Post on 21-Jan-2023
Media, Cultural Theory and Education Autumn 2013
Omar Ceja Salgado
Question 1:
Choose a media and/or cultural theorist whose work you find particularly valuable in the fields of Media and/or Cultural Studies. Explain a) why you consider their work to
be of particular value and b) show how their work helps you to analyze a contemporary cultural text, object, event or practice.
Manovich’s principles of new media as an approach to analyzing “Portal” as a learning object
FINAL SUBMISSION I confirm that I have read and understood the Institute’s Code on Citing Sources and
Avoidance of Plagiarism. I confirm that this assignment is all my own work and conforms to this Code.
Word count (number of words): 5213
Student evaluation submitted: N
Copy posted on Moodle: Y
Names of Tutors:
John Potter Andrew Burn
Alison Gazzard
MA in Media, Culture and Education Institute of Education, University of London
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CONTENTS
Introduction _______________________________________________________ 4
Digital Media Is Software _____________________________________________ 6
Principles Of New Media _____________________________________________ 9
Game Analysis ____________________________________________________ 12
Numerical Representation _________________________________________ 13
Modularity ______________________________________________________ 15
Automation _____________________________________________________ 17
Variability ______________________________________________________ 18
Transcoding ____________________________________________________ 19
Portal As A Learning Object __________________________________________ 20
Conclusions ______________________________________________________ 21
Illustrations _______________________________________________________ 24
Games Cited _____________________________________________________ 24
References _______________________________________________________ 25
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FIGURES
Figure 1.0 Table of principles of digital media and learning objects. ___________ 11
Figure 2.0 Example of binary code. ____________________________________ 13
Figure 3.0 Example of game programming code. _________________________ 14
Figure 4.0 The Sims avatar creator. ____________________________________ 14
Figure 5.0 Project Spark terraforming tools. ______________________________ 14
Figure 6.0 Portal: Entrance and exit portals. _____________________________ 15
Figure 7.0 Portal: Montage of game screenshots. _________________________ 16
Figure 8.0 Portal: Artificial Intelligence. _________________________________ 17
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INTRODUCTION
A lot has been said about media from its usage, production, distribution, and effects.
The results of a simple Google search are a testament to the incredible amount of
information coming from marketing, publicity, education, news, and social sites, to
name a few.
Media has become not only a common word in everyday language, but also
media objects have come to be a familiar sight and inherent elements of different
societal relations and environments. In fact, media objects play such an important role
in the way we interact with the environment and with others, that they can be
considered one of the ways in which humans make sense of their surroundings; that
is, they can be used as mediators. Therefore, media objects are semiotic constructs
in themselves, but they also keep a close symbiosis with the social context out of which
they are born.
Lev Manovich has dedicated most of his academic years to the analysis of
media creations and software, and how the transition from analogue to digital media
has resulted in the creation of interfaces that allow the user to interact and alter the
properties of such productions through software. This, in his words, has come to
“change how media functions. […] The properties of digital media (how it can be
edited, shared, and analyzed) are now defined by the particular software as opposed
to solely being contained in the actual content.” (Manovich, 2013a:30)
The purpose of this essay; therefore, is not to be one more paper posing the
idea of how media has an irrefutable place in culture and society; nor does it intend to
become a compilation of the statements presented by Manovich or other academics
in the area of media objects and culture studies. This paper tries to explore the
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educational value that the five principles of new media1, which Manovich (2001)
named in his book The Language of New Media, may bring to the creation of media
objects given the similarities that such process has with the production of learning
objects.
For the purpose of serving as an example of the propositions made in this
essay, screenshots of the computer game Portal2 will be used. This computer game
will be analyzed as a cultural object to which Manovich’s principles can be applied. It
will also serve as the basis for the idea behind the use of computer games as learning
objects.
In order to give this essay a clearer structure, it has been divided into four
interrelated sections: the first one explains Manovich’s idea that there is no such thing
as digital media; the second section presents the five principles of new media
described by Manovich in his latest book and how those principles relate to learning
object design; finally the third and fourth sections are composed by the analysis of the
game which draws from the idea behind using computer games as learning objects,
based on the principles reviewed previously.
