I learned some things I didn't know today. For example:
- I didn't know that if you checked your ATM and found money missing, that it was you who was responsible for showing how it went missing.
- in Feburary 2009, facebook made amendments to its privacy settings that allowed the site to take ownership of anything the users posted on their profile, even if they deleted their account.
The idea of personal Onus of Proof and the lack of control I have over my face book page alarms me. Although this sort of ties into the Spin thing that we were talking about in Professional Writing and Publishing, if you'll let me draw paralells.
With spin, it's basically taking any situation and turning it to your advantage. The way they word the terms of service for certain companies does the same thing. With the bank, they don't really care how it happens as long as they get the money.
My notes say Agenda Setting, which is basically the same thing as Spin. Choose the setting you want, angle your agenda towards it, and you can almost convince anyone of anything. The correct wording is paramount, and as a result of learning all of this I've been reading through my contracts and anything else I agree to very, very carefully.
Monday, September 21, 2009
Monday, September 7, 2009
play vs work
now THIS is a subject that interests me. The idea of being able to make real world money out of a video game? Quit my job and take up playing a game all the time? Sign me up for that. I love video games. They're a form of escapism that, if the story is told properly, you can really become immersed in.
My favourite games are all survival horror games. Well, aside from Fallout 3, which is like a great massive multiplayer game, only it's not, and you're the only one playing it.
One thing that the lecturer said this week was that "All games have rules, but not all have goals" and this struck me as very very true. Many, many games I have played over the years served little to no purpose, other than to hack at things until they exploded in a bloody mess. A game with a purpose, I think, is a game that makes you think. A game that makes you sit there and gasp at the screen because something just struck you that you hadn't thought about before. A lot of media can do that, I guess. I know there have been television shows that have done that to me. They can be used as an educating tool, hilighting ignorance or bias and showing people ways to get over it, even if it is just through residual guilt.
The idea of Alternate Reality Games though, that's an interesting one. Escapism is a way of ...well, escaping the world as we know it. I can see how some people might be drawn into these games, like Second Life, or World of Warcraft. And the way that people make money off the games fascinates me. I'm not very good at finance and things like that. Commercially challenged.how they do it completely escapes me, and not everyone can. But it also, tying into the previous entry, raises issues of copyright. If you create content in game, is it really yours? I know people who have created content for games, so does that mean they're breaking the law?
But role playing, or real life games, are the most fun. Seeing what the world would be like if something happened, or if we were all different somehow, is interesting. And all sorts of fun.
My favourite games are all survival horror games. Well, aside from Fallout 3, which is like a great massive multiplayer game, only it's not, and you're the only one playing it.
One thing that the lecturer said this week was that "All games have rules, but not all have goals" and this struck me as very very true. Many, many games I have played over the years served little to no purpose, other than to hack at things until they exploded in a bloody mess. A game with a purpose, I think, is a game that makes you think. A game that makes you sit there and gasp at the screen because something just struck you that you hadn't thought about before. A lot of media can do that, I guess. I know there have been television shows that have done that to me. They can be used as an educating tool, hilighting ignorance or bias and showing people ways to get over it, even if it is just through residual guilt.
The idea of Alternate Reality Games though, that's an interesting one. Escapism is a way of ...well, escaping the world as we know it. I can see how some people might be drawn into these games, like Second Life, or World of Warcraft. And the way that people make money off the games fascinates me. I'm not very good at finance and things like that. Commercially challenged.how they do it completely escapes me, and not everyone can. But it also, tying into the previous entry, raises issues of copyright. If you create content in game, is it really yours? I know people who have created content for games, so does that mean they're breaking the law?
But role playing, or real life games, are the most fun. Seeing what the world would be like if something happened, or if we were all different somehow, is interesting. And all sorts of fun.
Tuesday, September 1, 2009
on referencing, texts and sugar crashing (also perhaps copyright)
Referencing is kicking my ass. I keep forgetting to reference the actual text in my work. APA referencing has so many rules that it feels like I'm trying to navigate a minefield with a stick. Not exactly the best method and I'm more likely to get blown up. And I'd rather keep my limbs intact, thanks.
Although I do like having this laptop so I can update this blog DURING my tute.
now, onto the lecture.
We talked about copyright. My own work is under a creative commons copyright agreement. I'll have to look it up (ahh, here it is) but the creative commons license notes I took are as follows.
CREATIVE COMMONS
Creators choose a set of conditions they wish to apply to their work:
- Attribution: you let others copy, distribute, display and perform your copyrighted work – and derivative works based upon it, but only if they give you credit in the way you request.
- Share alike: you allow others to distribute derivative works only under a license identical to the one that governs your work
- Noncommercial: you let others distribute it for non-commercial purposes only.
- No derivative works
---
Also, Fair use.
Fair use factors are:
-The purpose and character of the use
-The nature of the copyright work
-The amount of sustainability of the portion used
-The effect of the use on the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work.
--
So as far as I'm aware, nobody can post my work or create a derivative work without asking me. Which is an interesting idea, but doesn't work so well in practice. Another thing I have noticed (with regards to
DeviantArt in general) is that most people do not pay attention to a Creative Commons license. It's free, which might be a part of the problem, but websites and other people can take and modify it however they wish without asking permission, and there is little to no recourse for the artist. Because the website is based in America, unless you're american you don't have access to their legal system.
So I can see where copyright might be problematic. The remediation and transformative works clause was fairly interesting as well. I think it's 10% of the primary source can be used before it becomes plagarism? But remediating isn't the same as transforming. Remediating is just spreading, honestly. Opening it up to new avenues. Transformative works takes the actual text and makes it into something different, based off the original. At least, that's what I got out of it.
(I am, however, on a sugar crash)
Although I do like having this laptop so I can update this blog DURING my tute.
now, onto the lecture.
We talked about copyright. My own work is under a creative commons copyright agreement. I'll have to look it up (ahh, here it is) but the creative commons license notes I took are as follows.
CREATIVE COMMONS
Creators choose a set of conditions they wish to apply to their work:
- Attribution: you let others copy, distribute, display and perform your copyrighted work – and derivative works based upon it, but only if they give you credit in the way you request.
- Share alike: you allow others to distribute derivative works only under a license identical to the one that governs your work
- Noncommercial: you let others distribute it for non-commercial purposes only.
- No derivative works
---
Also, Fair use.
Fair use factors are:
-The purpose and character of the use
-The nature of the copyright work
-The amount of sustainability of the portion used
-The effect of the use on the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work.
--
So as far as I'm aware, nobody can post my work or create a derivative work without asking me. Which is an interesting idea, but doesn't work so well in practice. Another thing I have noticed (with regards to
DeviantArt in general) is that most people do not pay attention to a Creative Commons license. It's free, which might be a part of the problem, but websites and other people can take and modify it however they wish without asking permission, and there is little to no recourse for the artist. Because the website is based in America, unless you're american you don't have access to their legal system.
So I can see where copyright might be problematic. The remediation and transformative works clause was fairly interesting as well. I think it's 10% of the primary source can be used before it becomes plagarism? But remediating isn't the same as transforming. Remediating is just spreading, honestly. Opening it up to new avenues. Transformative works takes the actual text and makes it into something different, based off the original. At least, that's what I got out of it.
(I am, however, on a sugar crash)
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