http://www.planetseed.com/relatedarticle/tragedy-commons
As we learned in class, the Tragedy of the Commons occurs when one individual or a group of individuals acts in ways that are logical in terms of achieving personal goals with no regard for how they will hurt the commons as a whole. Since it is impossible to balance personal and common interests, this always has a negative effect on the common good. In the article attached, there are three outlined modern examples of Tragedies of the Commons. These examples helped me understand this concept a lot better as well as opening my eyes to how often we are faced with choices that can either help or hurt the people we share our communities with. I also liked the way the article recognized the reason so many people produce tragedies of the commons. The author claims that it is because when looking out for personal interests, immediate results are seen and experienced by the individual, whereas acts in favor of the common interest do not show positive results right away and may not affect the individual ever. This can be seen in professional sports when an athlete chooses to use PED’s (performance enhancing drugs). The player acts with an intention to help themselves and their career, without considering the negative results they could produce for their team and their league, as well as the reputations and integrity of the other athletes in their sport.
Thursday, October 1, 2015
Why #BeSocialBeSafe and Other Social Media Movements Have Such Potential
Farmhouse Fraternity's first promotional video for their 2015 #BeSocialBeSafe campaign.
Scrolling through Facebook earlier this week, I came upon a refreshingly meaningful, substantive post that has really hit home with me. Out of recent tragedy in their immediate community, Farmhouse Fraternity at the University has launched a social media campaign focused on the dangers of the overconsumption of alcohol and on redefining the culture that surrounds drinking in college. Being a member of the Greek community myself and an individual who worries about others to overly extreme extents, I'm a huge supporter of this. I have my own hesitations about its capacity for success, but in beginning to recognize the impact of social media in other matters significant to humanity, I can really get on board. #BeSocialBeSafe has the potential to make a difference on our campus, and even beyond, because it follows the trend of many broader campaigns and, even in its earliest breeding grounds, has the right aims and motivations to make an impact.
I think it can be easy to doubt the power of the age of social media. How can a few videos, a catchy hashtag, and a of couple posts per week possibly cause change in the grand scheme of things, let alone revolutionary ones? Although in an extremely early stage of its lifespan, the #BeSocialBeSafe campaign is kairotic-- that is, it has come at an opportune time to address its aims. The recent death of a beloved member of the house has provided an exigence for the organization to take matters into their own hands. This is not a new method of provoking social change, but rather can be seen in comparison to other, more global movements, and provide predictions for the possible ends to be achieved by it.
A significant realization that has come out of my recent focus on the nature of hashtags and social media campaigns is the way in which most are developed. #RefugeesWelcome, #BringBackOurGirls, and #HeForShe are some of the most powerful uses of the hashtag in the past year. Their overwhelming success (based on general response and majority actions that extend beyond the world of social media) highlight what seems to be a pretty simple process, one that I predict will also be true in the case of Farmhouse’s campaign. It looks something like this:
The existence of a problem in real life--whether the Syrian refugee crisis this past September, the inequality of men in women, or the overconsumption of alcohol leading to the worst possible scenario-- has been cause for the creation of social media campaigns that allow people to voice their own opinions as individuals but also to come together to create a larger meaning. This form of democratic iteration has defined what hashtags and these kinds of campaigns can be. Following suit from the motivation or disturbance of what is promoted through the movements has come real life action that has the ability to change the lives of those targeted people or ideas. Nationwide relief efforts, public conferences, and the challenging of a socially-accepted notion of sociality are just a few of these, with multitudes of possibilities associated. These hashtags have brought together individuals from across the world regarding their perspectives on specific concerns, and provide points of common interest to begin to initiate social change.
The Farmhouse #BeSocialBeSafe campaign speaks to those who drink and those who don't, to those in Greek life and beyond it. It is providing a grounds for a new type of conversation surrounding our culture of alcohol and socialization. This movement provides a local example of the way in which hashtags and more general social media campaigns are able to impact the world in real ways, beyond our screens. As individuals, we have a platform to start the conversation that is unlike any that have ever been presented in all of history. And that is pretty dang sweet.
Memes and Parody
While covering the meaning and influence that Memes have in communication, we learned that Memes can be quickly passed from one person to another, can be reproduced according to context, and can influence how collaboration occurs between the audience. Apart from affecting how communication happens, Memes guide people by allowing them express and to experience real life and their emotions through the creation and modification of Memes.
