theMazed

‘Wayne’s World’ is a postmodern comedy. ‘Wayne’s World’ uses plenty of references, some of which are: Garth recreating the infamous shower scene from Psycho with donuts, Wayne getting pulled over by a cop who looks like the T-1000/Robert Patrick from Terminator 2 and the sequence with the string of product placements. The thing is, we have to be aware of these references beforehand so that when we see them in ‘Wayne’s World’ we can make sense of them.

The use of the camera also invites the audience in on the action of ‘Wayne’s World’. Wayne appears to address a camera but we feel like he is addressing us personally as he is introducing himself and his friends and the places that he frequents. The camera also lets us see the world behind the camera, which is supposed to be hidden from us. During the shooting of Cassandra’s music video, we see all the equipment that is supposed to be shooting it. We see the equipment shooting Wayne’s initial home cable show and also in the studio set up of the show. Similarly, ‘Wayne’s World’ sees the audience as important because we are required to read the English subtitles when Wayne and Cassandra are speaking in Cantonese.

We can make easy assumptions why ‘Wayne’s World’ is a Hollywood type of film. ‘Wayne’s World’ is an American film, so it came from the Hollywood studio system. It is a system that has been mass-producing films for mass consumption from its beginnings. ‘Wayne’s World’ uses Hollywood star players and the Hollywood auteur to brand itself. ‘Wayne’s World’ uses the standard Hollywood aesthetic practices. But we can to use some aspects of the language of film criticism to find out if ‘Wayne’s World’ is in essence a Hollywood type of film. The terms that we will be dealing with are: utopian sensibilities, postmodernism, plot and story, self-reflexivity, continuity editing and the classical Hollywood cinema narrative details about film .

Voice Over IP (VOIP), the technology that lets you use your Internet connection to make and receive phone calls (with a regular telephone, not just your computer), seems to be expanding its reach daily. Many of the big telecom companies have been adopting it. Many younger people have been abandoning landlines since cell phones are now almost required in our society today. At most, a landline may be kept for the purposes of a broadband DSL connection, but with cable broadband, landlines aren’t a necessity even for those who need such connections. But cell phones often have reception issues and the pricing structure means that one often has to be careful not to make too many calls between 7am and 9pm on weekdays, when calls are usually metered. Per minute charges over your monthly allotment can very quickly skyrocket.

VOIP makes an excellent supplement for some. The cost, especially if not using one of the large telecoms’ VOIP services, can be quite inexpensive. There’s yet another option out there that is kind of a cross between VOIP and the old Internet voice conferencing applications like NetMeeting. “Skype” has become a real phenomenon among lots of bloggers in general. The voice quality is not only supposed to match a regular telephone line, but with broadband speeds to actually surpass it by quite a bit! It provides voicemail, conference calling, and many of the features you would want out of a telephony product. Microsoft has built in VOIP over Wifi functionality into their newest Windows Mobile 5. ‘VONAGE’ probably the best-known and perhaps oldest VOIP provider already offers a version of their software that works with Windows Mobile devices, including smart phones. “Skype” has also has a version for Windows Mobile Devices. It seems the main benefit that will come out of all these technologies converging will be to drive prices down even more and one would hope to increase the overall voice quality. Of course the ultimate in convergence here would be a cell phone (in particular a smart phone) which would also be able to use one of these internet telephony services, and thereby avoid some of the pricing weirdness of mobile phone plans.

Microsoft’s approach to the mobile device market and television is a lot like the “Survivor” ethos. On the popular reality TV show, contestants are advised to “outwit,” “outplay” and “outlast” their opponents. That might describe what Microsoft is doing in both television and mobile computing. First, on May 11th, Microsoft and Philips Electronics announced they will marry Windows with Nexperia. Nexperia is a range of chips used in devices such as mobile phone handsets, DVD players, and digital television sets. Philips will extend this to include its Nexperia chips for in-car entertainment and next-generation digital TV systems. Philips will also add support for Microsoft’s Windows Media Digital Rights Management 10 system in its chips for portable music and video players.

A number of new features are expected as well, including improved applications such as a PowerPoint viewer and more powerful versions of Excel and Word. Further usability enhancements incorporate improved one-handed navigation and the ability to add caller ID photos. While QWERTY keyboard support, persistent storage technology, and upgraded wireless manufacturer and carrier support allow more robust advancements.

