I am sensing this final project will be a bit difficult for me but I know I’m up to the challenge. I plan on looking at “Dakota” by YHCHI and The Familiar. The Familiar ended up being one of my favorite things we read in this class and one of the artifacts I think I would be able to write well about. I thought the day in class when we didn’t speak and only communicated through social media was awesome. “Dakota” was playing during parts of class and I honestly was unable to watch the video (or I might have made the choice not to) and keep up a presence in the conversation because giving that much focus to more than one thing was too difficult. You could do that to yourself but it’s no fun and gives you a headache. I think my initial annoyance at the video is what is making me want to look at it further because in order for a kind of media to rile something up in people it has to be saying something.

I am thinking about making my project take the form of a video. I like the idea of alternating between modes where you are forced to pay attention at the pace of the creator of the video and where you can read at your own pace. I would also maybe create a simple website with additional information and writing, and the link would appear at times in the video for the viewer to copy and paste so they could then take a break from the hyper attention and read more of my final project at their own pace. This might end up being kind of clunky but it’s what I plan on doing so far.

My initial ideas about what my argument will be about surround ideas of choice and whether or not people have the ability to choose what they consume. The relationship between author/creator and reader is more complex than I think we take into account a lot of times, but it’s something that should be examined especially with the creation of new types of media. With more ways to consume media than ever before, what are we choosing to take in and what are we being shown not necessarily with our permission. I typically think in larger terms since I am not necessarily used to writing close readings, so I am choosing to go the route of creating a larger, overarching argument that I believe both artifacts work together to illustrate and then support that argument with specific examples from the texts.