Digital Media: Sources and Significance

By Sidharth Ojha

[sidharthojhasns]

Critical Analysis

McLuhan, M. (1964). Understanding media: The extensions of man. 

“Understanding Media” by Marshall McLuhan is a highly influential text that examines the impact of media, in every shape and form, on human consciousness, perception, and society. In particular renowned for the phrase “the medium is the message”, McLuhan discusses in depth the many ways in which the tools with which we express our ideas hugely dictate how we live our lives, form thoughts, and organize society. Although the book was first published in 1964, many of its ideas are still highly relevant today, with its concepts only taking on new and exciting connotations as society progresses. 

As we enter deeper into the age of artificial intelligence and particularly delve into AI-generated art and what it means for the artistic industry, I find McLuhan’s ideas very interesting and worth examining, specifically when he discusses automation and its impact on human society. I have selected two pages (390, 391) from Chapter 33 - “Automation - Learning a Living”, where McLuhan discusses the true meaning of automation using a variety of metaphors, and its profound effect on human society and human imagination. 

McLuhan begins by referring to the computer as a perfect micro example of automation, where the energy or electricity being fed into the computer for it to function - and the information it emits once it operates - is fundamentally similar on a molecular level. However, the process within it is complex, with different parts that perform various functions and work independently but also in relation to a system of unity, each function occurring simultaneously. He draws a parallel to a musical instrument such as an oboe, which requires a series of mechanical functions to occur in order for it to produce certain tones. As opposed to an electrical instrument, which can produce any tone for any duration instantly. I found it interesting how he compares a musical orchestra, where multiple instruments must play simultaneously to create a homogenous sound, to a simulation of the “organic unity” that occurs within a computer. Here he demonstrates that where what would take a lot of human labour and effort to do by humans can be done simply and instantaneously by a computer. 

McLuhan moves on to discuss how industrial automation created an effect of joblessness in the digital age, similar to how an electronic instrument renders the mechanical toil of an organic instrument less valuable. Markets that revolved around physical labor, toil, and mechanical effort became defunct. Essentially, labor of any kind no longer has similar, inherent value in the age of automation. 

McLuhan believes that this rendering of human effort as defunct simply makes liberal education even more necessary. Since the automation of every kind releases man from the “servitude” of mechanical work, or skill-based specialization, we must now delve further into how we employ ourselves, and our “imaginative participation in society”. I find this phrase particularly interesting since the manner in which we participate in society can no longer be as simple as fulfilling a physical service or mechanical function. Imagination has replaced physical limitation and we must now be creative with the ways in which we can productively participate in society. 

As McLuhan puts it, “This would seem to be a fate that calls men to the role of the artist in society”. The role of art in society is not strictly speaking essential, the way food and shelter are, however, it has always been an essential part of how human beings process the world, progress, and articulate themselves in order to develop. Today, artists must contribute in increasingly imaginative ways to the world as technology progresses. This is particularly relevant to my work and field since the advent of AI art has the power to render the “mechanical” functions of art obsolete - and so we must now imagine a world where artists fulfill a greater function that is removed from specialization and mechanical servitude - perhaps to a realm that is purely conceptual, and as generators of ideas. But what is considered mechanical and what is not is also not fully articulated until it has been replaced by a machine, since hindsight is 20 20. It would also be very challenging going into the future to differentiate what can broken down into simple Turing machines and what cannot be. The road to deciding what it means to be human and our role and meaning is going to be one with many twists and turns.

McLuhan discusses how automation has made people realize how much they depend on the routine of daily mechanics, and the confusion and purposelessness one may feel if that structure is removed. He refers to how early man performed the sedentary tasks of hunting or gathering before he began to specialize. Writing and printing marked the beginning of this specialization, separating human effort into skills of knowledge and skills of action. Similarly, I can draw parallels to a similar reality unfolding today. Artists too may have to now examine how much they depend on the routine of perfecting their specialized skills in order to succeed in what has until now been a skill-based industry. We may now have to consider what we intend to communicate with our skills, where our individuality and creative expressions lie, and what we have to say if we remove technical prowess as a factor entirely. 

Finally, McLuhan discusses how our very nervous systems are now extended globally, thanks to the interconnected technological world. We now have the ability to interrelate every human experience. Of course, this has been true for many decades - and now more than ever, with social media. We can compare our experiences to infinite other ones online. McLuhan uses the metaphor of being able to simulate the flying of a plane on a computer that has never been built, by a person that does not know how to fly planes, to illustrate the imaginative power of automation on the human psyche. In my view, this is also a lens through which we can view AI as an art-making tool. 

[sidharthojhasns]

Reader

1.

Nicholson, N. (2013). Cultural studies, oral tradition, and the promise of intertextuality. The American Journal of Philology, 134(1), 9–21. Available at: https://www.jstor.org/stable/41809503

Nigel Nicholson's "Cultural Studies, Oral Tradition, and the Promise of Intertextuality" discusses that the concept of intertextuality should be a part of how we study oral traditions. This text made me realize how a number of different texts and artworks connect through time. And especially through humanity's main source of communication, speech. Nicholson refers to theories by a number of writers. who all discuss language as fluid through time, where the meaning of words changes according to the context and how it affects how we communicate

Nicholson speaks about how intertextual analysis often focuses only on literary texts and neglects oral traditions, and thinks this is a missed opportunity. Oral traditions are rich with intertextual connections since they change upon each retelling and reveal a lot about the cultural dynamics of the teller. He discusses Bakhtin’s viewpoint of intertexts being not just an echo within literature but also a shared reality and document of issues within a community. I found it particularly interesting that Nicholson refers to the idea of a text not only responding to existing texts but also being a response or instigator of potential and future responses to that text.

2.

Elkins, J. (2001). The object stares back. [Archive.org]. Retrieved from https://archive.org/details/objectstaresback00elki_0

In "The Object Stares Back: On the Nature of Seeing," James Elkins discusses the concept of the objects that we look at every day and their relationship with us. Seeing is not a one-way road as it's usually understood. He sees seeing as an active process that is influenced by our personal perspectives and cultural context. One of the things This text helped me see things in a different light where the objects we see don't necessarily have intrinsic or objective qualities but are what they are is largely dependent on the subject looking at them.

In the book, Elkins discusses the many aspects of seeing including physiology, psychology of perception, and the cultural history of images. Our eyes and brains work together to create the image that we see, and the book discusses how our own subjective experiences affect the visual world and have throughout history across cultures. I like the idea of examining how the knowledge we have access to at times in history, can impact how we see things, and how that can vary widely. 

3.

McLuhan, M. (1964). Understanding media: The extensions of man. 

