WHAT IS THE NETWORK SOCIETY PARADIGM?

Firstly, I would like to introduce this blog post by breaking down what this module was focusing on before diving deeper into its aspects and the main focal example I will be using: Liquid Life. 

The idea of the network society paradigm is simply – “a society whose social structure is made up of networks powered by micro-electronics-based information and communications technologies.” Theorist of the concept, Manuel Castells (2004 p. 3). 

Communication was never always as electronic based as it is today. In fact, it was always at a distance in and not at all ‘constant’ until the 19th Century. Around this time came the invention of the telegraph (1837), and from this moment communication became ever so changing. Now, this is where the idea of the network society comes into play. “…absolutely annihilating space and running in advance of time…a net-work of nerves of iron wire…” (The New York Tribune, 1845). 

THE NETWORKS

Centralized – the idea of a centralized network is it being owned/run by one company/community. This allows for that one authority figure to gain control over content, servers, or source codes. This is the type of network which aligns with most contemporary applications around today. “Data resides on a centrally owned database controlled by a company.”

Decentralized – these types of networks are made up of more than one node unlike centralized networks. They are not run by authority, for each separate node acts as its own, however are all existing within the same space. 

Distributed –  these networks are the type. They are made up of multiple nodes like Decentralized, however what differs here is the way they interact. “Applications in which computation is distributed across components, communicate and coordinate their actions by passing messages. The components interact with each other in order to achieve a common goal.”

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CYBERSPACE

Cyberspace is explained to be a graphic representation of data – a consensual hallucination. (William Gibson,1984). The idea of cyberspace is that it is the home of the mind, an existence within that of ourselves, but also an external factor. Think of this as the vast world of the internet and the way it exists within thought or, a hallucination if you will. “Cyberspace consists of transactions, relationships, and thought itself, arrayed like a standing wave in the web of our communications. Ours is a world that is both everywhere and nowhere, but it is not where bodies live.” 

LIQUID LIFE?

Now that I have briefly discussed the idea of the network society paradigm, its networks and the identity of cyberspace in relation to the vast existence of the internet, I will be introducing Liquid Life. 

Going off how the telegraph changed communication, how the internet and mobile phones grew from the extensive technological advancements of time, it is only right to assume the way society as a whole changes. New ideas, new ways of communicating, creating and displaying yourself openly to the world through the web. 

I’m sure we can all think of plenty of changes to society based on these factors, however one that really stuck out to me is the ideas of Liquid Life, or Liquid Labour. Today, everyday life has become another way of working. Everything is about work, rather than about life-style. This has created the ideology of Liquid Life, which can also be referred to as Liquid Labour. 

This brings us to the New Capitalism. “The relationships of capital and labour, argues Manuel Castells, are increasingly individualized and organized around the network enterprise form of production, which integrates the work process globally through telecommunications, transportation and client-customer networks. Such worldwide integration introduces a fundamental aspect of unpredictability to the nature of work,” 

This is the age of working culture, of hustle culture, of being overworked and enjoying it. Or, rather, presenting yourself as if you enjoy it. “…Not only does never stop hustling – one never exists a kind of work rapture…In the new work culture, enduring or even merely liking one’s job is not enough. Workers should love what they do, and then promote that love on social media, thus fusing their identities to that of their employers.”

THE LOGIC OF FREE INFORMATION FLOWS DEMANDS LABOUR THAT IS UNRESTRAINED BY BOARDERS AND ALWAYS AVAILABLE FOR WORK.

All of this comes from, as explored through ‘Liquid Life, Convergence Culture, and Media work’, a lack of stability and security. We do not work for a career any more, not really, in contemporary times aligned with that of social media, and networking, we instead create for short term effects. What is going to get this result right now, for we do not know how long this opportunity will last. The new capitalism. This has become extremely prevalent in the way of working off social media platforms. Everything is based on current flows, trends and catching up. 

This idea of Liquid Life is not something majorly negative, though nor is it inherently positive. This type of ‘hustle culture’ has created mass amounts of opportunities for society. It’s this idea that “anyone can make it”, anyone can achieve big goals and aspirations. Especially from social media platforms like Instagram. Anyone can gain success, power and influence over networks. 

That being said, this type of work-style not life-style has enabled the lack of self-care. When everything becomes about work and not about life – about a healthy balance between the two – then you will often find yourself a victim of burn out, “a state of emotional, physical, and mental exhaustion…” This wave has moved forward the lack of care one has for themself, which is why the importance of self-care is so important within today’s society. For you will never be performing at your best when struggling in the overwhelming nature of hustle culture.

