Part 1 of my notes on the Society of the Query conference can be found here.

David Gugerli a historian specialized in the philosophy of science gave a lecture on the history of databases and of data management as a signifying practice. In a Deleuzian fashion, he states, knowledge operates in distributed networks. The world is a database and database management systems are shaping our world. It is a very big market (think IBM, Oracle and Microsoft)  with a high level of client lock-in where people are very dependent on their data management systems. Before however (in old databases) data was structured in a hierarchical tree-system. In this way the structure of the database determined which questions could be asked. With the coming of the search and query language every possible combination of entries could be interpreted based on recombination and relation. This meant that interpretation of data became independent of the data structure and place. These new systems were highly efficient and made for new and unexpected questions. They were also more narrative based. Gugerli compares this rise of the relational database model with the rise of critical thinking in the 60’s. Critical thinkers like Barthes, Derrida and Foucault found that a literary work could be seen as a machine that can deliver interpretations. It is a galaxy of signifiers, it has no beginning and we can gain access to it in different ways, none of which is authorative. The interpretation of the text cannot be determined by its author, the interpretations the reader produces when reading are part of its meaning. These traits can also be seen in the development of database concepts: the cultural consequences of these changes are stupendous, according to Gugerli. They do not only influence the relation between author and text but effect any form of information processing in every format. This also has big societal consequences for it has changed our information processing and caused major changes in software structure. The search society and its idea of recombination operates in real time. This requires continued change management, Gugerli concludes, a permanent fluctuation of its composition, of its practices of search and query, which shows the importance of the underlying (relational) database system. The full text of Gugerli’s talk can be downloaded here

Matthew Fuller took a closer look in his talk at the alternative modalities of search and how to develop them. He states that search engines have a morphology, a scheme that generates body, they have different internal structures. Search engines can be seen as cultural machines, they connect information and knowledge. Fuller states that since the rationalization of culture is impossible, this explains the noisiness and the inaccuracy of search engines. Search engines also focus on the analysis of users and the identification of situations. This is an even more abstract process than mere personalization, where the user is not individuated but recognized as a force that produces information. As Fuller states, we need to think on the basis of populations of data producing subjects instead of on the basis of individuals. We need to focus on the dynamics and conditions of search engines. Fuller goes on to discuss different kind of search engines, in order to delve deeper into the morphology of search. Viewzi for instance adopted the aesthetics of the iPhone into a search engine, it makes maps of images and lets you see if they are linked in any way. Oamos views information search as an experience. It is not a full search engine but it uses results from a certain amount of search engines and it looks at relational information. Kartoo and Liveplasma are examples of network visualization interfaces. DAUM, NAVER (both Korean) and Directionless.info of context driven engines. With these examples Fuller gave a good overview of the multiple possibilities for search and the different possibilities for interface design. Fuller states that delving deeper into the complexities of the web and its users and reflecting this in its design is the challenge for the next wave of search.

Lev Manovich’s lecture focused on how we can learn from Google. How can the search engine design serve as a new methodology for cultural analysis, or, how can we use Google as a tool for cultural analysis? First of all he stresses it is important to look at the size of our data. Most of the time cultural analysis focuses on a very small sample of cultural production, where a search engine uses every accessible web document (and now Google also indexes Twitter and Facebook) offering much larger scale for analysis of contemporary cultural production and interpretation. Secondly, when it comes to categorization, mostly cultural objects are placed into small numbers of genres/categories. A search engine can make an analysis of each web document to generate its unique description (using 200+ signals). As Manovich states, although significant research in automatic classification of web pages into genres exist, Google does not use it, because it wants to give you any page that is most relevant. Thirdly, when it concerns “links”, traditionally cultural criticism gives an analysis of a small number of selective links (“influences”) between a given object/person and others. A search engine on the other hand gives a systematic consideration of all (explicitly defined) links between a given web page and other pages. Fourthly, Manovich states that what is very important in cultural production, is that it builds on the old, on old features (characteristics, attributes, dimensions), or a small number of subjectively selected features different from text to text. A search engine focuses on lots of features and can take the interaction with the user into consideration. Where traditionally in cultural analysis theoretical work does focus on reception, in practice it gives more an analysis of documents as experienced by a critic. Web analytics on the other hand can give a good analysis of user interactions with a web site. As Manovich states, cultural analysis looks from one critique, and is thus is not empirical, as it does not look at the user interactions with cultural products. Next, when it comes to zoomability, in cultural analysis the focus is mostly on a document, a creator, group, period or paradigm with highly uneven coverage. With Google search technology or Google trends the search patterns of billions of people over a number of years can be analyzed. Think of the possibilities of Google Earth and Google Street View. As Manovich states, software developed by the digital culture industry and also by the academy often contains innovative theoretical ideas about culture which are embedded in its design (i.e. what software does to calculate the results). However this design is often used to support an outdated (i.e. 20^th century) understanding of culture when it comes to search (looking for particular members of a set) or classification of culture into a small number of genres. Manovich understands the search technology as a new paradigm for cultural analysis: what if we take the principles from search engines, web analytics and Google trends (interactive visualization of patterns), and imbed them in new software tools for analysis? In this way we can extract features from each document in a set, instead of using the features to classify documents into a few classes, and we can visualize the patterns and the variability across a set. As Manovich concludes, the old search paradigm is based on knowing what you want to find, where the new search paradigm is based on finding relations. Manovich ends by asking: might Google take over the Humanities?

