The Future of Meida.

The future of media, literature, comic and game.

In this post I want to talk a little about my personal view on the future of media, literature, comic and game. Personally I can’t really separate any of them with others, as they all have part of each other. Video game, or even paper top game normally has a story which drives the plot of imagination, and that’s literature. Comic, especially graphic comic is basically literature with fancy images, and they are all form of media.

I believe that in the future the different between each of them will be less and less noticeable. Student will be playing game for its greatly written story, and people will be reading more and more books with images. I think today’s world is full of information, data and knowledge, and it will be harder and harder for people to accept information without any visual help. Voice, sound and music will become more and more popular in form of media. Comic, especially online comic will likely to have sound effects or even theme sound to enhance the reader’s experience.

I believe in the future the goal of media will no longer be to deliver the message, but how to make people to accept that message. It will be like trying to read a 3,000 words paper in 5 sec; you can only get that much out of it. People are going to live in a world that they will see lots of advertisement, commercial, shots and images every day. The goal of the media artists will be to create things that people can get it as fast as possible. Shorter the better and faster the viewer can get the message the faster he can move on to the next 3,000 words.

As a game design major student, I can see gaming and net working is moving closer and closer. It’s all about connecting people together, and playing game is one of the easiest way to build friendship with others. I also see the potential of advertising and gaming working side by side. Video game can create a perfect digital market that concentrates all the same type of people together, and this will be create for any marketing or advertisement that’s designed to aim for a specific group of consumers.

Heavy Rain

Heavy Rain

Heavy Rain is one of those games you will play it once and never pick it up again. However, that one play through will rock your world, and make you question the future of gaming and movie. Heavy Rain has one of the best stories in my gaming history, and I think it can also be one of the best stories ever written. Heavy Rain will still be a great novel or movie on its own, but it’s the interactive of gaming that really brings out the greatness of it better than anything else. Heavy Rain is not the first of its kind; however it’s the first that does it so perfectly. The graphic, music and gameplay all work perfectly together to tell this great detective story set in this none distance future.  

You played as four different characters living totally unrelated life, and slowly throughout the story it brings them all together to the big picture. In a way I think Heavy Rain it’s more like a interactive movie than a game as you can only do it once. There are things that you can change and the ending will change base on your path of actions, but once the big mystery is out there it’s just not that interesting anymore.

Player spend a lot of time doing normal daily things with the main characters, like taking a bath, watching TV, making dinner and driving, but it’s those little things that really connect the player to those characters. We start to act like those characters, and we care and worry for their business. However is those little boring things that prevents me from playing it the second time.

Personally I believe this will become a great example for people making game heavily base on narrative, and those are going to be the alternate movie and novel in the future. This can also be great for educational purpose…imagine in the future we learn things through experiencing different situation and digital environment?  I think those will a more effective way of learning than anything else.

COSMIX 2011

The talk from the 1 person immersive was an interesting one. I went to the morning talk on Friday, and had some thoughts after the talk about the future of our media. The technology part of the dome was really cool as it’s the first time I had ever really got to know about such media. I can totally see in the near future we will be going in to fully digital environment, and there will be no more frame in a movie or a game. People will be able to just walk and look around freely in that environment, and even interact to it. Imagine creating the world of Avatar in a fully realistic 3D dome and allow the audiences just walk around the environment, and touch the strange alien plants. I didn’t went to the Saturday show so I don’t know how the actual work looks like, but from what they show us on Friday I can tell it going to be really realistic watching that in a fulldome.

The part about story writing for the dome is really interesting too; I like how she talks about her own personal experience. I had so many classes about storytelling before, but doing story telling for a fulldome it something else. How do you fully use what you have? And as there is no actual frame, it’s hard to stage what’s going to be where. I believe that in the future story writing is going to be more about the environment and the situation as a whole instead of focusing on the story itself. Audience will be able to experience the situation for themselves instead of seeing other characters doing it, which means that script and story writing will be totally different from today. Writer will need to work even closer to technician and artists in order to actually create the perfect experience for the audiences. The progression of the story will be depends on the audiences, and everyone will have a different story of their own. This will make it worth re-visiting the experience again and again, and each time the audience will experience something different due to his personal experience and knowledge of the story. Video games had done this for a while now, but not for movies or novels. Imagine in the future we will be able to watch a movie again and again and base on our interaction to the movie we got different ending and different story happens inside the world of that story. Writer will need to create a more fully develop world before focusing on the main story, and in the end what’s more important to the audiences will be the small things that they experienced differently than others.

