Website Design Templates

I found this website when checking out lifehacker.com, and I thought this would be really helpful to a lot of people who're doing their projects online.

It's a bunch of free website design templates, and a link to a few open-source WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get) web site builders.

Lifehacker

Weekend Hours Redux

Honors Intensive Weekend Labs:

Sunday, December 2 noon to 6 pm. Dave Lopez will be available for Flash Help. Student workers will be here. No meals but I may be able to cough up snacks and drinks.

Saturday, December 8 noon to 6 pm. I'll have a student worker, all labs open and again, likely snacks and drinks.

Spring Thesis Show Dates (4/10-4/19)

Hey All Honors Seniors:

Although all of the planning is not yet complete, I wanted to get you the information we do have so far: the thesis show will have two events--a preview for seniors and their advisors on Thursday, April 10 from 5-8 pm; it will then remain up and be open from 4-6pm each day the following week M-Th (students will have to switch off running it for those two hours daily) and there will likely be a VIP/Dean/Provost night mid week (around 4/16 or so). This will all culminate in a big bash on Friday, April 18th from 5 to 8 pm after which, it will close.

Of course, we hope to then put all the projects into an online journal before graduation. Further, we welcome your input on the planning and execution of this--it is your thesis show, after all. If you would like to join the planning committee or have suggestions, email Virginia at vkuhn@cinema.usc.edu

-VK

The Ultimate Rube Goldberg Machine

I am posting this mainly for Matt but thought you all might like to see it:

Congrats to Rachel!

... for her $2000 grant from the School of Theatre to finish her thesis project. Below are some clips from her planning. Nice work!

Web page with tips for us

Here is some script to help some of our projects: https://tiger.iml.annenberg.edu:8005/web.html

YouTube Custom Player

Wanna watch a root canal operation?

Looks like every possible procedure in almost every profession will eventually be filmed and placed online. People inevitably want to know more about what goes on.

This enterprising dentist has live demos of root canal, crowning, denture and air abrasion techniques on his web site, he spent a few thousand dollars, hired professionals to shoot the procedures, and apparently more and more patients have been coming to have their teeth done by him after watching his videos. Knowledge and increased disclosure do inspire confidence!

http://www.dentalcomfortzone.com/techniques.asp

Thesis Project Weekend 11/3-4

Nov 3rd, 9 am - 2 pm
Nov 4th, 10 am - 5 pm

The IML will host a weekend "boot camp" for senior Honors students to work on their thesis projects. There will be help with and access to:

- Video Editing
- VoiceOver (w/Pro Tools)
- Dreamweaver
- Second Life
- Flash (custom with Dave Lopez--must arrange ahead)
- Sophie
- Feedback
- Camaraderie
- Commiseration

Come before the Homecoming Game Sat and/or all day Sunday and build your shell. This is a good time after mid terms and before finals. Lunch will be served. Both labs will be open and tech staff will be standing by.

For more info contact Virginia Kuhn (vkuhn@cinema.usc.edu)

Sweet Interactive Sketch Site

Hey guys...

I know this doesn't really have anything to do with our class, but I thought it is a great example of what the internet and user interaction can come up with. See for yourself:

http://www.zefrank.com

See ya in class!

Olivia

Rachel Kerry Story Board Movie

Here is the youtube of the storyboard I showed everyone last week.

Comments?

The Right One

21st Century Students

This is a new video from the creator of The Machine is Using Us:

Second Life project (machinima)

Check out this machinima of the Second Life event held on IML's island last month. It may be a way for a few of you to represent your projects (or a portion thereof).

Vectors: Objects of Media

This project, designed by Amelie Hastie and Raegan Kelly, is an interesting take on the multimedia experience. Conceptually it is multiple projects in one; a group of scholars produced their own “biography” of a material object, and then connected that object with a theme they wished to explore within their specific field – for example, an embroidered condom represents the marginalization of Asian gay men and their subsequent attempts to stand out. The project engaged the viewer by allowing him/her to pick an individual approach to the content. It explains in the beginning pages that the project is intended to be similar to a conversation rather than essay-istic. Like a conversation, the viewer is able to veer off on tangents (or longer explanations of a particular object).You can wander through the projects in any way you choose, however, whether by the objects themselves, their histories, or their scholarly reflections; or, one can choose to go through each project one at a time. What is unique is that all these exploration options are present on the screen at the same time, allowing the user to have their own experiences with the projects and not just a linear, text-based experience. The navigation of the project works well with the design of the
project itself. The main objects that appear in the design are circles and pluses. When moving between narratives you are able to move right, left, up and down... much like a plus (+) sign. Yet like a circle, the ever changing content keeps the viewer interested and eventually takes him/her full circle through the entire discussion, but is not so rigid as to make the user feel trapped in the project. We particularly liked the use of color to identify each narrative. Although the navigation became complicated at times, color identification for each subject was incredibly useful.

