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The interface

The interface. The Medium is the Message. Two Aesthetics of the future now. Blade Runner. Mac GUI circa 1984. A big question.

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The interface

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  1. The interface The Medium is the Message

  2. Two Aesthetics of the future now Blade Runner Mac GUI circa 1984

  3. A big question • Between these dystopic (digitality will ruin everything!) and utopic (digitality makes everything better!) extremes, what is your developing opinion on the changes in all aspects of our culture brought by new media?

  4. Circular influence Culture Design and Aesthetics Ways of Thinking

  5. INterface • “A point where two systems, subjects, organizations, etc., meet and interact.” • Webster’s Dictionary • GUI (Graphical User Interface): “a human-computer interface (i.e., a way for humans to interact with computers) that uses windows, icons and menus and which can be manipulated by a mouse or finger (and often to a limited extent by a keyboard as well).

  6. TMITM “The Medium is the Message.” -Marshall McLuhahan But what does this mean?

  7. Key Quote • “When you use the internet, everything you access- texts, music, video, navigable spaces- passes through the interface of the browser and then, in turn, the interface of the OS. In communication, a code is rarely simply a neutral transport mechanism; usually it affects the messages transmitted.” • Manovich (64)

  8. Mediums

  9. Past influences • In many ways, most websites reflect the values of print culture before them: • Rectangular surface • Limited amount of info • “The screen is aggressive.” • Designed to have an order • Some relationship to other pages • Embedded images, drawings, and tables • Why?

  10. Past Influences • Movable Camera • Rectangular Representation of Reality • Something “inside” and something “outside”

  11. Seemingly simple hyperlinks, but one of the biggest differences • “The acceptance of hyperlinking in the 1980s can be correlated with contemporary culture’s suspicion of all hierarchies, and preference for the aesthetics of collage in which radically different sources are brought together within a singular cultural object.” • Manovich (76) • Think about • Your ipod • Your dinner table • Your wardrobe • Your television habits • Your computer bookmarks Put Differently: If the WWW was created in the 1940s or 1950s people would most certainly not have been ready for it.

  12. Organization of computer data • Hierarchical • Organized • Linear Logic • Clear Paths to Results • User Control • Manovich suggests this is more than a way to organize computer data- the decision to organize computer data in this way reflects a worldview.

  13. Organization of the wWW • Non-Hierarchical • Emergent Importance • User Chosen Paths/Wandering • Associative Logic • User Creation • A very different worldview than system data information. • We switch back and forth between these two interfaces all the time, every day. • Effects?

  14. activity Think about, discuss, and be prepared to give a short presentation on how accessing or experiencing your assigned list item through a computer (digitally) alters your experience with the thing and changes the way you think about its importance or what you can do with it. • Books/articles • Photographs/Images • Music • People (such as on a social network like Facebook)

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