1 The term “New media” has often been related to the interactive side of online magazines and newspapers, on-demand television, or social media sites and applications. In this paper, the term will be used to make reference to digital media objects or creations such as video, audio, and still images that are not born out of analogue hardware, but out of software. 2 Portal is a first-person, puzzle computer game developed and published by Valve Corporation in the year 2007.
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DIGITAL MEDIA IS SOFTWARE
Opposed to the traditional view of new media as a digital form that has resulted from
the shift from analogue formats, Manovich (2013a) makes a very detailed argument
as to what that shift represents and the misconception of the term.
For the author “none of the new media authoring and editing techniques we
associate with computers are simply a result of media ‘being digital’.” (Manovich,
2013a:31)That is, those techniques are not inherent elements of the objects
themselves, but rather concessions from the software; while at the same time, they
come as the result of a social process in which software and its features are created
by groups of people by taking into account the feedback and needs of users, as well
as the features of software that has been released to market previously.
Analogue, as opposed to digital media, relies on hardware3 rather than on
software and it is that property that gives it the features that would differentiate a
painting from a photograph, a song played on a piano from a video made through a
linear editing technique, or even two recordings of the same conversation, or a
duplicate of a photograph. The raw nature of hardware guarantees a result that cannot
be replicated as a carbon copy, and reproductions can be seen not as mere
duplications, but as new creations in themselves. This is the quality that gets lost in
the shift from analogue to digital formats, and the one Manovich relies on to argue the
absence of individual properties of digital media due to its dependence on software.
So, what role does hardware play in this new era? Is it only the instrument
through which media objects can be experienced, and in which software is stored and
3 I use the term hardware in a broader sense which includes not only that of computer science, but also mechanical and other types of physical equipment.
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used? As it stands, while hardware influenced heavily the creation of analogue media
by giving it individual properties; what the integration of software has done to digital
media is to strip hardware from the ability to pass on such properties, and at the same
time, it has helped in unifying all these new creations not only through the need of
computing devices, but in making them essentially undistinguishable from one another
due to the lack of individuality of features and; therefore, allowing the creation of
carbon copies; as Benjamin puts it “the criterion of authenticity ceases to be applicable
to artistic production” (1935:5).
Manovich (2013a) believes that the fact that these new media creations share
a common platform, the computer; and that software is used in the production, editing,
and appropriation process of media objects is proof enough that digital media is a term
that denotes something that does not exist in itself, but as a result of the use of
software; that is, “media becomes software.”4 (Manovich, 2013a:37) One must ask;
however, if that same analogy can be used to cast out “old media” or analogue media
objects as an equally inefficient term when it comes to its reliance on hardware, and
further question the idea behind whether such a distinction is valid for one format and
not the other.
Just the way Benjamin regards Marx’s critique of the modes of production in
the beginnings of Capitalism as having a “prognostic value,” (1935:1) he certainly
foresaw, in the same way, Manovich’s propositions in regards to the loss of
authenticity towards the changes happening in art (media) production, or as Benjamin
calls it, the withering of the “aura” (1935:1) which he defines as “[the] presence [of art]
4 Regardless of the validity of the term or the misconception of its use as it has been discussed to this point. As a differentiator and due to the popularity of the term, new media creations which rely on software and computers will be referred to as “digital media” along this essay.
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in time and space, its unique existence at the place where it happens to be” (1935:3).
What he may not have anticipated, however, is how prominent digital media would
become and how essential the ability to duplicate an object would be when it came to
defining it and analyzing its features.
After considering the propositions of both authors, it can be said that new media
may be viewed from a perspective that is twofold; on the one hand, as a production
that has lost its essence and that, as a result, risks being seen as inferior; and on the
other, as a new kind of creation that has become free of the boundaries of analogue
media, a kind of media object that emerged from analogue formats, but now stands
on its own and which demands to be seen from its own meritory standpoint where it is
a creation with its own features (or the ones of software for that matter) and which has
departed from its analogue upbringing.
Digital media, and especially computer games, as is the case of this work, have
long been seen as a convergence of different analogue formats, be it paintings or
photography, video or film, audio, etc. In a way, digital media are “the representation
of one medium in another” (Bolter & Grusin, 2000:45) that is, digital media are subject
to a process of “remediation” (Bolter & Grusin, 2000:45). That particularity of the
medium is what links it to analogue formats, but at the same time, it is what sets it
apart from them.