In this book, McLuhan explores how human perception is shaped by media and technology and how it also impacts how society is organized. McLuhan is the author of the well-known “medium is the message” and discusses how the medium itself contributes a great deal to the message and is a huge part of the content being communicated. Each medium creates its own experience and cannot be separated from the message. 

I found the concepts of “hot” and “cool” media very interesting. The book proposes that “hot” media provides a lot of information without requiring audience participation, such as print, and “cool” media requires the audience to fill in the gaps, such as telephone. In the book he examines various aspects of media and how it influences the world and human consciousness. This text helped me understand how the medium itself affects many aspects of consuming or making media. Many things that are hard to notice, or just taken for granted. 

4.

Goetz, C. (2012). Tether and accretions: Fantasy as form in videogames. Games and Culture, 7(6).https://doi.org/10.1177/1555412012466288  

In this paper, the author discusses how RPGs are structured with two key aspects, tether and accretions. A “tether fantasy” is the experience of being safe in a game vs being exposed, such as venturing outside a home into dangerous environments, such as in Minecraft or Terraria. The accretions fantasy is defined as the process of accruing or accumulating power and objects to improve a character and make them strong in the game world such as collecting items, this was an interesting articulation of what I would have only really differentiated as an action RPG or Survival RPG, terms that are widely used practically, but little reductive. experience points, etc to level up. I also find it interesting how the paper uses the word “fantasy” instead of “story” for games, seeing all games regardless of genre as a fantasy where the player identifies with not just the avatar in the game but also the fantasy of growing powerful or having adventures. Although I disagree with the statement I found it an interesting perspective on games as a medium.

5.

Robson, J., & Meskin, A. (2016).  Video games as self-involving interactive fictions. The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, 74(2), 165–177.   Available at: https://www.jstor.org/stable/44510494

This article explores the concept of “self-involving interactive fiction” through the context of video games. According to the authors, in traditional fiction such as books, the audience engagement is passive. However, SIIFs are interactive and therefore have the audience itself as a participant in the fiction. Within the fiction, the player has influence and also fictional truths and realities. In video games, players are always referring to themselves in the first person and imagine themselves to be the performers while in other mediums they are vicariously experiencing other characters' experiences very often. The paper acknowledges Walton’s theory that all fiction involves audience participation but makes the distinction that SIIFs require participation not just in the imaginative experience but also in creating the tangible aspects of the text itself.

6.

Kanji, L. (2016). Illustrations and influence: Soft diplomacy and nation branding through popular culture. Harvard International Review, 37(2), 40–45. Available at: https://www.jstor.org/stable/26445579

In this article, the authors discuss how popular culture is used by nations for soft diplomacy and nation branding, where aspects of a country’s culture can impact its image internationally and even achieve foreign policy goals. The best example is Japan’s use of anime and manga and how that has been used post-WW2. The article also mentions examples such as Britain’s focus on art and education, Turkey’s “Turkayfe” website that promotes Turkish culture, and the US Sports Diplomacy program. Soft power and the image of a country or culture are incredibly valuable and affect the lives of people. And despite being individuals everyone invariably carries with them a collective image of where they come from. This text helped me articulate my thoughts on this subject. since soft power cannot be quantified. It also discusses how soft power can be misused as a political tool that can manipulate public image. 

7.

Punday, D. (2012). Narration, intrigue, and reader positioning in electronic narratives. Storyworlds: A Journal of Narrative Studies, 4, 25–47.  DOI: 10.5250/storyworlds.4.2012.0025

In this paper, Daniel Punday argues that existing narratological frameworks which are developed for print media cannot accurately analyze reader engagement in narratives that are created in electronic mediums. I find the concept of “intrigue”, borrowed from Aarseth’s work on text adventure games, interesting as a way to categorize the reader’s role in making choices and navigating the world. This is in juxtaposition with the classic role of the narrator in texts. Punday explores how in electronic narratives there is both the story being told or the narration and the underlying mechanics of the medium. This means that the readers must participate in the text and interact with its rules in electronic narratives, which is crucially different from print media.  

8.

Torikian, G. J. (2010). Against a perpetuating fiction: Disentangling art from hyperreality. The Journal of Aesthetic Education, 44(2), 100–110.  DOI: 10.5406/jaesteduc.44.2.0100   

In this article, the author discusses the concept of hyperreality and how it is a consequence of postmodernism and its impact on art. Within postmodernism, due to the deconstruction of objective truth, there is a sort of alternate reality created which is more about possibility than reality. This leads to what is called hyperreality, where a fabricated reality exists which is more about signs and symbols than true reality. In the article, the author tries to differentiate between art and hyperreality. According to the article, art reflects human disposition has aesthetic goals, and can arouse ideas and emotions within the audience. In contrast, hyperreality becomes a copy of a copy, becomes reliant on technology and mass production, and is passively consumed. This text is also heavily related to texts by Jean Baudrillard that I read for my blogs. The article criticizes contemporary art’s tendency to move towards hyperreality by embracing commodification. 

9.

Natale, S., & Henrickson, L. (2022). The Lovelace effect: Perceptions of creativity in machines. New Media & Society, 26(4), 1222–1240. DOI: 10.1177/14614448221077278

In this article, the author introduces the concept of the Lovelace Effect, which speaks to 

AI-generated art and how it is perceived by people. According to the Lovelace Effect, the quality of AI art cannot only be measured by how it appears as art, but also whether it is following the process of making what we can consider art. Meaning that if the viewer sees the art as original or creative, the AI has performed its task. Although AI-generated content is perceived as art, this is in contrast with the Lovelace Objection, which is the idea that AI is limited to its algorithms and programming, and focuses on the AI’s capabilities rather than how it is received. The article discusses examples where various AI artworks have been displayed in museums under artistic contexts so that it is perceived and critiqued as artwork as opposed to the technical capability of a machine. The Lovelace Effect essentially speaks to how cultural framing, social factors, e.t.c influence how we attribute creativity to machines. This text also helped me immensely in my blogs.

10.

McKim, J. (2017). Speculative animation: Digital projections of urban past and future. Animation: An Interdisciplinary Journal, 12(3), 287–305. 1 2 DOI: 10.1177/1746847717729581

In this article, the author explores how contemporary artists and architects use animation to illustrate urban landscapes and geography. The article argues that digital media and aesthetics have impacted cultural memory and also our view of the future. Theorists such as Stiegler and Hansen emphasize that digital media is “non-experiential” and so can limit our imaginations of the future, whereas the article argues that digital animation has the aesthetic potential to envision alternate urban futures as well as reconstruct the past and traumatic historic events. The article uses various case studies such as Stan Douglas’s historical reconstruction of Vancouver, Forensic Architecture’s documentation of urban atrocities, etc, to illustrate how animation can be a form of resistance against dehumanizing forms of digital media.