Liquid Life offers up both positives and negatives for the future in society, and like most things, it is incredibly important to structure a healthy balance between the two and to start living a style and work style. 

REFERENCES 

A declaration of the independence of Cyberspace (2016) Eff.org. Available at

A Global Nervous System [BCM206] (no date) Prezi.com. Available at

Ashby, J. (no date) 1.4 The network society, Soas.ac.uk. Available at

Centralized vs decentralized vs distributed (2019) Blockchainengineer.com. Available at

Civilization of the mind: understanding the network society paradigm (no date) Prezi.com. Available at

Griffith, E. (2019) “Why are young people pretending to love work?,” The New York times, 26 January. Available at

Mark Deuze (Indiana University) (2006) “Liquid Life, Convergence Culture, and Media Work.” Available at

Melinda (no date) “Burnout prevention and treatment – HelpGuide.Org.” Available at 

In September of 2005 a series of interactive toy’s begun under the name Pixel Chix. These games were interactive with an LCD screen and came in many forms over the years. Marketed towards young girls by introducing them to life through little pixel girl pals. Created by Mattel, these games were desgined for you to live within a house with your character. You were able to dress them up, feed them, have pets and put them to bed. Over time the toys begun to add more to how you could play with different generations.

When thinking back on these games, which ultimatly ended as physical devices in 2009, we are met with intense nostalgia – an analytical framework which these games can be viewed through. I wasn’t sure if Pixel Chix would be an incredibly niche “old” game, especially considering how little it is brought up in spaces when discussing childhood games. However, after looking through the responces of this tweet of mine I knew it wasn’t just me who felt that hard love for these games as kids.

this might be incredibly niche but please someone tell me you remember these games from the 2000s 🤧 #bcm215 pic.twitter.com/SR6h1oVaJ6

— taylorlani 🕯🎞🍷 (@Taylorlani2) August 3, 2021

Pixel Chix House created a loveable expierence in little kids. Not only were you able to dress up and play with your girl pal yourself, you were able to connect the houses together and vist each others homes anc charaters. This created a connect, in person expierence for kids in the 2000s to play together. There was orginally three styles, “Cottage”, “Loft”, and “Mansion.”

Over the years Mattel made many different generations of Pixel Chix.

Road Trippin Vehicle, 2005

2-Story House, 2006

Love 2 Shop Mall, 2006

Roomies, 2007

Babysitter, 2007

Unlockets Charm, 2007

Pixel Chix TV, 2008

Fab Life, 2008

Secret Life of Pets, 2007

McDonalds Happy Meal Toys, 2008

Pixel Chix was also hosted as a game under “EverythingGirl.com” which lasted several years past the production of them in 2009, until the site closure in 2014. This makes me question the way I would analyse this game. As stated before, when talking about nostglic games Pixel Chix is non exisitant in many spaces as an option. Yet, when directly asked many of us as kids loved them so much. Until doing research I had no idea that the there even was a website game.

Unlike many different childhood games like “Temagotchi,” and “Cooking Mama”, Pixel Chix has not made any kind of new wave technoglical developments, there has been no new console game or phone app. It’s like it never really made that big of an impact, or if it did consdering they even had a McDonalds toy line, that it was not long lasting at all. Maybe this has to do with the games being developed by Mattel the toy line which is always mass prodcuing new content.

Pixel Chix might not be something that instantly comes to mind for anyone, yet it still has managed to fit in the gaps between the ones you do think of straight away. I think that has to say something, it’s not hated as i saw in the replies to my tweet, but its not remembered even though it was well liked. It’s a game that really sticks out as a fever dream to many people – which in a way is quite a unique type of nostaglia.

Hey, hey!

Last week I shared a blog post dedicated to pitching my Digital Artifact idea for this semester at University and so did many of my peers. You can read it here, but as a quick reminder, I will be conducting investigative research into music and sounds of video games and analysing their importance along with their effects. After this though, I was given the opportunity to read and give feedback on fellow students’ pitches. I think it is such a rewarding thing to have a community to give and receive feedback from, and I took this process to really reflect on even my own critiques in order to advance forward with my work. I hope those who I had the honour of reviewing feel that from the feedback I shared.

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Firstly I reviewed James Mckay’s pitch, and while this might be my longest comment I am so incredibly excited to see where James goes with their ideas. Their pitch presented the question of “Do Video Games Suck?”, and goes on to explore the relationship of different era games – the old vs. the new – to analyse the quality of them. They intend to do this by streaming on Twitch and having a rank type system of three similar styled games.

