Never say never...

I was wrong again. I didn't think it would really work. I thought there would be like three people at our end-of-the-term webinar. And digital media proved me wrong again.

I am constantly amazed by the power of digital media in connecting people of similar interests and creating a habitat wherein they can share their ideas and collaborate. It was so neat to hear everyone's ideas today, to respond to their questions, and to feel their excitement. It really was enlightening and refreshing. There is nothing in a traditional research paper that compares with the feeling that I had when the webinar was over-- that feeling of "just a minute more" or of "is it really the end?" I've loved the journey. I've found new light and new inspiration in the vitality of the internet, and I don't ever want to go back. Really, I've discovered so much about myself and about the creative process, and now, my task is to go forward and implement all the things that we've been learning. This is kind of a short post, but I'll end it now in just saying how great a blessing the webinar was for me. It is the defiant "I can" in the midst of a sea of uncertainty, and it will be something that I look back to for years to come as I embark on my quest of digital discovery over the rest of my life. So glad to have been able to take part.

The Fountainhead of Human Creativity

I'll be working to integrate more of the primary work into my analysis, but for now, this is the final draft of the research paper that I wrote for my digital literacy class.

The Fountainhead of Human Creativity

          From the very genesis of recorded history, mankind has sought to create, to bring his thoughts into reality and to leave his indelible mark upon the world around him. For some civilizations, that has meant erecting massive monuments to gods and men; others preserved their ideas and culture through literature– within epics and songs and the tales of the past. In the modern, globalized era, however, the rules of creativity are changing. Especially over the last few decades, the desire to create has taken on new forms as the Internet and other digital media resources have made accessible the realms of thought and creativity for the world as a whole. Ayn Rand, in her landmark novel, The Fountainhead, investigates the concept of creativity, championing the individual creative ideal and warning against the collectivization of creative thought. Rand died years before the invention of the Internet and a great many other modern digital resources, yet her commentary on creativity and thought abide today as a lasting monument to the human spirit of creativity. A thoughtful study of digital media through the lens of Ayn Rand's The Fountainhead clearly reveals the value of independent creativity and unveils digital media's role in providing a new and living medium through which creative thought may find expression.

Learning Outcomes Revisited

I've been thinking about the different learning outcomes that we had as our goals for my digital literacy class, and it has me reflecting back on all the different things that I've been doing this semester to try to meet them.

• 1. Learn and Follow the BYU-Idaho Learning Model

  1) Prepare

  
  

  -I've done my best to be ready for discussion in each class period, and I've worked at making sure that I complete assignments on time. I've learned a lot not only from the things that we've covered in class but also from independent study. I studied Amusing Ourselves to Death and read pretty much anything that I stumbled upon that had to do with blogging and digital media, and I've worked to not just do what was required.

  
  
  

  2) Teach One Another

  
  

  -I've been consistent about contributing constructively to other classmates' work and have tried to post numerous comments on everyone's work throughout the semester. I contributed research materials and ideas to my cohort members and others throughout the research process. In terms of my own research and learning, I have shared my research with as many people as possible, as evidenced by the almost 1,200 blog views that I've gotten over the course of the term. I've shared things that I've learned in class with friends, roommates, my mom, and others, and I have advocated blogging to a number of writers that are working on getting their works published.

  
  

  3) Ponder and Prove

  
  

  -I've tried to make digital media a major part of my life, especially over the course of the term. I've thought a lot about the implications of digital media and tried to use digital media in new ways (E-books rather than regular books, Google hangouts instead of regular get-togethers, collaborative work through GoogleDocs). I have tried to embrace digital media in multiple forms in creating 2D art based on the premise of binary art, creating a video blog, composing and recording a song to Youtube, experimenting with various programs and engines (Wordle, Icerocket, Twitter, GoAnimate, Photoshop, Adobe Illustrator, Prezi), creating Wordles (and for various purposes) and GoAnimate videos, creating "Samemes," and in my blogging, I've really tried to put as much of myself out there as possible.

  
  

Coming to a Close...

It was kind of a bittersweet moment meeting with Dr. Burton and my research group today to discuss our papers. We've worked really hard on our research over the past 6 weeks, and it's been almost the sole focus of everything we've been doing for at least the last month, so it's weird thinking that it's all pretty much over. I've really enjoyed the research process, though it is a lot higher-stress than traditional research. I felt really pressured by time and by other people's ideas throughout the process, and that kind of wore away some of my patience little by little.

I have been thinking a lot about why we did all this-- why we recorded our research experience through blogging, why after a month and a half of digital media our professor asked us to go back and write a traditional research paper, why it's been important to get social proof and all that. I had a tough time getting into the digital age, and I've had an even tougher time trying to get out of that mindset for my research paper (it's been difficult to drop the I's, me's, we's, etc.). I think that was really the point, though. We've talked so much about how much digital media can add to a research project, and we've experienced the freedom of blogging (and the joy of social response). I think, in the end, Dr. Burton doesn't want us to ever go back to 'just another research paper' again. And honestly, I don't want to go back either. We've learned to see the life and the reality and the importance of digital media in the learning process, and now, we're going to be cast back into a sea of educators and students who are oblivious to the experiences that we've had, people that will tell us that traditional methodology is the only way to go. Well, this isn't the end of it for me.

