Windows and Mirrors Chapter 7-8-9

Chapter 7.

This chapter has had some very interesting points showing us how we can be the receivers as well as the senders when we immerse ourselves in the digital art world.  By creating anything online, we have now become senders in a world where most others will be receiving our information.  Whether it be a picture or a blog similar to this one we are exposing our ideas to the entire cyber space.  The book has a line "To design a good Web site or any digital application, the designer should try to understand as many of the contextual levels as possible: from the psychology of the individual user to the constraints imposed by the user's language, system of beliefs, and popular culture knowledge." Yet only three paragraphs before it has this statement: " As a result of this close connection, such systems had to take the user and her contexts into account.  But at first, the only context that HCI researchers considered was the individual herself".  Since we are being told that we have to watch out for whom we are creating the information that we are willing to share, yet the book writes about female individuals?  Very ironic wouldn't you say?

Chapter 8

A great point that is made in this chapter is that we are sometimes made to look at things that may not be necessarily what we would of looked at in the first place.  Such techniques like rack focus where the creator refocuses our vision to look at what he or she wants us to see and not the other way around.  In sense this is what the SIGGRAPH gallery does.  It shows us the websites in a way that they want us to see them and not to see them the way we want to see them.  It is a very common technique used quite a lot in movies as the director can pick and choose which items are important and what he or she wants us to see.  This is huge when we create and share anything on the web as we control what interests others and not the other way around.

Chapter 9

Along the same lines of the previous 2 chapters, chapter 9 informs us of how we must understand that being flashy does not always work.  Just by having lots of bling on anything we design does not necessarily mean that it is going to be better. "No matter how flashy, every digital design must convey a message to its viewer or use. Even the most businesslike information website should provide the user with a compelling experience."