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Task 9: Network Assignment Using Golden Record Curation Quiz Data – Helen

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Task 9 Network assignment

I’m using the newer GoldenRecordB file for the analysis and reflection. In this file, I’m in community 3 with Junel and Yijun.

Link to Junel’s justification: https://blogs.ubc.ca/missjunetexttechnology/tasks/

Link to Yijun’s justification: https://blogs.ubc.ca/etec540trista/2022/07/09/task-8-golden-record-curation-assignment/

We have selected many instrumental songs, but due to different reasons. I focus on minimizing the possibility of aliens misinterpreting the lyrics. On the other hand, Yijun thinks lyrics are redundant to the “Greetings from Earth” track, so they do not need to be included. Nevertheless, we still share similar reasoning. The pieces of music we choose are created by musicians with different cultural backgrounds. And we make these choices because our goal is to include “diverse” music and be “inclusive”. However, does it mean people in other communities are not being “as inclusive as possible” as Carl Sagan would like to see (Twenty Thousand Hertz, n.d.)?

Motivated by curiosity, I have randomly selected another classmate from community 4, Erin. I quickly realized that Erin picked a variety of songs as well. The graph fails to reveal that we have the same goal to be inclusive. And it surprises me that although Erin and I are not grouped in the same community, we still share 5 vertices. Note I only have 5 and 4 vertices in common with Yijun and Junel, respectively. It is demonstrated that the graph is unique because of everyone’s presence and everyone’s choice. For example, if Yijun and all community 4 members did not select their 10 songs, I will be grouped with Erin, not Junel, since Erin and I have more connected edges (Palladio, n.d.).

The discovery inspires me to think about communities and social networks in the physical world. The communities are also shaped by both people inside and outside. People usually form a community or are perceived as a community based on similar ideologies and characteristics. However, they may have more similarities and connections with people outside the small circle than we think. In addition, the environment, people, and behavior form a system of triadic reciprocal causation as Social Cognitive Theory proposes (Bandura, 2011), which continuously changes the boundary of communities. In other words, communities are neither isolated nor fixed. Computer algorithms with no temporal information only capture a snapshot of the community ecosystem (e.g. association in LinkedIn) but fail to demonstrate the richer messages behind the shifts in time.

It would also be interesting to explore the notion of community in a weighted graph. If we were asked to rearrange the 10 songs instead of listing them, the orders can be assigned to the edges as the weight. The resulting graph may be a more comprehensive model showing our underlying assumptions about what is the most important thing that we can afford to keep.

 

References:

Bandura, A. (2011). Chapter 17: Social cognitive theory. In P. A. M. van Lange, A. W. Kruglanski, & E. T. Higgins (Eds.), Handbook of Social Psychological Theories,  349-373. London: Sage.

Palladio. (n.d.). Create a facet filter. Stanford. http://hdlab.stanford.edu/palladio/tutorials/facet/

Twenty Thousand Hertz. (n.d.). Voyager Golden Record. [Audio podcast episode]. Megaphone. https://cms.megaphone.fm/channel/20k?selected=TTH4214315391

Task 7: Mode-bending – Helen

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Link to the video version of the what’s in my bag task: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1rkgKbHHoSW4cFv7dLipxyQK5JnLi0imr/view?usp=sharing

I have recreated the what’s in my bag task using a self-made video by utilizing multimodal design techniques proposed by the New London Group (1996) such as visual design (showing the items, zooming in on the item to draw attention), gestural design (movement, pointing with a finger), and audio design (talk when filming to describe the items). The video compresses the 1000 words of writing into a 5 minutes talk, reproducing and transforming (New London Group, 1996) it into something more casual and approachable. Words describing the position of the items (e.g. “from top left to bottom right”) are simply converted to visual representation (e.g. picking up an object in front of the camera and excluding the items in the background from the frame). In addition, the video version demonstrates more information than the writing by showing where each item is stored in my bag, and how they relate to each other. The organization also reflects on my habits and personality and serves the goal of introducing myself. Overall, using emerging forms of different media, I was able to practice multiliteracies skills (New London Group, 1996) by constructing my multilayered identity.

