I was very intrigued by the Salvage Expedition mission in there podcasts. They had an innovative idea to observe the sources of fascination/ attention that comes with certain aspects of popular culture. With trying understanding these features of popular culture they intended to find way to transform that attention towards activism and social change.
I am can not vividly envision this transformation, none the less I am drawn to there subject topics. I like the atmosphere that surrounds there discussion, very casual and humanized. I feel like this is compatible with the effort to understand the personal reasons people are drawn to certain aspects of popular culture and why. Strangely though the discussion seemed to missing people who actually enjoyed pop culture and know how to articulate why, excluding the Minecraft podcasts with the two kids.
The Minecraft podcast was most entertaining and informative to me as a listener. Mostly I was gripped by understanding what Minecraft is and understanding the range of players it has gathered throughout our culture. Also hearing it from kids who were players and had a very non intellectualized relationship with the game was fun. I like how the speakers were able to tie anonymity in to the discussion of activism. Activism is so focus on being seen and heard, I thought was important to point out how being unseen can be beneficial and empowering too. Activists using costume in the action is awesome. They talked about integrating play worlds our of the screen. For example, putting on your video game characters costumes and protesting. Its like saying “this matters everywhere”, it is also a way of empowering the people protesting, showing there interests and making the experience fun and vibrant.
I didn’t really understand the podcast on the the 100 billboard songs. It seemed like a mostly opinion based discussion that didn’t really explore the reasons the songs had become popular. Because of this I do not think they were successful in there mission to use their observation to learn about activism. Things in pop culture gain attention for a reason. It is a strange process but I think it still deserves a sense of openness because the those involved are people, they are humans! There harsh criticism made it hard for me to see how they were going to use there podcast for activism.
I think it is important when trying to support a cause make something visible and get people to give there attention to something is to not exploit our interests. So much of pop culture pulls people in by throwing out things that will shock people. It is a cheap shot, that disorients out culture. If anything it is important to see how pop culture has unhealthy methods of getting attention and avoiding those things while promoting a cause. The people will be stronger in a fight if they are not wrapped in by scheme to get their attention. It is needed people understand why they are connected to there cause.
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