Stop Motion Commercial

This video is the first of a series of Amazon Kindle commercials. I have only seen it on youtube, not yet on television however I find that it is a perfect example of a "homegrown"/ amateurish type of commercial for the reason that it utilizes stop motion film, a method pretty much anyone is capable of trying out. For example, in my advertising class my final project is going to be a stop motion film for cereal and once it is finished I am interested to compare the quality of my amateur video to that of the Amazon Kindle.

Kevin Kelly

When the Internet was first becoming popular many thought of it as a new television, a new digital version of media, an electronic newspaper, amongst other simple outlooks. However, we now know that the Internet is much more complex and dynamic than the previously mentioned ideas. The capabilities of the ever-growing Internet are unknown, but it seems Kevin Kelly is very confident in his predictions of what it will grow to eventually be.

I found Kevin Kelly's description of devices as windows to the Internet to be frighteningly accurate. The Internet, a vast intangible world wide web, is equated to a giant machine which we are responsible for creating. Kevin Kelly said that 5% of global electricity is used by the global internet. Humans are becoming increasingly dependent on their wired-in devices, such as cell phones, ipods, laptops, etc. The point is that we are almost ALWAYS connected, and eventually will reach a point where we are always connected. Our everyday natural environment will be web-embedded, everything will connect back to the internet. To think of the natural atomic world and the digital electronic world as one seems sad, but all too realistic. I think there is a necessary division between these worlds, however it seems their collide is inevitable.

The most interesting part of Kevin Kelly's theory for me was the comparison to the human brain. The "machine's" (Internet) complexity is comparable to that of the human brain, but the rate of expansion for the machine is much, much, much faster. So much so that one day the "brain power" of the "machine" will out-power the number of existing and functioning human brains. When that point is reached, will that mean that the internet and its devices will ultimately have control?

Finally, Kelly's take on McLuhanism, or his "McLuhan Reversal Theory" was basically a view that humans will eventually act as the extension of the machine, rather than the machine as an extension of human. We will act as the provider by extending senses that the machine is not fully capable of; feeling, taste, etc. I am not sure I totally agree that one day the roles will completely switch, but it's possible I am just not comfortable accepting that thought.