New Youth Subcultures

Yeltsin's Dream. Digital photograph by Brandon Muir.

Bran is a blog by Brandon Muir, a young Canadian electrician who makes digital pop-art and music in his spare time. His band is called The Lou Diamond Philharmonic. His digital art is interesting because it combines different stars, political figures and other symbols to make ironic and funny statements. Its a great way of playing with semiotics. Newspaper and magazine collage was made by the Dada artists in 1920s Germany to make political statements.

Mark Paterson describes the consumer paradox of innovation and trend setting as more evident in youth subcultures.(57) The Bran blog could be an example of this idea. It is not reliant on the purchase of branded goods and commodities to form an identity. Alternatively it is commenting on mass production and mass consumption of media.

Reference: Paterson, Mark. "Consumption and Identity: Manufacturing Choice." Consumption and Everyday Life. New York and London: Routledge, 2006. pp. 36-57

Satine October Dane Concert à Emporter

Satine October Dane Concert à Emporter
Uploaded by lablogotheque. - See the latest featured music videos.

One of my fellow students brought a site named La Blogotheque to my attention. Its made by a frenchman named Vincent Moon and features video of musicians performing in all sorts of unusual locations. The resulting footage has a live energy that is uplifting and charming. I like hearing groups I would not normally be exposed to. This clip is one of my favourites because I like the rooftop view and Satine's voice is mesmerising.

I really like this site and I probably wouldn't have found it myself. I like the way blogging can act as a tour group of the internet. Multiple users can share their experience about a topic and maybe help to eliminate time spent researching it. The great advantage of participating in the Cultureblog is that "social and aesthetic domains can overlap". (Haney 39) This can be very helpful particularly in the study of popular culture through an increased sharing of knowledge and ideas.

Reference: Haney, William. S. II. "Beckett out of his mind: The theatre of the absurd". Studies in the Literary Imagination. Vol 34, Issue 2, 2001. p 39(16)

Lyle the intern legend

Lyle makes blogging seem easy and fun by using a videocamera to record entries. I really like his humor, it seems spontaneous and ad libbed. He appears totally in the moment and wonderfully wacky. His content is refreshingly original and dangerously out there!I was shocked when I saw him do this skit on the Letterman show a month ago. He made me want to do a videoblog!
He also did a skit about his internet show. both of these skits poke fun at public creation of internet media.