Hw#14 - Second Text [Everything Bad is Good For You By Steven Johnson]

The main point in the game excerpt that Steven Johnson keeps repeating is "probing". In video games, we must probe to progress to the next stage and using game manuals and coming up with strategies, we can get smarter. Because our mind are thinking up ways to solve the game and since the game has a story, which has an order that allowed us to be more organize, finishing the puzzle step by step However, that can also be applied to the real world because we are thinking up more ways and the organization that is in it helps us improve.

In the television excerpt, it is about how watching television can bring up our emotional IQ and learning socializing skills; our way to identify others expressions quickly because we keep seeing it in the shows, where the “raw” expressions that the actors or real people have put out. It can help us know what we should say or not say when an expression comes up (like politicians have to be careful with what they say) and helps us with connections and relationships to be better. And as for Internet, it is an advancement of both the games and the television where we can get more information and “learning new ways to connect”. Johnson talks about how people learn the complexity of the applications, and enjoying the process of figuring out how the applications work.

*Truthfully, I can get some of the general arguments that Johnson is talking about but I’m not completely sure if what I am getting in the excerpt is correct.*

I think I agree with the arguments that Johnson has placed out in the game excerpt. At first when he explained about the books, and the contradicting about the books, I thought it was interesting. The argument said, “Books are also tragically isolating” but I thought a lot of the times, in the libraries, don’t they have read aloud? And they discuss the book? So I thought that the argument (he thought of?) doesn’t prove our “isolation” with books.

I hadn’t really thought of games as a way to have our mind think deeper, to think about the strategies and answers in how to solve these game puzzles and move to the next level. I was surprised that Johnson’s seven year old nephew only learned a short time in the Sims game and he knows about changing the tax and etc. After reading that chapter, I think by replacing reality with games and games with reality, we can learn more, imaginatively but not too much because I still think playing too many games would still hurt our bodies. However, comparing with being in a class (if the class is boring) than I rather learn the materials from the games because we can virtually experience it.

In the television excerpt, he said by watching reality shows, soap operas, and dramas, we can learn more about people’s expressions, which can help us be ready for whatever its going to happen. I thought the emotional IQ was an interesting point and knowing others feelings can help me understand what the others are thinking; feels more prepared to face them. All of us are living in this world together so we should try to understand each others feelings and watching television to learn that isn’t bad. Shows such as the one that shows not actors but real life people and their lives are great examples to show their “raw” feelings. I agree with what Johnson said that we are watching the shows, performed by people, with amusement as the performers are performing (p.o.v) of “humiliation”. Television helps us access with others matters quickly. A quote that I thought was interesting: “Television is our culture’s principal mode of knowing about itself”.

As for the internet excerpt, I don’t think I have much of reactions because it’s already known that internet is a resource full of resources. To socialize, we use chatting and texting, we download programs and applications to use. We go online and go to the famous Google and we can get what we need. However, his evidence of how fun it is to use the applications was interesting. Because it is interesting so we want to try it. In the excerpt’s last paragraph, he said that “we’re finally learning new ways to connect”, which I believe is true. Because we isolate ourselves around the Net, we get to connect elsewhere instead of with actual people. With these “social networks”, everybody is creating “new possibilities for strangers [each other] to share ideas and experiences”.

I think the base point of this excerpt is that the digital is good and in Feed, the digital is bad. Games, television and the net make us smarter but Feed is making us dumber. In the excerpt, Johnson tells us to influence our kids to learn to like reading but in Feed, its all about Feed and the Feed doing the work. The kids doesn't need to do much but wait for the Feed to give them the answers. Another contradiction that Johnson had was the way we think in the game and the organization and meaning that comes along helps us develop our brain neurons into thinking more. And in Feed, Violet is mostly the only teenager that thought deeply about the world dying and other teenagers and most of the adults are just following along the Feed. Then in a way, I think buying video games costs money just like the Feed and that both the games and the Feed is glued to our brain once we start playing it. Feed and games are addictions to a lot of the kids in the society. I think the games and Feed help us socialize but when we talk to each other about what strategies or what to buy, I still feel that we are talking on the surface of it.

Feed is like an application but in the book, the program Feed wasn’t explored much but is use a lot. The people that have them use it to buy things and use it to search for things but they don’t explore the program itself. That makes the people rather dumb because Johnson said that by exploring the programs, the cranks and nooks; it can help us to be smarter. By thinking how they can twist the application to their will then they will have a chance to think “wow, I can do this” because in Feed, it is more that the Feed is controlling the people and not the other way. The kids that have the Feed are taking the Feed for granted and the punishment that they would have is the malfunctioning (well except for Violet’s case, it’s a bit different because she’s smarter than others. Although she did want a Feed so it’s a question mark, how we want this but think its bad).

A parallel that I see is that Johnson and Anderson both talk about “connecting to each other”. In Feed, everybody’s mind is instantly connected, or never disconnected from the Feed in their brain. If they want to find something that instant, they can find it and when they want to talk to someone they can connect to them at that spot. However, because we don’t have Feed in the reality, but with the Net, we are connected as well. Everybody is connected with each other if they want to, like with Facebook, aim, and Twitter. "Virtue of being participatory" is what Johnson's one of the three fundamental and related ways. We participate in connecting with each other through the Net to find more stuff to learn about or just to enjoy about. I’m sharing my thoughts right now through this blogger to connect with others as well.

I still don’t know which side I agree on, whether on Johnson’s side that digital is good or on Anderson’s side, that digital is bad. I think it’s bad if we use it for too long, not 24/7, which will damage our bodies but I can’t stop using the digital because it’s already pasted in our life. Like a story, we are following this thread of life where technology can’t leave us completely alone or we won’t know what we should do though it might take us a long time to figure that out. Reading Feed and the excerpt, I see that the good and bad sides are always going to be there, and for anything else. But I wonder if there are more aspects besides those two. If we do have Feed in the world, how would the Net be replaced? Would we still be using the computer? I don't think so and people said that using our fingers and hands a lot, we wouldn't get arthritis too much so using computer can affect how our muscles (since we need to type on the keyboard). In a lot of Johnson's points and Anderson's messages, I agree with them but I think i am stuck, wondering what's going to happen.