Captain!
Bad Captain, Situation 2
You are in the middle of a war! All of a sudden, your platoon finds itself lost in the forests! What do you do? Your soldiers are ready to give up, and lives are on the line! How does these scene end? Make sure to show the consequences of your characters’ actions. Oh, and you have to have at least one character use the phrase, O Captain! My Captain!
Good Captain, Situation 2
You are in the middle of a war! All of a sudden, your platoon finds itself lost in the forests! What do you do? Your soldiers are ready to give up, and lives are on the line! How does these scene end? Make sure to show the consequences of your characters’ actions. Oh, and you have to have at least one character use the phrase, O Captain! My Captain!
Bad Captain, Situation 3
You are riding along on an airplane when all of a sudden there is lots of turbulence and the pilot informs you that the plane may not make it through the storm. What do you do? Eventually the plane pulls through and everyone is safe, but for a couple of minutes, people are going crazy! Make sure to show the consequences of your characters’ actions. Oh, and you have to have at least one character use the phrase, O Captain! My Captain!
Good Captain, Situation 3
You are riding along on an airplane when all of a sudden there is lots of turbulence and the pilot informs you that the plane may not make it through the storm. What do you do? Eventually the plane pulls through and everyone is safe, but for a couple of minutes, people are going crazy! Make sure to show the consequences of your characters’ actions. Oh, and you have to have at least one character use the phrase, O Captain! My Captain!
It sounds cool, I'm sure why some are good captains and some bad captains lol, but that could just be my mind and the severe lack of any relaxation. I used a revised edition of the moral resoning today in class. Remind me to show you some stuff and to go over it with you. It was the shhhnizzle and seems like kids would go nuts with this...so sweetness on the cool lesson Peepster.
PS: Check out the last.fm link on my site. I downloaded it yesterday and I'm not gonna lie, I'm quite hooked already. The amount of new music I've been opened up to has been so refreshing. It's such a break from the monotonous music we are generally given around here, but this programs opens up whole possibilities.
I started reading Thich Nhat Hanh's Teachings on Love which presents the readers with numerous meditations. I am really liking it and feeling the meditations as well as elements from the Buddist religion are very powerful and allow one to feel more of a oneness with the world. I was curious, so I throw this out to the wiki community who are probably more schooled than me on the topic, does Buddism have any symbol or any God on earth type of thing comparable to the Catholic's Eucharist? From reading the book Buddism seems to really be focusing on people, on the mind, on real relationships and how one can better identify with the world. I am loving it.
Also, I am soon teaching a lesson on O Captain my Captain and am brainstorming having groups or students write poems using some sort of extended metaphor, was wondering if anyone had any good generic extended metaphor prompts, such as, "Riding in the car for riding through life," or anything like that. Just an idea. Wiki wiki. ~Peep (They're all over the place!)
April 3
On Lessig and free culture...
I see the idea, and I like it. I think the wiki and the whole remixing and redubbing texts and artifacts really serves to foster creation and definitly imagination. I like the idea in free culture, with too many restrictions and too much red tape leading to anarachy. It's kinda like the way space programs or greater space technologies aren't flourishing, because we solely have NASA which doesn't foster competition. Even is communications classes we talk about how economists are missing this idea that if you give something for free (shareware), there is a corellation between sales, and they go up! ~Peep
April 2
You know what really is is playing on my wiki-style and frequency of posts is the 'recent activity' sidebar... I wish it existed as it once did. Can anyone make that so? ~Peep
Peep: I haven't been able to fix it yet, but there is the other link in the sidebar called recenet changes...But aI know, it is nice to see who is on right now - it encourages one to jump in. I will keep searching for a solution. - mobius
The Wisdom of the Bar Bathroom (Page 126 -127-128 of Ubik)
With his foot Joe Chip tripped the pedal which controlled the TV set. The TV was showing some college football game, an arbitrary and boring sport, and the crowd of bar-goers seemed disinterested, save for a select few. When the TV’s screen faded and the sound ebbed into silence, no one in the entire bar said a word. Joe, erroneously feeling that his blunder may cause sudden anarchy in the densely populated bar, fled to the bathroom, only to receive some cryptic message in the middle of a well-deserved urination from the graffiti-plagued dirty wall: “Any asshole can piss on the floor, be a hero and shit on the ceiling.” Pondering his situation and the absurdity of shitting on a ceiling, Joe continued relieving himself, and a sense of wonder and awe filled his body.
That doesn’t fit with the previous graffiti on the bathroom walls, Joe reflected. Maybe Runciter is dead after all. Everyone on that TV screen seemed to think so. The announcers just spoke on and on about their tedious game, as if the matter of Glen’s death was merely the tiniest bit of a speck of some matter of interest. Joe left the bathroom.
Suddenly, as he was walking back to his seat, the TV relit, hastily switching between channels. For what seemed like hours, channels flew by as the crowd continued their drunken conversations, ordering their drinks and watching as the band play on as if in slow motion. Images blurred around Joe as he peered around from person to person. Every gaze was locked on him, peering into his soul, challenging him to make a move.
“This is too much,” Joe thought to himself. “I have to make it back to the bathroom.”
As if captured in quicksand Joe raised from his seat, painstakingly nudging his heavy body through people, between pretty girls in short skirts and tight tops, rubbing up against burly men in polo shirts, meticulously avoiding the burning ends of lit cigarettes. Finally, he made it back into the cramped graffiti-filled bathroom. What awaited him he never in a thousand years could have guessed: the face of Glen Runciter.
“Run,” Runciter said in his familiar gravelly voice.
