About oliviawindsor

A writer, everyday dreamer and hopeful wanderlust adventurer. A Melbourne city girl through and through, Olivia is a Communications student at RMIT. Now also a columnist at Teenage Girl’s Survival Guide: http://teenagesurvivalguide.com/ and a beauty writer for Couturing.com. Olivia belongs to the world of performance, dancing classical ballet, jazz and contemporary. As such, her closet is overflowing with tutus, sequins and sparkly leotards! Enchanted by the bright lights of the stage, she’s drawn to the glitz and glamour of the world of beauty. She never leaves home without makeup essentials- peach lip balm, perfume, and a sweep of mascara, her ipod to satisfy her music obsession and a page crinkled book. Oh and she thrives on good quality coffee. Follow her at https://twitter.com/#!/oliviawindsor

THOUGHTS ON DATABASE LOGIC

Database Logic

  • Many new media objects don’t tell stories- don’t have a beginning or end or any development
  • They are collections of individual items- every item has same significance as others
  • Relationship b/w database and narrative?
  • Database defined as a structured collection of data
  • Data stored in a database are organised for fast search and retrieval by a computer
  • Different types of databases use different models to organise data

MELBOURNE HAIR AND MAKEUP ACADEMY

This article was originally published on Couturing.com

Calling all beauty enthusiasts! Form a line and give a warm welcome to the new Melbourne Hair and Makeup Academy in Greville Street, Prahran, opened by the talented hair and make up artist Silvana Mitkovsk. The site brings together a hair and makeup salon, retail store and a training academy in one space.

The Australian hair and make-up artist aims to provide a beauty arena that promotes ethical products that are simultaneously high quality and luxurious. The line oozes pure glamour and elicits memories of the bygone Old Hollywood style with the aim to “make everyday gals feel like a film star”.

The store stocks a variety of makeup and haircare ranges that are not tested on animals and do not contain parabens, sulphates and other harmful chemicals. The brands include Beauty Is LifeSynthesis Organics,Alterna Haircare BambooCloud Nine Hair Styling Tools and Curtis Collection Make-Up.

Beauty is Life is a phenomenal European make-up range that is only available in Australia at the store. The German brand is hypoallergenic, against animal testing and famed for its high-quality products. The brand is a perfect fit for Silvana Mitkovski as it offers products that “are good for the environment and good for our health without compromising glamour”.

Synthesis Organics is an Australian organic, cruelty-free, vegan and environmentally friendly skincare line.Alterna Haircare Bamboo offers organic haircare products without harsh chemicals that are perfectly complemented by Cloud Nine Hair Styling Tools. Curtis Collection Makeup is an Australian line that provides high quality mineral makeup designed to “make women glow from within”.

Customers are provided with expert assistance through the team of industry professionals, makeup artists and hair stylists on hand to answer questions and provide stunning makeovers. Silvana Mitkovski delivers even further by providing stylists to work with customers on location as well and is also launching make-up and hair training modules.

If you’re passionate about beauty and want the ultimate experience, this boutique is the place for you. One thing’s for sure, Silvana Mitkovski will undoubtedly set a new benchmark in beauty service!

The Melbourne Hair and Makeup Academy is located at 109 Greville Street, Prahran. Hours are Tuesday to Friday 12pm-6pm and Saturday 10am-6pm. Find out more and purchase products online at www.makeuphairacademy.com.au

WEEK 11 READING: ACTOR NETWORK THEORY

The week 11 reading detailed more about the notion of networks, specifically looking at the ‘actor-network’ theory (ATN). The important take-away ideas were not so much about ATN but about the wider characteristics of networks.

 

The reading dealt with the misunderstandings to do with networks because of the various meanings and usages of the word ‘network’. The word shouldn’t be given a technical meaning that implies subway or phone networks and it also shouldn’t be considered as having much to do with the study of social networks.