Take 3: The Fountainhead of Human Creativity

Greg Bayles

Research Paper

Dr. Gideon Burton

6/8/2012

The Fountainhead of Human Creativity

          From the very genesis of recorded history, mankind has sought to create, to bring his thoughts into reality and to leave his indelible mark upon the world around him. For some civilizations, that has meant erecting massive monuments to gods and men; others preserved their ideas and culture through literature– within epics and songs and the tales of the past. In the modern, globalized era, however, the rules of creativity are changing. Especially over the last few decades, the desire to create has taken on new forms as the Internet and other digital media resources have made accessible the realms of thought and creativity for the world as a whole. Ayn Rand, in her landmark novel, The Fountainhead, investigates the concept of creativity, championing the individual creative ideal and warning against the collectivization of creative thought. Rand died years before the invention of the Internet and a great many other modern digital resources, yet her commentary on creativity and thought abide today as a lasting monument to the human spirit of creativity. A thoughtful study of digital media through the lens of Ayn Rand's The Fountainhead clearly reveals the value of independent creativity and unveils digital media's role in providing a new and living medium through which creative thought may find expression.

Getting Off the Plane

I'm coming up on a year since I got back from Ukraine.

At first, honestly, it was pretty hard to be back. I was kind of angry at the world for the first little while, and I felt like I didn't really understand people and no one really understood me either. I wasn't prepared for the loneliness that follows a mission. I wasn't prepared for everyone else's apathy. They really just didn't understand... likely still don't. I wasn't prepared for the American "How are you?", which is really just another greeting to be reciprocated and then forgotten. As I stepped off of the plane in Sacramento, I wondered if it had all been just a dream. Two years in Ukraine. Two wonderful, magical years in Ukraine. But no, I still had all the memories and-- yes-- I could still speak Russian. It must not have been a dream after all. But there's something about that first step off of the airplane that sends you reeling back, and you're flooded in a sea of memories and emotions, and it certainly feels a lot like a dream. And you wonder why, if it was so amazing, you ever had to come back. And you bear the concourses of people asking you how it was and wanting to hear only a "Great" -- nothing more. And you've been moving at a hundred miles a minute for the last two years, and now you have nothing to do because everyone's at work and all your friends are at school, and you're looking for a job at the end of June when you know that likely no one will hire you for the month and a half that you have remaining before you, yourself, head up to school.

And then someone does, and you wonder why, because you can see that he has all the help that he could ever need at the warehouse, and then you realize that he gave it to you purely as an act of kindness just because he knew you needed something to keep you busy and to help you through the long days. And you feel the anger start to go away. And your friend gets back from Moscow, and that helps a lot, but then you're off to school and you meet lots of new people, and the loneliness goes away. And you start into classes and you find a job and your free time goes away, but then you realize that there are a lot of great things to do and great people around you, so your sleep goes away and your free time comes back. And then you get through the first semester, and your nostalgia goes away, because it's Christmas, and you're surrounded by people, and the fire's warm, and you only sometimes think about the people without heating in their homes, somewhere in a dreamland far away. And you only half think that it would have been better to just take all the gifts and sell them and send the money to the poor who were everywhere in Ukraine and who, no doubt, huddled out public sight. And then winter comes, and you remember all the cold days that you spent outside, and your fingers ache just thinking about it, and your toes are always cold. And you get through winter classes, and somehow you did well, and you're excited for spring.

And you're finishing up your other classes, and you're not married, by the way, and you don't even have a special someone or anything like that either, and you thought that maybe you would have by now, but you've met a lot of really cool people, and you at last feel, after a year, like you finally belong somewhere, and you finally feel like you're fully home. And you finally get off the plane, and you start your life again. And it's a good life. And you're just grateful... and happy again...

Take 2: The Fountainhead of Human Creativity

Greg Bayles

Research Paper

Dr. Gideon Burton

6/5/2012

The Fountainhead of Human Creativity

               From the very genesis of recorded history, mankind has sought to create, to bring his thoughts into reality and leave his indelible mark upon the world around him. For some civilizations, that has meant erecting massive monuments to gods and men; others preserved their ideas and culture through literature, within epics and songs and the tales of the past. In the modern, globalized era, however, the rules of creativity seem to be changing. Especially over the last few decades, the desire to create has taken on new forms as the Internet and other digital media resources have revolutionized the realms of thought and creativity for the world as a whole. Ayn Rand, in her landmark novel, The Fountainhead, investigates the concept of creativity but warns against the collectivization of creative thought, indicating that in following after and yielding to the opinions of others, the creator compromises his virtue of self and betrays his individual creative identity. However, a thoughtful study of digital media through the lens of Ayn Rand's The Fountainhead clearly reveals the value of independent creativity and unveils digital media's role in providing a new and living medium through which creative thought may find expression.

The Fountainhead of Human Creativity

Greg Bayles

Research Paper

Dr. Gideon Burton

6/4/2012

The Fountainhead of Human Creativity

From the very genesis of recorded history, mankind has sought to create, to bring his thoughts into reality and leave his indelible mark upon the world around him. For some civilizations, that has meant erecting massive monuments to gods and men; others preserved their ideas and culture through literature, within epics and songs and the tales of the past. In the modern, globalized era, however, the rules of creativity seem to be changing. Especially over the last few decades, the desire to create has taken on new forms as the Internet and other digital media resources have revolutionized the realms of creativity and thought for the world as a whole. Ayn Rand, in her landmark novel, The Fountainhead, investigates the concept of creativity but warns against the collectivization of creative thought, indicating that in following after and yielding to the opinions of others, the creator compromises his virtue of self and betrays his individual creative identity. However, a thoughtful study of digital media through the lens of Ayn Rand's The Fountainhead clearly reveals the value of independent creative thought and unveils digital media's role in providing a new and living medium through which creative thought may find expression.