With that a white van screeched to a halt outside the bar. Joe Chip heard this commotion, and coming out of the bathroom, saw through the window two men approaching the bar door with automatic AK-47s. Suddenly he felt an even greater weight at his side: his own brand new top-of-the-line sniper rifle!
Like a bat out of hell Joe was out the back door of the bar. Outside, his own white van awaited him, nicely parked all alone under the dimming streetlight of a foggy alley. He hurriedly opened the driver’s side door, praying with his life that the keys would be in the ignition. They weren’t.
Now in a blurred panic, Joe quickly searched all over his body for the lost keys, aware that in any second two gun-wielding men were going to emerge through the same back door and cause tiny fragments of metal to whiz through his body leaving him a bloody fountain.
Frantically he searched! Left pocket? Nope! Right pocket? Nope! Ashtray? Nope. Finally, as the door swung open and a stream of bullets flew violently out of the tubes of the guns, Joe’s shaking hands located the keys under the floor mat of the van and spun off in a cloud of smoke.
He drove and refused to look back. Like a lost caribou sprinting from the wolves on the great frozen tundra, Joe felt the sensation of panic and fright rip through his numb body as he continued flying down the streets, making some lefts and then some rights, trying to randomly lose his position, attempting to become as hopelessly lost and confused as a boy scrambling up the colors of his Rubik’s cube.
Half-heartedly convinced that he lost his attackers, Joe parked the van by the curb in an old abandoned lot and climbed clumsily on top of a building, scrambling up a rickety metal ladder. This lot seemed to contain numerous old factory buildings of some type, all rusty and longing for their now-deceased employees. Now on the roof, Joe laid down on his stomach, just like those guys in the movie, taking his sniper rifle into his sweaty hands and looking through the long scope. As he knew they would, his pursuer’s white van appeared from around the corner and halted in the same abandoned street. The two men got out of the vehicle.
“He gotta be around here somewhere,” the one man said.
“Look, there’s old Joe’s van, right over there by that decrepit building!”
Joe watched from atop the roof as the two men loaded clips into their weapons and slowly began trudging towards the building where he lay. He was prepared to fire his rifle, well aware that he had the ability to take human life.
He looked nervously through the scope, had the one man perfectly in the crosshairs, and reached for the trigger. Suddenly, as if made of vapor, the bottom half of Joe’s sniper rifle vanished. Clumsily and blindly he searched for the missing trigger. The men were coming closer and closer. Any second now they would be standing right next to the building. Joe continued looking through the scope. The figures of the approaching men were growing larger and larger, becoming more real with every passing second. Death was immanent. The heart in his chest pounded harder and harder, faster and faster until Joe felt as if his whole torso was about to explode into a hundred fleshy pieces. He thought about his pitiful life. He peeled his right eye away from the scope and looked up at the night sky. He tried to count the stars, needed to know this was happening. He questioned his existence. He wondered, where is God? Lost in thought he forgot about the approaching murderers. Now snapping back into his brain and back into his critical situation, Joe again gazed into his rifle’s scope, only to see a cartoon spray bottle appear at the other end as colorful shapes would appear in a kaleidoscope.
“What in the world is that?” Joe wondered. So purple and shiny and perfect!
A voice boomed from above him: “It’s Ubik!”
And with that one of the two gunmen sprayed Joe’s entire body with a can of more-powerful-than-ever Ubik; a feeling of wonder and awe overtook him.
Dazed, Joe seated himself, his eyes fixed on the screen as he set his pitcher of frosty beer onto the wooden table. The football game was back on! The players were running frantically around the field, crashing into one another in loud collisions. “That was one hell of a trip to the bathroom,” he thought to himself as he poured himself a glass of purple ale.
Taken aback from the sight of the purple liquid, now standing up, Joe said loudly, “You know I’m here, does that mean you can hear and see me?” But the bar was completely silent, completely empty, completely real.
***Remix Explanation***
Rhetorically, I wanted to continue with Philip K. Dick’s blurry line that gets drawn between the real and the make-believe. For me in ‘real’ life, this blurring of the line occurs when I begin to alternate my reality, the only way in which I currently do so (and I guess I am talking physiologically) would be with alcohol, which is why I decided to remix this scene and change the setting into a bar. I enjoyed Dick’s idea of graffiti on the bathroom wall, and find this unique medium particularly interesting when staring at the walls while taking a drunken pee. Somehow, as Mr. Chip may see, the messages really seem to speak to you, perhaps because of the intense focus skills or ability to really analyze the heck out of something while under the influence of booze. I wanted to really create the sort of dream-world that may begin to exist in our heads while at the bar, a world that becomes more vivid (in the moment) and more unbelievable (the next day) as the night goes on.
I try to blur the line even further by creating the scene of gunmen pursuing what seemingly is my self, even though this persona is located within the fictional character of Joe Chip. The scene was modeled after a dream I had when I found sleep after a night of drinking, a sort of night that somehow erases all memory of the trip home. In the morning, one’s job becomes to separate the real from the imagined, the reality from the fabrication. Perhaps this interpretation of a night of partying reflects one’s interpretation of a sober ‘reality’: What can be trusted as wholly real? How unworthy is our paranoia?
I like playing with the idea of being followed, of having to ‘get away.’ As some probably experienced sometime or another, a dream can become a really haunting thing when the pictures become so vivid and the sense of fear so alive. I wanted to create a sense of panic in Joe as he fumbles for his keys and later fumbles to find the trigger of the rifle, knowing (in a metaphorical way) that no matter how hard you try, no matter how fast you try to run (especially in a blurred dream-world), your pursuer is always right behind you, two inches from your heels. Joe questions his life, wonders what the heck is going on, questions his reality and considers the possibility of this whole episode being a dream, then awakes. But to what?