It seems that Microsoft is insuring that it will continue to prosper in a world of digital convergence. At the same time I think Microsoft sees that video is going to be a key driver in developing future markets. more

Analysts say in game advertising could generate as much as $1 billion in new revenue for the fast growing industry by the end of the decade because it almost assures advertisers quality time with an audience they need young men. The increased spending is another sign of the booming popularity of video games. In 2004, $7.3 billion worth of video and PC games were sold in the United States.

Mobile-phone gaming has historically been driven by casual games, ports of old arcade games, and simplified versions of sports games. Amp’d Mobile the first fully integrated 3G mobile entertainment company for youth/young adults. Gameloft a leading international publisher of video games for mobile phones announced a multi-year partnership at E3 Expo to create exclusive 3D video games designed specifically for Amp’d Mobile and 3G. Games based on movies are also as popular in the mobile phone world as they are in the console world, with tiny video versions of Peter Jackson’s King Kong, Steven Spielberg’s War of the Worlds and Revenge of the Sith all making appearances. Amp’d Mobile, set to launch nationwide later this year, will leverage the nation’s largest CDMA 3G EV-DO (Evolution-Data Optimized) network and will offer traditional wireless phone services plus a completely fresh user interface and fully customizable experience designed specifically for the 18-35-year-old audience in America. Gameloft has emerged as one of the top innovators in its field. The company creates games for mobile handsets equipped with Java, Brew or Symbian technology. The total number of mobile handsets with this technology is anticipated to exceed one billion units in 2007.

Media violence is a controversial issue, which has been, discussed many times in media. What is media? “God is all knowing and all-powerful. He is a spirit, not a body, and he exists both outside us and within us. God is always with us, because He is everywhere. We can never fully understand him, because He works in mysterious ways. In broad terms, this describes the God of our fathers, but it also describes electronic media, the second god, which man has created” (Tony Schwarthz, 1983). So by this perspective we can image about its’ power. Now we need to know about media violence. According to oxford dictionary “showing or caused by strong force or caused by very strong feeling.” Here the question is what is that force or feelings, obviously the answer will indicate media. Radio and television are everywhere and they are always with us. American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) released its Policy Statement on Media Violence, a document claiming that several studies have “proven” there is a strong connection between children’s aggressive behavior and a penchant for violent entertainment. A prediction to the test by showing pairs of nursery-school children a Woody Woodpecker cartoon, regarded as violent, and non-violent cartoon more . After each film the children, who were friends, were observed for fourteen minutes while in a playroom, and special note was taken of any signs of aggression directed towards each other. Although statistically fully significant, a comparison of the two conditions revealed more rather than less aggression after the violent cartoon. This theory predicts that a violent film will act to remove the inhibitions that normally prevent a person from expressing aggression. Media stories of any occurrence of criminal violence contain complex message that tell us much about gendered relations of power, the way boundaries of acceptable social behavior are policed and the way the media itself operates. Not only children but also adult seduced by the media in different way and media is responsible for many real life violence directly or indirectly.

Reference:
· Schwartz, Tony, 1983, Media: The Second God, Anchor Press/Doubleday Garden City, New York.

Online service is considered as the most convenient way to access any organization or event. For the lacks of resources people are unknown about plenty of places those are inaccessible. Online is the great opportunity to let the people know about the places and event and also very useful for those who are not capable to visit there. The National Cultural Network will provide an important outreach service for the cultural and heritage institutions, particularly those in the rural and remote areas. A number of states and territories already set up such technology named Virtual Cultural Center in Western Australia more and Vicnet for Victoria vicnet.This organization will provide a range of recourses and information linked to countries heritage. A fund of $10 million more will be spending in next three years for to spread the cultural network in schools, libraries and cultural institutions. They coalition believe that people should not deny the opportunity of participating cultural activities to resident of the capital cities. Thus they will spend an amount of $7.5 million for establishing a regional arts fund to make the arts more accessible to Australian’s in rural and regional areas, which is a great attempt for the sake of cultural development. This fund will provide assistance and provide education to the rural arts centers, museums and arts organization.

