Your primary task with this assignment is to watch one film or series you’ve never watched before (if you choose a series, your goal will be to watch at least three episodes–more if you’ve got the time). I’ll ask you to do things as you watch and after you watch to get the most out of this experience. An equally important task with this assignment is to chronicle exactly how you find this new thing to watch (this was a little hard to recall as we thought about story experiences from the past in assignment one, but you should be able to capture lots of details this time around). You might let the film or show find you (as a recommendation on your favorite streaming service) or perhaps you will find the film or show by looking into things that interest you (genre, technique, artist, etc.). If you decide to seek something out, you can use the experiences and techniques you identified in the first assignment to assist in your search. Even if you selected a text or a game for the first assignment, there will be films and shows that use the same techniques and have prompted the same experiences.
You will follow the same steps as you did in assignment one to chronicle and process your discovery and viewing experience in a post for our course website. You can return to the prompt for assignment one you’re fuzzy on the details. We’ll be following these same steps for the third assignment this semester, so this will start to feel familiar.
After you have found your film/show, watched it, and chronicled your discovery and viewing experiences, I want you to do one new thing for this assignment. You’re going to think about the algorithm that helped you find what you chose and decide what features about the show would be most useful to extract to help the film/show find its ideal audience. You can do this in lots of different ways. You might think that the recommender system you used could be better if new features were included, or you might think of another way to spread the word about it (perhaps a review in a place where fans of a particular genre, creator, or topic are likely to find it). In this last section, you’ll be brainstorming possibilities that you can revisit and develop more fully for your final project of the semester.
The Parts of This Assignment
Part 1: Chronicle and Process your Discovery and Viewing Experiences
- Chronicle how you found the film/show or how it found you
- Describe your viewing experiences (at least one, you can do more!)
- Classify your viewing experiences (at least one, but you can do more!)
- Describe the features prompting your experiences
- Try to determine the techniques used to create the features you describe
- Brainstorm about a better algorithm to help people find this film/show
Part 2: Create a Post on Course Website
- Title
- Featured Image (something you’ve created or something you’ve found)
- Complete media file details for featured image
- “caption” field should include an attribution statement (TASL guidance here)
- “alternative text” field should provide a summary of what is in the image
- “description” field should include the URL for the image file you downloaded
- Discovery and Viewing Experience with any sources clearly cited (hyperlinks for online sources and in-text citations for print sources) with a list of works cited at the end.
- Ideas on how you could improve/design a tool that would help the film/show find its ideal audience
Part 3: Write a Project Reflection
After you submit your post, I will read it and prepare feedback for you (usually as a video of me reading your post aloud and sharing ideas for ways you might want to expand on the ideas for the final project). You will have one week from the time I have sent your feedback video to watch it and prepare a project reflection to submit through Canvas.
Part 4: Contribute to our Discovery Tool
During the first class meeting after this assignment is due, you will submit your experience to our course website and we will spend time in class discussing the experiences you identified and brainstorming how a system for classifying the experiences readers have with stories might be used to improve current recommender systems.
FAQs
- Do I have to share my post with the class? You can choose to share your post with classmates or share it only with me (set your post to “private” if you only want me to see it).
- Should I do research on what I’m reading? Only if you want to. You can process your reading experience without looking at what others have said about the text, but some students like getting the perspective of others. If you do look at secondary sources, please mention this in your reading experience section (even if you don’t wind up citing the sources)
- What if I don’t like what I pick? That’s okay! I don’t recommend picking something different. You can still describe your experiences, the features that prompted that experience, and try to identify the techniques prompting that experience. You can also think about the audience that might enjoy it more than you.
- So, this isn’t a typical “English paper”? No, it isn’t. There is no requirement to have a single argument or claim. You are not required to find peer-reviewed sources to support or contextualize what you want to say. There is no requirement to be original. I want you to let your interests guide you and share your experiences, questions, and theories with me (and your classmates!).
- Can you share an example of what a finished product is supposed to look like? Yes! The post I’m asking you to read before next class is my attempt to do this assignment. Yours does not need to look like mine, but I offer it as an example in case you find it useful.
- How will you grade this? After you submit this project, I will prepare feedback on your work (most often in video form, but I will ask what you prefer). I’ll ask you to read or watch my feedback and compose a project reflection that responds to my feedback, describes your experience completing the assignment, and assigns a grade to your work. The instructions for each project reflection are in Canvas; they will be due (via upload to Canvas) one week after you receive feedback from me on each assignment.
Reminders
- You may find it useful to compose in a document outside of OpenLab (Microsoft Word, a Google Doc, or something else).
- Assume that there will be spoilers—no need to alert readers to them.
- We’re not writing reviews, though people reading what we’re writing might decide to check something out that they might not have encountered otherwise.
- Include lots of direct quotation and clips from the film/show. If you’re saying that a film has a specific feature, make sure to give an example of that feature
- Write to a general audience—clarity is a priority!!
- Share your experience of the film! Give details.
- Share your best sense of how the creators of the film/show prompted an emotional response you had. If you want to research how others have explained their techniques, go for it. Do make sure to cite what you read.