I bring Joe out of this nightmare with a can of Ubik, a substance that stops entropy, causing in Joe the same refreshing sensation that his drunken urination does earlier in the narrative. He’s no longer on the brink of death but fully restored and with a whole pitcher of beer. Surely he was daydreaming, but his present reality is none the better: his beer is purple and he is completely alone, except of course for the hum of the TV set and the pixilated pictures of football players competing in arbitrary sport, no different than his own arbitrary life and existence. Perhaps his only hope are the ‘select few’ paying attention to the big game, but even so, where have these few vanished to by the end of his adventure?
This was an awesome read Mr. Peep. I thought the imagery and setting intesified the blurring you speak of in your explanation. Also, the increase of action made the plot seem much more chaotic and almost momentus. By momentus, I mean that this moment could be a pivotal point that changes the novel. I think Dick's novel is flittered with momentus, just as your remix includes. Great fuilidity in your writing Peep!
Grade=A
PS: I think I might check out that book you've been reading stated in your most recent post.
Peep, Well done! I really got into your remix. Like Ishmael, I also thought you did a fine job of blurring the real and the make-believe. The sequence of events in the chase scene had a dream-like quality and really helped to blur the line even further. A -Princesspizza
Final Project idea: Society of Control Quote Website/Book -Call Me Ishamel
I just finished C.S. Lewis's first book of his Space Trilogy, Out of the Silent Planet and thought it was a pretty good read, entriely too allegorical ("Shoved down your throat") as my roomate would say. But the ideas were really good and it made ya think, so I think I am going to move on to the next book. Other than that, I read a pretty F'ed up memoir called Running with Scissors which is really off the wall, about a kid (Augusten Burroughs) whose mom goes insanse then in forced to love with the mom's psychiatrist's family, a rather essentric group (to put it very lightly). ~Peep
Also was made into a pretty decent movie this past year. Rachel Evan Wood, who plays the wild daughter, is fantastic, but I found Gwyneth Paltrow to be flat and boring, like she was in The Royal Tennenbaums. The film is somewhat like The Royal Tennenbaums, only more genuine and honestly crazy. Annette Benning was incredible as the mother, but I felt like I had seen her in the same role a million times before. However, the book was really great. I noticed a woman sitting next to me on an airplane starting the masterbatoreum chapter, lookingy around anxiously to see if anyone was noticing the big title in the middle fo the page. Hilarious! -TheBoogieMonster
March 18
How was everyone's break? Mine was pretty good. I finished Trigger, A Man Without a Country by Vonnegut, the Diary of Anne Frank (which I will be teaching...lesson suggestions? Feel free!) and finished a J.R.R. Tolkien biography, which was awesome. Now I am wearily beginning some C.S. Lewis, Out of the Silent Planet. So overall, a relaxing and kind of productive spring break. I was really really happy with Trigger, thought it was an excellent read. Really stimulating and entertaining, and I look forward to wherever this course is headed to post spring break. And wow, is it me or does pbwiki have a whole new interface?? I'm excited!!! Just want to leave you with a letter from some lady to Vonnegut commenting on airports requiring passangers to take their shoes off. It made me laugh:
The shoe thing at the airports and Code Orange and so on are world class practical jokes, all right. But my all time favorite is one the holy, anti-war clown Abbie Hoffman (1936-1989) pulled off during the Vietnam War. He announced that the new high was banana peels taken rectally. So then FBI scientists stuffed banana peels up their asses to find out if this was true or not. Or so we hoped. (A Man Without a Country, 108).
~Peep
March 6
A new favorite part of Trigger is the thought of our seeded genetic codes being placed on Earth billions of years ago for the sole purpose of evolving to a point in which we our nervous systems aquire the ability to contact our 'creators'? This is a fun thought. We as humans really have this crazy thing in our heads that we really need to learn how to use better. I feel this is becoming the main message of Trigger, the idea of programming wetware in order to change perceptions or at least see differently. If every religion (I'm sure not every) focuses on some sort of higher power, some essence, some 'spirit' running through everything, in a way, religions all compliment one another. I speak of this ebcause I was on a Catholic retreat this weekend to do some volunteer cooking, and being a liberal arts student and fan of philosophy, I began thinking about why none of this 'religious' stuff makes sense to me. I am starting to think about God not in the way of the 'One Catholic God,' but rather as the essence, the spirit of life that surrounds all, the deeper meaning that is sought after by many religions, and the thought that it doesn't matter which religion you choose because we are all communicating to the same essence.
Does anyone have any thoughts or recommendations about religion, books to read, different philosophies?
I wonder, did anyone post a recommended beginners guide to meditation or if anyone can comment on methods that work for them. I figure it's worth a try especially if this means quieting the noisy mind that seems unable to escape the feed.
As time progressed, Tesla suggested that perhaps such an aircraft could be run entirely mechanically. The theorized appearance would typically take the form of a cigar or saucer.
Aren't the cigar and saucer archtypes or the most popular cited visions of UFO spacecraft? And, Tesla said several times that his eccentric experimentation with radio waves and electricty put him in contact with extraterrestrial life. Tesla was an interesting character, although I just been reading about his because of his role in The Prestige, easily the best movie I saw in a long time.
