Note re Pixel video

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Note re Pixel video

Victoria Hughes
Check out the run time. Semiotic compression and smart references  
created a more complex narrative than 2.5 minutes would indicate.  
Visual sutra.

Tory

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Re: Note re Pixel video

Nick Thompson
Victoria

911 still too raw for me to take pancaking buildings as any part of funny.

Thin skin, i guess.  

N

Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Ethology,
Clark University ([hidden email])
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
http://www.cusf.org [City University of Santa Fe]




> [Original Message]
> From: Victoria Hughes <[hidden email]>
> To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
<[hidden email]>; <[hidden email]>

> Date: 4/8/2010 8:32:08 PM
> Subject: [FRIAM] Note re Pixel video
>
> Check out the run time. Semiotic compression and smart references  
> created a more complex narrative than 2.5 minutes would indicate.  
> Visual sutra.
>
> Tory
>
> ============================================================
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org



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Re: Note re Pixel video

Steve Smith
Nicholas Thompson wrote:
> Victoria
>
> 911 still too raw for me to take pancaking buildings as any part of funny.
>  
I still remember how taboo any kind of large-scale urban violence
(terrorist threat) felt, even in movies made well before 9/11, at least
for a while.

We recently (re) watched the classic "Towering Inferno" ... it was quite
odd after the reality of 9/11/01 .

- Steve

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Re: Note re Pixel video

Robert Holmes
In reply to this post by Victoria Hughes
Wow. Thanks for that. Loved the 8-bit music at the end -- R

P.S. Kinda reminds me of the teddy bear invasion of Worthing sea-front

On Thu, Apr 8, 2010 at 8:32 PM, Victoria Hughes <[hidden email]> wrote:
Check out the run time. Semiotic compression and smart references created a more complex narrative than 2.5 minutes would indicate. Visual sutra.

Tory

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Re: Note re Pixel video

lrudolph
In reply to this post by Nick Thompson
Nick to Vic:

> 911 still too raw for me to take pancaking
> buildings as any part of funny.

I never follow up unexplained links to videos,
partly because with my slow connection all videos
load painfully slowly, mostly because I disapprove
of moving pictures in general (1. push media::BAD;
2. we aren't evolved to resist videos' inevitable extra
baggage, 3. if anything, we're evolved to far too
easily be sucked in by their extra baggage, 4...
I can rant on indefinitely, but won't now).  
So I'm always glad when someone, even if not
the original poster, does explain--in words--
WTF a profferred video link purports to be (other
than, essentially always unstated by the poster
even when smugly admitted by the videomaker [e.g.,
in cases of explicit advertisements], some kind
of mindfuck--oops, there I go ranting again).

In this case, though, Nick, is it supposed to be
"funny" or is it supposed to be "art"?  Karl-Heinz
Stockhausen voted "art" for the original show
(specifically, I guess, "performance art"),
remember?  (If you don't remember, go look it up,
it will be good for you, even if you didn't spend
far too many hours in the late 1960s listening to
Karl-Heinz's "Gesang Der Junglinge".)

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Re: Note re Pixel video

Eric Charles
In reply to this post by Nick Thompson
Lee,
Not sure what you are ranting about... but I did detect a request for a plain explanation of the video.

It is a cute video where a bunch of "pixels" invade NY city. A bunch become bad guys from old video games and start taking apart the city (with most of their weapons turning real things into pixelated things). Even Pacman makes a showing, gobbling up the dots on the subway charts and thereby deleting stations. There is a quick part where Tetris pieces start falling from the sky to fill in the missing part of buildings. Needless to say, when a level of the building gets filled in, a part of the building disappears. I assume that is what Nick was reacting to. Weird to me that he connected it at all with 9/11. It was a clever video, that didn't seem to be advertising anything other than the company that made it (a company that apparently wants to break into a larger segment of the advertising market, having only made a handful of foreign commercials in the past).

Eric


On Fri, Apr 9, 2010 06:46 AM, [hidden email] wrote:
Nick to Vic:

> 911 still too raw for me to take pancaking 
> buildings as any part of funny.