Reworking Creativity

I've had a really fun time getting to hear different people's takes on creativity as I've been researching for my digital literacy class. As I've received feedback from other people, I've been able to rework my ideas and my emphases little by little, and it's been neat to see the evolution of the topic. It will, perhaps, come as no surprise that I am yet again shifting my focus in a slightly different direction, but I think that this time will likely be the last (or at least I hope so, based on the impending due-date of Monday the 4th!).

I began investigating how digital media influences creativity, and that was really interesting, but in the end, I found myself asking, "So what?" about everything that I was writing. I felt like it was all a statement of fact, something that anyone with two eyes and a brain could have figured out. I then shifted my emphasis to how digital media is changing the standards of creativity, and that, too, was short-lived. At the beginning of this week, I decided to tackle the individualist creative ideal of my primary-text author, Ayn Rand, a move that, I think, worried my professor a little bit. I originally changed because I felt like it would be a much more provocative topic, and that certainly proved to be true. I've had a tough time trying to figure out exactly what to write about, though, because on one hand, we're learning about digital media and collaborative creation and all sorts of stuff like that, but on the other hand, The Fountainhead champions an individual creative ideal and de-emphasizes (and even bashes) input from others in realizing our creative works. I have realized over the past month or so, though, that really, the conflict that I see between these two ideals is the conflict that exists within me. I've been trying to get my feet wet in digital media, but it's been a foreign experience for me, in a lot of regards. The transition, though, I think, is not one unique to my experience, and I feel like a lot of people could really benefit by using modern digital media. That's why I wanted to shift the focus of my paper.

In researching and writing my paper, I still want to talk about creativity on an individual level, and I still really want to touch on ideas of self-actualization and finding one's creative identity, but for a lot of people, a big part of that process of self-conceptualization is taking place or will take place in the realm of modern digital media. So, I want to focus more on how digital media can aid us in realizing our individual creative ideals, and I want to show that the Internet is not oppositional to creativity but that it is a medium, like stone or paint, that can be used to bring life to an idea or an emotion. It is in light of creation that we truly begin to see ourselves and realize our potential.

Getting My Feet Wet...

This is a song that I put together to try to convey some of the thoughts that I've been having about creativity and expression lately. I've been studying The Fountainhead, by Ayn Rand, and in it, Rand really emphasizes the idea of individual creation. I wanted to extend that to encompass more so the ideas of self-actualization through creation and of finding one's own creative voice through use of digital media resources. Feel free to leave your thoughts or to browse the research and writing that I've been doing lately. I hope you enjoy!


Where is the fire
That Prometheus stole,
That burning desire
To create and be made whole?
What wonders and myst'ries
Can this Brave New World hold for me?
'Cause I'm standin' at the edge of the sea,
And I'm just learning to swim.

An endless ocean before me,
And the waves a rumblin' by,
I long for solid ground
And miss the clear blue sky
But I'll find myself inside the deep, deep blue.
Yeah, I'm standin' at the end of the sea,
And I'm ready to swim.

I'll set my fears aside
And set fire to the sea
Give life to soul and mem'ry
And let creation break free
And at last, I'll find myself inside the flames
And at last I'll find myself again.

The Spark of Creation

I've been looking for a good rendition of this song, and I think this one does a good job. I first heard this song in "The Pink Palace," an apartment that I lived in while serving in Ukraine as a proselytizing missionary for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. My missionary companion was a theater and performing arts major, and he loved to sing. One day, he broke out randomly into this song, and I was mesmerized by this idea of the spark of creation. I've been thinking about creativity lately as I've investigated the influence of digital media on the creative process, and I feel that the message presented in this song encapsulates perfectly some of the ideas that I've been trying to get across in my research. So, please enjoy "Spark of Creation" from Stephen Schwartz's "Children of Eden," performed here by Stefani Wood, and if you're interested in finding out more about my research, check out my previous posts on the right side of the screen! I'd love to hear your thoughts!

EVE

Beyond,beyond

It sounds full of wind and mist, doesn't it

It means other things exist, doesn't it

Beyond, beyond

It says Adam leave your list, doesn't it

Father why does my head feel this joy this dread since the moment I said

Beyond!

I've got an itching on the tips of my fingers

I've got a boiling in the back of my brain

I've got a hunger burning inside me, cannot be denied

I've got feeling that the Father who made us

When he was kindling a pulse in my veins

He left a tiny spark of that fire, smoldering inside
The spark of creation, is flickering within me

The spark of creation,is blazing in my blood

A bit of the fire that lit up the stars

And breathed life into the mud, the first inspiration

The spark creation

I see a mountain and I want to climb it

I see a river and I want to leave shore

Where there was nothing let there be something, something made by me

There's things waiting for me to invent them

There's worlds waiting for me to exploreI am an echo of the eternal cry of
Let there be!

The spark of creation, burning bright within me

The spark of creation, won't let me rest at all

Until I discover or build or uncover

A thing that I can call, my celebration

Of the spark creationThe spark of creation, may it burn forever

The spark creation, I am a keeper of the flame

We think all we want is a lifetime leisure

Each perfect day the sameEndless vacation

Well that's alright if you're a kind crustacean

But when you're born with an imagination

Sooner of later you're feeling the fire get hotter and higher

The spark of creation!!!

At One with our Creative Ideal: Paper-in-a-Post

Just as the sun's rays flow into the figure and become part of his being, so also is the light of creativity an element within every individual, illuminating his soul and urging him toward his dreams.




 

While the Internet and other digital media resources certainly facilitate collaborative efforts and provide a worldwide stage whereon creators can display their work, the creative process remains a largely individual endeavor, as evidenced in Ayn Rand's landmark novel, The Fountainhead.

