So, during one chapter of Hamlet's Blackberry Powers talks about how helpful our technology is.  Because if you think about it, there really are so many pros to having a cell phone, a lap top, etc... The most important being my blackberry obviously.  He describes how when he called him mom while driving he was washed over with a rush of emotions and he was very excited to visit his family.  Without this technology, it really would have been quite a process just trying to get in touch with her.

Our cell phones are much more than entertainment.  Maybe we text excessively or play games on our smart phones too much, but at the end of the day I need it to call family members, fellow students, professors, employers, and my friends.  But then again, i could have a basic phone for those purposes and instead i have a blackberry. and definitely use it excessively.

So whats the solution?  We obviously need phones for practical reasons, but we don't need to play tetris every hour on our phones. or have facebook notifications sent to our phones.  I dont know, i guess we should take a look into all simplifying our technology in a way?

ps- while i was doing this blog i was logging into what i thought was "blackboard.newpaltz.edu" and instead i found myself accidentally typing in "blackberry.com"

way to go, kasey.

Last night:


Me and two of my house mates are sitting in my living room.  One of my house mates was baking cookies so we were pumped. 


But then something happened.


My two friends had laptops on their laps and let me know that they were talking to each other through facebook while sitting literally a person away from each other.
Immediately it reminded me of what Eden was talking about in class the other day, when her house mates were doing something similar. SO i told them that story and was like, do you guys want me to take away all your shit?


needless to say.. they didn't.


just thought it was funny that this kind of stuff happens to more people than we'd ever like to believe.

weird stuff.

"This time, like all times, is a very good one, if we but know what to do with it."

-Ralph Waldo Emerson

This is the quote that Powers opens up with in Hamlet's Blackberry.  I feel like this has so much to do with what we've been discussing in class this semester.  We have so much power at our fingertips.  We can virtually do anything we want.  The possibilities are endless but its like we are using our power for evil, not good.

It sounds cliche, but I think it's pretty accurate.  Its like, when you look back in time, people did not have nearly as much technology as we do, and they accomplished so much more than us.  Instead of coming up with kindles and blackberrys, they created the lightbulb and the television and a computer. 

Then we came along and contaminated these tools by adding more and more useless functions to them.  For example, instead of watching television once an evening for one solitary program, it has turned into necessary white noise that is always on in the background of your life.  Same goes with the computer.  Instead of using it to write and send papers easily or to access certain information, it has turned into just one more vehicle for entertainment purposes.

So basically, the quote is saying that we can do so many great things with the technology we have today... so why are we creating applications for our iphones that allow us to tweet with celebrities we don't know? weird.

remember elmo, guys?

thanksgiving has passed and it is immediately christmas time. like, immediately. i barely put my licked clean of turkey dinner dish into the sink before my mom had christmas tunes playing.  I don't mind though, i love christmas. but, i don't necessarily love the craziness it brings out in people.


I have never participated in black friday. ever. i hate people when i shop, and i'd rather go on a random day when the stores are empty and i can just get shit done.  This year was different.  my older sister, my younger sister and my mom were all down to go to Target at 4 am.  and i figured i should experience this crazy day/morning for myself in order to fully know how much i hate it. 


Literally, at 4 am the parking lot was packed and the store was full of people buying tv's in fucking bulk.  it was so weird. my mom bought my sister a wii for christmas and it was dirt cheap, so that was cool...  but it was so bizarre how many people woke up for this chaos.  


Now, thinking about it, its like, ten hours ago we were supposedly giving thanks to everything we have and appreciating our family and friends because we are lucky we have anything at all.  and now, those same people are pretending they don't hear me say "excuse me" when i am really just trying to get by them, i'm not after their fucking precious play station they've been waiting for.  chill out people.


I understand you want to make your kids happy, make your friends happy, by getting them the ultimate christmas gift, and if you can get it for a cheap price, hey,  i love a good deal too.  but come on, don't be crazy. 
...i think we all remember the "tickle me elmo" incident a few years back. 

amateurs everywhere.

I've been thinking a lot about if there is high art and low art.  I really feel like its so subjective who can say if one artist's piece of work is better than someone elses? If I have a totally different style than someone I am obviously going to have different tastes in art.  Maybe some artists have more "technique" but that doesn't necessarily mean I will enjoy it more. 