~Peep
March 2
This weekend I am cooking at a Catholic retreat and brining along Trigger...is that wrong? I was thinking of people reprogramming with LSD or meditation techniques, and I am currently thinking of it in the regards similiar to having a dream them viewing something in a new light come morning. Did you ever have a random dream where you were dating, messing around with, or being intimate with another person then see them the next day? I feel the subconscious state of mind altered my view of the person, at least for a small ammount of time. I was wondering if med/LSD alterations were proven to last a significant ammount of time or if the mind slowly regresses away from the change? Hope everyone has a good weekend, happy fake st patty's day. ~Peep
Feb 26
Is it bad that this course and Trigger is making me want to experiment with LSD? There has to be some negative consequences associated with the drug. [Admittedly, I have never tried LSD and don't know much about it. What I do remember from old DARE programs in school is that we were told never to do it. "Get 'em while they're young!" Now, however, I think I'd be open to it. The fear that LSD produces negative side effects just sounds like the self-policing that we've all been trained to do.-loadstool] Leary repeats the necessity of LSD being administered in the right environment, in the right context, etc. The other day my roomates and I conversed about 'trying LSD someday before we die' and my "crazy third roomate" commented that he wouldn't buy it from anyone up here, because you don't know what the hell you're getting, which made me really appreciate the section of Trigger which talked about Leary (I believe) trying to get the govt to control the drug to prevent the production of LSD for the inevitable black market. It would seem after reading eventually have effects on your brain that the harmful consequences of using LSD are uncertain or even not existant.
Keep reading! It is not my intention to make you want anything new from the outside world but to instead teach you how to focus your attention a bit on your inner world. These readings will likely teach you that the point is not the LSD but, as Wilson points out in the intro, our response to LSD or anything else in our experience. This is a teaching in becoming responsible-able, able to respond in freedom to the twists and turns of the epics we all find ourselves living in. Learning to focus our attention is the real lesson here, and it is mobius's hope that the readings will give you all the desire to do something very much like that. Meditation is a rhetorical practice, but then so too is any practice of caesara - the interruption of a train of thought that seemed inevitable and determined. This at least feels like the discovery of real freedom of thought, and it can be dizzying once it is engaged. But the central teaching is always this: your capacity to focus your attention is always there, and you are likely to remember how to do so the more you open yourself to the reality of otherness, the fact that the world is different from your perception of it. Responding gently in joy and love to that difference is the central tenet of many religions, and it may be that this is so precisely to evolve our attention toward greater and greater complexity and interconnection. Almost by defintion, this practice needs to happen in a safe and suppreotive and legal environment, so I am working with many other scientists to make such carefully controlled therapeutic experiences available again. Deja Vu!-mobius
Haloo out there in the digital world. As to LSD I can say this: it is not about taking a drug, nor is it about being 'high' or doing something illegal. These are all elements (which some users, single-time or more, focus on), but the POINT, I believe, is to examine your own responses to it. It's a window into your own mind...think of il like experiments we do to our bodies. You go for a run and push yourself to go farther than you thought possible. You reach a threashold and break through it and find a new level of ability and possibility and (perhaps), feeling. LSD can do much the same for our minds...taking it beyond it's normal confines into something foreign and new. It creates a new reality: if you've taken LSD and perhaps feel that you absolutely can not move, like your limbs a weighed down by gravity - well, perhaps there's nothing sitting on you holding those arms down, but in the reality of your mind motion is still impossible. By putting the mind in a new environment, in a way, we see it in a new light. I'm sure I'm not saying this well, but I've been up all night studying for a midterm. Yes, there can be negatives. Headaches, nausea, paranoia, vomiting...but these, as far as I've seen, are due much more to the state of the mind when the drug is administered than the drug itself. In other words, go into it terrified of the consequences and have a terrifying experience. Go into it open to new possibilities and awating enlightenment, and you'll find that. Mobius mentioned it and I'll steadfastly encourage it: meditation. Try it first, because it might just be possible to reach the same 'enlightened' state through meditation rather than through a chemical. - Ceridwen
From the above website:
Dangers
Purely psychological hazards, not harmful to body. May release latent psychosis or exacerbate depression, leading to irrational behavior. There is also a danger of foolish or incautious behavior, e.g, misjudging distances or thinking one can fly. Physical overdose is not a hazard, though one may easily ingest more than one may be able to handle psychologically.
For us liberal arts majors or fans of philosophy and the question of existence, does anyone advocate experimentation with LSD, purely to free the mind so to speak and gain a new perspective? I'm all confused.
I wouldn’t recommend doing anything besides the isolation tank. But you know the hypocrisy in all of this LSD drug war? A little birdy told me, if you go to your local pharmacy and get a bottle of Robotussin Cough and drink the whole thing, it gives the user similar experiences to LSD – which I also don’t recommend doing. It is completely legal. In fact, you can buy Dextromethorphan off the internet in KG legally. And the little birdy also told me that drinking a bottle of cough syrup will kill your brain and liver much quicker than all the LSD you can handle. --GoNZo
Check out this link to an interview with RamDass, where Ram Dass speaks about his experiences with drugs as a way to free one's mind from its myriad imprisonments. ~E
"I'm a golden god." ~ Almost Famous
~Peep
I completely agree. While running through this book, I considered trying LSD, not for the trip, but more for the reprogramming that Leary discusses...