[sidharthojhasns]

Blog Post 10.

Originality and being at the forefront

It is a very common thing that artists today when they start making art start by copying their great masters whoever they might be, starting. Young people who go on to make great films start out making fan films, writers start with fanfiction, since it's hard for people to create something from scratch perhaps in the past or in isolated incidents where the person hasn't had exposure to media they will not do this. But in our increasingly media-saturated world, it is very difficult for people to not get influenced by other's works. One way this can happen is in the ways described by (Bloom, H. 1973) being correcting or 'fixing' the influencer's work, adding new dimensions to it, subverting it, trying to find its broader themes, rejecting it completely, or incorporating it in a way where something original is created. This doesn't necessarily have to happen in this order. But many artists will experience at least one of these in their careers.

An artist in their career must also face the changing nature of what creativity is and how it has evolved. What may be considered creative in one time period may change and evolve. The meaning of originality itself might change. (Kaufman, J.C. and Beghetto, R.A. 2023). A culture may even reject and stigmatize the idea of trying to achieve originality. Instead of focusing on tradition. So what is original and at the forefront may exist in a superposition with what is degenerate. And what is old and archaic may be in a superposition with tradition and sublime, coming in and out of shape according to the temporal conditions.

Artists can take a few different approaches in their artistic journey, they can be at peace with their influence and wear them on their sleeves like for example someone like Quentin Tarantino does, the influence of many directors like Sergio Leone is very apparent. But he and many other artists do is to transform the artwork and turn it into something new, or present it in a different tone. It is also possible for someone to try to get rid of influences and try making something wholly original. But this task seems almost an impossibility. For someone to make a piece of artwork in any medium would have needed to come across at least one piece of artwork in it. But it is also possible for someone to create something exciting or new, by simply being ignorant, and having that work for their success by having a fresh mind or having wrong ideas or misinterpreted ideas of an artist they can take organically come up with something very new and fresh.

An interesting approach to this is by the conceptual artist Sherrie Levine who does not attempt to recompose or reinterpret the original works she appropriates. Instead, Levine intends to keep the images true to their reproductive sources, thereby dismissing any creative or original act. Weintraub's essay explores how this approach challenges the conventional understanding of authorship and originality in art. By reusing existing images and objects, postmodern artists like Levine create new meanings and perspectives, questioning the very essence of what it means to be original (Weintraub, L. 1996). perhaps in the game of trying to create something truly original, the only winning move is to not play.

This can also have a lot to do with how in our world and especially in Western or Westernizing societies there is great emphasis on personal growth and achievement. The artist feels the need to separate himself from the rest of the world and form an identity of themselves. The approach to making art in other cultures can be very different.

Sources-

⦁ Bloom, H. (1973). The Anxiety of Influence: A Theory of Poetry. New York: Oxford University Press

⦁ Kaufman, J.C. and Beghetto, R.A. (2023) 'Where is the When of Creativity?: Specifying the Temporal Dimension of the Four Cs of Creativity', Review of General Psychology, 27(2), pp. 194-205. doi: 10.1177/10892680221142803.

⦁ Weintraub, L. (1996). Unoriginality. In: L. Weintraub, ed., Art on the Edge and Over. New York: Art Insights, pp. 45-67.

[sidharthojhasns]

Blog Post 9.

Depiction of historical periods in media from a modern lens

Depiction of historical periods in media from a modern lens There are many depictions of historical periods on screen over the years, any period that is not of the time when the media was created can even extend into the future and into the past. Historical media can be informative, and educational, it can give us a glimpse into another period or put us in the shoes of someone very different, it can even just be an interesting backdrop for a story, that is something different that can add a little variety. These depictions often form the public's perceptions of the period (Rosenstone, R. 1995).

People remember and acknowledge the past through cultural and symbolic acts, and they in turn form their cultural memories and identities (Reading, A. 2011) and their ideas about the past are very often influenced by media.. This is important for understanding our identities and histories.

But there are a few aspects of historical depictions that are peculiar and can be seen in many places forming a pattern. One of these is the depiction of people and how they behave. Their mannerisms personalities, behavior, their way of speaking is often very formal and stilted. And often it even has a theatrical feeling. Certain things that we expect people to have while they are speaking like stuttering, and swearing. Being sarcastic, cracking jokes, and very naturalistic ways of being that are commonly seen in contemporary media are absent.

This difference can be compared with the change between classic Hollywood and New Hollywood that started in the 70s. Where the artificiality was dropped in most cases. When it comes to historical media, it wasn't. One of the reasons might be that when new Hollywood decided to shed its artificiality, there was no new visual style that had to be created. The actors had to just be themselves or had contemporary references to draw upon. But when artificiality is dropped in a historical film or TV. The natural state of being has no reference. To do it naturally, would require a very high knowledge of the history of that period. And even then the results may not be accurate. Going for a naturalistic approach to acting and dialogue in a historical piece may seem fake with the characters feeling too 'modern'. This is often seen in the internet meme that goes around in film and media circles that refers to actors playing characters that have 'seen an iPhone'. And are unable to sell themselves as someone from a different era.

It's also possible that if the results are historically true it may come across as uncanny or absurd. Since human culture can vary greatly over time and is subjective to a great extent. People might find something that is actually accurate as being too absurd. A small example of this could be how George Washington is rarely depicted with dentures since modern audiences may find that absurd. It is perhaps impossible to truly represent a historical period that has gone by and it gets harder to represent it the further back we go in time. Therefore it might be much better to focus on representing an impression of the past, or the feeling of it. And in that case, it might be better to not focus on Truth in a literal way. However, it should also be acknowledged that these feelings of the past can even be weaponized and used nefariously by political forces (Kalinina, E. (2017).

One example of depicting the past as a feeling is the TV show "The Terror" which depicts a British expedition into the Arctic to find the northwest passage in the 19th century. The show is based on real events and follows the period and history very closely in great detail. However, it has some supernatural elements in it. The major one is the presence of an uncanny, polar bear-like monster called "Tunbaak". This creature although at first glance seems out of place. It makes more sense once examined. In the modern world, we are constantly surrounded by images of polar bears, we have seen them in zoos, tame ones being cute in YouTube videos, plushies, and friendly animated characters. Our relationship to a polar bear is very different from a 19th-century explorer, which is why it might be a better choice to show a monster instead of the real animal which is how polar bears would have been perceived back then by some who had never seen anything like it. In this way sometimes when imagining the past, fantasy is more 'true' than reality.