I am taking a ceramics class this semester.  I am a complete amateur.  I don't really know what I'm doing but I just wing it, and my teacher suggested me majoring in this.  So its like, even amateurs have to start somewhere.  Right?

People who post their work on blogs or facebook are amateurs but what's wrong with that?  I might be really inspired by some random artists work and I wouldn't see it unless they posted it somewhere.  

So, in my amateur opinion, I think that the idea of high art and low art is silly.  It's whatever you make of it.  The other day I totally wrecked a piece I made in class and I hated it, but my teacher came over and loved it and convinced me not to throw it away.  It was high art to her and low art to me.

Basically what I'm saying is that  amateurs can make high art to someone and experts can make low art to someone.

windows seven.

That new commercial for the Windows 7 phone kind of confused me.


When I first watched it I seriously thought it was all about how we use our phones too much and we are missing out on life because our heads are always staring into the little screen in our hands.  And then at the end of it I was like oh. this is supposed to make me want to buy a new phone? I don't know maybe I'm missing the real point but to me it just made me think about how I do use my phone too much and I should try to stop.


So.. now will I go buy the new Windows 7 phone? Nope. I actually have been seriously trying to use my phone less.  For example, I realized how fucking annoying it is when people are texting when you are trying to speak to them. So I've made a conscious effort to put my phone away when I'm with my friends. 


If I'm hanging out with my friends then who else do I really need to be texting?

desensitize this.

So I was thinking about how much the web has truly desensitized us to certain things.  For example, personally, I feel like when I hear about really vulgar stories regarding rape, drugs, murder, I am not as phased as I should be.  Its like, we hear about these things so much and in such a nonchalant manner through the web that it doesn't have the impact on us as a society anymore.

But... is that really true?  Because, then I started thinking about the recent suicides of the gay men who were bullied or made to feel inadequate because of their sexuality.  They obviously were not desensitized to the words they read through their facebooks or twitters.  Its like, we are still affected by what we read or hear through the web in such an extreme way; the web literally has the power to kill.   


That thought made me kind of uncomfortable for a second.  The same page that I visit every single day, every single hour of my life and joke to my friends, stalk strangers, procrastinate.. this is one of the sites that others are viewing and resorting to suicide because of the things they see about themselves.  How did facebook/twitter get that power?  And when did people think that they should use social media vehicles to torture and torment other people?


I change my mind.  We really aren't too desensitized to everything on the web, we are still very sensitive.

the web helps me. i swear.

Facebook has been consuming my blog/life for the past few weeks.

I feel like in our class discussions we always remind ourselves about how awful facebook is for our youthful minds and how authors such as Keen think sites like this are making us dumber.  But am I really becoming dumber and less human because of facebook?

Maybe some people are, but that's because they probably are shy in real life too, so they use facebook as an outlet.  It's not like the people who are incapable of talking face to face would really be drastically different without sites like facebook.  Maybe we'd spend our time differently... but let's be real I'd probably just end up shopping on line or watching tv, or finding some way to get distracted and procrastinate before doing actual work. 


I just noticed how I've been ragging on facebook for the past few weeks and I should probably stop since I myself am one of facebook's number one fans.  I think that there are definitely pros to facebook because I can count a few occasions when I've found classmates or they've found me through facebook and its helped a lot when I've had a project or something and couldn't get in touch with them any other way.


I know.. that's just one example and it only happened a couple of times, but what would I have done without it?

I just wanted to make sure I wasn't criticizing the web too much, since I do love it.. and I think we all need it to some extent.

judge me, please.

So me and my housemates just celebrated Halloween for the past few days.  One day they all dressed as Smurfs, we were robots, one of us was a Girl Scout and one was a Cavewoman.  The weekend was sick, everyone had an awesome time. but now that it's Sunday I've starting analyzing the way we actually did act.

The whole day we have been hungover slobs laying around the living room, unshowered, stanky, and recalling our slutty/drunken/hilarious moments from the weekend. So, as we lay around in the most embarrassing states, we also just judged every single picture from the weekend.

Every.single.picture.