(pssst.... you can't separate one from the other...)E
...I'm torn between these two ideals. 1.) Are pains/misfortunes/screwups make us who we are. 2.) Reprogramming gives us another chance. It's a toughy, because I have some lingering woes, which I'd like to rewire to allow me to experience certain things again for the first time and inevitably make the better decision. Certainly I wish we could all accomplish this without an outside party, i.e.. the LSD, by reprogramming through internalized discource and thought, but most of the drugs mentioned are natural (found by nature's graces). That is alwys appealing on some level. It's all tricky situations and this one was definitely a compelling read. Call Me Ishmael
Feb 22
So far I am enjoying the Trigger a lot more than Ubik. The theories presented from the early pages are absolutely intriquing, entertaining, exciting, you know, the opposite of Ubik. Anyways, I was particularly fascinated with Clark's Law (26) and Wilson's Corollary to Clarke's Law (27) and the thought of technology and civilizations advanced billions of years beyond our own, and even more so the thought of our planet being some giant (or really small) antfarm of an experiment being conducted from somewhere else, out there. The whole thing really is a mindfuck and I often feel like I'm living in a cloud trying to wrap thought around this stuff.
~Peep
Admittedly, I haven't read past the preface of Trigger, but already in the opening pages the book seems to share a lot with PKD's work (ie the notion of multiple realities, "induced brain change," the human as a composite of bio-information, etc). I'm wondering what your beef w/ Ubik is. I agree with your earlier post that the text induces a kind of dream-like, in-between state in the reader -- but that's a pro, and it's part of what makes Dick so great! I hope the same drug-like effect happens while I'm reading Wilson. Anyway, expand on the negativity toward Ubik if ya want. I'm glad we both like Trigger, at least. -Houdini
I guess I didn't like Ubik because I didn't think it had any real substance, kind of going along the lines of it being a 'fake novel.' Dick succeeds in producing the dream-like in between state, but I am questioning if that's the effect I want then I am reading. I'm thinking that for millions and years, humans have been questioning their reality, their existence (an obvious), asking what's real, what's fake, theorizing about not really seeing, the Allegory of the Cave, same thing: Matrix, and the fact remains, that like Hamlet, we just don't know, and the odds of our generation, one lifetime after a million others who came before us, finding out these answers is absurd. I am not saying we shouldn't question our existence, and if that's what you are citing as the benefit of reading Ubik, then I agree that that is one benefit, but I would just prefer a book that lends some insight or teaches me how to do better, with what I got, this life. What did you enjoy most about Ubik?
As far as Cosmic Trigger is concerned, I feel I like that more because there is no story interwoven, just stories and anecdotes and theories that really entertain the mind, and I can't put it down. I like the author because he at least is something real, someone who is living his life on earth (if indeed that's the reality which he wouldn't say so, I think), someone who in a way scientifically, historically, intelligently talks about life. Let me know what you think. ~Peep
Feb 21
"He felt that his whole life was some kind of dream and he sometimes wondered whose it was and whether they were enjoying it." Douglas Adams
Feb 20
So it goes...
UBIK really has that quality to throw you into a world where a sort of dream is mixed with reality. Do you ever have those dreams where you are like running from something but no matter how fast you run you stand in one place? I just finished reading the scene with Joe struggling to get up the stairs in the hotel, his clothes ripping away like "something wasps fashioned." Dick really captures the essence of this whole ordeal, as I feel myself growing weary just reading a scene like that.
Thruoghout the book, Dick uses the phrase "so it goes," which makes me think (perhaps others drew this obvious connection) about one of my favorite writers, Kurt Vonnegut Jr., this being the phrase he uses many times in Slaughterhouse Five whenever someone dies. Throughout his novels, Vonnegut also creates a fictional writer named Kilgore Trout, who pens many science fiction novels but never (if I remember correctly) receives reconition until he dies. He ends up seeing his sci fi writings in arbitriary places such as between the pages of porn magazines, lining bird cages, etc. The more I think about it, the more I believe Vonnegut probably had a writer such as Dick in mind when creating Kilgore. Anyone know of the two author's relationship?
~Peep
Feb 18
THON is the place to be,
Welcome to the BJC!
Call Me Ishamel, I got moved from Milton to Bellefonte for pre-service teaching!! Time for 8th grade English! You get a placement yet? ~Peep
Brad got moved to Spring Cove school district and that's where I am as well. I got high school! I'm so psyched. Although, it's almost an hour and a half away. Those times are gonna be quite tiring. Call Me Ishamel
Feb 16
One early morning, In the middle of the night,
Two dead guys begin to fight.
Back to back, they faced eachother,
Drew their swords, and shot eachother.
If you don't believe me, ask the blind guy on the corner,
He saw the whole thing!
~Peep
Bigyellow, your love for peeps really shows. As for the American trend you talked about in your post.. I feel the same way. I cannot relax even when I should be relaxing. While I was in Spain, many of the stores would close down for 2-3 hours during the day and all of the American exchange students would get so frustrated because nobody could just chill out and siesta. So many people would just chalk it up to the Spaniards being a lazy culture. Think Society Against the State.. But actually, I read this article just the other day. Why a day without a nap is crap! --Princesspizza
Feb 15
Don't Eat the Yellow Snow
Ahh, that was a nice Valentinesnow Day. What did you do all day? Did you relax...
I didn't, and I really sometimes feel like I can't! I been thinking about a brief comment Mobius made the other day about removing himself or separating himself from the mainstream (word choice?) world, saying so when someone asked if he saw the Superbowl or whatever, and how it really allowed him to begin to think better. He talked about meditating in the Sasaparilla center, and I began thinking how hard it is for me to 'relax' even when I have seemingly nothing to worry about.