Alessandro Ludovico and Christophe Bruno both focused on the potential search engines offer to art, by both using search engines and by reflecting upon them (in an often critical and playful manner). Ludovico discusses his project Google Will Eat Itself (GWEI), in which he established a fake website about online marketing, and subscribed to the Google AddSense program, which lets you publish Google textual adds on your web site. After opening a bank account for the project, they developed a special software which would generate an unique IP address, simulating a user, and would make automatic clicks on the adds by Google. As Ludovico explained, it would be impossible to define a fraudulent click from a true one, making it hard for Google to ban them. Ludovico sees GWEI as a conceptual artwork, as a scientific experiment. Through this project they got a lot of attention in the media. As Ludovico concluded, the worst enemy of a giant is not another giant, it is a parasite. If enough parasites would suck out enough money, it will suck the giant empty. Ludovico wants to dissect, decode and expose these giants through conceptual artworks and theories in order to create cultural anti-bodies. Christophe Bruno also discussed some of his recent artworks or Google hacks. He mentioned Ephiphanies,  a Google Poetry hack which he developed (based on Joyce’s walks in Dublin during which Joyce would collect random sentences overheard). Keywords typed into the Ephiphanies machine will collect random sentences from Google and send them back to the program to form a new poetical structure. Poet Ton van ’t Hof gave a short introduction on Flarf, a cut-up technique using Google search results, rearranging them to make a new text. As Van ‘t Hof explains, these kind of cut-up techniques are not new, as they have been used before in the 1920s by the Surrealists, and in the 50s and 60s by for instance Burroughs. As Van ‘t Hof states, its first practitioners practiced an aesthetic dedicated to ‘the exploration of the inappropriate in all its guises’. The idea behind Flarf is to mine the internet with odd search terms and then to distill them into often hilarious and sometimes disturbing poems, or plays on other texts. According to Van ‘t Hof the genre is very popular now and would not have existed without Internet or without Google.

Who would have ever thought that a time would come when kids would answer the age question “What do you want to be when you grow up?” by telling their parents, “Mom, Dad…when I grow up I want to study video games!” Thanks to Ludology and our present engulfment in new media, all of those kids that stay glued to their Xbox’s and Nintendo DS’s may actually have the chance to pursue their dreams of studying videogames by entering into the field of Ludology! Ludologists aim to study games, particularly video games, in terms of gaining an understanding of the underlying structure, elements, and rules of the game. Games should be understood not in the narrative sense, but in the simulation sense. While of course they possess many of the same qualities as the typically understood notion of “the narrative”, video games go a step further to offer a virtual world through this model that further simulates behaviors. Players have the chance to navigate this simulated space through game play and virtually interact with all aspects of the game (sometimes even having the ability to modify the simulation via meta rules).

Manovich’s piece on Navigable Space acts as a nice compliment to Frasca’s reading on the introduction to ludology that explores the differences between narrative and simulation. In learning the basics of game studies, we are better able to comprehend the simulations and worlds that Manovich mentions as he discusses the mystical world of Myst and the level-based world of Doom. All genres of games lend themselves to ludologists as a means to study the simulations in terms of the “rules” and ideologies, thereby acting as a rhetorical tool to understand the overall picture as well as the hidden beliefs of the simauthor/video game designer. These hidden beliefs often reflect on the designer’s personal morals or the general message they want to get across to players by offering them a variety of “choices” to make when playing the game. For instance, in the game BioShock, there are three separate endings based on how the player chose the game.

