Ian W. Remmel Design

ut I was kinda amazed at how well I connected one point to another, so I’ve decided to post I here.  

Even after reading the paper, it took me a while to figure out for what course it had been written.  Turns out, it was for COMM 250 (a.k.a Movie Watching II).  Silly as it sounds, I think COMM 250 was probably one of the top five most important courses that I’ve taken.  Sure, all the courses in my major(s) will (or at least should) help me find a job, but let’s face, the memorability of the courses in one’s major is directly proportional to how painful the course is (up to a certain point, after which one simply blocks out the semester.  EE 210, I’m looking at you).  

Anyway, back to the purpose of this post.  The paper is written in response to an article by someone name Dery.  I really don’t remember much about him or the article[1] other than that it was about something called “Culture Jamming” which was (is?) a practice whereby people would modify billboards or commercials, hack websites, or otherwise alter media to present a related, but different message, from the original.  Think of the SNL commercials where you initially think it’s a real commercial, only in this case, you don’t have the benefit of knowing you’re watching SNL to help you realize the commercial is a fake. 

The assignment appears below in its original, unaltered form as it was submitted for the course. 

While written only 15 years ago, Culture Jamming is extraordinarily out of date – which may be the single most disturbing thing about its accuracy in depicting the information age.   Dery writes that “VCRs and electronic games have given rise to a culture of illiteracy”.  That’s a pretty scary observation from someone who won’t know about World of Warcraft for another ten to fifteen years.  Quoting the campaign staff, he discusses the Reagan years, “’[The campaign staff] became Hollywood producers.’” 

At the time the article was written, the internet, as the public understood it, was little more than a collection of BBS systems, yet the article predicts the ability of anyone to write about anything and the only hope of keeping the public informed is an alternative to mass media.  Dery writes about a future where not only will people be able to start discussions about anything they want, but they will even be able to have their own “node” on the Internet, allowing everyone to be a publisher.  Enter the Blog. 

The Blog has changed society in profound ways.  Initially, the advent of Multimedia Systems (from TV to the Internet) may have led people to become less literate, but now, I believe we are on the upswing.  Though not evident at first, blogs are causing people – at least those people on the high side of the digital divide – to become more literate than possibly they ever were before.  While true, many “bloggers” write about nothing and no reads their blogs, it is important to note that they are writing.  And all those people that couldn’t be bothered to pick up a book in high school, they’re now “wasting their time” reading blogs.  Once again, there is little of consequence in most blogs, but it is once again important to note they are reading. 

While many blogs contain little of value, many of them contain enough semi-accurate information to make their readers curious, which tends to lead to researching the topic and therefore leads to an overall better informed society. 

What, you may ask, does this have to do with Dery’s article?  The point is that while he started out painting a rather bleak picture of government and corporate control, the general “dumbing down” of society, and mass media manipulation of the public, Dery finds a glimmer of hope in the counter culture of “Culture Jammers”.  These Guerillas of the Information Age prank the media, “adjust and improve” billboards, or hack corporate data systems to expose underhandedness all in the name of public protection.  While these tactics may have helped to stem the tide, there just aren’t enough people involved to make a change. 

The Internet and its fundamentally new media, which at first seemed to be leading us down a path towards illiteracy and media control, may be our only hope of avoiding exactly those things.  The blog has allowed anyone to become a reporter and has led (or is leading) to a more literate society.  YouTube has made literally any video available for free.  Wikipedia provides a starting point for any research project (and is a lot easier to access than going to D.C. to use the Library of Congress).  While the internet has caused problems and may have been a step back for society, it is ultimately its own best solution.