Rettberg and Ulmer Week 1

I started reading Rettberg and after reading the first paragraph I had a question about her view on technological determinism. In a book about blogging, I was wondering how technological determinism would factor into her writings about digital media. I read fifty pages and finally found what I was looking for--on page 53 she states that the "moderate viewpoint referred to as co-construction, a term that emphasizes the mutual dependencies between technology and culture." The idea that culture and society is shaped by technology is rather extreme. I wonder about the inventors of major technologies and speculate if they anticipated the massive response to their products. Did cell phone inventors ever think that not only would one household own one but every member in the household? Or that there would be laws passed to ban the use of cellphones while driving? Technological co-construction does address the fact that technology has an impact on our culture while avoiding the extreme views of technological determinism.

Throughout the Rettberg reading I tried to make note of the way in which she classified or described blogs. One aspect that I though could relate to Ulmer was the cumulative nature of blogs. Rettberg says, "because blogging is a cumulative process, most posts presuppose some knowledge of the history of the blog, and the they fit into a larger story" (4). The cumulative nature of a personal blog can aid in the retention of events and ideas. A narrative is built through the posts and topics discussed in the blog. Another characteristic is the dynamic nature of blogs. Rettberg highlights that "today's blogs are expected to change regularly--indeed, their chief defining feature is that they are frequently updated and that the content does not stay the same" (23). I must say there are a couple of blogs that I follow and I am disappointed when the author does not update them on a consistent and frequent basis. This idea of blogs being a dynamic and possibly two-way communication medium relies on the characteristic that the content constantly changes and is reciprocal.

In the Ulmer reading I was looking for a clearer idea of what a Mystory is and all that is involved in this project. I googled Mystory and Bystory and had a few good hits but still had some questions. In Ulmer's book on page 6 under the Make a Mystory I was struck by the statement "Memory is crucial since we are testing the power of the punctum (Barthes) or memory sting as the connection bet ween personal organic memory (living) and the artificial memory of computing and the web" (7). In undergrad I did my final senior project on the public or collective memory in regards to the memorials in Washington D.C.. I compared and contrasted the Vietnam and World War II memorials and how the designs are indicative of society's memory of the wars. I thought of this in comparison to Ulmer's emphasis on memory but in a "personal organic" manner. Mystory is the personal counterpart to public memory.