In class our professor quoted that "Memes are culturally equivalent to genes". Memes allow people to express themselves because they are in the language of people. Memes have a sense of humor and humor is the language of people. Less people connect to newpapers because the language is not in the form of humor. The language of newspaper is more formal, comes in more complete sentences, and focuses more on informing the audience.
In class we also discussed the concept of enthymeme. Enthymeme is bringing forward an argument while leaving a premise out. This lets the audience modify the Meme by allowing them to add to it. Adding to them illustrates how Memes are an expression of their life and emotions. Memes can only be understood when the person modifying it understands what came before.
The audience of the memes can be anyone, but these focuse more to UNL students and faculty.
1. https://www.facebook.com/UNLmemes/photos/pb.142369825883411.-2207520000.1443759700./154012278052499/?type=3&theater
This meme shows emotion. The guy has a facial expression of "oh shit". Many students have missed blackboard deadlines while they are out. Procrastination is common among college students. Modifying this meme allows students to relate on a personal level - the feeling of forgetting to submit an assignment on blackboard.
2. https://www.facebook.com/UNLmemes/photos/pb.142369825883411.-2207520000.1443759700./275938875859838/?type=3&theater
Many city campus students can relate to this mean. When having to go to east campus for a class or two throughout the week, many students feel like they are in the middle of nowhere. They describe most people who are from east campus to being hicks or farmers, and that not much happens "over there".
These two memes are examples on how memes are humorous (you have to understand the background information in order to get it), are modified, and allows the audience (UNL students in this example) to connect with the meme on a personal level, resulting in further modification and sharing.
The 13 theses at college
Look around a college campus. So much diversity. People speaking so many different languages. Things in common with these different languages are conveyed in the thirteen theses.
Think about the conversations you hear throughout the day...what are the ones that you remember the most? Gossip, stories, news, lectures? This follows along with theses 1 and 2 as they convey the saying, "You are what you attend to."The ones that you remember most are the ones that you probably are around everyday and how you go about living your life.
When you are in a conversation with others around you do you notice one who always buts into someone else's story to link it back to something they did. It gets really annoying right? Well they are just trying to compete for the attention of group. (theses 3&4) It happens in everyday life and I'm pretty sure we have all experienced it.
Pictures that have so much stuff in them that no one can tell what is supposed to be the main focus of the picture are available to anyone. Same goes with media. There can be so much information in one mediation that the audience can not interpret what the author wanting to convey. There are also authors who give a message to others just to attract the attention because they feel that they need the attention to live out there lives. (theses 5&6)
Everyone who follows social media can relate to have something pop up that they click on to see what other information is available through the link. The internet is so advanced that it can recognize what you browse more to make available to you through the social media of your choice. These 'suggested' links can be seen as distractions to the reasons you are using your social media (theses7&8)
Linking back to the example of authors sending a message out just for attention, the internet and social media has made this situation explode. When a message is posted on social media it can be linked to people all over the world, which can attract lots of attention from many different audiences. (theses 9)
Think about the conversations you hear throughout the day...what are the ones that you remember the most? Gossip, stories, news, lectures? This follows along with theses 1 and 2 as they convey the saying, "You are what you attend to."The ones that you remember most are the ones that you probably are around everyday and how you go about living your life.
When you are in a conversation with others around you do you notice one who always buts into someone else's story to link it back to something they did. It gets really annoying right? Well they are just trying to compete for the attention of group. (theses 3&4) It happens in everyday life and I'm pretty sure we have all experienced it.
Pictures that have so much stuff in them that no one can tell what is supposed to be the main focus of the picture are available to anyone. Same goes with media. There can be so much information in one mediation that the audience can not interpret what the author wanting to convey. There are also authors who give a message to others just to attract the attention because they feel that they need the attention to live out there lives. (theses 5&6)
Everyone who follows social media can relate to have something pop up that they click on to see what other information is available through the link. The internet is so advanced that it can recognize what you browse more to make available to you through the social media of your choice. These 'suggested' links can be seen as distractions to the reasons you are using your social media (theses7&8)
Linking back to the example of authors sending a message out just for attention, the internet and social media has made this situation explode. When a message is posted on social media it can be linked to people all over the world, which can attract lots of attention from many different audiences. (theses 9)
Memes
Many people do not know that memes originated in 1976 when Richard Dawkins, a British evolutionary biologist, used it to explain the spread of ideas being passed down form culture to culture. Now we see memes as pictures with funny words on them. We use them as a way to communicate with others without even thinking about it.