I never follow up unexplained links to videos,
partly because with my slow connection all videos
load painfully slowly, mostly because I disapprove
of moving pictures in general (1. push media::BAD; 
2. we aren't evolved to resist videos' inevitable extra
baggage, 3. if anything, we're evolved to far too
easily be sucked in by their extra baggage, 4... 
I can rant on indefinitely, but won't now).  
So I'm always glad when someone, even if not 
the original poster, does explain--in words--
WTF a profferred video link purports to be (other
than, essentially always unstated by the poster
even when smugly admitted by the videomaker [e.g.,
in cases of explicit advertisements], some kind 
of mindfuck--oops, there I go ranting again).

In this case, though, Nick, is it supposed to be
"funny" or is it supposed to be "art"?  Karl-Heinz
Stockhausen voted "art" for the original show
(specifically, I guess, "performance art"),
remember?  (If you don't remember, go look it up, 
it will be good for you, even if you didn't spend
far too many hours in the late 1960s listening to
Karl-Heinz's "Gesang Der Junglinge".)

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Eric Charles

Professional Student and
Assistant Professor of Psychology
Penn State University
Altoona, PA 16601



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Re: Note re Pixel video

lrudolph
On 9 Apr 2010 at 8:58, ERIC P. CHARLES wrote:

> Lee,
> Not sure what you are ranting about

Example follows.

> It was a clever video, that didn't seem to be advertising anything
> other than the company that made it

*Every* production of a system-ostending-behavior
(I originally had "exhibiting", which is undoubtedly
clearer, but I couldn't turn down the opportunity
to suggest a useful abbreviation; as to "behavior",
I throw that back at you for explication--I certainly
want the term S.O.B. to include *at least* all "higher"
life forms, probably all life forms, but I also
want it to include various social and silicon-based
systems) is advertising something.  [<--- That is a
proposed axiom.  AKA proto-rant.]  Birds, bees, and
babies are constantly advertising "themselves", as
you well know.  The question is, what kinds of
"protective measures" (against the "advertiser"
taking control) are afforded to the "advertisee"?
I don't think humans have adequate "protective
measures" against Moving Pictures (in particular)
and other "push media" (in general).  

My problem with "push media", particularly "art in the
age of mechanical reproduction" (although Walter Benjamin
in fact doesn't anywhere, at least in that essay, talk
about either sound recordings [music, speechifying,
what have you] or motion pictures) is that they
(by definition) make the relation between "advertiser"
and "advertisee" *much* more asymmetric than it is
In Nature (that is, in the world where life-as-we-knew-it
evolved).  Live music, live poetry recitals, plays being
performed on stage, dancing, religious services, sports,
production and consumption of food and drink (either
vernacular or at bars and restaurants--even McDonaldses)
and all such sorts of "traditional" "expressive media"
always involve negotiations between the musicians/poets/
actors/dancers/celebrants/sporters/foodfolk/etc and the
"audience". (Don't for a minute think that actors aren't
aware--not necessarily always "consciously"--of who else
is there.)  Yes, the relation is asymmetric, but
"information" flows both ways.

Plastic arts like sculpture, painting, jewelery making,
architecture, and so on, are a bit harder for me to
deal with in this way, but not impossible.  Books on
the other hand are no trouble at all, but there isn't
room in this margin to give the proof.

...Dammit, my rant is running down before its time (and
showing cracks in its foundations, to boot--dammit^2).
Must be low blood sugar taking its toll.  Off to
breakfast!

Really, what it comes down to is, I disapprove of these
new-fangled Moving Pictures!  Not to mention all of
those Records the young kids listen to!!  Get off my
lawn!!!

Lee Rudolph

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Re: Note re Pixel video

Pamela McCorduck
In reply to this post by Victoria Hughes
As someone who actually lives in Manhattan, I thought it was very  
clever indeed. I'd have to rewatch to catch the semiotic compression  
and smart references--I was just looking for landmarks I knew.