In trying to conciliate Benjamin and Manovich’s views, digital media objects can
still be seen as situational in the sense that they continue being influenced by the time
and place of their creation, but in the same way, the features that unify these objects
and that are the reason for the loss of their authenticity and uniqueness have become
the new essence of their being, that is, the five principles of media that are the focus
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of this work “will ultimately define new languages of expression. And it’s those
languages that will tap the potential of digital media as new vehicles of expression”
(Hotzman, 1997:15).
Therefore, while it makes sense to think about authoring and creation
techniques as something that is not embedded in digital media, and assuming the
conception that the essence of its being is in fact software or its “aura” recalling
Benjamin’s (1935) term, one must agree with Manovich (2013a) when he argues that
digital media objects do not possess properties of their own, but they borrow them
from the software that gave them birth.
Furthermore, the differentiating factors between one creation and another are
purely stylistic or “representational,” as well as semiotic or “expressive” while still being
subject to the five principles to be described in the following section.
PRINCIPLES OF NEW MEDIA
Manovich (2001:49) named five different principles which he considers to be inherent
to all new media creations thanks to the computerization of culture. Those five
principles can easily be exemplified through computer games, from how they are
structured and how the game’s assets are organized and montaged together, given
that computer games are not only a convergence of different kinds of media objects
(For more on convergence culture see Jenkins, 2008) such as still images, videos,
audio, and animation, but also a combination of the programming languages and
software used in the creation of the myriad assets that conform them. Although, an in
depth analysis would show how those principles can be found as deep in the games
as the code itself.
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It is those five principles that all new media creations possess, and which are
the focus of this critical work due to the similarities they have with the features of
learning objects. Furthermore, They can act as the starting point for the use of digital
media in educational settings, regardless of whether they were created following an
instructional design or not.
Learning objects are mostly regarded now as creations in the area of computing
or computer sciences and they have been defined as units of information, designed
following an instructional purpose, or to serve an educational purpose (See Beck,
2010; Enríquez, 2004; Wiley, 2000); however, it is not a requisite for a learning object
to be conceived as one,5 since it is the use of such objects in an instructional design
what further guarantees their efficiency as learning tools, and not the objects
themselves.
While digital media creations do not have a limit as to how large6 they can be,
other than the data support in which they are stored or perhaps considerations as to
how they can be shared, streamed, or distributed; learning objects have mostly been
seen as small in size in order to foster the level of granularity necessary for them to
be combined with other objects. This is especially true when we refer to films and
computer games that can be made in a smaller scale, but still be considered larger
than other types of digital media objects such as images or audio.
The size and the granularity of learning objects is of course just part of the
considerations behind the design of digital media. Figure 1.0 contrasts the five
5 Although there are different terms such as pedagogical components, components of instruction, educational software components, online learning materials, resources, just to name a few (see Wiley, 2000:5-8) and which are used to describe learning objects in the academic field. The term learning object will prevail along this essay as to avoid confusion in its use. 6 It is important to note that the concept of the dimensions of an object in digital media is of a very distant nature of that in analogue formats, or at least twofold, one being the physical or visual perception of the scale, while the other being the amount of data necessary for the object to be stored.
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principles that Manovich (2001) put forward against the characteristics of learning
objects as posed by Beck (2010). It should be noted that Manovich did not consider
these principles, or the idea of digital media as being relevant to instructional design,
most likely due to the area of study not been directly related to his research field;
nonetheless, the distinctions and correspondences are more evident when such
principles are presented side by side.
Manovich’s principles of new media: Beck’s properties of learning objects:
Numerical representation Can be aggregated and modified
Modularity Reusability
Can be put in a sequence
Self-containment
Automation -----
Variability Interoperability
Accessible
Durability
Transcoding Are tagged with metadata
Figure 1.0 Table of principles of digital media and learning objects.
As it can be noted in the table above, some of the properties of learning objects can
be considered part of the same principle in Manovich’s propositions. Only the principle
of automation does not have a related feature among Beck’s listed characteristics.
Furthermore, following the assumption that learning objects are fully digital creations
now a days, one can come to the premise that all learning objects can be seen as
digital media, but not all digital media can be regarded as learning objects.
