I, Curtis

Making ExIf 35 Mobile

The first application that I intend to write for Android will be a mobile version of my own ExIf 35 application. I have chosen to do this for several reasons. First, I need an application that has a clear purpose to write for my first application while I am learning. Second, at the current time the desktop version of the application relies on my use of a notes application for iOS or Android (carrying the device with me) or carrying a physical notepad and pen. This also requires me manually keeping track of a time stamp, which is in itself a waste of time.

The first issue is fairly straight-forward. Its harder to write a good piece of software if you don’t know where its going, and you really can’t put a lot of effort into pre-designing the application because you don’t know exactly what the constructs of the development environment entail. Through using ExIf 35 as my base I know what its supposed to look like, what its supposed to do and I have a rough idea of how to get there, but the new environment still takes time to learn. Another advantage of using ExIf 35 is that the object classes are already written, so I don’t have to spend valuable time in the learning process trying to write a new object. My Exposure.cs and Roll.cs will be attached to the new application just as they are to the old one, and the cool thing is, if this works out, then I can keep them synced with each other and not have to ever unlink them (they are objects, thus not platform or environment dependent). While this means that I do still have to write and compile in C#, I am not bothered by this idea. Mono (open-source version of .NET) is a good and usually efficient set of libraries which should work well for what I am trying to accomplish.

There have been complaints about ExIf 35 not being mobile since the day I released it publically (literally, same day someone on Flickr demanded an iOS variant). I have to agree with these complaints, since I still have to use a notepad app on my phone or on my iPod to keep track of my exposures until I get back to my desktop to transfer them. This is a waste of time as it requires me entering the data twice. I considered writing a method that could use a standardize text file as input, but unfortunately humans aren’t very good at doing things in a standard way and we use so many personal conventions in recording things that it would require as much time to train a human to write the file as it would to write the application to do it automatically. The other issue is time-keeping. It is important for the purposes of ExIf 35 that times be kept fairly well and as such it is inefficient to have a human keep time, it just happens. I have also found that in using a notes application or a physical notepad I am less likely to enter the extended details of an image (filters used, whether it was close, macro or far, or any number of other settings) than if I were entering it in the desktop application immediately after shooting. While I do not anticipate having all of this information recorded from the start of the mobile app, it will be simple to use since the object class will be maintained.

The hard part for me about writing the existing application over will be trying to remember how I did it. At present the application opens to the last file known, it knows to create a new file if there isn’t one and any number of other little goodies that I don’t even remember because it comes together so seamlessly. I don’t remember exactly what functions I wrote first before, and thus I will have to start from scratch at remembering how to do them again. A lot of code will be borrowed from ExIf 35, but transferring such a complex set of code over to the new application will result in a number of problems until I get everything sorted out and linked with where it is supposed to go, so I won’t do very much of that until the basics are implemented.

A final concern I have about writing the new application is its impact on its desktop predecessor. I will not immediately have the capability to sync data between ExIf 35 PC and the Android version, so I will mostly work on an active file and then transfer it back to the desktop at the same time as I take the roll out of the camera and only use the desktop version for making changes or for writing the data to the image files. This changes the primary role of the application and therefore I will have to re-evaluate the design of the desktop version. Its going to be an iterative process from borrowing the code through the impact on its predecessor.

Entering “Thesis Summer”

At this point in my graduate school career I should have narrowed down a thesis topic and be prepared to engage in a detailed literature review of that topic over the next several months. Unfortunately I have yet to isolate my thoughts that closely and feel like I am not ready to begin my literature review or engage in the types of preliminary research that is typically considered prudent during this time of my academic career. Of the 6 people in my cohort, all have isolated their topics to at least one particular category of interest and seem to have a strong direction in which they seem to want to go, except me.

I have a wide range of interests in Sociology, but I’m finding it difficult to narrow any of them down to a specific topic I wish to engage in a long-term, in-depth way.

