Experiments in Cyberspace

When a network settles down, and is not so new anymore, it can be quite a challenge to keep it’s activity level. Should a network then transform into a so-called ‘organized network’? Organizing a network does not necessarily mean decreasing the level of spontaneity to make way for rules and hierarchy: it can provide a place for sustainable knowledge sharing and production. As Ned Rossiter argues in his book Organized Networks (2006), face-to-face meetings are crucial “if the network is to maintain momentum, revitalize energy, consolidate old friendships and discover new ones, recast ideas, undertake further planning activities, and so on.” Network Cultures Winter Camp is therefore meant for those networks and (potential) network members that need support to gather in real life, conspire, discuss and make the necessary steps forward. Winter Camp does not have an (academic) educational or training component, but there is a lot to learn. Winter Camp will be organized by the Institute o...

Protection is not confined to your bedroom or another convenient place as this year's Valentine's Day approaches. Those old, sorry mature enough to remember the havoc caused by the cute "I Love You" and "Love Letter" viruses will sadly remember. How time flies, doesn't it? The damages had exceeded 6 billion dollars, then. You can of course say "it's worth it," or a similar cliche but better be protected rather than sorry. Possible names for these lovely bugs to reappear on or around this naughty day of February might be "You are beautiful", "From me to you", "I wanna hold your hand", "Only you", "Love at first sight", "I am addicted to you", "Our song", "Save the last dance for me", "Helter Skelter" (O.K., this one's a joke)... But you get the drill. Be vewy vewy careful!

  Tomorrow we shall witness a penumbral (not full) lunar eclipse. It will be visible in Eastern Europe, Middle East, Western Africa while the Moon is rising, and in North America while the Moon is setting. In places to the east of Iran, the event can be observed all night. As you may know 2009 is World Astronomy Year and I invite everyone to participate the observation.

Sousveillance, original French, as well as inverse surveillance are terms coined by Steve Mann (Toronto, Canada) to describe the recording of an activity from the perspective of a participant. "Surveillance" denotes the act of watching from above, whereas "sousveillance" denotes bringing the practice of observation down to human level (ordinary people doing the watching, rather than higher authorities or architectures doing the watching). If you are in Aarhus Denmark around or on Feb 8-9 and do not know what to do, Sousveillance , the art of inverse surveillance conference is an event not to be missed. From the web site: Moving away from cameras and directional microphones, face and voice recognition, the pervasive technologies offer not only the ability to gather and organize huge amounts of dissimilar data, but as well on grounds of these to predict probable patterns of behavior. Commercial mobile variants of Google Maps, YouTube or Facebook are by far the onl...

Linda Hilfling, with her project Gate Peepin' and the Misspelling Generator, will be among the speakers of Speaking out Loud symposium of Netherlands Media Art Institute , to be held on December 18, 2008. Linda works with the premises of participation and public spaces within media structures, with a focus on means of control (codes, organization and law) and their cultural impact. Her artistic practice takes the form of interventions reflecting upon or revealing hidden gaps in these structures. Initially designed and coded in python and bash by her and also available as a Firefox extension thanks to Erik Borra, the Misspelling Generator intervenes directly within the Google search engine, allowing users to take advantage of the informational gray-zone of misspellings. And it does exactly what it claims: Each query typed into the normal Google search-box will generate misspellings inserted above the normal Google results – similar to Google’s 'Did you mean', but now...

I have seldom been to Second Life ; not that I do not like the idea but because of my unstable and slow Internet connection, which turns the experience to a misery. I am aware that some people are not easy with the idea of an on-line 3D world created by its virtual residents' wild imagination but to tell you the truth, it can be fascinating. Let's see if I can change your mind, too. According to Second Life Herald, the always-fairly-unbalanced e-zine founded by philosophy professor Peter Ludlow, two virtual world ballet companies premiered new productions on Sunday, November 23, 2008. La Performance with its high school gym-style performance of "You Are So Beautiful" of Shakespeare (music by Zucchero, and choreography by Jie Loon), and Ballet Pixelle (formerly known as Second Life Ballet) with "The Nut: A Slightly Abridged Telling of The Nutcracker" (music by the Bolshoi Ballet Theatre Orchestra, and choreography by Inarra Saarien) opened the season. ...

How does code dream? What are dreams of code? Piksel08 examines the other side of code, an alternative side to a hard-coded reality of work and play. Open hardware and free software project a utopic vision, yet exist within economies of capital, the dream factory of mainstream technology. Within the chance meeting of sewing machine and umbrella on the dissecting table, hardware and software are flattened. Piksel08: code dreams explores the dreams of this soft machine; bachelors coding for pleasure, reverse engineering paranoiac constructs of the real, automatic coding practice, soft hardware, and everyday magic.  Also spracht Piksel's informative page about this year's event, Piksel08 , where artists and developers working with Free/Libre and Open Source audiovisual software and hardware will congregate in Bergen, Norway this year. If you are around, do not forget to take a look. There is also a live CD of last year's event ready for download at the site. Image: Exp...