Week 7 Mode Bending- Can you guess what’s in my bag?

I chose Szu Chun’s Task 4 post as my sixth linking assignment. Szu Chun and I both decided to base our mode bending around describing our backpacks themselves, rather than the content. Therefore, the focus was less on what is in the backpack and more on how the backpack exists in physical space. We did still comment on where we place things to maintain the overall goal of the assignment to discuss what is in our bags.

Szu Chun and I differed in the mode of delivery. She chose to record a video, creating more of a visual form representation of her backpack and its compartments. I tried to do the same without the visual aid by recording a description of my backpack. I wanted to try something unique to what I have done before. I have made visual aids before so I wanted to test my ability to use the audio mode.

The difference in mode resulted in a difference in clarity. Since Szu Chun used a video with pictures of her backpack, along with some images of what she places in some pockets, it is very clear what exactly she is referring to. Since I only used an audio recording, I had to rely more on descriptive language to convey what my backpack looks like and what I put in it. There is value to both approaches depending on the product being made. For this type of assignment, I see why Szu Chun chose to use a different visual form to explain what is in her bag. It is much clearer to literally see since it is visual. The audio form I chose may not have been as clear but I felt like it was a true difference in mode, the goal of the task. The audio format may be better suited to a broader conversation rather than a specific topic such as what is in a backpack. This explains the popularity of podcasts for large topic conversations that don’t rely on visual aids.

Another element she introduced was a sort of learning check. Every so often, Szu Chun posed questions in an informal type of quiz format to see if those watching her video could guess what she put in her backpack. I like this idea as it serves as a test for her ability to describe what is in her bag using both the visual aid and her own description. Something like this was not required in the assignment, so Szu Chun deserves praise for being creative with this. It makes the watcher have to be more thoughtful and engaged. It is easy to lose engagement when watching a video so these quizzes were effective at keeping watcher interest.

Task 8: Golden Record Curation

I chose Kelvin’s Task 8 post as my fifth linking assignment. This assignment was limiting in what could be selected, since everyone had to choose 10 songs of the 27 options. Where there was room for individual differences was the parameters around how people chose the songs.

Kelvin used the presence or absence of vocals as his initial parameter to separate the songs. Kelvin only chose his songs from the list of instrumental songs, eliminating all vocal songs because he felt the instruments provided a universal language. He categorized the instrumental songs as orchestral and not. He added all 9 songs he classes as instrumental and chose “Rite of Spring” by Stravinsky as his tenth song. The reason he chose this song is because of the way you can hear all of the separate sounds.

Kelvin picked instrumentals to represent the universality of music and all cultures. I explicitly chose songs from each region of the planet. My initial parameter was songs I enjoy, but an important secondary parameter was explicit representation.

Kelvin and I may have differed in why we chose the songs because of our different backgrounds in music. Kelvin mentions usually separating his playlists by the presence or absence of vocals as he reflects in his initial parameter for song selection. I tend to separate music by language, which I did when making my selections too. I cannot conclusively comment on Kelvin’s experiences with music but he seems to be someone with orchestral experience because of his appreciation for the different instrumental sounds. I like to listen to music from different places in the world and in different languages which is why that was a big factor for me. Our different experiences are likely the overlying reason for differences in parameter for song selection.

Task 11: Algorithms of Predictive Text

I chose Melody’s task 11 post as my fourth linking assignment. The prompt Melody chose for the predictive text is “This is not my idea of…”. She used Instagram as the platform to create her predictive text. Melody has not used the Instagram account for a year or possible two. This is where Melody and I have a difference in the experiences we had.

The initial difference between melody and I is the prompt we chose. Melody’s prompt is very open and could have gone in multiple directions. When referring to what is not someone’s idea of something, this could go to not their idea of fun, of work, of a good time, etc. The prompt I chose is “Education is not about…”. This prompt limited what my algorithm could have predicted and generally what I could have chosen. Even though our prompts differed and could have gone in very different directions, Melody’s algorithm actually brought her towards education as well. Melody’s algorithm led her to text going back to school, after commenting on the weather. Mine went towards money in education.

The next difference was the applications we used. I used the Notes application on my phone rather than Instagram. I am not sure if the application used will make a difference in the information that the algorithm has to use.  The use of Instagram as opposed to the Notes app will then become a factor. For example, if the application does matter, the texts predicted by the algorithm for Melody’s Instagram account will relate to what she has previously posted. Typically, people are very selective with what they post on their social media accounts. My use of the notes app is more liberal than her use of Instagram, since the Notes app is just for personal use. This could effect the nature of the texts predicted.