Many people share memes just because they think they are funny. I share memes with my friends because I think they will also think it is funny. All memes have a background that you have to understand to get the comedy in the meme. This meme (as creepy as it may be) can communicate different things with different people. If you had a background of posting a lot of memes and you posted this one, you could be (creepily) trying to tell a girl to "hit you up." Personally I take this meme as a creepy guy with a giraffe neck but that girl might take it as an invitation to message you. We all have a different outlook on things and therefore, every meme has a different communicative capability.
Political memes could persuade you to think the same as the politician or could just simply make fun of a politician. Although the picture itself has nothing to do with what could be actually going on, the words make you think otherwise. The words on the picture is what makes a meme.
Richard Dawkins communicated memes as a way to pass ideas down from culture to culture and with simple words on a picture, Americans are able to communicate with one another in a rather comedic way. We are able to share various memes with each other passing them down from culture to culture as Dawkins first suggested.
Memes: Pope Francis and Star Wars
In our discussion in class today we learned that memes often have deeper meanings within them than is often noticed at first glance. Over the past few years memes have become a very powerful tool in regards to understanding and discussing politics, current events, and everyday life. They have given internet users a new medium to express their opinions and do so almost instantaneously with the world.
In recent current events, Pope Francis met with Kim Davis, the Kentucky county clerk that refused marriage licenses to gay couples. This meeting between the two was extremely surprising and shocked a lot of people in the United States and the world. Pope Francis has been known for his more liberal perspectives regarding the Catholic church, although not changing Catholic doctrine. He was quoted when asked where he stood on homosexuality as saying "Who am I to judge". This was also a surprising meeting because Kim Davis is very protestant and in the course of history protestants and catholics have never really gotten along, to put it lightly.
The meme below refers to Star Wars III: Revenge of the Sith when Anakin betrays Obi-Wan, joins the dark side and becomes Darth Vader. The line that was written above this meme was "How I felt when Pope Francis met with Kim Davis".
In the Shifman reading, Shifman writes about what makes a video memorable and why certain videos receive a lot of views. We can also relate this to memes. Shifman writes that humor, simplicity and repetitiveness play a large role in what makes something popular. This can also be applied to memes such as this one. This meme has a very laughable aspect about it, it's relatively simple (assuming the audience knows where the meme originates) and it is repetitive because this meme has been used countless times to refer to different events. It also has a deeper meaning regarding how some people felt about the meeting between Pope Francis and Kim Davis.
In recent current events, Pope Francis met with Kim Davis, the Kentucky county clerk that refused marriage licenses to gay couples. This meeting between the two was extremely surprising and shocked a lot of people in the United States and the world. Pope Francis has been known for his more liberal perspectives regarding the Catholic church, although not changing Catholic doctrine. He was quoted when asked where he stood on homosexuality as saying "Who am I to judge". This was also a surprising meeting because Kim Davis is very protestant and in the course of history protestants and catholics have never really gotten along, to put it lightly.
The meme below refers to Star Wars III: Revenge of the Sith when Anakin betrays Obi-Wan, joins the dark side and becomes Darth Vader. The line that was written above this meme was "How I felt when Pope Francis met with Kim Davis".
In the Shifman reading, Shifman writes about what makes a video memorable and why certain videos receive a lot of views. We can also relate this to memes. Shifman writes that humor, simplicity and repetitiveness play a large role in what makes something popular. This can also be applied to memes such as this one. This meme has a very laughable aspect about it, it's relatively simple (assuming the audience knows where the meme originates) and it is repetitive because this meme has been used countless times to refer to different events. It also has a deeper meaning regarding how some people felt about the meeting between Pope Francis and Kim Davis.
The Art of Swearing in Movies
As a film student, and movie buff, it's my opinion that nothing makes or breaks a movie quicker than its dialogue.
Yes, the plot can be illogical and obnoxious. Yes, your lead actors could be awful. But beyond the obvious, it's good dialogue in movies that can mean the difference between success and failure.
Now, swearing in films--especially excessively--can be considered crass and unnecessary by some; others, however, may see it as simply another vernacular set within a film's certain setting. But no matter your views on cursing, one thing is certain: it's vital to the success of a film.
By this I mean, if a character swears excessively, or perhaps not at all, we as the audience are given valuable insight into who the character is as a person.