On Apr 8, 2010, at 10:32 PM, Victoria Hughes wrote:

> Check out the run time. Semiotic compression and smart references  
> created a more complex narrative than 2.5 minutes would indicate.  
> Visual sutra.
>
> Tory
>
> ============================================================
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
>


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Re: Note re Pixel video

Nick Thompson
In reply to this post by Victoria Hughes
Lee

> In this case, though, Nick, is it supposed to be
> "funny" or is it supposed to be "art"?

You know, now that you mention it, I wanted to ask that very question but
was too shy.

Nick

Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Ethology,
Clark University ([hidden email])
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
http://www.cusf.org [City University of Santa Fe]




> [Original Message]
> From: <[hidden email]>
> To: <[hidden email]>; <[hidden email]>
> Date: 4/9/2010 4:48:30 AM
> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Note re Pixel video
>
> Nick to Vic:
>
> > 911 still too raw for me to take pancaking
> > buildings as any part of funny.
>
> I never follow up unexplained links to videos,
> partly because with my slow connection all videos
> load painfully slowly, mostly because I disapprove
> of moving pictures in general (1. push media::BAD;
> 2. we aren't evolved to resist videos' inevitable extra
> baggage, 3. if anything, we're evolved to far too
> easily be sucked in by their extra baggage, 4...
> I can rant on indefinitely, but won't now).  
> So I'm always glad when someone, even if not
> the original poster, does explain--in words--
> WTF a profferred video link purports to be (other
> than, essentially always unstated by the poster
> even when smugly admitted by the videomaker [e.g.,
> in cases of explicit advertisements], some kind
> of mindfuck--oops, there I go ranting again).
>
> In this case, though, Nick, is it supposed to be
> "funny" or is it supposed to be "art"?  Karl-Heinz
> Stockhausen voted "art" for the original show
> (specifically, I guess, "performance art"),
> remember?  (If you don't remember, go look it up,
> it will be good for you, even if you didn't spend
> far too many hours in the late 1960s listening to
> Karl-Heinz's "Gesang Der Junglinge".)



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Re: Note re Pixel video

Douglas Roberts-2
I'm not sure it's fair to be having a flame war without having invited me...

;-}

--Doug

On Fri, Apr 9, 2010 at 8:15 AM, Nicholas Thompson <[hidden email]> wrote:
Lee

> In this case, though, Nick, is it supposed to be
> "funny" or is it supposed to be "art"?

You know, now that you mention it, I wanted to ask that very question but
was too shy.

Nick

Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Ethology,
Clark University ([hidden email])
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
http://www.cusf.org [City University of Santa Fe]




> [Original Message]
> From: <[hidden email]>
> To: <[hidden email]>; <[hidden email]>
> Date: 4/9/2010 4:48:30 AM
> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Note re Pixel video
>
> Nick to Vic:
>
> > 911 still too raw for me to take pancaking
> > buildings as any part of funny.
>
> I never follow up unexplained links to videos,
> partly because with my slow connection all videos
> load painfully slowly, mostly because I disapprove
> of moving pictures in general (1. push media::BAD;
> 2. we aren't evolved to resist videos' inevitable extra
> baggage, 3. if anything, we're evolved to far too
> easily be sucked in by their extra baggage, 4...
> I can rant on indefinitely, but won't now).
> So I'm always glad when someone, even if not
> the original poster, does explain--in words--
> WTF a profferred video link purports to be (other
> than, essentially always unstated by the poster
> even when smugly admitted by the videomaker [e.g.,
> in cases of explicit advertisements], some kind
> of mindfuck--oops, there I go ranting again).
>
> In this case, though, Nick, is it supposed to be
> "funny" or is it supposed to be "art"?  Karl-Heinz
> Stockhausen voted "art" for the original show
> (specifically, I guess, "performance art"),
> remember?  (If you don't remember, go look it up,
> it will be good for you, even if you didn't spend
> far too many hours in the late 1960s listening to
> Karl-Heinz's "Gesang Der Junglinge".)




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Re: Note re Pixel video

Nick Thompson
In reply to this post by Victoria Hughes


Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Ethology,
Clark University ([hidden email])
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
http://www.cusf.org [City University of Santa Fe]

Pamela,

you wrote:

<I thought it was very  
> clever indeed

This is interesting.  I obviously am standing on the Old F--t side of some
cultural divide.  

