"Gay Cure" App to be taken down

The Washington Post (3-24-11) reports that an app from a religious group that seeks to "cure" homosexuality will be removed from the Apple apps store. They are also being pressed to cease carrying an app that helps warn drivers about DUI road checkpoints. Does the controversy surrounding these two applications represent the entrance (imposition?) of social values into the choice of what software to sell? Will all software now be subjected to an ethics test before it is listed? Or are these particularly egregious cases unlike most software which is ethically neutral or harmless?

Creativity vs. Profitability

On Wednesday morning, author (and Larry Thompson's messiah) Dan Pink returned to Ringling to speak about his new book Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us. In the book Pink sifts through economic and social science studies to find what motivates people in the workplace. Of particular interest was a study he cited by Teresa Amabile regarding commissioned versus non-commissioned work of art.

"In the 1990s, a team of researchers led by Harvard Business School’s Teresa Amabile conducted an intriguing experiment with visual artists. Amabile asked 23 painters and sculptors to randomly select 10 of their commissioned works and 10 of their non-commissioned works. Then she presented the 460 pieces to a panel of art experts – museum curators, art historians, gallery owners, and so on, who didn’t know where the works came from – to evaluate the art.

“Our results were quite startling,” Amabile and her colleagues reported. “The commissioned works were rated as significantly less creative than the non-commissioned works, yet they were not rated as different in technical quality.”

Put another way, the commissioned art was good. But the works that were great were consistently the non-commissioned ones."

At Ringling we always speak of "Shattering the Myth of the Starving Artist". Amabile's study suggests the best art is done not for money, but for self expression. Conflict?

NY Academy of Art Challenges Facebook Censorship

Excerpt from NY Times article:

Facebook apparently had determined that an image the academy had uploaded to its Facebook page ran afoul of its ban on nudity. Yet the image — an ink-on-paper drawing of a woman’s naked upper body by Steven Assael — was hardly racy. It was the kind of drawing you might see in galleries and museums the world over.

Link to NY Times Article
http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/02/18/art-school-runs-afoul-of-facebooks-nudity-police/?hpw

Link to Academy of Art Blog article addressing the issue.
demyofart.blogspot.com/2011/01/facebook-curator-of-culture.html

Human Wall Protecting Cairo Museum During Egypt Riots

Not sure if I should be heart warmed by this story of Egyptians risking their lives by building a human wall around museums to protect many of their ancient artifacts, or deeply disturbed that in the midst of fighting for freedom and democracy some use the unrest as an excuse to rob and loot from their heritage.

I-phone kids' games lead to huge bills for parents

Click on this link to read a Washington Post (2-2-11) article about how games on Apple phones, played by kids (a lot!) are leading to unanticipated bills for parents.

Facebook's "sponsored stories" creates controversy

Social networking's fascination with following the actions of participants is increasingly being mined for its marketing possibilities. Click on this link to read a Washington Post (1-27-11) story about a new marketing practice of Facebook that takes users expressions of likes and check-ins at restaurants and attaches them to products for advertising purposes.  There are apparently some questions about how clearly the practice is being described; this affects the level of consent achieved for participation.  If I choose to share my life with my online friends, am I also choosing to share with them my buying preferences?  Perhaps!

Museum of Modern Art to display controversial video | Reuters

Museum of Modern Art to display controversial video | Reuters

A controversial video that was not shown due to a scene depicting ants crawling on a crucifix will now be exhibited.

Sony hits snag in PS3 hacking case

Click on this link to read a Washington Post (1-18-11) article about how Sony is having difficulty suing a hacker for hacking into the PS3 game console (and then publishing how to do it).  Should owners of technology have the right to hack them any way they wish?  Is this a separate issue from that of sharing how to do it with others?  Or, if I have the right to hack my PS3, why is it wrong to tell you how to do it, if you have the same right?  Are content mediators that carry the instructions liable for doing so (as Sony apparently believes)?

Obama 'HOPE' artist and AP settle copyright claims

Here's an article from the Washington Post (1-13-11_ about the apparent end to the controversy between Shephard Fairey and AP over the use of the Obama image.

Gaming - making the world better

I thought this presentation by Game Designer, Jane McGonigal, was interesting in light of the recent article in the Sarasota Herald.
Video - Jane McGonigal
Liberal Arts Faculty Member Dr. Ryan Van Cleave and Ringling College Computer Animation Department Head, Jim McCampbell were featured in a front page article in today's Sarasota Herald-Tribune. The article features Dr. Van Cleave and his recent book entitled " UnPlugged: My Journey Into the Dark World of Video Game Addiction."
Van Cleave's recent book, published by Health Communications, Inc., is a compelling portrait of one man's journey into the obsessive of video games. The article presents Ryan's story in contrast to the Game Art & Design focus here at Ringling and is an incredible article you won't want to miss, sure to inspire some intellectual debate.

