Category Archives: Pop Culture

The Librarians on TNT

Posted in Media in Media, Pop Culture, Reviews, TV by

Posting a day early this week!

I am LOVING TNT’s new series The Librarians. To see people who love books, history, Latin, museum artifacts, and research, not holed up in some dusty basement crunching numbers, but out kicking butt and saving the world, is amazerful!

Promotional poster for The Librarians a new show on TNT. It comes on Sunday nights.

The Librarians has become apart of my already crowded Sunday night lineup, along with Downton Abbey and Once Upon a Time, which thankfully, is on hiatus until March.

The basic premise is that there’s a huge old library that exists in its own dimension. It’s contains all of these old artifacts from the famous myths we all know. Image the breadth and depth of the Library of Congress plus all the Smithsonian Institute and the National Archives in one huge maze of a room.

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Can’t get Typography out of my Head

Posted in Books, Classes, Movies, Projects by

It was extremely important to me that I acquired some serious design skills while earning my masters. It also happens that two design courses are required for my degree. I took them both and at some point each of them focused on typography. That was a year ago. I thought I was done.

Now, suddenly, almost a year later, my head is full of typography. I think it was prompted by the project I did for my class, which I also blogged about here, and also by my desire to design my own logo, but I notice it everywhere. I’m always trying to explain Gestalt principles to people, mostly my mom, who really doesn’t care.

It’s bad… Like this meme. LOL!

Ryan Gosling meme about typography.

My life has turned into typography. I can’t get it out of my head.

Since I can’t get it out of my head I’ve decided I only have one option… read books about it!

I’m going to start by rereading the text book for my class Thinking with Type by Ellen Lupton (@EllenLupton). I’ll do some research for more in the coming weeks. Just don’t be surprised by the sudden influx of typography themed posts here. I’m just trying to get this out of my system. Please bear with me!

Books and New Media: Super Sad True Love Story

Posted in Books, Media in Media, Self Reflection by

My last post about new media and culture, RE: Mockingjay Part I, was well received, so I thought I’d do another one concerning my favorite subject ever… Books!

I read Super Sad True Love Story last year. It is so obviously a satire of our current situation as a nation that it’s more uncomfortable than funny.

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Everyone carries around these devices, äppäräts, the ultimate smart phone. They even can aggregate all the data produced by and about you, compare it to those around you, and spit out “hotness” and “compatibility” scores. The apparat then projects these scores constantly to all the apparats around you at all times. Imagine that your Klout score was taped to your forehead. Eek! If you haven’t calculated your Klout score… Don’t.

Needless to say this was another example of a possible path advanced tech can take that also freaks me out. The tech of itself seems fine i.e., not a weapon, but the characters dependence upon devices to determine other characters worth and value was terrifying! I was reminded of Sheryl Turkle’s Alone Together.

Reading this book, just like watching Mockingjay, made me wonder if society as a whole is really thinking about where technology is headed and if that’s a place we actually want to go. It’s the passive acceptance attitude of the characters in these works and in the real world that is just a little unnerving.

World AIDS Day 2014

Posted in Awareness, Self Reflection by

Speaking of missing journalism, I was first introduced to World AIDS Day when fulfilling the last journalism requirement for my bachelors. I did a Storify of activities in the D.C. area throughout the day. Writing the story and compiling the Storify attached me to cause. It has been close to my heart for several years now.

You can find the link to my original story here.

To learn more about World AIDS Day or to donate click here.

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Movies and New Media: Mockingjay Part I [Spoiler Free!]

Posted in Media in Media, Movies, Pop Culture by

I fell in love with The Hunger Games much later the most people. I believe that you can only be a fan of one Sci-fi/ fantasy series. Mine is Harry Potter, so I had a hard time even accepting that I liked the Hunger Games, but I did. I’ve only read Mockingjay and that’s because I couldn’t bear to wait for the movies to learn what happens. I’ve now seen all three movies.

Needless to say, they’re great. Jennifer Lawrence is amazing. It was wonderful to see Phillip Seymour Hoffman, to whom the movie is dedicated, one last time. I have some complaints, but that’s a different post.

I did notice something. When discussing new media in pop culture, the best place to see it are in movies. One of the huge debates among new media theorists, is that all new media developments are not good. Humanity should be wary of just developing new media without questioning the complete range of potential am uses.

If there was ever an example of new media used for bad, it is in The Hunger Games series.