[sigh]

Nick


> [Original Message]
> From: Pamela McCorduck <[hidden email]>
> To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email]>
> Date: 4/9/2010 7:49:55 AM
> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Note re Pixel video
>
> As someone who actually lives in Manhattan, I thought it was very  
> clever indeed. I'd have to rewatch to catch the semiotic compression  
> and smart references--I was just looking for landmarks I knew.
>
>
> On Apr 8, 2010, at 10:32 PM, Victoria Hughes wrote:
>
> > Check out the run time. Semiotic compression and smart references  
> > created a more complex narrative than 2.5 minutes would indicate.  
> > Visual sutra.
> >
> > Tory
> >
> > ============================================================
> > FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> > Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> > lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
> >
>
>
> ============================================================
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org



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Re: Note re Pixel video

lrudolph
On 9 Apr 2010 at 8:34, Nicholas Thompson wrote:
 
> This is interesting.  I obviously am standing on the Old F--t side of some
> cultural divide.  

You just noticed???

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Re: Note re Pixel video

Pamela McCorduck
In reply to this post by Pamela McCorduck
Nick, I think it has nothing to do with age, more to do with life  
experience. I was born into an air raid, so am always, at some level,  
expecting death from the skies. My first five years were spent at war.  
What with that, getting caught in Tiananmen Square, and spending a lot  
of professional time thinking up worst-case scenarios, 9/11 shocked  
but didn't surprise me, if you know what I mean.  So this I could view  
with equanimity.

I tell you, it wasn't always thus. I couldn't hear a siren--ambulance,  
police, fire--for my first twenty years without the hair standing up  
on the back of my neck.

P.




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Re: Note re Pixel video

Steve Smith
In reply to this post by Douglas Roberts-2
Doug is always invited to a friendly flame war, even if he was too busy working or cleaning his ditch to start it.   A good flame war with Doug is often followed by lots of beers to put the flames out.  Recycled beer.

But I think what we have here is more (and less?) than that.  And following Nick's self-description and Lee's  fitting into the same, I stand firmly with my feet planted on both sides of the "cultural divide" (separating Old F***s from the rest of the world?).

Like Lee, I have a very questionable internet connection so even 2:30 of video like this is an investment.   Tory is an old friend so I make the effort when she sends things.   This one was definitely very "clever" on several levels.  

As an old hand at CGI, Visualization and VR, I am naturally fascinated at the facility with which the producers managed to mix their synthesized and real video.    I can think of dozens of ways to approach it, but none of them are easy and the results of this particular exercise are (nearly) flawless.   It gets high marks technically.

I also came into my adult years as the classic video games referenced were all the rage, Pac Man, BreakOut, Tetris, Space Invaders, Mario Bros.    I remember the feeling of these mini-worlds the video games created had some kind of reality of their own... so to see their reality invading ours resonated.

The notion of the pixelated (voxelated?) invaders pixelating the world as they encountered it is actually "semiotically" relevant to Lee's (and maybe Nick's) objections.   Lee harps eloquently on "Moving Pictures" and "Push Media" and I believe that "pixelated attack-creatures" are a good signifier for all that is bad/risky/dangerous/questionable about the "new media" that has arisen in the time period roughly marked by the inception of video pong (where was Pong and Asteroids and BattleZone in this clip?)   The cautionary tale in this clip is that our own digital media (e.g. Pushed Moving Pictures) is in the process of eating our world.  

In the spirit of McLuhan's "Medium is the Message", we are *becoming* digital creatures ourselves, if not as abruptly and literally as the animation clip we just saw would suggest, simply by consuming it in the quantities that many of us do (especially our children/grandchildren for the old F***s among us).

I think this stuff is rotting our brains... but most of it is rotgut and I really appreciate the occasional draught of the well-crafted stuff.

Lee's other point, about "everything" advertising itself is very interesting as well.  Obviously this movie clip is an advertisement for the skills and cleverness of the producers, encouraging others to hire them to do something similar for their own product.  