Sources-

⦁ Rosenstone, R. (1995). The Historical Film as Real History. Film-Historia, 1, 5-23.

⦁ Reading, A. (2011) 'Identity, memory and cosmopolitanism: The otherness of the past and a right to memory?', European Journal of Cultural Studies, 14(4), pp. 379-394. doi: 10.1177/1367549411411607.

⦁ Kalinina, E. (2017). Beyond nostalgia for the Soviet past: Interpreting documentaries on Russian television. European Journal of Cultural Studies, 20(3), 285-306. DOI: 10.1177/1367549416682970.

[sidharthojhasns]

Blog Post 8.

Race between AI and Artistry

Mnemonade is a short film on YouTube that has the tagline "The AI Film That Made Hollywood Cry" The film is about a woman in a nursing home hallucinating about being in a diner and meeting her dead. The film has a very distinct AI look to it. If the film had been made with real actors and had a similar level of production quality that the AI is simulating. It is unlikely that it would have the number of views that it has on YouTube. Since the fact that its AI is its selling point. The reception to these AI films has been varied, with some liking them, some finding the technical achievement impressive, and others reacting negatively. Some have also argued that AI art's relationship to human-made art would be similar to photographs' relation to realistic painting that came before it, where it will be an entirely new thing. Only taking the former's place in some domains. (Mazzone, M. and Elgammal, A., 2019)

In the last few years, there has been a lot of chatter about how AI is going to affect the world. This has already had a profound impact on how we consume art, and on artists (Jiang, H.H., Brown, L., Cheng, J., Khan, M., Gupta, A., Workman, D., Hanna, A., Flowers, J., & Gebru, T. (2024).

One field where this process has already started is the production of digital media production, with AI-generated imagery, and AI-generated video 3D models. Increasingly different aspects of the digital media world are being presented with AI replacements. This has prompted many people to say that more and more mediums are going to be made entirely by AI.

Considering these things we have to tackle the question of AI-generated content replacing human-made content, where exactly does the art exist? The artwork is not the physical object itself, but on some level, the physical object whether it be a painting, a reel of film, or a physical sculpture, or some other examples just signs and pointers to an intangible experience. Real artwork exists in an intangible subjective space between the consumer of art and the art itself. the artist is still a human and the AI is still a tool in this equation (Ploin, A., Eynon, R., Hjorth, I. & Osborne, M.A. 2022) because a film, to take one example is not merely a sum of all of its components like clips of footage and the different sounds and music. Where the "film" resides in the object is hard to pin down, it exists as a phenomenological entity.

In an AI film the fact that it simulates something made by a human, even if it is indistinguishable still does not make replacing the human-made film possible. Because where the media is not pointing or is a sign of an artwork, where the media is to be taken at face value and is no more and has any other emergent qualities other than what is contained within its physical firm. Example stock footage and images. The replacement with AI is almost already completed. While in films it hasn't taken place. To give another example the director of a recently released film that made a mediocre film that flopped came out and revealed that the entire film was AI-generated. People still wouldn't watch it, because all that the AI can give you is footage, not the film. Therefore it's not enough to look at just the technology's technical achievement but also how art is perceived since it can be easy to fool an audience into making them perceive creativity. What also matters is the audience's engagement with the artwork. (Natale, S. and Henrickson, L., 2022)

Here we have to make a distinction between an artwork being made by AI vs a person Using AI to make an artwork. This distinction however easy to make at an initial glance is not that simple. The production of an artwork has three components, the Artwork, the artist, and the artist's tool. We can take the relationship between artist and how much they use their tools on a spectrum. With the artist using minimal tools on one end and maximum on the other. Dance could be seen as one end of the spectrum where the body of the artist is the tool as well. Would be AI-generated art on the other end. But even if the labor of the artist is absolutely as minimal as possible. It might just be an act of pushing a button and the art is generated automatically. The artist is still the person. At what point could it be said that the AI is the artist itself? Is the effort that is put into the artwork, not of relevance? But the agency that one of the components has of relevance? When someone says that AI has made this art it is implied that the AI is conscious of an active agent in some form. And if the tool is more of an active agent. Or has the potential to be one more than who considers the artist. Then AI would be the artist and the human would be seen more as the person who drove the artist to their studio.

So then the question arises. Is the AI that we have today an active agent? Now this question is a lot less subjective and can be understood.

Art-generating AIs like Dall-e and Midjourney and LLMs like ChatGPT work similarly, they are a set of mathematical equations that use a brute force approach on a seemingly endless amount of data, to train parameters to generate content. Very simply and roughly put, it is similar to the old metaphor that a monkey hitting keys at random on a typewriter keyboard for an infinite amount of time will almost surely type any given text, including the complete works of William Shakespeare it works very differently from what we think of as human or any other consciousness. It does everything with a brute-force approach. It mechanically creates parameters of untold amounts of real images, artworks, or text written consciously. To create a simulacrum. In this case, it cannot be said that the AI is an active agent. The active agent would be the author of the data the models have been trained on. The actual LLMs and other mathematical sets that generate this content are not the most technically impressive part of this. The compilation of astronomical amounts of data is a far more consequential achievement.

Sources-

⦁ Ploin, A., Eynon, R., Hjorth, I. & Osborne, M.A. (2022). Art for our sake: artists cannot be replaced by machines – study. University of Oxford. Available at: https://www.ox.ac.uk/news/2022-03-03-art-our-sake-artists-cannot-be-replaced-machines-study. [Accessed 29 Dec. 2024].

⦁ Natale, S. and Henrickson, L., 2022. The Lovelace effect: Perceptions of creativity in machines. New Media & Society, 26(4), pp.1909-1926. DOI: 10.1177/14614448221077278.

⦁ Mazzone, M. and Elgammal, A., 2019. Art, Creativity, and the Potential of Artificial Intelligence. Arts, 8(1), p.26. Available at: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.

⦁ Jiang, H.H., Brown, L., Cheng, J., Khan, M., Gupta, A., Workman, D., Hanna, A., Flowers, J., & Gebru, T. (2024). AI Art and its Impact on Artists. ACM Digital Library. Available at: ACM Digital Library [Accessed 29 Dec. 2024].

[sidharthojhasns]

Blog Post 7.

Digital Disney Affect

Disney has used the 12 principles of animation to create an iconic style that has defined the look of the medium for almost a century. If broken down the principle is a largely simplified condensed aspect of reality that is used to bring life to simple lines on paper, and since the lines on paper have few details and are low resolution, these aspects are exaggerated. These principles have influenced countless artists' styles, schools, and genres, from Classic American animation to anime, from 2d to 3d. This media is constantly consumed by people in an online environment, where the lines between social interaction and consuming content have been blurred. On this online platform how we see and are being seen affects our sense of belonging and our physical presence and actions show that we belong (Bell, V. 1999) This in turn influences our physical presence in the world or our affect.

