Arranged Delirium

As we begin Photoshop work in my New Media course, this MacWorld article outlining some of the application’s history is proving to be quite timely. I have a love/hate relationship with the software. I’ve been using it for nearly 20 years myself and it’s remarkably versatile and useful. But the pricing and availability of it at this point has me looking for alternatives for my classes. I suppose I love the software, but hate the Adobe business practices.

In any event, it’s always provided an excellent production platform for considering the various social and ethical implications for our current use of media. One of the more recent dramas has been the result of the image below. You can read all about it in the National Post article.

BTW, if you haven’t checked out Photoshop Disasters, you ought to give it a look. SOme of the commentary is pretty funny.

Thanks for CH for sending along this video that ties together a couple of my primary interests: archaeology and social networking. While the fieldwork described in the Onion New Network piece might not be as glamourous or exciting as that conducted in the Mediterranean or the southwest US, it’s a lot less dirty and smelly…

Now you know what happened to Friendster.

Over the last week, we’ve seen more thoughts and impression on the Apple tablet device published. One thing that I’ve been personally interested in is the information regarding some the accessories, as that resolves my own issues with USB and SD capabilities (more info on the tech specs page). And, Engadget has a guide published that they’ve been updating as they learn more.

But I remain struck by the discourse concerning the product and the seeming unwillingness to see it as something other than what people expect to see. This isn’t a laptop. This TechCrunch article does a good job of representing the idea - and that may be the thing that folks are missing: This device isn’t really for technophiles. Its not a computer - its a media interaction unit.

Brian Caulfield from Forbes has a short piece up based upon his short experiences working with the device - though any of us with an iPod Touch could likely extrapolate. And his closing line articulates what I’ve been saying for a year now, and why I’m interested in the device: “Make a PC really small and it kind of sucks. Make an iPod really big, however, and it’s kind of great.”

So, I’ve decided I’m getting one, and I’ll post some substantial reviews once I work on it for a while.

LOL. Gizmodo actually interviewed the Panera Bread iMac Man (see my post from last month). Apparently, he uses an iLugger...and he has two level 80 characters.

(...and this is one reason why I don’t want people taking my picture - you never know how it might get used!)

From Gizmodo
Step one: bring your iMac to a Panera Bread.
Step two: play WoW on it.
Step three: be old.
Step four: win the unconditional respect of the entire internet, forever.
UPDATE: This appears to be a habit.

As our games course wraps up, I enjoyed this timely article at the Chronicle: 5 Teaching Tips —From Video Games. I’ve really come to appreciate how playing games can really teach problem-solving skills in ways that are inherently motivational for students. It reminded me of the early days of multimedia development when we could get students to pay attention to content merely because it was interesting to them. Then, that got me thinking about my own teaching and what elements are effective and which are less so…