We do a lot of contemplation/discussion on this list about "life itself" and the recurring themes are phrases like "gradient descent" and "self-organization" and "natural selection".   This "self-advertising" theme seems to be the natural result of "sexual reproduction".    "Look at Me!" seems to be a counter-productive strategy (predator-prey) until  you mix in sexual reproduction.

Just ask any of the Peacock's in Doug's backyard...

- Steve
I'm not sure it's fair to be having a flame war without having invited me...

;-}

--Doug

On Fri, Apr 9, 2010 at 8:15 AM, Nicholas Thompson <[hidden email]> wrote:
Lee

> In this case, though, Nick, is it supposed to be
> "funny" or is it supposed to be "art"?

You know, now that you mention it, I wanted to ask that very question but
was too shy.

Nick

Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Ethology,
Clark University ([hidden email])
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
http://www.cusf.org [City University of Santa Fe]




> [Original Message]
> From: <[hidden email]>
> To: <[hidden email]>; <[hidden email]>
> Date: 4/9/2010 4:48:30 AM
> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Note re Pixel video
>
> Nick to Vic:
>
> > 911 still too raw for me to take pancaking
> > buildings as any part of funny.
>
> I never follow up unexplained links to videos,
> partly because with my slow connection all videos
> load painfully slowly, mostly because I disapprove
> of moving pictures in general (1. push media::BAD;
> 2. we aren't evolved to resist videos' inevitable extra
> baggage, 3. if anything, we're evolved to far too
> easily be sucked in by their extra baggage, 4...
> I can rant on indefinitely, but won't now).
> So I'm always glad when someone, even if not
> the original poster, does explain--in words--
> WTF a profferred video link purports to be (other
> than, essentially always unstated by the poster
> even when smugly admitted by the videomaker [e.g.,
> in cases of explicit advertisements], some kind
> of mindfuck--oops, there I go ranting again).
>
> In this case, though, Nick, is it supposed to be
> "funny" or is it supposed to be "art"?  Karl-Heinz
> Stockhausen voted "art" for the original show
> (specifically, I guess, "performance art"),
> remember?  (If you don't remember, go look it up,
> it will be good for you, even if you didn't spend
> far too many hours in the late 1960s listening to
> Karl-Heinz's "Gesang Der Junglinge".)




============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org


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Re: Note re Pixel video

Robert J. Cordingley
Pong was there knocking bricks out of a bridge.

There are two kinds facing each other across another divide:  half the world is digitizing everything while the other half is making it look analog (graphic, visually stunning).

Robert C.

On 4/9/10 9:08 AM, Steve Smith wrote:
Doug is always invited to a friendly flame war, even if he was too busy working or cleaning his ditch to start it.   A good flame war with Doug is often followed by lots of beers to put the flames out.  Recycled beer.

But I think what we have here is more (and less?) than that.  And following Nick's self-description and Lee's  fitting into the same, I stand firmly with my feet planted on both sides of the "cultural divide" (separating Old F***s from the rest of the world?).

Like Lee, I have a very questionable internet connection so even 2:30 of video like this is an investment.   Tory is an old friend so I make the effort when she sends things.   This one was definitely very "clever" on several levels.  

As an old hand at CGI, Visualization and VR, I am naturally fascinated at the facility with which the producers managed to mix their synthesized and real video.    I can think of dozens of ways to approach it, but none of them are easy and the results of this particular exercise are (nearly) flawless.   It gets high marks technically.

I also came into my adult years as the classic video games referenced were all the rage, Pac Man, BreakOut, Tetris, Space Invaders, Mario Bros.    I remember the feeling of these mini-worlds the video games created had some kind of reality of their own... so to see their reality invading ours resonated.

The notion of the pixelated (voxelated?) invaders pixelating the world as they encountered it is actually "semiotically" relevant to Lee's (and maybe Nick's) objections.   Lee harps eloquently on "Moving Pictures" and "Push Media" and I believe that "pixelated attack-creatures" are a good signifier for all that is bad/risky/dangerous/questionable about the "new media" that has arisen in the time period roughly marked by the inception of video pong (where was Pong and Asteroids and BattleZone in this clip?)   The cautionary tale in this clip is that our own digital media (e.g. Pushed Moving Pictures) is in the process of eating our world.  