As the project’s introduction states, this technique allows each essay and its related object to “represent multiple threads of an exchange,” and as “segments of a broader, collective conversation.” We thought the project was engaging and seemingly random at times, mirroring a real-life conversation. Pictures for each topic was the closest the viewer was able to get to each physical object. Each object was mentioned as a starting off point to a later discussion of another related subject. It was effective in producing a very non-linear reading and learning process. At the end of the experience, we felt that we were looking at objects around me in a more global sense, so I felt that the project was not only effective in establishing the sense of a conversation but also in promoting this scholarly exchange in the users’ own settings.

Vectors: Dead Reckoning

by Sonia and Tiffany

Caren Kaplan and Reagan Kelly’s Dead Reckoning is a very innovative project which details the historical significance of visual perspectives in military operation and their impact on visual culture. The project chooses four topical areas, Perspective, Chronophotography, Edge Detection, and Targeting. Within each segment, the user performs simple tasks, such as dragging an airplane across the screen or zooming in on an aerial photograph from World War II. The task, however rudimentary, serves as a visual introduction to aerial perspectives. During this process, text boxes appear with more detailed information about the action the viewer is performing. By allowing the viewer to virtually experience the perspective before reading about it, the viewer can contextualize the subject matter. Furthermore, Dead Reckoning rewards the user for interacting with the interface, displaying additional information as the user moves the airplane across the screen and succeeds in effectively engaging the user’s attention.

The multimedia aspect of Dead Reckoning is highly visually stimulating, using floating text boxes as yet another medium to communicate their controlling idea. The text boxes appear in sometimes rapid succession, obscuring one another and blocking the line of sight of the viewer. This forces the audience to manipulate the text boxes so that they can comprehend the screen layout, which speaks directly to their idea of visual perspectives. The only flaw in this setup is that some of the text boxes which are obscured cannot be brought forward, thus making it difficult for the viewer to fully experience all of the text and image.

The information presented within the text is not only about the history of perspectives and vision, but also about the application of these concepts to specific historical situations, such as Hiroshima and Desert Storm. While the material presented shows a wealth of research and effort, the diversity of the material seems to confuse the main idea of the project. The supposed topic is aerial perception and construction of targets, but these ideas are interspersed with portrait-like stories and other pointed political statements which, though of interest, serve to distract the viewer from the main thesis. Nevertheless, Kaplan and Kelly ultimately present a thoughtful and engaging experience for learning about the multiple portrayals of visual perspective through the context of military operations.

Panorama Ephemera - Reviewed by Olivia and Beth

Plants to food to compost to soil to plants to food. Oceans to vapor to clouds to rain to rivers to oceans and back again. Ideas to pictures and sounds and words then to books and movies and music and then to shelves. There they lie, unseen, unheard, and unused.
– Rick Prelinger

In 2004, Rick Prelinger wrote and directed the feature film Panorama Ephemera, a “collage” of ephemeral films produced in the United States of the 1920s through 1970s that uses images both familiar and mythical to depict the fears and hopes of the American populace during these times. His contribution to the Vectors Journal is an extension of this film that serves to further explain his theories and reasons for archiving ephemeral films. On the one hand, this project is a straightforward intellectual piece that directs the user to Prelinger’s three main topical considerations. The first is his declared project Manifesto where Prelinger flatly declares the work of the archivist as a modern savior to an overpopulated and over stimulated popular culture. The second aspect of his project, where the most substance lies, is in the delineation of the four aspects of archiving ephemeral films. Here he delineates the events in media history that have dictated the career of the ephemeral archivist. And, lastly, Prelinger concludes his work with a short essay describing and defending the role of the archivist as a position perpetuating and expanding the possibilities of art. On the other hand, Prelinger moves away from a completely argumentative thesis with his chronological exploration of significant events in his life alongside advancements in his archiving of ephemeral films. The juxtaposition of this element with a non-linear collage of ephemeral films from the feature film Panorama Ephemera serves well to lay out the various aspects of Prelinger’s interests and theories in a comprehensive study of the ephemeral archivist.

