hypermediacy

The phrase of the day: "like TV only better," seems maybe a bit too shallow in the terms that it's looked at. The article, "The Double Logic of Remediation," gives a good point to the fact that all media new and old, TV or print, are competing for the edge in the media race today. All of the companies are caught in a constant rat race of trying to out-do the other. The idea has gotten so ridiculous that when I get bored I can pull out my cell phone and at my finger tips is an multitude of games, clips, and audio of large studio's storied hits. I would say that I disagree though that every one's trying to look like a modification of the TV or it's networks. While companies do cross pollinate their web and television and other media sources with each other to broaden their listening base, I would say that these networks must distinguish each aspect of itself as something better than the other forcing these pieces (television, web, radio) to get further and further away from each other in likeness. Networks realize that everything can't be TV and TV will only be TV never better than itself.

Girl Power

Girl power didn't necessarily strike me as "the perfect name" for Sadie Benning's short autobiographical film. The film depicts Benning's adolescent and childhood years as she grew up learning no fear and little reality in a home that seems cold and meaningless for her as a youth. The film strikes me as a reaction and tribute to the one thing she had to rely on as she grew up. the TV. Benning's film contains many pieces of footage that would have effected her as she grew up. Even her own imaginative world that she describes is built off of the things and people she would view on television. The style or look of the film also strikes me as a tribute to an older b&w television set she may once have watched. I do believe that after editing her film together she recorded it off of a television set to give it a fuzzy analog television feel. Benning's girl power is nothing more than the imagination of one girl who is hooked on the boob tube.