Response to "The Asethetics of Digital Poetry"

I agree with the article on a point about the differences between writing on the computer and writing on paper. The article says “.. there is much in computer and net art that could be traced back to historical ideas, so from an aesthetic point of view nothing really innovative results.” (42) I completely agree with this statement. In my experiences with composing animated writing there really hasn’t been a change in the overall message that I’m trying to get across to the reader. The way the message is presented may change, but the meaning behind the message is the same.

In my opinion experimental writing is designed to put the medicine in the food, to dress the message up in fancy clothes and tell everyone how beautiful it is so they can pay attention. Once the people begin to pay attention and start breaking down this image of beauty the true message will begin to show itself. With experimental writing you have to find a way to be preachy without being preachy. Does that make sense?

For example if I say smoking is bad. People will get turned off because they’ll say I’m coming across as preachy. But if I create an animation that uses real life images of what smoking can do to the body it may do a better job of explaining why smoking is bad and then the message may come across better. Experimental writing allows the reader to personalize the message a lot more than if I just wrote it on a piece of paper.

Although my experience with composing animation is very limited, I can speak from the perspective of growing up in the hyper-commercialized American culture. When I turn on the tv I’m bombarded with all kinds of commercials for every kind of product imaginable. What usually separates the successful commercials from the failures is how the animations are used to persuade the viewer to buy their product. The message in these commercials is simple. The message is “please buy my product”. It is how “please buy my product” is presented to the viewers that really pulls them in.

So essentially the message never changes, it’s just presented in a different way which is exactly what the experimental writers of their respective eras did. I’m not trying to compare commercials produced by corporate America to the innovative and experimental writings of writers who intended to change how people viewed and interpreted text. I’m just saying the same basic principal is there in both cases. Experimental and animated writing tries to answer a question that no one really has a definitive answer to. That question being: How do I get people to pay attention to what I’m saying?

This question is a question I always ask myself when composing an animation. What can I do to make sure the reader understands what I’m trying to say? Computer animations are limitless in terms of how the animations are constructed. This is the main difference between paper and computer animations. But it doesn’t matter if the animation is hand drawn or computer animated the message will still be the same.