Since Melody has not used her Instagram account for a long time, her algorithm was going off of old text information. My Notes app is something I use every few days, so it is constantly updated for the text I frequently enter. It would have been interesting to see if Melody compared the algorithms of this less often used app with a feature on her phone she uses more often. It would show if there has been a change in what she frequently texts. In general, that would be an interesting element to add to the task, seeing how the algorithm naturally changes along with changes in text.

One similarity Melody and I found was that the algorithm did well to sound like each of us, but was very flat. The voice the algorithm presents is very basic whereas if Melody and I could have chosen what we were typing, it would have added more personality and context to the message.

ETEC 540 Final Project

Task #6 – An Emoji Story

I chose Brian’s Task 6 post for as my third linking assignment. This task does not have as much to compare as other tasks on the surface, but there are some interesting similarities and differences between Brian and I. Starting with similarities, we both chose our specific films because the titles would be easier to symbolize with emojis, rather than necessarily choosing the movie we saw most recently. Brian chose one of the most popular movies of all time (particularly for his son as he mentions!). The movie I chose is not as popular but is similar to Brian’s in that the title could be represented by just 2 emojis. For the title of the films, we both used emojis to represent words. We used emojis differently for the synopsis of the films. Both Brian and I used emojis in place of symbols in the film since we both found it would be easier than trying to represent words or syllables. With words or syllables, there is more room for error in interpretation unless the exact word has an emoji.

Though Brian and I both used the emojis as symbols for the synopsis of our film, the difference in popularity of the film we chose makes a difference in terms of how easily the emojis can be interpreted. Brian used more emojis than I did for his synopsis, but as he mentions it was easy to do so since most people are familiar with the Lion King. The familiarity with the film gave him the security to be looser with the emojis he used for his synopsis. Since my film was less popular, I felt I had to be more meaningful with the emojis I selected. Cop Out, the film I selected, has plot points that would not easily be represented by emojis. This difficulty in symbolizing the synopsis along with the limited general popularity of the film meant that even if I used more emojis, I do not think my film would have been easy to decipher. This task really shows the importance of choosing a film that is either very popular or its synopsis can very easily be represented with emojis.

https://www.notion.so/Manual-Scripts-b1e207cc2a234b18b9cc953c8c6a02c3

I chose Kevin’s Task 4 post as my second linking assignment. Kevin wrote a poem inspired by the protests taking place in Los Angeles as part of the Black Lives Matter protest. Kevin and I were both inspired by the events taking place in the United States around June 1. We both commented on the events taking place and sentiment around police. The last similarity though is that we used handwriting to create the manual script.

After the similarities I mention above, Kevin and I differ in the reasons we chose to write by hand, the approach we took to the manual script, as well as the platform that we used to post our tasks. First I will talk about the differences in why we chose the handwriting option in this task. Kevin mentions that handwriting allows for him to manipulate the space on the page more. This was effective for his writing product as he wanted to control how much white space he left in each part of the page. I chose handwriting because I feel it is something I am very comfortable with and I feel like it allows for a real raw reflection of someone’s thought process.

Another difference we had was the approaches we used when completing our manual scripts. Kevin chose to do a poem centered around sensual language to convey the feeling people in Los Angeles would have. He paired that with the names of people in the US who had called police officers on black people in the US even though they had done nothing wrong. His poem was powerful as it called to light those who were abusing the job of police officers. I focused on police officers in a different way in my approach to the manual script. I wrote a reflection on why I felt these longstanding issues around race and police were not solved yet. I focused primarily on the precedence that has been set in the US up to now and how there were no high profile cases of police hurting or killing a black person and being sentenced. The element Kevin mentions around who calls in the police and why is something very interesting to note. What if police weren’t called because of the suspicion that a real $20 bill was fake? Maybe George Floyd would still be alive today.

The last difference I will comment on is the difference in blogging platform. I used the WordPress blogs which I would say fits the traditional mold of a blog, particularly the layout. Kevin used a platform called Notion. I think for his purposes of spacing out the photos of his manual poem and controlling the space (something he mentioned as an effect of handwriting as well) the notion platform functions well. The only reason I prefer WordPress is the location of others’ comments. For some reason seeing the comments before Kevin’s post made me feel like it was a spoiler of sorts. I prefer to read someone’s blog, then see what others had to say regarding it, which is how I have set my blog to be.

