the social attitude test

An internet test just told me I am selfish and unwilling to make strong opinions.

…

I already knew that.

“This test is adapted from Hans Eysenck’s own political inventory which was developed after extensive empirical investigations in the 20th Century.”


Find out who you represent in society by way of big political words about values

Have a go.

 

life without arguments, whaddup

another river

Douglas, J. Yellowlees. The End of Books — Or Books Without End?: Reading Interactive Narratives.

This week has involved reading about reading interactive narratives – about the true never-ending story. Whilst I should have begun my understanding of hypertext and its relation to writing a couple of weeks ago, giving myself a crash course in its history by jumping all over the web, building my knowledge from bits and pieces, seems more immersive and appropriate to its definition. Instead of being given a long string of words to take in, hypertext allows you to choose your path of information input through hyperlinks like this**. Hypertext narratives take the link jumping business and put it into the form of a story where the reader can change how it begins, progresses, and ends each time they read it. It’s kind of like an R.L. Stine “Choose Your Own Adventure” book, only with a vast amount more options.

With that in mind, does that mean R.L. Stine wrote a primitive print version of hypertext?

I get the impression that hypertext fiction is like a book with an intelligence of its own. In print, different readers can have different interpretations of a story. It seems like hypertext must amplify this ten-fold – not just different interpretations, but different representations of characters, settings, locations entirely. 

This difference between interactive and print narratives can make comparing accounts of what each reader thought the story was “about” […] infinitely more varied and problematic.

It’s like the hypertext narrative becomes a person, becomes a friend. Each reader it meets is granted a different impression and different memories to associate with it. It is a living story.

I would like to read some hypertext narratives to see if this is true.

by mog 

 

untruth

How do you know if it’s better to tell a lie?

At the beginning of each tutorial for Networked Media, every student is to mark down upon a form exactly how many ongoing subject requirements out of ten they’ve achieved within the last week. Whilst some blogs may be checked for compliance with their owner’s markings, it is mostly an honesty based self-assessment.

Which, of course, is trampled all over by students wanting to raise their grades by way of a little white lying.

“If they’re drafts, they still count as a post.”
“I skimmed both readings. Yes, it counts.”
“Sure, I was at the lecture (guys wat was it about srsly tell me)”

Yeah, okay. The chances of you getting caught out by a tutor are pretty slim. Go ahead and fake it.
Today, my classmates decided that there would be absolutely no negative repercussions were we to be found cheating. None. No catch, nothing. Tutors, you’re either really stupid, or you’re really sneaky. The way I see it – with no consequences from your tutor seeing your lack of posts other than their disappointment in you and your work ethic, it’s going to simulate getting the cold shoulder of disappointment from your parents, rather than being shouted at and punished. Your moral compass is going to spin out if you lie.

Why? Because you know you’ve done wrong. You have nothing and no one to bounce anger off at, so you end up deflated and guilty. Well done, Networked Media tutors. Plan well thought through. You knew some smart student would suggest the ‘no punishment’ idea, and that everyone else would agree.

Honestly, I’d rather just have to shout everyone food or drinks. You can earn money back a lot faster than you can respect/trust/all other virtues.

fuck this, why can’t i lie?

An essay is a river

Takeaway idea from “The Age of the Essay”

Apparently, when writing an essay, it is okay to take an unexpected direction. It is okay to let an idea take off on its own course. It is okay to correct the river, to nudge it back south when it has gone a little too far east, and then let it flow free again.

This goes against everything I was ever taught in high school.

 

Food for thought.

mog out

walking wieners

I bet most people around my age have already seen this.

Hot Dogs or Legs?

So many photos have boiled up over the last few years of (mostly) girls’ legs at a rather nice place, usually some form of waterhole, that emphasises their shape, shade and size in a way that is flattering. This is done with the outwards motive of showing viewers a place they’d rather be, when really, the subject just wants to show off in an annoyingly vain fashion.

In a way similar to the plump pout becoming forevermore the “duck face”, someone special on the internet has managed to turn the sexy stick-legs into walking wieners.

Beautiful. The Facebook page was created about 15 hours ago*, and I’ve seen it jump from 40 000 likes to over 120 000 in the last few.

 

mog thanks dog for social networking

 

*at time of post