Animation has been trying for years to sample reality which includes human behaviour. In the last few years there has been a phenomenon where the exchange happening is the other way around, what was a stylized simulation of reality is now in turn influencing the real world itself. Most clearly seen in stylized dance moves that people are doing on TikTok and other social media. This has also been seen in many anime fans having unnatural mannerisms that are stylistically shown in the animation. This is a phenomenon of a simulated reality affecting the real world, which in turn creates even more stylized animations and so on.

There is also the question of whether this phenomenon is an attempt by people to create caricatured versions of themselves for others online, in the same way, the animators use the 12 principles to present a simplified reality, where people might feel the same thing, or if it is affecting people's natural affect and how they behave at a fundamental level.

Since real human behavior is complex and always entertaining to look at. Performing is a larger part of the average person's social behavior. They put on a sort of online persona that was previously only reserved for a TV presenter or comedian, who was deliberately putting on a act. But since so much of the social experience is not supplemented by the online but takes place on it entirely. People might feel the need to change their affect completely. Even performing in such a way in real life. Outside of a digital/virtual environment. This phenomenon of creating an artificial reality based on a perception that is socially reinforced can be called a dramaturgical reality (Oomen, J., Hoffman, J. and Hajer, M.A., 2022)

This can even be observed in the way people talk. There is a phenomenon that has gained notoriety recently known as 'Marvel writing' or 'Millenial writing" where dialogue written for different media is excessively quirky, saturated with quips and half-jokes, and it seems that characters are trying to talk in a way that shows them to be cool or interesting or entertaining. The dialogue isn't straightforward and communicative. This can also affect the way people talk in real life and create more feedback loops. There is a distinction in online space between the "personne" (individual) and "personage" (role) and the individual also has two parts where one is socially embedded and autonomous. (Bell, V. 1999).

"animated" online persona's

Sources-

⦁ Bell, V. (1999). Performativity and Belonging: An Introduction. Theory, Culture & Society, 16(2), pp.1-10. DOI: 10.1177/02632769922050511.

⦁ Oomen, J., Hoffman, J. and Hajer, M.A., 2022. Techniques of futuring: On how imagined futures become socially performative. European Journal of Social Theory, 25(2), pp.252-270. DOI: 10.1177/1368431020988826.

⦁ Martin, E., 2022. Persuasive Technology and Personhood on Social Media. Science, Technology, & Human Values, [online] Available at: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/01622439221137038?download=true [Accessed 29 December 2024]. DOI: 10.1177/01622439221137038

[sidharthojhasns]

Blog post 6.

Storytelling through the environment in games

The primary method of storytelling in video games is still through cutscenes and cinematic language. Like cutscene. But a notable example that does it primarily through other means is the souls-borne series by Fromsoftware.

Video games have often employed storytelling techniques from other more established and older mediums. Some of these work well with the medium of games some not so much, such as cinematic analog in games of cutscenes, which can often feel like a game being interrupted periodically with clips of a film or vice versa. This depending on the audience can be good or bad but there are also many tools of narrative building that are unique to a video game (Juul, J. 2001).

The story in these games is told mostly by the environment and through item descriptions, the environments and levels are designed in a way where the lore of the game is revealed to the player visually. This use of environment gives the game a sense of spatiality, two aspects of this spatiality that have to do with the environment are the representation ie the visual and narrative aspects of the game world, including the design and aesthetics of the game environment. and mechanical that are the rules and mechanics that govern the game, including how players interact with the game world and each other. (Bakkerud, F. 2023)

Visions of a great battle between men and dragons

The game begins with a cutscene exposition that just gives you enough to acquaint you with the world. And then everything is revealed through the levels and environments.

Because this style of storytelling does not employ the detail-filled techniques of prose or cinema and other mediums. The story that the player experiences is almost impressionistic. And very open to interpretation. The gameplay feels almost like an investigation of clues and evidence that the player uncovers like a detective. The story forms in bits and pieces as if on a wall of clues from a detective film.

The NPCs in video games are also an important vehicle for storytelling. Their creation, use, player's interactions with them, characterization encounters, and progression work differently in games than in other mediums (Mallon, B. and Lynch, R., 2014). this is no different Fromsoftware games. The NPCs, the dialogue, and cutscenes from the few NPCs in the game are given cryptically as if you have found the NPC in the middle of their journey. What they talk about appears that way because they are already a part of the lore of the world and you have found them at an arbitrary point in their journey. Their existence in the game is not to serve as an accessory to the player's story. Instead, the encounters feel like crossing giving a glimpse of a vast and expansive story. But the player in a way is much more on par with the NPCs in importance inside the game's universe.

The NPC, unlike other games, is unaware of the mission that you are doing at that point. The player is in the same position in the Souls game. Instead, the player has to make an active effort to make themselves a part of the NPCs quest.

The art direction of the entire world is that of a dead, dark, and decaying world. Full of untold dangers but there is one environmental element that adds a lot of narrative and thematic depth to the game with the use of a simple checkpoint system. The checkpoints are bonfires that are found glowing in dark dim worlds around which the player can rest and it's a rare moment of relief and serenity in an otherwise dark world. This really sells the narrative and themes without cutscenes

Sources-

⦁ Juul, J. (2001). Games Telling Stories? Game Studies, 1(1). Available at: https://www.gamestudies.org/0101/juul-gts/.

⦁ Mallon, B. and Lynch, R., 2014. Stimulating Psychological Attachments in Narrative Games: Engaging Players With Game Characters. Simulation & Gaming, 45(4-5), pp.508-527. DOI: 10.1177/1046878114553572.

⦁ Bakkerud, F. (2023) 'The Ontology of Game Spatiality', Game Studies, 23(3). Available at: https://gamestudies.org/2303/articles/bakkerud

[sidharthojhasns]

Blog post 5.

Short form video as Gesamtkunstwerk

An experience for all your senses, for a while, is engaging. But an experience such as that can also be addictive. To know that our sense can be hacked by media is an alarming realization. although the term Gesamtkunstwerk refers to a large extravagant piece of art that employs many art forms. that captures all the senses. this can be achieved not just by a large encompassing scale. but just by the capture of all our senses. One such thing that does this is short-form video content such as TikTok or Instagram reels.

Short-form video is available readily for everyone at all times in their phones, which they carry around everywhere. And this Gesamkunstwerk takes up a lot of the time that used to be taken by other recreational things whether they be media or otherwise. the apps and websites where this content is found. The audience doesn't control what they see, and the creators don't control who sees their content creating an algorithmically driven environment where all participants are let into digital troughs (Bhandari, A. and Bimo, S. 2022). Where the content is infinite and never-ending.