Currently my scopes are:

Sociology of the Internet
Deviance (Social Construction of Deviance)
Sociology of Sexuality (and the intersection of sexuality and gender)
Sociology of Culture (Sub-cultures)
Social Complexity (Complex Systems approach to Social Science, which is more of a method than an area of study)

I have very broad interests in sociology (as well as other fields such as philosophy and information technology), so for me to narrow them down will be a huge struggle, but somehow I have to manage to get through it if I want to graduate next spring. I suppose the key to doing this will be to start a brief review of the literature of each of my major areas of interest and determining if there is any concentration area where I feel like I can dive in and make a difference.

Spring 2013 Papers

The Spring 2013 semester has now ended. My academic papers for this semester have now been released.

Thesis Proposal: The Effects of Stigma on Self-Disclosure in the BDSM Community Issues in Social Research (SOCY 6652)	Gay Sadomasochism as Hyper-Masculine Performance Theoretical Approaches to Gender (WGST 6602)
Complexity of Social Deviance Complex Adaptive Systems (ITIS 6500)

Why I will never write for iOS

Mobile application development is becoming a big deal in computer programming lately. I am very late to this particular game. I have considered writing mobile software since the initial releases of ExIf35, when people asked for a version that would work on iPhone. Unfortunately, I have decided that I will never write for iOS as long as Apple maintains its present developer-hostile atmosphere to application development.

Here is a short list of reasons why I will never write for iOS:

Fees: It costs $99 per year to write for iOS. This is not a lot of money for a developer who will profit from their applications, but it is a deterrent for a hobbyist or anyone who doesn’t plan to profit from their software. It can be a fun activity, it doesn’t have to become a profit-seeking enterprise.
Platform dependence: While it is technically possible to write for iOS on any platform, Apple has certainly made it simpler to write for iOS on their own OS.
Gatekeepers: Apple must verify and certify every application in the App Store. While this may seem like a good idea for the protection of the end users, it hinders the type of applications that can exist in the marketplace. Anything that competes with their own offerings are quashed and anything that may be for an adult audience runs the risk of not being approved at all. Also, while Apple will defend their own apps from being duplicated, there are many applications that seem almost like duplicates in the marketplace. Try looking for a flashlight app for iOS, there are several hundred of them.
Hardware Limitations: iOS applications can run only on iOS, same can be said for all platforms (kind of a duh I guess), but iOS only runs on Apple hardware, narrowing the scope of what can be done. Other platforms that are more open run on a variety of hardware, while this in itself can be a challenge, it opens up the possibilities for what can exist.

At this time I am planning to begin trying to write mobile applications over the summer, at least in a limited capacity and as a learning experience. I will be developing for Android only. I have more iOS devices than Android devices, but I think that ultimately the Android development will be more fruitful and useful.

The Kindle Dilemma in Academic Resources

For myself and many other students the invention of e-readers, specifically Amazon’s Kindle, has lifted a burden of carrying numerous physical volumes and has given us quick access to new resources that we may have otherwise not obtained had we been restricted to physical volumes. The problem is: citation styles do not keep up.

I am in the middle (or maybe about 1/4 of the way through) my Gender Theory paper. One of the texts I am using (Butler’s Gender Trouble, if it matters), has both “Real Page Numbers” as well as the traditional Kindle location numbers. My dilemma is perhaps a quirky one. I do like having access to the page numbers of a real volume as it allows me to keep up with discussions in class with others that have physical volumes, but I fundamentally disagree with using page numbers from Kindle for the purpose of citing quotes and other uses in academic papers.

My primary issue is that those page numbers are not as “real” as Amazon would have you to think that they are. The page numbers are from whichever edition of the text that Amazon decided to match the Kindle edition to. Also, not all Kindle books have “Real Page Numbers” and as such the unit of conversion is quite misleading. Finally, I love that Kindle location numbers are more specific than page numbers. If I am quoting from a page I can touch and hold the page at the start of the quote and it will give me a location that is specific to the Kindle line number that the quote appears on, making it easier to retrieve, validate or re-read the specific area of text in question.

