Big Brother Google

In everyone’s free time, they’ve Googled their own name at least once. I have before, but having done it most recently, I was genuinely astonished and slightly creeped out at how much information came up…

Everything from when I worked on my best friend’s senior film at LMU, to the games that I had tested at Vivendi (now Activision-Blizzard), to every single one of my blogs and even other people’s sites who use photos I’d taken came up. There’s also the given web pages that I want to show up (i.e. http://people.artcenter.edu/~kcoats/) but the amount of data my name carries with it was surprising and unsettling. Be wary of what you attach your name to, citizens.

And they’re off!

One week into the third term and it’s looking like an eventful one. On the site gamecareerguide.com there’s a weekly feature article called “James Portnow’s Game Design Challenge.” A couple weeks ago I entered the challenge to design a replacement for the standard machine gun in first-person shooters. Earlier last week the results came out and my Doppelganger gun design got third place. It’s some of the first recognition I’ve received for design related directly to video gaming so I was pretty excited. I passed on the following challenge though which was coming up with a new take on the WWII FPS genre… Genius has its limits.

During the first Colloquium of the term an MDP-exclusive scholarship was announced. The guidelines of the scholarship call for students to modify their website to “include a clear statement of direction.” The deadline is midnight, of Tuesday, May 27. Since scholarships at ArtCenter are about as common as hit film-based video games (every now & then there’s a good one) I’m going to attempt a redesign. Although I’ve been avoiding making a Flash-exclusive site due to the difficulties in the content being Google-able, it might just be time to go for it. I’ve done a few sketches, but so far have had a lot of difficulty escaping anything resembling a “tree” or “web.” I might just go with the cliche; some design standards do seem to stick around because, unbelievably, they really work. I mean that whole wheel thing still hasn’t gone away.

Last night was the culmination of numerous designers’ hardwork, namely Mieke Gerritzen and Koert van Mensvoort, in the Biggest Visual Power Show on Next Nature. The show was part-side show, part-rock concert, and part-high art. After working the ticket booth & will call in front of the Million Dollar Theater in downtown L.A., I got to catch the last 3/4 of the show. I was very glad I got to not only volunteer for it (& receive a few free goodies), but also watch the performance and all the visuals accompanying it. The Dutch definitely have some good stuff going on over there below sea-level. If anyone is able to, I’d highly recommend trying to see the next one in 2009 as I believe they happen annually, although quite possibly in different cities.

With all that, I’m going to get back to my website redesign. 9 days is not a lot of time, especially in MDP terms…

Thesis Moral Crisis (#1)

It’s Thursday of Week 12 of my second term and after laying down for a bit to clear my thoughts before diving into the tumult of final projects I came to an unexpected realization about my thesis. As I’ve gotten closer to entering my third term and the inevitable “Thesis Gateway” at the end of it, I’ve been attempting to seriously consider what my year-long thesis project will be.

So far, two of the largest themes that I’ve found myself interested in are isolation and self-sufficiency; emanating mostly from the world of floating islands and airships known as Pelago. The concept of having one’s own self-sufficient, secluded island floating in the clouds has always attracted and fascinated me. In an age of global warming this seems even more intriguing as instead of trying to “fix” global warming or stem its effects, why not just lock ourselves away like was so often planned for nuclear holocaust? There can be no global warming or climate change in a self-sustained ecosystem or biosphere.

And herein lies the conflict. While attempting to solidify my voice for the second project in my Comm Design 2 class on the Rem Koolhaas book Mutations, I realized something unsettling. My response to Mutations was essentially, “Yes the world is mutating and so are societies. It’s globalization and we must view the world as one body with humanity in it and not warring tribes with individual agendas. The earth isn’t large enough for everyone & their egos so we must look at the larger picture.”

This goes completely against isolationism and self-sufficiency!

We, as the United States, are inescapably dependent on the rest of the world for resources. As such, and in a world of global climate change, we can not practice diplomatic isolationism again. It simply does not work. What we don’t know can & will hurt us without even a second thought.

In the face of this realization though, how does one progress on an original thesis without succumbing to the current global warming hype (not to downplay the seriousness of the issue at all; I use ‘hype’ in a cultural sense) in which everyone has an answer, but no viable solution? Is it isolation or global unity?

*sigh*

How soon are we getting to Mars?

Le premiere entree

Here’s the first entry for Kylan Coats’ graduate Media Design blog. Currently I’m in Echo Park at Christiane Holzheid’s home for a Super Studio 2 meeting. It’s a bit warm even for a southern boy like me.