New Technologies and Domestic Consumptions

According to Eric Hirsch, there is a distinct connection between new technologies and domestic consumption. In addition, domestic consumption has been both sustained and threatened by new technologies" (Hirsch 158). He uses the example of the television and the computer when used in a domestic setting. The television, which was once "new media" is being rivaled by the Internet as the main source of broadcasting. His central argument in is essay "is that an explicit emphasis on domestic consumption...has been a project of domestic self-sufficiency" (Hirsch 159).

This argument is an echo of a theory we have discussed over and over again this semester....the medium is the message. For example, before communication devices such as radio, television, the phone, the marketing of products was drastically different. However, once this "new media" found its place within the domestic settings, items such as soap, perfume, furniture, lights (just look around you right now) were marketed in more efficient ways which allowed more of them to sell. The higher the demand, the fancier these products became. Soon, well years and years later, there was the emergence of even new "new media," such as the computer and the Internet. The essay stops here with the land line modem.

Hirsch uses a family that he knows for his study. They purchase a modem so they can connect to the Internet, but it doesn't work in quite the way the want it to. First, it is in the way, and second it ties up the phone line. These were common consumer complaints at that time. However it wasn't long, before better and faster models came about. Hirsch ends his essay, restating McLuhan's theory that the medium is the message. Hirsch states that "what is new and what is old or established are alway co-existent, always define each other. This is only made so by how what is old and what is new are utilized to reshape culture and its needs.

Works Cited

Hirsch, Eric. The Television Studies Book. 2nd. London: 1998.

The Future Coming Fast

I chose to focus on 2009 for this blog. I read most of the other readings, but this is the one that I feel that I can talk about the best. Perhaps this is because not only is 2009 just a couple of years away, but we are started to see some of the technology described in 2009. We have computers in watches, picture frames and even rings even though they are watch-rings. I find it fascinating what is being done with digital technology. The section of Communication for instance. While we cannot see the other person as of yet as a 3-D image, and I doubt that we will in the next couple of years, there is technology used now that has the potential of heading that way. I'm not talking about video conferencing or web chat, interesting though they might be, I am speaking more specifically about the hearing impaired. Not only can they now text message via cell phones, but the phone service called Voice Relay, which uses a third party that acts as a phone line between you and the other person has changed. The person who can hear still has to pretend that the person who is speaking is not really there, but the hearing impaired person instead of the old text box on their end, they now have boxes that have graphical capabilities. When you laugh and the operator types that in along with your response, your response shows up as text along side an image of a laughing face. It really is neat, but unfortunately costly.

Haraway: Cyborgs Are Here

When we first read Haraway's Cyborg Manifesto, I was confused by what the ending meant, I'd rather be a cyborg than a machine, and it wasn't until today that I believe I understand it. Since people have been shaped by myths, such as one gender is better than another or race for that matter, they have become machines. Machines don't question, don't think. For the most part, machines simply do what they are programmed to do. They cyborg on the other hand has the intelligence to step outside of the myths, in essence, to throw them out and reshape its own culture and politics. Unlike the simple machine, the cyborg has the intelligence to say, "nope, sorry but that's archaic." Haraway described the cyborg as "a cybernetic organism, a hybrid of machine and organism, a creature of social reality as well as a creature of fiction” (Haraway 516). Which would you rather be...a cyborg or a machine?