Ask Me For The Moon and New Orleans

One of the things that intrigued me was that both of these pieces were a translation of a different genre of known writing, poetry and persuasive respectively. The imagery and, in the case of "Blue Velvet," sound, helped contribute more to the conversation than the written word alone could have.

In "Ask Me for the Moon," one of the things that struck me was how in this format, the poet was able to control how the reader viewed the work. Not all the lines came at once. some were drawn out and some led quickly into others. The imagery in the background of the buildings helped give a background to the piece. When a reader normally confronts a poem, he or she can scan it at leisure or pass over lines at a time. The reader here is not allowed to do so. Provided that the viewer remains on the webpage, they will consume the poem closer to how the poet intended. This is the power of technology to transform writing and help people get inside the mind of the writer. Also, we get some of the sense of disillusionment here. The lines show up on the screen as loose thoughts, as if they could be our thoughts. It works.

In "Blue Velvet," the author is attempting to make an emotional connection with the viewer. There is an interactivity here, where the viewer must click on certain words to gain all the information available. This keeps the viewer interested and connected. The sound, the pounding percussion and dramatic tones, give us the idea that what is here is important and indeed it is.

Most discussions of what happened in post-Katrina New Orleans are flat--facts on a page with no personality. The other accounts are overly dramatic, but touch only on the emotional aspect of the story. What is done here, and quite nicely, is the tying together of the facts and the emotional nature of the story in such a way that the viewer is engaged and horrified at the same time. Simply reading facts on a page would bore the average reader and allow them to disengage. Here, we are constantly reminded of the reality of the situation.

When you click on a word, it splashes through the land, reminding us of the after-effects of the storm. The persuasive essay form at the bottom of the page isn't arranged in classic rows of type, but in varying sizes that draw the eye around the page. The videos from the Katrina wake can be accessed from the page, reminding the viewer's soul of how it felt in that situation.

Also here, the words used are not arbitrary at all, but meant to gain a response. Liberty.Activist segregation Privatization. These words are meant to move. And the way the site moves, they are meant to tell a story in an engaging and new way. This format educates, informs and effects emotions in a way possible only by the format.

So then, while these two pieces vary widely in subject manner, they accomplish the same thing. Both expand the conventions of the written word and redefine those conventions using technology. "Blue Velvet" is more effective because of its complexity and interactive nature. It takes a hot-button issue and expounds far beyond normal in an innovative way. It combines images, sound and words to make an argument against the atrocities experienced throughout New Orleans.

"Moon" claims to be one account of the reality in Hawaii and how it is a place overrun with tourists that outnumber citizens. While it is visually pleasing, it doesn't push the envelope in the way "Blue Velvet" does. It doesn't move me to change or to make any decisions about anything. It is a commentary where "Blue Velvet" is almost a manifesto for change.