In the spirit of McLuhan's "Medium is the Message", we are *becoming* digital creatures ourselves, if not as abruptly and literally as the animation clip we just saw would suggest, simply by consuming it in the quantities that many of us do (especially our children/grandchildren for the old F***s among us).

I think this stuff is rotting our brains... but most of it is rotgut and I really appreciate the occasional draught of the well-crafted stuff.

Lee's other point, about "everything" advertising itself is very interesting as well.  Obviously this movie clip is an advertisement for the skills and cleverness of the producers, encouraging others to hire them to do something similar for their own product.  

We do a lot of contemplation/discussion on this list about "life itself" and the recurring themes are phrases like "gradient descent" and "self-organization" and "natural selection".   This "self-advertising" theme seems to be the natural result of "sexual reproduction".    "Look at Me!" seems to be a counter-productive strategy (predator-prey) until  you mix in sexual reproduction.

Just ask any of the Peacock's in Doug's backyard...

- Steve
I'm not sure it's fair to be having a flame war without having invited me...

;-}

--Doug

On Fri, Apr 9, 2010 at 8:15 AM, Nicholas Thompson <[hidden email]> wrote:
Lee

> In this case, though, Nick, is it supposed to be
> "funny" or is it supposed to be "art"?

You know, now that you mention it, I wanted to ask that very question but
was too shy.

Nick

Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Ethology,
Clark University ([hidden email])
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
http://www.cusf.org [City University of Santa Fe]




> [Original Message]
> From: <[hidden email]>
> To: <[hidden email]>; <[hidden email]>
> Date: 4/9/2010 4:48:30 AM
> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Note re Pixel video
>
> Nick to Vic:
>
> > 911 still too raw for me to take pancaking
> > buildings as any part of funny.
>
> I never follow up unexplained links to videos,
> partly because with my slow connection all videos
> load painfully slowly, mostly because I disapprove
> of moving pictures in general (1. push media::BAD;
> 2. we aren't evolved to resist videos' inevitable extra
> baggage, 3. if anything, we're evolved to far too
> easily be sucked in by their extra baggage, 4...
> I can rant on indefinitely, but won't now).
> So I'm always glad when someone, even if not
> the original poster, does explain--in words--
> WTF a profferred video link purports to be (other
> than, essentially always unstated by the poster
> even when smugly admitted by the videomaker [e.g.,
> in cases of explicit advertisements], some kind
> of mindfuck--oops, there I go ranting again).
>
> In this case, though, Nick, is it supposed to be
> "funny" or is it supposed to be "art"?  Karl-Heinz
> Stockhausen voted "art" for the original show
> (specifically, I guess, "performance art"),
> remember?  (If you don't remember, go look it up,
> it will be good for you, even if you didn't spend
> far too many hours in the late 1960s listening to
> Karl-Heinz's "Gesang Der Junglinge".)




============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org

============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org

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Re: Note re Pixel video

Steve Smith

Pong was there knocking bricks out of a bridge.
Sure that wasn't "breakout"?   A sort of single-player pong...
ç

There are two kinds facing each other across another divide:  half the world is digitizing everything while the other half is making it look analog (graphic, visually stunning).
Yes... like that.

Robert C.

On 4/9/10 9:08 AM, Steve Smith wrote:
Doug is always invited to a friendly flame war, even if he was too busy working or cleaning his ditch to start it.   A good flame war with Doug is often followed by lots of beers to put the flames out.  Recycled beer.

But I think what we have here is more (and less?) than that.  And following Nick's self-description and Lee's  fitting into the same, I stand firmly with my feet planted on both sides of the "cultural divide" (separating Old F***s from the rest of the world?).

Like Lee, I have a very questionable internet connection so even 2:30 of video like this is an investment.   Tory is an old friend so I make the effort when she sends things.   This one was definitely very "clever" on several levels.  

As an old hand at CGI, Visualization and VR, I am naturally fascinated at the facility with which the producers managed to mix their synthesized and real video.    I can think of dozens of ways to approach it, but none of them are easy and the results of this particular exercise are (nearly) flawless.   It gets high marks technically.