I love this idea, and I made sure to relay that in my feedback. I’m a very opinionated person and am attached to certain games based on my own experiences. This really stuck out to me because I really allowed myself to see how little my own pitch goes into when it comes to audiences or even the type I wish to attract. It is clear to me, based on the game like examples in my own pitch, I could have conducted more research into the who these target audiences are and why certain scores/soundtracks are presented to them.

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I then moved onto reading and engaging with Jules’ pitch, which really struck me because of the similar concepts but different ideas involved. I love seeing how differently people can execute projects. Their DA dives into the concept of nostalgia and its correspondence in gaming. Not only that, but they included the science side of things, going deep into what they wished to achieve with this project.

I feel like I might be excited for everyone’s DA’s, and Jules’ pitch really cleared me up on how I should handle things in my own work. Her audio/visual was very clean and still simple and as someone who really kind of struggles with that it allowed me to see ways that I can improve.

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Lastly, I took a look at Jacob’s pitch blog post, and it was instantly recognisable. Their project was detailed and very clear to read, explaining how they intend to utilise their youtube channel to make game commentary around FIFA and further explore and analyse it from there. I found that Jacob’s pitch was very researched and had clear drawbacks to class content and lectures.

I really liked this about their pitch, because it is very clear on my own that I need to improve my engagement with frameworks and lecture understandings. Which is something I know myself as well as feedback given to me over the course of peer reviewing.

Throughout this process I was able to gain insight and understanding of other people’s projects which enabled me to take a look back at my own, critique it and has given me the ability to better my personal Digital Artifact in the long run.

I’m sure most of us to some extent are aware of The Sims game or have even played most of them. Seperate from SimsCity, The Sims series started all the way back in 2000 with the release of what is refered to as The Sims 1. Now, it’s not too far fetched to say that this franchise is one of the most successfull for games. I can think at the top of my head a handful of different Sims games. For example, Sims Castaways, Sims Medievial, Sims Pets etc.

However, I’m not here to discuss the successes of The Sims. No, Im here to go over one of the biggest fails instead.

The Sims Mobile.

Now, essenitally, The Sims Mobile is just a phone version of The Sims, or at least it wanted to be. Released in March 2018, “players are able to create unique Sims with the in-game character creator (Create-a-Sim), build houses, start families and control the lives of their Sims.” In theory that should be a great thing and that this should be a great game.

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Instead, it was met with mass disapointment and bad reviews. Not only that, I don’t think I’ve ever heard anyone bring up this game ever.

Most people have issues with the gameplay. For example, they found it boring and as if you were simply pressing buttons. Also, as a common cirique with EA Sims games, you have to pay to really enjoy it. There is a limit to four Sims that all live within the same house. The game doesn’t validate player’s time and investment either, for like a lot of mobile games, to do anything you use energy but unlike in the PC games you can’t just feed or put your Sim to bed. Instead, you have to wait – and wait – until you can even play again.

https://youtu.be/wfquHLIicWA

All of these things and defiently more left Sims fans bored and uniterested. I lot going to say they uninstalled it the next day. In fact, if I remember back to 2018, I did the same thing and I only installed it to see how bad the game was myself.

One notibale comment is that it is a phone game and that it shouldn’t have the same expectations as PC. While this is true, this also is quite simply the solution to the game’s downfall. In theory, if The Sims Mobile was created not nessiarily like a cash grab and was produced to emulate The Sims 4 in accuracy, gameplay and grapfically, then possibly this could have been avoided. If, purhaps, there was more care to creating a good game, however that is another comment EA recieves all the time.

As I was saying before, so many diffferent Sims games come to mind when you think of them. Arguably most people could list a few at the top of their mind. Yet, The Sims Mobile flopped so badly that no one ever really considers its existance. And if that doesn’t show how failed your game was then I don’t know what does.

REFERENCES

Beausoleil, M. (2021, March 13). Ten ways EA is ruining their Sims empire. Retrieved August 17, 2021, from Medium website: https://beausoleil.medium.com/ten-ways-ea-is-ruining-their-sims-empire-b67c95c587df

Guest Writer. (2018, July 3). 3 reasons why Sims mobile misses the Mark: In-depth analysis — deconstructor of fun. Retrieved August 17, 2021, from Deconstructoroffun.com website: https://www.deconstructoroffun.com/blog/2018/7/2/simz

The Sims Mobile. (n.d.-a). Retrieved August 17, 2021, from Fandom.com website: https://sims.fandom.com/wiki/The_Sims_Mobile

The Sims Mobile. (n.d.-b). Retrieved August 17, 2021, from Miraheze.org website: https://crappygames.miraheze.org/wiki/The_Sims_Mobile

Timeline of The Sims games. (n.d.). Retrieved August 17, 2021, from Fandom.com website: https://sims.fandom.com/wiki/Timeline_of_The_Sims_games

(2019). My first time on the Sims mobile: A worse Sims 4.