Polyp

Asterios Polyp is one of the best graphic novels I have ever read. The story is good, but what makes it GREAT is the art. There are countless different art style going on in Asterios, and they are there not only for the visual, but for the story telling as well. Different style means different personality, condition, feeling, emotion and situation. Polyp himself is mostly a poly constructed person, which representing he is all about function, logic and close to “emotionless”. His world is all about making sense and everything need to function in the way that they are suppose to. (That’s why when his house got burn down by lighting he take it rather hard as none of those things are suppose to happen)

There are a range of different type of storytelling using different types of element, lines, colors, shapes, facial, word and more. One of the most interesting things I found it’s the mix of style when Polyp first meets Hana. They were drawn in two totally different art style (representing personality), and when they start to talk they both has taken the other’s art style and mix within their own. It is visual story telling at its best; not even the best facial emotion drawing can tell a person’s emotion that clear. Polpy’s dialog bubble is always squire and Hana is circle, again, its visual story telling using every element that’s on the page. There in a scene where Polyp visit Hava in the classroom where she is teaching some students, and when they meet the box around that shot become circle to represent they are now a whole instead of individual.

 The use of flashback and what could have been is another great element of the book. Having the “DEAD” twin brother to tell the story of Polyp is a really interesting and fresh style. I realize there is no black ink at all in the whole book, and I think that’s really unique for a graphic novel. I am not sure what was the reason or purpose behind it, but it’s sure interesting to see that. In the end I think Asterios Polyp is more about the icon, shape, lines and color that’s connecting to the reader instead of reading the story itself.

Snowman, tell us please about the deeds of Crake.

Oryx and Crake

First, I have to say this is one of my favored read so far because of its theme and the way the writer tell the story. The plot and dialogues are clear and easy to understand (which is great for someone with English as a second language), and there is a scenes of realism due to its person story telling. There are many things in Oryx and Crake that interested me, such as the media of the future and the beginning of an origin story of the creator “god” Crake. There are some factional elements that can become real in the near future, such as the suicide-LIVE online site and those genetic creatures…

All the main characters feel real and somehow related to me, as the writer brings us in a journey of their childhood, teenage and adult. It’s like reading the entire Harry Potter book in one concentrated book. The events that happen (besides the ending which killed everyone) to the characters feel like something that could happen to me or one of my friends. And the two main characters have such a strong bond due to they both admire the other’s trait…Jimmy see Crake is the brilliant, and Crake sees Jimmy as the normal guy who can get girls. I can relate to those two characters easily as we all have friends that we see as the “brilliant” and some we see as “the guy who get the girls”. I think one of the reasons why this book is so good is because something big and extreme happened to two that’s normal, and we never question about the plot as somehow it all makes sense.

The book has a interesting way to telling the story take reminded you that Jimmy is the Snowman, but somehow Snowman see Jimmy as a third person. With all those voice in his head, perhaps it’s hard for him to think of himself as first person anymore, and he is still living in the cage that he created when he killed Crake. It has a sad but interesting ending, especially with “Crake’s children”. A perfect human race created by Crake, and in a way Crake is the god of the new world as he destroy and create everything in it. Perhaps it will be interesting to see how that world will become in the future, seeing Crake and Oryx as god and goddess of the world…the first time that human take the world in his own hand and create the Origin tale of a brand new world. Imagine growing up in that world and learn this story as like the Bible, and live and pray to our creator god Crake, for everything he had done for us.

Kool Kool

So what is cool? Or perhaps it’s cooler to say “what is kool?” Yours parent may tell you to be the best you, you can be, or everyone is unique in a way that makes us cool. But what is it to most of the people in a nowadays society? Cool isn’t something that you can see it for yourself, as cool is something that can only be tagged by someone else but yourself. If you just walk around and tell everyone you meet how cool you are, you will surly see that it isn’t cool to put the cool title on yourself.

Cool also change through time and through different group of people, and there is a pattern that everyone will agree to be “cool” in side that specific group of people. One group of people may think that the creator of Dungeon and Dragon (D&D) is the coolest thing ever, but everyone else may consider that to be very nerdy. Fashion on the hand can be cool in a way but if a guy that’s into fashion can be consider “gay” to the other people. So basically what I am trying to say here is that cool isn’t something we can say for sure of what it is or what it takes to be cool.

