Otaku Otaku

Remember the good old days?

2010-09-11T02:49:00.002-04:00

While looking through Gizmodo, I found this particular gem. There are several obvious problems with this particular product, and it's promises.

One: At most photo places and office places one can get photos printed straight from the SD card.

Two: The photos are going to be really bad, Vivitar makes some fairly cheap cameras.

Three: The expense and chemical waste of film was why the switch to digital was so widely adopted. I'd rather buy 1 SD card once, than a mere 24 shot roll indefinitely.

There are no advantages to the Vivitar camera over even a basic digital camera, and whatever advantages advertised are outright lies.

However, this post is not quite about how silly this commercial is. It's about reminding me that someday I too will be that old man unwilling to adapt to the new age. That commercials touting the nostalgia of using a plastic keyboard to type this blog post will draw me in.

I've feel like I've finally seen the harbinger of the new generation that freak me out, and I don't want anything to do with. In between my episodes of "Venture Brothers" on the Adult Swim websites; I've been seeing the commercial for the movie "The Virginity Hit". I know in my mind that no young generation in America (or perhaps anywhere else) has ever not fooled around in ways that freaked out the older generation. However, these kids are strange.

I thought the younger generation was supposed to have better ideas of gender equality, racial and cultural understanding. I thought that us millennials were the beginning of a new and better America. Instead I see the same objectification of women, exaggeration of middle class lifestyle standards, and group of chummy white folks living in their safe world away from everyone else's problems.

Maybe I'm wrong. Perhaps this movie is just a what it is; a bad movie that no one should care about. Maybe there will be a hope that the children of born under the Bush Administration will be just as good or even better than the ones born under the Reagan Administration. (I was technically Carter)

Spider-man

2010-06-01T17:22:00.003-04:00

Marc Bernardin a writer for i09 wrote a compelling bit on the idea of a non-white Spider-man.

My proposal is quite simple. We need a Korean-American New Yorker to play the role. The name doesn't even need to change that much, I kinda like the ring to "Peter Park"

Imagine the idea of a struggling Peter Park trying to make ends meet, with his duty to his family, a nerdy interest in studying physics at ESU, and less than successful attempts to date Mary Jane, Felicia Hardy, and Betty Bryant.

Imagine this as a opportunity to tap into an untapped fan base to have a hot young Asian actor play a role and draw in all the fan girls. People who wouldn't care about comic book movies would come to see the movie just to see an Asian Spider-man.

I can not think of a better time for this to happen. Someone help me pitch this to Marc Webb.

New "murse"

2010-05-13T20:03:00.007-04:00

Lately the newest fashion trend seems to be the mythical "murse". Recently my trusty FLCL bag had started to see some wear and tear and it was time I got a new bag to carry my stuff. As much as I'd like to replace it with this, I figured it was about time I dressed like an adult. I'm not going to go into what's in my bag (see: EDC) but I'd like to talk about my new bag I just got.

Picking the right bag for me had a few major parameters which took quite some time to figure out. Here were some of the basic metrics

-Less than 150 dollars

-Dark or Black leather

-14-15 inches in width

-Sturdy construction

-Unique look

-Compartments for EDC items

While searching high and low I ran into a number of problems. The dream bag that I wanted from Fossil was perfect, but way over my price range. I was playing around with the idea of getting a map case for that nostalgia kick, but I figured most of what I found was way too thin what I wanted. So I found this bag on Amazon which looked promising. I came in the mail last week and I've been using it for a few days now.

Cons:

I was a bit disappointed in the color. I thought it'd be more of a black, but it's actually more of a dark chocolate color. Not an unflattering color, but not what I was hoping for either. Secondly, the description said there was a zipper; however, the bag I got has no zipper.

Pros:

It's the perfect size and fits all my things. It feels fairly sturdy, I don't know if it truly is full grain leather or not, but it should be at least as good as canvas. I really like the fact that it has snap buttons. I don't like the idea of having magnets on a laptop bag, I avoid velcro as much as possible, and buckles tend to be more trouble than they're worth. It fits my laptop perfectly, and is fairly comfortable to wear.

I really like messenger bags. I mostly like the ability to be able to wear the bag and swing it around while walking and pull and put stuff in the bag. Perhaps this appeals to my desire to be more mobile. I've stopped using rolling bags and started packing things in a duffel for my trips. When I go anywhere by plane, I try to reduce everything I need to just carry-on. I think gets my to rethink what I really need in this world and it saves on the hassle of having my checked bags getting lost. (BAD bags are truly the best duffel bags one can buy.) It's a form of fantasy really. I preference mobility over comfort, less material things, and the ability to pick up what I have and just go where I'm needed. I feel we all have these guilty little fantasies in our minds what why we do what we do and how they influence our decisions.

The Space between People

2010-04-21T22:28:00.003-04:00

Source picture from Penny-Arcade, full comic can be found here.

Perhaps my friend The Pendant can illuminate me, but an interesting article popped up on "City of Ontario v. Quon" and how this reveals a bit on our Supreme Court Justices' grasp of technology.

Take for example this juicy bit I pulled from the transcript on establishing reasonable expectation of privacy.

CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS: Again, it depends upon their reasonable expectation. Do any of these other people know about Arch Wireless? Don't they just assume that once they send something to Quon, it's going to Quon?

MR. DAMMEIER: That's -- that is true. I mean, they expect -

CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS: Well, then they can't have a reasonable expectation of privacy based on the fact that their communication is routed through a communications company.

MR. DAMMEIER: Well, they -- they expect that some company, I'm sure, is going to have to be processing the delivery of this message. And -

CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS: Well, I didn't -- I wouldn't think that. I thought, you know, you push a button; it goes right to the other thing.

MR. DAMMEIER: Well -

JUSTICE SCALIA: You mean it doesn't go right to the other thing?

(Laughter.)

I imagine the laughter was do to the sarcasm of Justice Scalia and not at the expense of either Chief Justice Roberts and Justice Scalia. I also don't mean to make fun of them, being that this is an important point of contention which has no easy answers with technology. What do we expect to be private, and should we trust such expectations? This blog isn't private, and I am aware that I'm pushing this out there in the public sphere, but many feel that text messages and e-mails are private, but they are barely encoded and run on the same public communication lines. Many computer and mobile phone users don't take the time to think of these things despite their familiarity with interfacing with it. It may seem funny to us, but these particularities are hardly addressed but really should be.

Now that people are getting over the hoopla of the iPad, I remember that I had a tablet PC with a touch screen back in 2006, and it was great. I really loved the thing, it did everything the iPad does now, but had a physical keyboard, a camera and USB and SD card slots. It even had little metal legs in the back that folded out and created it's own stand. So when I got my new netbook for school I left behind the PepperPad back in my parent's home. I figured I could mod it or use it for parts some time in the future. The thing is, since it was so user friendly, I could set it up as a really good e-mail machine for my mom. She doesn't have an e-mail address yet, but she owns her own business and I figured she might like one. So I asked her if she'd like for me to teach her how to use the Pepper Pad to check e-mail she responded with...

No that's okay, I like talking to real people, I don't want to talk to a robot.

I understand that she didn't mean that literally, but I wonder if she feels the same way about talking on her mobile phone, or any phone for that matter. In a sense, she's quite right, most of my generation doesn't feel that way and are perfectly comfortable with the idea that we're communicating through technology and that on either end of all this technology is a real human being. However, without this imaginative leap, we are still interfacing at an inanimate object.

Someone once told me that any technology created before we were born is perfectly natural; any technology made before we were 20 is new and exciting; and any technology made after 40 is dangerous magic. Young or old, there are many assumptions and ideas which we take for granted. I take for granted that when I call someone on my mobile phone, the person on the other end is real, and that no one is making the effort to tap into my wireless signal. Is this the natural order of things? Will I be calling my daughter about IT support to fuse with the core mind? At what point will I myself start saying that this particular use of technology has distance us too far from human interaction.

Palatable Violence

2010-03-28T18:55:00.003-04:00

I've been playing around with the word "palatable" lately to give meaning to something that has been bothering me lately. It's not as strong as to say there is a correlation or a link, but it does aptly describe a certain relationship between personal action and media messages. It would be wrong and unfair to say that certain messages no matter how blatant causes people to act violently. This would go against some very highly held beliefs about free will and responsibility which would be difficult to fight against. To make an idea "palatable" would mean to put at ease ideas that may have had some earlier disagreement. It is still the responsibility of the individual to act on such ideas, but the message had made the act feel less distasteful.

My friends and roommates have been clamoring about the new music video by Lady Gaga the hot new sensation who is trying to be Madonna to Adam Lambert's David Bowie.

Now I'm not being anti-Lady Gaga, or that Lady Gaga is "corrupting our youth" as Labor Whip Greg Donnelly would say. This is a part of larger trend which can not blame one individual or even her army of marketing, production, and visual design team. Let's take the simple idea of product placement in which "The Lady" seems to be fond of. No one really thinks...

"Perhaps I might purchase an LG rumor 2 because I saw Lady Gaga use it in that enticing video of hers, also I would like a diet Coke."

However, I do think that the idea of a cellphone with a pull out side keyboard is a more palatable type of phone in which individuals will be more familiar with this design and choose it it available among others. Then companies either in coordination or conspiracy against with the production team of Lady Gaga will provide such a phone at an attractive price point. "Ta da" consumerism wins. In this game, even a 60% success rate would be very lucrative.

So let's expand on this to more scary waters. I've become quite good friends with Dr. Meda Chesney-Lind at the University of Hawai'i. She has been tirelessly doing some excellent research and campaigning against the suspiciously gendered rate of arrests on the national average and in particularly Hawai'i. Her research had showed that "while the total number of arrests declined, females under age 18 had an increase of 6.4% in the ten-year period while arrests of juvenile males declined 5.9%...the trend for drug abuse violations arrests was upward--120% for girls compared to 51.2% for boys. Girls had a greater increase in “other assaults” arrests in the ten years—40.9% for girls and only 4.3% for boys." (Chesney-Lind 2004:7) This is showing a frightening change in rates of arrest for women in only 10 years.

Now one wouldn't be realistically looking for an accurate portrayal of women's prison's in a music video. If that was the case, I'd be attacking the "Dire Straits" for their over simplification of blue collar work, or Genesis for portraying our world leaders as bumbling fools. I do understand that this is supposed to be artistic and just in good fun. However, the message does make the idea of women in prison a palatable concept and we are less inclined to be concerned with any crazy statistical analysis which would indicate a serious exploitation of the women in our society. A reality which is just too horrifying or at the very least a "buzz kill" to an otherwise good time of imagining women wearing fashion made from junk. All the while real people and increasingly women are being abused daily in state funded prisons with reintegration programs cut from the budget due to these economic times.

My EDC

2010-02-11T13:12:00.005-05:00

What I regularly carry either in my pockets or "man purse"

One of the things I have been noticing is the prevalance of the concept of EDC or "Every Day Carry". EDC items.com is a fairly comprehensive website on the theory and practice of EDC in the United States. It's not a particularly new concept, people tend to have a common set of tools which they deem useful to their everyday life and this set is a constantly changing arrangement of things which tells quite a bit about a person and the life they live.

In my experience EDC usually involves some active or retired military guy going through his gear which often includes a gun (and a backup gun) They tend to be fairly frightening looks into the mind and mentality of many Americans I and I worry if this is a part of a growing trend. Just hearing Nutnfancy talk about the piercing power of his EDC bullets is wincing.

One of the things about growing up in Virginia is the Open Carry allowance for all Virginians. For the most part, Virginians are allowed to carry a handgun with no permit and few restrictions. Which sounds good in theory, but their is nothing friendly about the sight of a big guy with a pistol out on his belt at the Red Lobster.

This to me is a part of nerd culture which is not often understood as nerd culture. It's a "masculinitized" form of gadget geekery, show and tell on the internet, and promotes and reinforces a mindset of being in battle everyday. Who is the enemy in which one is in fear to carry two guns to go to Arbys? Is this a part of the military culture in the US bleeding into the civilian culture? Is this a part of Barry Glassner's "Culture of Fear"?

Girls in Paris

2010-02-08T17:33:00.003-05:00

Photo from Doritos ad 2010

"What I learned from Superbowl ads last night: If you're a henpecked dude with a bitchy wife/girlfriend, buying beer/Dodge Chargers/Dockers khakis/miniature TeeVees/etc. will restore your manliness"

This was a rather inspired quote from a friend of mine on Facebook earlier. The friend in question is somewhat controversial for me. I had a ridiculous crush on her in high school and she didn't seem to give me the time of day. She went to the rival state college, married a Department of State guy, moved to Africa with him, got a divorce and is now living in NoVA YUPy bliss with her new boyfriend... who is also a sociologist.

Other than the obvious problems of the media and the rampantly bad representation of masculinity. One commercial gets to me rather personally.

I understand that the ad is going to be biased, but in its efforts to promote Google as the window to life's opportunities, it simplifies and disinfects the complications of the "international lifestyle" while at the same time pushes some odd ideas.

The history of travel has always been the history of wealthy people going to foreign lands and having sex with the natives. This commercial is a new post-post-modern interpretation of this old colonialist motif. What angers me the most is that the commercial hides the complicated and dirty parts of travel that I have come to respect. It opens up an entire life of going to Paris, seducing and marrying a French girl as something as simple as doing a Google search. It skips the problems of being on the streets of Paris, looking for a job in a town that distrusts Americans, months of doing nothing but washing dishes to pay enough for rent, being rejected by several women, and historically Catholic churches that won't let you have your non-denominational spiritual life-bond ritual. Living a life anywhere involves a lifetime of building trust and knowing the community, not just a simple information and monetary exchange. Unlike what Samantha Brown may lead you to believe, life outside of America isn't just a pretty amusement park for your enjoyment.

Mob Justice

2010-01-22T18:38:00.003-05:00

Original photo owned by Summit Entertainment LLC

The story of the village mob taking justice in their own hands is as old as villages themselves. My brother and I had always felt that living in any small town where everyone knew each other would be the worst thing imaginable. Apparently, one of the products of mass communication has produced a virtually world wide village effect.

