Let the Games Begin…

Welcome to the first post of my blog! You may have figured out from my About Me and Readings pages, this blog was created for a directed research course that I get to choose a topic of interest and design. While this is not a response to a reading per se, it is more of a get-to-know-each-other post, and a sort of insight to my inspiration behind my topic and research.

As a previous university student, I remember the days when pagers came out and the professors’ protests and clear instructions to either turn them off during class or not bring them at all. Well, much has changed since then, and it seems that most professors these days urge students to not text, or even ban laptops and tablets. That aside, I sometimes catch myself feeling archaic in the fact that I can’t seem to just read my readings off a computer screen like most of my fellow (and much younger) students. I have to print everything (much to the chagrin of being environmentally friendly). And I much prefer taking notes by pen and paper rather than using my macbook or tablet.

Not that I have anything against the computer. In fact, I love the accessibility of being able to look up virtually (pun intended) everything via the internet. In fact, it has made my life as a born-again student easier. Ten-fold. My friends joke about my aversion and “allergy” to the library (don’t get me wrong, I LOVE books…just not the library), so you can imagine my thrill when I can pre-research through the internet.

And what of social media? While I may have a facebook profile I hardly go on it, and I can’t seem to bring myself to have a Twitter account. Yet, I find myself quite attached to Instagram. I get it, in order to be “with” everybody, I have to be connected. Yet, I find it eerie that I have to market my own self almost as if it’s its own product and entity. Yes, I am an entity, but a product? Of what? My parents? Ryerson? facebook? Coca-Cola? So…this means I have to think about branding myself as a product? McLuhan was onto something when he said that technology becomes an extension of the man. But to think of myself as a commodity (I could open a can of worms here my inserting a joke/comment about me being up for sale…I’ll leave that for you)?

I know, there is ironic value to having a blog for my research and criticisms on the internet and social media. But as I began setting up the site, I realized that not having Twitter or “creeping” through facebook 80 times a day really has left me a little out of touch with technology and by and large, what is going on around me. I actually struggled with creating my blog. I left it for a couple of days week, because I was scared and overwhelmed by all the features and buttons and things to click on. Hence the birth of my blog name: samvscomputer. Because admittedly, more often than not, I have moments with my computer.

Embarrassing as it may be, I had other terrible names for my blog before I finally came up with the genius one I have now:

*mythesisblog           and         *thesitewithnoname

I had several others, but they were unfortunately taken. The above runners-up were of the few that weren’t already taken. Hey, the creative process can be seriously stunted when you’re under pressure and overwhelmed. But I like to think that I won this round Computer.

Sam 1, Computer 0