Response 2-AndrewW

Jennicam was the first foray into lifecasting. Lifecasting raised a lot of questions about the relationship between people and technology. One question raised by this was what it meant to be someone on the internet, what was the relationship between people and their online identity. This new experiment in broadcasting opened up the internet to a new concept of transparent living. Webcam technology and and camera technology had obviously already been invented into society, but the use of the tech was new. I think that race and gender and all of that do have a large influence on these new “online” selves. People will often take on certain identities online in order to appeal to a certain crowd. However when you are recording every moment of your life you cannot hide behind a persona, you either have to be yourself or you will eventually crack. Even if you do act the way that you always do the pressure can be to much, like in the case of Jennicam.

The other article I read was on the existance of smart clothing. Smart clothing has evolved quite dramatically from its first days around the 1980’s. The idea of fitting a computer inside a room had not to long ago been a great achievement, however now we are implementing computers into all sorts of clothing. From light up shoes to google glass, all of these things involve computer processing. However this advancement is being used for multiple different applications. The application touched upon in the article was the use of computers to record and survey things incognito. This application of the clothing was used to challenge a certain societal ignorance, the ignorance of camera’s in public stores, government locations, etc. Recent uses of smart clothing have been to communicate and connect to those around one’s self. The  idea of a shirt computer have many other exciting possibilities, perhaps they could create a shirt that reads bio-signs…