Archive for the 'Identity' Category

Digital democracy: Where’s your voice?

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Published on May 2, 2008 in Utopia, Video, Identity, Digital literacy, Usercontrols and Technology. 1 Comment Print This Post Email This Post

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“The job of a citizen is to keep his mouth open.”
- Gunter Grass

Gunter Grass’ message is especially critical to those early-to-late majority users (i.e., everybody) who may not know the value or importance of their voice in the battle for a many-to-many democratic internet.

This post seeks to address why this is with resources and activities designed specifically for early-late majority users to find and use their voice for digital democracy.

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Social networking and social class: Survey

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Published on April 29, 2008 in Equity, Community, Identity, Social software and Technology. 3 Comments Print This Post Email This Post

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For those who have experienced inequity on the wrong side of the social and digital divide, social networking sites may not be experienced in quite the same way as those who enjoy material privilege and/or stability. In this sense, webby fun is relative to inclusivity. Especially in spaces that are not designed according to our actual identities, values, beliefs and experiences but the value of our consumer demographic data.

[FULL STORY continued below]

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Second Skin: a new movie about MMOs

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Published on January 29, 2008 in videogames, gaming, Society, Identity and Classroom2.0. 1 Comment Print This Post Email This Post

Check out the trailer for Second Skin, a new documentary about massively multiplayer online gamers. As a gaming-positive educator, I was also excited to see my friend and colleague Tony Walsh, make an appearance in the film. From Tony’s blog:

“Since 2006, I’ve been following the adventures of the team at Pure West–filmmakers researching and journaling MMO game culture for a documentary which would come to be called Second Skin. The team’s blog gave a behind-the-scenes look at the trials of the documentarians and their evolving subject-matter, but I was fortunate enough to meet the filmmakers first-hand during one of their many journeys across the U.S., Canada, and overseas. These guys weren’t just trying to cash in on the swelling interest in MMOs, or exploit players as objects of curiosity or ridicule–it was clear their mission was to seek out and reveal some compelling human stories at the intersection of real and virtual worlds.

Admittedly, I’m a console gamer although I recently enjoyed playing Wolfquest (an educational game that teaches kids about … you guessed it: life as a wolf!)

Social network profiles and “taste”

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Published on November 13, 2007 in Identity, Social software and Meta. 0 Comments Print This Post Email This Post

As social networking becomes more and more popular, I am increasingly curious about the accountability of user-selected signifiers as an authentic thin slice of identity. As an aesthetically-inclined person, I’ve always been interested in the notion of “taste” - specifically, who and what defines it and what it really says about who we are. Additionally, how does that investment change according to age and identity formation?

For example, if I list Ulysses as a favourite book, am I a Joyce lover or a pretentious snob? According to Hugo Liu, a researcher of digital aesthetic theory, the aesthetics of our self representation are predominantly defined by our investments in social and cultural capital.

“Why does one like what one likes? According to the literature reviewed below, one’s tastes are influenced both by socioeconomic and aesthetic factors. Socioeconomic factors—such as money, social class, and education—can shape tastes, because access to cultural goods may require possession of these various forms of capital. Aesthetic factors—such as paradigms of personality (e.g., degree of sarcasm), sentiment (e.g., utopian versus dystopian), and identity (e.g., degree of fashionableness)—define motifs toward which one’s tastes may gravitate.”