 

While it will be noted that a vast multitude of history's great thinkers developed and tested their ideas at least to some extent in social spheres, the ideal of creation has always been more so about self-actualization than about yielding to the opinions of others. Rand brilliantly expresses this idea in The Fountainhead through Howard Roark's non-conformist architectural style and unwillingness to compromise his creative integrity. For Roark, architecture is not about pleasing a customer or accruing public acclaim but rather about maintaining one's innovative integrity and staying true to the identity of the creative work as an entity. Peter Keating, whose career represents the diametric opposite of the Roarkian ideal, yet described those who compromise their creative ideal in yielding to others' opinions as follows:

When you meet them, they’re not what you met last. In any given hour, they kill some part of themselves. They change, they deny, they contradict–and they call it growth. At the end there’s nothing left, nothing unrevered or unbetrayed; as if there had never been any entity, only a succession of adjectives fading in and out on an unformed mass.

 With the birth of the Internet and other digital media resources, we have seen how ideas in their infancy can take on a certain vitality of their own as projects garner support from enthusiasts and collaborators, but at its heart, every creative endeavor represents a piece of the creator's soul. One must first discover it within oneself and then breath life into it through pen or paint. Only then, by virtue of his creativity and willingness to sacrifice, can the Promethean creator set the world afire with his creation. Dr. James Montmarquet, author of "Prometheus: Ayn Rand's Ethic of Creation," remarked that "[t]he architecture of the mind is conceptualization and consciousness; conceptualization is at the heart of any cognitive advance." Ultimately, creativity is a manifestation of the human soul and intellect, and the Internet is simply a facilitator of that creativity, a vehicle through which the creator can express and share his work. The ideas of others will, of course, serve their purpose in shaping a creator's ideas, but the creator must find within himself the courage, integrity, and confidence to go forward with his labors, pursuing his dreams even when everyone else tells him that he can't. 

Moving Toward an Understanding...

So, I've been thinking a bit about my research topic, and it's been interesting to see the different viewpoints come in from friends, peers, enthusiasts, and scholars alike as to how digital media influences creativity. I wanted to post a couple of the responses that I've gotten, in part as a way for me to organize and recall some of the thoughts that I've had lately and in part so that you can hear the different opinions, because I feel like some of them are pretty interesting. Anyway, here's one from my friend, Xiaojia: 

I think it all really comes down to privacy. What do you want to be known, shared, if you want credit, etc. Possibilities are quite endless in both cyberworld and the physical world. And so many things can go between the both. The physical world may give you more privacy than the internet so that could lead to people feeling freer (that doesn't look like a word 8D) so they'd be more open to experiment. But anonymity on the internet could also encourage people to share without feeling the consequences (or at least a decent amount of consequences as a hard copy can create sometimes idk that's open to debate haha).
You should check out postsecret.com if you haven't already!
In the end the internet is just a resource.

There's a couple of ideas here that I want to touch upon: the first is this idea of privacy and expression, an idea that I've been discussing with my mom these past couple days. She's been working to publish a children's story, and I keep telling her that she should post a rough sketch of it on a blog or something so that she can get feedback and start to get people talking about her stuff, but she worries that if she posts it, someone will snatch it up and publish it before she can. That's one part of the internet that you really can't change: it's out there. People will see it. People will interact with it and judge it and change it, and in the end, it might not end up where you had originally intended it to go. I think that's one of the amazing things about the internet, though, as well, that you post something and it takes on a life of its own. If you're writing just for the money, then it's understood that you risk a lot in posting original content, but I've been really impressed at the fact that some bands work on donations alone and are thus able to offer their music for free (or for a price determined by each individual downloader). We are seeing a shift in media rights, an exodus in the direction of freeware and open-source software, and with it, we are witnessing the birth of a different breed of consumerism, a system fueled by the media Medicis, the thousands of private patrons of the arts that each put in their small sums in support of creativity.

Friends for The Fountainhead

For the past couple of days, I've been talking about what I've been up to in terms of social discovery. For me, social discovery has been an interesting journey. I've been up to 3 in the morning most nights this week, reading articles and blog posts and dissertations and writing hopeful messages to strangers, hoping that they'll take interest in my work. There were definitely some frustrated moments, especially by Wednesday night, when I had received word from only one of the many scholars that I had attempted to contact. But things are looking better now, and I am realizing more and more what kinds of things I need to do to get people involved in my work.


The scholars that responded to my emails were the ones whose research I had shared on my blog, and I wrote a personalized letter to each of them asking them to comment on my work. It was neat to hear back from them so soon after emailing them (one responded the next day, and the other the day after that). I was worried that because classes are out for the summer, professors would be away from their work or vacationing or otherwise indisposed, but things are turning out just fine.

For the next couple weeks, I'll be following up with some of the contacts that I've made and will be trying to distill my ideas into a more powerful and clear message that I can share as I seek more opinions on creativity in Ayn Rand's The Fountainhead. I hope to be able to branch out more into the realms of creativity and digital media in a general sense and hopefully get some experts and enthusiasts talking about The Fountainhead as a creative epic.

 Anyone, on to my list of potential interested parties, collaborators, and contacts:

Social Discovery: Scholarly Response

Yesterday, in my post, "Experiments with Social Discovery," I talked about my efforts to get friends, peers, and enthusiasts involved in my research project, focused on Ayn Rand's The Fountainhead. Today, I'd like to continue on in detailing my efforts to contact professors and scholars in fields pertinent to my area of research. It's been a rough road so far, but I'm hoping that I'll get some good responses sometime soon.