As we learned in class, curse words have meaning, history and intent behind them. For instance, when you call someone a bitch, you're likening that person to a female dog meant for breeding. So wouldn't it be a logical conclusion that if a character does or does not use these words that their choice is also a part of their intended message they're trying to send?
For example, "Pulp Fiction" is Quentin Tarantino's 1994 cult hit and almost everyone can quote at least one line from the film. The movie is famous for its violence, style and rampant swearing. Jules, played by Samuel L. Jackson, is best remembered in most viewers minds from the scene above. In the scene, Jules is toying with a young man who's betrayed Jules' boss, crimelord Marsellus Wallace. During the encounter, Jules, naturally, swears excessively while the young man being interrogated never does. The purpose of this it that it helps establish a power relationship between the two characters. Jules, by swearing and calling the kid names like "motherfucker," is setting himself apart as the more intimidating, stronger and more alpha-male of the pair.
Thinking back to earlier in our class when we learned about the communication model of sender-receiver, we learn that when we're being given a message we first encode/decode what is being given to us. By Jules swearing--along with other factors--he's verbally sending the message to the boy that he means business and it also incites fear in him as well. Essentially, by Jules' excessive swearing it makes it easier for the boy to encode closer to the nose of what Jules is trying to say.
However, it doesn't always make sense for a character to swear. I'm sure we could think of many many collective examples which prove this. A more interesting example of this would be the character Nina Sayers in "Black Swan."
Nina is very passive, demure and polite--she also doesn't swear for the entire first half of the movie. By keeping her language fairly "clean" we as the audience are in a way encoding Nina's words and behaviors, and shaping her personality subtly in our head. However, once Nina begins to lose her mind, we see her personality change. She becomes more sexually liberated, forward and aggressive. One of the subtler changes that tips us off to her inherent change is when she does swear for the first time.
After a night of uncharacteristic partying, Nina comes home to a confrontation with her domineering mother. During this fight, Nina says she "fucked" two men she was clubbing with. Now this is a pretty crass choice of wording--especially to your mother!--but it's intent is to tell the viewer that Nina has fundamentally changed. It would've been a very different situation if Nina had simply said "I slept with them both" or something along those lines.
Essentially, there is an art to swearing in movies. Some people master it, others do not. But always be mindful as a viewer what it means if you're being given a world with excessive cursing. It is rough circumstances and swearing is their way of letting off steam? Are they alpha characters trying to establish dominance over others? Or if they do not swear, what does it help us understand about them as people?
Yes, the plot can be illogical and obnoxious. Yes, your lead actors could be awful. But beyond the obvious, it's good dialogue in movies that can mean the difference between success and failure.
Now, swearing in films--especially excessively--can be considered crass and unnecessary by some; others, however, may see it as simply another vernacular set within a film's certain setting. But no matter your views on cursing, one thing is certain: it's vital to the success of a film.
By this I mean, if a character swears excessively, or perhaps not at all, we as the audience are given valuable insight into who the character is as a person.
As we learned in class, curse words have meaning, history and intent behind them. For instance, when you call someone a bitch, you're likening that person to a female dog meant for breeding. So wouldn't it be a logical conclusion that if a character does or does not use these words that their choice is also a part of their intended message they're trying to send?
For example, "Pulp Fiction" is Quentin Tarantino's 1994 cult hit and almost everyone can quote at least one line from the film. The movie is famous for its violence, style and rampant swearing. Jules, played by Samuel L. Jackson, is best remembered in most viewers minds from the scene above. In the scene, Jules is toying with a young man who's betrayed Jules' boss, crimelord Marsellus Wallace. During the encounter, Jules, naturally, swears excessively while the young man being interrogated never does. The purpose of this it that it helps establish a power relationship between the two characters. Jules, by swearing and calling the kid names like "motherfucker," is setting himself apart as the more intimidating, stronger and more alpha-male of the pair.
Thinking back to earlier in our class when we learned about the communication model of sender-receiver, we learn that when we're being given a message we first encode/decode what is being given to us. By Jules swearing--along with other factors--he's verbally sending the message to the boy that he means business and it also incites fear in him as well. Essentially, by Jules' excessive swearing it makes it easier for the boy to encode closer to the nose of what Jules is trying to say.
However, it doesn't always make sense for a character to swear. I'm sure we could think of many many collective examples which prove this. A more interesting example of this would be the character Nina Sayers in "Black Swan."
