User:Ricotta

R I C A R D O A B B A S Z A D E H

Cybernetics: Working with self-organizing systems

Critical Making

Mindmap/ideas before getting into research

'Reimagine an existing technology or platform using the provided sets of cards.
'With our group, we simply chose which combination of cards most suited our interests. Thus we ended up with Memes in a dystopian future, realised by video. This was a collaboration with: Laura Ketting, Jorijn de Jonge and Eva Schoren.

Research

After agreeing on the subject, we immediately began writing down collective knowledge and ideas. How does this fit in the feedback loop as discussed in class? We also started a shared Google Drive document to collect all our found information.

It soon became clear that Memes are not only mere jokes floating around the internet, but they also carry heavy political value. We also discovered that the politically charged messages had to be transfered by language, thus Meme culture has a language on its own. With these findings in mind, we started to further research and develop our project.

Findings / references

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Donald Trump tweets Pepe the Frog

Flag of Kekistan

Meme culture

- The Meme Wars by Kim de Groot or rather Mona Lisa's is a good example of someone who researches the relationship between Meme culture and folklores. Watch the footage of the Meme Wars video here<<

- Pepe the Frog is a classic meme icon, and it is used in countless Meme's. However, since Donald Trump used this Meme (see image on the right), Pepe the Frog became a political symbol of the right-wing society. It also became the mascot of Kekistan, a fantasy world which is part of a strange sub-culture. This interesting (Dutch) documentary about Kekistan can be found here<<

- This is certainly not the first time where presidents get intermigled with Memes. This is a little (joke) example of a Barack Obama Meme.

- Memes often get merged with other Memes, and carry a different value with their origin and references. Origin of the name Kek.

Language of Meme culture

- Just like our languages, Meme culture language changes over time. When we master a language, it changes the way we think, just as Lera Boroditsky explains in this Ted Talk.
- This occurrence is also known as the Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis. The Sapir Whorf hypothesis states that the specific language we speak influences the way we think about reality. It is also used in Sci-Fi such as the movie Arrival (2016).

To conclude
When we compared Meme culture and language, we came to to the conclusion that there is not much difference between these two matters. We were deeply interested in the seriousness of something which appears funny. While we got deeper into researching Meme culture, we found a lot of images, which were beyond our understanding; this clearly reveals the linguistic part of this subject. Examples of Meme feedback loop and found Memes beyond our understanding below:

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  The feedback loop system.

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  The Feedback loop explained with Memes.

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  Meme example.

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  Meme example.

Result / video

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We were inspired by Sunspring's Sci-Fi short video. The creators of this video made a machine learning script for their project. As quoted from the link: "...They created "Jetson" and fueled him with hundreds of sci-fi TV and movie scripts..." and "...they gave themselves 48 hours to shoot and edit whatever Jetson decided to write.". This also had something to do with language. What if this script will all of the sudden make sense in the future? With this hypothesis in mind, we made our own hypothesis.

Our video is based on real Memes found on the internet. Just by how memes merge, we merged memes to fit the script. Hypothesis: "What if meme culture takes over and meme language would be understood by everyone?".
Below is a preview image, Click here for the video

Cybernetic Prosthetics

Mindmap/ideas before getting into research

"A new relationships between a biological organism- and a machine, relating to our explorations on reimagining technology in the posthuman age." With this assignment we were building working prototype which "simulate interactive feedback loops that generate emergent forms." Due to common interests/ambitions, I teamed up with Jorijn de Jonge and Tim van Hooft.

Research

Since writing down ideas and common interests really worked in the previous project, we started doing this first. Many ideas came to mind out of excitement, so it was a struggle to narrow our ideas down to one subject.

We again, started a shared Google Drive document to collect all our found information.

Findings / references

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Human and technology

At first we desperately wanted to do something with plants and nature, but why? What is the benefit of this? how can we realise this in less than two weeks.

- The Cactus Project by Laura Cinti made us very excited. We found it such a remarkable idea that the usage of technology could merge genes of plant and human.
- The Next Nature Net is also very iconic concerning nature and technology. The modular body drew our attention.
- What happens when art, nature and technology meet head-on? This is a small collaboration video of a project done.