This aforementioned example goes along with the notion that video games are MEANT be replayed using different strategies and techniques. Players learn more about the game and virtual realm by experiencing numerous (often countless) sessions of playing, usually encountering different events, characters, and items each time the game is restarted. Unlike the binary structure of narratives with a fixed sequence of events, simulations and video games are not isolated experiences. That is the true beauty of videogames and probably the reason why ludology is such an interesting field; the sheer amount of options contained within a game add to the intriguing complexity in the medium. The mystical element of the interactivity in these video game plot-lines is best explained by Brenda Laurel as “a hypothetical beast in the mythology of computing, an elusive unicorn we can imagine but have yet to capture” – however, I will venture as far to say that each and everyday we are getting closer to capturing that unicorn.

Lastly, I want to bring up Roger Callois’ distinction between “play” and “game” by explaining the two terms, Paidia and Ludus. Paidia is the style of play that exists in early children in their open-ended games of make-believe and running around playing tag. It is crucial to understand the OPEN-ENDED aspect that exists in Paidia; the decisions are up to the player, offering up an environment for “games to grow.” On the other hand, Ludus represents the types of games that have social rules, incorporating specific delineations that define a WINNER. There are two possible endings in Ludus, winning and losing, thus implying limitations that are non-existent in Paidia. The simauthor effectively chooses whether to utilize Paidia or Ludus, hence delivering a separate agenda as per their eventual choice. For a game like Mario that is morally charged in the sense that Mario must save Princess Peach from Bowser in order to win, Ludus is in effect. However, Paidia rules in a game like The Sims where the player has total control of the design, building, behaviors, and life choices of the characters – there is no winning and losing, the game play is seemingly infinite.

Both Paidia and Ludus operate within these simulations through different ideological levels that aid in conveying the elements of the game itself. Through the most basic level of simulation and narrative, the changing of characters within the game does not change the rules but can change the ideology that is expressed based on certain moves the player decides to make. (Ex: building a Sim house using modified skins that place a variety of famous movie stars in the same family) The second level of manipulation rules is most common in Paidia where the player works within this level, doing whatever they are ABLE to do within the model in order to progress. The third level of goal rules basically doles out what the simauthor says is MANDATORY for the player to win! The final ideological level, meta rules, are those rules that state how the game rules can be changed. Video game designers choose to allow for these mods to be in the game, they do not “unintentionally” give the player more freedom, but it definitely gives an essence of personalization. The Sims is a perfect example of where meta-rules run rampant especially due to the plethora of objects, skins, houses, objects, and patches that exist on user-content-created sites on the Internet. Many games are fueled by this user-generated content, giving the player the ability to get creative act as a video game designer!

While it might be too late to pursue the career field of ludology, understanding the theories of simulation and the elements of game play truly helps to relate to the overarching picture of digital media and interactivity. The realm of gaming transcends unto various mediums- from the television screen to the computer screen to handheld devices even to music where the musical scores for games are becoming popular playlists on iPod’s everywhere. Understanding the popular games as well as having a knowledge of simulations (and the great potential they hold for the future!) allows for one to delve a bit deeper into the reasons for choices made in game design. Video games are well on their way to becoming a tool for educational purposes, in fact, The Sims is already being used by child psychologists to observe their choices made in family structure, house design, and overall playing of the game.

Space, or at least the navigation through it, is not usually considered a way of relaying a story in and of it’s self, yet Lev Manovich points out how new media, specifically computer games depict how Navigable space is in fact a form of narrative on it’s own.  Manovich highlights two games developed in 1993 as two key factors in furthering the notion of storytelling through Navigable space in computers. For anyone who was a child in the 1990’s, Doom and Myst are most likely games that they remember and Manovich speaks about how the extraordinary popularity of these games is an indicator of the power of narrative through Navigable space.

For anyone who has not played either Myst or Doom, they are notable not only for being some of the first of their kind but also for their very specific style of game play. For all the similarities that will be discussed in a moment they are quite different stylistically. Where Doom is fast paced in that the player must move as quickly as possible to move from one level to another in order to gain points, Myst is slow in that it is extremely detailed. Each world is built around the details that one must uncover and the clues that are pieced together because of that, many of which can be nuanced. The world of Doom is filled with monsters and demons that one must destroy to advance where as Myst is completely empty and it is the puzzle that must be unwrapped that is at the center. Doom follows the usual convention of computer games in that it contains many different worlds, where Myst contains only four worlds where each is extremely vast and a universe for itself. The worlds of Myst look completely different from each other, unlike many other games.

