Literature in a Wired World

Robin Sloan and Matt Thompson’s Epic 2015 looks forward to the future of the infomediascape.

Perhaps to distract us from the future they intend to make inevitable, Google is celebrating its 10th birthday by encouraging us to look backwards at the distant, quaint past world of 2001.

Click here to go to Google 2001, where you can search through Google’s earliest complete database of online material. Links will take you your choice of the current version of your search results or to cached versions of the sites on the Internet Archive.

What do you notice is different? What is the same? Should we expect massive change in only 7 years?

For Thursday’s class, delve deeply into the experience that is “lonelygirl15.” You’ve already dug up some info and maybe even had a chance to watch a video or two. These links should help you find out more:

• lonelygirl15 - her videos on YouTube
• The Los Angeles Times finds “the Creators”

We also discussed viral videos and viral marketing. Here are some examples we mentioned of viral videos. You should check them out — they’re insidiously entertaining.

• The End of the World
• Star Wars Kid
• Chad Vader, part 1
• Chad Vader, part 2
• Numa Numa
• More on the Numa Numa thing, including song lyrics and the story of what happened to this kid
• The Ultimate Showdown of Ultimate Destiny

Have fun!