Task 3: Voice to Text Task

I chose Rania’s task 3 post as my first linking assignment. Rania and I seemed to have some similarities in our experience of voice to text, as well as some differences. Since we had both a similar and different experience when completing the same task, I thought it would be a good post to link to.

Rania and I had both never utilized the voice to text function before. We similarly noticed the spelling mistakes and lack of punctuation that came with voice to text. However, in the process of voice recording, Rania paid more attention to the time that the recording took, while I paid more attention to the lack of punctuation I saw being recorded. I feel like Rania likely did not see the words popping up as she spoke and this may have been because she used a different software than I did. The reason I noticed the lack of punctuation was that I saw the text popping up as I spoke. This meant that I immediately saw spelling mistakes as well.

Another similarity we share is thinking that scripting the story ahead of recording would have improved the story by reducing errors. Our reasoning for this is different though. Rania believes scripting would not have fixed all of the mistakes since she puts them down to a communication issue when speaking to the software. I felt that scripting would have reduced a lot of issues, besides punctuation, since it would remove the need to contemplate what exactly is being said.

One area where the course design effected both of our reflections was sticking to the questions that were asked. If Rania and I had expanded on our reflections beyond the base 5 questions, we may have made more meaningful insights. I can only speak for myself in regards to wanting to go into future implications of this type of software. Rania also being a teacher in the K-12 system would have likely commented on this as well if given the opportunity.

The two narratives will be the views of two different peoples’ perspectives of online education which has become the norm due to the everlasting threat of a global pandemic.

Narrative 1

Hi there, my name is Joe and I am 15 years old. My school, just like every school in the world, has moved to being taught online. At first I thought this was great! I no longer had to try and scrape together any money I could find to buy nice clothes so that I wouldn’t get bullied. The school also said they would give me a laptop! It was amazing for the first 2 months. By the time November came around, I really started to miss my friends. I would still see the other kids in my building, but we weren’t allowed to hangout together or play basketball together anymore. It started to be really boring. Even the laptop, once I did an update on it, it got really slow. I tried to tell my counselor about it but he said that’s the best the school board could give. My family doesn’t have much money, so we didn’t have a laptop of our own. At first the slow laptop was okay, just annoying. Then, my Social Studies teacher wanted me to do a video project. Every time I tried to record my video, it would lag! I explained this to my Social Studies teacher but she said that it was my responsibility to figure it out. I was really bummed out. I just wish we could go back to in-person learning.

Narrative 2

Hi everyone, my name is Jim and I am 15 years old. Due to the pandemic that does not seem to be going away anytime soon, my school is fully online. I was both happy and sad when school went online. I was happy I didn’t have to follow all the rules that teachers have for in-class time and that I can just finish assignments whenever I want during each day. My only responsibility is to make sure everything is in on time which is easy enough. My parents paid for me to get an online tutor too so sometimes I can just ask him and he will just tell me the answers! My parents bought me a new laptop, top of the line, fastest streaming and recording speeds and everything, especially because I had to video call my tutor and I hate when it lags. I was sad that I could not see my friends though. My friend group is all people like me, we all live in the same neighbourhood and go to the same country club. I miss seeing them at school because of all the fun stuff we could do, but I still see some of my friends who are on sports teams with me. I think this is fine for now until we can get rid of the pandemic since all the young people I know still have some social time with people their age. I hope I can go back to in-person school one day, but maybe if it stays online I can get a new top of the line desktop too!

A statement like this would likely only be in a blog since it is not well articulated or fully coherent. I would normally have used other terms regarding the benefits/importance of working in education while not referring specifically to money made “in the past year”, that was a limitation of the predictive text. The statement’s meaning represents what I would say, but the particular voice was not exactly like me because I would have used different terms and tried to be clearer about what I am trying to say. The predictive text used vague terms that don’t necessarily mean as much. This type of algorithm predicting text can be particularly dangerous in something like business where direct messages with predictive terms could create suggested conversation, rather than the original goal of the message. In essence people who just follow along the predictive texts may be allowing their devices to decide what they are saying.

Task 10

Click the above link to see the screenshot showing that I completed this week’s assignment!