Manovich goes into detail about the variety of differences between the gameplay styles of both Myst and Doom, yet he also states that they are similar in that they tell a spatial narrative by allowing the person playing the game to move through a variety of spaces and in that way decide the journey for themselves. Manovich states that despite the differences between the styles of gameplay they both share the notion that space is a key element in the story telling of the game. The player must make sure that the character visits all of the given areas of each level or world in order to get everything they need to advance. Space dictates the story telling. In this way, Manovich believes that it is a return to ancient forms of storytelling such as the Odyssey where spatial movement of the main hero becomes a key element. Such as traveling through distant lands to save the princess or other such story-telling devices.  These narrations therefore strip away the representations of inner life and other modernist notions in order to make the story simply about movement.  Movement becomes the story.  He states that games such as Myst and Doom challenge the notion that descriptions (or in this case descriptions specifically of spatial areas) break the natural flow of the story because it is the description (or visual representation) of the spatial areas that actually advance the story and create the central theme. When one plays a game like Doom or Myst each level or world becomes the story in that as the player you must guide the character through it and unlock the certain keys and discover the certain elements that you need to in order to move on to the next level and in that way advance the story forward.  If the player does nothing and does not explore the world then the narration stops. Manovich also states that in comparison to the modern novel or film, where dialogue is what moves the story forward, action-oriented games such as these are driven by looking and acting upon what is seen in the visual game space.

In thinking about these kinds of games where it is incumbent upon the player to advance the story by exploring the spatial world, new games such as the Sims and World of Warcraft especially seem like excellent examples of the new kind of story-telling that Manovich is speaking of.  These two games both show what game designer Richard Garriot is speaking of when he says that “the characters are supposed to support the world and the message”.  A person, granted maybe a slightly disturbed individual, could live their whole life in a game like World of Warcraft in that the world is endless in its response to the players commands and the narration never ends because like the real world there is no end to the levels that one can advance to. It is all one level and it is never ending, as long as the player wants to keep the narration going, it will go. There have even been cases of people dying while at their computer due to malnutrition caused by getting so wrapped up in the game that they never left.

Manovich states that structuring games through space is common through almost all games, it is just that games like Myst and Doom make it the main storytelling element. In addition he notes inventions such as roller coasters, flight and vehicle simulations and even film fly-through sequences in films such as A Space Odyssey and Star Wars as examples of the fact that space and navigation through space, or at least the simulation of it, has become an important part of storytelling in general.

Games like Myst and Doom are just further advancements in that the player suddenly becomes in control of the spatial narrative. In addition Navigable space has become an important new tool for labor through 3D depictions of things such as architectural designs and models of stock market performances. In this way Navigable space is becoming an increasingly vital cultural element according to Manovich. One does not have to look any further than the fact that some universities conduct class in the simulated world of Second Life to note how Navigable simulated space has become an important cultural tool.

Manovich ends this talk of Myst and Doom style games by stating that Navigable space is a key form of new media and poses the question of why computer culture spatializes all representations and experiences as well as what the aesthetics of spatial navigation are.  What are your thoughts?

With the revolution of new media, it’s apparent that media forms have gotten much more complex.  There is rarely ever one choice, one path or one layer.  Digital images consist of “a number of separate layers, each layer containing particular elements” that each can be manipulated separately (229).  If one has ever used photoshop to edit an image before, you understand that you can create layers to add, remove or distort objects before pressing all the layers together to produce the final image.  Manovich explains that producers of films change the layers of films and delete backgrounds, blur objects, ect.

Manovich also focuses on two very important concepts: databases and narratives.  He describes databases as a “collection of individual items, with every item possessing the same significance as any other” (218).  Databases can be anything really such as flickr which stores millions of photos, or even imdb which stores pictures and biographical data.  Narratives, however “create a cause-and-effect trajectory of seemingly disordered items/events” (225).  This includes video games, where you are a character that follows a specific trajectory that holds different outcomes for different choices.  Narratives have an underlying algorithm, which is the hidden logic within the game or other medium.  In order to win a game, one must execute an algorithm.