Whereas there is a widely held idea that learning objects must follow an
instructional process in their design, and that they must be created with an educational
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objective, learning activities, and evaluation resources embedded in the objects
themselves; there is also a group of scholars who regard learning objects in a wider
definition, one in which they are simply units of information that serve an educational
purpose, and from that perspective the educational objective, learning activities, and
evaluation resources are part of the instructional design of the class; that is, learning
objects do not have to be created with that purpose in mind, or what is the same, any
digital media object can be incorporated into the curriculum with the proper
instructional design to determine the conditions of its use (See Beck, 2010; Enríquez,
2004; Wiley, 2000).
Going back to the syllogism posed above, depending on the view on what a
learning object is, it can determined whether digital media can be considered one or
not. As it has been defined before, this paper follows the idea behind the wider use of
the term in which all digital media can be incorporated in an educational setting with
the proper design and; therefore, can be seen as learning objects.
The following section is focused on the analysis of the computer game Portal
through the views and principles posed in the previous pages. For that reason, it has
been decided to define each of the characteristics of learning objects and principles of
new media along with the analysis in that section. The incorporation of still images
taken from the game can serve as a better example and as a visual cue of what those
principles imply for cultural practices, or in this case, the creation of computer games
and learning objects as a form of cultural text.
GAME ANALYSIS
The computer game Portal is “a hybrid of FPS [first person shooter] style and a new
genre of spatial brain teasers, […] Set in the mysterious Aperture Science
Laboratories, [where] players must solve physical puzzles and challenges by opening
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portals, maneuvering objects, and moving themselves through space in ways that
used to be impossible.” (Valve, 2014)
The game follows a very simple narrative, the player (Chell) is a test subject
who wakes up in a room inside a laboratory. She is asked to solve a series of puzzles
with the use of portals created with an “Aperture Science Handled Portal Device”
throughout nineteen chambers in the promise of cake by the end of the experiments.
There are a series of visual and auditory cues that help in solving the puzzles, and
GLaDOS (Generic Life Form and Disc Operating System) is a computer generated
voice that explains the plot of the game by giving messages to the player in different
sections of the chambers. These elements give context to the story and break the
sense of isolation in the deserted laboratory.
NUMERICAL REPRESENTATION
As it was mentioned before, Portal is a digital media object in the form of a computer
game and as such it conforms to the principles laid out by Manovich. Reduced to its
minimal expression, all the computer game’s assets and; as a consequence, the game
itself is formed by pieces of code which means that it can be not only represented by
mathematical functions, but also modified by algorithms, which constitutes the
modification of its code; this is what Manovich (2001:49) called numerical
representation.
Figures 2.0 and 3.0 are examples
of binary code, the language system that
computers use, and a piece of game
programming code, respectively. They
are the basis for all digital creations and
Figure 2.0 Example of binary code.
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can be seen as a digital DNA that
determines features and behavior of
the digital media they are a part of.
One of the properties of
learning objects is their ability to be
aggregated or modified, and this is
precisely where the numerical
representation comes to relevance
since, even though user interfaces
have been created so that
individuals who are not familiar with
the language of programming can
use software to modify or re-
appropriate a media creation, in
essence the process behind it is the
same. The code of the object is
aggregated or modified and;
consequently, such changes are
reflected as stylistic and behavioral
alterations.
Perhaps a clearer example could
be found in computer games such as
The Sims (see Figure 4.0) or the yet to
be released Project Spark (see Figure
5.0) where players can create and
Figure 4.0 The Sims avatar creator.
Figure 3.0 Example of game programming code.
Figure 5.0 Project Spark terraforming tools.
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modify elements of the environment and the avatar at will, within the parameters
determined by the software. Even though the changes are previously scripted, these
kinds of games give a sense of freedom that is essential to foster creativity.
In the case of Portal, this principle is better noticeable in the changes that take
place inside the video game with the input of the user; that is, the result of the
interaction between the player and the game, such as in the creation of portals.
Game mechanics are nothing
more than code that is programed to
behave in a certain way. Figure 6.0
shows how that programmability of
media is acquired in account of its
numerical representation. The game
allows for interaction with means that changes although previously scripted, appear to
happen on the spot as a result of the player’s interaction with the game.