Cool is like marketing, in marketing you can only get a specific group of people and you need to aim for that. If your advertisement is aiming to too large of a range of people in the end it may make that advertisement weak to all. A good advertisement is to aim to a specific of people, and making something they can all relate and all enjoy…and therefore is cool.

We can however say in general what is cool to most people using the popular culture and consumer marketing. If you got something that everyone need and have but bigger or better…you are cool. In a country that’s heavy toward materialism, you can basically say what you own is what your are. If I got a bigger tv than everyone I know I am cool, and if I have a house that’s bigger than most people I am cool…or am I? It almost sounds like I am say that being rich is cool, and personally I think it is true most of the time. However you can still be cool by doing things in the popular culture like doing Youtube,  however that’s only going to work if people enjoy your performance and what you have to share, or else it will be the totally opposite of being cool. People need to relate to what you do, and what you are doing need to be better…however there are other way of “cool” that is totally different than what I am talking about now.

In high school there is always this one good looking kid that don’t talk much, he site alone and don’t take part of any group activity and somehow that’s really cool for the girls. The silent type of “cool” may somehow suggest he use his brain more than his mouth, but why is that consider cool? By not doing things with the group he present the counter culture of that specific group’s culture and therefore is cool for young people just like in the 70’s counter culture. Those people are cool because they don’t fallow rules and is unique in a way. Many heroes in a police movie is always the rabble, who don’t play with rules and does thing his own way, and that is cool consider by many. I can keep going on and list out examples of what is cool, but in the end I believe cool is something that’s different with everyone, and can’t be lack in to a special category, as its different between groups, nations, ages, races and time.   

Characters

Character notes on the Graduate

Benjamin Braddock:

Benjamin is a college graduate and most importantly he needs to be around the age of 20 to 24. He is a clean-cut and well-bred young man with some confusion on his face. He needs to be dress like a normal everyday guy as his role should shows that he is just like everyone else who had just graduate from the college. He is not out standing with the look, but shouldn’t be too bad either, and his body type should be median size. Ben is always wondering and thinking about his future, he need to give the audients a feel that he is living in a dreamy world where everything doesn’t matter to him. He is not a good talker, and is a shy guy that’s not comfortable about sex and relationship with female. He is bored of his own life as there is nothing he wants to do or can do about his future, and is secretly hoping something exciting is going to happen. Ben is a good kid to his parents, and mostly do whatever his parent told him to do even he doesn’t want to. In the end I think Ben has a normal level of IQ and a just a little bit below average of EQ due to the why he expresses himself.

Mrs. Robinson:

She is a classic foxy woman. Mrs. Robinson should be about her late 30 or early 40 as she was likely marry really young. She is bored about her life and tired of her husband. As her daughter is in college and her husband is always working or with other women, we can see why she is so lonely. She talk like she is better than others, but in her heart she feel she is nothing. Once the relationship between her and Ben started, she sees Ben as low as she is and there for won’t allow Ben to go out with Elaine. She sees Elaine as herself when she was younger, and was hoping that Elaine will end up like her, marring someone that she doesn’t like. Mrs. Robinson is a selfish character, with the ability to seduce any man with her look.

Elaine Robinson:

She is the counter part of her mother, and she is a character that’s not yet polluted by this world. In the eyes of Ben, Elaine is a hope and a fresh new chapter of his life. Elaine is a beautiful young girl around the age of 20 to 22 perhaps just 1 or 2 years younger than Ben, which allow the relationship to grow easier. She is full of hope and is not afraid to express her love and hate. After she find out what is going on with her mother and Ben, her sadness and hate slowly recover when she move to a new area. This shows that she is still a girl that’s full of hope and looking the good side of everything. She is truly in love with Ben, unlike her mother who is only using Ben as a toy. 

Mr. Braddock and Mrs. Braddock

Ben’s parent is a classic good marry couples, however they care more of how they look as a family more than the reality itself. They are not close to Ben and most of the time they become the background character of Ben’s life. In the film we don’t even need to show their faces as the viewers don’t need to make any emotional connection with them as Ben isn’t as well. The Braddock is a wealthy family and the mother is likely someone that will spend most of her time dressing and doing her hair instant of spending time with her son.

