Wikipedia

In today’s tutorial we mainly focused on key things we learnt in the lecture. We also discussed what our essays will be focused on. I chose to write about the comparison between the film Alphaville and the film matrix and how they are both represented. Points I can focus on is how communication has changed and the impact it has made on people.

In the lecture we discussed Wikipedia and how reliable it is as a source. We learnt Wikipedia can be useful as big source of information but some pages such as one Steven showed us on Lee Cox can bend the truth, or even be completely false. So do not use it on any university assignments!

Create reality, alter truth - matrix

The Matrix study gave us a peep into the future, to see how far technology is going. It makes me wonder whether technology has already taken over our society and if communication technologies changed the perception of truth and reality.

Important notes
Correspondence Theory: Just the facts - observable, mesurable
Coherence Theory: Does it fit together and make sense?
Performative Theory: I do declare
Social Theory: What can we agree on?

Tutorial Task

How do the ideas from Walter Benjamin's "Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction" apply to contemporary digital media? Walter Benjamin says that mass production lets everyone view digital media and not just ones selected. Quality is applied to digital media rather than just quantity.

There was a time when "Art" was made by artists who were skilled professionals. Now that anyone with a computer can create things digitally (music, images, videos, etc), what does that mean for "art"? I believe art now is not as significant as it once was. But art is now free to do by anyone as new communication technologies allow people to do so.

Is a photo shopped image "authentic"? No, nothing cropped, changed and airbrushed can be considered real. Do digital "things" have an "aura" (in Benjamin's terms)? I guess so as people do provoke emotions when it comes to music and movies.