sinéad's lifestream

I’ve been a daily user of Google Reader for the past year, using it to keep track of all the blogs I read. Daily use has meant that I’ve been acutely aware of each new feature that has been gradually added over the last few months. Usually these are welcome, but as Google attempts to add more social features I fear they are reducing the ability of authors and readers to follow conversations spawned from blog posts – which is considered a traditional and necessary feature of the blogosphere. That’s not to say that Google are the only ones doing this, both Facebook and Twitter have elements to them that is contributing to this.

For a long time Google Reader has allowed users to share blog posts of interest to friends  that were also using GR and slowly but surely I am starting to build up a list of friends that I share with and they reciprocate in kind. This is a form of social bookmarking, but unlike sites like Digg the author of the blog post cannot track how many times their work is shared, or by whom. GR also now features the ability to leave comments on blog posts and – at least from a blog author’s perspective – is unwelcome, because these conversations are kept private. Private social bookmarking and private blog commenting has negative implications because trackbacks and blog comments are an integral part of the blogging experience and can reinforce an author’s motivation and drive to continue writing.

Facebook and Twitter also provide you with the ability to social bookmark and comment, but again without  direct trackback links, so a blog author can never tell who is linking to their work, and misses out on many of the conversations spawned.

The lack of trackbacks and private blog comment conversations on Google Reader, Facebook and Twitter is  completely irresponsible but is in no way the fault of the reader. Google and Facebook especially understand the value of user generated content, today the most prolific of which is the simple conversation – as demonstrated by the rise of Twitter. By poaching blog comments and putting them behind private walls they are of course trying to keep their users within their own walled networks, which in the long run, could discourage bloggers from continuing to write.

Yes some of us write for ourselves, but many write for an audience, and it would be tragic for a blogger to stop writing because their audience had started privately, rather than publically, encouraging them.

I’m tired of reading and hearing so many criticisms about the Bodies exhibition from anyone with a loud enough mouth to get heard. No, it’s not art. It is Science wrapped in a publicly accessible package, that in order to survive is required to market itself. Yes, it is entertainment. This is necessary in order to engage with people that have never had an interest in Biology, or any kind of Science before. It succeeds where the Science museums fail because it engages your curiosity, appeals to your intellect and forces you to have emotional reactions.

The use of real bodies is paramount to contextualising what you are seeing. For example, the initial displays, in the first room of the exhibition are just fragments of bone and flesh, parts of bodies in glass display cases. More like a “real” museum than anywhere else. One of the largest of these  displays is a pair of legs, with the muscles prominent and labelled  – but without the context of the full body the display just ends up looking like meat, like a large ham at Christmas time.

Adding even more context is the fact that they are posed, which is something that has been heavily criticised, clearly by individuals that haven’t visited the exhibition. The poses represent physical actions, and the parts of the body highlighted match this. They truly help you understand what you are seeing. For example, the cadaver pictured has all it’s individual muscles peeled away from the skeleton, posed as if about to kick something – illustrating how the body’s 650 or so muscles work together for motion or to create force.

I was surprised there weren’t more children at the exhibition when Darragh, Jen and myself went. For anyone that has fears that their child might be afraid or disguisted… all children are naturally curious, and they will only have these reactions if you have them too. The messages it teaches are important for everyone, not just to adults, or to the geeks and nerds that would usually frequent museums.

The exhibition describes how inside we are all the same, that we are not invincible and tries to make you understand the complexity and fragility of how we function. Just because it succeeds in doing this by luring you in with the promise of the macabre doesn’t make it any less valid, or any less educational.