I had a really mixed reaction to this seminar. While it was informative and entertaining to hear tales from MIT in years past, I didn't really understand why this discussioon was held at IMD other than that three of our professors were involved. The discussion basically ended up comparing these two arenas for interactivity, and it felt like everyone was getting miffed or disappointed that our program is not providing the same sorts of projects or experiences. But we can't be the media lab for reasons that Marientina started to point out. We are here to take many classes and earn a master's degree, which doesn't seem like a setting where we could spend all day every day in a lab on a single project. Instead I want to know what we can usefully take away from this discussion. Is there an attitude, or a motivation, or a curiosity we should aspire to? An outlook on learning/research/life that we can integrate into our current work?

This discussion made me kind of lament the fact that we aren't a more research-based program. I've always had sort of an idealized vision of the MIT Media Lab I suppose and from what I gather, their model has sort of fallen apart.

Jess, I don't think earning a master's degree doesn't necessitate spending your entire time at grad school in taking many classes. However, in our situation, I feel like that is the mandate of the cinema school and there isn't much wiggle room with regards to that. And I think that this lack of wiggle room is very stifling.

Imagine for example that instead of being an extra-curricular function, the Cloud project were a directed research project done for credit with the EA grant money funding the credits for each student participating. I think this model would help us be far more successful in realizing a complete final deliverable, but because of the rigidness of the IMD curriculum, this would exclude most students who don't have a spot to fit it in.

This was an interesting look at what was. Maybe what was is now what can never be had again. Maybe our Interactive Media Division, with its 8 million dollars from EA, is going to be the way things work in the post-grad sector. There are certainly other places (UCI, UCSD come to mind) where like things seem to be happening in like ways. Do we want it to be 1980 again?

YES! 1980 is so hot right now. Dust off your Human League records...

But if the researchs are market-oriented, like to study how to apply the most powerful a/v devices to entertainment products, it might make it win-win. I think sometimes the public tastes for entertainment products could be "educated" - you create something sales-promising enough, you win the market sooner or later(and your degree). By contraries, an entertainment product asks more research than does artistic work, because one must be responsible for every cent spent for the product, that is, you must study over and over for every trick you would blend into the design - for the mass instead of onesefl, whereas artists only need to care about her/himself so long as s/he has enough money to do the work...(to be continued)

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