This effect has also started affecting the way a lot of other media is produced and consumed. examples being film franchise after film franchise with almost an endless supply of content (Echauri, G., 2023)

The MCU is a great example of the changing media landscape where the content must continue endlessly.

There is also the use of split-screen content, where a video is put together with another video. a way of maximizing attention capture, whenever the user gets bored or loses attention the the other screen grabs the attention making the user jump back and forth making an incredibly potent attention grabber.

This process can be said to be similar to what is described as dopamine addiction. dopamine addiction works by making the anticipation of a reward pleasurable. but each hit of that pleasure also makes the person acclimated to it requiring further stimulation. and going back to a level where the initial dopamine hit was acquired is now a negative experience.

This has been almost a complete systematic capture of people's attention spans (Jablonsky, R., Karppi, T., & Seaver, N. 2022). The lack of attention by people is also a result of people's brains adapting to the onslaught of tons of information. more information than most people encountered in previous eras.

The websites that deliver these videos are also not social media platforms but content delivery platforms. This distinction between social media and content delivery has also changed in the last few years where once you had your digital social life on one platform like Facebook. content was delivered through other platforms. now the distinction has blurred making online social activity also as content and content as social activity (Bhandari, A. and Bimo, S. 2022).

Short-form video allows for something that is not possible in many other mediums of media which is to grab onto the person's attention. and be completely in control of it. while other mediums may go for the 5 senses, attention is another factor that is not fully weaponized by any other for entertainment the way short-form video, combined with the infinite scroll does. (Jablonsky, R., Karppi, T., & Seaver, N. 2022)

The combination of short videos, infinite scrolling, and the algorithmic roster of videos creates something incredibly potent and addictive.

The algorithm is also aware of all you the people's mental patterns, likes and dislikes many things that the user and even people very close to the user are completely unaware of. and this information that exists as piles upon piles of metadata is used to completely ensnare the user and capture their attention. making people scroll endlessly even while they are aware and thinking of stopping, they continue scrolling. the addiction overriding the conscious brain. also when the media is total it doesn't need to be concerned with the quality or content of the media, since all the senses have been occupied through stimulus overload, and the content is consumed passively. the mind is not asked to meet the media in the middle or make any engagement with it. an example of this changing landscape is a satirical tweet posted below.

Sources-

⦁ Echauri, G., 2023. Infinite media: The contemporary infinite paradigm in media. Convergence: The International Journal of Research into New Media Technologies, 0(0), pp.1-15. DOI: 10.1177/13548565231208135. Available at: sagepub.com/journals-permissions [Accessed 28 December 2024].

⦁ Bhandari, A. and Bimo, S. (2022) 'Why's Everyone on TikTok Now? The Algorithmized Self and the Future of Self-Making on Social Media', Social Media + Society, January-March, pp. 1-11. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1177/20563051221086241.

⦁ Jablonsky, R., Karppi, T., & Seaver, N. (2022). Introduction: Shifting Attention. Science, Technology, & Human Values, 47(2), 235-242. DOI: 10.1177/01622439211058823.

[sidharthojhasns]

Blog post 4.

Photorealism in Digital Media

"In the 20th century, different areas of commercial moving image culture maintained their distinct production methods and distinct aesthetics. Films and cartoons were produced completely differently and it was easy to tell their visual languages apart. Today the situation is different. " (Manovich 2006).

The medium through which we consume art has all moved towards a computer screen. (Manovich 2006). the computer screen where we today enjoy our films, animations, photography games, etc. has resulted in the physical differences between the medium to blur.today this competer screen is increasingly the one in our pockets Result of technological progress and optimization. another parallel can be seen in the way all technological needs are served by a singular device, our phone. while in the past we used to have different ones with different purposes, for example, phones, walkmans, cameras, and notepads.

There has been a shift away from hardware to software in technology starting from the 1980s when hardware which is case specific is replaced with a general-purpose computer and the software which is programming can perform multiple functions.

while this melding of different mediums occurs there has been a trend towards photorealism in this new hybrid visual language. this is true in many different mediums but perhaps the most apparent in games. where the games are often reduced to tech demos showcasing the latest in rendering technology rather than artworks with engaging gameplay or interesting art styles (Masuch, M. and Röber, N., 2005)

What's the point of faking cinematic imagery in games or animation? like motion blur or lens flare in games?is it that photographic imagery is far more prevalent and respectable? is it an attempt to hide the digital artificiality of CGI with a patina of cinema? which is tangibly more real. is it that the new medium is just imitating the older more established medium? (Manovich 2006).

The Order 1886, A game praised for its photorealistic and cinematic graphics, still failed because of bad gameplay and story.

Photographic realism is the standard or default visual reflection of the real world. or at least it has occupied that position for a long time. It offers the closest parallel to how the human eye actually sees everything. it's not clear though whether this is an obvious fact of nature or is the result of people being surrounded by photographs as the primary source of visual communication. most cultures throughout history when representing reality, chose an abstract form of doing it. maybe suggesting that our natural way of perception isn't obviously photorealistic. this also asks the question is art about simulating reality or sampling it? (Manovich 2006).

another reason might have been that the various styles of art and aesthetics that have existed have been a negotiation between three things natural biological need to communicate, a need for artistic expression, and the limitations of any physical medium and processes that have to be taken care of while making anything tangible.

However, the process and tools of expression are more accessible and have few steps involved that deal with the tangible. the shift towards photorealism continues. example. the live-action Disney films. the style of 2d animation seen in classic Disney films was very much informed by the medium. to a line drawing with flat colors simplified, exaggerated, and simplified features and expressions are an optimal way of expression on a piece of paper. which in turn informed the style. but now that the technical limitations aren't there, Disney has abandoned what was once a style, now a limitation. these media-specific qualities are what should be highlighted (Greenberg, C. 1960) but results have often been very different. even the stylization in 3d animation seen in many animated art forms today can be seen as a vestigial effect. only to be ironed out slowly.

This relationship can also be understood the other way around. Films have seamlessly blended transitions from one medium to the other and then back. the least noticeable might be the transitions in 1917. at what point a film could be considered not a film but a hybrid medium? or even an animation with film aspects? Many of the Marvel films have more CGI than actual footage.

Sources-

⦁ Manovich, L., 2006. Image Future. [online] Available at: https://manovich.net/content/04-projects/048-image-future/45_article_2006.pdf [Accessed 28 December 2024].