José Luis Rodriguez's winner of the coveted British Natural History Museum's annual Wildlife Photographer of the Year award had sparked an Internet outcry late last year. There seemed to be two interesting factions between the "proper" photography community furious at the uncultured harassment of obvious trolls, and the Internet community who are furious at the elitist photography community for being so gullible about a fake photo. So it turns out that although the photo wasn't photoshopped, further investigation had shown the photo did turn out to violate the rules of the contest. So Rodriguez was stripped of the title and the £10,000 prize.

For me this is a great example of an almost democratic process of internet communications. I wonder if this would set a precedent in which the "noisy crowd" can overturn decisions in established institutions or even break down their authority altogether. Not that think that "tea-baggers" should be the new wave of democracy, but internet communication to form and create mobs would be interesting to keep an eye on.

Asian women

2010-01-15T22:52:00.003-05:00

I found this video through a blog on how this artist seems very off from what cartoon drawing is about. To his defense, "How to draw..." instructionals for beginners are often quite bad and misleading.

I'm more concerned with the problem of his essentalist idea of what constitutes as an "Asian women". He seems to use the word "beautiful" as a descriptor for the physical traits. There is an uncomfortable awkwardness to his presentation of how he draws the figure and even the finished product is rather odd. If he had a similar presentation on how to draw "Black Women" it wouldn't be difficult to call him out as a racists, but for some reason it's socially acceptable for "Asian women"

I guess I'm extra sensitive on the issue of beauty and particular on Asian beauty is from a presentation I saw last night by Dr. Daniel Hamermesh. His argument was that from just looking at an input/output model, it seems that better looking people tend to get paid more, and are more valuable to their employers. What I found somewhat lacking was there was a very positivist and ethnocentric idea of what beauty was and there were little measures taken to take that into account. Obviously beauty is not a static thing nor is it commonly agreed upon in different groups. During the Victorian age, plump pale women were the height of beauty being indicators of being wealthy enough to stay indoors and eat, while tan skinny women were probably "gypsies" or "farm workers". So class is a huge predetermination for beauty and class defines what is beautiful.

What about the beautiful Asian women from poor third world countries that Western men go gaga for? They aren't rich why are they seen as beautiful. Again, as the saying goes, "beauty is in the eye of the beholder", and the beholder are wealthy westerners justifying their taste and unaware of the fact their taste becomes an indicator of how wealthy they are. They are wealthy enough to spend time to travel to "exotic" lands and pursue "exotic" women. In the world we live in now, there is no greater indicator of wealth than showing how "globalized" one's taste is.

In the end we are not talking about beauty of perfect tube shaped women which flatter kimono, or long slender necks, or tiny delicate feet. They are not marks of beauty admired by those with power, only the tastes of those in power matter, and they are privileged in society.

Symbolic Analyst

2009-12-07T14:26:00.004-05:00

Original photo from Wired Magazine

I don't know when this happened, but it seems that Penny Arcade is producing a webTV show. So far only the two part "pilot" episode has been made. It mostly sets up the premise of the show and goes over the things like how they understand their success, PAX and the birth of Jerry Holkins' daughter. If it wasn't for the fact that these guys are so humble and professional about their work, I'd be quite jealous of their success. But honestly, they're just fantastic people who happen to be living the nerd dream. I've thoroughly enjoyed the PennyArcade PodCast and really look forward to seeing more the show.

What I think was a really great message to me was that when they said on the show that they fully admit how lucky they are. There are a lot of guys that move in together, not attend college and try to start a business together and fail miserably. There are many who want to make it out there as a webcomic artist, and don't nearly have the fame as these two guys. What they have been able to do can not be replicated.

I've been really filling out my literature of great sociological writings and my gallery of references have increased immeasurably. One of which would be Robert Reich's "The Work of Nations" and his understanding of new globalized labor. In his work he describes one of the key professions of our age as the "Symbolic Analyst". Succinctly, Reich understands the profession to include a new exchange of information on a global scale.

...symbolic analytic services can be traded worldwide and thus must compete with foreign providers even in the American market. But they do not enter world commerce as standardized things. Traded instead are the manipulations of symbols - data, words, oral and visual representations. (1993:177)

I wouldn't assume the intention of the folks at Penny Arcade, but in a very organic way, these guys are doing just that. They have mananged to find a work around the tradition system of exchange of education for work, and work for resources, and have made a business out of grasping the nerd world around them and delivering it to a stable audience. They have created a nerd language and capture the experience in a way that is entertaining and meaningful. What is truly remarkable is that they have overcome many of the former blocks to such success.

I think the major component which has allowed this to happen would be the recent cheapness of wide reaching media. We are now in a time when one could reach a very wide audience over the Internet with a personal website with very little in terms of start up financing. I think this is the key component to understanding globalized work. Not to dispute Reich's work, but I think the profession of "symbolic analyst" has always existed; what is different now is that it is much easier for people of modest income to become one where before, one had to be very well placed and very wealthy.

Before, an aspiring comic artist to get out of distributing their comic outside of photocopies sold at the record store would have to appease the publishers at a comic book company or a newspaper. Many times this would require a vetting process and over time only artist who went to expensive art schools or were able to finance themselves would be able to get into the business. Even then, there were influenced by the whim of the publishers, a biased concept of acceptable material, and coerced product placement. Even famous and talented comic writers like Alan Moore, had his fair share of problems with publishers.

With Internet comics, there is less of these constraints and, an audience is generated commonly on the quality of their work. That being said, there are a lot of comics out there, and I would say a great majority of which are very poorly done. Below is a small list of comics that I have thoroughly enjoyed and is produced very well.

Gunnerkrigg Court by Tom Siddell: A British comic artist who has a very unique fantasy setting and some excellent character development. The art is very well done with a mix of beautifully detailed work and simple caricatures which don't end up too much like "Teen Titans" in the style.

XKCD by Randall Munroe: An American comic artist who mostly works in stick figures but manages to do them with a certain style and gets by with very witty jokes based on science and nerd relationships. Occasionally he has some objectionable opinions on women, but often they capture perfectly the issues of human interaction in our world today.

Shortpacked by David Willis: Shortpacked is a spin off comic which is part of an entire "Walkyverse" I have not had the time or ability to read the other comics David made, but I am told they were quite impressive. I think what I like most about this comic is the honest representation of working retail.

Hark, a vagrant by Kate Beaton: I'm afraid that I have have fallen in love with a women I have never met. Kate Beaton a Canadian comic artist writes a fantastically funny comic on history and literature. Her references to Canadian history are often great and force me to do a bit of research on the great white north. I think her subtle touches on facial expressions works well with the perfectly set up dialog. Byron's face at the end of this comic makes me laugh everything I look at it.

There are others of course, especially ones that I haven't had the time or inclination to read for whatever reason, but as a whole there is something unique about this business of web based comics.

Christmas wishlist

2009-11-22T19:41:00.002-05:00

So it's the time of year when we have things that we want, but the realities of finance and responsible spending preclude our ability to get them. This post is my personal "fantasy wishlist" of things I'd like but realistically would feel guilty spending the money to acquire.

A New Gaming Laptop
The Toshiba Qosmio is really tempting. I've been really tempted to get a few PC games lately and I have never really had a decent gaming computer. DragonAge: Origins has been getting alot of good reviews and I've been very tempted by previews of Starcraft II and Mass Effect II. I've often really liked Toshiba computers and this one in particular have a few features that light up the geek in me. Things like solid state hard drives, multitouch track pads, and light up keyboards are really cool. Unfortunately I already have a Netbook and a dedicated work laptop that I use very much. A third computer would be a bit overboard in luxuries.

A Smartphone
Now that I'm a professional academic always on the go, I've found that I have a need to stay connected 24 hours and have the ability to access information while I'm traveling between WiFi zones. OK, that's mostly a lie. I mostly want a toy that I can play around with Android 2.0 software because I love Google so much and use everything they have (send me a Google Wave invite please.) I've heard alot of good things about the new Droid phone and my Verizon plan is up for a phone upgrade in January. Although this would mean an additional 30 dollars a month in service charges and that I'll be "that guy" that has all these crazy gadgets on his phone. Right now I have the Juke I love it because it's small, red and flips out like a switchblade. How much more phone do I really need.

New Wheels
Right now I my mode of transportation is through my feet. (Or riding The Bus) The idea of having something I can ride to the beach is very tempting. Zipping along on my little two wheeled thing might be fun and appropriate for my new island life. Also there is the raging desire to get an El Camino. For some reason I've been really interested in getting a muscle car, and one with a truck bed would be infinitely useful. (Also it's a freaking El Camino, that's just coolness on four wheels.) But to be honest the cost of gas, parking and other environmental factors are not optimal. I should just get a beach cruiser bike and get awesome abs from all the working out I could be doing.

Japanaphile

2009-10-29T17:22:00.004-04:00

The above photo is cropped from the controversial photo of Hanna Montana doing that slanty eyes thing people used to do to me when I was in elementary school.

For those not in the know, the word "weeaboo" was the replacement word for "wapanese" after the world "wapanese" was used so often to insult other users on various online message boards, a filter was set up to block it. The word "weeaboo" itself is a reference to a fairly funny web comic "Perry Bible Fellowship".

I'm not entirely sure, but there seems to be a fairly large taboo with folks who are not Japanese (by ethnicity or nationality) who are highly interested in Japanese people and things. This "anti-weeaboo" sentiment is so strong it creeps in to mainstream media pretty often. The following video is from the new DLC of GTAIV, and although it is a satire of the Japanese animation industry, I feel that it strongly looks down upon the audience of the people interested in such media.

This video seems to be able to be insulting on two fronts.

First, it makes an extremely unfair generalization of Japanese animation as only poorly produced, over sexualized marketing tools. Almost in turn insulting the Japanese as a people as strange others who live weird lives and have weird interests. Reinforcing the long standing tradition of creating the Japanese as the exotic other.

Secondly, it insults the various people who are have an interests in Japanese animation. That surely we can't control what those strange Japanese people make, but why would red blooded Americans want to watch such things unless they were weird too.

This cuts across all facets of life from academic research (Why is that white woman studying geisha?) , political interests (What does that white guy think he's doing in the Japanese Embassy?), dating preferences (Rice Queens), travel (Another trip to Tokyo?) , and consumption ($500 dollars for a sword?) . It seems that there is constantly a strong rejection of people who are interested in Japanese related subjects. (or even just Asia as a whole.) So its a strange line to walk along, would people be more or less forgiving if Miley Cyrus was doing that slanty eyed thing because she wanted to be more Asian. Is it equally racist to love another people's lifestyle?

RFID chips

2009-10-18T19:34:00.003-04:00

The use of RFID chips are hardly a new or incredible issue, but it is interesting to see this potentially dangerous technology being used to such a high degree without really knowing how it really works. Several tests at DefCon have shown that it is possible to make a long range reader that extends as far as 2 to 3 feet, and Mythbusters were barred from ever haveing a show on how to hack an RFID chip by several major corporations in cooperations with government agencies. At the same time, more and more companies are using RFID chips, even dermal implantation for clubs.

The video below from the blog Gizmodo shows a very interesting way of studying the range of an RFID chip.

Immaterials: the ghost in the field from timo on Vimeo.

I used to use a Metro Smart card to get around Washington DC and it felt really cool to wave the card to get through the toll gates. There is something very cool about RFID technology that appeals to our generation. Perhaps it's part of the current technological trend of wireless fetishism. We seem to love the idea of having something connect to something else without the need of cables. Perhaps there is a psychological relationship of cables as tethering our technology, when now we attribute "freedom" with having no strings attached to anything. The idea of being bound to anything by physical cords feels trapping, and wireless connections feel free. This relationship of freedom with physical bindings is obviously problematic. This is perhaps from a rejection of an obsolete idea of bondage. The traditional idea of bondage is to be subservient to a particular location. I believe in our desire to escape from any form of locational bondage, we have in turn created a new form of bondage. When I first got my mobile phone, I didn't realize that I was beginning a relationship of bondage. We tend to equate mobile phones with freedom, but for me it meant that no matter where I was, I was on call and reachable. Having a wireless connection didn't free me from physical bondage, it made the chain longer. At least when we were operating in the traditional idea, one could know when they had escaped bondage. Now when our responsibilities can contact us from very far away, we never really are free from their control and really only are "free" at their courtesy for our privacy and personal time.

This is not only a theoretical idea of post-post-modern terms of bondage, but has relevant questions for our age. Say if I a government contractor is assigned a government run blackberry. Do I bill my office for the time I have the devise on? Must I set up a schedule of when I'm on call? Am I beholden to answer my blackberry at any time? Are there different charges if it's an emergency? Can I refuse to carry a blackberry without worry of being replaced?

Back to RFID chips, how much personal choice will there be on implantation? Will there be laws prohibiting covert readers? Would wearing an RFID shield be a violation of federal laws like covering license plates or refusal to show ID? I admit that I think RFID chips have great potential and I enjoy it as a technology, but I wonder if we are moving too fast in its use before we really understand the where this is all going.

Otaku Politics

2009-10-13T14:31:00.004-04:00

source photo from MSN

Danny Choo a man I'm extremely jealous of posted a short article concerning THE GREATEST PM THAT EVER EXISTED! (I know I know, he's sexist, a nationalist, friends with "W", and won't recognize his son Yoshinaga Miyamoto, but somehow all is forgiven)

In this article on Koizumi's involvement with the production of the new Ultraman movie, Danny had this to say about the issue of adult interests in anime.

Its things like this which many folks who are not into Japanese culture don't understand and I get asked a lot in interviews by reporters - things like:-
Why do grown Japanese men still watch anime - I used to watch cartoons as a kid but only until I was 12.
Well for a start, folks like this interpret the world on what they consider to be standards that they set themselves. Just because they "don't", they expect others "to not" and anybody who "does" is strange by their definition. What surprises me is that some reporters who should have open minds (to enable them to convey an unbiased message) have the most narrowest minds one can possibly imagine.