I've sent emails to a few pretty renowned Randian philosophers, and while I haven't received any response back, I'm still trusting that something good will come of it, and I'll have been glad to wait a little bit. Leonard Peikoff, founder of the Ayn Rand Institute and author of Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand, uses a number of different digital resources to propagate Objectivist ideas, so I figured that he would be a good person to talk to about creativity, the Internet, and The Fountainhead. I left a message on his website, and now I wait.

I messaged Shoshana Milgram Knapp, a leading Randian scholar who presented a lecture series at the Smithsonian Institute on Ayn Rand in 2010 and who teaches The Fountainhead and others of Rand's writings as key works in her courses at Virginia Tech. She has a number of online resources, among them a great lecture investigating The Fountainhead as a modern classic and explaining how the novel can be used in contemporary learning. I'm still waiting for a response, but again, I have high hopes.

Experiments with Social Discovery

I've been trying my hand at this whole social discovery thing -- basically using the Internet as a resource to find people interested in the same things as you are interested in and then trying to get them involved in your learning and research process. I'll preface this by saying that this has been something completely foreign to me, but I guess actually doing the hard things is what makes them easier and/or natural in the end. Anyway, I've been trying to reach out to people in different online social settings to try to get feedback on my research, and honestly, I've had a tough time getting people to respond. That is really making me think more and more about my research topic, though, and I am thinking more and more that I would like to make it a more argumentative topic, one where there are definite diametric stances and where some people, on reading my research, would want to jump in and state their view of the matter.

I started my attempts at social discovery on Google+, and I managed to find a lot of people generally interested in Objectivism but not really any that expressed acute interest in The Fountainhead. I can't say that this was entirely unexpected, as people generally focus more on Rand's monumental work, Atlas Shrugged, the sort of pumped-up-on-steroids version 2.0 of The Fountainhead, this time based around an aspiring railroad tycoon among others. I didn't get any response from people that I had contacted personally, and those that I added to my circles in hopes of receiving a reciprocal add remained silent. One day, sort of in desperation, I wrote a call-out to Objectivists, and a day or two later, I got my first response, from a young man named Alexander. He had been searching for info on Ayn Rand and had stumbled upon my blog. We exchanged messages a little bit, and he seemed to be open to talking. It was something little in terms of the grand scheme, but it was something big in my process of social discovery.

I guess really my first response, though, was really a little bit before that, from a musician whose song I found on Youtube and shared a couple of weeks ago. He (Joseph) responded to a message that I sent through Youtube, telling me that he had written the song based on Atlas Shrugged. I was excited to find out, as I had had suspicions that was the case. Anyway, it was neat to connect with him and to see that people are creating media content based on Rand's works.

Quest Atlantis: Creative Voices

So, maybe I'm having a little bit of a nerd moment, but I'm really psyched about some research that I've been doing recently, and I wanted to share something that I found. One of the articles that I read through while researching The Fountainhead mentioned an online game-community called Quest Atlantis, which, from what I understood, was basically an online game world centered around the diametrically opposite architectural ideologies of Howard Roark and Peter Keating, two main characters in The Fountainhead. Well, I've come to find out that it's not just that -- it's like a whole community dedicated to teaching kids, age 9-16, important values and skills through a fun and engaging online world full of quests and adventures and all sorts of stuff. The architectural aspect is just one little part of it! This is the kids' schoolwork, to play games and build buildings and solve problems, and it is all really cool.

I was interested to find out on the official QA blog  that students have independently established hotels and shops and advertising companies and even a functioning stock market! Pretty unbelievable. Students are currently working on developing a legal system for this online world, as money and regulations have recently become more mainstream. Teachers are able to implement this amazing resource as a way to teach and reinforce a number of really positive lessons, listed in QA's mission statement:

• Creative Expression – "I Create"
• Diversity Affirmation – "Everyone Matters"
• Personal Agency – "I Have Voice"
• Social Responsibility – "We Can Make a Difference"
• Environmental Awareness – "Think Globally, Act Locally"
• Healthy Communities – "Live, Love, Grow"
• Compassionate Wisdom – "Be Kind"

I feel like these are the same lessons that I am still learning and relearning every day. I wanted to touch for just a moment on the architectural aspect on QA, because I feel like it, above all else, reflects the ideas that I'll be addressing in my research...

From Promethius to Nietzsche : A Research Bibliography for The Fountainhead

Tweethis Statement: In a world of conflicting values in the realms of expression and innovation, digital media has emerged as a powerful player in the creative process and has reignited the fires of creativity both for individuals and for the collective web-populace.

Branden, Nathaniel. My Years with Ayn Rand. Ed. Ayn Rand. 1st ed. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Publishers, 1999. Print.

• Biography
• HBLL Bookshelves
• The revealing story of Branden and Rand, whose relationship began as student to teacher and progressed through friendship to lovers and finally to adversaries. A very personal account of Rand's character and persona from the perspective of someone once very close to her.

Cashman, Mark. "Does Information Technology make Us Smarter?: If so, how; if Not, Why Not?" ACM SIGCHI Bulletin 1995: 52-3. Print.

• Scholarly Article
• HBLL Online Database
• http://delivery.acm.org/10.1145/580000/570125/p52-cashman.pdf?ip=128.187.73.9&acc=ACTIVE%20SERVICE&CFID=104423253&CFTOKEN=67093345&__acm__=1337606419_6e9d0f95476f635518842c599a8490b7
• Gives a psychological approach to information technology as applied to creativity, conceptualization, and consciousness. 

Fand, Roxanne J. "Reading the Fountainhead: The Missing Self in Ayn Rand's Ethical Individualism." College English 2009: 486-505. Print.