Vectors Project "Malperception"

Perry Hoberman & Donald Hoffman's project "Malperception" explores the way in which the human brain constructs reality based on data collected by sensing organs, and that while sometimes wrong takes are caused by failure to collect information about reality, quite often malperception occurs during the brain's translation of that information.

This controlling idea is apparent in an engaging and pedagogical context. The research is clearly extensive and the multimedia format allows each phenomenon to be divulged in its own respective manner.

The web exhibition is proportional to the project in that one can easily jump around from a static menu bar. Each link leads to a considerable amount of textual information that has been boiled down from its original state and broken up into short paragraphs and surrounded by images that keep it from feeling uninviting or daunting.

Overall the project does a great job at taking a large amount of information and making it easily browsed and digested. The one problem is that its supplemental interactive Shockwave demonstrations of the malperception principles being discussed are incompatible with new Mac computers running on Intel chipsets until Adobe updates the old macromedia plugins or Mac updates its OS.

- Dustin, Alexis, Xing

"Virtual Vaudeville" Vectors Close Reading

By Ashley Hsieh, Rachel Kerry, and Matt Gerhardt

“Virtual Vaudeville” is a Vectors project by David Saltz, which tries to recreate the experience of historical vaudeville theater. The project is pedagogical, teaching laymen what vaudeville is, and introducing key vaudeville figures. Additionally, the project is experiential. “Virtual Vaudeville” recreates famous acts by Frank Bush in 3-D animation and allows the viewer to change audience perspectives. There are a variety of vantage points, including that of the performer. Additionally, the project includes a dialogue box with interesting facts about the performance.
The principle failure of the project is that the viewer does not feel connected to the performance. Because animation is used primarily to create a fantastical world, the audience is drawn in as a spectator, but not as a participating member. The viewer is never actively engaged in the 3-D performance recreation. Perhaps if it were done in live action, the project could be more compelling. Also, we believe that making the laughter surround-sound would be beneficial. With laughter coming from all around, the viewer will experience a more organic project (instead of the current artificial, laughter).
The project is set up for easy navigation by the viewer, but the program is not. The Performance Viewer cannot be viewed on a Mac. The viewer can watch the recreations as a QuickTime movie, but the experiential aspect and scholarly asides are lost.
The project is very interesting and makes a good point for the scholarly uses of video game design, etc. However, with a more user-friendly platform and a stronger attempt at viewer connection (perhaps an actual plot leading up to and after the performance, or an interactive game element) the project would be more engaging.

Article on MSN: Online community Second Life becomes venue for recruiting, interviewing

From the article:
A few major companies have begun experimenting with this virtual world as an additional tool to find employees. In May TMP Worldwide, a recruiting firm, hosted its first virtual job fair called Network in World on Second Life.

“To date, more than 1,800 candidates have either registered for a NiW job fair and then applied for open positions, or have expressed interest in a position and then left their contact details for employers,” says Russell Miyaki, a vice president of the recruiting firm, adding that about 214 interviews have taken place and about four people have gotten jobs as a result.

Companies that have interviewed candidates at the virtual job fairs included Sodexho, the food management company that hired Giordano, as well as Microsoft and Verizon, among others.

"Competition on a global scale is forcing companies to look at innovative ways of both marketing and recruiting,” says Andrew Mallon, executive director of the Social Research Foundation, a consumer research firm that conducts opinion polls of Second Life members.

“Some industries will have a greater advantage or relevance in a virtual world like Second Life." he says. "For example, a high-tech recruiter in a virtual interview gets to see the initiative and interactive skills that job candidate put into creating the look of their avatar. But candidates should study the company in advance and come to the interview knowing what value they can bring to the employer. Following that standard rule still is a big plus. Then, instead of the old ‘Dress for Success,’ an avatar must ‘Impress for Success.’”