⦁ Masuch, M. and Röber, N., 2005. Game Graphics Beyond Realism: Then, Now, and Tomorrow. Otto-von-Guericke University Magdeburg, Games and Graphics Research Group, Institute for Simulation and Computer Graphics. Available at: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/252486461 [Accessed 28 Dec. 2024].

⦁ Greenberg, C. (1960). Modernist Painting. In: Forum Lectures. Voice of America.

[sidharthojhasns]

Blog post 3.

Hitman, and the evolution of the mainstream game.

It is rare to see games like the Hitman series today. it is a big name title from the past that was well well-known, recognizable icon.

The approach in Hitman is very different from many other games. It has entire gameplay mechanics that exist that the player is discouraged from using. namely the shooting and fighting mechanics. shooting games are one of the most popular ones that are available today. they provide an action-packed experience. and are extremely profitable.

all the mechanics in the game are also pretty unique. like using disguises accidents and elaborate schemes to kill targets. the game is also very slow-paced requiring the player to wait in one place for sometimes even several minutes to time an event. The stealth aspects of the game which include guard patrolling are an important part of the game. in the Hitman series, but especially Hitman Blood Money. the guard's behavior is slow and requires a lot of patience. there have been many different uses of this mechanic in many different games with various effects (Al Enezi, W. and Verbrugge, C., 2023).

Agent 47, waiting patiently to knock out and impersonate a pastry chef.

today a game that is as big and influential as hitman was back then. would be much larger in scale than the small-scale lean stealth game like Hitman was. all games today are packed with as many game mechanics and sprawling worlds, a small-scale game like Hitman if released today will get completely drowned out by the marketing of bigger games. it would be a relatively obscure indie title.

AAA games today have become too big taking in ever larger resources and time. and in a rush to include as many mechanics and features as possible all AAA games have also become generic and the same. this is coupled with assetization of many games where they have fewer gaming experiences in the traditional sense and are more like gambling machines meant to generate revenue by the gamification of player behavior, there is also a more closely tied relation between the game and the player, where once a game was bought as a commodity now it is a service. with advanced data collection and user engagement that is continuous ( Bernevega-gekker-2021)

these kinds of unique and interesting mechanics have been successful and popular. would make the game a niche experience today where gaming is worth billions of dollars and business decisions take precedence over artistic ones.

the screenshot of Elden Ring, a game considered high-quality above; a parody highlighting modern generic gaming conventions below.

Is it the path for any artform that is it gets more popular? the things that make it become popular in the first place are subsequently ironed out to make the content more appealing to as wide amount of people as possible. and the medium or individual artwork reaches a point of saturation which results in a blowout. Although the Hitman series has retained its charm many other game series have lost what made them special. this need for commercializing creating more and more cynical forms of marketing the game to an audience has hurt the industry in the long term. since these generic games don't leave an impact they rely on Skinner box-like gamification components to sell themselves. while a unique and rewarding experience would sell through the word of friends family and other trusted personalities like streamers and research shows that the latter method is far more effective. (Mathews, C.C. and Wearn, N., 2016)

Is it that this is the result of the commercialization of the medium? or is it that people's attention spans and tastes have also changed? were gamers far more open to a novel or challenging experience that may not immediately come across as rewarding? and aren't anymore?

many people complain about the generic nature of many AAA games and long for more engaging and interesting experiences but it is also true that AAA games most often do make huge profits. this can imply a few different things which all might be true or false to varying degrees. is it that people don't care either way and are okay with generic games? has the repeated slurry of these games made gamers cynical or changed their tastes where they cant imagine the existence of something better?

It is not immediately obvious why some qualities that are associated with niche content and mainstream content are what they should be. why is it not possible that for a piece of media to be mass appealing it can't have a unique and interesting feature and for something to be less popular it would have to be generic? since a generic game that tries to be a jack of all trades, does not try anything new treads the old, and includes a little bit of everything. and since people don't like things that are boring. and want unique and novel experiences, why isn't it that unique and novel media experiences aren't what is considered "mainstream"

Sources-

⦁ Bernevega, A. and Gekker, A., 2021. The Industry of Landlords: Exploring the Assetization of the Triple-A Game. Games and Culture. [online] Available at: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/15554120211014151 [Accessed 27 Dec. 2024]

⦁ Al Enezi, W. and Verbrugge, C., 2023. Evaluating Player Experience in Stealth Games: Dynamic Guard Patrol Behavior Study. Proceedings of the Nineteenth AAAI Conference on Artificial Intelligence and Interactive Digital Entertainment (AIIDE 2023), pp.1-184. doi:10.1609/aiide.v19i1.27513

⦁ Mathews, C.C. and Wearn, N., 2016. How Are Modern Video Games Marketed?. The Computer Games Journal, [online] Available at: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/305663724_How_Are_Modern_Video_Games_Marketed [Accessed 28 December 2024].

[sidharthojhasns]

Blog post 2.

Evolving nature of the Image

It's a common fact that an abundance of something can sometimes, counterintuitively create scarcity of said thing. example. being alone in a big city full of lots of people can feel more lonely than being alone on a hike away from civilization. this can also be said of our films, books, and other media. and since the quantity has increased our bandwidth has gone down shrinking it to a smaller point in time (Hillenbrand, M. 2017).

"The world is experienced through photographs… the photograph is the most powerful way of shaping how the world is perceived." (Sontag, 1977, p. 80) By reading Sontag's writing one is reminded of the many iconic photos of the 20th century. one is the photograph of the napalm girl. this image shocked the world and showed the horrors of war made itself a part of the public consciousness and shaped our visual culture.

Image has become a dominant aspect of visual culture for decades now (Sontag, S. 1977). But this process may be put into overdrive with the existence of the internet where millions of gigabytes of data is uploaded every second constantly. this has changed our relationship to the image vastly in the contemporary world. making it very different from what the pre-internet generations experience. with the amount images that exist now. and the rapid pace at which they arrive. our relationship with the image seems to have changed. This has happened through many different processes and has had many different results.

One of the results has been the repetition and the existence of remakes. images when they acquire a certain virality or importance are subjected to remakes and iterations leading to memeification. (Hillenbrand, M. 2017).

This memification also happens in a few different ways, where a meme can just be media that is being shared in an im traditional sense, in an altered form, or in a form where the original has lost meaning and the alteration process takes a life of its own. this has been described as a structural meme, emergent meme, and the quintessential meme, respectively (Wiggins, B.E. and Bowers, G.B. 2014).

A small sample of how images get transformed and turned into various memes online, going on a long journey.