It seems that these two concepts (narratives and databases) are polar opposites.  Is there a way to connect them into one object?  Through Tziga Vertov’s film, Man with the Movie Camera, the two concepts seem to gel together nicely.  The film is a straight hour of seemingly random images and footage with no characters or storyline, and, thus, a database.  However, the montage of images “reveal social structure among the multitude of observed phenomena” (240).  In a way, it creates a narrative by trying to make a story about the filming of such images and the complexity of everyday life.  I found something similar to this film, called video art.  The creator, Gary Hill combines vast quantities of random images (database) with a narrator and possible meaning that can be derived from the art.

Another example of database and narrative mixtures is the film, Mulholland Drive.  The film seems to start out like any other Hollywood film, with characters revolving around a storyline of a famous actress who no longer remembers who she is.  However, as the film progresses there appears to be many different layers and stories (a director being blackmailed into hiring an actress, a man who has nightmares about a hairy man in a parking lot).  The film is filled with many images, often times having nothing to do with the supposed storyline, distorting any sense of narrative the viewer originally started out with.

You can find the whole movie online if you’re ready to be confused out of your mind and experience a very intriguing mash of database, narratives, and layers that sometimes intersect.

The term database in itself always conjures one word in my head: Wikipedia. Used oftentimes everyday by NYU students, it’s one of the most extensive databases available and I find that in a since it is both a narrative and a database. Upon first entering the sight, one has the option of searching or clicking onto a variety of topics. But, once one has reached their topic, the data is always presented in a narrative style. If you wiki Beyonce, her page presents her life early childhood, to her breakthrough into music, a career with Destiny’s Child and keeps on listing data until we reach the present. Not only that, but at the bottom of most wiki entries, in keeping with a database format there are links to other pages of data, at the bottom of Beyonce’s one can access her discography or a little less related, one can access a roster of other Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Cover Models.

In addition, the Wikipedia database can be thought of as syntagm and paradigm as well. When one jumps to a particular page, what’s in front of you is the model or interface that has been prepared.We see a finished product that presents as much data based on a particular topic. Thus the web page is explict. But, if one chooses to, they can can manipulate the text or data on the web page, making the imaginary real, directly affecting what’s in front of their eyes. This is why many professors and authorities feel that Wikipedia is not a credible source, because anyone has the ability to manipulate it. Personally, I’ve conducted searches where the results have been spliced with naughty words or personal attacks, just to see it anyone notices.

Something else I find fascinating that connects to the Wiki database is Wiki Race. Wiki Race, is in a way someone trying to use a database to produce a narrative. On Wikirace.org, one can engage in a game where they can click through successive links in order to reach a new target-topic. One example is Curry-Michael Phelps. The two topics are very unrelated, but when playing wikirace, one starts at Curry and links to different pages until they reach Michael Phelps. What we are left with is a series of web pages, that while they aren’t narrative, they still lead from point A to Point B in the way a narrative explains things from point A to point B.

On another note, one thing I found especially intriguing from the two class videos was the music. The video for Catalog shows a series of John Witney’s analogue work, but as futuristic as the images may scene, one might expect something very uptempo or techno-like. On the contrary, the music was very somber and classical. This immediately made me think of a similar phenomenon in the film 2001: A Space Odyssey, the legendary opening features dramatic and out-of-this-world images set to Richard Srauss’ Also Sprach Zarathustra. Stanley Kubric, the director of the film, is known for choosing nonverbal music for the film because he didn’t want to rely on the traditional techniques of narrative cinema. Which in a way was forming a database between the music and the film, two unrelated concepts, presented together. Here’s a link to the films opening scene.

The way we choose to organize our world dictates our own place within it—in Gothic times the cathedral, for example, stood at the center of town, inherently helping us perceive what was important, where we stood in relation to it, and how we should and could interact with the rest of the space surrounding it.

The first generation of interface designers had to decide, then, how to organize the computer space. They had, essentially, an entire world at their fingertips, which they could mold and design and organize in any way possible—the space could look like anything. It was important, however, especially given he limitations of technology of the time, that the space was easy to represent.

In this week’s reading of Interface Culture, Johnson takes us through the creation and evolution of the desktop from its early stages to the interface we know today. Throughout his discussion in this chapter, he emphasizes consistently the idea of the “desktop metaphor.” Similar to the metaphor we discussed last class, it encompasses the way in which reality is represented and even simulated on the desktop interface and how those representations help us to understand the way we use and navigate it.

