Sam Knowlton

Digital denizens or digital zombies?
Photo: Sam Knowlton

Way back in the pay-per-hour days of America Online, circa 1994, I used to run up ridiculous bills playing an online multiplayer game – I was addicted to it.

And back in my day, we didn’t have fancy graphics. Our fantasy scrolled on in line after line of text. Imagination worked overtime conjuring images of spells and knights and trolls. It was like living in a J.R.R. Tolkien novel, but ten times more engrossing, because there was no end.

That was the Golden Age. But the fantastic collaboration of so many imaginations began to break down, as one by one the imaginations fell victim to greed and became zombies.

What happened? Instead of manually typing in commands, players replaced their own input with a scripting program.

Then they’d leave their computers while their in-world characters performed endless chains of commands, returning to find a stronger, richer character.

Is Alex Wiebel actually playing Second Life, or is he questing for cash money?
Photo: Sam Knowlton

The rise of scripting eventually eroded the quality of the experience so much that the whole point of the game—to have fun imaginative experiences—was lost.

Well, it’s 2007, and 3D graphics have replaced text and the thousands have turned into thousands of thousands. But, surprisingly, the spread of zombies continues throughout online worlds.

When I log into Second Life, I see droves of avatars that appear viable in world, but are, in fact, “zombies.” What are they after now? This time, it’s real money.

10,000 Lindens was about $35 the last time I checked. With camping benches that pay just 2 Lindens every 10 minutes, it would take about 34.7 days to get 10,000 Lindens.

35 bucks a month isn’t too bad a deal.

But imagine if you had 10 different characters logged into Second Life. Imagine if you had 100.

I’ll take $3,500 a month. Hell, I’ll even quit my job. Sure, it’s a bit dramatic, but this motivation is real.

Soon, our fellow Second Lifers may not have anyone to play with: Zombies are on the rise.
Photo: Sam Knowlton

And they hold the potential to erode Second Life like any other online world.

There will always be a place to find richly textured characters in Second Life, but they are truly going to be the diamond in the rough, and active users will have to seek them out one at a time. Meanwhile, millions of avatars will be collecting their paychecks, 2 Lindens every 10 minutes.

Tired of paying for television? You might not be for much longer.

Paris Hilton wields an iPhone in a display of the most important internet content you'll ever see.
Digital illustration: Sam Knowlton

If I come across anything even flirting with seriousness, I close my browser. Why would I want to read anything serious when I can read about unsubstantiated celebrity rumors, some guy’s opinion of the iPhone, or gaze contentedly at the hypnotic allure of cute kittens?

I mean, we only have so much time in this world, and I want to get as much meaning into my life as possible. No news, no politics, no activisim. Yuck!

I know that we all feel the same way about this, but did you know there is a growing group of people who are using the Internet for such depraved diversions like news and opinion?

Thankfully, few of them have infiltrated the storied halls of Technorati’s most popular blogs. But one has.

I mean, we all remember the formula, right?

Celebrities and/or technology and/or cute kittens = $$$ and/or fame and/or glory

Adhere to the formula, ye faithful, and blogosphere stardom will be yours.

And hopefully, if we flood the Web with enough cute kittens. celebrity rumors, and gadget news, we’ll drown out all of this ridiculous noise and preserve the true purpose of the Internet.

By the people, for the people, and of the people. Oh, and, on occasion, a cute kitten or two.

Warren Beatty plays a "real" politician in Bulworth.
Image: IMDB

I've always liked the movie Bulworth. There's something so lovable about Warren Beatty delivering incisive truth through his raps.

I've always thought that if Bulworth were real and he ran, that he'd win.

As the presidential race gears up for 2008, things are getting equally ridiculous.

Politicians everywhere are scrambling to master the oft-misinterpreted "facebook effect."

Sure, facebook is the future, but the future of what?

On the surface, facebook appears to be a platform where empassioned young citizens can organize, leveraging the collective power of adolescent zeal.

Sure, people appear to support given issues. "Tell 10 to Tell 10" has been a recent one. It asks each member to tell 10 friends to click each day to help fight breast cancer.

I got an invite from somebody (can't remember who), and sure, I thought it was a good cause, so I joined. But do I do my 10 clicks a day? Sorry, I don't.

Let me tell you something: I know that almost every last one of my friends is on facebook and uses it daily. To my knowledge, not one of them has become more politically active than they already were.

I think that the excitement that has been generating about facebooking politicos and events like the CNN/YouTube debate is not so much about new media as it is about the new perspective on politicians that it gives us.

These outlets bring us close to our politicians as people, warts and all, which is a radical shift. Overly rehearsed political speeches, made by Washington aspirants heavily caked in broadcast makeup, are no way to develop rapport.

But let us into your life and we'll be your friend. I'd still vote for Bulworth.

I've been goofing around with a bit of code that Pinick gave me for image pop-ups, finally tweaking enough to create "The Perfect Link."

It looks like this:

<a href="URLGOESHERE" onclick="window.open('URLGOESHERE','popup','width=800,height=600,scrollbars=yes, resizable=no, toolbar=yes, directories=no, location=yes, menubar=no, status=no,left=0,top=0'); return false"> LINKING TEXT GOES HERE </a>

What I like about this is that it doesn't navigate away from the base page, and the new window is inconvenient enough that you sort of want to close it, thus returning you to the originating page.

Here's an example that links to this blog...

I also like this one, but decided that having the location bar is a useful necessity for those who want to copy and paste the link somewhere, or haven't discovered the magic of hitting Ctrl+D. It is, however, perhaps useful code for control freaks with crappy content who just can't bear the thought of people navigating away...

Notice that you can manipulate the various elements (substituting "yes" for "no" and vice versa) to make the new window perfectly suited to your cause.

If you really want to bug people, try something like this.

All in all, it's a little more work than your average "a href," but perhaps worth the effort if you hope to keep your visitors reading your incoherent rant. Thanks, James.

Marshall McLuhan, media medium

Somewhere in Toronto, Marshall McLuhan’s tomb is being replaced with a giant convenience story hot dog-rolling machine.

Since the Internet has grown into its awkward tweenage years, gravediggers have been working over time to keep up with the rotations of McLuhan’s body—this will save them time.

If the medium is, in fact, the message, then the Internet’s message is one of attention-deficit hyperactive schizophrenia. And, consequently, our comprehension and critical thinking is surely taking a hit. My productivity sure is.

For some reason, however, it seems some people believe video to be the culmination of the Internet’s development. Sure, YouTube is great idea, but it’s not the media messiah. And slapping video onto every online news story isn’t going to improve content. It will quite assuredly degrade it.

As a self-styled “new media journalist” I like to think of each medium as another tool in the trusty old toolbox. And, to continue with such a tired, tired, cliché (I didn’t say talented journalist), that video is one of my staples, like, say, a hammer: Blunt, quick, fairly imprecise, but great when I need to drive the point home.

But to propose that video needs to be on every story on every site every time seems akin to proposing that we pound nails into every inch of wall space we can reach.

Actually, I'm a large.

But that’d be distracting. And ridiculous.

The true mark of successful new media journalism is not a matter of multimedia content — that part is expected — it’s the skillful framing of each component of storytelling in its optimum medium and knowing how to combine the components with finesse.