One image that draws a parallel to the image of the napalm girl is the image of the drowned Syrian boy from 2015. the effects of this image were very different from the former. (Hillenbrand, M. 2017). the impact was a lot smaller and the image also spawned many imitations remixes and parodies. and if this is compared to our relationship with image today 10 years later, this effect has only grown stronger.

there have been many victims of memification. the power of the internet to over-saturate and overexpose seems to have taken power away from the image. there is a tendency of the internet to trivialize almost anything. Is this a result of the general collective consciousness of humanity and its tendency to do that and the internet only provides a platform for it?. or is it only done by certain people and the flat nature of the internet where any voice from any place can be heard at any time, creates an environment where the voice of a few can seem like the voice of the collective? it can also be the cynical commercial and political forces that have the incentive to dial-up or suppress the power of a said image. reasons can be a combination of all these points.

Also, the fundamentally global and universal aspect of the internet does not seem to care about cultural differences. a taboo topic from one culture might not treated in the same way in another culture. which are now occupying the same space on the internet. this also dilutes images and other signs that are present on the internet. The phenomenon of virality is also capricious and very few other things can be considered lightning in a bottle the way a viral internet meme can be. and trying to recreate its effect, or induce it artificially almost always fails. but still, the act of repetition continues to happen on the internet. and the image keeps transforming in unexpected ways.

Sources-

⦁ Hillenbrand, M. (2017). Remaking Tank Man, in China. Journal of Visual Culture, 16(2), pp. 127–132. DOI: 10.1177/1470412917703154.

⦁ Sontag, S. (1977) On photography. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux. pp. 98–127

⦁ Wiggins, B.E. and Bowers, G.B. (2014) ‘Memes as genre: A structurational analysis of the memescape’, New Media & Society, 17(11), pp. 1886-1906. doi: 10.1177/1461444814535194.

[sidharthojhasns]

Blog post 1.

Virtuality and the real world

Technology has been replacing organic human experiences bit by bit and human experiences are being replaced by virtual ones where sometimes the real and the virtual are hard to tell apart. This can also go to the point where the original reality can be lost and only the virtual experience remains as argued by Baudrillard (1994).

The virtual world was imagined to be a world with clear boundaries and immediately recognizable. A place that was ventured into with something like a VR goggle set. A good example of this is the book Ready Player One or Snow Crash. These visions of virtuality have also ways been perceived as unreal in the tangible sense. where what makes it virtual is that it is digital. but this definition may not be wholly accurate. Perhaps what matters most is whether the aspect of the real is present in its essence. or is it only present in the physical sense but the essence is missing.

The virtual world is also not being created in its entirety in a parallel place to our own. Very often the virtual is replacing the real in bits and pieces. Very often in a way where it is hard to notice or think of as important. One example is the prevalence of Online streamers. These streamers who record themselves watching other media, playing video games, etc. these streamers do not make online content in a traditional sense. Instead what they provide to the viewer is a sense of companionship or a parasocial relationship. This can have an added layer as well often where the human streamer can also be replaced by virtual streamers. adding another virtuality and creating a hyperreality. Baudrillard (1994). These virtual streamers often also have a similar effect and level of engagement with the viewer as there real counterparts. Stein, Breves, and Anders (2022)

In an increasingly Isolated world, they virtually provide something that would otherwise be provided by real people. a person watching a gaming streamer is supposed to simulate the feeling of being in a dorm room, sitting on a couch while your roommate plays a video game on the TV. another example of the virtual replacing the real is dating apps. where what was a complex organic system of courtship and human interaction. has been turned into a gamified digital experience where the person interacts by swiping left or right on a phone screen.

Another phenomenon is that when something is made virtual. It loses a lot of its imperfections and small, hard-to-quantify qualities. this happens to make something more real than the real itself. this is also a practice of making sanitized, packageable, and marketable aspects of reality. An example of this is the depiction of women in digital media. Very often virtual women in games or animations are far more "feminine" than their real-life counterparts. This process becomes even more complicated when the virtual feminine is not a 3D model but an actual person playing a role, such as in pornography. this creates an altered virtual version of reality. which can be hard to tell apart. and often bleeds into each other. There are examples of this happening to the other gender as well. few examples are twilight books and films, and K-pop where the depiction of men is a virtual depiction. often seen through a female gaze. which is not true to reality.

These examples do to men what male-focused media has been doing to women for decades already. It takes the gaze of the opposite sex beyond a certain point where the balance of being attracted to one end of the gender spectrum and aspirational to the other end of the spectrum is tipped over. and the focus is entirely on one attraction. this can lead to rifts between the genders.

The vision of real and virtual is often explored in the science fiction genre of cyberpunk. The depiction of that has remained similar since the onset of the genre in the 80s, punk rock fashion, neon lights, and Japanese imagery. also physical hardware-based computers and tech.

A vision of the future stuck in the past.

Most of this is what the vision of the future looked like in the 80s. and cyberpunk also predicted a world not too far in the future, Bladerunner shows 2017. now that we live in the world that cyberpunk talked about in the past. the virtual that was predicted, is similar in some ways and different in other ways compared to what exists today. this has been illustrated in detail by Kushnarov, V. (2023).

The cyberpunk genre has been quite prescient in its prediction of the future compared to other genres like 50s and 60s space-age sci-fi. or earlier predictions. but it hasn't really evolved with the real world now that it has a lot more drawn upon from the real world itself and not just a vision of it.

An example that comes to mind is the Cyberpunk 2077 series. the games have all the trappings of the genre neon colors, Japanese, etc. (Li, H., 2022) but things like software digital life, the internet, and all the high-tech, low-life aspects of the world today are not explored. since our technological world is more software-based than hardware. One such example in the Cyberpunk 2077 universe is the existence of "Braindance". A brain dance is a virtual experience, that employs all the senses and feels like a highly detail VR experience, complete with taste smell, and feeling. These brain dances are almost analogous to films in the fictional universe. But this virtual is still has a clear boundary different to what we see very often today.

Sources-

⦁ Baudrillard, J. (1994) Simulacra and Simulation. Translated by S.F. Glaser. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.

⦁ Stein, J.P., Breves, P.L., and Anders, N. (2022) 'Parasocial interactions with real and virtual influencers: The role of perceived similarity and human-likeness', New Media & Society, 26(6), pp. 3433–3453. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1177/14614448221102900 (Accessed: [Insert Date]).

⦁ Kushnarov, V. (2023). Cyberpunk as a Metacultural Movement: Philosophical-Cultural Analysis. Culture and Arts in the Modern World, 24, 40–48. https://doi.org/10.31866/2410-1915.24.2023.287657.

⦁ Li, H., 2022. Reflection of Modern Society through Cyberpunk. ISSS 2022 BCP Social Sciences & Humanities, 16, pp.599-604. Available at: https://doi.org/10.5749/minnesota/9780816650477.