Nina is very passive, demure and polite--she also doesn't swear for the entire first half of the movie. By keeping her language fairly "clean" we as the audience are in a way encoding Nina's words and behaviors, and shaping her personality subtly in our head. However, once Nina begins to lose her mind, we see her personality change. She becomes more sexually liberated, forward and aggressive. One of the subtler changes that tips us off to her inherent change is when she does swear for the first time.
After a night of uncharacteristic partying, Nina comes home to a confrontation with her domineering mother. During this fight, Nina says she "fucked" two men she was clubbing with. Now this is a pretty crass choice of wording--especially to your mother!--but it's intent is to tell the viewer that Nina has fundamentally changed. It would've been a very different situation if Nina had simply said "I slept with them both" or something along those lines.
Essentially, there is an art to swearing in movies. Some people master it, others do not. But always be mindful as a viewer what it means if you're being given a world with excessive cursing. It is rough circumstances and swearing is their way of letting off steam? Are they alpha characters trying to establish dominance over others? Or if they do not swear, what does it help us understand about them as people?
A Continuation on the Topic of Anonymity and Invention
To begin, let's take a look back at Tuesday, September 29th's class. A public, non-moderated Google Document was put up for the class to discuss, edit and define the term "Invention". In this short, but effective social experiment we began to see what "Invention" means in the internet age. An eloquent deeper meaning was revealed to lay beneath the shit-posting of a classroom filled with tech-savvy, and often grammar illiterate undergraduates (I truly am sorry for missing the apostrophe, Anonymous Wombat). After this experiment, I was inspired to continue writing my blog posts on Anonymity and invention, and how in recent years the world has experienced some wild things for better or worse.
Since my last blog post I have delved deeper into researching TOR, and some of the history behind it. The most notorious site in the history of TOR is arguably "The Silk Road", and I would like to discuss an aspect of the site that the general public was not aware of. I don't want to talk about the millions of drug deals, firearms trades and countless other illegal activities that were conducted on the site; I believe these are already well known, and should serve to show that anonymous invention in the modern day can also be very dangerous. That is one reason why the site's main operator- Dread Pirate Roberts hired a Spanish doctor who specialized in drugs in addiction to post and respond to questions on the forums. Going by the screen name 'DoctorX', Dr. Fernando Caudevilla was paid $500 per week to provide harm reduction strategies and various other services (all completely anonymous) to anyone who visited the forums.
Here is a screenshot of one of DoctorX's posts on the forums:
Since my last blog post I have delved deeper into researching TOR, and some of the history behind it. The most notorious site in the history of TOR is arguably "The Silk Road", and I would like to discuss an aspect of the site that the general public was not aware of. I don't want to talk about the millions of drug deals, firearms trades and countless other illegal activities that were conducted on the site; I believe these are already well known, and should serve to show that anonymous invention in the modern day can also be very dangerous. That is one reason why the site's main operator- Dread Pirate Roberts hired a Spanish doctor who specialized in drugs in addiction to post and respond to questions on the forums. Going by the screen name 'DoctorX', Dr. Fernando Caudevilla was paid $500 per week to provide harm reduction strategies and various other services (all completely anonymous) to anyone who visited the forums.
Here is a screenshot of one of DoctorX's posts on the forums:
After my last blog post, I felt it necessary to delve deeper into what the DarkNet entailed, and how it became what it is today. While the Silk Road was shut down in October of 2013, many other sites have risen in it's ashes. The DoctorX types still exist, and more cutting edge inventions continue to surface after the seizure of The Silk Road. These completely anonymous forums, and sites such as The Silk Road have sparked a need for invention in the way of communication.
If this topic interests you, I highly encourage you watch the recent documentary "Deep Web". Much of the information I found for this blog post was found on there, in addition to sites such as Vice, and The Daily Dot.
Kairos in Social Media
Kairos is defined as the right or opportune moment (the supreme moment). The ancient Greeks had two words for time, chronos and kairos. While the former refers to chronological or sequential time, the latter signifies a time lapse, a moment of indeterminate time in which everything happens. As we've learned in class, Kairos can be an extremely beneficial tool in argument, but I would make the argument that Kairos is especially beneficial when used in a social medium. Kairos can add humor to a post, or present a tremendous opportunity in marketing for social media-savvy businesses.