Being the type of person that I am, I am often questioned on my abnormal behavior and tastes. I am often quietly offended at other people's concept of what is standard. I once saw a presentation by one of my favorite comicbook writers Marjane Satrapi who commented up until a few years ago she thought that comics were only for children and addled minded adults. It wasn't until she discovered the French "New Wave" comic style in which she realized that this was a uniquely powerful form of literature. For me that is how I normalize my love of comics and cartoons. If being a nerd was a counter culture movement, my call to arms would be "medium not genre". In my experience many who are not fans seems to think that all comics and cartoons have the same themes and any selection of such are representative of the whole. As if you could judge all animation on loonytoons, or all comics on Batman. Not to say that either are bad, but they do not account for all there is to be had in the world. I have experienced too many great works using this medium to make any generalizations on it's credibility. There are plenty of bad stuff out there in all things. Much like there are bad country songs and good country songs, bad vampire novels and good vampire novels, bad landscape oil paintings and good landscape oil paintings. We tend to be very quick to judge others on their interests based on our limited experience of that interests. Perhaps there is nothing unique to nerds about this, but it is interesting to note the social stigma commonly associated with it.

Nerd Tech

2009-10-01T21:21:00.003-04:00

When I was in highschool I read the opening to a book on Tombraider. I don't remember what kind of book it was, but I seem to recall it was more than just a strategy guide. The introduction posed the idea that much of what we have gained now in technological innovations are often inspired by fantastic dreams of their creators. For instance the desire to build robots are a certain type is not ever purely out of functional or pragmatic reasons, but from literature the inventor read as a child which sparked a personal obsession. In short, childhood dreams, often turn into adult innovation.

I'm a huge fan of Josh Whedon's Firefly. Many of the commentary on the social world throughout the show speaks to me. It was the type of Sci-Fi I like, I could spend hours discussing ideas of the whole 'verse from the hierarchy of companion guilds, Alliance politics, or core world/outer rim distinctions. That was the beauty of it, it was a large enough world in which we geeks can wallow in its richness and opened the door to greater inquiries.

So Google just released a new bit of software which they call "Google Wave". I am a shameless fan of Google products. I think they're often well designed and is seriously breaking the traditional use of technology by companies. Obviously anyone who is also a fan of Firefly knows the insignificant mention of the core planet technology they also called waves.

I think this was the only mention of how a "wave" worked. I still think in the Firefly 'verse, computer technology was returning to a "mainframe" model. Basically the tablet which young Simon was using is just a device which communicates to a local mainframe for computing power. From the conversation this could be one that serves the entire district. The bulk of the technology that accesses the mainframe gains a sort of timeshare on the processing power. I can imagine Simon's wave was particularly large and taxed the mainframe so much that it "shorted out" anything else that was tapping into the mainframe, like Mr. Tam's office computer. I can only guess that a "dedicated sourebox" would be a dedicated source of processing power to the mainframe just for Simon. Perhaps even switching over to other mainframes throughout the city if the local one didn't allow enough power. Like the difference between buying a condo and buying a timeshare. This would allow Simon greater processing power and an always on connection which with Simon's skills also allow him access to other mainframes throughout the city.

ok enough geeking. (seriously get me started on talking about AR and you'll be here for hours.)

With the popularity of light computers such as netbooks, pocket computers, and cloud computing this may be where we are going towards. I can't wait to be sending waves on my netbook accessing the school WiFi on the campus courtyard.

Nerd Insecurity

2009-09-29T07:48:00.002-04:00

Monday's xkcd comic really touched into a personal insecurity of mine; and judging from the xkcd forum discussion, I have quite a bit of company in this issue. I found it quite interesting that there were discussions on both camps on men that felt similarly paranoid about being outed as creepy, and girls assuring guys that short of unwelcome touching or hideously poor hygiene its really ok to approach women.

Riding around the metro myself I do try to be a friendly person. I genuinely don't try to hit on random strangers and infact I find it most difficult if I personally find the other person to be quite attractive. It's easier if I'm making friendly conversation with someone I feel relatively neutral about; but with someone really hot, I get paranoid and second guess my intentions. Something in my mind goes a bit like this.

"Wow she's really hot. I'd like to get to know her."
"You pig, all you want is to get in her pants."
"Well... that's not all I want, I think she's really interesting."
"Well get to know that part and ignore that part for now."
"That's not fair, that's part of the attraction too I can't just drop that under some pretension to be a gentlemen. That's lying and lying is a horrible way to start any relationship."
"Then you do just want to get in her pants after all...

Honestly, it goes on and on like that in my head with every attractive person I meet.

I wonder if nerds are the only ones paranoid about being creepy. I personally attribute it to not wanting to be either the creepy guy who obviously looks emotionally instable, or the jerk who is so aggressive they don't care about treating women like objects and even if they get rejected 19 times out of 20, there is still that one girl that goes for it anyway. This middle ground of acceptable behavior is difficult and even the borders of scale are problematic.

One, people are pretty forgiving of poor social skills. I always forget that. Most people don't have great charm themselves and are willing to accept a modicum of baggage and insecurities in others.

Two, I'm unjustly jealous of the jerk. I disapprove of the behavior, but deep down envy the attention it gets, even if it's purely out of frequency. This idea also treats women like objects in its own way, it takes the agency out of women and places them as merely victims of the ploys of jerks. People make their own choices, men or women, and more often than not they make poor ones and usually because of how they are inside and not through coercion.

But seriously, Rihanna, you are too beautiful, smart and talented to waste time on those losers. Why can't you give me the chance to show you what a true loving and supportive relationship is all about.

marketing to women

2009-09-25T16:52:00.005-04:00

Often I write about sexism in game marketing, so I'll try not to beat a dead horse. Although this is a joke I often feel that this is actually how some people feel games should be marketed to girl/women.

Not that games like cooking mama isn't fun, I just don't think there is any reason to market is as a "Girls" game. I think it is a very good gender neutral game, that both men and women can enjoy. Then again I think and know women that genuinely enjoy playing Halo. (and not to impress boys or to humiliate them.)

Another interesting tactic for marketing things to women is the use of magic. TV troupes has an excellent article on "Clark's Law for Girls' Toys". There are several DS and Wii games out there targeted towards young girls and all of a sudden your stylus or Wii-mote is a wand, yet for boys the Wii-mote uses advance gyroscopic computing.

The point is, efforts to have unsubtle marketing for women mostly comes out as crass and often humiliating. Now not all companies do this, "Pony Friends" is a relatively respectful game. Yes the target market is for little girls that love horseys and such, but you're not feeding the horse magic jelly beans or showering it with magical rainbows. You're picking out crap caught in the hoof, which from my friends who do ride horses is a fairly important and vital part of horse care. People will play games out of interests, and well made games that are fun to play will attract more people; no amount of marketing can cover that or impress more girls or boys to play them.

Science

2009-09-14T23:08:00.003-04:00

Right now I'm taking the required SOC 606 course on Research Methods and Design. It's one of those courses that everyone that does research goes over and the student's eyes glaze over at the thought of it. Not surprising being that the same cases are often dragged out, Nazi experiments, USPHS racial profiling, Crazy Voyeurs, and of course Yalies and Cardinals doing stupid stuff. Students tend to zone out and tell themselves "yeah yeah, whatever, I'm not a psycho, I'd never do such a thing." (Obviously they should listen better, being that the findings of the last two would prove them wrong.)

I don't think I genuinely enjoy the course, (The idea of reading the CFR or the Belmont report for the 20th time doesn't fill me with glee.) but it does give me a moment of reflection on the the whole process of the scientific method. I like questioning the idea of science. Much like religious faith, I think one's personal relationship with the work of science benefits from a bit of questioning. Its not that I don't believe in science, but I do desire to question its worth.

I've been playing Rock Band lately and have tried to not embarrass myself too much with singing the lyrics to "Still Alive". But with close examination of the song, I really think it has a very interesting message about the idea of science.

We do what we must
because we can.
For the good of all of us.
Except the ones who are dead.
But there's no sense crying over every mistake.
You just keep on trying till you run out of cake.
And the Science gets done.
And you make a neat gun.
For the people who are still alive.

Really interesting lines put into the perspective of understanding the legacy of Science. In my favorite sociological book ever, Dr. Donna Haraway explains that science has a very strong messiah mythology. In this includes one of the title characters the OncoMouse, and how we continuously sacrifice it to save us from the sins of humanity.

Although I don't often think of science in this way, I would say we still need to challenge this notion of the validity of scientific research and understand that in its essence all scientific research involves this mythology in some form or another. Science is an emotional part of the curiosity of being human and hopefully for the benefit "for the people who are still alive."

Cyberpunk

2009-09-10T19:07:00.002-04:00

My friend from Cyberpunk Review and I once had a very interesting conversation over coffee on this idea we called transnational cultural feedback. (He was a systems analyst and I'm a sociologist so I guess that's logical.) Basically it's the phenomenon of constant generational exchange of culture between various countries where not only do we have one country imitating the other, but the other country imitating the imitation. This interests me in the nature of the conduits which allow for this transfer of culture. Who are the people carrying this culture between nations, and why and what meaning does this culture mean to the carrier. In terms of Pierre Bourdieu, the imitation of culture from one nation to another implies a relationship of reverence to that original culture. Value is attributed to the lifestyle and is imitated in an effort to gain similar status. Continued transfers back and forth implies a shifting of value reverence and activity between the nations.

Obviously the example I would pick out as an excellent case study would be between Japan and the US. Some would say that much of early inspirations of cyberpunk was born out of the heady days of the cold war during the Reagen administration. Fears of nuclear war eminent and a sudden realization of impotence to the frightening rise of Japanese technology. Cyberpunk captured the "what if" scenarios of technology on the human condition and more often than not high technology meant Japan. So many of the technological horror movies (The Terminator) may at least subconsciously derive from fears of Japanese technology.

What is strange is now with the Japanese interests with western culture including science fiction, much of that is in the sub-conscience of the Japanese as well. So when we see a technology research company call themselves cyberdyne and built a powered suit named HAL, we have to pause to think of why such an homage is paid to Western literature. (Read more about HAL here.)

Gamer's Girl

2009-09-03T22:28:00.004-04:00

This is perhaps a bit metaphysical but bear with me while I do a blog post on a blog.

There has been quite a bit of discussion on the role of gender and gamers and if playing video games has been a predominately male activity. Should there be games created to reach out to women, (Are such games appropriate or just humiliating?) Are female gamers a new phenomenon or have they always been there all along? Do girls consume games differently than men? Most of the time girl gamers are depicted fairly poorly enforcing stereotypes that girls of any value sexy and interested in what you're interested in. However, there are sources that are trying to bring some seriousness to the idea.

Gamer's Girl is a blog which describes itself as such.

The Gamer's Girl Blog is meant to share stories of humor, support, and wisdom to those who date, have fallen in love with, or are married to a gamer. Much like being a house wife or soldier's wife, being involved with a gamer has its own set of rules, rewards, and challenges.

First of all, I've flipped through a few issues of Military Spouse. There are quite a few inconsistencies of experience and assumptions on the family dynamic and for me acts more as a manual for mythical social norms, than a support magazine. Then again I'm not a a housewife with a husband in Iraq for the third time, so I am unfairly biased. For those who need to seek out a support group even intellectually it does work for those who seek it.

The blog is quite new but seems to be able to update more often than my blog so I must give credit there. Gamer's Girl is about sharing the often comical pros and cons of being in a relationship with a gamer. Most of the time this discussion is quite short and ends up with the same tired joke of men choosing the comfort of games rather than relationships.

This blog brings up important points on the personal experiences of these relationship and tries to not cast it in such black and white terms. I'm quite interested in the blog already and I intend to pay close attention to how it continues to grow.

Japanese Elections

2009-08-30T23:11:00.002-04:00

Only the Japanese would use music from the "Terminator" movies in their election coverage. Maybe I'm reading too much into it, but it does give an interesting example of the use of culture for symbolic meaning. How do we indicate to the people instantly that something important is going on? For years we had used strict rituals, dress, and displays of wealth as an indicator of importance to any event. The use of "important sounding" music regardless of the cultural source may be another one. (Although it reminds me of the use of the color red for the Communist or the Nazi parties.) We have to pay attention to these tools of solidarity because they have meaning as to how we understand what cultural cues become important. As we become more aware of our diversity in occupation and lifestyle and the reach of masses of humanity becomes larger, the key elements of organic solidarity become more and more complicated. Perhaps now the only things we can unite under are Coke-Cola, McDonalds, and Hollywood movie references.

Seriously though in case you haven't heard the news. The "Democratic Party of Japan" DPJ has won in a landslide victory gaining 308 seats in the house of Representatives. This is an amazing change for the Japanese as a political system. In true Japanese fashion "Rozen Aso" has resigned his position as PM. This will change the political environment in Japan and balance a decades long rule of of the "Liberal Democratic Party" LDP. I don't know much about the new PM Yukio Hatoyama other than the fact that his grandfather was also a form PM. (Seriously Japan, there is some caste system of elites or what?)

Another interesting turnout was the 9 seats for the "Japanese Communist Party" JCP. I was talking to a fellow Graduate student in my department of the progress of the communist movement in Japan. What I find interesting is that of all the countries I can think of, I think Japan would be most likely to be amicable to a communist state. Typically most Japanese have no essential distrust of monopolies or government run services. Your average Japanese person wouldn't know that Japan Rail is now a private company and not a government run system. I think if anyone is at all interested in seeing new things happen in the field of Communist revolutions, Japan would be a place to look. I feel there are similar conditions going on in Japan which Marx may have seen going on in Germany.

Hikikomori

2009-08-25T23:35:00.003-04:00

Hikikomori from Will on Vimeo.

Probably a topic which will come across pretty often, but always interesting to re-investigate are the hikikomori and otaku phenomenon in Japan. Perhaps no accident my Graduate mentor had completed his thesis on the Hikikomori phenomenon. His blog on the topic can be found here. I'm quite impressed with his work and it looks like he's living the dream being a recipient of the prestigious Crown Prince Akihito Scholarship. (Someday I'll get there...)

The video above is a fairly good mini documentary on this topic in Japan from the blog Japanator. One of the things that caught me right away was the perception of men in Japan associated with hikikomori.

So maybe males are more likely to be 'hikikomori' because they are weak weaker than females.

Definitely a perception different from Americans where very few American men would admit men are weaker than females. It seems this cross-national disparity of masculinity between Japan and men from other nations.

