MDA's Aesthetics are 'desirable emotional responses,' and it may be more accurate to say that Transformation is something a little beyond that. It is not simply the emotional response which I value, but the longstanding impact that it has on my life: see precursory tenet Art is Life-Changing.

QuoteTransformation (Game as catalyst for personal development): The sense that one's understanding of oneself and/or the world one inhabits has changed, irreversibly.

pingback: https://newforum.droqen.com/index.php?topic=236

What I value most in art and experiences of any & all forms is Transformation -- not mere exposure to new ideas, but incorporation of them into a new version of myself. This comes in many forms: non-fiction pieces of writing (The Timeless Way of Building and What Should We Do with Our Brain?), documentaries (The "Beauty" episode of Explained), important personal experiences in real life (taking the bus alone for the first time, breaking up with a long-term partner) and in videogames (being caught stealing loot that my whole party was supposed to share in Everquest), to name a few.

A life is measured in thousands of these important moments, and in no case is the moment taken in isolation -- it works to recontextualize unresolved thoughts that had come from elsewhere, only resolved as the result of a particular pressure or provocation.

Transformation (Game as catalyst for personal development): The sense that one's understanding of oneself and/or the world one inhabits has changed, irreversibly.

The MDA framework presents eight example Aesthetics, "the desirable emotional responses evoked in the player, when she interacts with the game system." They are as follows:

• Sensation (Game as sense-pleasure): Player enjoys memorable audio-visual effects.
• Fantasy (Game as make-believe): Imaginary world.
• Narrative (Game as drama): A story that drives the player to keep coming back
• Challenge (Game as obstacle course): Urge to master something. Boosts a game's replayability.
• Fellowship (Game as social framework): A community where the player is an active part of it. Almost exclusive for multiplayer games.
• Discovery (Game as uncharted territory): Urge to explore game world.
• Expression (Game as self-discovery): Own creativity. For example, creating character resembling player's own avatar.
• Submission (Game as pastime): Connection to the game, as a whole, despite of constraints.

All categorization is arbitrary and imperfect; the concept which I am about to present, Transformation, overlaps to some degree with many of the above, which I will explore. It may also be the case that this idea is not well-bounded by MDA.

I'm going to my cousin's wedding in June and for the first time I've found I can picture what everyone will be wearing and sort of place myself there at the event. What will I be wearing and how will my choice of clothing interact with the social fabric?

I can change my clothes in my mind's eye. What if I have a grey shirt, or a white one? What if I'm wearing a ridiculous hat? What if everyone dresses more casually, or more formally? This is still only a newborn sense. I work on it occasionally when I'm outdoors downtown: I look at what people are wearing, picturing them in different clothes, in each other's clothes, in all the same clothes. It's fun, and makes excellent practice.

P.S.

I really have to think more sometime on the nature of 'process is content'; in short, though, I think I hate it. But maybe that's just because of the whole "seek & hold attention" thing - leveraging anything as "content"?

Quotethese algorithms reward [whatever] seeks & holds attention

i no longer value this.

these platforms are built on a foundation i don't need or want in my life these days and participating in them no longer makes sense.

who can say whether this is because they changed or because i did?

regardless, learning this means that i'm done with this type of space. thanks for all the fish.

struthless' video is entitled "The problem with the internet that no one is talking about" but the only aspect of the internet that is discussed is platforms, so it's really "The problem with social media platforms that no one is talking about"

people are good at getting themselves into these bubbles where they think the ecosystem that surrounds them is representative of more than it really is.

the problem with social media platforms is that people on it think that's the most important thing on the internet

the problem with the internet is that people on it think that's the most important thing about reality

etc.

he may be right about these predictions - as '''content creators''' become exhausted themselves with creating daily content, they move to attempting to build their little buckets of fans who will accept them taking breaks, who will join their communities on community based platforms, who will persist long enough to support slower content schedules.

but i'm just not interested in content; i'm interested in timeless art.

at the end of the video, he makes some predictions.

Quoteprediction I. exhausting content schedules will decline in relevance [e.g. people won't make videos once a day, they'll make more like two a month]
prediction II. community based platforms will continue to rise [for example discord]
prediction III. 'going viral' strategy isn't going anywhere
prediction IV. social apps to promote content that doesn't look 'typically viral' in order to stay fresh
prediction V. taking breaks will become normalised

i think the thing i don't like about this video is that the conclusion he draws comes from '1000 true fans' which i'm somehow opposed to. when i hear about 1000 true fans, it doesn't sound like a healthy, desirable relationship to me.

our video speaker never really comes back to combat this, but it's the thing that made me continue watching the video - isn't this "the problem with the internet that no one is talking about"? or rather, the problem with being an artist on the internet - the transformative force which converts artists into those content creators if they want to be successful

Quote from: (earlier in the video than the above)these algorithms reward art that seeks & holds attention

i am extremely happy that i'm not thinking about any of this anymore. what did i expect, really?

i watched a third of this video in bed, then the rest a while later.

Quote1000 true fans

oh no, i've heard this before