As we discussed in class today, memes have the power to accurately express humor and underlying emotion in social media, and when this is coupled with Kairos, memes can explode in popularity. For example, the "old economy Steve" meme came at a time (2012) in which the vast majority of young people were dissatisfied with the state of our economic system. The creators of the meme, which was first seen on reddit, were obviously trying to be humorous, but there is an underlying tone of contempt for how easy it was to coast through life and wind up with a great job in the time period of old economy Steve. Kairos made this meme immensely popular because the audience was both found it amusing, and understood the meaning behind it.
Social media can also provide businesses with amazing opportunities to expand through their well timed use of Kairos. One great example of a business who utilizes twitter in an extremely beneficial way is Zappos. Zappos understands the most important idea that all businesses should in regards to Twitter, users don't want to be bogged down by annoying adds. People on Twitter don't log on to be sold to, they come for entertainment. Zappos understands this, and in this way is able to build an important relationship with all of the companies followers. Take the recent discovery of water on Mars for example, this has nothing to do with Zappos, but they give a timely, witty response anyway as you can see in this link: https://twitter.com/zappos/status/648574358856687616. Although the tweet does nothing to immediately market for Zappos, it does subconsciously by showing their followers they are interested in the same things as the general public, and in turn builds a relationship with potential customers.
Social media is an incredible tool for big businesses and singular users alike. When these users are able to pair the benefits of social media with Kairos though, it takes their popularity to new heights.
The many imitations of "doge"
Memes are everywhere in our culture. The internet makes the interaction and sharing of a meme too easy. In Limor Shifman's Memes in a Digital Culture, Limor says the success of a meme is based on simplicity, humor and participation. Something simple and funny can be used as a tool for expression on the internet and they become more popular with each imitation. Memes can be reproduced and edited to fit any situation.
The doge meme started with this picture of a Shiba Inu taken in 2010. The photo was then passed onto Reddit where it took off with the addition of texts.
It even made its way into politics.
The meme gained popularity before hitting its peak in 2013. After so many recreations of the meme, the image of a Shiba Inu became enough context for the meme.
The doge meme was so simple it spread like wildfire.
What makes it funny? In the original it is just the frozen motion of the dog's face, stuck in between a movement. To express a awkward emotion that we can identify with. Then later with reproductions when it got associated with the misspelled "doge", using misspelled words to direct the way the meme is used. They even stick with Comic Sans. Doge embodies a dumb characteristic, no offense to dogs. The doge went far, too far. Bitcoin, a form of internet currency, picked up the doge meme and made it its own cryptocurrency.
This internet joke got a currency! The value of the currency fluctuates with the popularity of the joke. Today 1000 dogecoin is worth about 14 cents. But the imitations do not stop there.
Internet communities unified through dogecoin, coming together to sponsor NASCAR driver Josh Wise at Talladega. They funded athletes at the Sochi Olympics, they found ways to get people to donate to charities.
And in nature of a meme's function, these reproductions are what makes this funny.
We've gone from the surprised Shiba Inu in 2010, to a myriad of japanese dogs taking over the internet with typos in Comic Sans, to a recognized internet currency to NASCAR and back. The internet breeds this type of behavior. We love to see how far a joke can go. But eventually this cultural phenomena could be disastrous. If we took something more real than a "doge", like Donald Trump running for president for example, and let it run, what could happen?
memes
Richard Dawkins coined the term ‘meme’ in 1976, long before the days of the internet. Its original usage described units of cultural expression, such as popular pottery styles, architectural features, or even stereotypes. These memes were communicated largely through trade, theatre, and other traditional media. Through time the internet has coined memes to be pictures and videos that are trying to say something or to get a point across. Memes have become such a major part of social media and even everyday communication. I feel like anytime I go on social I always see some sort of meme.
Memes are becoming a main way of communication in our generation. Their are memes for almost about everything these days. Weather they are dealing with government or even something stupid such as overly obsessed girlfriend or ERMAHGERD. Memes can be very creative in many ways weather it is dealing with serious or not so serious topics. The point go a meme is to get a message across in a humorous way most of the time. I know personally that my friends and I use memes in group chats and things to communicate and sort of make fun of each other in a funny way that gets each others attention.
