For each reading, we will have a shared Google Document in which you will post questions prior to class. These contributions will not be graded, but participation is required.

By midnight on Monday, you should post two different kinds of questions to our Google Document:

1) Questions of Clarification
These questions should be about terms or concepts you didn't understand or about moments in the argument you found unclear. These questions are, for the most part, focused on understanding the reading, and we will address these first during class discussion.

2) Questions for Discussion
These questions are more geared toward opening up class discussion, and they can be focused on connections you see to other readings, the implications of the argument we've read, or ways that you think the argument might be applied to research questions.

This document will be open during class discussion, and it will serve as a collaborative note-taking space.

Once during the semester, each student will review a book that is cited by one of the texts we've read as a class (you cannot review a text that is on the syllabus). Reviews will take the form of a Pecha Kucha presentation - a presentation of 20 slides, each shown for 20 seconds (6 minutes and 40 seconds total).

Your primary task in this review is to explain how the argument works and how it engages with other scholarship. You should not focus your efforts on an evaluation of the argument or on whether or not you disagree with the author. See the grading criteria below for some tips about how to approach these reviews, and please feel free to ask me questions.

When providing feedback on these presentations, I will be looking for the following:

• Does your presentation adequately summarize the text and its argument?
• Do you explain the text's significance, its most important features, and its contributions to a scholarly conversation?
• Have you explained how this text connects with the texts we're reading for this class?
• Have you avoided a discussion of whether or not you disagree with the author? Have you avoided a discussion of flaws or shortcomings in the argument?
• Have you followed the rules of engagement
• Have you paid close attention to the design of your slides?
• Have you followed the Pecha Kucha rules (20 slides, shown for 20 seconds each)

During our unit on software, we will be reading about different approaches to analyzing new media objects at the level of code and computation. In groups, you will testing out these approaches and analyzing computational objects. The objects we will be analyzing are:

Reagan Library, a work of electronic literature by Stuart Moulthrop
Taroko Gorge, a poetry generator by Nick Montfort
ELIZA, a version of the famous ELIZA chatbot created by Michael Wallace

Each of these objects is written in Javascript, but you do not need to be an expert in Javascript to conduct an analysis of them. As you examine the code, you might find the W3Schools documentation on Javascript useful. Each group will be assigned one of these objects and will be tasked with doing three things:

1) Providing a detailed explanation of how the program works. This explanation should be accessible to non-programmers, but it can and should contain snippets of code along with explanations of that code. The key here is to provide a detailed account of how the software is doing what it is doing.

2) Providing an interpretation of the object's use of computational processes using some of the theories and approaches we are examining in class (including, but not limited to, concepts such as expressive processing, procedural rhetoric, invisible code, etc.)

3) Create a "remix" of your assigned work.

The first two tasks will be completed as part of a collaboratively authored paper, but the third will most likely take the form of a web page. In class, we will discuss some ways of approaching the remix portion of the assignment.

You will share your papers with me and classmates using Dropbox, but you can use Google Documents to collaboratively author those papers. In addition, you will have the opportunity to present your work in class. This presentation will be a somewhat informal one, in which you will walk us through how your object works and how you've chosen to remix it.

When responding to these projects, here are the questions I'll be asking:

• Have you provided an accessible and accurate account of how this object works
• Does your interpretation of the work link computational mechanism to surface effects, explaining how computation is being used as an express and/or rhetorical medium?
• Does your remix transform the work, taking the existing data and processes in a new direction to make new arguments and express new ideas?
• Is your paper clearly written and generally free of grammatical errors?
• Does the project show evidence that the group has effectively collaborated on both the paper and the remix?

In Racing the Beam, Bogost and Montfort try to draw attention to an area of new media research that has been neglected - platform. Offering a description of the various levels of new media studies - reception/operation, interface, form/function, code, platform - they suggest that a platform is "a cultural artifact that is shaped by values and forces and which expresses views bout the world, ranging from 'games are typically played by two players who may be of different ages and skill levels' to 'the wireless service provider, not the owner of the phone, determines what programs may be run" (148). A study of platform is a study of what shapes and constrains the design and use of certain new media artifacts.

While Bogost and Montfort say that platform studies need not focus on hardware (as their study of the Atari 2600 does), we will be undertaking a platform study by way of hardware. While the software studies project focused on the code and form/function levels (along with some attention to reception/operation and interface), this project moves to platforms.

The class will be divided into two groups. One group will study the Nintendo Entertainment System, and the other will study the Macintosh Classic. Our focus is not only on these pieces of hardware (though, we will look at them closely) but also on the platforms out of which they emerged. We will study the NES console as a window into the NES platform and the Macintosh Classic as a window into the Macintosh platform.

One goal is to examine how "hardware and software platforms influences, facilitates, or constrains particular forms of computational expression" (Bogost and Montfort). While this is a focus on how platforms affect design and designers, we will also be interested in how that platform shapes the end user experience.

The aim is to use these two pieces of hardware to ask broader questions about the platforms out of which they emerged, and this approach is one more way of paying close attention to the "guts" of our various new media interfaces and infrastructures.

Just as we did with the software studies project, you will produce both a paper and an informal presentation. You will share your papers with me and classmates using Dropbox, but you can use Google Documents to collaboratively author those papers. In addition, you will have the opportunity to present your work in class. Again, this presentation will be a somewhat informal one, in which you will walk us through the system you are studying (both at the level of the particular piece of hardware and its platform).

When responding to these projects, here are the questions I'll be asking:

• Have you provided an accessible and accurate account of the technical details of your object of study and its platform?
• Does your study demonstrate how the platform shapes or constrains the activities of both designers and end users?
• Does your study shed light on the particularities of this platform, the cultures out of which it emerged, and its various idiosyncracies?
• Is your paper clearly written and generally free of grammatical errors?
• Does the project show evidence that the group has effectively collaborated on both the paper and the presentation?

The final project for this course will be a paper and/or a digital object that accounts for new media at the level of both interface and infrastructure. Throughout the semester, we have talked about theories and approaches to new media that move beyond reception or surface effects. We have attempted to link these surface affects to various computational mechanisms and infrastructures. You will continue this work in the final project.

The final project can be a continuation or expansion of one of the group projects (software studies or platform studies), but it does not have to be. You can collaborate with other students, or you can choose to work on your own project.

If the final project is a piece of writing, it should be the length of a typical journal article (roughly 6000-8000 words), and you should have a particular journal in mind while writing it. If your project includes both writing and a digital component, the writing can be shorter than this. If your project is a purely digital composition, it should (on its own) demonstrate a significant scholarly intervention.

Projects are due on December 11, and we will do informal presentations of projects on this same day. The possibilities for this project are pretty much wide open, but you will need to complete a project proposal (500-1000 words) by November 20. That proposal should include the following:

• Abstract: 250 words that explains the project, its argument(s), and its intervention(s)
• Research Question(s): What question or questions are you asking? This should be a clearly articulated question or set of questions that engage with existing research.
• Method/Approach: We've covered approaches and methods such as software studies and platform studies. While you are not confined to these methods for your project, your proposal should lay out what method or approach you plan to use. That might be a qualitative research method, rhetorical analysis, any of the approaches we've covered in class, or any other method that is appropriate for what you hope to accomplish.
• Work Plan: What will you accomplish between November 20 and December 11, and how will you accomplish it? This should be as detailed as possible, and it should provide a realistic timeline for your work.

I will provide written feedback on these proposals that addresses the feasibility of the project and that helps you further refine your research questions and approaches.