Entry 3 Reading: From a new media perspective and from a marketing, public relations, and advertising perspective, “American Idol” is fascinating. What makes “American Idol” different from other reality TV shoes is that the ideas from multiple genres are combined. For instance gaming shows have existed for decades and have been popular, contest shows such as “Survivor” and the “Amazing Race” have been successful, and “American Idol” brings these elements together, as well as bring in audience participation. Although I have only watched a few episodes of “American Idol”, I was at a family gathering, I have heard people talk about the show, so I know approximately the format. What is interesting to me is not the show but rather the process and how it engages people. The voter participation helps people feel like they are part of the process, watching the bad people sing makes people feel good about themselves, and then gossiping and debating about who is going to win gives people something to talk about and a reason to watch the show. If any of these elements were missing “American Idol” probably would not be as popular. I also find it interesting that FOX was able to give each audience member something, for instance the singers are young for the teenage audience, and then there are older judges, and celebrities like Elton John for the older generation. What is very interesting to me though is how angering people got when they found out that FOX had mostly decided who was going to win before the show aired. Clearly, the voting was a big part of the show, even though FOX had plenty of avenues to control the votes. Moving onto “The New Media Language. I was interested by the idea that computer user interface and human computer interface use metaphors from ancient history, such as a scroll. Although I am not convinced that the developers consciously choose to model webpages after scrolls, a more probable explanation is that scrolling was the logical for viewing large amounts of texts. I also thought it was interesting to think of a screen as like a prison. I never thought of viewing a movie as being imprisoned but after reading “The New Media Language” I can see this explanation. Equally fascinating is the idea that photography and cinema are impressing the past. Then of course with virtual worlds the roles are reversed because now the person in the real world is being imprisoned instead of the media. This maybe a reason why virtual reality has not taken off with consumers. Although virtual reality offers unique possibilities people do not like the idea of having to transport themselves to an alternative reality. They instead like to be able to be in both worlds at the same time. Clearly, the computer interface did not spring out of nowhere. The idea that forms of cinema, the printed word, and human computer interface came together does not surprise me. I am not sure that I understand how computer windows are a page metaphor. For me there is little similarity between flipping or schooling through pages and reading a book. Again, Apple most likely just figured out that organizing information into windows was useful for the user. For me seeing how cinema influenced computers makes is much clearer, especially for gaming. Recently video games have used elements from movies such as different angles and shots to make it easy for characters to move around. This is also present in virtual worlds such as Second Life. Second Life: While I like some elements of Second Life I found the overall game to be boring. There were not enough people to interact with and the fact that you have to spend real money to buy items was discouraging. I enjoyed seeing the building that other people had created, though I still feel that seeing architecture in real life is more impressive. Although Second Life has some interesting opportunities to explore I just do not feel people want to invest that much time in a virtual world. Why would you go to a virtual bar, when there are plenty of real world bars, especially when you cannot even get drunk? The fact that you do not need to worry about the survival of your avatar also makes the game seam less realistic. In the SIMS for instance your characters have urges that have to be satisfied, for example they get hunger, have to go to the bathroom, and they can fall in love. Since this is part of real life and it is not translated to Second Life the game feels artificial and so you wonder why you are playing it. Also, I feel we already spend enough time in virtual reality on website such as facebook and twitter. Company names: Intersecting Media Fourroadsmedia