MODULARITY
The second principle is the modularity of media which makes reference to how media
objects are made out of smaller individual pieces such as letters, words, icons, images,
sounds, pixels, polygons, etc.
Perhaps this is the principle that is most clearly visible throughout Portal.
Although it probably responds to the need of having consistency within the sections in
the game, as well as the game dynamics. Its modularity allows the creators to re-
purpose assets in many of the sections of the game world, from the implementation of
doors, buttons, cameras, portals, crates, and lasers, to the execution and use of
behaviors, interactions, textures, images, sounds, and all types of visual cues such as
text and signs (see Figure 7.0).
Figure 6.0 Portal: Entrance and exit portals.
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Rather than creating a sterile environment, the re-use of media objects within a game
helps in creating a game world that is clear and easy to understand, in opposition to
convoluted areas where perhaps something more than visual cues would be
necessary to understand them. Moreover, modularity helps in optimizing time and
resources since the code can be used as is, or it can be modified or aggregated to
create new objects.
Due to the nature of this quality, media objects can be split and its pieces will
keep their own integrity. It also means that those pieces can be rearranged to create
new objects. This is a principle that was previously posed by David A. Wiley (2000)
Figure 7.0 Portal: Montage of game screenshots.
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when he described learning objects and how they could be created and applied
through instructional design theory.
As it was stated before (see Figure 6.0) not only the assets within the computer
game, but also the game itself can be reused and put in a sequence with other media
objects to serve an instructional purpose, even though these creations are in essence
self-contained, which means that if they are isolated from the sequence, their features
will remain a part of the object, as they are not borrowed from other elements nor
obtained by being part of a group.
AUTOMATION
The third principle involves the idea of new media being at least partially created
automatically. This automation, as Manovich (2001) defines it, can be exemplified in
the way scanners or image editing software is able to automatically improve the quality
of an image by altering its contrast, color, size, brightness, etc. In a similar way, a
video editor can split scenes from a recording, or put different clips together and add
music and effects with very little human involvement.
The same principle is fairly evident in the example used previously regarding
numerical representation in The Sims and Project Spark (see Figure 4.0; Figure 5.0)
where the altering of the code is done automatically while at the same time the
computer game acts as the software that makes those changes possible. In a way,
the game allows for the creation of a
game within itself.
In the case of Portal, the best
example of automation is represented
with the game’s A.I. (Artificial
Figure 8.0 Portal: Artificial Intelligence.
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intelligence). Small robots can track the player’s movements and attack if Chell is
within their field of vision (see Figure 8.0).
VARIABILITY
Following the idea of conversion culture proposed by Henry Jenkins (2008) the
variability of a new media object, the fourth principle, implies that it can be presented
in many different mediums and it is not exclusive to a single platform. As Jenkins posed
“the migratory behavior of media audiences who will go almost anywhere in search of
the kinds of entertainment experiences they want” (2008:2) determines the how, when,
where, and why these media creations become available for their consumption. This
is a testament to the influences between culture, new media, and the social practices
of users, as well as the reasoning behind the creation of such objects.
In the case of Portal, the principle of variability applies to a certain degree. While
it is true that computer games, as well as the assets that are contained in them such
as audio, video, and still images, have the potential to be used or experienced in
different platforms7, there are restrictions to such activities. Copyright policies and
political interests between developers, publishers, and console manufacturers are just
some of the elements that play a role in determining how many, which platforms, or to
what extent computer games and the media objects that conform them become
available.
The fact that computer games such as Portal adhere to the principle of
variability, implies that there can be different versions of the same product; although,
one could argue whether after the modification of a media object to create a variant of
it, such object can be considered a new creation in itself as it was discussed in the
7 Among the myriad of computer game platforms, there are: personal and dedicated gaming computers or devices, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Nintendo WiiU, Steam boxes, tablets, smartphones, PlayStation Vita, Nintendo 3DS and 2DS, and Nvidia Shield, to name a few in the market in present.
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previous sections. From Beck’s vision of learning objects, this relates to the fact that
computer games can be used in different settings and with different platforms, ergo,
they are interoperable. In the same way, they can be accessed to a certain degree
and for a particular period of time that is determined by the platforms and the political
considerations discussed earlier.