• Scholarly Article
• National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE) Database and MLA Bibliography
• http://www.ncte.org.erl.lib.byu.edu/library/NCTEFiles/Resources/Journals/CE/0715-may09/VM0715Reading.pdf
• Discusses a professor's experiences in presenting The Fountainhead in her Literature and Popular Culture course and investigates the creative and controlling personality and ideology of Howard Roark.  

Research Questions

Well, I've been throwing around a bunch of ideas for a thesis statement for my upcoming research paper and wanted to get people's takes on the different ideas. Some questions that I've been looking into include:

• What is the value of digital media in the modern creative process? Are the rules of creativity and innovation changing? 
• What is the role of social media in self-actualization?
• What is the power of an individual to bring about change when armed with digital media?

I am leaning heavily toward the first, though all of them are kind of interconnected, so I could touch on all of them potentially. I feel like the first is most pertinent to my novel, The Fountainhead, but at the same time, it goes in opposition to what is said in the book, so my research would represent a refutation of Rand's ideals. Kind of murky waters for the moment being.

Which topic do you like best? Any ideas for a better one?

Thoughts on Research...

I stumbled upon this article while researching The Fountainhead the other day, and I thought it provided a couple really savvy insights into social response to Ayn Rand's philosophies and works. Among other things, the author talks about Rand's totalist mentality as a source of friction between her supporters and her detractors, and that's an idea that I've been toying with recently in my study of online interactions between Rand's friends and foes. It's been really interesting seeing the dynamics of social involvement in Objectivism, and I am wondering if I might be better off doing my research paper on just that (though it would likely distance me from the actual primary text to some extent). In any case, check out the article! If nothing else, it provides a good overview of Rand's influence and place in modern society.

And, just as some food for thought, an idea taken from Rand's "Man's Rights":

There is only one fundamental right (all the others are its consequences or corollaries): a man’s right to his own life. Life is a process of self-sustaining and self-generated action; the right to life means the right to engage in self-sustaining and self-generated action—which means: the freedom to take all the actions required by the nature of a rational being for the support, the furtherance, the fulfillment and the enjoyment of his own life. (Such is the meaning of the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.) . . .

We Need to Talk...

So, this video was posted on an Ayn Rand social networking site, but I still wasn't really sure whether it had been written with one of  Rand's characters in mind. I was able to get in contact with the artist, though, and he affirmed that it was inspired in part by Atlas Shrugged. Anyway I really like the ideas presented in the song... and the vocalist sounds sort of like John Mayer.

I've been digging to try to find some social contacts with regard to The Fountainhead, and I kind of hit jackpot tonight with the social networking/dating service. I actually ran across an obscure reference to it in a scholarly article and thought, "Really? REALLY? They have a dating service for fans of Rand's stuff?" And sure enough, they do.

I feel like it's been somewhat difficult to track down fans of Rand's philosophies because of the nature of her philosophies themselves. One of the primary tenets of Objectivism is that you find meaning in yourself, and you don't really rely on the opinions of other people. That's all fine and dandy, but it just so happens to be a huge obstacle in terms of my efforts to practice social discovery. How are you supposed to use social media to discover others and get social proof when the people whose opinions you're seeking are philosophically disinclined as regards both social discovery and social proof? Well, it's been a struggle, but I feel like I might finally be getting somewhere, little by little.

So, for all you Objectivists out there, send me a message, drop me comment, toss me a +1, just anything to help me know that there really are Objectivists out there using social media. We need to talk...

Living YOUR Dreams

I've had a tough time really trying to express a couple of ideas in my research of The Fountainhead, but I think I've found a quote that kind of sums up a number of my thoughts on the matter:

Listen to what is being preached today. Look at everyone around us. You've wondered why they suffer, why they seek happiness and never find it. If any man stopped and asked himself whether he's ever held a truly personal desire, he'd find the answer. He'd see that all his wishes, his efforts, his dreams, his ambitions are motivated by other men. He's not really struggling even for material wealth, but for the second-hander's delusion - prestige. A stamp of approval, not his own. He can find no joy in the struggle and no joy when he has succeeded. He can't say about a single thing: 'This is what I wanted because I wanted it, not because it made my neighbors gape at me'. Then he wonders why he's unhappy.   -Ayn Rand, The Fountainhead

I've been trying to encapsulate this idea the whole time, the idea that an individual can seek his/her own dreams and still contribute positively to society, the idea that we don't have to chase after the age old aspirations of our grandfathers or follow the trends of our neighbors and friends. Each member of mankind is amazing, and each member of society has something special to contribute, some new innovation, some novel creation. It just doesn't make sense to waste our time living out someone else's second-hand dreams when we might, with a little effort, attain that which we ourselves desire more than anything else.

Rand, Roark, and the Digital Media Revolution

I've been thinking a lot about what kind of relationship Howard Roark, the main character of Rand's The Fountainhead, would have had with modern digital media. On one hand, I guess the Internet could have really helped him all those times when he is looking for clientele and trying to make his work more publicly known so that he could build more buildings, but on the other hand, Howard represents one of the most solitary and cold personalities of just about any book that I've ever read, so I have to wonder how much he would have cared for the social aspect involved in modern digital media. He was never one to really care about what other people thought of him or his work, and he was never one to think much about others or their work, so the idea of "Likes" and +1's and views would likely come off as superficial and pathetic to him. I noticed as I was reading that all of Roark's problematic clients insisted upon big, fancy facades, with useless collonades and superfluous ornamentation, and I feel like Facebook pages and profiles and all that would be, to Roark, simply a digital extension of the ostentatious facades proliferated in Classical architecture. Roark is about the real and the now, the stone beneath his fingers, the grass beneath his feet, the eyes that turn away from his unvarying gaze, and it seems to me that the Internet would be, for him, too immaterial, too fickle, too false.