...the Japanese... shy boy... dakara(therefore)... (some hand gestures indicating aggressive ) no no... but Italians and Americans... not shy

The stereotype of different degrees of manliness between nations have heavy suggestions of various themes of sublimation between nations.

Also there are the strong themes of isolationism and loneliness commented on in this video. I find it interesting that there are several references in which this is attributed to the prevalence of technology. Freud would have agreed with this sentiment of technology a product of civilization as an enabler of loneliness and personal dissatisfaction stating that "...there then no positive gain in pleasure, no unequivocal increase in my feeling of happiness, if I can, as often as I please, hear the voice of a child of mine who is living hundreds of miles away..." (Freud; 1931 38-39) Here he states that the technology of the phone has made it palatable for his child to live far away and give the illusion that an intimate human connection is still possible despite the distance.

As for solutions a few programs are in effect to solve this problem which affects the working force of Japan. (Which affects issues of immigration) However, many of them are very patronizing and shame the people with the sickness. The Television show "Welcome to the NHK" an anime show delving into the problems of NEETs and Hikikomori seems to have the disturbing message in which these folks are merely the products of enablers who allow them to waste away, the solution of course is to cut this line of support and force them out of their situation through starvation. The problem of course like any illness like the flu, addiction or depression, the greatest help is through the support of others and never through further isolation.

loneliness

2009-08-17T02:29:00.004-04:00

First of all, a bit of housekeeping; I am currently enrolled in the MA program at the University of Hawai'i Manoa. I'm quite excited about this being that this means I'm going to be able to pursue my passion as a sociologist. Hopefully this will reflect in greater quantity and and quality of work in this blog.

With moving in and limited access to the lifeblood of mine that is the internet, I've had alot of time on my hands to look over a few of the things I have downloaded and never gotten around to consuming.

Lililicious an excellent scanlation team has a few of Ebine Yamaji's work translated into English. Being that this novel is not likely to be picked up by any of the US publishers, this is perhaps the only way her work will reach an English audience. Hopefully this will drum up enough attention for a US publisher to pick up her work.

I finally got the time to finish "Free Soul" this morning. This was an excellent story that gracefully reaches out to troubles we all have about love, relationships, parents and careers. I find myself reflecting on my own insecurities about relationships and self image and find some strong emotional bond between myself and the Keito. In an interview with Ebine Yamaji, she discloses that it was "more fun to write about two girls"

Up to that point, I had never really enjoyed telling straight love stories. I just felt that my heart wasn't into it - I didn't get the same feeling of satisfaction from working on them. But once I produced a girl-meets-girl piece, I just realized that it was so much fun - I loved it! So, actually, recently I've been thinking to myself that if I try to approach working on straight love stories the same way that I do gay ones, then they may go better (laughs).

I wonder how common this concept is to people. I find myself agreeing with her sentiment, but I wonder why I do, and what goes on in the minds of those who don't feel the same way. Are there events or experiences which lend themselves to be able to see relationships beyond the gender borders. Or even which perspective has the blinders on? Those too caught up in fixed ideas of gender to see the relationship or those too caught up in the relationship to see the gender?

One of the things I have found distinctly different between the US and Japan is the idea of romantic friendship. Americans now have difficulty reading Tennyson's "In Memoriam A.H.H" without finding it extremely "gay". However, I find many people of the same sex able to openly hold hands or show some physical affection without raising any real suspicion. I once found one of my male students sitting in the lap of another male student all the while one was casually stroking the other one's chin. When I asked why he was doing that, he replied that it was "interestingly pointy". What the "civilized" world finds appropriate in terms of public displays of affection between humans are odd and inconsistent. Perhaps there needs to be more study into how such changes in shame and love came to be. One thing seems to be clear in my mind is as we further curtail and compartmentalize appropriateness in intimacy this seems to create nothing but loneliness.

Turning Japanese

2009-07-22T17:39:00.003-04:00

Above is a recording of an excellent interview with my personal role model George Takei. There's this other guy too, but I don't know what's the deal with him.

Growing up as an Asian-American in the 80's I didn't have many asian role models on TV. It was mostly just George Takei and Martin Yan. (This may explain why I like cooking and Sci-Fi so much.)

Although it seems that even today a more progressive and racially sensitive age in which we live in, there are still paltry examples of asians in the media. What's more it seems that must be a deficit of Asian-Americans in Southern California, becuase white people are taking the burden of playing asian roles. Everyone from Goku in the Dragonball Z movie to the problematic casting choices of "Avatar the Last Airbender", or the odd casting of Jake Gyllenhaall as the Prince of Persia. Of course good news is that there are groups now that make definate strides in turning this around.

Of course the interesting issue for me wouldn't be in terms of just policy changes, but something more subtle such as actual perceptions. As much as I sometimes fancy the idea of changing perceptions, I often come into the conundrum of who has authority on what is the "right" perception. What is seemingly straightforward can become quite grey in practice. My friend's mother once acused her daughter of "Japing out on her" and she was shocked that her mother was using such language. Although to her defense, it wasn't that long ago that such terms were not taboo. These terms and perceptions of Asia do not exist in a vacuum but are heavily contextual in the events of the time. How we deem them as appropriate or not must always be in context of the country's military and economic relationship.

Women's work

2009-06-30T12:22:00.004-04:00

The interaction of how we are to understand each other and the values that run between nations and perceived nations is at the heart of what I research. Transnational perceptions focused on "nerd culture" is a rather narrow field, but I find there is often quite a bit to study when I keep my eyes open. This article on Lee Si-kap's collection of 85 satellite dishes to satisfy his Vietnamese bride, Bui Thi Huang, sets up an interesting picture of transnational ideas of gender.

"In recent years, the South Korean countryside has had an influx of brides from
poorer countries like Vietnam, China and the Philippines. Like Ms. Bui, they
marry South Korean farmers who have difficulty finding a spouse because so many
young Korean women have rejected rural life and migrated to cities."

There is an incredible amount of fascinating things going on here all at once in this phenomenon. First of all I wonder how it is that women in Korea have a greater ability to move away from their rural town into the cities. Is it easier for women to find work in the city than men? Is it difficult for women to find work in rural towns? I wonder if it is heavily pragmatic as this, or is it overlayed by symbolic ideas of men as "country boys" and women as "uptown girls" as portrayed in the US through shows like "Green Acres". The idea of a single women living the city is a long standing mythology which has existed as far back as "Ars Amatoria" by Ovid, with even then carried the same feeling to disdain/admiration.

Then on top of this, is the idea of finding women from "poorer countries" and having them move to South Korea to become wives plays an interesting role of how these men must perceive these women and what they represent for them and for their home country. As this linked article put:

The rising status of women in the United States sent American men who were
searching for more traditional wives to Russia in the 1990s.

Again the product of greater mobility and economic independence for women becomes a punishment for men who desire more "traditional" wives. So as these women move to greater positions in the world, men are left in the dust. It's a strange antagonising of progress for women that seems to unfairly bring guilt to women who want to move up in the world through the limited avenues available to them, and at the same time draws sympathy for men who are unwilling to change with the times. This is similar to the problematic solution presented by Betty Friedan of hiring maids and nannys (from poorer nations) to do the women's work while affluent wives build a career outside the home. If we are to truly understand how gender roles are changing and improving, we must pay close attention to how this is changing as a whole system. Having some women improve their lives to have their previous roles replaced by women of poorer nations may not be the path we are looking for in dramatically changing gender roles in society.

What makes a man a man?

2009-06-19T11:34:00.004-04:00

(image from "七人の侍" 1954)

The Mainichi has an article on "reki-jo" (歴-女?), This seems to be a new boom and I've never heard the term before. The very end brings up an interesting commentary on what is going on with genders roles in Japan.

Tetsuaki Higashida from the Dentsu Communication Institute suggests that women are attracted to the masculinity of these warlords, compared to the more passive modern men that they know. "Gender role reversals have been taking place, with men cooking and women playing golf," he says. "It's not unacceptable nowadays for women to take an interest in warlords, which used to be an area of interest reserved for men."

The Dentsu Communication Institute is the think tank wing of The Dentsu Group who probably provided the data for this study. Most of the research I've seen them do usually concerns studies of social networking in Japan.

This idea of "gender role reversals" reflects this article from The Slate on "Grass Eating Boys" (草食女子) Personally in my experience, Japanese men tend to be rather stuck in 1970's America's idea of masculinity. Although it doesn't surprise me that the younger generation has rejected this idea of masculinity and is starting to prefer the opposite.

How are we to understand masculinity? I don't think there is such a strict bi-polar system of Samurai vs. "grass eating boys", or even a sliding scale in between. I wonder what forces are coercing these rigid forms of identity. Before I get too deep into gender, I'll just leave it off with a video about the modern Samurai.

East vs. West

2009-06-14T09:30:00.007-04:00

Japan is a very "brand conscious" country. I know more women in the US who have never heard of Vera Wang and Hermes than in Japan by far; and you'd never see a man walk around town in a $800 Yves Saint Laurent bag.

Japundit, has a link to an article on the new Sanrio brand tartan being released. Yamanashi, the prefecture where I lived for awhile was the birthplace of the Yamanashi Silk Center, which was the company the later became Sanrio in the 1970's when the company figured out that printing cute pictures on their clothes sold better. Now that the silk industry of Yamanashi has completely bottemed out in recent years, this connection has long been forgotten.

What I find interesting here from a transnational standpoint was this comment here by Yuko Yamaguchi

Yuko Yamaguchi, the Hello Kitty designer since 1980, said the British capital was chosen as the feline's home because "London was the place Japanese girls admired in the 1970s."
Britain was a nation of fairy tales for Japanese girls who read "Alice in Wonderland" and the "Tale of Peter Rabbit," she said.

The ways in which certain cultures and our association with how we perceive certain nations is a fascinating thing to study. As Ai Yazawa has shown us, many Japanese folks today still admire western fetishes as a mark of cool and trendy things. In her work "Paradise Kiss" many of the main characters take on "western" nicknames in an interest to sound exotic and otherworldly. Many people thought it was really cool that a guy that looked in many ways like a Japanese person, had a cool name like "Charles". On the other side of the pond, many people in the US and the UK see anything Japanese as the height of fashion and culture. Japanese things permeate almost everything in the US to give it "added value" or a flair of the exotic. At the same time in both cases this admiration of a national culture has nothing to do with the nation itself, but our association with being something other than we are. These associations reestablish global bounderies that places like the UK, the US and Japan remain as the other, and keep them as exotic distant lands. Despite cheaper transportation and communication between such nations, the distance between them is still far far away in the minds of its people.

gifts and violence

2009-06-11T07:01:00.002-04:00

Yesterday I was in an antiques store in Leesburg, VA with some friends and I saw a beautiful Obi draped over a bench near the register. I could tell from the fact that the embroidery ran all along the length of the obi on both sides, it was pre World War II. There was hardly any discoloration and it was in excellent condition in which the colors were still very bold and pronounced.

The owner of the store said that it was once a gift to a Four Star General who had served in Japan during World War II and was brought back here to Virginia. After the man died, the properties of his estate was sold and this store had acquired quite a few of his items.

Obviously I could be falling for the oldest trick in selling. Tell an interesting story about the thing and suddenly customers will want it. Not to far away in the store were some brass bowls from China which were obviously made in China for tourist to buy. Separated merely by time and space the same occurrence could be happening to me.

But regardless, if it was true, it's an interesting thought on the travels of this piece of garment. The exchanging of hands from Japan to the US, the history of the cloth and it's symbolism as a gift to a US General. There are layers of meaning which cuts across different cross sections of class, nations, gender and race. Is there a significance to the giving of a woman's clothes as a gift to a General to mark the end of a war?

The collection of souvenirs of war service reminds me of a story my aunt once said of a man who was in service in Vietnam for a number of years. This man was struck by the beauty of the Vietnamese "áo dài" and wanted to take one home for his wife to wear. Now there are two parts to an áo dài, the top dress-like part which is similar to a Cheongsam has a slit which will typically go to about an inch above the hips. The man not knowing much about how an áo dài is worn only bought this part and forgot the crucial set of pants which go with it. When the man brought the dress home his wife was quite shocked about how revealing it was and was suspicious of her husbands endless praise on how beautiful it looked on the local women in Vietnam (and their sense of modesty.) So here we have an interesting scenario of the formulation of an intellectual intersection in concepts of gender between the husband, the wife and the women of Vietnam.

What meaning did the giver attribute to such a gift and what meaning did either military person take with him on receiving the gift. Did the gift have meaning for himself, or was it thought of only as a gift for a woman? The weight of these things hang on my head as I think of this obi now draped over a bench in some sleepy antiques store in Leesburg and I wonder who will pay the 450 to buy it and what meaning that buyer will give it.

Japanese Cultural Revolution

2009-06-07T09:07:00.004-04:00

I have always felt that "Razor Ramon Hard Gay" was a champion for social change. This is especially true with his encouragement that even yankī aren't too cool to honor their father. Although he seemed like another crazy comedian stereotyping "homosexual behavior", I've felt that there was more going on under that pleather biker cap.

One of the toughest parts of being an English teacher in Japan is seeing a lot of really sweet kids run their lives into the ground. It's half their own doing, but society has some of the blame too. I've found myself on occasion arguing with teachers that we can't just give up on these kids now and label them as hopeless at 12. I know enough about child development to know that giving up on such kids at this age is the worst anyone can do to harm a whole life. But there is a culturally encouraged tradition in Japan to cast off people who are deemed "unworthy".

This is why it makes me really happy to see men like Yu Waki try to make an effort to turn things around for Japan. The Mainichi has a fairly good article on his work, and his book can be found here. The Japanese have a strange comfortable attitude about their organized crime popularly known as the "Yakuza". Someone once told me that they are the modern day representation of the Samurai clans. Although for the few more powerful families this may be factually true, I think it's a dangerous and manipulative myth in which the gangs put out. If you want to know more about the Yakuza, I'd suggest Tendo Shoko's book Yakuza Moon: Memiors of a Gangster's Daughter, and Robert Whiting's book Tokyo Underground: the Fast Times and Hard Life of an American Gangster in Japan. I actually sat in on a presentation by Hiroyuki Suzuki on his efforts of rehabilitation of members of the Yakuza. It's more of a chirstian based effort, but his movie "Jesus is my Boss" is pretty interesting to watch despite the low production values. I think small movements like this will inch Japan towards real social change that is rooted in the community and culture of Japan and not merely an acquisition of western ideas of social progress.

morality

2009-05-20T14:23:00.002-04:00

Over the weekend, I was in my hometown with my brother which has put me in my high school mentality. I spent the weekend playing games with my brother on his X-Box 360 on our ridiculously huge HDTV.

