Show older

action != behavior

action = disruption of behavior

behavior = absence of action

greeting someone with "howdy" = behavior

greeting someone with "the end is near" = action

agency = the capacity to disrupt behavior

p.s. action movies should be called behavior movies

<<Nguyen [creator of Flappy Bird] wanted to make games for people like himself: busy, harried, always on the move. “I pictured how people play,” he says, as he taps his iPhone and reaches his other hand in the air. “One hand holding the train strap.” He’d make a game for them.>> rollingstone.com/culture/cultu

"There is no variation or evolution in gameplay throughout the game, as the pipes always have the same gap between them and there is no end to the running track, having only the flap and ding sounds and the rising score as rewards." again Flappy Bird

"We could have games for anything. Games for attending classes, co-working, and making art. Games for work. Games for just hanging out. We're going to make these kinds of games. But at this point, it's time we stop thinking about them as games and start considering them part of a broader field: spatial interfaces." darkblueheaven.com/spatialinte

"The accumulation of gadgets hides these meanings Those who use these devices do not understand them; those who invent them do not understand much else. That is why we may *not*, without great ambiguity, use technological abundance as the index of human quality and cultural progress." Wright Mills (1959)

interface proletarization: disappearance of navigation, the user doesn't go anywhere, things come to them

a good interface: one that, despite its complexity, you can understand so well that you can forget about it

"I realized that we can't have a single good term to describe what we do with digital media for a reason.

In the 1960s-1970s digital media pioneers like Alan Kay systematically simulated most existing mediums in a computer. Computers, and various computing devices which followed (such as "smart" phones)came to support reading, viewing, participating, playing, remixing, collaborating.. and also many new functions.

This is why 20th century term s- reader, viewer, participant, publisher, player, user - all apply."

Lev Manovich in 2011

lab.softwarestudies.com/2011/0

currently in the rabbit hole of ppl programming on their mobile

if agency is the ability to interrupt automatized behavior, then rewiring the computer means acquiring agency in a computer system

"From the perspective of system developers, a utilitarian morality governs technology use. The good user is one who adopts the systems we design and uses them as we envisioned (Redmiles et al., 2005). Similarly, the bad or problematic user is the one who does not embrace the system or device. This creates a moral problem, a stain to be eradicated." ics.uci.edu/~djp3/classes/2012

angry birds (action) vs flappy bird (behavior) for now in Italian, but soon to be translated and expanded

not.neroeditions.com/interfacc

the most "active" user of an hegemonic technology is the one who decides not to use it

"Hence one has to ask what happens existentially when I press a key. What happens when I press a typewriter key, a piano key, a button on a television set or on a telephone. What happens when the President of the United States presses the red button or the photographer the camera button. I choose a key, I decide on a key. I decide on a particular letter of the alphabet in the case of a typewriter, on a particular note in the case of a piano, on a particular channel in the case of a television set, or on a particular telephone number. The President decides on a war, the photographer on a picture. Fingertips are organs of choice, of decision." Flusser

"At root, [World of Warcraft] is not simply a fantasy landscape of dragons and epic weapons but a factory floor, an information-age sweatshop. custom tailored in every detail for cooperative ludic labor" Galloway, The Interface Effect, 44

the most representative experience of being a user of a network computer nowadays is the mobile phone:
1) on average, more time is spent there than on laptop or desktop
2) most websites became fundamentally mobile-first in their design, or even mobile-only (think of Instagram)

"[…] software relies on the assumption that there is something like a programmer and something like a user. This also presents a special set of problems, the most important of which is the status of the actor versus the acted-upon, and under which circumstances which is which" Galloway, The Interface Effect

two ways to determine behavior and reduce agency:

1. calculate all the possible variables

2. reduce the variables to the minimum

agency as the extent of deautomatization available

Alan Kay to Steve Jobs re. the iPad: “Look Steve. You know, you’ve made something that is perfect for 2-year-olds and perfect for 92-year-olds. But everybody in-between learns to use tools.” fastcompany.com/40435064/what-

on the concept of user 

1) User. I can't provide a singular definition of this term, because the tensions between contrasting definitions provide fertile ground on the research. Alexander Galloway points out that one of the main software dichotomies is the user versus the programmer, the latter being the one who acts and the former being the one who's acted upon. According to Paul Dourish and Christine Satchell, the "user" is a discursive formation to articulate the relationship between humans and machines. For Olia Lialina, the concept of user is a way to highlight the system that mediates the interaction. Lev Manovich indicates that user is just a convenient generic term for who can be considered from time to time a player, a gamer, a musician, etc. Manovich's point is something I'm considering further. This variety of uses he suggest is predicated upon the conviction that the computer is, in Alan Kay's words, a metamedium. But, when the main personal computer becomes the smartphone, is that still the case?

"The computer is as inhuman as we make it" Ted Nelson

behavioral wet dream: software that doesn't need explicit input. all input is deduced by rhythm and modulation. software responds only to eye focus and adapts accordingly

apropos "IF THE BUTTON IS NOT SHAPED LIKE THE THOUGHT, THE THOUGHT WILL END UP SHAPED LIKE THE BUTTON" by Ted Nelson, ca va sans dire...

"There is one game in town: a positivistic dominant of reductive, systemic efficiency and expediency". Galloway, The Interface Effect, 99

knowledge as know-how 

Knowledge is always a know-how. This know-how, which might be implicit, is first codified and then automated: a technique becomes a commodity. Example: online search. What search engines commodify is not the information itself but the information retrieval process. The PageRank algorithm codifies the social practice of linking. The list of results is the commodity that derives from such codification process.

terminological conundrum, help needed! 

How to call that messy assemblage around computers made of popular devices, semi-standardized interface layouts of apps and websites, widespread functional expectations, daily online habits, prevailing sentiment towards technology?

Some ideas:

- mainstream computing
- the anti-Stallman
- the Techium
- GAFAMondo
- the generalist software-hardware continuum
- normie computerdom
- platform consensus
- conveniencism
- hegemonic computing

Follow

terminological conundrum, help needed! 

@entreprecariat I like conveniencism, maybe IT conveniencism.

terminological conundrum, help needed! 

@cirku17 nice!

Sign in to participate in the conversation
Mastodon Bida.im

Un'istanza mastodon antifascista prevalentemente italofona con base a Bologna - Manifesto - Cosa non si può fare qui

An antifa mostly-italian speaking mastodon istance based in Bologna - About us - What you can't do here

Tech stuff provided by Collettivo Bida