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20588553/

Updated proposal

hey guys,

I just put my proposal up but since I made the first draft a while ago it didn't show up as the most recent. So...unfortunately you have to scroll down a bit to see it. Sorry :(

Matt's Proposal

Title: Roundabout 'Rithmatic - Expressing Engineering in a New Light

Abstract: Many facets of engineering arern't readily obvious to a non-engineer. This project hopes to lift the veil of engineering, by showing real-life examples of engineering in a Rube Goldberg-type machine. Different aspects of engineering will be portrayed as the machine progresses, and as it performs each task, the machine will explain the theories occurring. The segments of engineering that will be examined are kinematics, fluid dynamics, electricity, magnetism, light, and possibly chemistry and heat transfer. The machine works its way to the final task, which is turning on a light bulb. This is to represent both one of the more significant pinicles of engineering, and also to, hopefully, represent the lightbulb that goes off in the head of the viewer.

Media Presentation: This project will have two separate media components. First, there will be a tactile exhibit, which I feel is integral to the project, as it will show cohesive examples to those who will be able to view the project firsthand. However, this doesn't have as great a reach as I would like. Therefore, I will also be creating an internet component, which will have the entire project filmed, along with the theory behind each individual component explained online.

Alexis' Proposal in Short

“Music is the universal language of mankind.” ~Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Title: The Language We Don't Talk About: Hearing Time and Place in Film Scores

Abstract: This project delves into the world of musical color, specifically in relation to the creation of the sensation of a time and place in cinema. It is an in-depth exploration of this aspect of film music and its relationship with American culture via YOU (any American). This project argues the musical color in film scores has become a national language by comparing score motifs internationally and within American pop culture. It is targeted for any film listener (even the blind). It will be a pedagogical, interactive website (flash or html) that, if time permits, may launch a multi-layered, interactive game (flash).

Media Presentation & Justification: This thesis will include a flash website with film clips, sound clips, visual images, and game devices to allow decision making in order to let the user to declare their own connotations when they hear score motifs. This project should be in multimedia because "writing about music is like dancing about architecture" -Zappa. Also, this project requires the allowance of users to make decisions in a way that cannot be done in an essay. It is a personal discovery best revealed through interactivity.

Sonia's Newest Proposal

I am studying the relationships of the concepts of duality within science and various religions. In science, especially physics, many of the important driving concepts have been forged using the idea of duality. This is how we discovered antiparticles, normal forces, and gravitational forces. I would like to explore dualistic relationships within religion, and find any correlations between those of religion and those of science. It is my belief that our reason for viewing our world "in pairs" stems from the ancient religions of our ancestors, and religion has always had a very important influence on scientific progress.
The religions that I will be researching are the religions of the more scientifically advanced civilizations, such as the Aztecs, the Greeks, etc. I also want to touch on the psychological aspect of duality, and why we, as human beings, feel the need to see everything with duality. Even when we cannot witness them, we claim that there are opposites to everything, that there are forces we cannot feel, dimensions we cannot see, microscopic symmetries and particles. Is it solely due to our social construction of the world, or is it possibly the way our mind works?

Platform:
I think that project will be done through Sophie. I want to make each segment a short movie clip or animation, and place them within some small amount of text. I think that having this platform makes the project much more interesting, and I'm hoping the animations will help explain some of the more complicated physical concepts. I also will do several interviews with both scientists and religious figures, as well as professors of religion. These will be interspersed throughout the project, with "hot buttons" to click to other segments or explanations. It's still a work in progress...I'm thinking about it!

Tiffany's second attempt

I am studying how everyday personal and social decisions affect happiness because I want to demonstrate how economic principles can explain differences in people’s self-reported levels of happiness. By doing so, I am trying to help the average person gain a better understanding of the discrepancies between perception and reality in the relationship between decisions and experiences and in turn, the user may learn simple concepts in economic theory in order to make more informed decisions that will have a positive effect on his happiness. Hence, my goal is to help the average layman learn about how to use economic analyses to make better decisions. I want my project to be both interactive and informative, and since I want this tool to be accessible to everyone, I may design my project as an online website.