For example, right now I have a very lax schedule because I have not yet to begin this semester's main assignment of student teaching. But, even with ample time, I always feel like I should be reading something, should be writing something, should be going to the gym, calling home, emailing Aunt Sue, should be doing a million things. Even over Christmas break, when I had nothing due, nothing to worry about, I still couldn't lay around and just watch tv. Time goes by so quickly because it really seems there aren't enough hours in the day. Does anyone experience what might be an American trend? I just feel like my attention is pulled so many different ways each day, and even with a nice snow day, I couldn't sit still or watch a movie. I fear the meditation room because my brain is so damn loud!
Ok Wiki post done, now on to the next thing, then the next, and the next...
I am thus far enjoying the novel Ubik. I don't really know what a Ubik is per se, and I'm not sure if the novel will eventually explain the idea of Ubik. Right now I am perceiving the Ubik to be pretty much anything, or perhaps the subject of whatever happens to be occupying our attention. I guess Ubik is another 'future' novel, as I think it's taking place in 1992? Anyways, my mind is becoming filled with numerous novels predicting the future, now: Feed, 1984, Brave New World, and now Ubik. What do they have in common? Definitly the paranoia. I think these novels exemplify our society's journey into the information / technology age where everything is becoming smaller and more efficient except for the ammount of information flying around. Thanks to the Internet, nothing is sacred. There may not be telepaths and precogs, but the feeling of people being inside our minds cannot be ignored. For me, the big question comes down to whether or not we can overcome the precognitive predictions. As in Minority Report, once the precogs 'see' Tom Cruise murder the man, he's under arrest, even though he 'knows' he will not commit the crime foreseen. Low and behold, the precog vision comes true, but surely Tom didn't commit the murder (the man grabbed the gun while still in Tom's hand and shot himself). Another flaw in a system of control.
I guess one commentary can be seen as the precogs predicting our powerlessness to this society driven by consumerism. Kind of like, the big precog somewhere is having all these visions of us walking into Abercrombie & Fitch and purchasing these 80 dollar polo shirts. Will these predictions come true, or are we going to have to run to Runciter for some inertials so we can counter the pull of scandily clad college girls in their underwear?
"Thanks to the Internet, I am now bored with sex." ~Fry, Futurama.
~Peep
"Here's more for our ongoing discussion of teens in current news...No more fun at all. Haven't we all felt used at one point? So is the next article going to say... Researchers find it harmful for teens to leave the house. Current researchers in some stupid place discover that teens should not be allowed to leave their house until the world is deemed safe and they will be old enough to actually make mistakes."
Yea I agree, but is there really anyway of knowing? Will something click and our bodies and mind are positively absolutely ready? Just seems like we are never really ready for those kind of experiences. Can never know the unexpected until it actually happens.
About the Society Against the State page, I am not sure how the idea of leisure plays into our everyday. The article talks about primitive society's really enjoying their leisure, doing enough work to just stay alive then allotting the rest of their time to sitting around, eating, smoking, and probably having sex. I didn't think this really sounded all that bad.
This means that once its needs are fully satisfied nothing could induce primitive society to produce more, that is, to alienate its time by working for no good reason when that time is available for idleness, play, warfare, or festivities.
This brings me to the central idea of What is happiness? Why are we in college? Does our society allow us to be happy? I want to share a quick except from a book CallMeIshmael let me borrow, entitled The Lord of the Rings and Philosophy. I thought this chapter was really moving, and I know he did to, cause, well, he underlined it. So both he and I probably find this worth sharing. This specific chapter is entitled "Tolkien's Six Keys to Happiness," by Gregory Basshsm:
Hobbits are merry, good-natured folk who delight in simple pleasures: eating and drinking, pipe-smoking, gardening, wearing brightly colored clothing, attending parties, giving and receiving presents, making simple jests, and gathering at village pubs with friends and neighbors. They live uncomplicated, rustic lives in in "close friendship with the earth" (Fellowship of the Ring, p. 2), dislike complex machinery, have no real government, and enjoy singing simple, comical songs about hot baths and shinbone munching trolls. (The Lords of the Rings and Philosophy, p 50)
Call Me Ishamel : Oh how I agree. It's one of the best expository essays I've ever read.
I know my favorite times echo this passage, and I know the old saying about the best things in life being free is true. How does this relate to the article? Well, the webpage cites the overproduction of material goods leading to a control of those goods, then someone becomeing the master and someone needing to depend on that person for survival. A return to a simple living style may do people some good, and "when the taste for accumulation replaces the sense of leisure" (cite: Society Against the State), something may inherently be wrong? Do you think we work too much? Is our lifestyle becoming too much about the name-brand goods...do we have to blow up our expensive condos and start a Fight Club? I don't know...
Are there cameras in the forum? I think we brought this up in class, so I decided to investigate a little. These pictures are from 102 Forum and I think they are cameras.
After class I asked the professor if they were cameras (the course itself is about communications technology, so he was more than helpful and interested) and he said he wasn't sure, but invited me through the "Staff Only" doors to talk to the tech guy. I asked the tech guy about the cameras and he informed me that "he was just there for the day" then asked "Why do you want to know?" So, I'm thinking they are cameras. For what purpose, I am not sure, but I brought up the possibility to the professor that they could be used to deter cheating, to which he immediately replied "I wouldn't plug them in to anything, Who would monitor all those cameras?"
