How much is enough?

Tyler and I chatted this past week in my office, and in that discussion, a few really important questions came up. I’d like us as a class to chew on these questions and see what wisdom we might be able to produce or share. First the set-up.

We talked this past week about what sorts of ‘dreams’ or futures we imagine for ourselves, and several of us shared them. Rachel laid out a common dream, which is to acquire a little more than our parents — from a tw0-story house and two cars to three stories and a three-car garage, for example. I think her description is accurate.

But making money and acquiring stuff can’t be our chief goal, right? Making more money can’t be the goal or even a priority of pursuing a good life, or can it? I ask because there is no reason to have money other than to spend it, and we can’t “spend” our way into meaning or goodness or significance. Growth, even financial growth, ultimately fails to make us happier. Oh, and it’s environmentally destructive, even disastrous. It’s senseless as a goal in and of itself, and even as a means to other goals unless it is achieved at some point on the way to those greater “good”s.

The banking crisis of 2008 (and since) showed us that our economic system relies on the motives of greed and acquisitiveness, which are morally bankrupt. Our best hope? To do what we’re doing. To figure out what a ‘good’ life looks like, and how to pursue it. To un-do our society’s distortions of ‘good,’ and to pursue a morally good life that is sufficient unto itself. (Some of these distortions include ‘competitive spending,’ or acquiring to keep score; ‘snob goods,’ or goods acquired simply because they differentiate one from the less-well-off; and ‘bandwagon goods,’ or goods we want simply because others have them.)

So, my questions for you, and I think they are just critical to what we’re doing in the course:

• What is wealth for?
• How much money do you need to lead and pursue a ‘good’ life? (a moral, virtuous life in community and where exemplars ‘flourish’)

Deadline for your comments to this post: noon, Tuesday, March 12

CREDIT for many of these ideas goes to the new book, How much is enough? by Skidelsky and Skidelsky.

A “good life” thought experiment

Borrowing from the Mitchell reading, and zero-ing in on the first sentence of paragraph 20 (“That usually I believe . . .”) as a means to analyze ideas, here’s what I would like each of you to do:

List five of your beliefs or feelings that you currently have (or had in the recent past).

Discuss how you come by those ideas or beliefs?

Look to apply other points of analysis from paragraph 20 to your beliefs.

What happens?

This should be really, really interesting. And feel free to comment on others’ reactions here so we extend our discussion. We have so little time in our class sessions; let’s leverage the blog to unpack some more of what I believe to be two of our more critical readings. Let’s set a deadline of 9am Tuesday, Feb. 19, which will give me a chance to read them before class in the afternoon (hopefully).

Thinking about immersive, natural, experience-based multimedia journalism

Whew, that’s a long title, but an important one. For this thought experiment and journalism safari, I want you all to spend some time with “Snowfall,” a six-chapter multimedia feature story from the New York Times on an avalanche in Washington’s Cascade Mountains, a project that required six months and more than a dozen journalists to produce.

As The Atlantic magazine pointed out, “Snowfall” isn’t “the future of journalism” for lots of reasons. But it is a cue of what is to come, of at least a part of the future of journalism. It’s not THE future because it took six months and a dozen journalists to produce. And because not every story needs or warrants this sort of immersive experience. Most news stories don’t. But some do, especially process journalism, the most difficult kind.

What I find most notable about the slick, easy-to-navigate, layered feature is how natural it seems. If Apple did journalism as it does phones and computers, “Snowfall” is about what I imagine Apple might create. The feature smoothly and naturally transitions from element to element, giving the “reader” (or interactor) information when it makes sense to begin incorporating the new layer but without interrupting completely the narrative flow or arc. It’s an experience, in other words.

So, I’d like us to study “Snowfall,” and to do that we’ll crowdsource, we’ll divide and conquer. Group 1, I’d like you to “experience” the “Snowfall” feature on an iPad and bring back notes of that experience. How did it “work”? What’s best about the feature on iPad, and what might be improved? What might this signal to us about a part of the future of storytelling in digital environments?

Group 2, I’d like you all to compare “Snowfall” with another immersive, graphics-intensive feature, from Pitchfork, and one of a very different sort. The “cover story” looks at author Natasha Khan and her approach to (fictional) storytelling.

Group 3, do the same, but with the ESPN feature from “Outside the Lines” on the very colorful long-time Pittsburgh Pirate pitcher, Dock Ellis.

We’ll then compare our notes to come up with some best practices, or at least some really good things to think about as we think (and re-think) digital storytelling. Let’s think about what sorts of stories merit these kinds of Herculean efforts. Let’s also appreciate how text-intensive all three of the features we’re looking at in fact are; text is not dead; in fact, it’s resurgent. Smartphones are bringing with them the return of the dominance of text, as recent Pew Research study findings suggest.