Mr. Robinson and the Others:

Try to keep as few characters as possible, and focus on the mains.  Mr. Robinson is someone that is normally not there when his wife or daughter needed him, and so he should feel the same to the viewers the same way. What he does or what he did isn’t important to the story, as he is like a background character that’s there for the story of Mrs. Robinson and the connection of the two families. He isn’t doing anything unique or interesting during the whole story, and so his character should feel the same. Every other character in the story should be there as the contrast to the main characters, and by do so take their personality and interest.

auteur

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Michelangelo Antonioni

Before starting this blog, I am going to say that I am not going to discuss what I think is good or bad about the film, as this blog is about the auteur relationship between those films and their director.

Michelangelo Antonioni was an Italian modernist film director and best known for his use of long shot and open-ended narrative. Personally, I had never watched any of his films before this assignment due to I normally don’t watch old films unless someone told me to. The films I chose from Antonioni’s works are the three first English-language films he made, Blowup, Zabriskie Point and The Passenger.

Antonioni was already well known for his well directed films like La Notte and L’Avventura before Blowup, and it didn’t take much for American audients to accept him. After watching Blowup the first thing that comes to my mind is A Clockwork Orange by Stanley Kubrick. They have very similar dreamy quality and open-ended narrative, and I think it’s because Kubrick had been influenced by Antonioni’s style. I think that is what a true auteur should be; an auteur should have his unique style and in the same time influence the other with his style. Maybe Kubrick isn’t the best example here, as he is also a well known director with a unique style of his own, but who isn’t being influence by others? Every good directors and artist all learn from the past best and combine those elements in to a unique mix.

The next film I watched is the Zabriskie Point, and to be honest it feel really different than Blowup. The style of storytelling is totally different; however some iconic Antonioni’s camera works were still there. Blowup had a simple clear story with less than three main characters (the photographer, the woman in the photo, and the others.) Zabriskie Point had a complex storyline with many characters that I don’t really care about, and I totally lost the story half way into the movie. The story of Zabriskie Point is hard to fallow and with all those fast music and slow long take it is hard to pay attention. Antonioni once said that the reason he likes to use long take is because he want to force the viewers to watch the details of the shot, however it is hard to do that while all those explosion and crazy music is going on. In the end both of those films had some similar quality of Antonioni’s work, and perhaps Zabriskie Point was just not a good movie to use the same style as the Blowup.

The next film is the Passenger, and this is the one that I feel the “age” of Antonioni. When he made the Passenger he was about 62…63 years old and perhaps his style of directing aged with him as well. The reason why I am saying this is because the passenger is a really slow film. It has really interesting Hitchcock style of mystery element in it, and as well as the Blowup. The film feel really realistic but in the same time extremely dreamy. In the second final shot of the movie you see every main character in the room with Locke, and that’s like only five people. This remind me of the Blowup, as they both share the mystery element, simple story, open-ended narrative very few characters and they both had a long take in the end of the movie.

 In conclusion, we can easily see the style relation of those three films and we can also see the influence of time and theme that affect on the films. Zabriskie Point is about the counter culture and perhaps long takes and slow narrative didn’t work well with the subject matter. Blowup is a fresh take with very few spoken words and the mystery theme works well with the style, and as well as the passenger. Antonioni definitely had a iconic direction style which influence the others, and all those three films had his signature on it.

The definition of an auteur is a film maker whose individual style and complete control over all elements of production give a film its personal and unique stamp.  Maybe Michelangelo Antonioni didn’t have complete control over all the elements of production as no director can control the acting unless he does the acting himself, and it is hard to have complete control over the story when you have three other writers. However, Antonioni was doing the best he can with the elements that he can control to push the film toward his direction and belief, and I think it is fair to call him an auteur.  

Detective Novel

The Maltese Falcon is a detective novel wrote back in the 1930 by Dashiell Hammett. It is a detective novel, and it is clear of what it is from the beginning of the novel. We had two investigators, and they have a mystery to solve (but one die before he can do anything)...classic detective story which includes detectives in the story. Most of the detective novel at the time used elements like the dark side of the city, a foxy woman, murder, blood, strange European guy, crazy Asian scientist to catch the reader’s eyes. They all including some sort of mystery solving and saving some beautiful lady.


Almost all the detective stories I read had the following elements in them:
           

1.    The reader is giving a mystery to solve in the beginning of the story, and this mystery is seemingly a perfect crime or a twist of story line in the end.