Festivals are the events to identify a nation through social occasions. It might be cultural or economical. “Each Festival was long preceded by a historical and cultural search for roots and authenticity”. (Hutchinson, 1992). Festivals reflect on the culture to give a clear overview on the nation. These festivals keep the identification of the nation years after years. Festivals are conveying the culture to the new generations from the early age. The new generations can learn the culture form the festival easily. Festival inspires everyone to keep the culture through some occasions. There has been number of festivals of a different kind growing recently. They have been mainly cultural in purpose. These festivals held around the country after establishing the festivals in style and popularity by influence. The life of Bengalis is full of different festivals. The effect of festivals in Bengali life style and their traditions are vital. Bengali celebrates different festivals through out the year. Festivals have always played a momentous role in the Bengali life style. Those are the parts of Bengali culture and tradition. The celebrating of those festivals shows the existence of Bengali culture. The purpose of this essay is to discuss the growth of festivals as a vital appearance of Bangladeshi cultural identity. It also demonstrates some examples of the festivals and the reasons why it happens. It signifies how these festivals influence the life style of Bangladeshis and their social lives, and their advantages and disadvantages.

Festivals have a central theme, which gives rhythm to everyone, to celebrate it according to their own culture. “Pohela Baishak” – Bengali New Year is an example where people follow the central theme of their culture to celebrate the New Year festival. Through this festival the Bengali culture can be recognize. The “Pohela Baishak” festival is the huge gathering of people celebrating the Bengali New Year. The concept came from celebrating the first day of Bengali New Year as a traditional Bangladeshi as to remembrance the real culture of Bengal. The “Pohela Baishak” festival reflects the most important cultural influence on the Bengali society. The importance of this festival does have greater impact as in the day of this festival the whole nation reacts with the consciousness of Bengali cultural tradition with literacy, music, arts and poetry. As Bengali culture does have the rich background of such activities, every single soul of Bangladesh wants to share that great flow of cultural activity. The reason behind such celebrating might be to memorize the tradition for whole year by participating it in the first day of the year. Such superstition still ongoing into peoples mind that the whole year will follow the first day. Although this is not happening because greater western influence is swallowing the Native culture and peoples are adopting that quite happily. “Modernization could accelerate in the coming years and decades, a process likely eventually to weaken traditional Tibetan culture by breaking its link with the society, which feeds it” (Mackerras, 1999). To avoid such contradiction into peoples mind the government and the social workers are pushing the nation into the ideas of being Bangladeshi by celebrating own culture. Thus when the events come, everyone can gets into it and participate it with full rhythm. The celebrating “Pohela Baishak” starts with “Provat feri” where “Provat” implies the sunrise and “feri” implies walk, creating meaning for walk onto the sunshine. The whole nation gets early in the morning and gather in a place called “Ramna”, which is the centre of this festival. When the sun rise everyone welcomes the first day by singing the song “Aso he aso he Baishak” means welcome Baishak. Baishak is the starting month of the Bengali year. The festival celebrates by everyone all over the country but Ramna is the central located in the nation’s capital Dhaka. The people perform the song “Esho he Baishak” written by Nobel winner “Rabindranath Tagor” as he has greater influence on Bengali literature. This festival reminds us about our rich tradition over the centuries to be a part of a great nation and the coming new days. more

Floating Life is movie that is all about Australian identity. It tells a story, which shows us the process of ‘othering’. National identity and self-identity is not the same and national identity relates to the process of ‘othering’ through discourse. Australia is a multi ethnic country. Immigrants from different countries migrated to Australia many years ago and then Australia questioned its national identity. Questions such as where am I? and who am I? Floating Life shows us how the immigrants from different cultures are supposed to be in Australia, what might be their identity and how they should act. Through the globalization process national identity has become hybrid identity. Like in the movie, in Germany, Yen (Annette Shun Wah) finds her identity and cries before sleeping at night. She finds her root and her relation with her root. On that image we get a clear view of how every different migrant is continuously thinking about their identity but at the same time they are following other cultural identities by speaking German, living in Germany and so on though they do not belong in it.

In the movie, Pa (Edwin Pang) tells Ma (Cecilia) about an offence that had been done by a 12 years-old boy in America and just after that Bing (Annie Yip) gives her younger brother Chau (Toby Chan) a hard time about his clothing and says to Ma about her concerns. This concern actually indicates Western and Australian culture, though those cultures have been Other. The Chan family finds their identity in Australia but simultaneously they are ‘self-whole’. And again according to Mark Roxburg “the members of the Chan family are Other because of the way they understand their difference from the absent Australian self”.

In the movie, white masculine landscape acts as a symbol for cultural identity. It reminds us about bush legends, mate ships that are some Australian national identities and in the same way when we see the kangaroo in the movie it reminds us that we are in Australia.