Hey, hey!

After looking at nostalgic, old games and ones that have failed in previous weeks, I have decided for my Digital Artifact I will be discussing and looking at the music for games.

EXAMPLES AND RESEARCH

Examples of popular video game music that comes to mind almost instantly is the die hard love for Nintendo’s game scores. Often uploaded and shared via social platforms like Youtube in “relaxing”, “study” playlists with thousands of views.

And it’s not just claming Nintendo scores that are popular, even though they come to mind so quickly.

Simon Wood’s “Video Game Music, High Scores: Making Sense of Music and Video Games” – goes into the connection between games and popular culture and how “the video game has now become a ubiquitous part of the domestic landscape.” Along with how fastly growing in importance it seems to be. “In the United States, the National Academy of Recording Arts and Science now includes music from video games in the ‘Score: Soundtrack Album For a Motion Picture, Television or other Visual Media’ category in its annual Grammy Awards.”

THE DA

For this Digital Artifact, dissecting music by understanding the formal elements of games. Formal elements include the basic rules of the game (you know, setting, theme, narrative and genre.) However, it also includes things such as features, controls, software/hardware requirements, difficulty settings, its goals/challenges, as well as its sound design.

I will be writing about and analysing popular soundtracks, scores and sounds from video games to uncover the reasoning for this. I will be conducting textual analysis of games, exploring the love and hype around their musical attributes, and questioning why that is. For example, what makes this soundtrack stand out? How does it make you feel? I will be using this blog to publish posts doing as such, along with my content based Instagram, Simply Taylorlani, where I will be sharing more casual content about game music.

Here is a visual display of my outlined plan for this Digital Artifact for the course of the semester.

OVERALL

In whole, this Digital Artifact has the aim of providing a deeper analysis and understanding of game music for not only myself but my audience. I hope to gain insight and knowledge into the way game music production is created, its importance and why we as players hold such love and connection to scores.

REFERENCES

(2020). dream land || nintendo ost + thunderstorm ambience.

(2021). Little Nightmares 2 – Ambient Soundtrack Mix (Depth Of Field Mix).

KeithByrne. (n.d.). Retrieved August 20, 2021, from Deviantart.com website: https://www.deviantart.com/keithbyrne

Wood, S. (2009). Video Game Music: High Scores: Making Sense of Music and Video Games. In G. Harper, R. Doughty & J. Eisentraut (Eds.). Sound and Music in Film and Visual Media: A Critical Overview (pp. 129–148). London: Bloomsbury Academic. Retrieved August 20, 2021, from http://dx.doi.org/10.5040/9781628928969.ch-007

Hey, hey.

If you remember my last Digital Artifact which was entirely art based, then I guess you might be surprised that this one is mostly not. Over the course of time my old Digital Artifact died and was reborn into Simply Taylorlani and this semester I’m focusing on my writing which just so happens to be on this blog.

Essentially my DA has the aim to produce more writing content and after taking a moment with my existing audience on Instagram, we narrowed that down to music. Which is great, I love writing about music whether it’s reviews, my opinions, ranking artist albums and breaking them down. This is something I do in my seperate time already.

music won the poll for my #bcm241 #bcm206 niche so i feel like i need to apologise now for how annoying i'm going to be this semester 🤧

— taylorlani 🕯🎞🍷 (@Taylorlani2) August 2, 2021

I love engaging with artist content in a constructive way, especially when someone releases a new album or single. Personally, I found I know a lot of people that don’t really think of things that way when they listen to music. They just say if they like it or not without really going deeper. I want to go deeper with this. I enjoy going further into music than the surface.  

I also showcase a lot of this on my content based Instagram which goes in hand with this DA. For example, I’ve started sharing a weekly song and album’s which I’ve enjoyed or have been on repeat for myself. Along with this I have some of my Spotify playlists public for my audience while over the course of this semester I create and update one with my weekly music choices. Maybe even others depending on how the semester goes.

I hope that with this Digital Artifact I can introduce some of my audience who don’t engage with my personal taste to different music or even get them to think about it differently.