Those animal creations we see in the arena, i.e. tracker jackets, the communication/surveillance devices, the weaponry used by the Capitol and the Revolution, are all prime examples.

Watching the movies just reminded me of reading Evgeny Morozov’s theory of technical solutionism. Just because we are able to make some technologies doesn’t mean we should make those technologies. We shouldn’t see every advance as beneficial to humanity. It may not be, but we can always hope that the odds are ever in our favor.

For more work by Evgeny Morovoz see the video of his talk for The Gaudian. You can also follow him on Twitter @EvgenyMorovoz

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Take all my Software for Free

Posted in Pop Culture by

I was perusing Twitter this morning and came across this article on The Verge. Microsoft will offer the mobile versions of its Office software for free. The article is great but the finish is what caught my attention:

It’s a bold move from Microsoft, but also a defensive one. Microsoft’s competition will now have to look elsewhere to plot their Office attack.

I’d have to agree with the author; Microsoft is attempting to push back against Apple, but in my mind, they’re doing it better. I love Apple with all my heart. I do. However, they are only offering iWork for free to those who purchase new OS X Mavericks devices. People like me, long-term lovers of all things Apple, who own four perfectly good Apple devices, were left out of the excitement.

My point being that Microsoft not only did Microsoft surprise and support their long-term users, the die-hard PC lovers, but they also piqued the interest of Mac users that Apple left behind, like me. Smart move… ball in your court Tim Cook!

Microsoft is clearly playing for keeps. You the real MVP Satya Nadella!

Microsoft is clearly playing for keeps. You the real MVP Satya Nadella!

Book Review: Mr. Penumbra’s 24-Hour Bookstore

Posted in Books, Pop Culture, Reviews by

The reason I thought I should share my love for this book on my blog is because the characters, like many of my peers, are steeped up to their eye balls in new media. Mr. Penumbra’s 24-Hour Bookstore is about a young man, Clay, who gets a job at a 24-hour bookstore, only the store is just a front for a secret society. His attempt to update the bookstore’s online presence and stir up more clientele sweeps Clay into a mystery as old as the printing press, with the bookstore and its proprietor at the center. Clay’s boss, Mr. Penumbra goes missing and Clay seems to be the only one who notices or cares. In his search for Mr. Penumbra, Clay discovers that the bookstores he works in is really a front for a secret society that has been working on the world’s oldest brain teaser. Clay, his best friend, and his girlfriend, Kat, who works at Google — that’s a awesome enough reason to read it right there– take some serious risks to figure it out.

Here are three reasons I think it’s a great read:

  1. The cover GLOWS!! It freaked me out at first but after a while, it is really really cool.
    The cover of Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore

    The cover of Mr. Penumbra’s 24-Hour Bookstore

     

  2. It’s like 007 for nerds and I’m a self- embracing nerd so I don’t mean that badly. Amazon calls it a “technothriller.” I think that’s a very appropriate description. Designers, hackers and engineers all get to be the hero in this story. It’s refreshing. Clay’s character is endearing. He is clearly still trying to find his way and life and is struggling with the idea that he is not as traditionally successful as some of his peers. This investigation of his boss’ disappearance seems to really be a journey for Clay to find himself. It’s interesting to see him grow up. I learned some things about myself along the way.
  3. Robin Sloan offers a behind-the-scenes look at Google. Like I said above, read it for just that. Kat offers to assist Clay on his quest by offering Google’s book scanner. So Clay goes to visit Google’s campus in Silicon Valley, CA. I was amazed. I’m not sure if Sloan’s description of Google is accurate but I’m certainly curious to find out now.

This book has a lot of technical jargon but don’t give up. It is also full of mysteries, twists, romance, and happy endings. It is so worth it in the end.

The Big Bang Theory: Hot Troll Deviation

My class has been discussing Turkle’s Alone Together, in which she decribes several people who have seperate lives online. I talked about Pete, who had a second wife in the online game Second Life, in an earlier post.

It all reminded me of this clip from The Big Bang Theory where one of the main characters looses his girlfriend because she catches him “cheating” on her with a troll in the online game War of Warcraft. I talked about it in class but no one watches the show so I thought I would upload the video for everyone to see and enjoy.

In the video, Howard, guy in trouble, is asking Penny, friend of ex-girlfriend, for help on how to repair his relationship after the “hot troll deviation.”

Enjoy! The show really is hilarious.