I'm trying to put together a psych study for my thesis, and I want to make sure it turns out well... but I haven't done anything like this since sophomore year. Has anyone in our seminar taken a lot of psych? Would you mind if I talk to you about this, just to get some advice? I need to meet with a psych prof about it too, just to get it all together, but I'm worried they're all going to be extremely busy... Gotta get on that as soon as I get back to school after break.

Aaaahhhh, so much to do... Thanks for your help!!

My computer crashed last week, and I'm just now starting to realize how much I'm in withdrawl. I find myself coming home late at night and not knowing what to do before I fall asleep, since I can't watch a movie or a TV show on my computer. I find myself wondering who's emailed me lately but unable to conveniently check. I find myself waking up in the morning with a hankering to listen to a particular song but unable to, since I don't have access to my iTunes. I can't even charge my iPod while my computer's broken.

I'm addicted, and it's sad.

Which leaves me with this question: does technology improve our lives, or does it make everything a little more complicated (especially when we're detached from that technology)?

Overall, I thought Melting Pot was a great film. But I'm not going to get into the nitty-gritty details here... I just want to touch upon some issues of authorship. So Rusca directed this movie and also wrote it, but as we've discussed in class, authorship in film is a sticky subject. As we saw during the credits, which seemed to go on forever, hundreds of people went into the making of this movie (even though it was independent, low-budget, and made under some serious time constraints). Still, it seems to me that Rusca is pretty much the primary author... or is author even the appropriate term here? He definitely created the concept and oversaw its implementation, but he also mentioned that he checked with Latinos and blacks from communities in Los Angeles to confirm and fine-tune certain aspects of the screenplay. If these people helped shape the film in any way, shape, or form, does that make them secondary authors? Can a project as big as a full-length film ever have a sole author, anyway? Just some things to think about...

For my Representing the Metropolis class with Prof. Koss at Scripps, we went on a field trip last Saturday. I'm normally not too fond of waking up at 8 am on weekends to venture into Los Angeles, but this particular trip turned out to be really interesting. We visited a bunch of old movie theaters on Broadway in L.A. (like the Orpheum, the Palace, the State, and so on). Some of them are abandoned...some of them have been converted into churches...and others now look like regular stores from the front, but once you go back into their storerooms you see the remains of an old movie theater. It's pretty incredible.

Behold: The Fast and the Curious.

You can find more remixed films here: Trailer Remixes.

It's amazing how much a little editing and a change in music can alter the tone of a film (good examples: Shining and Scary Titanic)...

Is it reasonable to do a psych study as part of my Media Studies thesis?

Here's an abridged version of the proposal I just sent my readers (but it's still pretty long, so feel free to skim):

"I've figured out that what I'm most interested in is the psychology surrounding the issue of photographic truth. I would like to examine the ways in which photographs were initially seen as 'windows onto reality' and 'mirrors with a memory,' followed by an analysis of the theories challenging this idea and an investigation of how public attitudes toward photographs (with regards to their 'truth status') have evolved over time. Today, it's common knowledge that photographs can lie, but it they still have the power to deceive. Through my thesis, I want to get a little closer to understanding why this is the case.

On Wednesday we talked about how Manovich sees database and narrative as "natural enemies," i.e. conflicting ways of making sense of the world. Because of this, he says they're in constant conflict, and each new medium that emerges privileges either one or the other (novel = narrative; photography = database; film = narrative; digital arts = database). But it seems to me that humans are inclined to look for narratives in every form of media. For instance, even with photography, which Manovich defines as a database art, people strive to construct narratives. We go to museum exhibits of photographic works that are grouped into themes, which strive to tell us a story and give us a coherent idea.

564 current front pages from 52 countries:

Today's Newspapers

(Tip: unblock popups on your browser while looking at this site.)

I found the Star Trek + Nine Inch Nails video clip on YouTube:

Here it is.

All I can say right now is... wow.

A short video clip:

Bush Uses "The" Google

Oh man. This sort of thing really makes me sad about the state of our country... mainly because our president cannot speak...

I read some comments about this interview in which people were defending Bush, saying that no one his age really knows about Google, the Internet, and that sort of thing. Basically, they think everyone should stop "picking on the president" and quit looking for ways to criticize him. But to me, it's not just about the Google thing... It's about the way that he clumsily articulates himself.