I enjoyed learning about interactivity, particularly in relation to video games. While I don’t dislike films, I prefer video games because the level of interactivity draws the player into the narrative in a way that films do not. The academic perspective was also interesting- I found the argument that old media could be interactive very intriguing. I also enjoyed Bandersnatch, because it was the first interactive film I played, and it was interesting to see how the plot unfolded in the film snippets based on your choices.

For this selfie, I wanted to tie in our discussion about selfies in political activism movements online. According to Yarimar Bonilla and Jonathan Rosa in their #Ferguson essay, selfies have become “politically meaningful in the context of racialized bodies.” In my selfie, I am posing with a sign that references the #representationmatters movement on Twitter that was initiated to give representation to the minorities and cultures that are largely invisible to the public. Below me is a picture of Emma Stone in the movie “Aloha” which was called out for casting Stone as a person of Chinese and Hawaiian descent. Even though Hawaii is over 70% non-white, the film features acts of mainly actors of Caucasian descent. Whitewashing in Hollywood has a long history that goes back centuries and there continues to be little Asian American representation in American films. The film “Crazy Rich Asians” made history for Asian American representation becoming the first contemporary American film with an all-Asian cast with an Asian American protagonist. Hopefully, the success of the movie encourages Hollywood to continue casting people of color to tell the story of their own struggles and their own culture.

The internet creates new forms of surveillance and new forms of protest and resistance all at once. The question is whether resistance can succeed within the same structure it is resisting.

#digitalactivism #hashtagactivism

I wanted to use a tweet format for this week’s topic since we were discussing hashtag activism. Twitter, as a structure of resistance, may not be the ideal organizing place. It is widely known for enabling the harassment of women and activists and for allowing white nationalist groups the freedom to spread hate even while other social media platforms began to remove them. Yet the system of hashtag organization and the sheer number of people who use the platform (in the less ‘public’ way that one uses Facebook) has proved to be extremely useful in organizing movements. Beyond Twitter, the internet itself is allowing the construction of global movements in an unprecedented way. But the globalism and freedom afforded by this infrastructure is often used against activists by governments, who can use the same tools against them to track their activity and arrest them or cut off their access. It remains to be seen which way the balance will tip in the future, and whether the internet will become more or less free.

In 1913, Henry Ford was able to begin mass producing cars by introducing the first moving assembly line. The assembly line is where workers are assigned to specific tasks that are to be repeated. People were responsible for one task, but they were able to excel, and perfect, a task. Assembly lines not only optimized the time it took to build a vehicle, it also commercialized a luxury good by making it more affordable to the general population. Ford set the precedent for future industries as a plethora of industries adopted this process. As humans, it is expected that we make mistakes – one may not be feeling well that day or did not had enough sleep the night before. As technology advances, people are beginning to view humans as a risk factor compared to robots which are programmed to be as precise and specific. A recent study found that up to 670,000 U.S. jobs were lost to robots between 1990 and 2007. With the given statistics, there has been a growing fear that robots will take over our jobs and disrupt employment opportunities. Although robots may replace workers who perform repetitive manual tasks efficiently, it does not have the capacity in understanding human emotions. Manual labor may be automized, but in automating or digitizing every activity we participate in encourages the lack of human interactions thereby impedes emotional growth.  Careers that hold heavy emphasis on human interaction (i.e. social worker, therapists, etc) will never be obsolete. In fact, these jobs may be in even higher demand as humans crave affection. As ubiquitous as social media is, it does not satisfy the validation that humans seek from others. The fear of employment opportunities is a valid one, but, in my opinion, a more eminent fear is why there are and will continue to have a deficiency in mental health professionals in our society.

I made this meme as a response to this week’s discussion about the “iPhone girl” story and the way that consumers think about the objects they purchase. Rather than being conscious of the labor and manufacturing process that goes into producing a smartphone, users imagine that the iPhone is constructed by robots or simply appears in the Apple store in a shiny, clean box. The reason this meme fits is that it is very tempting to think about consumption this way in order to avoid feeling guilt about the exploitation of workers.

Stop scrolling. Look at your device; ponder where each piece of machinery came from so you could read this right now. #InfrastructureMatters

Inspired by https://anatomyof.ai/ and the lessons involving digital infrastructures, my classmates and I have been thinking about the hidden infrastructure behind our digital objects. From the mining of the metals, to the manufacturers, distributors, and everything in between, there is a huge amount of labor and environmental damage that allows us to use all of our items. We completed a workshop where we unpacked the anatomy of the lithium-ion battery, and I have often (probably annoyingly) brought up the human rights violations involved in lithium and cobalt extraction in casual conversation, to ensure more people understand the weight of the objects that we use so familiarly. Whenever we have the privilege to use these devices, it is important to take some moments to remember all that went into it, including all of the laborers who made it possible for us. The silence of this knowledge is one factor that allows for the injustice to continue.

This selfie was captured shortly after waking up for church. I woke up feeling rather famished and, naturally, searched for some quick calories. I wanted to wish a friend good morning, and thought it was more intimate to send a photo of myself rather than a quick text. I thought it would have been cute to press my slice of against my face as the bite could represent a face. Given the nature of our relationship, we communicate via selfies. Ironically enough, I refuse to use snap chat which is a platform that is dedicated to communicating through a visual medium.

More recently, I changed my profile picture to this photo on facebook. It seemed like a very authentic representation of myself. I believe this selfie denotes that I am dorky, and am not afraid of what people think of me. Nowadays, people sometimes have photo shoots that are dedicated to finding the “best” photo to present themselves to the world. Personally, I think that this selfie is empowering. It is validation that I am unapologetically being myself.

The “Surprised Pikachu” meme is used to show that the narrator is shocked by the (predictable) outcome of a situation. Since memes are easy to modify by design, it is easy for corporations to use them as advertisements. This iteration of the meme pokes fun at how jarring it is for me to see memes used to push company agendas, when they have often been used to convey political ideologies and agendas.