The Remediated self
We see ourselves today in and through our available
media.
This is not to say that our identity is fully determined
by media, but rather that we employ media as
vehicles for defining both personal and cultural
identity.
A man has as many social selves as there are
induviduals who recognize him and carry an image of
the person in their mind.

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We look at to types:
Virtual reality (second life) where we live
different lives.
Networked self. Live simultaneous lives in
cyperspace (video conference, email…)
and in the physical office.

The desire for immediacy cannot be
fulfilled by transparent media
(photography, live television, virtual reality
and three-dimentional computer graphics)
and must therefore be supplemented by
technologies of hypermediacy (text, video,
sound and animation).
Remediation of the body
Is the self defined by gender.
- We have cosmetic surgery
(computerprogramme to see the result)
- Tatoos
- Cloating and jewelry

-
Female bodybuilders defy the cultural ideal
of female beauty.
Normally you have a male gaze in technology
but the female gaze is growing.
The virtual self
try to construct a pure transparent
version of the digital self
Virtual reality defines the self through
visible bodies, not through minds, which
do not appear in virtual worlds.
 Virtual reality and three-dimensional
graphics in general are technologies for
achieving self-presence through a newly
mobilizrd point of view.

In a fully interactive application there are
6 different ways in which you can alter
your relationship the virtual surroundings.
- up/down
- Left/right
- Side to side (forward/back)
 What makes interactive computer
graptics unique is, that the shifts can now
take place at the viewers will.


Virtual empathy/graphic can also be
radical in the way that the user should
learn about dinosaurs or even molecules
by occypying their perspectives – wearing
a helmet.
The freedom to be oneself is the freedom
to become someone or something else.
Because there is no single privileged point
of view, the self becomes a series of
”other” points of view – the intersection
of all possible points of views that can be
taken in a given space.
 Virtual reality will change our notion of
self because we will now be dynamic or
unstable bodies.

The networked self

-
-
The hypermediated self is expressed in
the many forms of networked
communication on the internet.
Newsgroups
Email
MUD (multiuser dungeon – users in
different psysical locations can
communicate in the same networked,
virtual space) text-based
Chatrooms
Unlike the self in virtual reality, the self is
defined and in a sence embodied through
its participation in various media
See figur 17.1 page 263.

Gender trouble in MUD

One can never be sure of the gender of
ones partner in MUD.
Assignment remediation

Go back to the presentation we had on a
specific person and find out if this person
also remediate him or herself, and if they
do how.