Memes are becoming a main way of communication in our generation. Their are memes for almost about everything these days. Weather they are dealing with government or even something stupid such as overly obsessed girlfriend or ERMAHGERD. Memes can be very creative in many ways weather it is dealing with serious or not so serious topics. The point go a meme is to get a message across in a humorous way most of the time. I know personally that my friends and I use memes in group chats and things to communicate and sort of make fun of each other in a funny way that gets each others attention.
There are also very humorous memes out there are really conveying an important message that we sometimes completely look over. This one for example:
You may not realize it but it is really hinting at a message to not text and drive/ do not be on social media while driving because when you are you don't pay attention to driving, which is completely true.
Memes are a very effective way of communication and are give conversation a good topic and something to laugh at. Memes only keep arising in our everyday life and are only getting better.
The importance of Kairos
Thanks to the Ancient Greeks, "Kairos" is still in our everyday lives. Back in the day, Kairos meant "the most opportune time". Not only did Kairos mean time, but "Chronos" did too. Chronos refers to Chronological time and is more quantitative while Kairos is a moment in which time happens and is qualitative. To Sophists, Kairos was the rhetor's ability to take advantage of an unexpected time. For Aristotle, Kairos was the perfect time that the "proof was delivered".
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kairos
Now that you know how the Greeks understood Kairos, how do we understand it in the modern day? To me, Kairos means taking advantage of the perfect time to act on something. To seize the opportunity and execute it is Kairos. After reading about Kairos I realized how important its meaning is to everyday life. We don't realize how often we use it. We also don't realize how powerful it can be when using it at the perfect moment.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kairos
Now that you know how the Greeks understood Kairos, how do we understand it in the modern day? To me, Kairos means taking advantage of the perfect time to act on something. To seize the opportunity and execute it is Kairos. After reading about Kairos I realized how important its meaning is to everyday life. We don't realize how often we use it. We also don't realize how powerful it can be when using it at the perfect moment.
In the book, it gives examples of when to use Kairos and when NOT to use Kairos.
In the following video you can have a better understanding of the right and wrong times to use Kairos and also have even more knowledge over Kairos in a more fun and unprofessional manner.
GO HERE:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KlWL7zYgVyg
Kairos can be very powerful when used in the perfect way and in the perfect moment. Taking advantage of Kairos could potentially help you. Martin Luther King Jr's "I Have A Dream" Speech was successful with the help of Kairos. His speech changed minds, persuaded people to support the civil rights movement, etc. But the speech was also powerful because of its "kairotic" moment...The timing of the speech and the atmosphere during the speech. He took advantage of the location, the time of day, and the situation at hand. From that, he gained listeners and persuaded them.
Pretty much what I'm trying to say is: USE KAIROS TO YOUR ADVANTAGE.
http://writingcommons.org/open-text/information-literacy/rhetorical-analysis/rhetorical-appeals/595-kairos
Kairos can be very powerful when used in the perfect way and in the perfect moment. Taking advantage of Kairos could potentially help you. Martin Luther King Jr's "I Have A Dream" Speech was successful with the help of Kairos. His speech changed minds, persuaded people to support the civil rights movement, etc. But the speech was also powerful because of its "kairotic" moment...The timing of the speech and the atmosphere during the speech. He took advantage of the location, the time of day, and the situation at hand. From that, he gained listeners and persuaded them.
Pretty much what I'm trying to say is: USE KAIROS TO YOUR ADVANTAGE.
http://writingcommons.org/open-text/information-literacy/rhetorical-analysis/rhetorical-appeals/595-kairos
(AD)tention seeker
Psychotherapist Michael Hausauer notes, teens have a, "terrific interest in knowing what's going on in the lives of their peers, coupled with a terrific anxiety about being out of the loop." In, The Jugglers Brain, one of the premises of rhetoric and attention is that the Internet commands our attention just to scatter it. This takes away depth and creativity. But, will the internet stop growing anytime soon? The answer seems to be no, but to improve something always comes at the cost of another. While reading, The Jugglers Brain, on my laptop, I was focused but the constant notifications of texts or social media made me lose my focus.
When reading I was thinking of all the ways how the Internet scatters my attention while it is doing it right before my eyes. Before I realize I'm checking my Facebook then the ads on the side of Facebook, much like these ads in this blog. Our attention is scattered so easily because digital technology produces an abundance of information. Looking at a simple home page of an email account, you have news stories, accounts to sign up for, ads for things to win. The amount of information on the web is unprecedented and it demands our attention.