The logical problem is that since Kindle books are not physical books, the concept of using location numbers as page numbers is misleading. Also because some books have both locations and pages, it can be vague to cite a location number that is particularly low (say under 500). As such I find myself having to modify the existing citation styles to accommodate my needs. At present I am working inside the confines of MLA. Instead of using the basic format (Butler 25), I am using a somewhat modified style (Butler loc286) to decrease the misleading/vague aspects of the citation. It is my hope that in a future version of the Modern Language Association (ha! just remembered the “M” stands for “modern”, ironic isn’t it?) protocol there is some official guidance or methodology for addressing this specific issue or some general guidance for how to handle special cases. I do feel somewhat encouraged by the fact that generally the resources regarding MLA style do indicate that where a protocol is not specified that the author has free judgment in how to comply with the standard.

MA Sociology Degree Plan

I have entered my full course plan into GITI through next spring, and as such I can now view what my final degree arrangement for sociology might look like. Each course represented in the chart is 3 credit hours, except the thesis which is 6 and the second tutorial which is currently entered as 2. This chart is not inclusive of other courses, such as Theoretical Approaches to Gender, which are primary courses in my other programs and function as electives in sociology. Looking at this chart I see no reason why I can’t manage to finish this degree and do so in the normal time scale. Even if I do have difficulty with my department I have to remind myself that the thesis is just a 6 credit hour project that I must push through as a example of what I have learned in my time in the program. My present thesis ideas center around acquisition of knowledge and considering the way that the Internet impacts the perception and understanding of social information instead of more progressive ideas which are more in line with my personal research ideas. I guess it just means that this comic is true: http://www.phdcomics.com/comics/archive.php?comicid=1436

Out of Place in Sociology

As I prepare to close out another semester in two weeks I find myself considering my place in the academic structure, and eventually in the academic cannon. One thing I have become increasingly convinced of is that I do not belong in sociology, or at least not the version of sociology that is practiced at UNC Charlotte. My thoughts regarding what sociology is have been repeatedly dismissed in favor of what the faculty perceives sociology to be. I suppose this is a problem faced in every graduate academic department as each embraces its own unique epistemology. Unfortunately I thought I was more compatible with my department than I now find myself.

I am about three courses and a thesis from being done with the program, so I am not all that concerned with changing programs at this point, but I am concerned about how I am going to finish the program. If there is one thing that I have learned from the Issues in Social Research course that I’m taking this semester it is that there are many ways to conduct social research and many ways to “do sociology”. That idea alone gives me hope regarding my ability to complete a thesis that is meaningful to me as well as is acceptable to my faculty.

I feel as though my background in critical theory, post-modernism and cultural analysis has contaminated me in such a way that prevents me from being able to embrace more empirical methods of doing social science.

Spring 2013 Paper Topics

Normally by this point in a semester I have all but posted abstracts for my papers that I will be completing. This semester things have felt more in flux and I have been lax at discussing my academic work. Also I have been less certain of my topics this semester. Even at this point there is one that is still up in the air.

Theoretical Approaches to Gender: for this course my final paper will be a discussion of the cultural elements of masculinity and how they are presented and fetishized in sadomasochism, especially for gay men. Unlike my previous papers regarding alternative sexualities this one will be somewhat narrow. My first paper in alternative sexualities discussed BDSM, fetishism and other paraphilia collectively. In this paper I am going so far as to break up BDSM into its component parts. I am primarily interested in sadism and masochism (as well as the combined form of sadomasochism), with fetish as a supporting element for the implementation of SM. I do expect that when the paper is completed bondage will make an appearance as well, but dominance/submission themes will likely be completely absent. The key point of the paper will be establishing a framework for considering sadomasochism as a masculinizing sexuality for gay men. There will likely be some discussion of the origins of leather culture and the quest to “butch-up” gay culture.