 

The properites common to all networks are:

  • They remove the concept of proximity
  • Remove the distinction of small or large scale-, that is a network is never bigger than another one it is simply more connected
  • Implies different social theory, so there is no hierarchical pyramid
  • Removes notion of inside/outside, so networks are all boundary without inside and outside

 

In terms of computer networks, these can be considered to be intensely connected, distant, compulsory and strategically organised. However, an actor network may lack these characteristics and can be local, have no compulsory paths and no strategically placed nodes.

 

Finally, the theory should make you think in terms of nodes that have as many dimensions as connections.

POTTS AND MURPHIE: ALL ABOUT THEORIES

The Potts and Murphie reading was about key theories relating to culture and technology and our society. Here’s a list of the key points I took away from reading:

  • Poses the question are technologies neutral in themselves? So, does the way they are used determine their cultural impact? Or do technologies have intrinsic properties that shape the cultures into which they are introduced?
  • Technological determinism refers to belief that technology is the agent of social change
  • Technological determinism is linked to idea of progress
  • TD considers technology as an ‘independent factor with its own course of development and own consequences’
  • Ideas that we live in an Information society or Computer Age ‘betray the technological determinist notion that society is shaped by its dominant technologies’
  • Consider whether society is shaped by its technologies or are technologies shaped by the needs of society?
  • Alvin Toffler’s idea of the “Future Shock” which warned that ‘post industrial societies need to protect themselves from dislocating effects of automation and computer-based technologies’
  • Theorists focus on the way a new technology creates new potential and possibility for human thought, expression or activity

– McLuhan’s theory: All technologies are extensions of human capacities
tools and implements are extensions of manual skills, the computer an extension of the brain

– Media are technologies that extend human sense perceptions

FRIENDSHIPS

This was originally published on The Teenage Girl’s Survival Guide 

Friend ~ “a person attached to another by feelings of affection or personal regard” . 

Sitting in the computer lab after school hours, You Tubing the Elephant Love Medley from my favourite movie Moulin Rouge and singing along, I knew I’d met one of my best friends.

Bonding over our mutual love of Ewan McGregor, secretly reading the Vampire Academy in our religion classes and re-enacting scenes from Titanic, my friend Jade is one of those rare finds you meet in high school and know you’ll have for life.

As you grow up you realise the importance of quality over quantity in friendships. You learn it’s not about having as many friends as possible BUT about having real, true people who’ll have your back no matter what.

Friends are what make your life that little bit more interesting. Friends are the people you go on crazy exciting adventures with, the ones who know your secrets, your flaws, your strengths, your embarrassing moments and love you for being you.

Think about the friends you have. What is it you look for in a good friend? Similar thoughts, beliefs, interests? Or the opposite- drastically different personalities?  What draws you to each other?

Different friends offer you different things. There are your childhood friends, your family friends, your high school friends, your work friends, your uni friends. There are the people who come into your life briefly before shortly exiting and then there are the ones you know will be there for the long haul.

I’ve got friends who won’t sugar-coat things for me. Who’ll tell me the cold hard truth even if it hurts because- let’s be honest- none of us wants to leave the house looking like a cake faced barbie doll!

Other friends will put up with me whinging and moaning about why my life isn’t textbook perfect and to their credit offer empathetic smiles and pearls of wisdom.

You know you’ve got good friends when they let you call the shots on where to go for coffee every time even if it means walking the distance.

Good friends are there in emergencies, will hold your hand when you’re scared, wipe your tears away and hug you when you’re broken-hearted.

My good friends let me raid their closet at a minute’s notice to find the perfect outfit.

They’ll pick me up, chauffeur me around, take me out to dinner, for coffee, to a movie.

They’ll laugh with me and not at me when I’ve done something absolutely ridiculous.

Good friends will tell you to slow down on the drinks and then pull your hair back when you’re vomiting.

They’re the ones you can go months without speaking to and when you finally manage to see each other it’s like you’ve never spent a day apart.