I also came into my adult years as the classic video games referenced were all the rage, Pac Man, BreakOut, Tetris, Space Invaders, Mario Bros.    I remember the feeling of these mini-worlds the video games created had some kind of reality of their own... so to see their reality invading ours resonated.

The notion of the pixelated (voxelated?) invaders pixelating the world as they encountered it is actually "semiotically" relevant to Lee's (and maybe Nick's) objections.   Lee harps eloquently on "Moving Pictures" and "Push Media" and I believe that "pixelated attack-creatures" are a good signifier for all that is bad/risky/dangerous/questionable about the "new media" that has arisen in the time period roughly marked by the inception of video pong (where was Pong and Asteroids and BattleZone in this clip?)   The cautionary tale in this clip is that our own digital media (e.g. Pushed Moving Pictures) is in the process of eating our world.  

In the spirit of McLuhan's "Medium is the Message", we are *becoming* digital creatures ourselves, if not as abruptly and literally as the animation clip we just saw would suggest, simply by consuming it in the quantities that many of us do (especially our children/grandchildren for the old F***s among us).

I think this stuff is rotting our brains... but most of it is rotgut and I really appreciate the occasional draught of the well-crafted stuff.

Lee's other point, about "everything" advertising itself is very interesting as well.  Obviously this movie clip is an advertisement for the skills and cleverness of the producers, encouraging others to hire them to do something similar for their own product.  

We do a lot of contemplation/discussion on this list about "life itself" and the recurring themes are phrases like "gradient descent" and "self-organization" and "natural selection".   This "self-advertising" theme seems to be the natural result of "sexual reproduction".    "Look at Me!" seems to be a counter-productive strategy (predator-prey) until  you mix in sexual reproduction.

Just ask any of the Peacock's in Doug's backyard...

- Steve
I'm not sure it's fair to be having a flame war without having invited me...

;-}

--Doug

On Fri, Apr 9, 2010 at 8:15 AM, Nicholas Thompson <[hidden email]> wrote:
Lee

> In this case, though, Nick, is it supposed to be
> "funny" or is it supposed to be "art"?

You know, now that you mention it, I wanted to ask that very question but
was too shy.

Nick

Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Ethology,
Clark University ([hidden email])
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
http://www.cusf.org [City University of Santa Fe]




> [Original Message]
> From: <[hidden email]>
> To: <[hidden email]>; <[hidden email]>
> Date: 4/9/2010 4:48:30 AM
> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Note re Pixel video
>
> Nick to Vic:
>
> > 911 still too raw for me to take pancaking
> > buildings as any part of funny.
>
> I never follow up unexplained links to videos,
> partly because with my slow connection all videos
> load painfully slowly, mostly because I disapprove
> of moving pictures in general (1. push media::BAD;
> 2. we aren't evolved to resist videos' inevitable extra
> baggage, 3. if anything, we're evolved to far too
> easily be sucked in by their extra baggage, 4...
> I can rant on indefinitely, but won't now).
> So I'm always glad when someone, even if not
> the original poster, does explain--in words--
> WTF a profferred video link purports to be (other
> than, essentially always unstated by the poster
> even when smugly admitted by the videomaker [e.g.,
> in cases of explicit advertisements], some kind
> of mindfuck--oops, there I go ranting again).
>
> In this case, though, Nick, is it supposed to be
> "funny" or is it supposed to be "art"?  Karl-Heinz
> Stockhausen voted "art" for the original show
> (specifically, I guess, "performance art"),
> remember?  (If you don't remember, go look it up,
> it will be good for you, even if you didn't spend
> far too many hours in the late 1960s listening to
> Karl-Heinz's "Gesang Der Junglinge".)




============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org

============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org

============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org


============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
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Re: Note re Pixel video

James Steiner
Not merely Break-Out, but possibly a ref to Arkanoid, a popular enhanced break-out.



On Fri, Apr 9, 2010 at 12:34 PM, Steve Smith <[hidden email]> wrote:

Pong was there knocking bricks out of a bridge.
Sure that wasn't "breakout"?   A sort of single-player pong...

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org