I played "Mirror's Edge" for the first time, and found it to be a very fun game despite various criticisms. Although that being said, it is a very challenging game. If you don't like games that have a great deal of trial and error, then you might not like the game. I like to think of myself as a gamer who is not as frustrated with impossibly hard games. The game has a great visual feel and the controls feel very natural once you get used to it. I really like the use of color in the game the layout of various levels.

For those unfamiliar with the game, "Mirror's Edge" is about an underground courier service which has become the last remaining unmonitored form of communication in a Orwellian future police state. You play the character Faith who has to run, jump and climb like Jackie Chan to get from point to point to complete various missions. The game also allows you to steal people's guns and turn around and shoot them, however, with a gun in your hand you run slower, and inhibits your ability to climb. In an entire jungle of games in which the only strategy are different means of killing people, "Mirror's Edge" offers a refreshing solution which doesn't envolve killing.

This is where I find there is a great example of moral choice. Shooting people is not required to complete the game, nor are you blatantly rewarded for being a goody-two-shoes other than getting an out of story based achievement award. This is quite different from the other morality driven decisions in games in which there are active consequences in your actions. For me, this attempt to consider moral choices merely operates on the preconventional level of Kohlberg's moral stages. A gamer will do a morally upright action within the game for the purpose of some direct reward. There is no moral education, and people tend to do different actions just to see what would happen. However, in games like "Metal Gear Solid", or "Mirror's Edge" the gamer must chose whether or not to kill someone. They don't have to, and they won't be rewarded directly for not doing so. In fact the game doesn't seem to care either way, the choice is ultimately on you. This for me reaches a Postconvential level of moral reasoning because it is only up to the judgement of how the player feels is morally correct. In the end Postconventional moral reasoning for me relies on the idea of what one does when there is no one there to judge you.

Social litmus

2009-05-09T00:08:00.003-04:00

I've always felt the most interesting part of the Star Trek universe was its ability to be a constantly evolving world to match the way we see our own world. Gene Roddenberry did not just want to make a "wagon train to the stars", but take the social issues of our time and transpose them to theirs. For the sixties, it was a phenomenally delicate approach to understanding issues of race, nation states, the cold war, and the human psyche. Subsequently, the movies and the later shows of "Star Trek the Next Generation", "Deep Space Nine" and "Voyager" added newer layers which consistently matched many of the social issues topical to the time. I have often used the Cardassian/Bajoran strife to explain the Balkan wars or the other way around depending on the audience. Deep Space Nine's Producer himself said that "The Kurds, the Palestinians, the Jews in the 1940s, or the boat people from Haiti; unfortunately, the homeless and terrorism are problems in every age." As the means in which the public understood thier own world changed, Star Trek changed with it.

So what does this new movie have to say about our times now? I noticed an interesting theme emerging in this movie. This was a movie which developed and molded the characters of Spock and Kirk in fascinating ways. Again and again I saw the theme of men set apart from their family and their home. These were two men confused by the conflict of their past and adrift in a world of rituals. I find it interesting that this message would speak so powerfully to our generation. We live in a world of odd preconceived notions of normality and patterns. Many of us has convinced ourselves that there are only a few avenues towards success in life, and if we had missed out on those tracks, then we deserve no better than to be kicked to the curb by those who found the course. Excellence has become a standard, which was never meant to be for all, so a majority of people who find themselves "sub-excellent" feel lost and confused. What I think the story of this new Star Trek movie has shown us, is that these roads of predestination are completely artificial and carry as much authority as people give it. The roads to our future are uncharted, and the rules and models created by the sages of the past don't work anymore. In short, "to boldly go where no man has gone before."

Masculinity

2009-05-02T20:59:00.004-04:00

Now that I'm working in a military office, I'm getting more and more tired of the alpha male attitude with problems. I once walked in on an army Sergent banging at the copying machine, threatening to bring in explosives to "fix it". The conversation went like this (Names changed to protect the innocent.)

SGT Turgidson: What this copier needs is some C4 to clear this jam.
Nesuphyn: I think this may be the rare cases in which explosives may not solve the problem.
SGT Turgidson: Son, in my experience explosives can solve any problem.
Nesuphyn: I don't see how that could be the case.
SGT Turgidson: If the copier gets blown up, Xerox will replace it, that's how it worked in the Sandbox.
Nesuphyn: I think I'm going to get some coffee.
(Nesuphyn exit stage left goes to cry into coffee.)

But in all fairness it seems that nerds have their fair share of aggression against technology. Gizmodo led me to this wonderful video on YouTube of a guy stabbing a Mac Air. I'll take a moment to be a racist and point out that this is an affluent white man destroying an $1800 product to prove how much of a sucker he was like his 6 other friends who also bought an $1800 computer.

Whew, OK, I'm better now.

So what's with the rage? (and not just white folks) We are often bombarded with staggeringly oppressive images of violence which is often open linked to being masculine. Yet our day to day lives are mostly quiet and heavily controlled by social norms and civilized affluence. I wonder what that does to the psyche and if that cognitive dissonance causes problems to our ability to be civilized people.
What I find disturbing, is that this use of violence is an excellent marketing tool. Manly men are rough with our toys so we "are forced" to buy better and bigger toys. I use the Sumsung Juke as my cellphone. One of my "manlier" friends sneered at me and said "Wait until the spring breaks". I don't think it need a phone that is piece of solid metal for it to last a few years. I've been using this phone for over a year, and still works fine. I take care of my things, use it for its purpose, and treat it with respect. I know a cellphone is considered a throw away product these days, but I still treat mine as something I shouldn't take for granted. I worry about how we men are convinced what it means to be a man, and at the same time this culture of masculinity just happens to make us better consumers.

Homosexuality

2009-04-29T11:51:00.005-04:00

Both Kotaku and Penny-Arcade has brought an interesting issue to the forfront on homosexuality and gaming culture. Of course for many people the nail in the coffin for this issue was stated by BioWare's community manager Sean Dahlberg on the issue of the words "homosexual", "lesbian" and "gay" being censored on the boards.

As I have stated before, these are terms that do not exist in Star
Wars.
Thread closed.

I don't claim to have authority on what does or does not exist in the Star Wars universe. I'm no expert on the Star Wars universe, however, from a fan perspective the idea of homosexuality is interesting. For the longest time adolescent kids (and adolescent minded adults) have ignorantly used the idea of homosexuality as a demeaning term for someone which often has nothing to do with sexuality. The thought of calling someone "gay" was not necessarily to imply they were attracted to someone of a common gender, but was someone of lesser values. This becomes a problem when this parlance is used and the people do not think of the implications on actual homosexuality. Much like the problem with the World of Warcraft ban on the GLBT guild, the concern was misrouted away from actual homosexuals, but more on the use of homosexual terms outside its context.

I often wonder if there is something intrinsically different about “nerd communities” or if it’s just the same as the rest of society, merely with a different flavor. I’d like to think that nerds are more sympathetic to diverse people and walks of life, but I find equal evidence for and against this theory.

Japanese Fashion

2009-04-25T10:59:00.007-04:00

My younger brother is graduating from college in a month, which happens to be during the month of his birthday. I figured I'd get him a really cool gift that he'd appreciate. (Usually I get him a game or something, but this year I wanted to get him something a bit more mature.)

Tokyo Flash is a website based in Okinawa (confusing I know) who sells all kinds of Japanese goods. Most famously for their really unique LED watches. They usually incorporate some unique way of displaying the time. My brother picked out the "Barcode" watch which was probably a good choice being that it was very different looking, but the display didn't seem difficult to learn.

One thing I have to say is that I love EMS shipping. I placed the order on Wednesday morning expecting not to see it till next week, but it just came this morning. I can barely get stuff from NewYork based stores that fast.

The box looks pretty cool, the photo makes it look a little cheap, but there is a cool embossing of of a dragon on the top and photos of "club people" around the sides.

It's a fairly hefty watch, but in a good way. All the pieces feel really solid and would be comparable to a watch by Tag Heuer or Diesel. It's not a fine timepiece by any means, but it definitely looks cool and doesn't feel like a cheap costume watch.

The watch came with batteries and was set to Japanese time. It wasn't too difficult to reset the time. The left most bar represents 5 hours of time, the second bar represents 1 hour. Then two right bars represent the 10's and 1's place for the minutes. A random animation lights up when you press the button on the side then the time is displayed. If you press it again, the date is displayed, then a third time the day of the week is displayed. In the photo above the time reads 10:47 am. The watch can also be set to either 12 hour time or 24 hour time.

This is a really cool watch, and if I didn't love my Skagen so much, I'd be really jealous.

Japanese food

2009-04-23T12:54:00.009-04:00

The Mainichi Daily News has just posted this year's Ekiben of the Year.

I freaking love ekiben, they're so good and give a little taste of the local area as you're riding the train. These things are usually pretty well made being that it only takes a few bad incidents and then no one wants to eat your ekiben.

The idea of a boxed lunch is interesting in terms of culture. In America, box lunches are usually considered cheap things to eat on the go, and are poorly made for mass consumption. While this does occur in box lunches in Japan, the idea of a high-end box lunch also exist. They're usally made locally in small batches fresh for that day, and can only be found at a specific station. For many casual travelers around Japan, these local ekibens become the gateway to spurring tourism for some of the more unknown parts of Japan.

I've been reading the manga Oishinbo (美味しんぼ), Viz just released themed volumes of the translation of this monster of a comic. Its been in print in Japan since 1983 and is still being written. To the Japanese, food is a very common topic. Many Japanese folks don't like to talk about controversial subjects, so most of the time you end up talking about food or the weather. Oishinbo takes this idea and explores how crazy the Japanese get over food and how much one can talk about food and the subtlety of different foods Japan has to offer. But there is more going on here than just food, it's the selling of Japan as a creditable culture. Back when this comic was first being published, the spread of westernization was driveing Japanese culture into oblivion. Japanese were getting more and more excited about western culture and losing sight of thier own. Oishinbo was a manga which attempted to convince Japanese readers, that Japanese culture is worth something, and if people didn't pay attention to it, it could disappear forever.

Gaming and College dropouts

2008-12-14T14:27:00.002-05:00

Games Politics, a blog I read on a semi-regular basis points out an interesting concern by the FCC Commissioner on the relationship between college drop outs and World of Warcraft. Deborah Taylor Tate briefly referenced the following with no other support on December 5th.

You might find it alarming that one of the top reasons for college drop-outs in the U.S. is online gaming addiction - such as World of Warcraft - which is played by 11 million individuals worldwide.

Obviously World of Warcraft is referenced specifically for it's notority, but it is very clever in it's way of opening up the fears of and concerns of parents at it's mere utterance. Of course this reminds me of the parody of similar concerns of a more primative version of a similar form of escapism.

Although I applaud her serious interest in the importance of broadband internet for the US I will have to punch a few holes in this particular statement for a moment.

First of all, there are a number of more pressiong and real reasons which college students drop out of school. Many of which could be generalized to either be from or cause depession. This could be a confounding variable in which depressed college students are more likely to play World of Warcraft and drop out of college. So unless there has been a particularly clever research into college students and MMORPGs I'm unconvinced by this supposed correlation.

Secondly, I would say from even looking at the trends published by the US Department of Health and Human Services, from 1970 to 1995, the percentage of highschool graduates who have attended college by the age of 25-29 increased from 40% to nearly 60%, yet within this same population, the percent of those who attained a bachelor's degree has stayed around 25%. So from a purely statistical standpoint, there are more college dropouts, because there are more college students to drop out. Any study of trends in college drop outs must take this into consideration in linking any causitive variables.

So what was the purpose of this statement. It seemed to me that the role of the FCC has always been whatever the commissioner at the time deemed it to be. When Micheal Powell (a fellow alumn of mine) was at the helm, he was more concerned with business practices and fair ownership of airwaves. Deborah Taylor Tate has been the "Children's Commissioner", we have to remember that she is the same person who convinced the "Cookie Monster" that cookies were a sometimes food.

Japanese Tabloids

2008-07-27T19:43:00.003-04:00

The Mainichi Daily News Online Website has recently removed the "Wai Wai" section. In the past it was a rough translation of various trashy Japanese tabloid articles in Japan. Here is a short list of the type of headlines you'd see.

Schoolgirls' decade of decadence: panty sales have punters panting
University turns blind eye as foreign students turn tricks
Coffee pot tips seductress plucking schoolboy cherry
Depraved duo target pregnant women in horror rape spree
Super Onanism Machines rubs the lonely the right way
Lion poo proves roaring success as deer deterrent
Sex shop offers discounts for big sluggers
Quirky quacks prescribing sexual harassment
Old fellas savor the ins and outs of a porno actor
Sucking away for huge hooters in the land of itty bitty titty

It was trashy news, unfortunately for many foreigners who read the Mainichi Online, they usually get the most hits on the site.

So here's my problem. On the one hand, this is a clear example of the Japanese selectively censoring its image to the world in thier ongoing effort to show a sophisticated, and cultured face on the global stage. Although all countries do this, it just seems that the Japanese do this with such a brazen disregard of how constructed it looks to outsiders. On the other hand, defending articles on how nurses give tell alls on how they sleep with thier patients seems not worth the effort. What I do see is this, it seems as if the crime here is not that these articles exist, but that they are being translated to English. The Mainichi has never claimed responcibility for these articles, they are merely translating them for curious foreign readers. I find it hard to swallow that Managing Director Yoshiyuki Watanabe needed to be punished for this publicly, being that he had no power on what the articles were about.

My question is how did this ever become such a big issue? It seems that much of the attention was directed at bloggers bringing traffic to the "Wai Wai" articles, and the reaction to them from Japanese citizens who are afraid of how this reflects Japan.

