To narrow down the scope of research, the essay will be focusing on wearable technology's nature of being classified as a form Ubiquitous Computing and how it affects the sociotechnical system in entertainment events with it's immediacy.
To narrow it down even further, Ubi computing's nature will be strategically categorized with Maris's (2000) categorization of Emancipitory and Repressive media.
I am going to revisit the term 'Sociotechnical systems' because the title of the essay would be discussing about the system which involves a mix of technology, people and the environment. Example; how does wearable technology and their thrive and demand for invisibility affect the people, environment and technology around them?
This theory of Immediacy will be placed in a context for public uses in large spaces rather than analyzing the majority wearable devices which are now built for personal use. Analyzing from a broader perspective would involve the environmental factor, one of the three factors existing in the Sociotechnical system.
The three books related to this post were previously analysed in posts 8,9 and 10 and this post's aim is to gather different expert opinions on the concepts presented by those theorists.
Ubiquitous computing
1. Mühlhäuser(2008) confirms that in 1988, Mark Weiser coined the term Ubiquitous computing. It this book, the author confirms Lister's (2000) statement about Ubi computing, which states, "VR brings the world into the computer, but Ubi Computing brings the computer to the world." (p.1) This is a very obvious binary opposite of these technologies which were addressed by both theorists.
"Embodied Virtuality" would be the synonym of Ubiquitous Computing states Weiser(1999). (p.2)
Passionate about devices being embedded in our environment, Weiser's theories and goals for Ubiquitous computing is gaining more and more attention with new media, with the rise of Wearable Technology.
(The brief history of Ubiquitous Computing is analysed from Mühlhäuser's (2008) book, available in the reference)
2. Weiser (1996) speaks of THE AGE CALM TECHNOLOGY, another term/synonym of Ubiquitous Computing which speaks of the future of computing.
It states, "It is when technology recedes into the background of our lives." Weiser (1996). The future of Wearable Technology would be a part of the age of calm technology, something which I could conclude in the essay.
(Available on his website in reference)
3. Kalle Lyytinen and Youngjin Yoo from the Department of Computer Science of The University of Aarhus have produced a clear chart of the differences between 4 types of computing.
What Lister (2003) has mentioned in Post 9 is further deconstructed in this chart.
In Lister's (2003) text from his book New Media, he mentioned Ubiquitous computing being miniaturized and embedded in our physical lives.
However, Lyytinen, Yoo (2002) referred the same statement towards MOBILE computing and stated that, "As a result, the computer becomes a taken-for-granted, ever-present device that expands our capabilities to inscribe, remember, communicate, and reason independently of the device’s location. This can happen either by reducing the size of the computing devices and/or providing access to computing capacity over a broadband network throughlightweight devices."(p.64)
The comparison between the two texts seem to emphasize on the level of mobility of ubi computing and mobile devices. There seems to be a slight confusion with Lister's text as it may be too general.
What Lyytinen and Yoo (2002) mentioned about Pervasive computing being intelligent computers which recognise their environments and adjust their functions too them. Ubi computing on the other hand involves pervasive computing with a high level of mobility.
The text has also mentioned the term SocioTechnical system (interlinked systems of a mix of people, technology and environment) which was mentioned in the proposal and how Ubi computing affects that system.
In this article, they have also confirmed the author's thought about Ubi Computing being at an immature, and new state.
References
Mühlhäuser, M. and Gurevych, I. (2008). Handbook of research on ubiquitous computing technology for real time enterprises. Hershey, PA: Information Science Reference.
Weiser, M. (1996). Ubiquitous Computing. [online] Ubiq. Available at: http://www.ubiq.com/hypertext/weiser/UbiHome.html [Accessed 8 Dec. 2014].
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Hypermediacy, Immediacy, and Remediation
Many texts and articles interrelate these three differences of media together. However, I would only be focusing of the Immediacy of mediums. Comparisons will be made with Hypermediacy and Remediation, but it will be very brief. Remediation does not fit into the goals in the essay, therefore it would not be mentioned.
1. MIT press
MIT press (no date)"The desire for immediacy is apparent in the increasing popularity of the digital compositing of film and in Hollywood’s interest in replacing stunt men and eventually even actors with computer animations. And it is apparent in the triumph of the graphical user interface (GUI) for personal computers."(p. 23)
As the author(myself) had mention numerously in her posts about how Immediacy and the transparency of these mediums are in demand, the MIT Press article has then confirmed it with this statement. This article may have no date and author, but if the article is published by this very renowned site, there has to be some legitimacy to it. I would also like to hear the opinions from MIT experts who published this article. Placed in the context of Wearable Technology, many inventions thrive to make the mediums as invisible as possible by disguising them as daily wearable clothing or accessories like glasses, ear rings, or rings.
As mentioned in the article, the users are no longer aware of the medium, and confronts the content straight away. (p. 24)
2. The Time Barrow is a professional blog run by a Ph.D holder in Technical Communication and Rhetoric from Texas Tech University and had been an adjunct faculty member of the Technical Communication (formerly Multimedia Writing and Technical Communication) program at Arizona State University, instructing in both classroom and online settings, since 2003.
In his blog post, he analyses each term from Bolter's Remediation book, done in this blog in post no.8.
He talks about how the term 'Transparency Immediacy' should be taken apart and analysed from both different perspectives of both the developers and the users.
Transparency would correlate to intuitiveness and Immediacy, a demand of invisible mediums. These keywords are important for deconstruction and understanding the term better.
However in Bolter's book, he merges both the terms together but defines Immediacy as a 'transparent' medium'. So it would be quite repetitive if someone were to use transparency immediacy. It would be transparent transparency immediacy.
3. HARVARD.edu
This review on Bolter's Remediation (1999) book published by Harvard by Sara Marie agrees with the The Time Barrow (expert no. 2) about Immediacy's meaning of the transparency of mediums and how it is more focused on its content rather than its mode of representation. Personally, could the term 'Immediacy' derive itself from 'Immediate information'?
However, in this article in paragraph two of her review, she declares Immediacy as Transparency as if they were the same meaning and word.
Bolter(1999) merely referred transparency as a trait of mediums, not a replaceable identity for immediacy.
The Time Barrow sees the two words as completely different identities which separate themselves from one another.
I could conclude that Immediacy is definitely not just about transparency in general, but it only correlates if the transparency of mediums are in question.
References
Barrow, T. (2010). Immediacy, Hypermediacy, and Remediation. [Blog] Time Barrow : Contemplating Digital Orality. Available at: http://blog.timebarrow.com/2010/08/immediacy-hypermediacy-remediation/ [Accessed 8 Dec. 2014].Bolter, J. and Grusin, R. (1999). Remediation. 1st ed. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press.
Immediacy, Hypermediacy adn Remediation. (n.d.). 1st ed. [ebook] Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT Press, p.23. Available at: https://mitpress.mit.edu/sites/default/files/titles/content/9780262522793_sch_0001.pdf [Accessed 8 Dec. 2014].
Lister, M. (2003). New media. 1st ed. London: Routledge.
Marie Watson, S. (2014). Immediacy and Hypermediacy. [online] Harvard. Available at:
http://isites.harvard.edu/fs/docs/icb.topic148217.files/WatsonRemediation_review.htm [Accessed 7 Dec. 2014].
Marris, P. and Thornham, S. (2000). Media studies. 1st ed. New York: New York University Press.
Marris, P. and Thornham, S. (2000). Media studies. 1st ed. New York: New York University Press.
