Writing About Cool Intro, Ch 1, Ch 2

• page 1 Rice talks about cultural dimensions of electronic writing
• on page 3 Rice shows how cool is used to related to youthful attitudes
• on page 7 Rice tries to explain that he will talk about using each definition of cool as a model for writing in hypertext??
• page 9, Rice shows how cool as a form of approval for urban youth
• on page 10 he talks about popular perceptions of cool, like individualism and rebelliousness
• page 14 points out early groups like TheWell and their help in moving the word cool to the internet
• page 16 talks about attitudes associated with words like cool and how their subject to being used rhetorically for consumer purposes??
• pages 20-21 talks about everything2.com and the movement of the word cool from a marketing tool to a writing system

This reading was easier than McLuhan, but I still wasn't quite sure how Rice was trying to make connections to the word cool. When he uses hip hop as an example of cool in our culture, it just confuses me as to what he is using cool for. Sometimes it seems like a way of doing something, other times it seems like he's just using examples of things that are considered "cool" to prove a point, but I really don't understand it too well.

We discussed in class a little bit about this reading. From class notes I got a better understanding that he is pointing out relationships between sites can have different motives, like some for being cool or others might have financial gain as a reason for linking up with other websites. We also talked about hypertext, and linking that goes throughout that which is used to create a perception for the users to buy into. I still wasn't sure from class with the term "cooling". We talked about it being linking with unexpected relationships among sites, but I really still don't understand the many different ways the word cool is being used.

Participation

I would like to talk about what I think about classes where participation is a large part of the grade. I actually don't mind it as much in really small classes, but the larger it gets the worse off everyone is. People start to feel like they have to speak and just say whatever they want just to get those points, or marked off for the day for participation. This doesn't necessarily mean that they contributed anything meaningful to the discussion, or enlightened anyone in class. I have this class (not English 201) where participation is pretty important, and its about 40 people, and just listening to some of the people talk really bothers me. I'm not saying their unintelligent, but because of participation being forced many people speak, and ramble on until the teacher nods their head in approval of what their saying, so they can feel like they made a point, when really they just reiterated what someone else just said, or copied what they said just using some different words.
If classes like that put less emphasis on participation being needed for grades I feel the discussion would be much more beneficial to everyone in class. Again, a class like ours of about 20 is good, I haven't felt pressured to talk out of place for no reason yet, and I don't feel that it has been an issue or anything, it's just my other class where too many people talk for apparantly no reason. It just seems it would overall be better in midsize classes like that to let people talk when they want, not ramble for 4 or 5 minutes and throw in the point they were trying to make at the end that had nothing to do with what they were just talking about.
What's much worse than classes like that are ones where it's a large lecture, and there's always that kid that has to ask questions, about clarification, or something that hasn't been covered yet, just so the teacher will remember they asked the question and seemed interested. I'm sure everyones had classes with someone like that in it, where everyday you just expect them to raise their hand with 5 minutes left to get their 2 cents in for the day. If anyone reading this is that person, it's nothing against you, I just want to get out of class as soon as possible.

Media Hot and Cold

• "Page 36 McLuhan describes the differences between hot and cold mediums and also gives examples of each."
• "Page 37-38 McLuhan uses tribes to explain how a hot technology will succeed a cool technology with a disruptive impact."
• "On page 39 McLuhan states that it is a concern with effect rather than meaning as a basic change in an electric time, I don't really understand this."
• "Page 40 discusses more areas of hot vs. cool media."
• "Page 43 has McLuhan describing the importance of hot or cool media being used in certain cultures and how where they are being used makes all the difference."
• "Unsure how example of meeting a person for the first time used on page 44 is showing difference in hot and cool media."
• "Last two paragraphs, page 44 and 45, I do not really understand anything that was being talked about."

From class we discussed that hot and cool must first and foremost be used with the different media that are able to transmit messages to the public. We then went on to talk about Media vs. Content of the medium where we brought up the point that the medium of transmission and moreso consequences of the medium is what matters*. We also talked about remediation, like a story going from the book to the film as an example. And to close out the discussion on this reading we made a list of what was hot media and what was cold media according to McLuhan, both definitions of what would fit into those categories and then specific types of media he introduced.

Following discussion I had a slightly better understanding of the readings. When I was doing the readings there were many areas where I wasn't quite sure what McLuhan was talking about, and I think it was because I didn't understand what he was trying to say at the very beginning of the chapter about hot and cold media. After class and discussion about some hot and cold media I had a little better understanding, but was still overall confused because in class we couldn't even come up with a straight answer about what McLuhan meant throughout the chapter. I understand some of what he says is hot and cold media, but I still don't really know the importance of what the media vs. content of the medium part was about.

Concert

Tonight I went to the Jack's Mannequin concert in Milwaukee. I went with my roommate and his girlfriend and we ended up meeting up with a few of my friends from home. Before the concert we went to the annex on the Marquette campus just to get some food and drinks. We got there pretty late because we didn't really care about the opening bands and found out that a bottle of miller lite was 7 bucks, so we decided to not continue drinking. When the concert started I tried to sing along to the first song, but my voice went out, in part because before it started I was trying to talk over the music, but also because of my job. I'm an operator for deaf people, and I basically have to speak like a robot for how ever many hours at a time, and so I just had no voice. Because of that I just kinda stood there, I felt a little uncomfortable, but I think if you like a band and you're at the show you should either sit back and enjoy the music or do the more fun thing and get really into it, I mean there's no middle ground, you can't just mouth the words to a few of the songs choruses and feel like you're getting into it at all. But all in all it was a really good concert, he finished with a cover of My Name is Jonas and then probably his best song MFOE. It was well worth the money, that went toward cancer research anyway.

Blog Assignment 1

I did not have a good idea of what rhetoric was before the reading. What I thought it was was some sort of use of speaking or writing that was there to try to persuade the listener/reader. After reading Herrick's introduction I have a somewhat better understanding of what rhetoric is. It seems that the same basic definition of what I believed rhetoric was is an important part of rhetoric as a whole, but from the readings there is much more to it than simple persuasion through speech and writings. Herrick describes it as "intentional practice of effective symbolic expression", and explains that what rhetoric is used for is just as important as how it is being used and goes on to state several characteristics of how it is commonly used. From my understanding from the reading I would extend the definition of rhetoric to say that it is also used to convey ideas or messages, not jus tpersuasion, through a number of means beyond speaking and writing with an added importance of how it is being used in different situations.

Naming the Website

Hello my name is Andy. This is my first time writing a blog, but my brother has a blog that I check out daily so I am somewhat familiar with them. The name Katric Frurphy is a combination of my roommate and his ex girlfriends names which came from the Colbert Report's usage of Filliam H. Muffman for William H. Macy and Felicity Huffman. At this time I am unsure of what the content of the blogs will be, but we'll see where it goes.