Firstly, I am defining “happiness” as subjective well-being, quantifiable only by the user as a reflection of her personal level of satisfaction. I am going about making the argument that the average person does not correctly forecast or backcast his experienced happiness by developing a tool or simulation that mimics the process of making a decision. This may be accomplished by a four-fold method: 1. Have the user complete a questionnaire related to what is to be learned or decided upon. 2. The user will make an actual decision or complete a simple task similar to those summarized in textbooks. 3. The user will complete a post-task survey. 4. A results section will use economic analysis to explain their decision. The goal is to have the user come to the realization that their perception of a decision may be different from the actual outcome because the average person fails to take into consideration changes in aspirations and adaptation, as well as other social and economic forces that play a role in determining one’s happiness. Therefore, my contention is that the people do not accurately predict which actions will actually result in significant (lasting) improvements in their happiness.

The platform will be similar to a website with surveymonkey attached

My topic is narrow enough to cover in depth. I have not yet commenced any interviews, but believe that they may not be necessary if sufficient published material is available to reference. However, the details of my interface and planning process are rather vague and need to be carefully tailored to further the goal of this project and teach the average person how happiness relates to economics through a multimedia experience. Some other experiments I have identified that may be incorporated in the project are:
- The desire to see rewards for progress: People would rather choose to earn $30,000 one year, $40,000 the next, then $50,000 the following year, rather than earn $60,000, $50,000, and then $40,000, even though the latter is greater in absolute dollars. This experiment also introduces the ideas of aspiration and adaptation. I would probably go about doing this through a survey of 2-3 short questions relating to financial and social reward, followed by an explanation about why the user selected the answer she chose, and whether or not such choice was consistent with economic ideology.
- Remembering a general idea, but not details: Subjects reviewing a list of words will recall a general idea about the words, but do not remember them exactly and their mind will “fill in the blanks” and summarize, creating an inaccurate recollection of the event.
- Peak-end theory: What a subject remembers about an event is determined most strongly by the peak and end of the experience. For example, subjects would prefer to submerge their hands in ice water for a longer amount of time and then in warm water, than to submerge their hands in ice water for a significantly shorter amount of time, due to the peak-end theory.

Olivia's Proposal

Here's a brief recap of my proposal -

Content:

The focus of my thesis argument surrounds the edification of campy B teen sci-fi/fantasy films of the 1980s as academically, scholastically, and historically valuable. Namely, I will be taking a cultural studies approach to the genre to explore how these films reflect their era, their creators, and how they reflect the dominant (or counter-culture) ideology. The fact is that "B films" are not generally seen as viable sources for mainstream film studies and are instead relegated to cult phenomena. While I understand that these films did not play a particularly obvious or intentional role in the construction/advancement of film history and language, it is also obvious that their role is severely under represented. The fact that they do have a fan following proves that they are playing a role in film. It is my objective to show how these films have affected the bigger budget Blockbusters throughout the decades and, most importantly, to show the 1980s as a decade when "B films" were not in the film world but a key element in the development of the modern day Blockbuster.

Format:

My media presentation of this thesis will be displayed as an interactive website. The user will be able to choose from a selection of categories that will each display different information on the genre (a time line of the progression of the genre, a flash video with hyperlinked pop up windows that display further information on the content, and a game/quiz page where the user can test their knowledge of the era and/or films). Aesthetically, I am really aiming to have the feel of a fan-based website. I will definitely be drawing from other websites based on B-films for inspiration. I want the users to not feel bombarded with information but instead be interested in the theories and facts they might not have thought about. To encourage the users to express their own analysis and share information, I want each page to have an interactive commentary. Here the users can annotate the given information, find links to other relevant sites, and identify further references or examples. Also, ideally there would be a link on each page to a forum where the users can discuss/contest the site content and hold open discussions about the genre.

So, that's all for now!

Beth's Proposal

Toxin-Antitoxin Pairs in Escherichia coli

BACKGROUND
Toxin-antitoxin (TA) pairs are gene pairs that encode a stable toxin protein and a labile antitoxin protein. In a healthy cell, the toxin protein and the antitoxin protein bind together to form a complex that is harmless to the cell. If, however, the cell loses the gene pair, production of the two proteins ceases, the unstable antitoxin is rapidly degraded, and the toxin accumulates, eventually poisoning and killing the cell. There are at least ten of these TA pairs on the E. coli genome, and we want to figure out why they're there. We believe that these TA pairs exist as part of a quality control mechanism that protects the larger, healthy population by causing a damaged cell to enter a programmed cell death pathway. We know that in competition, a population of E. coli cells lacking just one TA pair is less fit than a wild type population containing all ten of the TA pairs. Thus the focus of my research is to determine a hierarchy of fitness for seven of these TA pairs, that is, the order of importance of seven of these TA pairs. I will be utilizing basic microgiological and newer molecular biological technqiues to accomplish this.