Rand, on the other hand, would have likely utilized digital media as a way to disseminate her ideas. Leonard Peikoff, the leading Randian philosopher and founder of the Ayn Rand Institute, uses all sorts of modern media to teach about Objectivism: he has online lectures, podcasts, videos, etc., and he encourage those with questions to email him. I actually emailed Peikoff asking him about his thoughts on digital media and The Fountainhead, and though I haven't heard back yet, I'll be interested to see what his thoughts are on the matter... What about you? What do you think?

The Family: A Proclamation to the World

In 1995, the First Presidency of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints issued The Family: A Proclamation to the World, a document containing valuable truths as to man's nature and stating God's word concerning marriage and familial relationships. I didn't really realize how important all this was until I was about sixteen, but then it came to really mean a lot to me, and it in some senses saved me. My family growing up had it's problems, perhaps like every family, but the truths contained in this document have helped us to be stronger as a family unit and have helped me to know what I will need to do as a husband and father to provide for the spiritual, emotional, and temporal welfare of my family. I really do love it. Read the full document here.

Revisiting "Acolytes and Adversaries: Public Response to the Fountainhead"

In my post, "Acolytes and Adversaries: Public Response to the Fountainhead", I talked a little bit about the polarization that Ayn Rand's works seem to create among followers. In reading an article in the Los Angeles Times on The Fountainhead, I was impressed by some of the author's thoughts on why Rand's work hasn't hit it big among the general populace:

College students might love Rand's books, but few will ever stumble across her on a syllabus. Academic philosophers don't acknowledge that she ever existed. Even those who love Rand's books tend to dismiss her most loyal followers as crackpots. "I've read 'Atlas Shrugged' a half-dozen times; a great book, just terrific," says Michael Shermer, who publishes Skeptic magazine from his house in Altadena and who wrote a chapter, "The Unlikeliest Cult," on Rand's die-hard followers in his book "Why People Believe Weird Things."

"I love that black-and-white world view, heroes and villains," Shermer says. "But as a scientific tool to model the world, it doesn't work. People are not all good or all bad; they're complicated. The Randian world is black and white. It's fantasy. How can they hope to appeal to mainstream America with their philosophy when they have these weirdos who project it?"

Peikoff and other Randians don't want to appeal to mainstream American if they have to compromise. Their role model, after all, is Howard Roark, the brilliant architect-philosopher of "The Fountainhead," who blows up his own building rather than see his design debased.

As Berliner explains: "Orthodox objectivism is a redundancy. It's just Objectivism. Some people like to have Objectivism and at the same time indulge their whims. What it holds, it holds as an absolute. A lot of people are psychologically uncomfortable with that. They want to water it down, compromise it, add their own stuff, and think that they're still Objectivist."

Fountainhead Wordles

I was talking to a classmate about Atlas Shrugged, and we got onto the topic of Rand's deification of her characters. In all of her works, Rand seems to put a huge emphasis on characters, and that was something that I saw from a little bit of a different perspective as I made Wordles for both the first chapter and the entire book. Rand really uses her characters to try to get her ideas across, usually centering around one or a few 'enlightened' and passionate individuals who, by their integrity and innovation, are able to evoke strong positive change in the world. It will be noted that, at times, the characters become kind of flat as they are overpowered by the philosophical crusade waged throughout Rand's works, but in general, there is much of value that we can take from the examples of Howard Roark, Hank Rearden, and other such heroes in coming to understand our role in the world and our potential to triumph in spite of adversity.

Binary Art

I've been thinking a lot about the way that information is transferred and how that is changing modernly, and it got me marveling at the fact that digital media is composed, at its basest level, of just 1's and 0's. It is crazy to think that we can express ourselves through music or writing or art or videos, and it's all done with strings of 1's and 0's. Anyway, in tribute to digital media, I tried my hand at some binary art, using the cover for The Fountainhead as a foundation. I love this picture, especially how the light just seems to flow seamlessly into the image of the person, making him and the sun seem almost as if they are the same entity.

Acolytes and Adversaries: Public Response to The Fountainhead

In my previous post, "The Power of the Word," I talked a little bit about the impact that a well-put phrase or a even just a couple of perfectly-paired words can have on a person. I've been researching Ayn Rand's The Fountainhead, and in looking over some of my favorite quotes, it's been fun to experience Rand's writing again. She really has a way with words, and honestly, that was probably the thing that made me love her books so much -- the ideas are interesting, but I just loved the writing. I figured I'd share a quick passage from The Fountainhead, just so you can get a taste of her style, and then I'll follow up with some thoughts on the impact of her work in my life personally and the general population's consensus on the work.

The leaves streamed down, trembling in the sun. They were not green; only a few, scattered through the torrent, stood out in single drops of a green so bright and pure that it hurt the eyes; the rest were not a color, but a light, the substance of fire on metal, living sparks without edges. And it looked as if the forest were a spread of light boiling slowly to produce this color, this green rising in small bubbles, the condensed essence of spring. The trees met, bending over the road, and the spots of sun on the ground moved with the shifting of the branches, like a conscious caress. The young man hoped he would not have to die.

Not if the earth could look like this, he thought. Not if he could hear the hope and promise like a voice, with leaves, tree trunks and rocks instead of words. But he knew that the earth looked like this only because he had seen no sign of men for hours; he was alone, riding his bicycle down a forgotten trail through the hills of Pennsylvania where he had never been before, where he could feel the fresh wonder of an untouched world.

