Topic 5 - Why I Hate Wikipedia

Lecture

In the lecture this week we discussed Wikipedia. Now I personally have nothing against Wikipedia. I think it's a great site for finding out the basics of a topic and sometimes the information can be very accurate. However, the fact that anybody can log in and change any information that's posted on there, is slightly disconcerting. I can't see why someone gets enjoyment out of putting up fake information, as it doesn't really benefit them and it's basically a big time waster. I think though, that most of us decided Wikipedia was a great starting point when trying to learn more about a new topic, however it is not a reliable academic resource.

Readings

The reading this week was a short story by Jorge Luis Borges titled Tlon, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius. The story was about how easily people can be manipulated into believing anything. Borges story has elements of facts and fiction in them which consequently, has raised discussion about what is real and what isn't. The story describes what happens so often in our society, people are so easily swayed into one opinion. When being informed by someone on a subject, as long as some of the facts are true, people will quite happily believe everything that that person tells them on the subject. This reading is relevant while examining Wikipedia. Since anyone can add anything on Wikipedia, when mixed with some truth, people will believe it.

Tutorial

How do the ideas from Walter Benjamin's "Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction" apply to contemporary digital media?

In today's society, it is very easy for people to replicate art, especially digital media. Movies and music are mass produced already and I think most people know how easy it is just to copy these yourself. Today digital media is more available to people and art can be made easily by anyone that owns a camera. To coincide with Benjamin's theory, digital media lacks unique existence. Because there are often so many copies, it's individuality and aura is gone. This is more of an issue now than in Benjamin's day, but the similarities are not unfounded.

There was a time when "Art" was made by artists who were skilled professionals. Now that anyone with a computer can create things digitally (music, images, videos, etc), what does that mean for "art"?

Now that people are able to create things digitally, I think it can impair those who want to create 'real' art. That is not to say that because something is created digitally it isn't art, but it brings about issues of plagiarism, of 'borrowing' or potentially stealing someone else's work, as it's harder to prove who exactly the author is. It also means that absolutely anyone can create art and does not need to be labelled an artist or be a skilled professional. I don't know whether this demeans artistic expression, if it makes art less special because absolutely anyone can do it but it certainly can change the definition of what art is and what it will become.

Is a photo shopped image "authentic"?

No I do not believe a photoshopped image is authentic. On the one hand it is a creative piece. Someone has chopped and changed an image around in order to suit their own needs and used it for whatever purpose. And yet, to photo shop something is to alter another piece of' 'art.' The base of something that is photo shopped is already a piece of art. That is the authentic image. When alterations are made and the piece is edited it then becomes another piece of art, but because it has come from something else I would argue that it is not authentic.

Do digital "things" have an "aura" (in Benjamin's terms)?

Benjamin believed that only the original piece of art, or authentic image had an aura and the more a piece was reproduced the less "aura" it had. Something that is made digitally is copied over and over again - it's mass produced. For example, when a movie is made and released on DVD, the copy that you have is not the original and therefore does not have the "aura" that comes with the original. That applies to most digital things. These products are so readily available to us, that when stocks run out, they just make more. In Benjamin's terms, the original piece of digital media certainly has an "aura." Any reproductions however, do not.