icam | computing and the arts

when i first made the page i was even wrong about the major's title. i thought it was computing in the arts instead of and the arts. i still think computing in the arts is cooler.

so from this i have learned that i just need to choose a topic that is cool just like how we grow up everything needs to be cool. since an academic major is a respectable topic everyone is ok with my topic.

i still need more info but for now this will do. i will continue working on it during spring quarter for my final project in icam. i hope it doesnt suck.

drinking game

the game actually went pretty well during the trial compared to how it went during class without 2 decks of cards and alcohol. i think it was the alcohol that made the difference.

during the initial trial my friends played the game with the penalty being at least a quarter of a can. they measured the amount by finishing a beer within 4 sips. They seemed like they had a lot of fun but I also bought them the beer in order for the participation.

personal dynamic media - alan kay and adele goldberg

so i am back again. feeling good and refreshed from all the little bitches in the world. i guess there is only one person an if i were to say myself he is a little bitch.

so this Dynabook that came about was the first notebook-looking design. this notebook has become a pen to the entire world...almost like a car for the mind. there were interim dynabooks, designs for future dynabooks, etc. i really dont like the name.

its sounds very last century. these guys also introduced what seems to be the beginning of the internet era - smalltalk, ethernet, mouse, graphic user interface, animation. it all started with a huge computer and a graphical operating system and ended up with all the new notebooks and the internet and servers we have today.

Playing Politics: Videogames for Politics, Activism, and Advocacy, Ian Bogost, 2006

These initiatives represent a new type of “virtual grassroots outreach,” using the Internet as a bonding agent for ad hoc communities of constantly–involved constituents.

so before the article even begins to discuss videogames it give a little background on how the internet has changed procedural thought/mechanicisms of society through the internet. through politics, history, i dont have any more examples.

the history of videogames begins with sid meier's civilization. i remember playing that game from junior high to college. i never played the second or third version because they kept getting more complicated. i guess the learning curve is also a big influence to whether someone will play a game. while playing i never thought of it as a learning tool but i do remember recalling certain aspects of history from the game instead of from history books.

just want to save what i have so far

This major is generally known as ICAM to all the students and faculty on campus. It is available in the Music and Visual Arts Departments although it can go very deeply into computer science topics. Every student, whether in the Music or Visual Arts Departments, must enroll in lower and upper division classes that are meant to open their eyes and lead them to their mode of expression. It is not available in the Computer Science department because it is not meant to be the main course of study. It may be the form of art or music but intellectually it has nothing to do with its ideas or goals.

[edit] history

Interdisciplinary Computing in the Arts Major, also known as ICAM, was first introduced as an undergraduate major in the fall of 1998 at the University of California, San Diego. After the initial introduction of the major, too many students tried to declare ICAM as their major and therefore had to enforce a pre-major requirement of at least a 3.0 GPA in order to enroll in its advanced classes. Just recently (meaning fall 2007) the pre-major requirement was removed and it is no longer an impacted major.

from computer power and human reason - joseph weizenbaum

"That science is creative, that the creative act in science is equivalent to the creative act in art, that creation springs only from autonomous individuals, is such a simple and, one might think, obvious idea."

that everything comes from a singular idea no matter the form. ideas drive art; ideas drive technology.

ELIZA reminded me of a program like photoshop that lets you use "plug-ins" for different topics. if you want to make something look old you use a different filter. if you want to discuss a different topic you insert a different program. they are the same in the computer sense. it also reminded me of the matrix when NEO was learning all that crap about fighting and shit. the only difference is that a human can learn. i guess that is what artificial intelligence is trying to do. but at ELIZA's time that was not possible.

there were different topics that came about in the article:

1. some psychiatrists thought it could actually be of help to clinical society to use the DOCTOR program on patients.
2. people formed bonds with the DOCTOR program after interacting with ELIZA a few times. maybe it was because it was a place where everything would be secret. a computer cannot gossip. thats why people got mad when he wanted to read their conversations. it was almost like talking to yourself yet still having an audience.
3. the DOCTOR program also made people believe a computer could understand language. it seems impossible that a computer could learn like a human especially in the field of having your own ideas. can a computer make art that wasnt based on the programmer's idea of art?

it is man's responsibility to limit technology?

six selections by the oulipo

so upon reading this assignment all i could think of were those books about choosing your own adventure. i remember reading one; then, i thought i was too cool to be seen with a "choose your own adventure" book. It also reminds me of MadLips. they are also reader interactive. I guess this reading was assigned to give us an introduction to this form of literature so we could move on to the next step of computer assisted literature whether random or not.

A HUNDRED THOUSAND BILLION POEMS

since i did not participate in its true literary function i found the poems to be very boring and also annoying. making no sense. participation was key to this form of literature because randomness was key to these poems.

having no meaning also gave it a chance to have meaning. two lines, to different trains of thought, brought together to support each other but it never happened for me because i was unwilling to photocopy and cut up papers. i am a bad student.

YOURS FOR THE TELLING

when first seeing this literature i thought it was cute. for one thing it was short enough to keep my attention whether it was interesting or not which it was not. it was just the structure that was cute.

it seemed like the ending should have been multiple. i guess that technology did not come about yet. although there were 2 endings they both ended the same way. almost like a cop out. so this literature only based on form not content.