The Inspiration Behind Howard Roark

Roark's Stoddard Temple is likely based
on the Unity Temple in Oak Park, Illinois,

http://reasonandlibertycentral.blogspot.com/2010/02/ayn-rand-code.html

I found a great little blog post today that talks about the potential sources of inspiration behind Howard Roark's architectural masterpieces as described in Ayn Rand's The Fountainhead. I had heard before that Roark was based loosely on Frank Lloyd Wright, the great American architect and thinker, but I had never really before considered the buildings themselves, so this was something kind of new for me.

240 Central Park South, one of a few potential
inspirations for Roark's Aquitania Hotel

Presumed to be the model for
Howard Roark's Wynand Building.

I decided it might be fun to see some of the different buildings from The Fountainhead rather than just hearing about them; when I was about 15, I wanted to be an architect, so I enjoy just getting to look at different buildings, especially ones that for their time were thought to be very radical and outlandish. Seeing Roark's works in  physical representation really does seem to kind of brings the book to life, giving Roark real substance and personality, but on the other hand, the ideals promoted by Roark (and his character in general) are intentionally unrealistic and impossible to captured on a page; they challenge us to escape the clutches of conformity and rise to the greatness that is inherent in every man and woman. I at first thought it odd that I couldn't find much art for book, but I am understanding more and more, at least for this story, that the visual is not so much that which matters; that which matters is the idea and feelings that the book instills in the reader. It is about the power of one, the power of the me and of the you, as individuals, to enact positive change, at whatever necessary costs. A lot of people spout that Objectivism is such a selfish, godless idea, and maybe that's true for it as a whole, but I take what good I can find in any source, and for me at least, that good is the courage and power to enact change, the integrity to pursue one's dreams, and the confidence to do it all when everyone else tells you that you can't.

The Fountainhead: The Integrity of Innovation and the Power of One

Taking a whack at video blogging. For some reason, though, the thoughts inside my head sound a lot less monotone than my voice does.  :)

Robots in the Garden

Tonight I watched the film adaptation of Ayn Rand's The Fountainhead, and it was honestly a pretty poor movie. I like the book and everything, but something about the movie just made everyone seem so robotic and dispassionate (not to mention pitiful. It was, perhaps, this that got me thinking first about robots. I guess I kind of pictured robots sitting around chatting to one another and dropping really corny lines, and then I thought about the good lines and the interesting ideas from the movie, and I wanted to share them in a creative way. So, I've been working on making a kinetic typography video that would incorporate some ideas on the nature of creativity and on the paradigm shift that is going on in terms of how we create, share, and consume media (most specifically literature). Anyway, I ended up with the above picture, a bunch of robotic audio clips, and a master sheet for the first part of my quotes but which I'm unable to finish until Adobe will decide to let its downloader actually download After Effects, the program that I was going to use to put together the typography animation. It's kind of a first try at all this for me, so I'm just chucking some of what I've done up here, in addition to a number of movie quotes that I've tweaked slightly so that they would correspond to writing rather than architecture. Really, the overall message of this and the focus of my study of The Fountainhead will be the idea of departing from old ways and embracing the new ways of digital media, stretching and cultivating our minds in order to understand and grow from the wonders of the modern digital age. Another primary focus will be the power of the word and, more specifically, the power for good or for bad of a single person when armed with the word.

"The Best Part about Beauty..."

So, I stumbled upon this video a while ago and just recently ran into it again. It has had me thinking a lot about beauty and the way that we define it modernly. Francis Bacon is quoted as saying, "The best part of beauty is that which no picture can express," and I believe this to sentiment to be true, but at the same time, we live in a world that places a whole lot of emphasis on physical appearance. The past decades have seen revolutions in technology and computers, and as photo-editing programs and computerized rendering have grown more and more developed, we've seen their influence grow in defining beauty. To some extent, we have created an unattainable ideal of beauty, one that exists only within the pages of magazines and the windows of computer screens; we've created an unrealistic expectation for what a man or woman ought to be, how he or she should look, what he or she should think about the way that he or she looks. Well, it's not natural. It's not even skin deep.

Technology is great, but when the line becomes blurred between technology-augmented reality and technology-distorted reality, there is a problem. When that which is false and non-existent serves as a standard for that which is real and breathing, something must change. We are seeing some amazing developments in virtual reality these days, with new graphics engines and artistic innovations that could not have even been imagined a decade ago, but we need to remember throughout this all what beauty really is. It's not about the special effects and the perfect, airbrushed, ivory skin. It's not about having the nicest clothes or the perfect hair. Beauty is that which exists in all and which is recognized by few. It is that which evades those who seek it and which comes to those who strive to recognize and cultivate it in others. Beauty is inside each of us, and we need not pander to the whims of society in defining who we are what we are worth. Because in the end, while reality can never replace the beauty and innovation of virtual reality, the opposite is certain as well, that digital beauty can never truly compete with the beauty, that spark of divinity that is natural within each of us.

"Cut Off": An Ode to Comcast

An ode to Comcast, clearly written in a moment of extreme grief and hopelessness.

"Cut Off"

Sit I before an iv'ry-colored screen
And wonder just how long I'll have to wait
Until my squirr'ly internet returns
And fickle stop-and-go speeds do abate.
How grand the world in Chrome's begoogled view!
How small the world to him whose bit rate's low!
So doth the internet's untimely fail
Yet chill my heart and strike a crippling blow.
Curse Comcast and its wretched service techs
Who sold to me this modem made in hell
I'll do my best to work on other tasks
And bear my offline isolation well.