STCR Update Winter Twenty10: The Machines Are Shaping Us

January 1, 2010 · Written by Tahero at 2:14 pm · Filed under Advertising Critique, Daily Feed, Social Studies

Friendster? We Off That!
MySpace? We Off That!
Facebook? We Off That!
Twitter? We Off That!
Willful Obscurity? We On That!
Right After I Finish This Mass E-Mail!

Yes I have moments of digital silence - I don’t like to take up bandwidth without having something inspired to say. In that last year I also moved my main method of digital ranting over to Twitter. I didn’t really mean to and I didn’t tell anyone. I just let it grow organically. It’s been cool.

If You Have An Investment In The System, You Are More Likely To Play By Its Rules.

As an ethnographer and artist; Friendster, MySpace, Facebook, Wordpress & Twitter have also been mediums of experimentation to me. I try to not take them too seriously. Keep an arms distance between Me and Digital Me so I can observe how my interaction with it changes how I am.

The machines are shaping us. Get into it.

It’s been very interesting to see communities create a vernacular and a set of social rules while exploring a new form of communication. It is also interesting to see real world rules of class, gender, race & ego replicated in the new space. It is also interesting to be able to witness human transformation is such a short period of time. Compare the time span between the creation of fire and electricity to dial-up and WiFi and the effect this speed increase has on thinking & doing.

As I reach my second to last archivable Twit (pronounced Tweet), I’ve decided this year that I’m going to Blog more, which is inversely proportional to Twittering less. I set out to do this for one simple reason: Twittering & tagging are labor we do for them; Blogging & journaling are labor we do for us. More on that here: The Internet as Playground and Factory Conference

Hip-Hop Word Count x Ethnographic Database x Cultural Pattern Recognition

My blog topics this year will be heavy on the Hip-Hop Word Count because the 2nd beta is finally launched. Hip-Hop Nerds Stand Up!

I will be sending private beta testing invites in the next STCR Update. If you’d like to be a beta tester register for a user account and subscribe to the STCR Updates list by clicking on the email button on the top left of the page.

Best, Tahero
–
Creative Director, Strategist
::
http://twitter.com/tahero

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yah said,

January 11, 2010 @ 11:09 pm

Its funny cus at first I hated twitter. Still do really but find it comforting to just throw up random thoughts from time to time. Facebook seems too personal to get personal. With all the pics, long lost school mates and coworkers. Twitter seems more like going to confession….you can say anything but really…you shouldn’t.

Its all too weird but I find myself getting sucked in all for the hope of promoting my business. There’s no way to do it from the outside…it sucks you in.

We definitely need more dialogue on this subject. Especially its effect on a people that have historically been so mistrusting of the “system”, of the machine to be so engrossed its a wonder. How did they get “us”?

Tahero said,

January 13, 2010 @ 3:52 pm

I feel you Yah. It’s our innate need/desire/ability to communicate with other humans that fuels the technology. That’s the basic principle right? There are theorists looking into peer-to peer based social networks and ways to make your online identity more portable. Look at some of the slideshows from the The Internet as Playground and Factory Conference link above.

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