Unfinished Technology?

The Mannovich reading is the description of how the media (technology) of today is formed around the 5 principles: numerical representation, modularity, automation, variability and transcoding. What is effectively examined is the tangibility of new media in the present day and age, it’s influence on humans and daily activities, and every aspect of the computer world. This new media is described as “…mathematically and can be manipulated via algorithms.” What Mannovich here argues is that old media isn’t exactly so old, it’s still present but formed and shaped under the same viable coding and presented as something new. All data in the computer world is written as 0’s and 1’s, how they are used is entirely up to programmers who invent new ideas and the instruments to fulfill those purposes. Lunenfeld would perceive the coding and the computer itself an “unfinished” instrument, solely because a computer cannot finish a task itself without a user. The user has to first build a computer with a purpose in the coding for it to carry it’s task, but without the human it is nothing but a shell that collects dust. Technology in computers is voted as something that will make the impossible, possible and life easier to live. Computers of the future cannot finish what humans are able to, such as surgeries, novels, portraits, they cannot complete these tasks because they lack creativity and again; the necessary part of having a creator to give it a specific purpose for its creation. Mannovich argues that “human intentionality can be removed from the creative process, at least in part" because of the automation in computer programs that allow for templates, colors, algorithms to be involved immediately instead of concentration on the task at hand. Are computers a bad thing to have in life? Some would argue yes because they make us less human, depending on code and variables to make shortcuts in life. Some would argue no, because efficiency and simplicity is what people need to be able to perform their daily tasks comfortably. Mannovich and Lunenfeld share a common view, that computers themselves have a limit, because of their source…the coding in their media. 0’s and 1’s go only so far versus a human mind, the human mind can make business “finish” since it’s capable of constantly thinking of new ways to solve issues. Coding can go only as far as a programmer can, which is the limit to technology in this day and age.