#comm 170

[lkoppel-blog]

A screenshot tour of my Minecraft base, partly built as a project for my Comm 170 class. DISCLAIMER: I noticed, after taking all the screenshots, that my character was holding a Dirt Block the entire time. So, you'll notice a brown cube in the lower-right corner of every photo. Please disregard it.

[lkoppel-blog]

Commentary on Social Networks

I find Facebook to be, by far, the most useful tool for social networking and collaboration. It allows you to interact with a huge number of people in a natural and customizable way. For instance: you can share hundreds of photos of your recent class trip to the lake with your old friends from high school, your parents, etc… Your friends then can comment on these photos, “like” them, or share them with others. All of these are simple and easy to do. As for customization, you can create lists/categories within your friends, and limit what these groups can or cannot see. For instance: you can make sure your parents can’t see all the pictures you just uploaded from the wild party last weekend, but all your friends can. Or maybe you want to keep your relationship status hidden from just your ex; you can do that too. All the social behaviors and boundaries you would normally see in the real world have a Facebook equivalent.

I dislike Myspace the most, primarily because it is outdated, feels too simple and immature (as a website), and is limited in the interactions/customization it allows. Most importantly, however, is the fact that it is socially deserted. Everyone has moved over to Facebook. No one is left on Myspace. No one uses it. Therefore, trying to use it as a social networking tool is ineffective and foolhardy.

I have not had any particularly meaningful or useful electronic interactions with other members of the class. I am discounting social interactions I have with friends who happen to be in the class as well, as these were not inspired by or relevant to the class in any way. However, if the class had made a Facebook group, I feel that this could have been a useful tool. Everyone is already using Facebook all the time anyway, and so putting the class into that already-thriving social atmosphere could create a more collaborative, interactive experience.

While I love social networking sites, they are, in many ways, just another electronic distraction. True social interaction happens in the real world, face-to-face, and too much “Facebooking” tricks us into thinking that commenting on someone’s Wall or “liking” their posts counts as real friendship and real social behavior. Social networking is useful, but we need to keep it in perspective. It is an extension to real-world society, not a replacement for it.

[lkoppel-blog]

Commentary on Commenting

There’s nothing quite as disappointing and isolating as being the only person commenting on a given forum on the Internet. Therefore, I made a point of trying to comment on posts that already had comments on them. This way, it felt more like an active conversation between myself, the blogger, and the other commenter, as opposed to a single awkward attempt at interaction, most likely lost in the void. Unfortunately, other commenters were few and far between. For the most part, the class blogs I perused were barren of activity, both on the author’s part and on the part of their readers. Therefore, (to more directly answer the question): 2 out of the 3 comments I made were the only comments on that particular post.

I commented on 3 different blogs: Alex Geyster’s blog, Rose Ellen’s blog, and Isaac Zarsky’s blog.

Yes; Alex and Isaac I knew well already, and I had met Rose a few times outside of class (mostly in conjunction with Isaac). As would be expected, I purposefully commented on these people’s blogs for several reasons: a) I knew them, and I felt more comfortable commenting on their blogs as opposed to the blogs of complete strangers, and b) all of their blogs were Wordpress blogs. Commenting on Wordpress was simple and easy. Tumblr blogs have no commenting system, which made it impossible to use many of the class blogs for this assignment.

I do not believe that blogs and commenting are an effective way to communicate in a class setting. As I’ve already pointed out, many blogs do not have a way to comment, which poses a pretty substantial problem. Secondly, and more importantly, discussions on forums/blogs/commenting systems will inevitably fail due to their nature. Several crucial elements of a good, hearty discussion simply cannot take place online, in text form. Discussions online are staggered, which is to say, you have to wait for someone to type out their response before you can read it; you don’t receive it real-time. In person, discussions involve quick thinking, quick responses, and the ability to interject or add in at any point. If you’re just exchanging huge chucks of text back and forth, it feels artificial and stunted. Sitting and waiting, alone, staring at a computer screen, waiting for the next essay of a reply to appear is boring and doesn’t inspire academic or intellectual interaction. Even more frustrating is the “invisible timer” when typing out a response on a forum. Let’s assume you’re participating in a discussion online, and let’s assume you have a really great point to make. You sit there, taking the time to articulately type out your response, correct typos, look it over for mistakes, etc… Then, once you’re ready to post it, you see that several other people have commented in the meantime, and your point is no longer relevant, or someone else has made it, or the conversation has moved past the topic you were responding to. There was a window of opportunity for your comment, but that window had an invisible timer, and (sadly, as it often does in these situations) it ran out before you had your chance. In the real world, this problem doesn’t happen. Maybe the conversation will change, or move on, or render your point irrelevant, but it won’t be a surprise. You will be involved, real-time, in the conversation’s progression.

 See above.

[lkoppel-blog]

Building Something

The application I used to build/create was Minecraft. Unfortunately for this class, Minecraft is a world one must pay to enter. Purchasing a Minecraft account (in other words: purchasing the game) costs around $27 now. Back in my day, when it was still in beta, it cost less. This does mean class members cannot experience my project first-hand. However, through the magic of screenshots, I can upload some pictures and give you all a general idea.

What you see in the pictures below is the result of several solid hours of “work”, and a decent amount of trial-and-error, revision, and planning. Beyond the actual building of the structures, there was (of course) the gathering of the raw building materials. This added an additional several hours of searching and mining. Of course, this “effort” was not particularly strenuous for me. As Minecraft is a game, and a game I thoroughly enjoy, the time I spent on this project was not boring or tedious by any means.

I do like what I have made. This particular “house” is one of my favorites. It is roomy and attractive on the inside, with plenty of room for future expansion in every direction. It contains everything that is essential to success in the game (i.e. a safe bedroom for sleeping through the nights, a room for crafting and item storage, a farm for food production), and many things that are simply fun to create and have (i.e. a fireplace, a minecart rail system, a room for tamed wolves). As is the nature of many artistic endeavors, and as is the nature of Minecraft, this creation is not finished. It is a continual work in progress, and I will continue to play and improve as time goes on. [Screenshots have been added in a separate post, above. Click on each to enlarge the photo and see the explanatory captions]