IML THESIS PROJECT
My IML thesis will be a Flash-based, interactive multimedia version of a written scientific paper. This project is intended for a scientific community, but should be relatively accessible to a larger audience. The final project will consist of the basic components of a scientific paper - Abstract, Introduction, Materials and Methods, Results, Discussion and Conclusion, References (though perhaps not presented as such) - as well as several multimedia components (illustrations, animations, videos, etc.) that will explicate difficult subject matter and illustrate important aspects of the research endeavor.

Rachel Kerry's proposal

My IML Project is going to focus on developing multimedia performance art.

While multimedia is very chic for the theatre world right now, very few artists are successful in their attempts to fully integrate it onto the stage. The novelty of these new forms rarely supports creative content. In response, many theatre companies are chucking new media and embracing the manifestos of physical artists (such as Grotowsky)

Using an original script, I intend to produce a full length play that integrates multimedia into the artistic language of the stage. In addition to that, I mean to create a smaller scale (yet more multimedia reliant) performance that focuses primarily on one character's 15 minute monologue.

At this point, the piece is conceptually simple. Three hanging scrims with multimedia tableaus as a means to articulate the emotional landscapes of the piece. The key will be to find a way in which the actor can interact with the media instead of relying on it (or worse, ignoring it).

By December I hope to have the smaller-scale piece prepared as well as the pre-rehearsal arrangements for full-scale production.

Elissa Stooker's proposal

The Third Wheel: The Relationship between Radio, the Record Companies, and the Government
Working in radio this summer, I came to realize that no one in the general public knows what REALLY goes on behind the scenes in radio. I would like to create either a fun DVD or website that will explain how radio works, how the record companies work with radio, and the kinks that new payola regulations have thrown in this relationship.

I'd like to set it up as following:
- a diagnostic quiz to figure out what, if anything the user knows.
- an explanation of what payola is. a definition, history, and the current regulations
- a choice of whether to act as a record company or a radio station manager. the record company view will allow the user to act as a record company in dealing with radio, and learning about that relationship. the radio will act as the radio and view the relationship from the opposite perspective. throughout this exploration examples of radio/record company interaction will pop up, allowing the user to learn what to do. for instance, a box of CDs will appear in the radio office, and you will have to log them in the system in order to continue.
- finally, a quiz with consequences. if you pass, you'll get a raise, and if you fail, you'll get fined!

Ashley Hsieh's proposal

My thesis project is about Wong Kar-wai's film Chungking Express and what it reveals about the relationship between the transnational and the local. The film is heavily influenced by foreign and transnational elements. For example, the characters speak different languages other than Cantonese, the characters eat Western food and listen to America, raggae and Punjabi music. The space in which the characters occupy is heavily transnational, a merger of different and unexpected cultures. I want to ask the audience whether Chungking Express reflects a Hong Kong devoid of local "Hong Kong" culture or whether the Hong Kong portrayed is a reflection of how modern and global the city actually is. If I don't have enough time to do this, I think I'll just narrow it down to how Chungking Express reveals the transnational nature of Hong Kong although I consider that to be sort of boring and probably not as "multimedia" friendly.

My project will be an interactive DVD. It will basically open with a video of the history of Hong Kong: how it used to be a territory of China and part of its tianxia, or cultural kingdom, how it was colonized by Britain for 99 years and became a territory of free trade, thereby attracting a number of foreign investors and its eventual return to China in 1997 (although it will not be under Chinese governmental control until 2047). Because the film takes place in 1994, I will not go in depth about 1997 but rather use it as a date of apprehension.

There will then be three platforms: the first explores a bar and the transnational elements present in Chungking Express; the second explores an apartment or hotel and explores the identity crises present in the film; and the last is where you decide whether the film is a criticism of Hong Kong's lack of local culture or is merely a reflection of Hong Kong as a global city.