Issues in Social Research: this course has a paper in a required format of a thesis research proposal. I will be proposing a research project that will seek to find information regarding the perceptions of members of the BDSM community about the stigma that surrounds their community and the activities that the members participate in. The design I am using for this paper is a content-analysis of existing blogs.

Complex Adaptive Systems: this project is not really fully fleshed out yet, but will likely take the form of a literature-review style paper covering the use of CAS in social science and perhaps discussing the arguments for and against the use of CAS modeling in policy issues compared with more traditional methods.

Fall 2013 Registration

As a component of the progression of my graduate degrees I registered for classes this morning. At this point I can consider my schedule tentative at best. My department really is not offering any courses that interest me, or that apply to me. There are only 2 actual classes (not thesis hours or tutorial) which I haven’t taken yet.

My schedule, such as it is:

ANTH 5122	Ethnographic Methods	SOCY (Research Methods)
ITCS 6150	Intelligent Systems	CogSci (Elective), ITIS (Elective)
ITIS 6112	Software System Design & Implementation	ITIS (Core)
SOCY 6090	Topics: Religion & Social Theory	SOCY (Elective)

Psychopathic Sadomasochism

“Psychopathic personality disorder and sexual
sadism share several common characteristics, such as
emotional detachment from the suffering of others or the
preparedness to inflict pain or injuries.” Mokros et al. 2011

Under most circumstances I am proud of the progression of work in the academy. The above quote from the abstract of a 2011 paper in the journal of Law and Human Behavior, published by the American Psychological Association is a circumstance where that is not true. The article has major issues in its construction because it is not measuring what it claims to measure. The article defines an unusual concept of “severe sexual sadomasochism”, which is absent of any concept of consent. In the majority of research into sadomasochism consent is a required qualifier before the behavior can be considered sadomasochistic. This is primarily based on the qualifiers that are used in the BDSM community to self-identify. People who “play outside the rules” of SM are considered deviations from the community and the identity, not a “severe” form of it. I believe the authors of the article attempted to describe and interact with a type of sexuality that they were unfamiliar with. The forms of BDSM that are described in the article do not even qualify as “edgeplay” in SM circles, they are considered to be completely outside the sphere of SM.

My biggest concern with the article is the use of the phrase “emotional detachment from the suffering of others”. I would describe participants of BDSM as many things, but emotionally detached would not be something I could ever agree to applying to the SM community in a general way. My experience and observation would have me to believe that emotional engagement is a key component of the experience. The authors of the article focus on the psychological/psychopathological of sadist desire only, ignoring the masochist aspects. A lot of people involved in SM have strong leanings toward either sadism or masochism, but have desire in both areas at least to a minor level. Sadomasochism is commonly written together as a single word and not as “sadism & masochism” because of the tight interconnection between the two and the requirements of a parallel desire and not simply a desire to do harm.

Another critique I have of the article is the use of narcissism and violence as components of sexual desire for sadist individuals. This I find to be an overgeneralization. While there are some narcissistic sadists, many are reserved and as concerned with those around them as their own interests. There are of course some that are overly confident and lack an understanding of what it is to be concerned about the emotional wellbeing of others (although I have not yet met one who disregards physical safety). Violence is a fuzzy thing when it comes to sadism. The actions themselves can be interpreted as violent, just as boxing or soccer can be seen as being violent. The difference between the violence of sport and sadomasochism is that in sadomasochism there are not opponents, only partners, and generally at the conclusion of a sadomasochistic “scene” there is either affectionate or friendly interaction.

From an academic perspective I just must simply ask what the authors were thinking when they decided to compare something as benign as sexual sadomasochism with mentally/emotionally unstable serial killers and then conflated sexually frustrated murders with sane people who engage in a consensual activity that is no more harmful than most sports?

Mokros, Andreas, Michael Osterheider, Stephen J. Hucker, and Joachim Nitschke. 2011. “Psychopathy and Sexual Sadism.” Law and Human Behavior 35:188-199.