aaahhhhhh

Like the title says: AHHHHHH! I am so far behind. I needed to read the chapters and do the response from last week as well as this week's. I spent the entire weekend on homework. I have a group presentation in art history on Thursday so I had to make the drive to Pensacola saturday to work with my group to prepare. Bye Bye saturday.... We didn't get it all done on saturday so I spent all day Sunday doing research and putting together the presentation. Bye Bye Sunday.... So Monday, I called in to work and spent the entire day on homework again. I have a critique of the latest project in typography today so I had to finish it of course. I took me the whole day to get it done. Finally finished at 11 and had to get the kids in bed and ready for school today. So, I didnt get a chance to get to the readings....again!!! Blah.

On the bright side, I did place the order for materials to make throwies for the intervention project and i brainstormed ideas and called the George Ohr O'Keefe Museum to ask for a space to use. They gave me lots of ideas for spaces to check into which I havent gotten to act on yet.

So Hopefully I can catch up on wednesday..... fingers crossed

lab blog 1.1

So... soldering....... one word for ya: BLAH!
Definitely don't like it at all. I bought an iron from walmart for $5 and I guess you really do get what you pay for.  It's crappy. It has to cleaned every other instant. I am going to return it and get a better one from another source.
A HUGE thank you to Sara Jiron for being my tutor and go to person for this. Thank you for not letting me flounder helplessly!
Well, the project it done. The project works. Objective accomplished.

response 2...kinda

So i totally didnt realize that the reading is from the book we are supposed to have for the class until now. For some reason i was thinking there was link to it online like the last one. Silly me! I dont have the book yet because I am broke so I will read and respond as soon as I get the book.

lab blog 1

ok, so i just had a lot typed up, ran the spell check, tried to backspace a word and the stupid thing backed out of the entire post and erased it all! ughh!! Let's try again shall we. (hit save button now)

So we have done 3 labs so far. The throwie lab, the one using a 9v to light an LED, and the blinky light lab.

The throwie was by far my favorite. It was the easiest to understand and to execute. You just have to touch the legs of the LED to the correct sides of a coin battery to make the LED light up. Add a small magnet and tape it all together and you have a throwie, which is basically a magnetic light that you can throw at a magnetic surface for hours of simple amusement. These neat little things are often used in graffiti which is totally awesome. It was mentioned in class that we, as a class, should make a bunch of these and go out to do a collaborative graffiti work. Im all for it! (hit save here)

I found on the instructables web site, a way to make the throwie so that the light comes on when it sticks to a surface instead of staying on all the time. It was very simple. You just had to put in a barrier so that the leg of the LED only made contact with the battery when the devise was magnet was engaged. I altered my throwie to this design. I was totally accomplished! (save now)

I showed the throwie to my boss at the youth center. We might possibly do this little project at work with the kids. It would be a great community performance art piece!

The second lab was very similar. This time no magnets but still lighting an LED. Instead of a coin battery, we used a 9 volt battery. Since we were using 9 Volts we had to also use a resistor. The LED can only handle 3 volts with out blowing the circut so the resistor must be used to control the flow of the voltage so that the right amount of power reached the LED. We got to experiment completing the circuit with a piece of copper tape and a strip of graphite. Both materials are conductive and carry the voltage, but the copper tape is more efficient. The copper carries the power so that the LED maintains the same level of brightness as it has when the circuit os completes by touching the legs of the LED and the resistor together. The graphite only completes the circuit when the legs of the LED and resistor are close together and even then,the light is very dull. So copper is has less resistance than graphite. (save)

The blinky light lab was difficult and I didnt even finish it. We used a diagram to arrange parts on a bread board to make 2 LEDs blink on and off. It took me 3 attempts to get the circuit to work, and i still dont understand exactly how it works. We experimented completing the circuit with alternate parts:

control group:
120k and 33k resistor and capacitor value 4.7

-with a 120k and a 33k resistor and a capacitor value of 10 the lights flash slower (about every second) and stay lit slightly longer

-with a 120k and 33k resistor and capacitor value 22 the lights blink slower (about every 4 seconds) and the lights stay lit longer ( for about a second)

-with a 120k and 10k resistor and capacitor value 4.7 the lights blink faster and don't stay lit as long

-with a 120k and 10k resistor and capacitor value 10 the lights blink every 2 seconds but stay dont stay lit as long

-with a 120k and 10k resistor and capacitor value 22 the lights blink every 4 seconds but they barely stay lit

so... the capacitor seems to control how often the lights come on: the lower the number, the more frequent = frequency
....and the resistors seem to control how long the lights stay on: the more resistance the longer it stays lit = duration

I didnt get to the soldering yet...next time (save)

response paper 1

Megan Barton

Response paper 1

            This reading was written in smart people speak. It’s the kind of stuff that you can read the words, but they go in one ear and out the other without leaving behind any semblance of understanding in their wake, like poetry. You almost have to decipher it line by line and one dictionary page at a time. Of what little I understand in the reading, I choose to discuss the power of machine over man.

