technoculture203-09

For a number of reasons I don't use Facebook. Or LinkedIn or any other social networking site. The main reason is I worked on the recruitment team at one of NZ's big corporates and saw how recruitment strategies utilise social network sites. I found the way in which the social networking sites were willing to engage with us troubling, hence my absence. We weren't alone in this by the way, it is a global trend. Whenever I've mentioned this to people there is a sense of surprise, that somehow Facebook can only be viewed as a source of good. As we can see with this story, not necessarily. Only so much can be seen unless you sign up to a corporate site but once you have you would be amazed at what people show, and not necessarily in a good way. Aside from being a salutary lesson this strikes me as a use of the social networks that we didn't really discuss, which is the real, and regular use of this information by external participants to make judgements. Which kind of defeats the notion of social networking. It also leads to the idea that because of this we might end up moderating how we communicate online.

Okay so after hearing about those Extropian people I decided to look a little (emphasis on the little) deeper on the matter. I went on a website that was all about this particular group ( http://www.extropy.org/) and read up on some of their "current projects". At first glance I found it to be boarder line Mad Scientist territory. But the group or whatever they are seem to be very organised and public about what they are trying to achieve and aim for.

They have a number of vague goals that all aim to improve the human life span and quality of life. My impression from this is that their goals will be achieved through the merging of more advanced technology and the human body (hello sci-fi cyborgs) until the point where any human/flesh component will no longer be needed. And while the idea of me being 20 feet high with large laser cannons for arms is very appealing, I do think that this whole "giving evolution a cybernetic kick up the backside" is a bad idea.

The whole point of evolution is that we adapt to things that need adapting to. In my opinion using technology to advance physically is in the long run a bad idea. We may have some incredible ideas on how to use technology but in the end we will run out of ideas and then what? We reach a dead end on the evolutionar road. Can't go forward, machines evolve as we do, and we can't go back.

Plus one little side note, if we are all half-machine or whatever I do believe that someone might go on a power trip and get a little "dooms day" on us. People are violent already a flesh and blood. Giving them metal skin might not go down to well.

Not to mention the fact that if everyone is a robot and lives forever, how do we make babies? And I'm thinking that in a few hundred years or so the earth might become "standing room only".

I looked around the internet and found this;
http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1841108,00.html.
An article by Time outlining the development of 'mind-control' helmets by the U.S Army, with the article dated Sept. 14, 2008.

Some things i noted from the article:

- Schmeisser on "thought helmets" - "It'd be radio without a microphone," says Dr. Elmar Schmeisser, the Army neuroscientist overseeing the program.
"Because soldiers are already trained to talk in clean, clear and formulaic ways, it would be a very small step to have them think that way." I thought this comment by Schmeisser reflected an extropian ideology, as thought control over soldiers would definitely make them cyborgs, perhaps robots?.

- It is interesting to note at the beggining of the article it states; 'That's why the U.S. Army has just awarded a $4 million contract to begin developing "thought helmets", At first reading this it seemed like a typo.. $4M doesn't really seem that much compaired with the scale of other Army concept developments (billions im guessing?). If $4 million dollars is all they need to research thought control technology that seems like a pretty easy option for the Army if it works. How would other armies respond to this technology?

- The article also stated gamers are waiting on a similar brain wave system to be released by emotiv this summer - a $299 headset, which they hope will allow them to control video game characters by thought rather then any voice recognition like they may be used to. This prompts me to think about the future of gaming, or perhaps everything... are we all eventually going to have no use for old fashioned talking? because we can all communicate with each other telepathically at a high speed because we have hundreds of sensors hooked up to our brains.




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I agree with many of Bertozzi’s points, so carried out my own sort of experiment if you will with my border-line addicted gamer boyfriend (who we'll call... john) and his flatmates to test some of Bertozzi's points:

1. The consequences of challenging males: I asked John and his flatmates if I could play their multi-player-Halo-game-thing and the second I asked, 4 faces looked at me with an expression that easily read "err... why...?". To them, this was not a woman’s domain. As Bertozzi says in her article, there was hostility as I challenged the gender norms as it questions the very definition of masculinity. Directly, their masculinity.

2. Civility & chivalry: Although they were clearly uncomfortable with me in ‘their’ domain, they were very chivalrous when teaching me how to walk through floaty orbs, change from one gun to another that was apparently better, and ride big machine things. However, when I was playing (if you can call it that), I was ignored. Not a shot was fired at me and they ran past me like I was invisible, which backs up Bertozzi’s point about Catch 22 in cross gendered play. There was no glory in killing ‘just a girl’.

3. Female unwillingness to excel at cross-gender play: Even though I had 3 opportunities to kill John’s character, I did not want to. While I’m no 50s housewife, subconsciously I didn’t want to disrupt the gender norms that are constructed around me. The generalisation of male egos stems from somewhere and being beaten by a girl deals it a huge blow. I didn’t want to beat John at what is socially decided to be ‘a male thing’ for the very reason Bertozzi says in her article, not being seen as a ‘ball-breaker’ or appear less attractive to him.

So does this make me passive? A slap in the face to women’s rights activists? I think no. I believe it makes me someone who understands male/female differences and what each desires. For him, it’s getting the most kills out of his robot peers. For me, it’s as simple and cheesy as seeing him happy (but knowing I could kick his ass in Halo if I really wanted to.)

I was looking around the internet and found a website featuring this article.
It outlines how scientists have made an article of clothing, I think it is a jacket of cloak in this instance, which doesn't refract light of one wave length. This means it works like glass and you can only see it in certain times/lights etc.
The article outlines how it could be used in military settings, stopping night vision apparatus from detecting people who are wearing this item.
When wearing this, the person would become a cyborg, enhancing their natural existence, in this case by becoming invisible in some places and under some circumstances.
Would there be other things that aren't technology related, such as ordinary clothes or jewellery which are classed as additions to the person to enhance their natural person for beauty purposes?
I think no, when I think of cyborg, there has to be robot parts: actual technology that people can see or acknowledge, affecting how a person is living their life. I would also only class a cyborg as a cyborg if they acknowledged that technology's interference in their lives was making them as cyborg.

One of the thing that I found interesting when I had a look at the Web Trend Map http://xkcd.com/256/ was the cultural difference affect the use of SNS's. Many people seem to have their own SNS but the ones they use are the ones what their friends, families, co-workers etc use so they can communicate, share profiles more easily. In this map of online communities the SNS's are situated on the left side. Of course one of the most favoured MySpace takes up the most area which is clearly proven to be the popular among the rest. Myself as a Cyworld user I was quite shocked that Cyworld was even on the map next to MySpace. I only thought that this SNS was only popular in Korea and didn't even thought of anyone besides Koreans to know it. Seen by this map the area that takes up by the Cyworld is as much as FaceBook.

Cyworld literally means "realationship." Cyworld, much like a virtual space in the internet, which users can decorate their "home" and invite friends. As I said I'm one of the member of this SNS and reports show that as much as 90 percent of South Koreans in their 20s and 25 percent of the total population of South Korea are registered users of Cyworld.

After seeing this map I found out that today, cyworld has extended its operation to the United States, China, Japan, Taiwan, and Vietnam. This is quite surprising...