TRANSCODING
Finally the principle of transcoding represents and area that goes beyond the media
object. It alludes to the fusion of the language of computers and the language of
culture, both interlaced in the semiotic relationship between its components: computer,
software, the media object, and the user.
For Manovich this principle can be seen as the synergy between two layers, the
“cultural layer” (2001:63), as he calls it, through which the user makes sense of the
object by interpreting its signs with the help of language and the cultural sememes
stored in his/her mental schema8; and the “computer layer” (2001:63) which is formed
by the pixels, megabytes, file extensions, binary code, etc. that conform the language
of the “computer’s own cosmogony, rather than of human culture”. (2001:63)
The principle of transcoding also makes reference to how media objects adapt
to the properties of a format. An example of this idea is found in how computer games
need to be modified not only stylistically or graphically, but also in their play mechanics
in order for them to be used on smartphones or on dedicated gaming consoles; the
game system has to be modified in order to serve better the needs of touch sensitive
screens. To that end, “transcoding designates the ways in which media and culture
8 The term schema comes from Cognitive theory. Jean Piaget used it to refer to the integration of cultural sememes into a wide mental network that is used for the interpretation of the environment and the different stimuli a human is presented to. This information or knowledge is called schema and is constantly modified by the conciliation of conflicting information that is acquired through new experiences. (see National Development Plan, 2002)
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are being reshaped and transformed by the logic of the computer.” (Sorapure, 2003:5)
Metadata is part of that reshape, the need to categorize, store, and find information
into catalogues of libraries has made it necessary to incorporate a system that holds
data in the data itself.
As it has been discussed in this section, the principles of new media and the
properties of learning objects are too alike to be ignored as important elements of the
creation of media objects and how they can ideally be seen as two sides of the same
product. The following section will delve further in this area in an effort to characterize
Portal as a valuable tool in instructional design.
PORTAL AS A LEARNING OBJECT
The relationship between culture and new media is determined by language, whether
visual, auditory, or otherwise. Language has an important influence in the design and
creation of new media. At the level of sememes, structure, and interaction dynamics,
the development of software and hardware platforms is linked by its computer and
human components. Of course such interaction is not a unidirectional phenomenon,
there is a mutual flux of influence where one media creation triggers a reaction on the
human side; that is, the feedback of users, the result of which alters future productions
and; therefore, creates a cycle that repeats itself.
Although the process is much more complex and with many more components
than what has been posed in the previous paragraph, such a simplistic example serves
as the basis for the idea that media objects are deeply rooted in culture and to that
end, they are part of the human context which is used as an acculturation and
socialization tool (see Barbero, 1987; Barbero, 1993; Gerbner, G. et al., 1996; Orozco,
1996; Singhal et al, 2004; Montero, 2006).
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Consequently, as media objects are used in shaping one’s world by being the
elements through which humans interact and make sense of their surroundings, they
are in a unique position in culture to make them useful as learning instances, but not
only as part of informal education, as it has been implied.
By being created for, or integrated into the school curriculum, media objects
can be part of formal educational systems as main drivers of education as a whole,
and not only in a media class. As McQuail said “[media constitutes, for the most part,
a social reality and normativity for a shared public and social life and they are an
essential source of standards, models, and norms.]” (2001:116) [Original in Spanish]
One must ask then, why are educational systems so reluctant on integrating media in
all areas of the curriculum? A question whose answer would require a more in depth
view of the matter than the reach of this essay.
CONCLUSIONS
This short piece of critical work regarding Manovich’s five principles of new media and
Beck’s features of learning objects has served as the framework for the brief analysis
of the computer game Portal to show how through that framework and the filter of
instructional design, the game can be seen as a useful tool for education.
The so called “features” one would relate to certain types of new media such
as pixels, frames, or musical notes, and that would act as differentiators from one
media object to another can be reduced to their minimum components and; therefore,
be seen as nothing more than pieces of code, or series of numbers that conform the
binary language between computers and software and, in essence, as Manovich
makes note, they cannot be considered differentiators as they are all reduced to such
minimum pieces.
