Just something I found...

This is a cute segment I heard while scanning the radio this weekend - I guess it was on WHMP. It's called Typography and author Tom Pappalardo did something much like we will be working on in the next few weeks - but his is all about the snobbery of 'typeface'. I thought it was cute and I can appreciate the work that goes in to making a segment like this, so I thought I would share.

Also, he tweeted me back when I asked about the segment being posted online. So that's pretty cool too. :)

Check it out!

Audio B&G Intro Response

Using Audacity, I recorded and made an MP3 of my response for class today. Check it!

Trial Audacity Project

So, we had to take two audio samples and put them together using a program called Audacity.
I used two databases and picked a random, publicly owned (I think is the term) song by a band called My Morning Jacket (that sounds really familiar, I think I might have read about them in 'Nothing Feels Good' which I read forever ago in high school). I really liked the intro to the song I heard and ended up using that as a backdrop (a cool, funky backdrop) to...a Shakespeare Sonnet! #18 - the most popular, but it puts a whole new spin to a 'summers day'.

Check it out, enjoy!

18 + Groove

-Kate

W 9/23

Test Link to Sound File

B&G Introduction

This reading, the start of a much larger book I believe, was a very interesting read about my peers and our roles in technology today. The author is writing to an audience about twenty-years older than I am, and talks about the University-aged students as 'Digital Natives'. We are the ones who cannot separate ourselves from our real and online lives, do not serve under multiple identities, and Tweet as easily as we text...and not so easily as speaking on the phone. I think my parents did me a great service asking me to use the phone as well as handwriting thank you notes growing up because I feel like I have the skills to differentiate myself in these two departments. I mesh myself through online profiles, seeking out common bonds with my real friends who I've connected through via Facebook, but it is certainly scary to think about privacy and who else can see these facts. We were taught at an early age about 'Stranger Danger' and how important it is to keep ourselves safe online, but as we become adults I feel that these Dangers have slipped out of mind. The internet and user sites should not be as forgiving as we believe - anyone can sign up for them and we can friend anyone who may not have the proper intentions always. I think it's important to remind our generation that maybe we should only be friends online with people we can trust in real life. Screening acquaintances and releasing contact information which could be screened as well might be in our best interest as well. This introduction also mentions how my generation impresses, scares, and annoys those older than us, and I think it is something that should be brought to our attention. My next thought is, well who should teach this? We don't live in a society where etiquette is taught in schools (although my 3rd grade teacher would beg differently), but perhaps it should be a regulation of Universities to require ways to protect ourselves online (c'mon OIT - more posters, please!!) as well as within the major, be given skills to connect with the written world. I think every major other than English requires their Junior Writing class how to correct sentences and create cover-letters, maybe the English Dept. should offer How-to-Not-Write-on-a-Computer classes as well. Our generation needs to take the ear buds out of our ears and smile and talk with others, but it is so embraced amongst my peers, perhaps we are too far gone.

Baron, Wesch, and Powers Reflection for 9/21

For this class we were assigned to read this, watch this, and read this. Just like that, I've connected you all to my source of information. Now go watch it yourself...just kidding. The point of the video was to show how the digital age as transformed us. How quickly we are able to edit and improvise apart from a pen & paper and how comfortable it is to spread information through computers. And in practice, I am able to transform my ideas in to a blogs (did you know that a new blog is born ever 30 seconds? crazy!). The creator of the video used type, and visual media to portray his voice through these changes in media. Similarly, Powers wrote his essay using his voice as well, and didn't even touch the keys of a computer. Using voice recognition, he is able to speak his entire thought process at up to speeds of 300 words per minute, faster than any of us can write by hand or typing! I know when I type, I write sentences that have formulated well in my head. It is much like the way I speak, but to transfer thoughts to the screen take a little bit of careful, 'Does this sound right?' planning. Thinking before I speak...which doesn't happen in the real world. This author is able to draft a book through speaking, giving himself raw unaltered ideas to edit in the future. There is something organic about this process, almost like a psychology experiment, yet I could see to some how he is not considered a writer. The Baron piece focus on societies' transition to the digital era. We can only move forward, like this piece suggests, with acceptance of change and the ability to try something new. However strange speak-writing and digital link-age might be to technology, it seems important to accept the change and move forward to allow us to learn much more.