COMPUTER AND WRITER

there are 3 different types of literature involved here:

1. author > computer > work
2. author > computer > work > computer > reader
3. author > computer > reader > computer > work

i guess these three are the next level to the previous reading during the oulipo because now the same concept is used with computers. randomness is based on the programming involved.

these 3 different types demonstrate what the direction of a computer will be or is. a computer has become the ship and not the content. it is there to help express yourself or whatever it is your expression is about.

it is still nothing on its own. it is never the main attraction and is soon becoming a given instead of a plus. It seems all the readings in this assignment is about the use of computers as a helper. Just like the poems and short story without computers, now that there are computers it is an extention of the same meaning. it does not make its own meaning or form. computer science will one day become a GE. kids are learning programming languages in school already.

will ICAM last forever?

so i decided to write about another topic but i do not know if it will be deleted or not. this time i have been defending myself for the reason this topic should be allowed. i am writing about ICAM at UCSD.

here is wat i have written thus far:

Interdisciplinary Computing in the Arts Major, also known as ICAM, was first introduced as an undergraduate major in the fall of 1998 at the University of California, San Diego. It is available in the Music and Visual Arts Departments although it can go very deeply into computer science topics. Every student, whether in the Music or Visual Arts Departments, must enroll in lower and upper division classes that are meant to open their eyes and lead them to their mode of expression.
After the initial introduction of the major, too many students tried to declare ICAM as their major and therefore had to enforce a pre-major requirement of at least a 3.0 GPA in order to enroll in its advanced classes.

wikipedia project

i have begun a new article which is still under verification. i still do not know if it is already there but in a different language because I cannot type in diffferent languages. i will find out soon enough and if it is already there i will try and translate it.

the topic is Chunbukyo

customization and creative commons.

i wish everyone would just do the right thing. it is something i icould not live with for a long time. i tried my best not to judge people based on looks and in effect cared very little for my own. this led to very little action for my little buddy.

well i have begun to care more and have decided to give up this need for everyone to do the right thing. the one thing i have decided not to give up is on my own actions which will always be based on doing the right thing. i am down with all the mumbo jumbo about creative commons because it is based on the notion to do the right thing.

as you can tell i have changed some of the visual aspects of the blog from pixels to percentages. it feels a lot better now that i am not wasting so much space. america loves to waste space but i dont and i can still do the right thing for myself and change the width of this site.

not only for myself but for my future...i will not waste space on the sides of a website.

the GNU manifesto

how do i feel about "free" software? I think it is the way to go. i believe in it and feel it is my ethical duty not to care about any copyrights and what not regarding software and operating systems.

it seems college is the breeding ground to the belief that sharing is caring but for all the people living on campus it is a different story. in order to get internet you must let the university check your operating system to see if it is pirated software.

in order for me to bypass this a few years ago i had to use my friend's laptop to register my room's internet connection so i could use mine with a firewall. i believe i had to use my friend's laptop more than once to keep my internet connection. the university was very sneaky by stating the reason they wanted to check our operating system was to make sure we would not harbor any "viruses."

bittorrent has been a lot of help. you can find almost anything there...except an actual computer. i have not used it for a while but i do still benefit from my previous uses. i guess this is the ultimate "neighbor to neighbor" help you can get. at least we dont have to waste CDs and DVDs to create official copies to be sold in huge boxes so we cant steal them from the stores...well the boxes are smaller now.

since i am looking to be a novice programmer myself i would think i would care for copyright privileges but i dont. my work is based more on design so i guess i wouldnt know what it really feels like for all those programmers working in norcal.

thinking about flash makes me feel selfish. i feel glad there is a separate source file. although it is easy to learn and there are a lot of actionscript help out there it makes it a lot harder to copy exactly the same transitions as the one you see in front of you. atleast you have to do it yourself.

in the end would i care that much? i guess i wouldnt be into flash as much or maybe i would. i am still trying to learn javascript with as much enthusiasm and i have learned html/css accidentally by using dreamweaver for too long. but now that i know html/css i would rather write the code myself than use dreamweaver. it also seems having these skills are still of good use when finding jobs even though they are open source.

with all this talk about the little programming that i know i must state that i feel much more like a designer than a developer. my back end skills are wack. my front end skills are what i am proud of and although designs are always open source and copied just knowing that i came up with the design myself has been good enough thus far.

acs and the garden of forking path

finally my account is working. does it really take that long to reset an account? 2 weeks? after 4 different visits to apm which included 2 discussions of what was wrong with the same person who was very old and wrinkled; he/she finally fixed the problem after i told her the same problem multiple times.

are we really in college? maybe it was because he/she was in college before there was ever a computer. maybe acs should not hire people that do not know how to fix computers/networks.

does acs stand for ac stupid? i cant really think of anything else nor do i want to spend time thinking of it.

so after reading the garden of forking path i have relearned that he invented the hypertext novel though he never wrote his own novel. I didnt quite understand the literature and was lost very often. from some chinese guy to madden i didnt really understand how football had to do with anything he began writing about.

was that the entire point? to go from one point to another? am i just making this up to feel just a little educated. was i too dumb to understand? i hope i was just too sleepy to keep up. in the end madden was known to be a captain and the chinese guy was some kind of an author that gave up his lineage to write a book. i would not have the balls to give up an easy life for my own goals.