Just real quick, from Wikipidia, the groundhogs say this:
2007
6 more weeks of winter — Jimmy the Groundhog, Holtsville Hal
Early Spring — Punxsutawney Phil, Staten Island Chuck, Wiarton Willie, Shubenacadie Sam and General Beauregard Lee of Georgia, Malverne Mel
~Peep
Jan 31
RFID Chips In Penn State Student IDs...Class Attendance Soars or Enrollment Down, RFID Student IDs Flop
My RFID plan involves putting censors in the doorways of each classroom on Penn State's campus that automatically email the professor who has class in that room during a specific period, telling the professor exactly whose chips passed through those doors (and back out after class was over). No one goes to a class with 800 people in it. Why should they? Now...attendance grades! Professors are able to speak to so many students at one time (valuable information!), and the professor is sure the student is present...why? This baby.
With professors now knowing if students are in the large class, students show up, do well, earn good grades, and Penn State's average GPA increases...hello $$ for the institution!! Also, the press would be great, and more people would come to this fine university. Students could simply have a friend (or hired person, hello up and coming businesses) take their ID to class with them, but at such a large university, this could prove difficult. Also, bars downtown can secretly install similar RFID scanners (I usually carry my PSU iD in my wallet, don't you?) to monitor the downtown, therefore lessening crime and helping students feel more secure (come to think of it, should we just install these RFID chips right into our drivers licenses...I mean, we HAVE to bring that ID to the bar...) Oh the possibilities...
or
What do you mean they monitor if we go or don't go to class! I pay a ton of money to attend this university, and it is my damn choice to attend or not attend class! I don't want people knowing where I go at night! I'm a private person, and it's my right to be 'free.'
~Peep
Jan 30
Securing the Internet
Instant communication for all! What a weapon. Take some time and read this article about terrorists and the Internet. I feel that the need for the government to at least try to secure something as large and exponentially expanding as the Internet is a worthy cause, especially when the above article cites the number of terrorist websites jumping from less than 100 to more than 4000 in the pass ten years. And those are the ones we know about. What is scary is how the Internet itself can be seen as a weapon of mass destruction, a tool that allows the terrorists to post propaganda, recruit, train, and scheme (CITE: the above article).
To me it is comforting to know that our US government is 'monitoring' some 5,000 jihadi websites, though they closely watch a small number of these—less than 100—that are deemed the most hostile. The real scary part is the thought regarding how many websites are our there that no one knows about.
Like any new technology, we must harness it, because although the Internet is so good and revolutionary, allowing instant information about anything from Shakespeare to Babe Ruth to World War II to N Sync, the good and revolutionary also invites evil, and for that reason our generation and the people of this specific time in the history of the planet Earth must take it upon themselves to learn and secure this new profound technology.
~Peep
Jan 28
Don't tell me what I can or can't do when I'm rocking!
From PrincessPizza's post about RFID'd pets, I just want to say that my dog deserves the same freedoms as any other American, and I don't want the government knowing where he goes at all times, burying bones, cavorting with neighbor dogs, doing his business. If he does so happen to get lost, I guess he's just up to some secret scheme, and if that's the life he wants, then he deserves the right to choose! And if he gets kidnapped, Rudy is trained in the martial arts, and he will prevail.
Sweet JC they could be anywhere!!! This is in immediate response to Houdini's AE RFID post. The chips are so damn small (a grain of rice) that once this technology gets rolling I don't know how we are going to stop it. Perhaps already these chips are everywhere...Perhaps some crazy government RFID scheme is putting them in our cereal...they could know EVERYTHING!
If you have the time and want to indulge in some adolescent literature, read M.T. Anderson's FEED. It's basically about the future, and how everyone has this tiny chip (the Feed) in their brains that tells them everything that they want to buy, watch, and do. The author dedicates the book to "Those who resist the Feed..." I ponder who can resist the Feed, the constant bombardment of information day after day. It is crazy. The RDIF revolution is upon us. In many ways, it has started years ago. Information comes so fast, like really really from a thousand directions fast. Is there any stopping it??
If anyone wants to borrow said book, let me know.
Shameless Plug...
This week starting Monday, the PSU Tunnel of Oppression will be open for all in the Heritage Hall of the HUB. Go check it out. Take a walk through. Will be well worth your time between classes.
The Tunnel basically is, well, a tunnel, of information, exhibits, statistics, etc. that target different oppressed groups (you name it, they prob got it.) Lots of hard work has gone into the tunnel this year, so take advantage of this great PSU opportunity.
~Peep
Jan 25
Punterz,TOSers, and my Limited Hax0r Experiences
Does anyone remember the old AOL? It may have been version 3.1 or something? Anyways, those were the glory days. Being a kid and being granted Internet access is a scary thing. My first Internet experience included going on a website and downloading sound clips from Pinky and the Brain. Oh, how the doors were opened.
My main point: The old AOL had proggies called punters. (I remember one of my favorites being called Boot Final..haha)? You guys remember these? Basically they were programs that sent a string of html code through an instant message causing another user to recieve an error and be kicked offline. And remember, this meant having to go through the tedious and loud dial-up process to regain access to the internet...mmm..the 56k modem... Oh, it was wonderful... Another prog was the TOSer (Terms of Service...er) which attempted to somehow mimic another user sending email asking another user for his or her password, therefore having AOL admins (if there were many) ban the targeted account.
As for Social Engineering, there were Phishers...programs that send a series of IMs to everyone in a chatroom pretending to be AOL admin asking the person for their password. I did this once or twice...It worked on about 1 out of 15 people or so. I popped on some other's accounts, but what the hell was I going to do?
Eventually AOL found out about some of these Punter files on my computer while my dad was on the phone with them troubleshooting some computer problem. My account was banned, and that was the end of AOL as our ISP. I don't miss it. Does anyone? Narf!
