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Check out the comments on the first post to see a list of blogs that we have pulled up for your perusal. You should all have permissions to post your own response, here on our public blog.

Thursday, March 22, 2012

Who the Hell is Natalie?

I do not follow blogs, but I accidentily got invited into this forum and felt like commenting as that's the true nature of a blog anyways - to interact, communicate, follow, etc. So I apologize if this posting is short, but you can see that I have remarked on a few other postings.

One element that I think has not been approached quite yet (in written form that is) is the ability to intertwine different media types into a blog that is so much different than the written manifesto. You may have noticed that I'm kind of anti-blog-as-the-new-manifesto - but the inclusion of media is one of the positive aspects of writing online. Videos, animated GIFs, large format images (that ideally do not ruin the formatting of the blog, thanks Bryan), or sound can be referenced within a written piece. Manifestos can be listened to, rather than read (thanks TED talks). For a manifesto that is largely describing the relationship between film and diagramming, an online forum would allow to make stronger connections by allowing the reader to play snippets of the film.

However - In general, architects need editors. This blog is great proof. I think that there is something greatly lost when presenting oneself solely in blog format in comparison to the written manifesto. Manifestos emphasize theory, a new understanding of a process or concept, something that is beyond just exhibiting images of past work. Color me old fashioned, but I think there's still value in the printed word, with emphasis on editing, layout, aesthetics - overall thought process. (A similar argument can be make regarding printed versus computer presentations for studio projects.)

While I find blogs and internet findings quite musing and even sometimes incredibly helpful, I am still super embarrassed to post a blog or internet website as a footnote to my research. Perhaps if I was writing about something that is incredibly new, I would maybe venture more into this gigantic pool, but it's because of this changing, untested nature that makes me suspect the integrity of the information that I find. On the otherhand, if the posting was more related to a theoretical thought on architecture - I'm still quite hestitate to reference a blog or website because of it's changing nature (though the date would be referenced in the footnote, it would be less powerful if it was retracted the next day due to previous inebriation).

3 comments:

  1. The other thing about the blog is the anonymity of it. How do we know that Natalie isn't really Fernau trying to get a point across?

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  2. Natalie madelinehartzell@gmail.com author

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