Back to “Snowfall,” I think it’s important what graphics director Steve Duenes told Poynter Institute about his team’s goals: To “find ways to allow readers to read into, and then through multimedia, and then out of multimedia. So it didn’t feel like you were taking a detour, but the multimedia was part of the one narrative flow.” This is really significant: A single, coherent narrative flow. How do we pull this off when incorporating layers and multimedia?

To the Range Rovers!! Let’s do the safari and then compare our field notes on Friday, Feb. 15. Write up your field notes in some coherent, organized way, perhaps as a memo to your editor (me):

20 February 2013
Memorandum to Dr. Brian Carroll
RE: Lessons from Snowfall
Your report here, in 12-point Times New Roman, single-spaced type. (You will be turning this in.)

The muddiest point so far in pursuing a good life

I thought I’d take a quick pulse of the class. Take a moment or two to identify what is for you so far the muddiest point or least clear aspect of the course so far. It can be a term, a concept, a reading, a way we do things, something about the writing assignments — anything that you think is the least clear, most confusing aspect of the course experience thus far in our journey toward a good life. You can write as little or as much as you would like.

To facilitate discussion Tuesday, the deadline for this short post is: 9 a.m., Tuesday morning, Feb. 12.

Next safari: hunting down your favorite design era

Mies van der Rohe’s Bauhaus chair in chrome

Due Monday, Nov. 19, a briefing on your favorite design school/era/philosophy. You are to choose one that is established, not one you’ve sort of made up. The ‘history’ backgrounder linked off the course webpage is a good starting place, as is chapter 8 in our textbook. You are free to venture beyond these sources, but, again, make sure the school or philosophy is an established one.

In this briefing, provide:

• a backgrounder or description of the era/school, including several of its hallmarks or characteristics or repeating elements (a few paragraphs on this)
• three visual examples of the era (for example, a car, a piece of furniture, a movie poster, a building, whatever)
• the names of several of this era’s movers and shakers, from any field, but do identify each person’s claim to fame — for example, for Mission style, Frank Lloyd Wright (architecture and home furnishings).

Hunting down type

As we sub-divided in class, your job is to conduct one of four typography safaris as listed below.

For the first group, I’m commissioning you to choose a typeface for a 2012 adaptation of the novel Pride & Prejudice. This means an author has re-written the classic Austen novel so that the same story is set in 21st century England. Choose a typeface for the cover, and a typeface for the body text, and provide a paragraph justification for each as to why your choice is THE right typeface for the job. Your priority for the body text type choice is of course readability and legibility.

For the second group, I am commissioning you to choose a typeface for the (not-yet-introduced) iPhone6. You are choosing a type the phone will use itself, for email, texts, etc. Provide a paragraph justification as to why it’s the right typeface for the job. This is a typeface that has to work in really small or tight spaces, so do some testing. Make sure the typeface is readable even when really small, so be on guard against letters that bump into each other (like the Romney logo), and make sure “ones” are distinguishable from lowercase “L”s. Helvetica won’t work, in other words.

Group three, I’d like you all to walk from your dorm room to your first appointment of the day, taking photographs of any signage you encounter in between those two points. Write up a brief narrative of your safari, pointing out especially effective type (and why) and really poor type (and why). You will find that poor display type abounds. Think about signage type as interface. It’s supposed to help you quickly find what you’re looking for. So, ask, does it work? Or are there better choices? (For example, imagine being brand new on campus and having to find, say, Normandy or the cottages.)

Finally, the last group, I’m commissioning you to imagine yourselves running for the office prime minister of Berrylandia, an idyllic and wholesome land of milk, honey and someday soon, football. This executive office makes you an all-powerful ruler. You have to design a campaign poster, like Obama’s Forward PERIOD. And you have to choose a typeface for your campaign. This typeface has to embody and communicate your core values as a candidate. Choose a typeface and provide a paragraph justification as to why it’s the right typeface for your campaign, identifying what those core values are. Give us a sample of your choice if you can.

I’m making these safari catches due at class time on Friday, Nov. 9.

If you need places to experiment with typefaces online, there are several on the class page, in the block for this week. You can also visit: http://www.cubanxgiants.com/berry/300/type.html for some resources.

What should the law do?