If you give a mouse a cookie...

2008-07-06T13:50:00.003-04:00

So I just got Mario Kart for the Wii recently. I've been holding off on buying this game for a long time because I knew a few things about this game.

1) It's going to be a fun game.
2) My friends will come over to my apartment just to play this game.
3) It will begin the slippery slope into "geeky consumerism".

It all begins very innocently, with this game I will finally have a reason to get a second Wii-mote. (Although I've been wanting one ever since I bought Trauma Center, but no one else really was willing to appreciate my love of hospital drama.) This second Wii-mote is quite an investment. It's 60 dollars for both the Wii-mote and a nunchuck. (Not to mention the 10 dollar Wii-wheel)

Of course buying begets buying. Now I'm happy with two Wii-motes, and the two GameCube controllers I already got for Super Smash Brother's Brawl, and I have three friends who actually want to play on my Wii. But now I realize that my TV is too small to play the game.

For most guys of my generation this is not a problem. They just slip on some sandals get in their light truck and drive out to the newly rezoned commerical area 40 miles out from the city and buy a bigger TV at a big box store. A decent size LCD TV isn't that expensive these days, and I can afford it even on my salary. But that's not the point. The point is I know that once I let that door open, I'll release the flood gate of even more buying.

If I get a bigger LCD TV, then I will be tempted to buy a gaming PC to hook into it. This is because I really would want to do things like play Mass Effect, (Which I don't own) Skype StarTrek style to my friends, and watch Homestarrunner and AdultSwim. You see what I mean, buying this one game has set off a chain of more consumption. Now I don't mean to imply that there are some marketing guys at some company laughing at their genius marketing plan, but there is something insidious with how our consumer culture has prepped us to buy things.

Art imitates Life

2008-05-04T11:28:00.003-04:00

Above is Raytheon's XOS exoskeleton which was trotted out this weekend for a demonstration. It's no coincidence that Raytheon wants to connect the Ironman movie with their fledgling exoskeleton technology.

I have to say that the Ironman movie was very very good. This is truly a bold new age when superhero movies are actually pretty entertaining. I really like this movement for Marvel in their ability to make their superheroes have a universal quality. Spider-man wasn't just a movie about a teenager who gets spider powers, but carried the message of the choices one makes to become a healthy adult. X-men pushed the message of human discrimination. Ironman? the message in this movie was quite clear, and actually quite elegantly done.

We live in a world in which the corporations have become the most powerful force in the world. Outward conflict of guns, bombs and missiles are horrifically merely the backdrop to the truer means of control. Emile Durkheim wrote extensively on how social stability can be examined through understanding the centers of social solidarity. A nation is stronger, when everyone in that nation is aligned to a common goal. The idea of citizens rallying together against a common enemy is unfortunately a worn out tactic. What has happened now is the breakup of citizens in America in their allegiance to our country. Not to say that Americans have lost faith in America, but the vision of that faith has become fractured. What seems to be taking the place of national allegiance, is an allegiance to one's workplace. The dissatisfaction with the dirty hands of America as a nation, the romance of internationalization, and the ever expanding reach of transnational businesses have all driven this idea.

Ironman depicts a world which no longer rely on ideas of physical borders. (Honestly, Tony Stark takes a woman from Las Vegas across state lines to Malibu to have one night stand with her.) A company will sell weapons to anyone who will buy them, even if the buyer intends to harm the nation of the company headquarters. Tony Stark, horrified at this prospect takes it on himself (without the formal aid of the nation) to stop this menace. To further the point, he is recruited by Strategic Homeland Intervention, Engagement and Logistics Division or S.H.I.E.L.D., a nationless organization created to protect the world. (Think InterPol with a multi-billion dollar flying fortress.)

Research project on anime-fans

2008-04-23T21:46:00.002-04:00

It's been way too long, and I've seemingly abandoned my blog. This was not for poor reasons, but I feel bad all the same. You see I've finally become gainfully employed. This means that I now work 9 to 5 and can't spend the day musing about stuff I find in my hours of reading blogs in my pajamas.

One exciting thing is that one of professors has asked if I would like to co-write a paper with him this summer. He is a sociologist who is an expert on the political atmosphere of Burma. He had done an extensive ethnographic research there and is usually listed in many articles related to Burma. He has found that he was referenced on the "NarutoForums" message board. After reading the thread on recent events in Burma, he was interested in the level of sophistication which many of these posters were speaking on the issues involved. He has asked me to co-write with him because he doesn't really understand the culture of message boards very well, and would also like my advice on understanding any cultural meanings in the anime references.

In short, from a sociological standpoint, this is a rare opportunity in which we have documented evidence of how an informal community carries a dialog about political issues relating to my professor's work.

I was telling him that this paper would be a good opportunity for me to get published a few of my own ideas about geek culture. This idea borrows greatly from Lars Konzack's work "Geek Culture: The 3^rd Counter-Culture" in which is sets up the idea that "Geek Culture" is the rejection of "Yuppie Culture" in the same way that "Yuppie Culture" was the rejection of "Hippie Culture". I would go into further detail as to how this plays out in terms of how geeks seek to understand the world around them. I feel as if for many geeks, the key element of being one is this comfortable attitude with understanding fantastic worlds. A geek would be able to see a strange situation, and quickly adapt to the situation and operate on the level of that situation instead of on a personal presupposition. This gets into various famous arguments like which would win in a battle if the USS Defiant was put against the Millennium Falcon. A geek would answer "Depends on who was in command". I feel that this comfortable relationship with fantastic worlds allows for an attitude which is able to grasp other cultures with ease and without disregarding issues as too foreign to care about. While many Americans can't point to Burma on a map, geeks are curious to learn more about a place if they are given even an inkling knowledge.

Wanna play some smash?

2008-03-17T13:31:00.004-04:00

So my brother got me Super Smash Brothers Brawl last week. I've been playing it for a week and even had a few guys over to my place to really break in the game.

I really like the series. Super Smash Brothers has always been a solid game that understands that games should be fun. One of the things that I tend to get annoyed about many of the games out there is this idea that more violence, and darker themes would mean the game would sell better. Games that look like it was created through market research to appeal to the lowest common denominator.

Last Saturday, I discovered (or maybe rediscovered) another reason this game is great. I had a few guys come over to play the game. All four of them were seasoned veterans of the last game and were fairly good players. (One of them seemed to continue to dominate using Yoshi.) We had been playing for several hours and had gotten used to the new controls. Then another friend of mine came over later in the afternoon. She had never really played the game, but was a big enough nerd to appreciate the appeal of Nintendo characters fighting each other. After only a few rounds of playing she picked up the subtleties of the game right away. Within 30 minutes of playing the idea of taking it easy on the new player was completely ignored.

For the most part the game is very well designed. Even if you're losing, it's still a fun game to play and the penalties for losing are so meager they don't really mean anything. Also the controls are really easy to pick up. No half-circles, no crazy button combos, everything is pretty straight forward. Really good players can dominate a game on occasion, but with the way the game is made, the range of how good one can be at the game is very short.

It's the type of game that follows the ideology of the Wii. Wii games don't have to be the most advanced game out there to be a very fun game that can be accessible to a wide range of people and not just to the gaming elite. It also gets me thinking about the idea of categorization of games, as in games for girls, infants, kids, and adults. In many ways these distinctions get into the realm of silly and insulting. Is SSBB a kid's game? is it girl friendly? These ideas create assumptions about the abilities of women and children that can hardly be generalized in any reliable way. I was concerned at the newcomer's ability to enjoy the game not because she was a girl, but because she was playing against people who had played the game quite a bit before. (being outmatched no matter who you are is never fun) But it was through the design of the game that was able to encourage even newcomers to the series to find enjoyment.

Who are nerds

2008-02-19T11:59:00.003-05:00

This is a very fascinating bit on this guy that lives not too far from me. In fact I may end up going to see him in the near future if the desires strikes me.

Other than the fact that he's an example of a "white guy with too much expendable income". I don't have anything against him. He seems like your typical geek that has a hobby. To be honest, I've been inconsolably jealous of anyone with a lot of money lately. I don't even know why. I saw a site with several pictures of Dubai and suddenly had this fit of rage over how much freaking money is pouring into this city.

So the question is this, is being a nerd merely an extension of the culture of consumerism, or is there something more. Are you still a nerd if you don't have a lot of "stuff"? Does this stuff define you as a nerd? Are you a bigger nerd if you have more stuff? I'd like to think not. I'd like to think that being a nerd merely means interests in things, and not the collecting of things. I knew this guy who specializes in selling rare and highly sought after comic books. He was telling me that he was selling "Amazing Fantasy 15" to an NFL team owner. I know nothing about this guy, and I'm sure he is quite a fan of Spider-man and all, but the question is, does it make him a nerd?

I consider myself a big nerd. I know that there are two Dr. McCoys, (Dr. Hank McCoy, and Dr. Leonard McCoy) I read Gizmodo and Kotaku almost on a daily basis, and learned Japanese to be able to read manga in Japanese. I own a fair amount of nerdy things including a boxed copy of Final Fantasy 1, a Wii, a 9 inch figure of symbiote suit Spider-man, and a Principality of Zeon flag. But I have this nagging feeling that there is more to it. A more central reason to why I do all these things, and these things are merely products of that.

Psychology

2008-02-08T15:12:00.000-05:00

Mike Krahulik from Penny Arcade has written one of the bravest bits on personal psychology that I have read in a long time. Seriously, of all the things that I have personally read about psychology and have experienced personally, this perhaps one of the astondingly reflective and honest discription of what's it like to deal with a psychological problem.

It was almost impossible to go get help though because the very nature of the illness prevents you from getting it. So I worry alot, I know that. So I start to think maybe I worry too much. Maybe I have a real problem. Then I think, "no I'm just worrying too much". This is the kind of thing that keeps me awake at night. It's fucking inescapable like some kind of brain trap. So I have to write off this fear that I might actually be sick as another example of my needless worrying. Add to that the fact that I worry that if I do go to a doctor he'll tell me I have some kind of brain disease or I'm not treatable or maybe just as bad that there's nothing wrong with me. All this shit piles up and the result is that I'm 30 and I've never gone to the doctor about it until yesterday.

I started crying a bit a this part here. It cut very close to how I feel about myself and the way I am. I have often credited Penny-Arcade for it's quality work, but this is the first time I have wanted to send a strong message to Mike Krahulik that I am simply humbled by him.

Psychological problems are all too often linked to nerd culture. This could be simple depictions of nerds in the media as socially awkward individuals (see: Steve Urkel, Brian Johnson) or the litany of various claims that video games, comic books, and television would lead to psychological disorders. The Japanese have historically drawn much of their presuppositions on nerds from Akio Nakamori's "Mの時代"(The age of M). This was a case study of Tsutomu Miyazaki a famous serial killer. Since Miyazaki was also an otaku, the connection was commonly held that otaku may also harbor psychotic tendencies. (Similar distinctions have been made of both the Eric Harris, Dylan Klebold, and Seung-Hui Cho.)

I personally find it difficult to rationalize this in my mind. The only thing I could say is this. Perhaps there could be an attraction phenomenon. Reduced down, the promise of nerd culture could be said to be the promise of escapism. To be free from our physical and social restraints, of only in our minds and play with "what ifs" that would otherwise couldn't be. This could become a very attractive solution to people who are dissatisfied with their own reality. I take as an example Spider-man. If you're a kid living in a poor Jewish Romanian immigrant family in New York city, what better dream than to have someone who selflessly protects the people of the city. Even Peter Parker himself was a role model for me. When things in my life didn't work out very well and I felt like a failure, it made me feel a little better to know that even being a failure made me bit more like Peter Parker. In a time in which secular thinking is held at a pedestal, and we are no longer soaked in a culture of religious fervor, perhaps nerd culture acts as the non-spiritual solace which those who need it, seek it.

Modern Man (response)

2008-02-04T22:26:00.000-05:00

Many different journalist of better writing ability have responded in similar dismay to Hymowitz' article on the child-men problem.

Mighty Bargain Hunter, has a short piece basically saying that ideas of what it means to grow up are not as uniform as some my think it to be. I especially like the bit at the end.

If you grow up earlier than you should, life is “thrust upon you” and you’ll feel cheated. If you grow up later than you should, you’ll know it, and others will tell you once they get tired enough of your behavior. If you grow up at the right speed, you know what you’re leaving behind, and you know that where you’re going has a good chance of being better. After nearly six years of marriage I hardly remember what it was like not to be married, and when I think about what it was like, I don’t miss it that much. But I was ready to “grow up” and get married. There’s more responsibility being a grown-up, but it’s also more rewarding and more fulfilling. That’s where the payoff is, but it’s a payoff that you have to want.

I've found after teaching in Japan, that your average Japanese 20something is rather immature compared to your average 20something in America. Being that I taught elementary and junior high school kids, I have a personal theory. The Japanese kids are raised to uphold an unreasonable amount of responsibility. Although it's always good to teach responsibility at a young age, there is a point in which it becomes harmful. After growing up with it, the reason for having responsibility becomes meaningless and a mental rejection of adulthood occurs. In many ways forcing a child to act grown up, stunts their ability to actually grow up. I've found that growing up requires learning first hand those mistakes of youth, saying ouch, and then moving on.

Another article by Amanda Marcotte writes extensively tearing down the argument that because of "feminism" men have fallen behind in becoming adults. She writes sarcastically

of course women are to blame for men who are unwilling to take responsibility. Specifically the secret, all-powerful cadre called The Feminists. We all know the argument—men aren’t motivated to grow up and do icky girl stuff like get married and have children and hold down a full-time job on their own. No, they have to be bribed into it. You ladies have to sweeten the deal by offering dependence and submission. But never fear, men are like vending machines. You put submission and dependence in, ladies, and you’ll get devotion and responsibility back. So really, it’s all on you to “make” men be responsible.

Where the Xbox is concerned, is that men are spending their time and money on childish things like video games instead of growing up and appreciating how independent and career driven their wives are. Marcotte wrote that not only is this inaccurate, it implies that most women are now independent and career driven and wouldn't touch a video game controller for fear of getting cooties.