So if you’ve got all these amazing people in your life, what can you offer to a friendship? What values do you bring?

Are you a good listener? A problem solver? Full of vitality and excitement? Loving, caring, compassionate?

I’m sure you girls know friendship is about give and take. You have to put something into your relationship in order to get something out of it.

Friendships can be fragile things; hitting highs and lows. One minute you might be doing absolutely everything with a person and the next you can barely stand the sight of them. Sometimes it’s worth mending your friendships and other times you’ll be happy to ‘break up’.

Remember that no one is perfect. You’ll make mistakes, get into fights, be disappointed and disappoint others. Maybe you won’t always agree with the choices your friends make and sometimes your friends will be pissed at the decisions you make.

But at the end of the day, nothing beats having true friends to share your life with.

WEEK 9: GALLOWAY ON PROTOCOL READING

This reading was very long however there I do have some key takeaway ideas from my reading.

The reading discussed how the terms ‘diagram’, ‘technology’ and ‘management style’ come together in the modern age to define a new ‘apparatus of control’. The diagram refers to a distributed network resembling a web, technology is the computer and the management style is protocol.

Galloway ponders how the rise of technology will affect our future society and in particular thinks about who will have power and control. The theorist, Deleuze, believes we will exist in societies of control. They will operate with machines, information technology and computers. In this sense, Galloway and Deleuze say that power will no longer reside to the government as command and control will be able to move around.

Galloway speaks about computer protocol and defines it as a ‘set of recommendations and rules that outline specific technical standards’. On the internet, one such body of protocol is known as RFC (request for comments) documents. They are used by engineers who want to build hardware or software to meet common specifications.

Besides this, all this talk about control societies made me start imaging the premises for future dystopian worlds (both fictional and real!)

WEEK 9 READING: CULTURE AND TECHNOLOGY

The John Potts and Andrew Murphy reading consider the terms ‘technology, culture and technique’ and how they intertwine in our society.

In thinking about what technology is:

  • Long history and changing meanings of the word
  • It developed with terms like the ‘Industrial Revolution’ to describe the radical restructuring of Western societies as a result of industrial processes.
  • During the 1860s, technology meant the system of mechanical and industrial arts
  • Technology has now come to describe the overall system of machines and processes
  • Contemporary meaning of technology is ABSTRACT. Can be said “we now live in technology surrounded by technological systems and dependent on them”
  • Technology in the contemporary world involves cultural values, ideologies, ethical concerns and is shaped by political and economic determinants

The reading then went on to discuss what a technique is:

  • Put simply it is “the use of skill to accomplish something”.
  • We need techniques to use technologies
  • If we lost technique we would lose operational skills and the thinking to produce technologies

 

Finally, what is culture?

  • Very difficult to define
  • Can be about self-contained cultures
  • Can also embrace all human activity around the world
  • Can pertain to the arts or entertainment
  • Potts and Murphy think of culture as DYNAMIC and MULTIPLE
  • It is dynamic because ideas and values change
  • It is multiple because it contains the activities of different classes, races and ages.
  • In the words of Brian Eno: “Culture is everything we do not have to do”.

 

08 UNLECTURE

My main takeway point from this week’s unlecture was about ‘Play, game and stories’. Adrian told us that gaming is defined by the notion of competition instead of narrative which marks a clear divide between games and stories. You can have games without narrative and you can’t win a narrative. What seems to link the two together is the notion of ‘play’.

Adrian explained this idea clearer in his blog post by showing that you can play with both games and stories. So, you can play without needing to win and play with stories and words just like you can play games. When thinking about the word PLAY it is important to note that the end goal is not always winning. ‘Play’ can cause different results depending on what is being played- so playing with a story and language or playing a game. So, while games can have stories they don’t necessarily need to have narratives. The end purpose is to win.

Another important point, was about filtering content on the internet. Filtering means that depth is encouraged rather than exploration. Adrian told us he believes the future of this will see the ‘recommender’ become ingrained in this system.