Read the article

To Test Housing Program, Some Are Denied Aid

It has long been the standard practice in medical testing: Give drug treatment to one group while another, the control group, goes without.

Now, New York City is applying the same methodology to assess one of its programs to prevent homelessness. Half of the test subjects — people who are behind on rent and in danger of being evicted — are being denied assistance from the program for two years, with researchers tracking them to see if they end up homeless.
But some public officials and legal aid groups have denounced the study as unethical and cruel, and have called on the city to stop the study and to grant help to all the test subjects who had been denied assistance.
“They should immediately stop this experiment,” said the Manhattan borough president, Scott M. Stringer. “The city shouldn’t be making guinea pigs out of its most vulnerable.”

Desperate Housewives Quells Jihad

From Slate (12-08-10):
Desperate Housewives may seem the epitome of American decadence, but in Saudi Arabia, the show is turning youth away from jihad according to a secret May 2009 cable released by Wikileaks. The cable, titled "David Letterman: Agent of Influence," says the satellite broadcast of U.S. TV shows like Housewives and the Late Show With David Letterman has been more effective at quelling extremist zeal than the U.S.-funded TV news channel al-Hurra. The $500 million Al-Hurra, which features extended interviews with policians, can't compete with Eva Longoria and Jennifer Aniston, reported U.S. diplomats who met with Saudi media executives. The diplomats also said Saudi audiences were particularly attracted to certain themes like "heroic honesty in the face of corruption" as evinced by films such as the George Clooney vehicle Michael Clayton, reports the Guardian. "Saudis are now very interested in the outside world and everybody wants to study in the US if they can. They are fascinated by US culture in a way they never were before," the cable reads.

Read original story in The Guardian | Wednesday, Dec. 8, 2010

Apple Patents Sext-Blocking Technology

Apparently just keeping porn off the iPad isn't enough for Steve Jobs and Co. Now Apple is trying to take the tawdry out of text messaging with a technology that can prevent their devices from sending or receiving "objectionable" texts. The U.S. Patent and Trademark office approved a patent for "Text-based communication control for personal communication device" Wednesday. The background information Apple submitted with their patent request expressed concern that there is currently "no way to monitor and control text communications to make them user appropriate. For example, users such as children may send or receive messages (intentionally or not) with parentally objectionable language." Their new see-no-evil application would evaluate whether a given text contained "approved" content based on "objective ratings criteria or a user's age or grade level." If the text is too naughty, the application "prevents such text from being included in the text-based communication," and alerts the user (or his parents) that a text has been blocked. TechCrunch's Alexa Tsotsis says isn't overly optimistic about the chances of Steve Jobs saving the nation's teenagers from themselves. Serial sexters will just "find some clever workaround to express how much they want to bang, screw, hit it or a myriad of other words that don't immediately set off the censorship sensors," she predicts. And just keeping kids in line won't rid us of the nation's worst sext offenders, unless Brett Favre's mom still pays his phone bill. 

From Slate (10-14-10)

Read original story in TechCrunch | Wednesday, Oct. 13, 2010

Street artist enlivens The Simpsons

Banksy revives "Simpsons'" edge with wild opening scene

It's not the annual Halloween episode, but the opening of "The Simpsons" last night was equal parts dark, morbid and amazing.
Street artist Banksy came to Springfield last night, becoming the first artist to ever storyboard a "Simpsons" opening. And what an opening it was.
An underground sweat shop, a dying unicorn, a cat fur wood chipper: You have to watch the clip to understand the full horror and brilliance.

Banksy came to prominence with subversive stencils that started appearing on London streets in the '90s. He's an interesting choice for the cartoon show, and he has definitely vaulted the longtime TV giant back into conversation.

This is not the first time Banksy has visited "The Simpsons." The Daily Wh.at points out that Bansky took on Bart Simpson and the chalkboard gag in New Orleans in 2008.
After the jarring opening, the show went back to its regular routine of guest cameos, self-referential jokes and tangential story lines.

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By Melissa Bell  | Washington Post | October 11, 2010; 9:14 AM ET

Lost in the world of screens?

Click on this link to read a rant from Truthdig by Chris Hedges about how we are all losing ourselves in the world of screens (computers/phones/etc.).  This article was contributed by Robert Stanton.