The idea that men are always playing around with women and games is an old story that predates both the Xbox and yuppies. (see: Guys and Dolls "I'm playing craps", Pride and Prejudice "You tricked me with your womanly ways", The Odyssey "So, heres the reason it took me so long to get home.")

The Modern Man

2008-01-31T13:22:00.001-05:00

Kay Hymowitz from The Dallas Morning News wrote an interesting opinion article about his opinions of the modern man. For him all men seem to be behind in being able to grow up.

Now meet the 21st-century you, also 26. You've finished college and work in a cubicle in a large Chicago financial-services firm. You live in an apartment with a few single guy friends. In your spare time, you play basketball with your buddies, download the latest indie songs from iTunes, have some fun with the Xbox 360, take a leisurely shower, massage some product into your hair and face – and then it's off to bars and parties, where you meet, and often bed, girls of widely varied hues and sizes. Wife? Kids? House? Are you kidding?

I wish my life was like that. (I actually happen to be 26 right now.) Who even has a life like that? I tend to be pretty hard on affluent white people. I've been known to snicker at the silly things that honkies do. However, what I'm interested in here is the writer himself. Mr. Hymowitz has a few issues with the modern world and his generalizations tell more about what concerns him, than what is happening in America.

With women, you could argue that adulthood is in fact emergent. Single women in their 20s and early 30s are joining an international New Girl Order, hyper-achieving in both school and an increasingly female-friendly workplace, while packing leisure hours with shopping, traveling and dining with friends. Single young males, or SYMs, by contrast, often seem to hang out in a playground of drinking, hooking up, playing Halo 3 and, in many cases, underachieving. With them, adulthood looks as though it's receding.

What is this NGO? I know quite a few "jet-set" women and none of them have told me of any such NGO. On top of that most American women have never left the country and don't plan to go father than the time share resorts. The rest of the article is mostly alot of pseudo-psychology about why men aren't becoming adults and that it's the media's fault.

It seems to me that this is less of a commentary of the modern man, but casting nerd culture as an affront to male adulthood. Somehow a "real" adult is meant to have cast aside silly things like Halo 3 and iTunes and get in the real world with a real job working with heavy machines and responsibilities.

The problem I see is that the roles that are presented to us in the media, and the roles that men are able to fill now has changed dramatically over the years. We have not settled on what it means to be an adult in the modern age. (Frankly it's something we figure out in hindsight.) We are constantly being told that we need to get a "good" education, (like at least a masters) and then a steady job with a steady paycheck. In actuality there really is no set model. Some of the most influential people of the past and present hardly can be considered to have lived a normal progression of adult stages.

Technology

2008-01-25T17:07:00.001-05:00

Somehow the lady's message reminds me of this little scene from Johnny Mnemonic.

Johnny Mnemonic: Yeah, the Black Shakes. What causes it?
Spider: What causes it?
[points to various pieces of equipment throughout the room]
Spider: This causes it! This causes it! This causes it! Information overload! All the electronics around you poisoning the airwaves. Technological fucking civilization. But we still have all this shit, because we can't live without it. Let me do my work.

One of the interesting thing here is the overlap of two different ways to bring more power to the iPhone than it really deserves. The lady is blaming the iPhone as the harbinger of mind numbing technology, and the juveniles off camera are ensnared by the promises of new gadgets to make their lives better. Neither group understands each other's culture, the lady can't understand her own arbitrary cutoff point between good technology and bad technology , and the juveniles can't understand how far seduced they are by consumerism.

This brings up two interesting parts of the argument. The lady is pleading for a return to a natural state of humanness. However, is shown to be hypocritical through her patronage of sprint cellphones. (why is that open in her hands anyway?) The fact is our human bodies are far past any return to a "natural" state. We live far beyond the time of maturation of our offsprings surviving through a cocktail of vaccines and antibiotics. There is no "natural" state for humans, and even if there was such a person at this state, civilized society rejects them instantly with no remorse.

However, the juveniles are arguing that technology is at the aid of human potential. Through access to the internet, this serves as a collective unconscious of all information that one would desire. This is part of the salvation story of technology and science, that there will be some "thing" if perfected that will save us all from ignorance. (see OLPC) Marketing agencies play into this desire and use elaborate ads that promise us salvation but really are merely asking for our money.

As the hierarchy of class/age/sex/race/nation divisions stay solid while information sharing continues to lure us into being numb to these divisions, we will see more and more of these conflicts between people and cultures.

Mass (Media) Effect

2008-01-17T12:05:00.000-05:00

(Thank you Matt Ian for the art, I hope you don't mind my vandalism)

So I've been playing Mass Effect on my friend's Xbox 360 for a while. (I don't own one myself, I can't afford it.) I really like the game. It's every SciFi novel I ever read as a kid all rolled into one really fun game to play. However recently, it's gotten some poorly researched attacks by people who really don't know what they're talking about.

The first bit is from Cathy Ruse.

The game is "clearly marketed to minors," Cathy Ruse, a lawyer and senior fellow for legal studies at the Family Research Council, told Cybercast News Service.

"There are cultural implications for feeding porn to kids in this way," and "when you do this, you're teaching them a distorted lesson about human sexuality and human dignity. These are lessons that they will take with them into adulthood and ultimately society," Ruse said.

First of all, apparently a game that is rated M for mature is clearly marketed to minors. Even if we were to buy the argument that unless it's sold next to the porn, ratings will mean nothing to stop minors from buying them. The game box art doesn't look anything like something that is marketed for minors, the color scheme is too dark, and no one is smiling. Companies are usually pretty obvious when they market something to minors, and when they're not.

Secondly, to call the minute amount of sexual scenes in the game a "distorted lesson about human sexuality and human dignity" Is more than unfair. You play the game and there is a build up of a dialog between consenting adults who struggle with horrific terrors and at the same time challenge ideas of human loyalty, extra-special racism, and deep ideas of intimacy. It's not Shakespeare, but we don't live in a polarity that everything is either fine art or trash.

The second one that has gotten the most press was this commentary by Kevin McCullough.

And because of the digital chip age in which we live - "Mass Effect" can be customized to sodomize whatever, whoever, however, the game player wishes.

I've been playing this game for a while, and I really don't have that many choices of who to have sex with, it actually ends up being a choice between two people, Kaidan a hopeless romantic with psychokinesis, or Liara a bookish scientist with psychokinesis. While Kaidan is cute and all, I have a certain penchant for bookish types. That's it, in fact as you go through the game, each character starts getting more upset if you try to "play the field" and makes you choose. All the while my good friend is asking if I can have sex with the Krogan, (who looks like a cross between a dinosaur and a turtle, and has the manners of a steam roller. Go figure, she has adventurous taste.)

Although McCullough has since apologized, (twice) for some of the more outright lies in his article, he hardly seems to seem any more reasonable. The problem is that many of these pundits are making entire opinions without playing the game or knowing anything about the game. Even McCullough based his opinions entirely on stuff he saw on YouTube.

I'm all for protecting smut from getting to minors, and reducing unfavorable depictions of women in the media. And I think we as a society has progressed quite a bit in the last few decades. Mass Effect is in many ways the product of how far we've come in progress. We have here real depictions of men women aliens and humans in an in depth story in which shows people with true strength of character and human realities of emotion, loyalty, duty, and even faith. (Ashley Williams is a quite religious) If the ideas that violent video games are "killing simulators" are in any way true, then could there also be "socialization simulators"? We live in a time when we can't trust our neighbors, coworkers, or fellow bus riders. We live secluded and separated from our fellow people and have rare moments to ever be comfortable with getting to know anyone. That's a hard life, and it causes more psychological pain than any video game can muster. We are social animals, to keep us away from human contact is like denying a plant light. We need to figure out a way to understand how to interact with each other, and learn that human interactions are about love,consequences, pain, and forgiveness.

Japanese border security

2008-01-16T09:57:00.000-05:00

Apparently collecting fingerprints and photos of all "foreigners" coming into Japan hasn't been enough to quell neocon reactionist in Japan. Now it looks like Japan will consider making knowing Japanese a requirement to obtaining a long-term work visa.

Personally, I feel like I know enough Japanese to be able to pass whatever requirement that they would set up, so I'm personally not too concerned. Besides many of the jobs that I'd be interested in would require passing JLPT 2 anyway. In fact this may favor me because now if I were to work for a company that needs to send a guy to Japan, I'd be moved up to the shortlist of the employees that know Japanese. They couldn't just send anybody, they'd be required to send someone that knows Japanese.

To be honest the reason for this is to keep various people from entering Japan and taking up resources, space, and pension money. This is mostly those from South America, Philippines, Guam and other members of the working poor in Japan. However, the reaction from nerds on the internet is mostly "Oh noes, now I'll never get to work in a manga shop in Tokyo" I've gotta say that honestly in the grand scheme of things, this is hardly the case. I find this particular bit interesting.

"Japanese language ability is important to increase the quality of foreigners' own lifestyles, and is also important for Japanese society," he said. "It will be a very good thing if this builds momentum for people to say, 'I'm going to study Japanese in order to go to Japan.'"

Japan is far from being an international language. The only way one would need Japanese is if anyone is doing business with the Japanese. Languages like Spanish, Chinese, and French are far more useful for general worldwide appeal, also there are far more "obscure niche" languages to delve into, and Japanese is not one of them. (But Vietnamese is!) So this is really a way for Japan to increase the value of the Japanese language. Perfectly reasonable actions for a language that is already in linguistic decline. (ie: being slowly replaced by foreign words.)

I mostly wonder how this will affect jobs like JET and Nova. JET doesn't have a Japanese language requirement to be able to do the job, this has been their greatest recruiting tool for those fresh out of college. This also has widened the type of people that apply for JET giving them a large diversity of applicants to chose from. If JET must comply to these new language requirements, this will narrow down the applicant pool to only East Asian Studies majors and those that just happen to have learned Japanese.

In the end this will restrict the number of incoming workers in Japan and possibly even tourism. (Many tourist come to Japan because they know a friend who lives in Japan, if there are less foreigners living in Japan, then there will be less of those connections to incite tourism.) By no means does this stop anyone from getting their Japanese wife fantasy. Although actual life in Japan is quite different from perceived life in Japan.

Nerd Authority

2008-01-07T21:41:00.000-05:00

So Gizmodo has this great picture that they found of a few guys sitting by the pool for some beers and BBQ. This itself is enough hilarity to make an entire post about, but that's not why I'm here. What really interests me is the sudden surge on the Gizmodo comments page on trying prove if this is truly dangerous or not. It's everyone from the resident electrician to a freaking carnival engineer trying to outdo the other post in being the "expert" on electrical safety.

I've encountered such behavior pretty often around nerds. The one thing about being a nerd is that you'll run into a few that have this strange desire to be the absolute authority on something (or many times everything.) Gizmodo being a gadget blog attracts this sort of bunch as they scour these blogs so they can be the most up to date on happenings in the technology world. There is something frightening about this strange modern version of muscle flexing that many men do now. This reinvention of this habit of being able to say that "I'm right and you're an idiot." Last week I was a part of a dinner party and one of the guest was one of these guys. He was a perfectly nice guy, but he had this attitude about him of trying to be the biggest boy with the best toys. He spent a great deal of the night talking about his car, computer, or other type things that he could buy now that he was back in the US. I wonder if somehow it's a form of self empowerment in the form of consumerism to make up for personal feelings of a lack of control in the path of his life. I wonder as society pulls more control away from the individual will we see more of this "reclaiming" of control in the form of consumerism.

disappointing Wii games

2008-01-07T13:20:00.000-05:00

It's a new year and the post Christmas reevaluation of my material possessions is in order. Mostly, I'm talking about trading in some of my Wii games for more Wii games. Here is the list of Wii games that I've decided to part with.

Super Paper Mario:
This was actually a really great game. I really enjoyed many of the platformer/RPG elements of this game. It was fun to play, it had a zany sense of humor, and was challenging enough to satisfy my gaming itch. I really liked the whole flipping from 2D to 3D aspect of the game. It gave it an interesting element of problem solving and obsessive easter egg hunting that I like in a game. There were some really funny moments like Otaku Castle on world 3-4 was absolutely indulgent. Sadly, the reason that I'm returning the game is because it has little to no reply value. After playing it through once, there's no real reason to play it through again. They tried to make the game play a bit longer by having cards and things to collect, but I'm not interested in collecting cards. If I had other friends that owned a Wii, this would be the type of game that I'd just pass around.

Red Steel:
This was one of the games that came out at the release of the Wii. I was pretty excited about it because it looked like a pretty cool. For the most part the gameplay was acceptable for the time. It had a few control issues, but a decent FPS for the Wii. (Personally I don't really like FPS so I may be a bit biased) The only problem is that the story was cringingly bad. You would have to be a ridiculous wapanese to appreciate this poorly put together story. Get this, you play a white guy that is hired in Tokyo to be the bodyguard to a beautiful and rich Japanese girl. Then logically the two of you fall in love and decide to get married and so you fly to America to announce your engagement to her father. Then it turns out that her father is a retired Yakuza boss and your fiance is kidnapped as a part of an interfamily rivalry. The voice acting is miserable and the lines are worst than watching a Hong Kong action movie. The supposed "sword play" in the game is really sloppy and unsatisfying. You can only use the sword in pre-determined parts of the game and your frantic swings seems to have nothing to do with what actually happens on screen. All in all, Red Steel was a big flop and I doubt the sequel would be any better.

MySims:
I was actually really excited about this game too. I really like Sim games. It appeals to my desire to create perfect societies. The sprites are adorably cute, you just see them jump around you just wanna cuddle them to bits. The ability to build and create things was quite impressive and offered a limitless amount of customization. The only problem was that there was almost no Sim element to the game. The location and choices of buildings and people in the game had almost no impact on your little society as a whole. The only things that any of your residents seem to care about was getting stuff that matched their personality. For the most part it was less of a sim game and more of a virtual doll house game. That in itself is not so bad if you like playing with doll houses. So if you want to "simulate" the experiences of being a doll house hobbyist, then MySims is a great game. Personally, I'd rather have more gameplay in my sim games than just building things.

After returning these games I got 51 Gamestop credits. I'm not sure what I'll get with them, but we shall see.