            The writing tells of the subtle enslavement of man to machine. The author gives ample support for this claim which is rather intriguing. He discusses how electronics are designed with an emphasis on user- friendliness rather than functionality and aesthetics. That in the world today, according to the majority, electronics should be understood, not interpreted and they should not confuse or disappoint. In other words, electronics are designed so that they are so easy to use that people don’t have to think in order to figure them out. In this way, we are putting our lives in the hands of the electronics we use. We are slowly being conditioned to all think the same way or better yet, not think, but conform. The example given in the writing is the camera. When an individual is trying to take a photograph, a light will blink when there is a chance of ruining the image. This feature is limiting that individual in that it is not only limiting the creativity of that person, but it is also depriving them of valuable knowledge. If the feature wasn’t there to warn a person of the potential of a spoiled image, that person would have taken the photograph, seen that it wasn’t up to par, wonder why the photograph didn’t turn out, find the answer to that question and then modify the situation to correct the problem. That person would have used problem-solving skills and research skills to learn about the mechanics of a camera in order to take better photographs. The blinking light takes all the thought out of the situation, the light blinks, you move on; oh well, on to the next photograph.

            Another point to note is that because of electronics, “we readily cease to ‘see’ the world we live in, and become anesthetized to its distinctive features.” How often do you see people on smart phones, laptops, and I pods? In today’s world families don’t communicate face to face, even if they are under the same roof in a 3 bedroom house. In a commercial I saw on TV the other day, a woman is video chatting on the computer with her daughter. She is bragging about all the deals she got on clothing for the family and holds up some clothes and shoes she bought for her daughter with the money she saved from all the good deals. Suddenly the daughter leaves the screen and then reappears in the room beside her mother thanking her for the clothes. It’s ridiculous that they are in the same house but they are too lazy to go from one room to another to have that exchange in person. I have an experience worse even than that. Sitting in the floor in the living room at my mother’s house I get a text message from my brother. I look over, in disbelief I may add, at him sitting on the couch a mere 3 feet away from me! I mean really?? Are you so lazy, that you couldn’t find the energy to open your mouth and speak, but you could move your fingers and type a message? He’d rather use his phone to communicate than have an audible conversation with another living being. In restaurants, people get together to go out to a nice meal and instead of speaking and spending time with each other, they, especially the younger people,  sit there and text, or face book, or play one of the millions of apps on their smart phones or I pods. Just today I went out to Buffalo Wild Wings with my 15 yr old sister and two kids from work, both girls, ages 12 and 13, along with their mothers. The two mothers and I spent the time talking with each other while the 3 girls all sat there on their various electronic gadgets. All of these things illustrate the point. We are using electronics so much that we don’t see the world anymore. We see that screen. We walk down the street but we don’t notice the people we pass or the way the clouds look in the sky or the wonderful way the sun hits that puddle of water or the beauty of the shadows cast by the chair on the patio at that diner because our attention is fixed on that screen in our hands as we text or play games or watch ridiculous viral videos of people doing stupid things. Now in fine art classes, perhaps for the first time, we have to be taught how to see the world, how to appreciate its beauty and wonder.

            Electronics aren’t just a part of our lives; they actually help shape our lives. They help determine the type of job we get, the places we go, the things we see, and the people we meet. We can’t work from home if we don’t have a laptop, we can’t attend the meeting in the online chat room while on a bus without a smart phone, we can’t go a couple states away without a vehicle, we can’t know the most current events without a television or radio or the internet and we can’t meet people in Egypt from the comfort of our own home without some sort of smart device. We have become entirely too dependent on electronics. I wonder how many people retain their basic math skills when ever electronic device has a calculator on it. Do cashiers ever have to do the math to determine the correct amount of change to give? Do people ever have to do the math to determine the appropriate tip to leave a server after a meal? Most people don’t bother figuring out simple multiplication when they can reach in their pocket and pull out a devise with a calculator to do the thinking for them. How many phone numbers do you know? I know that I can say I only know a handful of the top of my head. I used to know all the phone numbers for all of my friends and family and the local pizza hut! Now I have my phone. All the numbers I need are programmed in the phone under the names of the people they belong too. I don’t have to know the number to call them, I don’t even see the number when I call; I see the name on the display. If I were to lose my phone I would lose contact with almost all of the over 200 people I have saved in there.

Having said all that, it is conceivable to think that man is becoming enslaved, so to speak, by machines. When you depend on something or someone for so much in your life, you become a slave to their will. They or it have or has power over you. We are giving this power over us to electronics. If electronics were to somehow become intelligent creatures with their own will, we would be slaves to them because we are losing the ability to think for ourselves.

machine love poetry

an excerpt from Romeo and Juliet from the artificial heart of the Shakespearean cyborg:

                             See how she leans her cheek upon her hand.
                              Oh that I were a smart phone in that hand
                             That I might touch that cheek!