Reply to comment

So far in this class, I think what works best for me and the group in this class are our discussions. The subjects covered and the ideas generated are really interesting and interactive. I think what I need to work on individually is developing my web paper ideas in new ways. I'm really interested by the innovative web papers others have done and in the second half of the semester I want to explore new ways of writing and thinking about the web papers, beyond a cut-and-dry essay.

Something I think we could work on as a group would be discussions of our web papers. In another course I'm taking (The Story of Evolution and the Evolution of Stories) during a group discussion we talked about what the topics we planned to write on for our web papers. Hearing what others were interested in was really fascinating and got me thinking about different questions to consider in my own paper. I think briefly talking about our ideas for web papers as a class would be really helpful.

Overall I'm really enjoying the class; most of the concepts we've covered have forced me to reconsider my assumptions and really explore and understand my own ideas. A good example of this is our discussion on what constitutes information. Although I'd previously expressed dissatisfaction with the black-and-white definitions of gender, before this class I had never stopped to consider why exactly they were unproductive or what alternatives exist.

I was originally going to suggest that we read Feed, but saw that aybala50 already recommended it... :) So instead, I suggest Neuromancer by William Gibson. It's one of the biggest novels in the cyberpunk genre, and revolves around a computer hacker who's hired to complete a challenging hacking job. Some of the novel's themes are the future of technology, the benefits of integrating computers/technology with our bodies, and the (free?) exchange of information on the internet.