Electronic Literature, pp. 71-85
I have to admit most of the regular English-related books we read on theory can sometimes be dry and boring but this one never fails to impress. Perhaps because it discusses a topic I like to talk about, computers and technology—then how they intertwine with electronic text. The fundamental idea of this reading appears to be one can no longer judge the text alone by itself but instead, one must take into account the technological aspect of the work itself. In terms of what algorithms are used, how are they employed in a particular work, are more advanced genetic algorithms in use or is it a simple work that has hard coded entries, that is, entries that do not change no matter how many times you traverse through a particular work.
Marcia Mencia, Birds Singing Other Birds’ Songs (also on E-Lit CD)
What I liked about this piece is it details how it was made, gives you a little history behind it and it comes with instructions. By the time bird is almost off of the screen you can just about read the text; however, by that time you lose much of what is being said, for the first option. The second option sounds like a bunch of kittens or mice, just as you have the word in place it blows up again. The third option shows a zoom-in and zoom-out of a bird figure “chip chuck.” Traversing the remaining numbers concurrently there are birds flying all over with different patterns that display different symbols, I am not sure what to make of this piece other than artistically its interesting but not sure what to take out of it as a whole.
Judd Morrissey, The Jew’s Daughter (also on E-Lit CD)
Note, requires PC/Mac to run this one. So I boot up my other computer to view this work. I must point out, off the bat its not very user-friendly no obvious way to quit, although Alt-F4 worked and closed the work, so once I had that down I investigated the work further. Correction, later on you are presented with “close” at the bottom right corner, once you dive into the work. As I did the reading before experimenting with this piece, I can foresee and agree with the author’s comments in relation to this work. You have to read, re-read and remember what you read in order to see what changed and how it affects the story. Slide 31 was a bit interesting, it slowly mimics the typing of the sentence over and over again “She had laid her head on the tracks and the train cut cleanly through her neck.” I had been navigating this text for awhile even trying to change the page to 200 or 300 but it seems to go on forever, does this piece end? Reading everything on a single page is quite a different approach to what we are typically accustomed to; however, I prefer moving from page to page, even if it were the same format, I think its probably because that is what I am used to and this goes out with that idea altogether.