Tiffany Ikeda's proposal

I am studying how everyday personal and social decisions affect happiness because I want to demonstrate how economic principles can explain differences in people’s self-reported levels of happiness. By doing so, I am trying to help the average person gain a better understanding of the discrepancies between perception and reality in the relationship between decisions and experiences and in turn, the user may learn simple concepts in economic theory in order to make more informed decisions that will have a positive effect on his happiness. Hence, my goal is to help the average layman learn about how to use economic analyses to make better decisions. I want my project to be both interactive and informative, and since I want this tool to be accessible to everyone, I may design my project as an online website.

I am going about making the argument that the average person does not correctly forecast or backcast his experienced happiness by developing a tool or simulation that mimics the process of making a decision. This may be accomplished by a four-fold method: 1. Have the user complete a questionnaire related to what is to be learned or decided upon. 2. The user will make an actual decision or complete a simple task similar to those summarized in textbooks. 3. The user will complete a post-task survey. 4. A results section will use economic analysis to explain their decision. The goal is to have the user come to the realization that their perception of a decision may be different from the actual outcome because the average person fails to take into consideration changes in aspirations and adaptation, as well as other social and economic forces that play a role in determining one’s happiness.

My topic is narrow enough to cover in depth. However, the details of my methodology are rather vague and need to be carefully tailored to further the goal of this project and teach the average person how happiness relates to economics through a multimedia experience. Some other experiments I have identified that may be incorporated in the project are:
- The desire to see rewards for progress: People would rather choose to earn $30,000 one year, $40,000 the next, then $50,000 the following year, rather than earn $60,000, $50,000, and then $40,000, even though the latter is greater in absolute dollars. This experiment also introduces the ideas of aspiration and adaptation.
- Remembering a general idea, but not details: Subjects reviewing a list of words will recall a general idea about the words, but do not remember them exactly and their mind will “fill in the blanks” and summarize, creating an inaccurate recollection of the event.

Xing Chen's proposal

I am going to conduct lab research in an aspect of Neuroscience and then use my procedures and my findings to create a multimedia presentation. The project will be strengthened by similar research and findings which I will also present in multimedia. Since my lab situation is not yet solidified, I am laying out the project as a frame into which the work will ultimately be placed. I'm focused on quality of content above anything else, but work involving imaging, network pathways, communication between brain regions, should lend itself decently to a media presentation. Right now, I am planning the possible ways of laying out the background research, goals, methods, and so on and the modes of presenting the info with visuals, and links to pertinent sources such as websites and journals. Using multimedia, I will be able to show more complexity than using words alone.

Updated proposals for those who got short-shifted

Again, I apologize to those of you who did not get a chance to speak in class. Go ahead and register in order to comment, all of you, and, meanwhile I will add a post for each person who will then be able to add their information (if you've trouble, just email it to me for posting) and each of us will then comment by Friday. My records show that the following people didn't get a chance today: Xing, Ash, Tiffany, Rachel & Elissa. Eventually we will all have work up here.....

Today's class

We have a lot of work today so I thought I'd post an agenda to keep us on task:

- portal login
- look for common times (again) Mon, Thu, Fri
- class on 9.18
- quick & dirty feedback on proposals (everyone jots notes on pages provided)
- identify your 3 action steps and email them to me (vkuhn@usc.edu w/"440 steps as subject line) by Friday 9.7 at 5:00 pm. action steps can include: annotation of main sources, storyboarding, script, platform tutorial/workshop, survey creation/feedback, draft in selected platform...

I am afraid for youth...

Welcome!

Dear Gang,

We have an exciting year ahead of us and this term will set the pace. The good news is we are devoting all of our time to the planning and construction of your thesis projects. As such, this is a lab-based class and we will do extensive workshopping of your projects. There are several dates on our schedule, many of which are imposed upon us by the university (grrr) but your IML management team is on the job and has planned accordingly! (That is the less-good news).

This blog is for both sections of 440, Tuesday 4-6 pm (Kuhn) and Wednesday 6-8 pm (Bray). Check here often and we encourage you to contribute.

More about our first few weeks together to come. Stay tuned.

Your fearless leaders,
Virginia Kuhn & Anne Bray