Matrix

I have registered for the edcmooc - E-learning and Digital Culture via coursera. The first week has a few short movies and some readings that result in the discussion topic: "There are many utopian and dystopian stories about technology told in popular films from Metropolis to the Matrix. Can you think of an example and describe or share it ..."? So here I am writing about the sort of movies that I enjoy watching repeatedly. Interestingly Keanu Reeves has starred in several movies that have this dystopian flavour - the most well known ones are the Matrix trilogy, but he has also appeared in Johnny Mnemonic, A Scanner Darkly and the re-make of The Day the Earth Stood Still. All of these movies had a vision of the future that was affected to a greater or lesser degree by technology and the greed of mankind. 
There are many other movies that portray a dystopian future. When I saw the list I realised I had seen quite a few of them - I think probably because of my interest in science fiction, which stems from a curiosity about what the future could hold. This genre of movies captures my imagination - and it often doesn't take too much imagination to envisage some of the scenes playing out in reality. In my teenage years we studied books such as '1984' by George Orwell and Aldous Huxley's 'A Brave New World'. I later gravitated to titles like  Isobelle Carmody's 'The Gathering' (very dark) and 'The Handmaiden's Tale' by Margaret Atwood. Most recently I have read 'Uglies' by Scott Westerfeld and watched 'Children of Men', 'Book of Eli', 'The Hunger Games' and viewed (again) a couple of real favourites - 'The Fifth Element' and 'Minority Report'. The thing that all of these movies and books have in common for me, is that they make a deep impact and the stories stay with me for  along time after, making me think about the possibilities they raise.

Re-visiting/reviving

This blog has been left idle for some time now.
I first started it when I was studying at University of Melbourne for a Masters in Training and Development.
I am now re-visiting it to write about my participation in the edcmooc for E-learning and Digital Cultures - an on-line course via Coursera.