Firstly, I enjoyed the introduction. The material was easy to understand. Several definitions of cyberspace were given such as, where data is located, social interaction, virtual reality, cyberculture, etc...
Cyberspace is something that is part of our daily lives and has become necessary for our social lives, education, knowledge, employment...However, I have never sat down and thought about what cyberspace really is, what it is made of, how it works or why it works. Perhaps this means that I don't have a true understanding of what it really is or maybe I don't apprecaite it. This makes me think that I really view the computer as a machine/appliance...
Moving on to the history of telecommunications--its hard to believe that the telegraph was only invented in the mid-19th century. It is amazing to see how far we have come from the telegraph with radio, fax machines, satellites, etc...
I'm alittle confused about the term hypertext--Professor Strate will you go over this?
I thought the idea of defining spaces in cyberspace was interesting--for we define these spaces by access rather than ownership. When you access the World Wide Web, you have everything available right at your fingertips.
The Internet is seen as a "transport medium"--transporting information or providing information to the user. However, cyberspace is considered to be the "environment" where all of this information is kept and regulated. furthermore, "cyberspace can be a place to go and get things to use, a place to ask questions and give answers..." (p54) So, the Internet and cyberspace have a constant connection.
I do witness how virtual reality can be "overwhelming." How many times are you on the computer, watching TV and on the phone at the same time? Since we are taking part in so many mediums at once--Charles Larson suggests that we lose our sense of community. He compares this to watching a movie--the audience can cheer or boo but there is a sense of community established. However, when on the computer--many tend to be engaging in other mediums simultaneously and community is lost. Prior to reading this book, I would have never thought about creating a sense of community within the cyberspace world.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Then again, nothing beats a sense of traditional community. I agree that people get wrapped up in too many things all at once, but then again we can never do all things at once right. We will be prone to being careless about something, and our attention deficit could cause some imminent disaster. A "community" in cyberspace is only in the eye of the beholder...
ReplyDeletewe'll definitely go over hypertext, as a literary form, and as the basis of the web.
ReplyDelete