From our discussion with Roddy Llewellyn (pictured), the scenario of the Vietnamese boy kidnapped and forced to work in a hydroponic cannabis lab presented us with an interesting context in which to ask our missional question: What should the law do? Here’s the scenario, excerpted from DS Llewellyn’s blog, The Slave Detective:

“One (scenario) is where a person was recognised by The Social Services as a minor, had been placed in a cannabis factory by a family he had worked as a domestic slave for and then locked into the premises having nothing to do with the cannabis plants. He was there for five days when the police arrested him for cultivation of cannabis, and he received two years imprisonment.”

The boy gets a prison sentence. But as Roddy asked in class, what about the people who kidnapped and placed him there? Who locked him up on the premises? Why is the “victim” in this also the perpetrator?

So, I’d like a comment on what the law should do in human trafficking instances and cases like this one, but to keep us honest, also answer how the law should do what you prescribe?

And realize as Roddy does that there are finite resources, that identifying, building a case against, arresting and prosecuting the higher level criminals in these networks takes years, and realize that political pressure is felt most in areas like conviction rates, street crime rates, etc. Remember Roddy asking Rachel what she wants her police doing — spending years going after these syndicate crime bosses, or finding the person who stole her TV (or whatever)?

Comment deadline: Tuesday, Nov. 6, 9am

“She’s not my type”

The goal with these online surveys is to explore our own attitudes and mindsets with regards to stereotypes, stereotyping, and ‘in’ and ‘out’ groups. A set of easy-to-take tests at Harvard, part of its Project Implicit, will help us do this. I’d like each of us to take at least two of these Project Implicit tests, and choose any two other than “Weapons” or “Presidents.” Each test takes approximately five minutes.

I also want each student to take two of the surveys at UnderstandingPrejudice.org. You are going to love these, I think. After you’ve taken the four tests (two at each website), comment to this post about what you learned, if anything. Were you made aware of anything useful? Surprising? Did the surveys change your thinking in any way? Share your experiences with these surveys here, and do so before 9 a.m. Friday, Nov. 2 I look forward to reading your responses.

A slight detour: Sharing your learning memories

I recently re-read Seth Godin’s blog post, What you can learn from a lousy teacher, and it got me thinking about the kinds of learning experiences students can have. I’ve been thinking about how out-moded much of our educational practices are for a digital mediated age and generation.

In his post, Godin lists the unintentional good lessons that bad teachers teach and model:

1. Grades are an illusion
2. Your passion and insight are reality
3. Your work is worth more than mere congruence to an answer key
4. Persistence in the face of a skeptical authority figure is a powerful ability
5. Fitting in is a short-term strategy; standing out pays off in the long run
6. If you care enough about the work to be criticized, you’ve learned enough for today

I agree with hese, and my list, too, would begin with the negative effects of the violence and illusion of grading. Success (or failure) on tests and even in courses is not a useful predictor of success (or failure) in life, I’ve observed. Grades seem to be a necessary evil perpetrated by the twin evils of standardization and scholarship and financial aid criteria. I try really hard to move us away from this illusory game and toward real learning, which is often messy and unpredictable but a lot of fun.

But that’s not my emphasis here. Here I want to leverage the benefits of the blog to ask you to share their most formative experience of your lives in school and/or college (any level, in other words). Let’s look (or listen) also for what doesn’t appear — what’s missing from our narratives. (Every appearance is also a disappearance.)

We discussed memory, including how it works, how it shapes who we are (or who we think we are) and our reality. How we tell our stories can say quite a bit about us, as well, so I’m interested in reading between our lines, too. How this selectivity works is a taproot into how we make sense of the world.

So, please share your story: What was the most formative or influential or memorable experience of your life in school (K to 12 to now)? Let’s shoot to have your response in the form of a comment by noon on Friday, Oct. 26. I genuinely look forward to learning more about the things you carry.

Parking lot safari

The swooshification of American culture

Because we can’t meet in class this week (boooooo!), I’ve dreamt up this fun visual rhetoric safari. Here’s what you’re going to do, and if you did it as a class, say on Wednesday from 12 to 12:50 when we would otherwise be meeting, the safari would have a really cool archaeological dig/social aspect to it. Not required, but recommended. Sorry, I digress. Here’s the safari:

Hit the Berry parking lots armed with only a digital camera (or smartphone with camera functionality). Search out in its natural habitat the most exotic, interesting, unusual, or mysterious piece of visual rhetoric as it is displayed on or as part of someone’s motor vehicle. This could be a bumper sticker, window sticker, obituary (i think those are pretty weird), doo-dad, hood ornament — it’s up to you.

Do four things:

1. Find and record (capture) the artifact
2. Write a sentence or two about what it means
3. And another sentence or two about how you know that, how you know what it means
4. And, finally, cite a power tool in your comments on how

Bring a color print copy of the photo of the artifact to class on Monday, Oct. 22.