However, the process of creating the video is not as easy as it seems. The greatest challenge is to recreate the same content as completely and accurately as possible. My experience demonstrates that writing serves as a memory aid, and it can capture ideas precisely with material means (Haas, 2013) which is impossible to achieve with just orality. Instead of reading what I have written before, I tried to retell the story as I film. And I ended up pausing multiple times and modifying my original messages. After filming the video, I had to edit out about 30 seconds of pausing and repetition in different sections to make the video less awkward. Furthermore, note that in the writing version, I was able to translate the text from Chinese to English and polish the translation using the word editing tool embedded in my computer. However, without the technology, I had to use words that immediately come to my mind, and convey the general meaning without solidifying it. The differences are evident in almost every translation when comparing the audio to the writing.

 

 

References

Haas, C. (2013). “The Technology Question.” In Writing technology: Studies on the materiality of literacy. Routledge. (pp. 3-23).

The New London Group.  (1996). A pedagogy of multiliteracies: Designing social futures. Harvard Educational Review 66(1), 60-92.

Task 5 Twine task – Helen

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Please download and play my Twine game here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1f6lJbWEoSlyOua1lfDLj5IlKTiXqH5NM/view?usp=sharing

Alternatively, you can play it online without the sound effect here: https://wusling.neocities.org/task5/index.html

 

Reflection

The temple of No (Crows Crows Crows, 2016) is a fun and engaging game that utilizes hypertexts. It remediates traditional printed fiction by converting audiences to players; it lets the players choose their paths to explore, experiment, and interpret (Bolter, 2001). The game inspired me to create a graphic novel that can invite the players to co-construct the plot with autonomy, so I created the game Locked in the Room.

To construct the alternative paths in an immersive way, multiple hyperlinks are embedded in the same frame for the players to “act”. Note that this approach to hyperlinks is the opposite of the intention of their inventor, Nelson (1999). Instead of visualizing the origins of ideas and transpointing parallel documents, these hyperlinks are single-way arrows that connect the action to its consequences. Different choices can change the frame that the hyperlink connects to, thus disrupting the “stable publishing” (Nelson, 1999, para. 14). However, it is argued that this approach is still liberating and does not “dissolve into a disordered heap” (Bolter, 2001, pg. 35). Players can go back to previous frames by clicking on the back buttons or restarting the game, redo the changes, and taking other paths. In addition, the approach can augment players’ thinking process by affording “automated external symbol manipulation” (Englebard, 1963, pg. 27). The secret of the plot is encoded in the texts and artifacts. The players can attach symbols to them, manipulate the symbols by using different methodologies and eventually reach their own conclusion of the story.

Following the goal stated above, variables are used to keep track of the selected options. And the debug mode is used to ensure the hyperlinks are constructed correctly. Although not created using microfilms, the browser in debug mode serves as a Memex that supplements the viewer’s memory (Bush, 1945). The value of the variables is listed next to the main frame, providing references for the game state. By comparing the contents on both “screens”, I was able to organize my ideas and implement the design.

 

References

Bolter, Jay David. (2001). Writing space: computers, hypertext, and the remediation of print. New York, NY: Routledge.

Bush, V. (1945). As we may think. The Atlantic Monthly, 176(1), 101-108.

Crows Crows Crows. (2016). The temple of No [Video game]. Crows Crows Crows.

Englebart, Douglas. (1963). “A conceptual framework for the augmentation of man’s intellect” In Hawerton, P.W. and Weeks, D.C. (Eds.), Vistas in information handling, Volume I: The augmentation of man’s intellect by machine. Washington, DC: Spartan Books. Available (as “Augmentation of human intellect: A conceptual framework”)

Nelson, Theodore. (1999). “Xanalogical structure, needed now more than ever: Parallel documents, deep links to content, deep versioning and deep re-use.” Online.