2.     There are always some evidences that point to the wrong suspect, and most of the time is either the main character (detective) or some beautiful woman.

3.    The police, or the “official government” crime saver is always either stupid, don’t care about the crime, didn’t get there in time or something that’s preventing them from solving the crime (so our hero can solve it)

4.    Most of the time the official government is useless

5.    The hero character is always the smartest character, but sometime the female character may out smart him.

6.    Most of these novels give clues to the reader alone the way, so the reader can have the joy to try to find out the true first. (Which is good for radio too) But in the end most of them have a twist that totally change the perspective of the story and all the clues we got are now useless…

7.    The hero (detective) must work hard in order to find the evidences for the mystery.

8.    Including some fighting, gun fight or something that involving the hero doing some action

9.    The detective always have some relationship with one of the victim, either they are related, friends or love interest. (this means the hero didn’t solve the crime just for the money)

10. Most of the time the hero smoke. (this is great for film, the smoke create some cool contrast on the character) 

Lo-Lee-ta

I spent two weeks read Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov, and watch the movie adaptation by Stanley Kubrick. The novel is a really hard read, as there so many culture references I need to check to make sure, and even after reading it I can only said that I understand about 50% of the book. I am a big fan of Kubrick’s work, but this time I feel the movie and the novel are two completely different stories. The novel is a dark-tragicomedy, but the film feels like a comedy with some controversial ideas. Perhaps we can only truly feel the emotion and pain of Humbert Humbert’s love by reading into every single detail that he had described of her, and the movie simply doesn’t have the power to touch us in the same way. I quote from the book:

“Lolita, light of my life, fire of my loins. My sin, my soul. Lo-lee-ta”

How can any visual images be as specific and powerful this passage? I love the “Lo.Lee.Ta.” part, as it bring some delegacy to the name, and makes it feel like a secret and need to be separated into parts so no one can ever find it. Humbert Humbert looks at Lolita as more of an art work than another human being, and throughout the novel Humbert plays the part of a prisoner to the obsession Loita. All the things that he did are due to his selfishness, but perhaps he is truly powerless to stop his obsession.

“thinking of aurochs and angels, the secret of durable pigments, prophetic sonnets, the refuge of art. And this is the only immortality you and I may share, my Lolita”

Even in the end of the story after losing Lolita, Humbert still hold true to his love and obsession. Humbert still loves her even she is now a little adult with child of her own, which means the obsession of Humbert is not because he like nymphet. In the end he changed from obsession to caring and loving her, as he knows she can never be his again. He once more describes her as a piece of art that’s legionary and their story is going to be remembered by everyone.

 If we change the character of Lolita to an older female then the whole perspective of the story will be totally different. Is the fact that she is underage that makes this whole story so morally wrong and somewhat disgusting to some? Or the ways that Humbert used to control her and have sex with her? I agree that Humbert did some really wrong things like marrying her mother, or trying to drug her but part of me believe that in the end he will still do the right thing for her. We can see that when he gave her the money in the end, as in that point he just want to hurt/kill the person who did hurt her. Humbert also stated that he is only crime to this whole thing is destroying Lolita’s childhood, and this sounds like something a true father will say. What if in the end Humbert didn’t kill Quilty (which I think is worst than Humbert), and somehow Lolita and Humbert got together again and live as two adults…will that be a happy ending to the story? I think while people question about Humbert’s crime, we should also question about our cultures moral believe. I am not saying what Humbert did is right or wrong, I am just saying that all those problems can be solved if she is a little older than she was.

My contemporary fairy tale.

Once upon a time, there was a young man who left home and travel around the world looking for a better life. He ended up in a strange land where people spoke and sung differently, they were bigger and looked different them people from home. He found a job as a miner, mining for a dark-blue metal the people there called “Dlog”. People in this new land use this metal to remember if someone did a service to them, and they will worship the one that had the most metal. The young man didn’t understand why people here like those blue rocks so much, as they smell bad and once he almost fell down the tunnel when mining the Dlog. Mining Dlog was a hard and dangerous, but the young man work very hard every day.

Everything in the new land was different and magical to him even as he didn’t understand the language and symbols they used. He sometime saw people looking at him strongly or with a funny face. As he is the only stranger here, he also got pushed around during work with other miners, and made fun of because he didn’t understand how to use those strange tools or read the instructions. He had no friend and no one would help him on anything…he started to regret coming to this strange land.