This then creates a competition of attention. We can't focus of everything on our Facebook page all at once. When it comes to messages, events, notifications, and friend requests we can’t focus on all that at one time. We are in this world what we attend to. When we are going through our Twitter feed weather we click on a political news story or a humorous video we are creating our ideals and beliefs. The internet is changing the way we think and process information. I hope you were distracted by these ads in my blog as the internet forces us to be distracted through social media and advertisements like these.
Creating is all Remixing
Talking about invention and creation in the past couple classes has made me think more and more about a previous class and an idea that relates to this on every level. Everything is a remix. We watched a series of videos (http://youtu.be/UP468k1u_Mk , http://youtu.be/Z-HuenDPZw0 , and http://youtu.be/wq5D43qAsVg) with this title and topic. These clips go through examples of music, movies, books, and everything in between and how they all play off of one another.
Something is not created from nothing. There must be some seed planted to foster growth of an creation. One may not realize they are creating something partially from the ideas, inventions, or any other part of another persons work but that is what happens. With the picture below (borrowed form clips above) creativity or invention is shown to have 3 main types of formation. There is copy, which is taking one idea and claiming it as your own. Transforming is taking an idea and changing it anywhere from a slight paraphrase to a complete reconstruction. And finally combine, which takes two or more ideas and takes parts of each to create a 'new' idea.
Something is not created from nothing. There must be some seed planted to foster growth of an creation. One may not realize they are creating something partially from the ideas, inventions, or any other part of another persons work but that is what happens. With the picture below (borrowed form clips above) creativity or invention is shown to have 3 main types of formation. There is copy, which is taking one idea and claiming it as your own. Transforming is taking an idea and changing it anywhere from a slight paraphrase to a complete reconstruction. And finally combine, which takes two or more ideas and takes parts of each to create a 'new' idea.
There are several laws that have to do with copyrights and patents and owning ideas/inventions in general. This makes creativity seem almost as a bad thing, especially in the way I've described it thus far. But creativity and other's role in it is anything but a bad thing (in most cases). Songs have been sung, movies have been made, phones have been...phoned. Invention is somehow at once communal and individual. We bring our individual thoughts together with others to make something new.
This is a TedTalk explaining what I said in a much cooler and funnier way (mostly the Steve Jobs quote) that took part in this blog post creation - http://youtu.be/zd-dqUuvLk4
Memes as a New Way of Communicating
In 1976, Richard Dawkins first used the term “meme” in his
book The Selfish Gene, defining it as
an idea, behavior, or style that spreads from person to person within a
culture. The internet has latched on to the idea of the meme with images,
videos, and even hashtags that appeal to many different audiences. It is hard
for me to go on Facebook or Twitter and not see a meme that somebody shared.
Scrolling through the texts with my friends, half of our conversations are
communicated through memes. With varied ideas and styles and vast amounts of
people to appeal to, memes are definitely becoming a new way to communicate
ideas and start conversations.
Memes are a popular way to communicate now because they make
things relatable for the audience. Putting an image or video clip in
conjunction with an idea or view point makes it easier for someone to
understand the idea. Most memes are humorous in a way that it makes light of a
situation that may be more serious, which in effect reminds the audience of the
importance of the issue that the meme represents. Some memes like the “Old
Economy Steve” or related ones reference the fact that life was easier in the “old
economy” 30-40 years ago, whereas today’s economy makes it difficult for some
college graduates to get a job. It takes on a humorous approach and then later
makes the audience focus on the real issue.
A recent commercial for the Truth anti-smoking campaign used
memes as a way to appeal to the college-aged audience and warn them of the
dangers of smoking. Using a variety of memes such as the overly attached
girlfriend, the “ermahgerd” girl, and a puking unicorn, they all conveyed the
message of “It’s a trap!”, in each memes context (overly attached girlfriend
represented the girls boyfriend’s ex or the ermahgerd girl holding rat traps) to the young people, making the point that even
social smoking is still smoking, and that it will trap you into smoking on a
regular basis. This is a good example of how a meme can appeal to a certain
audience when used in a certain context. In this case it was to promote the
dangers of smoking to the 18-25 age range. This also helps make the case for
how memes have taken over how we communicate. The developers obviously
understood that college students are familiar with memes in means of
communication and that it is an effective way to make a point to them.
Overall, memes have allowed us to communicate in a variety of contexts and relate ideas to one another, while having either a broad appeal or targeting a specific audience.
http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2013-06/20/richard-dawkins-memes
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