Album after album we searched for glimpses of us and whenever we caught eachother we would either tag or detag ourselves.  If I saw a picture of myself where my face was mangled or my hair was too wild I legit just removed it from my facebook forever.  I never have to see it again.  Its a fucking life saver honestly, because I have seen some ridonkulous pictures of myself.. but does it remove it from real life? or has facebook become real life?

So, besides checking ourselves out I noticed how much I was judging every picture I looked at. 

"oh my god, she was a slut." "wait, what was she?" "what was he fucking doing with her?"

What gives me the right to criticize these people for every aspect of their costumes, facial expressions and behavior when I know I'm acting like a fool right outside the camera's view. I should definitely try to stop, but maybe these people should just detag those whacky pictures of themselves the way I do...

facebook chat me. now.

So I've been thinking a lot about how much I text.  It's actually almost scary the fact that my blackberry has been skitzing out on me today and I haven't had any way of communicating with my best friend for a solid three hours so far.. I am beyond lost.

I literally got so nervous about if it was my blackberry trying to keep me from texting my friend meaningless nonsense or hers.   I still don't know because I am currently facebook chatting her while I type up this blog...

So basically when our blackberry's get temperamental we are lost. But find ourselves through facebook? So weird.
ps- my blackberry just started to work again!

Oh, so Keen is right when he says we are destroying our values, economy and culture.  Personally, my values revolve around my most prized possessions which consist of my blackberry and my blackberry's case.  I mean, of course I care about more substantial things as well, like my family and friends and whatever.. but for about three hours that my blackberry decided to try and ruin my life it was all I could think about. It consumed me.  Keen describes our society as being basically dependent on our technology, and I can confirm his ideas because I am the perfect example.
I am Keen's worst nightmare I think.

Wanna stalk for a little?

Chuck Klosterman talks about how the Unabomber had a thesis that "technology is bad for civilization".  He describes how Ted Kaczynski felt he had to kill people in order to get his ideas published.

Just a while before I was typing this blog I was sitting in the library with my friend.  She was studying and I was reading the excerpt from Eating the Dinosaur.  At one point she turned to me and said "wanna just stalk for a little?" I didn't even flinch.  Of course I did.  I love examining a person's facebook page so far back I know what someone wore to their high school prom.  After we realized facebook wasn't working fast enough we gossiped for a minute and then both just went back to working.  I went back to reading all about the Unabomber and she, I couldn't even tell you what she was "working" on. 

This definitely wouldn't have mattered much to me since we stalk people everyday, but in Eating the Dinosaur, the last page Klosterman says "I can no longer imagine life without it", regarding the internet.  It made me think I agree.  I love having every useless fact I want at my fingertips and like Klosterman, I literally cannot imagine my life without it.  What if whenever I was bored or needed a break from studying I had to think of something to do besides stalk my best friend's boyfriend's older brother who I've never actually met before but know far too much about just from observing his facebook...

Aside from me and my friends being the creepiest, I've realized that I am quite dependent on the internet.  I shouldn't rely so much on this machine to feed me information, entertainment and anything else I want or need.  The Unabomber might have been right when he said that technology is bad for civilization, it has sort of made me uncivilized if you think about it.  I spend time just looking at other people online.  Sometimes they're my friends, sometimes they aren't.  Either way this habit definitely isn't a good one. Maybe the Unabomber should blow up my hands too..

bye bye crackberry.

I experienced drunk texters last night yet again. and actually wanted to throw my beloved blackberry at the wall. i don't know if that's a dramatic response or not.. so maybe i would've just liked to find my out of control texters, take their phones and make them eat them or something. 

texting has become not only a way of communicating excessively, but a way of being more "honest".  some people text me the most random messages and when i see them in real life i know they would never say anything like that face to face. because they don't. if you are really going to use your cell phone as a catalyst to get to me, at least make an effort to speak your mind to me more literally too. like, actually use your words please.

basically i'm just noticing how cell phones have made people a lot less ballsy when face to face with someone.  kind of takes the fun out of things. i appreciate blunt statements and surprising comments and nothing even resembles a surprise through a text.. because nothings even real. there isn't an ounce of emotion shared through a text message, so it's like, seeing the words "i love you" or "i hate you" which are generally held pretty high up on the scale of "only say it when ya mean it" these days.. they don't mean shit through a text. they are just words on a screen. 

maybe ill just start turning my phone off at night. but how will i wake up? shoot.