Practices of Looking 337-343

In the book it talks about a simulation game called Second Life, which is a game that is sort of a social life game that allows interaction online (337). This can have some positive effects, but what effects do these simulations have on the real life interactions? Some feel that its now easier to express how we feel via text, messages, and other non-direct ways of communication. This affects how people socialize in real life situations like meetings or conferences and may make people less comfortable because they are so use to socializing indirectly. This can make people not be able to socialize well to others and hinder their social life.

Geocaching Project

This project was very interesting because I had to find a object. In my case I found something that meant something to me. Once I had an inspiration to work with I made two images that I felt that had a deep connection in my heart, This project allowed my to use my creativity very similar to how artist use their skill in creating art pieces like the famous artist like Pablo Picasso. The final aspect that I really enjoyed about the geocaching project was leaving it in a certain area that had a connection with the Triptych. I really thought a lot about this project and it has been a way of expressing myself in a way that would be difficult to do in words.

Practices of Looking 401-413

In the book it talks about how piracy which is primarily in the U.S. but also worldwide affects Hollywood sales (401). The book also talks about how Hollywood films make more money outside the use as well (401). My comments would be that, yes there are many ways to search for pirated movies online and illegally stream movies barely hitting theaters, but I personally, would rather pay to watch the movie in the best quality it can be, then to watch a movie that is recorded on a camera phone that has both bad sound and video quality. I also read online how Netflix is working with some Hollywood movies so that movies can be available on Netflix. By making a movie available on Netflix would help to fight piracy because some people would rather watch a movie at home, then watch it in the theater, outside of their comfort zone. Anyway, most bootlegged movies are going to be significantly inferior to a theater version, which is why I would rather go to the theaters.

Articles: Google changes to 'fight piracy' by highlighting legal sites

Google needs to promote legal websites and demote illegal one. There's one problem with Google doing this, the first is if someone types an illegal website into the browser, they will get hits related to that website, so there is not really a way to get a legal website when the search is specific. Another problem is that when Google promotes websites that pay more to be first when they are searched, is a problem. The problem is that Google should put legal websites first instead of higher paying corporations because what if a higher paying corporation is in fact, illegal. So is Google promoting piracy? Piracy is not just going to go away when there are servers outside the U.S. that can put illegal content online, and Google can't really doing anything to them. One example is Sweden, they have different laws then the U.S. and so they can pirate content, but the U.S. cant really do anything to stop pirated content when millions of people pirate content from servers outside the U.S.

Practices of Looking 389-401

In the book it talks about when the U.S first landed on Earth in 1968 and took pictures of earth from their (391). This was a big accomplishment for the nation and is still a remarkable event. In recent news, something very similar happened when India became the first Asian nation to reach Mars and orbit it. This is quite an impressive feat considering how far Mars is from earth. India is setting a goal for others to improve on technology for not only space travel but probably even to further technological advancements on earth. This is similar to how the U.S. and Russia was in a so called space race, and to see who could land a man on the Moon first. Maybe the next goal is to see who can land a man on Mars which would be a very difficult task to achieve, but with further advancements, it might be a lot easier to achieve.

Free Culture-Lessig 213-234

Lessig mentions that Disney used the stories of Grimm to make their ever popular movie franchise (213). But what happens when other companies or people start to do this, Disney starts to bash people like Deadmau5, when Disney themselves has violated copyrighted stories like Grimm which they do not own. Disney is making money off of creativity that wasn't there to begin with and claiming it as their own. Deadmau5's similar actions using a modified variation of Disney's mickey mouse bothers them, while it didn't bother them when they stole Grimm's stories. Disney does this with countless other stories that they made in to a movie adaptation, and as if it OK for them to do it and it's not OK for others. But there may be one flaw to this, which would be where did these original stories first originate, maybe Grimm wasn't the first to make stories which Disney altered.

Women, Fire, and Dangerous Things by George Lakoff

The author has a point when he says that "Every time we see something as a kind of thing, for example, a tree, we are categorizing" (5). I think the reason for this is to create an understanding of something we are not familiar with. It's like if we saw some sort of unfamiliar species, we may try to understand what it is by comparing it to something we do know. That is why categorizing is a great thing to do sometimes. Categorizing is probably even a subconscious thing we do because we categorize something everyday according to how we categorize things. But I think categorizing can be hard sometimes when it is defining music. Some music have elements of many genres and its hard to categorize them in just one word because they may be defined by more than one genre.