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Overall, users do not delve into such depths and technicalities in the creation
of new media. The implementation of user interfaces and the automation of many of
the processes done by software such as Photoshop, MovieMaker, or Webly,
guarantee that, other than the creators of the software, people do not need to worry
about learning about programming and imputing long pieces of code to do what now
has come to be assumed the simplest things such as changing the font type, color, or
size of a website, applying filters to images, or effects to videos, just to name a few.
As it has been debated, digital media is indeed software and their qualities or
principles that rule them are those of the software with which they were created,
semiotic and stylistic aspects being the only elements of individuality to them. Seeing
these “new” media creations as a setback in artistry, or as inferior to analogue media
is an invalid conception given that it relies in the analysis of a medium through the
eyes of another. A position which would always put one in an disadvantage point.
It is debatable whether all the principles discussed in this work are essential or
maintain a certain level of importance within a learning object in order for it to be
effective in reaching the goal that was set when it was designed. Nevertheless, both
the principles of new media and the properties of learning objects (See Figure 1.0) are
too alike to be ignored as important elements of the creation of media objects and how
they can ideally be seen as two sides of the same product. However, this brief analysis
of the structure of a computer game as a learning object did not intend to discuss on
aspects of level of influence or of effectiveness; furthermore, to look for an in depth
view of such an area would have proved impractical and beyond reach for a work of
this nature.
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As it has been mentioned before, all learning objects are digital media objects,
but not all digital media creations can be considered learning objects in themselves,
although they can certainly be implemented in educational settings with the
appropriate planning and laying out of objectives and uses.
As stated by Gerard, “Learning is the modification of behavior by experience;
and formal education is a conscious effort to modify behavior in chosen ways by
appropriately structuring experience.” (1967:218) Learning objects, and videogames
such as Portal, can have the same potential for helping in the creation of such
experiences. In this particular case, players learn about physical principles, such as
momentum, mass, length, speed, etc. as well as the development of logical and critical
thinking skills and geometrical thinking (see Valve Corporation, 2013).
Although it cannot be said that Portal is a learning object based on the premise
that learning objects must be designed as instructional tools, the computer game holds
enough elements and dynamics in order for it to be used as part of the instructional
design of a class; therefore, it can be used as a learning object.
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ILLUSTRATIONS
Figure 1.0 Table of principles of digital media and learning objects: Adaptation of principles of new media in Beck, R. J. (2010), Learning objects. [Online]. Available at http://www4.uwm.edu/cie/learning_objects.cfm?gid=56 Last accessed 05/01/2014. and Manovich, L. (2001), The Language of New Media. London: MIT Press.
Figure 2.0 Example of binary code: (2010), [Image]. Available at http://theknightinvintagedenim.wordpress.com/2010/11/25/ive-got-the-code0001-0011-0110-0101-0101_digital-media/ Last accessed 07/01/2014.
Figure 3.0 Example of game programming code: Barrowclift, M. (2013), [Image]. Available at http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2013/04/selling-coding-and playing-the-worlds-largest-videogame/ Last accessed 07/01/2014.
Figure 4.0 The Sims avatar creator: Maxis. (2011), [Image]. Available at http://forum.rpg.net/showthread.php?593565-Help-Making-a-quot-Create-aCharacter-quot-feature-for-an-RPG Last accessed 07/01/2014.
Figure 5.0 Project Spark terraforming tools: Microsoft Studios. (2013), [Image]. Available at http://i2mag.com/microsoft-build-2013-day-1-keynote-highlights-and-pictures/microsoft-build-conference-project-spark-3/ Last accessed 07/01/2014.
Figure 6.0 Portal: Entrance and exit portals: Portal [Computer Software]. (2007), Kirkland, WA: Valve Corporation.
Figure 7.0 Portal: Montage of game screenshots: Portal [Computer Software]. (2007), Kirkland, WA: Valve Corporation.
Figure 8.0 Portal: Artificial intelligence: Portal [Computer Software]. (2007), Kirkland, WA: Valve Corporation.
GAMES CITED
Portal [Computer Software]. (2007), Kirkland, WA: Valve Corporation.
Project Spark [Computer Software]. (2014), Redmond, WA: Team Dakota. Microsoft Studios.
The Sims [Computer Software]. (2000), Emeryville, CA: Maxis. Electronic Arts.
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