Thomas Conner
  • thomasconner
    • Bio
    • Professional: Resumé
    • Academic: CV
    • Teaching
    • Blog

Phenomonoscopy

The future of concerts: Being here, not there

8/15/2013

0 Comments

 
Picture
Hatsune Miku turns 6 this month, the ol’ gal, and she’s celebrating with another global simulcast concert event — the Magical Mirai 2013, a concert at Yokohama Arena broadcast on delay to movie theaters around the world, including Los Angeles and New York. Fans gather in each venue to watch the same show at the same time — a world tour without the performer having to travel. But why is a “hologram” like Miku the only performer regularly doing this?

Because she can, of course. Digitally animated performers like Miku, or 2.0Pac from last year’s Coachella, aren’t actual 3D holograms — but they aspire to be. As such, they’re paving the way for a future (not necessarily the future) of live concerts. They hint at the possibility of one day alleviating the extraordinary stress of touring, for both musicians (oy, the schlepping) and fans (the sound sucks, the sightlines suck, the beer sucks, and would y’all shut up and please put your freaking phones down?). The alternative: intimate shows for those who want to be there, and beaming it into living rooms — seriously beaming it, in 3D — for those who don’t.

Read More
0 Comments

album archeaology: the smithereens

8/14/2013

0 Comments

 
Pulled out the Walkman and some cassettes last weekend. I let the Smithereens’ “Green Thoughts” repeat a few times, an album I miss because for some reason I don’t own a digital copy. Suddenly, I became spellbound by only a memory, a deep black trip through some houses I used to live in and a world I once knew.

Read More
0 Comments

on fire: 10 underrated new wave guitarists

8/6/2013

1 Comment

 
Picture
Watching the Cure perform last night at Lollapalooza was a rich and rewarding experience, for two reasons. First, I wasn’t there. For the first time in years I wasn’t ankle deep in the Grant Park mud and debris a hundred yards from the stage trying to hear the music over the din of chatty Chads and Trixies. Instead, I was here on the West Coast with my feet up next to a pitcher of Rhett Butlers, watching the festival’s extremely well-directed live stream. Shoulda done it this way the whole time.

Read More
1 Comment

the state of comm scholarship (...again?)

8/5/2013

0 Comments

 
The Tao that can be explained is not the enduring and unchanging Tao.
— Lao Tzu


Before beginning my graduate communication studies, I knew I was entering a conflicted field. The fact that every scholar I’ve spoken to or studied with defines communication slightly differently and citing different theoretical perspectives is exciting, not daunting — and, surprisingly, not that confusing. It is large, this field; it contains multitudes. Translation: there’s still much to be done — more than ever, now that the communication of information is a vaunted pillar of modern society — so come on aboard.

Thus, a new missive questioning the standing, ambition and overall health of communication scholarship — “Communication Scholars Need to Communicate” by USC Annenberg’s dean, the earnest Ernest J. Wilson III — is merely the latest in a long series of semi-perennial glances toward our brainy navels. The field, it seems, is still fermenting.

Read More
0 Comments
    Picture

    this blahg

    I'm THOMAS CONNER, Ph.D. in Communication & STS, and a longtime culture journalist.

    I study the cultural histories and media effects of holograms, AR tech, and virtual performance. I was a pop music critic for 20 years.
    I'm a Taoist and a teaist. All of this and more is fair game here.


    &c. &c. &c.


    Categories

    All
    Academia
    Books
    California
    Communication
    Conferences
    Cultural Studies
    Hatsune Miku
    Haunted Media
    Movies
    Music: Background
    Music: Foreground
    Obits
    Oklahoma
    Science Studies
    Technology
    Television
    Theory: Comm
    Virtual Performance
    Woody Guthrie

    Archives

    May 2025
    April 2025
    February 2025
    November 2024
    October 2024
    June 2024
    April 2024
    December 2023
    November 2023
    October 2023
    September 2023
    June 2023
    April 2023
    October 2022
    August 2022
    July 2022
    December 2021
    September 2021
    November 2020
    July 2019
    May 2019
    January 2019
    May 2018
    February 2018
    October 2017
    September 2017
    July 2017
    May 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    July 2016
    May 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    March 2015
    January 2015
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013
    October 2013
    September 2013
    August 2013
    July 2013

    RSS Feed

Home

Bio

Professional

Academic

Blog

mine, all mine © 2000-now
  • thomasconner
    • Bio
    • Professional: Resumé
    • Academic: CV
    • Teaching
    • Blog