Initial Thoughts on the Class (Response to Discussion)

I was quite impressed with the class and a number of ideas quickly popped into my head regarding the first course text, Remediation: Understanding New Media. I have to admit I was unfamiliar with the term 'remediation' so I wikipediaed it with no success, and then came across an excellent definition from Dictionary.com (see below). Although I still have not purchased or opened the text book at this point, I still have a number of great ideas sparked from the class discussion regarding remediation.

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/remediation

The biggest thing i noticed with remediation was in the introductions Ian had us present. I believe Ian has already gone over the remediation process in music technology (record player to casette tape to compact disc to mp3), but the one I was considering most was video gaming technology.

Early video gaming technology was basic, and the 8-12 year olds of today wouldn't be nearly as fascinated by two dimensional super mario with repetitive and annoying music on Super Nintendo as I was as a small child. Throughout the years there have been massive improvements in the graphic design of games, themes, the exploration of a game, music, the level of difficulty and so on and so forth. Another thing to consider is Sony/Nintendo's/Microsoft's need for their systems to meet multimedia demands. For example, all systems (The big Three - Nintendo Wii, Playstation 3, and Xbox 360) can import and play/display the majority of music, picture and video files a computer holds, and Xbox 360 even has the capability to stream files directly from a Windows based PC to the system and onto your television screen. Who would have thought 20 years ago that a video game console would be able to play games with 80 hour storylines, 25 different weapons, graphic realism, the ability to physically immerse yourself into the game (a la Nintendo Wii), to play with friends online, hold your whole library of music and show your movies on HD DVD (Xbox 360) or Blu Ray (Playstation 3).

The thing that fascinates me the most with remediation is not the technological advancement, although that is something to behold with the Xbox 360's new capabilities, but our culture's hegemonic practice to constantly need bigger, better, faster. Obviously, this is spawned from ideas of capitalism and materialism that are instilled in us from a young age. When taking this into consideration I had a shocking vision of the future of gaming. If Nintendo, Playstation and Microsoft had some sort of merger, virtual reality gaming would be born. Nintendo's interactive gameplay, Microsoft's computer skill set, and Playstation's video graphic capabilities could combine to create an insanely accurate virtual reality game. Mind you, this is a process years in the making and we're still a bit far of technologically speaking. But - I say bring the remediation! On with the future of gaming, and the future of every other media medium for that matter.

Works Cited

"Remediation." Definitions from Dictionary.com. Random House: 2006. http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/remediation