One day when he was mining in the tunnel as always there is an elder worker hiding behind the entrance looking at him. This elder worker disliked the young man ever since he came, he thought that stranger looks funny and must be a demon sent by the devil. The worker secretly planned a mining explosive near the entrance hoping to trap the stranger so he couldn’t bring his evil power to this land. The young man was working really hard while he heard an explosion near the entrance. He ran as fast as he could, but it was too late the explosion had already block the only way in or out of the tunnel.

With the entrance blocked, the young man started to explore the mining tunnel. As he walked, he got deeper and deeper in to the inner core of the mine, where he had never been before. Suddenly he heard a strange noise and the ground he was standing broken in to two. The young man fell, and passed out from the impact. When he came to it, he was in a large cave full of Dlog and the emissive blue light from those Dlogs almost blind him. He wasn’t happy about all those Dlog, because he knew he will soon be dead if he can’t find a way out. He kept walking and walking for hours but there seems to be no end to this Dlog cave.

Two days passed away, and all he could see was cave after cave of Dlog. He drank the water in the cave, but there isn’t anything to eat, and the young man can’t walk anymore due to the hunger and tired from two days’ of walking. He laid down near a giant Dlog, giving up all hope of ever escaping the place.

When he was about to fall asleep he heard a small strange sound coming from behind him. The young man pushed the giant Dlog that he was laying on, and there was a large tunnel of river going down. He fallowed the path of the water for almost a day and finally a light coming from the other side of the tunnel, He was saved.

With the discovery of the Dlog cave the young man become the most respectful man in the land, and he use those Dlogs to buy the mine from the people there. He also got himself a nice house and got married with three wives. He also used those Dlog to bring more people from his homeland, and soon there are more of people from his home than people who originally lived there. He gave those native people some Dlog and allowed them to live happily elsewhere. In the end he and his people built a peaceful city there call Anilorak, and they lived happily ever after.

Dialogue

I am not sure if this is the right way to do it, but I am doing the dialogue on the topic of the online media (in this case online gaming) and the affect toward our interaction with people. I setup the stage, and create a situation for the following dialogue, and it may contain some use of bad languages due to the topic and the setup where this dialogue is happening:


In the Lost City of the Tol’vir, there are two dead bodies lying on the ground after an expecting wipe. The on laying the corner near the market street is Shadowz, the high undead shadow priest of the Under City, and the one laying near the stair is Dacoon, the mighty goblin shaman of Kezan.