Japanese Nationalism

2007-12-11T19:35:00.000-05:00

So the people at Microsoft have made themselves a bit of an enemy of Japan. It turns out that when you register for Xbox live on the 360 and try to register as being from Takashima, it doesn't recognize it as a part of Japan. (Which is impossible now anyway because as far as I know, there isn't much in the ways of Internet on the islet. Currently only a old couple from Korea stay there seasonally, the Kotaku article is a bit off on their facts.)

This is really interesting news being that I've also be recently accepted as a presenter at the Eastern Sociological Society meeting to talk about the islet dispute between Korea and Japan. One of the things that I wanted to talk about is how it's quite surprising how the younger generation are engaging in this controversy. For the most part, the Japanese avoid conflicts and debate to a irritating degree. Hardly anyone ever talks about politics or even keeps themselves tuned in on what's going on. (I remember one time the Vice Principle of the junior highschool I was working for was quite impressed on how much I knew about Japanese/US currency exchange rates. He thought only economist would worry about such things.) But from the flame wars on various message boards and such, it seems that people are quite fired up about this. This isn't something that the Neo-conservatives are pushing either, these are young 20 somethings in Japan that are usually apathetic to being a part of anything in their world. One of the things I'm interested about is why would this incite the Japanese so much? The news story report makes it seem as if it's some attack on the Japanese as a nation to make such a mistake.

Technology and Art

2007-12-07T17:34:00.000-05:00

This is a well done documentary about blogging in Japan. I read only a few Japanese blogs, mostly of my previous students and friends. I would have to agree that there is definitely something distinctly Japanese about the way they blog. This is an example of the subtle differences between cultures can change they way technology is used. Technology and Culture are two parts that constantly influence the other, and for some reason often are pushed apart. As if there are moments in which Technology transcends Culture, or that Culture is an attack on faceless Technology. However, really what we see is that both have always been interrelated.

Take for example, the technology for making potable water. As more and more people lived closer together, there was a higher amount of cross contamination in diseases between different people. So every society had to have a means of having drinkable water. Most European based societies solved this problem by fermentation, producing wines and beers that were free of the major bacterial concerns. From that, an entire set of food productions, holidays, and customs were created around the use of wine and beer. In Asia, water was cleaned through boiling and adding tea. Likewise, entire philosophies, ceremonies, and rituals were based on the idea of tea making.

On the other side, music has greatly influenced the technology produced in which to enhance or expand the range of music ability. Beethoven's playing style broke many of the pianos of this day, and newer means of building pianos were created which influence the modern piano. Changes in how music is recorded follow changes in concept of art elitism, to mass art consumption. Music changed from something the leisure class enjoyed, to something for all to enjoy. So technology was created to aid in this ideal.

Violent video games and violence

2007-12-06T15:00:00.000-05:00

You kind have to know about Firefly, specifically to the revelations about reavers in the movie Serenity to get the picture.

Recently, Fox Business had a story on the link between adulthood violence and violent video games. I usually scoff at anything Fox has to say, but further reading into the research shows more validity than I usually give such thoughts. But after reading a bit more on Dr. Bushman's website, I'm reconsidering my thoughts.

The research is quite sound. Most of it is comprised of 300 different studies, some by himself, some by others to create a long range study of video game activities and adult violence. In one study in particular was quite brilliant. Basically he took several school age children and had them play two types of video games coded as violent and non-violent. After 20 minutes of this, the child is then given a simple competitive task against a fictional child. The winner is then asked to punish the other child by giving them a blast of sound through a set of headphones. The sound is ranked from 1 through 10, and the child is told that anything above 8 would cause hearing damage. It turns out that the group that played violent video games were more likely to use a punishment above 8. A study like this is very costly and difficult, so I have a great deal of respect for it.

One of the major things that Dr. Bushman is concerned about is a generalized concept of why people behave violently. Many of this research studies break the traditional myths of violent behavior. One in particular that interests me is his theory on how violent people are not people with low self-esteem.

Narcissists, says Bushman, believe that they are entitled to admiration and respect and, when they don’t get it, they become aggressive. Bushman blames the self-esteem movement of the past 20 years for producing a generation of people who think the world has been turned upside down when they are not singled out for their “special-ness.”

“Because of the self-esteem movement, you have sports teams where everybody gets a trophy regardless of skill,” says Bushman. “There’s a school in Alabama where they had a mirror with a banner above it that said, ‘You are now looking at the most special person in the world.’ Children in elementary school fill out forms that begin, ‘I am special because …’ and they have ‘All about me’ weeks where they celebrate themselves. The problem is not low self-esteem.”

I find this interesting. (Mostly because it flips modern educational theory on it's head.) One of the things that I try to advocate on the video games controversy is to exert that video games is a medium. Like books, movies, music, theater, dance, and comic, they have no moral value or intellectual importance in it of itself. As the preface of The Picture of Dorian Gray said, "There is no such thing as a moral or immoral book. Books are well written or poorly written. That is all." There are well created games like Final Fantasy VI, Dance Dance Revolution, and PacMan. These games challenged the mind to understand and practice routines outside of their normal world. There are also poorly constructed soulless million dollar corporate projects made merely to produce profit at the expense of the public. (I'd care not to name names here.) Consider this, when you see how things are marketed, are these attempts to communicate human interaction, or are they a selling you the promise of solving all the ills in your life?

Women love the Wii

2007-12-03T23:31:00.000-05:00

Honestly, I didn't even need to add the text here. I'm not saying that girls don't play games. I'm saying is that this depiction of women playing games plays into the same thing as babes in beer commercials. There is nothing progressive going on here in terms of race or gender.

Ubisoft may sue me over this....

2007-12-01T20:41:00.000-05:00

Once again something has gotten the internets in a stir, and Something Awful is in the middle of it. To bring you up to speed, Ubisoft has long been promoting Assassin's Creed with the clever use of Jade Raymond to draw the male gaze to their game. Frankly, you couldn't see anything about Assassin's Creed with out her out in front. It's rather unfair, because the game itself is quite a draw on it's own and they didn't really need to have her tarted around. Also Jade seems to be quite a decent person and doesn't deserve to be treated like eye candy to promote the game. The idea of female role models in the game developer world is good and all, but that wasn't the intention of Ubisoft. It was blatant pandering of a person's looks under the guise of women empowerment.

So on the Something Awful boards, a vulgar comic was made in parody of the way that Ubisoft have been using Jade's looks to sell the game. It was vulgar and insulting, but it's the internet, this sort of thing happens. So Ubisoft decides the best thing to do is to bring legal action against Ubisoft.

My question is who is at blame here? Is Something Awful to blame for being the host site? Is the comic artist to blame for making a comic? Or is Ubisoft to blame for treating their own employee like a piece of meat to sell their game. Sierra never treated Roberta Williams this way, makers of gender conscience games like Leisure Suit Larry.

This "gamer girl" phenomenon is strange. When Morgan Webb was the G4 "gamer girl" people automatically called her a fake. The very concept that women would like games challenged the hegemonic idea of the "true gamer". Surely, girls can't possibly like games, if they do, they only like tetris, or they're doing it only to impress their boyfriend. Somehow it was more believable for girls to like other girls than for them to play through Chrono Trigger or circle-strife. Once the public finally got used to the idea the there are girls that genuinely like playing games, they became a national treasure. If someone "found" a girl that liked playing games, it was like finding buried treasure. The industry was no different, soon things like the "pimping" women out to promote games was on the main stage and not just as a part of "booth babes" at seedy gaming conventions. Women were front and center and filled out the "stereotypical" male fantasies of that perfect gamer girl they want to meet. There is nothing "empowering" about having women paraded like this. It is in fact detracting from the long history involvement that women have always had in the gaming world. This is merely treating women like objects to be desired in a new and underhanded way.

OLPC: supplimental

2007-11-28T22:58:00.000-05:00

It turns out that the OLPC people are under even more attack by the Nigerians.

OLPC

2007-11-28T10:42:00.000-05:00

I've been using web based e-mail service all the way back in highschool. I remember my awesome cool Animenation email address "cpnguyen@nervhq.com". But I have to say that Gmail is by far the best one I've every used. I really like it's spam filter. The other day I got some spam from Malaysia saying that I could claim some inheritance from a dying man who had the same family name. I cursed the OLPC project as I cleared out my spam.

The Joy of Tech has this scathing comic on the OLPC project which proves a pretty valid point. Although my girlfriend who did peace corps. in Madagascar can speak more on this subject, I really don't know if free laptops will do much for many poor countries. Even the Nigerians are complaining about the results.

One of the things I find interesting is the nerd mentality that is going on with the OLPC project. It's really the new revolution based on the pretense of how nerds understand the world and how "salvation" is found in technology. The sort of thing that works well in The Diamond Age but in real life isn't nearly as useful. Reducing the logic to a bare model we can see a simple set of assumptions.

10 There is an inequity of wealth in the world.
20 I would like to play a part in changing this.
30 LET having technology = success
40 IF we give technology to the poor THEN the poor become successful
50 LOOP UNTIL world citizens are all equal.

The idea is very seductive. Cheap technology for all, and then a globalized meritocracy will emerge where we are all connected through the internet with a chance to live up to the best of our ability. I think that to think the OLPC is missing some key aspects of why many countries are poor to begin with, and what kind of help do they need the most. Don't get me wrong, I think that in key situations, cheap laptops can be quite important. My family has been sending to Vietnam our old technology for years. I just think that flooding countries with cheap laptops isn't going to do much to help their economy as a whole if that is the goal in mind.

My brother said I looked like L yesterday...

2007-11-23T15:44:00.000-05:00

Sometime earlier this week a student was suspended for making a death note (source: Anime News Network). First off, I would like to say that the kid was behaving poorly. Disregarding the fact that the student was copying death note poorly, students who read "hit lists" aloud have always been suspended or expelled in the past.

I grew up in Richmond, Franklin Military Academy is a military highschool in the eastside. I don't have anything particularly against military schools, some people need that structure and discipline in their lives, it's when people began to glamorize it is when I get mad. The eastside was the type of place parents on the westend warned their kids about. Personally, I find it more of a sad place than a scary place. It's hard to be scared when you know how hard people have it there.

What I find rather upsetting is that the principle tells parents to look at a death note fansite, "to get to know the reference better". The website almost says nothing about the show itself, and is really only an online version of the fictional book. Reading through it a bit, it's like a cross between 4chan and post secret. (excuse me for not linking 4chan, I think you can google it yourself.) A mix of vulgar jokes and venting of immature aggression. Not really an accurate representation of the show, or the show's message. I find it upsetting that the principle would need to focus on this aspect of the student, and not other parts.

We live in a pretty inhospitable world. When the human mind can not stand it, we naturally lash out, unfortunately in violent ways. Right now institutions have little recourse in how to understand the problem. Mostly it comes out in the form of isolated what is perceived as dangerous from the community. Then a ritual of victimization is done to galvanize the community to establish how different they are from the perpetrator. However, I would say that this constant isolation does nothing but segregate out people who are in pain, from those more protected from pain. The idea that these people who do violent acts are merely anomalies in a community becomes the most important thing. There is rarely any attempt to say that these are the unfortunate products of the way we live and treat each other. As long as we keep isolating out those who we deem too dangerous to be a part of society, we'll never be able to look at what it is that influences these dangerous things.

I'd rather be fighting the man

2007-11-20T21:04:00.000-05:00

In a incredibly un-Japanese like fashion, people are protesting the new fingerprinting policy for all foreigners entering Japan. I'm quite excited about this. Although many of the protesters seem to be "gaijin" themselves, I do see a few Japanese protesters.

"It's an expression of Japanese xenophobia. Japan is using this system as a tool to control foreigners. For the past few years, the government has been associating foreigners with things like crime and terrorism," said Sonoko Kawakami, campaign coordinator for Amnesty International Japan

The main reason that I'm excited is that it seems that the recent exposure of the blatant corruption in the Diet has urged the Japanese to finally care about their government. In a way, Shinzo Abe was a good thing for Japan, he finally broke the flood gates of participatory democracy for the Japanese.

To be honest many "first world" countries are adopting similar policies. The issue of globalization will rest heavily on how countries choose to weigh state security and open borders.

Farming is Fun!

2007-11-19T23:46:00.000-05:00

I've been watching the newest releases of the show "Moyashimon" (もやしもん) streaming from Japan. Basically, it is about two boys from the country who go to an agricultural college in Tokyo. Kei is the son of the sake brewery and Tadayasu is the son of a "tane koji" store (種麹屋). Basically tane koji are the basis of fermentation. So obviously the two families of the boys have had a long standing close relationship. The interesting thing is that Tadayasu has the ability to see microbes. Being that this is Japan, the microbes are represented as merchandisable characters. (I really want to get my own plushy of Aspergillus Oryza from the Fuji TV station) Tadayasu uses his special powers to recognize different microbes in various useful situations and hijinks ensue.

The obvious aspect of this show is the ~~propaganda~~ promotion of the agriculture industry in Japan. One of the lines in episode 4 was basically, "There are 3.5 million farmers in Japan, of that, 2 million are above the age of 65. So ganbatte (try your best?), you are Japan's future." These are lines that cut deep into the general problem of the Japanese agriculture industry. Like Americans, farm life is quickly fading away. Less and less of the younger generation want to be farmers. It's thankless, and ugly work that pays next to nothing. Then again, I grew up in Richmond so I have no real say about life on the farm. I heard a rooster for the first time when I was 22. I do know that there are less and less people living out in the country. All of the villages out in the countryside in Japan are shrinking. So much so that they are merging with neighboring villages just to have enough in taxes and such. The problem is that most of the young people from the age of 16 move to the city to go to highschool and then college. They usually find successful lives in the city and never come back. Very few people choose to come back to their hometown to raise a family, and even less would come back to be a farmer. Japan has been working very hard at making farming an appealing career choice. Tadayasu's powers turn the boring part of agricultural research into a rather exciting magical power. I could see this show appealing to many of the existentially lost youth of Japan living dead end jobs in the city. This would remind them that they could come home and live the "simple life" of a farmer. Never mind the back breaking labor, constant anxiety over the weather, gossiping neighbors and corrupt mayors.