Metaphors

I think Seth Godin is really big on metaphors. I like how he shows his point though! I read a blog that I was drawn to because I though it was going to be about the Nile Perch, a really big fish, but it wasn't although the post was very enlightening. It was about the fact that you have to be weary when making changes in your life because those changes are going to affect other aspects of your life.

Like in my Biology class we talk about derived trait in species and how those traits sometimes have a negative affect on other parts of behavior.

Drones

Drones or unmanned aerial vehicles are easy to built as Pantopicon takes a look at the use of these vehicles and how anyone can now have one! Even me! Everyone can have fun with a drone, use it just for play or it could be used for surveillance.

Robots

Can robots be seen as their own species? With advances in robotics coming faster and faster one artist, Ken Rinaldo, wants to open our eyes to the reality that we are living side by side with technology. Are robots the new up and coming dominant species? Are they waiting for man to help them evolve into something greater?

With advanced mechanisms like NASA's Robonaut, or Honda's Asimo there seems to be no limitations to what technology can achieve as we look forward to a thousand tomorrows.

Big Red

On Wired I found that a new company has emerged in the UK called Institute for the Present. It is a collaboration between two companies, RIG and Tinker London, that both design pieces that combine real world and the interweb.

What they've come up with is this:

I giant, very impressive looking space bar!

Not very practical, it looks more like they are creating collectibles for the rich considering it cost 110 pounds or 173 dollars.

Experimental Portraiture

What is experimental portraiture? I found some photos of it when I looked on Flickr and google. What I found was just some distorted images of a person. I guess its just experimenting with a portrait to make that portrait into a different persona to allow it its own image. I'm not sure... Here are some examples.

Siggraph

Conferences about design have to be so much fun! So whats in the line up for the future of computer graphics and interactive techniques? Core77 gave us a look at some of the cool things coming up when they went to this years Siggraph, the foremost conference on computer graphics. This year 160 industry organizations were represented giving us a wide variety of projects to look forward to.

What Yemean?

Almara Al Sharif from Yemen has begun a one year photography project trying to discover the differences and similarities between her culture and American culture. She is looking at the lives of different american women her age and different Muslim women her age to try and close the gap between our cultures.

It's going to be a very eye opening project I believe. It's sometimes hard for people to understand other cultures that being able to compare and contrast these two at such a personal level is inspiring.

Pimp my Life

Dr. Anna Akbari came into class last week and talk to use about identities. How one goes about creating an identity for themselves and how this identity is who they are. What I understood from her presentation was that all identity was created by using different masks and only exposing parts of ourselves to people, therefore pushing them to believe that you are a certain way.

This idea of masks make us reconsider authenticity and so you appear to be this person, when you really might not be. She gave the example of the theater which she use to be involved in. The audience is society and you are putting on this act for them but, in a play what the audience sees is authentic to them.

The costumes in a play give life to different parts of you. Easily put when I go out I like to dress up sometimes but that's not me all the time, its only a small part of my identity. So you kind of achieve new persona's by dressing up differently.

As an experiment Dr. Akbari dressed up as different people: a tourist, a beggar, a prostitute, a Muslim... etc. and she found that as she dressed in these different costumes others perceived her differently. So what you dress like and how you act is a big part of identity.

You can make more of yourself by acting the part of someone else. She talked about how all different areas of ones life create the person we currently are, but it's so much more than that because everyone has a creative self, so we can create different persona's of ourselves.