Dacoon: WTF…
Shadowz: I can’t believe that just happened!  He purposely waited until we started the fight and left, so we will all die.
Dacoon: Yea, it’s crazy how people do that all the time.
Shadowz: Just because his didn’t get that chest, he was begging for that since the last boss.
Dacoon: ….
Shadowz: So he waited and left when we just started this boss…what a dick!
Dacoon: True true.
Shadowz: I bet he is someone that has no life and just sits in front of the screen every day, and gear is like more important to him than anything.  I bet he could level a toon from 80 to 85 in a day or something…
Dacoon: Yeap.  There are more and more people like this too, it happened to me twice last night.
There was one shammy who just kept calling everyone stupid and saying how he was better than everyone else because he knew everything..blablabla and in the end he just pulled some random mobs and got the whole group killed…
Shadowz: Name?
Dacoon: No idea, but he isn’t from our sever.
Shadowz: well that’s why he was doing that.
Dacoon: why?
Shadowz: I bet he would ever do something like that in real life, or even to the people on his same server.
Dacoon: Well, that depends on the people…
Shadowz: People are always trying to make themselves feel better.
Dacoon: So you mean by being stupid and calling other people names will make them feel better?
Shadowz: Partly, it’s a power thing, it’s because they can’t do that in real life.
Dacoon: what do you mean?
Shadowz: Like how we as human try to find ways to make ourselves feel stronger over others.  This just gives us a way we can do that without letting anyone know who we are.  It’s like getting to bully people without ever getting in trouble, or having them ever get revenge.
Dacoon: huh…
Shadowz: In the past we would swing swords to settle disputes. As we don’t swing swords anymore, our power is in the words we say.
Dacoon: well…we still use swords here.
Shadowz: so it’s even more metaphorical then, we can assume the role of these big hulking brutes with huge weapons.
Dacoon: huh…
Shadowz: and the only ‘pain’ we can cause through the online media is with words, and sometimes that’s almost worse…especially when there is nothing you can do to retaliate.
Dacoon: what pain are you referring to?
Shadowz: like emotional pain I guess, like telling someone they suck etc
Dacoon: so if you say certain words to people online, it will cause as much pain as in real life?
Shadowz:  People are likely to act meaner online than in the real world because we don’t know who they are. Like in here you can ninja items from people because you may not meet that person ever again. Obviously this is like blatantly stealing something while knowing the owner can never track you down to get it back.
Dacoon: but the acts you do online are like the acts you do in life, so this game sort of reflects your personality in the real world.  Do you think people are just being nice because they know they will see each other again?
Shadowz: not necessarily…that makes it sound like they are just naturally mean, which I’m sure some people are. I’d say it’s mostly that there are some situations where it is fun to be a dick to someone, but yes, like our situation in wow, it could be fun because of the knowledge of never seeing that person again, or having to pay for your actions in any way.
Dacoon: If there was a random man that was going to fall down a building or something, and there was a hard drive with the best ever gears in it, and you can only choose to save him, or let him die and get the hard drive. In the condition of no one will ever know what happened, what will you do?
Shadowz: how many items?
Dacoon: lol…full set
Shadowz: then the set, of course
Dacoon: cool cool…
Shadowz: bahahaha…it its BoE, it could potentially be sold on ebay for like a grand. He wouldn’t give me a grand for saving him, he’d just say thanks.  Nah I am just kidding lol, but see, that was a perfect example.
Dacoon: So do you think that sometime people do mean and stupid things online because they think it’s funny? Like that famous Youtube video about one guy that didn’t listen to the plan and let his whole team wipe?
Shadowz: dunnos…it may not be funny in the moment to some people who are serious about their gaming.  This is also a game you pay to play, so some people might take it more seriously, more like real life..  but I thought that video was hilarious…. Finally we got another healer!


The new healer revives the two, and they keep going on with their long journey to save the world of Warcraft.


FIN.

My Situation as a Reader

I am a senior college student, and due to the intensity of my school works and other random things I don’t have much time reading anything. Most of the time I read when I have to, and those are in the form of traditional books and papers. I enjoy reading only when it’s a really short paragraph, and I try to jump to the main point of the reading as fast as possible. I try to spend less time reading and learning the small details, and spent most of the time finding what the important things are.

Most of my readings are online, and most of the time takes place in blogs or news, as most of those are short and easy read. As my first language isn’t English, this makes reading and writing a little difficult for me. I do enjoy reading some classic novel from my own language sometime, as its easier and therefore I can totally relax and enjoy  the story without checking the meaning of the words every five minutes.

Phaedrus

Phaedrus, written by Plato, is a dialogue between Socrates and Phaedrus. The dialogue mainly covers the topics of love, soul and the art of rhetoric and dialectic. After reading the dialogue and a little research for further clarification those are the issues that Socrates discusses about:

1. The disadvantage of lover, and the advantage of non-lover (Phaedrus & Socrates)
2. “Divine” madness (Socrates)
3. Soul (Chariot Allegory) (Socrates)
4. Self-control and desire (Socrates)
5. Art of rhetoric and dialectic ( Phaedrus & Socrates)

The following are some main points that Socrates made during the dialogue:

• The advantage of non-lover over lover (ruled by judgment, and fair)
• Love lead to desire, selfishness and madness
• Love lead to madness but is a "divine" madness, Socrates listed four types of divine madness:

               From Apollo, the gift of prophecy (Mantic)

               From Dionysus, the mystic rites and relief from the present hardship (Telestic)

               From Muses, poetry (Poetic)

               From Aphrodite, Love (Erotic)

• Love is a gift from god, and therefore is a “divine” madness
• The story of Chariot Allegory, the two horses of rational and irrational
• The pursuit of pleasure, even manifested with love is not “divine’ madness
• The straggle between self-control and the desire of the pleasures of the body
• The non-lovers offer only cheap, human dividends
• The art of speech making cannot be art without a grasp of the truth
• One must use similarities to pursuits the audience
• One must construct the sentence, and clear the statement of the subject.
• One must understand whom he is speaking or writing to, before making a proper speech or writing
• Socrates stated that "In reality, our greatest blessings come to us by way of madness, which indeed is a divine gift”