The desktop metaphor was born in 1972, at a Xerox research center in Palo Alto (PARC). Working off of Engelbart’s ideas about mice, bitmapping, and windows, a researcher named Alan Kay stumbled upon the first implementation of such a metaphor in his hesitation over Engelbart’s windows. He said that the windows were difficult to use because they lay side by side and the screen could get crowded easily. Kay suggested that they “regard the screen as a desk, and each project, or piece of a project, as paper on the desk” (Johnson, 47). He decided that the windows should overlap, just as pieces of paper in real life would. A fitting analogy for a paper company, no? Windows gave the computer space while Kay’s overlapping of them gave the computer depth. And so, the original desktop (metaphor) was born.

The original metaphor was weak, but as the Xerox PARC team continued to develop the interface, they began to tighten it up. They realized that if the computer could look like anything, and since the computer was on its way to replacing the world of filing cabinets and stacks of paper, it may as well imitate that world. This expansion of the metaphor to digital files, folders and trash cans ensured that a user’s navigation of the computer was made that much easier, and that much more familiar.

Why a “desktop” though? If the space could look like anything, why didn’t it look like a park, or a house? I mean, there was already the window metaphor, so why not hallways and doors? The desktop most likely seemed like the most obvious and relatable way to represent the interface because it reflected what the computer was used for. In the 70’s the computer was mostly just being used in place of paper, and a desktop simply reflected that. As we will soon see, something like a “house metaphor” doesn’t really work as well.

Xerox PARC completed the interface and packaged it as Smalltalk, an experimental operating system. Xerox never did anything with it, but a few years later a man named Steve Jobs got his hands on it and created the first successfully marketable personal computer in 1984, the Macintosh—“the computer for the rest of us.” The computer, with the use of the Smalltalk technology, became a medium. It was no longer a flat vehicle. Now, it was creative and had character, complete with folders, trashcans, and icons. The creation of the Macintosh was the first time that a computer interface was genuinely user friendly, and was a revolutionary shift from a concentration on hardware to a fascination with the software. Here is Apple’s one-time Superbowl ad that illustrates this countercultural tone.

And another to show how the Macintosh desktop was marketed thereafter.

Bill Gate’s Windows system, slightly different in design but still using the same original metaphor, outdid Apple and became the more dominant in the marketplace for whatever reason.  The triumph of Microsoft Windows confirmed the effectiveness of the desktop and its ability to translate well to the average user.  Still, many were initially critical of the new interface, writing it off as an unnecessary toy.  It was deemed too silly a design for a serious corporate environment, which was happy with simple drop down menus rather than icons. 

Johnson goes on to talk about the importance of subtlety when implementing the metaphor.  He describes an interface called Bob, released by Microsoft in 1997, which took the use of metaphor too literally, thus simulating a 3D living environment modeled after a living room.  The interface wasn’t just a representation of real life objects but a complete simulation of them.  A calendar hung on the wall, a mailbox with envelopes sat on the coffee table, and to enter the interface you had to knock on the door.  Needless to say the system was a failure, despite its intent to make the user interface more relatable and user-friendly.

Johnson claims that Microsoft Bob wound up preventing novice users from exploring beyond the simple interface.  Users would rely on the comfortable look and feel of a home and never really explore the computer’s capabilities and move beyond the novice level of computer use.  It might push the user further from the technology.  The desktop metaphor works because it is simply that: a metaphor.  Here is a tour of the Bob interface.

Johnson’s insights only take us as far as 1997, the year in which Interface Culture was written, but here is another, more recent graphic interface, BumpTop, that turns the desktop metaphor into something of a desktop simulation.  Does Anand Agarawala take the metaphor too literally?

Johnson sums up by wondering what the future of interfaces might hold in a world of public life on the Internet.  Well, we know just what does happen with the introduction of online interfaces like MySpace and Facebook and even WordPress.  This notion of “interface culture” is a real one, now even more than in Johnson’s time.

The next reading, which I will discuss briefly, is Lev Manovich’s discussion of “teleaction.” Teleaction literally means “acting at a distance.”  When we talk about telaction, we are talking about our ability to be telepresent (present at a distance) and at the same time use controls to manipulate and affect the environment in which we are telepresent. 