Assignment One - Brainstorming Ideas

We are going to be using audacity to record a short essay on our own technology autobiography. My original idea was to speak about how my grandparents - surprisingly both on my mom & dads' sides were influences in greater technological learning. Directly, my Grampa Bond always was showing my mom, I assume, bits and pieces from his job as a camera operator for KETV Omaha. He was the first one out of our family members to get a computer, get online, use a cell phone, and use a webcam. What ever sweet new gadget was found online would ultimately be a Christmas gift the following season. He instilled in my mother the ability to use a computer proficiently, and being the type of person who had to do EVERYTHING my mom did, I was hooked as well. My other set of Grandparents couldn't use a computer to save their lives, but they always had a CB Radio hooked up for those long car rides. I thought it was such an odd piece of technology to be using...especially able to use in the car! They did not use it for complex tasks other than getting directions or listening to traffic patterns from the truckers on the interstate, but I did think it was a cool piece of technology.

Some of the other things to think about are:
-The roles technology plays in my life
-Popular gadgets in the house
-What does it mean to be technologically literate & who is the most technologically literate person I know?
-My technological literacy compared to others (pshh there's a master right here.)
-What items do I carry with me/want the most? (all I see in my mind is a giant APPLE. brainwashed much? In my defense they do have the swankiest items around)
-What technological problems do I see arising in the future?

This assignment should be an anecdote or  story, something about me which I'm pretty good at. It reminds me of the project I had in Earth Science my freshman year of High School - an audio project on Elephant communication. Mr. Flight said I had a wonderful 'radio voice' and I will be excited to put it to use...6 years later.

Yay for projects! We'll have to see what I end up with a few days down the line.

Response on technology in society from Bruce & Hogan reading

A line from this article which really surprised me and shaped the way I read the rest of the article fame from page nine, suggesting the audience think about how technology is used to accomplish goals and how those decisions can liberate or oppress a society. I think at this modern age, technology is moving so rapidly forward that there is no question whether it is a positive or negative transformation - it just happens and we adapt as a society. As also mentioned in this article, society starts to accept new technologies, as done over centuries, and sometimes new items just become tools of everyday living. Think about how some strange thing we used as a kid (maybe like this mechanical pencil right next to me) has become so routine we no longer need to distinguish what kind of writing utensil we need - this is simply a 'pencil'. How has this integration to our society either liberate or oppress us? Are we free to think whatever we want about our comfortabilty with tools, there is no second guessing why we are using it or how we came to be? Or are we oppressed because we do not have a choice - technology enforces standards?

This is a little bit like the computer in schools example from Bruce & Hogan - teachers now expect any homework outside of class do be done on the computer, assuming everyone has access to a computer. Perhaps in inner-city schools or rural locations this is still not the case. Those communities might resort to a community location, such as a library, to access a word-processor while so many others have multiple computers in their own homes. Even though technology is moving forward, it is requiring people of all different classes to do the same when those resources aren't always available. This is oppressive because class mobilization won't be possible without skills to move, and without the tools to obtain those skills, it is still a setback. However, liberating, is the institutions which encourage the underprivileged to obtain those resources whichever way possible (maybe this is seen through financial aid?).

Response on literacy to Brandt reading

Genna May, compared to her grandson Michael May, shows how different and relevant literacy was to their own lives in different generations. For Genna, her greatest accomplishments were receiving a certificate at the University level for learning typing and penmanship. There never seemed to be a stress in her family to write or read much more than what was needed for work. As a child, Genna was not influenced by her parents to read or write, even commenting that paper and books were not in abundance at her household. Even though she progressed to the University level, Genna was using her skills late in life to “record recipes, balance her checkbook, and send holiday…greetings to family members,” (73).

She is shown in contrast to her grandson, just a few years old at the same time Genna was described doing these tasks, learning with magnetic letters under the care of his parents. Genna’s grandson was involved with writing to community leaders (even when in elementary school) and eventually worked on a home computer, being taught how to messages on it. Their story talks about the differences between Genna growing up in a rural community where it was more important to work than be well rounded to the next generation living in the suburbs and acquiring different skills. They both used skills in communication, while Michael was brought up to learn in new forms (such as the letter magnets, computers, and in social situations), Genna only had a few resources to work from (assignments from teachers, some typing, practical/household use).

This contrast helped to show that learning a variety of skills, at a younger age, helps to advance literacy skills. The BabyBoomers and older have trouble adapting to technology as fast as their children because we are used to a new idea and playing with it. We have so many inventions and ways to communicate now that the older generation never played with growing up. Brandt’s studies do examine socioeconomic differences as well as generational differences, but it comes down to what advances have been made in the field, more particularly inventions and accessibility to those new gadgets, and how quickly society can adapt them to our own use.