~Peep
------WOW. This was Hilarious Peep! Definitely made my morning worthwhile. Call Me Ishamel -----
Jan 23 2007
Castes by Science...Media by castes?
In Huxley's Brave New World, people are engineered into specific castes, the Alpha's being the smartest and best looking, down to the Epsilons who are ugly and dumb. I was just trying to apply thinking to the wiki as a medium.
Something like, all Gammas are only to compose on tattered notebook paper. Their words are not important, and they can't write very well anyways, so notebooks for them. The Gammas are banned from the Internet.
All Betas can compose with a word processor, may share their work but only among other Betas. No Internet access is given to the Betas.
The Alphas can compose on the Wiki. Their minds are so great that we encourage their ideas to spawn other ideas, therefore improving their caste as a whole. All Alphas have access to the Wikis, the ultimate medium of the future.
Then one day, all of a sudden, every caste has access to the Wikis (after perhaps a revolution and surge of intense technological training). Does this help society as a whole, or do the Epsilons and Deltas simply write about the shortcomings of the Alphas, or better yet, constantly alter their Wikis or delete their thoughts?
Is our society ready for the Wiki as the medium?
-----Pretty soon this whole evolution pic will be changed to include The Hobbit. Seriously...check the news. Call Me Ishamel -----
The Shift to the Information Age
This is from: Schement, Jorge Reina and Curtis, Terry, (1995/1997) Tendencies and Tensions of the Information Age: The Production and Consumption of Information in the United States, New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Publications.
The resources are so pervasive and influential that it is now becoming clear the United States is moving into a new era -- the information age. Ours is the first nation to complete the three-stage shift from an agricultural society to an industrial one and to a society whose new patterns are only now emerging.
At its briefest, this is the gist of the post-industrial position. The prevalence of information related activities seems to prove that a revolutionary social change has taken place. In The Coming of Post-Industrial Society, Bell identified 11 transformations occurring in the 1950s and '60s, and proposed that their interplay was reweaving the American social fabric into a post-industrial society.
The shape of the new society: 1) The centrality of theoretical knowledge -- will become the primary source for inventions, as big science institutionalized the process of innovation; 2) The creation of a new intellectual technology -- experts can now exploit computers to make use of mathematical techniques to construct algorithms, models, and simulations, for the purpose of engineering more efficient and rational solutions to economic, material, and even social problems; 3) The spread of a knowledge class -- will emerge from the ranks of the rapidly growing technical and professional work force; 4) The change from goods to services -- by 1970, the U.S. had evolved into an economy where 6.5 out of every 10 workers were engaged in the provision of services; 5) A change in the character of work -- in post-industrial society, work will primarily be a game against people, human behavior, and facing completely new and unparalleled circumstances; 6) The role of women -- in post-industrial society the nature of service work will expand their employment opportunities, providing women with the basis for economic independence; 7) Science as imago -- the practice of science will become more bureaucratized and tied to the payoffs derived from its applications; 8) Situses as political units. -- political and social conflicts of the future will arise amidst the new social groupings created from within the service sector, possibly even preventing class formation among the new technocrats; 9) Meritocracy -- a more efficient and rational society will reward education and skill at the expense of inheritance and property; 10) The end of scarcity[?] (his punctuation) -- post-industrial society will place new scarcities of information and time alongside the old scarcities of material resources, causing even more complex problems of efficient allocation; 11) The economics of information -- there will be a growing need for cooperative strategies to insure the optimal distribution of knowledge in society.
~Peep
Jan 22 2007
On the Wiki proposal...
One of the first things students of a university should do is become comfortable with evolving technologies. For our generation, this means the Internet, and more specifically, the Blog, the website, file storage, online forms / buying online etc. The idea of the wiki in regards to composition courses is most beneficial because of the immediate access to all papers in a class. My Eng 15 course consisted of peer editing periods, which were less than helpful. Peer editing is very tricky, and a lot goes into it: why should I believe anything these kids are saying? Am I not the strongest writer in this group? You corrected my grammar? Thanks for letting me know I have to change its to it's.
The wiki allows immediate suggestion / criticism. But... students must learn what to look for or how to properly evaluate others' papers. Do students even care about making constructive suggestions to their peers? How many papers in a wiki based comp. course are students required to look at / comment on? All of them? Logistically, the course would have to be very wiki specific. In writing or on a wiki, the same concerns for me exist, the largest being the aforementioned suggestion that students (especially inexperienced Freshmen Eng 15 minds) really have no idea how to use writing in order to improve another's writing.
The proposal is interesting in what it regards at the benefits. "Upon graduation, students will be called upon to write and communicate in primarily digital environments." How true. I believe all curricula should be practical. The wiki allows at least for young students to encounter compositional methods that are digital. My fear as a wiki professor would be the lack of cooperation, the ability to anonymously slander ie "Your paper was just plain awful." It probably was...but what benefit does that statement give to a student? I want to continue pondering this method and report back later. ~Peep
Is there a such thing as Wiki Ethics? Is it a silent code, or is the lack of such a code what makes a wiki a wiki? I mean, can't anyone create a sort of wiki anarchy by simply going crazy and deleting all that's already written? I'm struggling to grasp this wiki concept. I know you can easily save text. But if someone keeps erasing, do you keep re-posting? Are there Wiki Wars? Have people's experiences with the Wiki been positive, or comment on this persisting thought of a sort of (what I perceive as of now) orderlessness that accompanies the wiki... ~Peep
One more thought: I look forward to seeing how this course 'plays out' with the wiki format. I'm not new to blogging, but new to wiki. Let the games begin..hiiiooooo!
Assignment Recap.doc
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