We can be telepresent through the use of a webcam.  We can see, in real time, a very important concept here, what is happening in another remote location anywhere in the world, or essentially the universe.  We are not actually present in these remote locations, but it is as though we are.  Teleaction, then, is enabled through certain image-instruments that allow us to act in that distant location, such as a switchboard operator controlling a vehicle under water to explore the bottom of the ocean (the opening scene of Titanic) or pushing a button in a small room to shoot a missile from one remote location and aim it at another.  To teleact is to manipulate reality through representations.

These ideas of telepresence and teleaction are not restricted to the real world, however.  We can be telepresent in a computer generated world as well, a world commonly known as virtual reality.  I would like to regard a desktop as a virtual reality, especially as its interface becomes more and more three–dimensional and interactive.  As I said in the very beginning of this post, interface designers had an entire world to create from scratch, which is essentially what they did in the simplest way.  By using the desktop, it is like we are telepresent in this digital workspace.  The desktop interface is a representation—we are not actually inside of this virtual computer world.  Yet by using other interfaces such as the mouse we are able to control and manipulate it.  We are essentially teleacting.  

And thus concludes our discussion of interface culture.

For your amusement.

            Teleaction, according to Manovich, is a very different operation. This because it is a complicated operation used to access new media, representing a shift from representation to conceptual space with telecommunication.  Manovich argues that real-time communication technologies (telegraph, telephone, television, telepresence, etc.) became subsidiary to technologies of representation (film, digital storage, etc) because of a shift in aesthetic. He relates this to definitions by Roland Barthes and Nelson Goodman deeming only finite objects as “texts” that can be “read.” But doesn’t the Internet and the increase use other real-time communication change all of this?

            Take into account the rise of Internet and real-time communication. Isn’t it true that most people are now interacting through phones, the internet has become just as common place as interactions with representational technologies? Can’t these also be considered an aesthetic also? If so then teleaction must be considered in two forms: telepresence and image instruments.

            Telepresence is usually defined as the ability to see and act at a distance, or representational technologies used to perform an action, in this sense x-rays, architectural designs, etc. would be one of these technologies. Brenda Laurel defined telepresence as “a medium that allows you to take your body with you into some other environment…you get to take some subset of your senses with you into another environment. And that environment may be a computer-generated environment, it may be a camera-originated environment, or it may be a combination of the two.” This could be applied using video guided missiles in real-time action. In the virtual environment, like that of the metaphor of the desktop, produces a screen space where telepresence uses on-screen action directly affected by user action. Manovich takes this all a step further and asserts that hyperlinking can be a form of telepresence, as the user is literally teleporting from server to server to access documents on computers in different locations.

            Manovich uses the term image-instruments to refer to Bruno Latour’s idea that images have historically functioned as instruments of control and power, that is to “mobilize and manipulate resources across space and time.” Manovich argues that since telecommunication uses images, but can also function by solely the electronic transmission of signals that real-time manipulation and control from a distance can happen.

            Lastly, Manovich touches on the concept of distance and aura. Manovich first summarizes Walter Benjamin and Paul Virilo’s arguments of valuing distance.  Benjamin argues that by bringing things closer you ruin the natural/ unique location of them. Virilo discuss small optics, geometric perspective, and big optics, the real-time electronic transmission of information. He argues that as big optics takes over allowing global transmission of information small optics is lost and so is time for reflection and correct action.

Phatic communication is a term first used by anthropologist Bronisław Malinowski to describe a communicative gesture that does not inform or exchange any meaningful information or facts about the world. Its purpose is a social one, to express sociability and maintain connections or bonds. We can call it small talk.

Are words in Phatic Communion used primarily to convey meaning, the meaning which is symbolically theirs? Certainly not! They fulfil a social function, and that is their principal aim, but they are neither the result of intellectual reflection, nor do they necessarily arouse reflection in the listener. Once again we may say that language does not function here as a means of transmission of thought. (1)

Phatic messages are not intended to carry information or substance for the receiver, they concern the process of communication. The fact of saying something is more important than what exactly is being told. They are meant to establish an atmosphere or maintain social contact rather than convey content. Examples of such phatic communications include courtesy titles in letters (“sincerely yours”, “all the best”), inquires about health or weather and a simple “how’s it going?”. (2)

With the enlargement of our social networks caused by greater connectedness we require the means to maintain sociability without spending too much time on it. The receivers of our messages do not necessarily need to be provided with “true” content. Sometimes an interesting link in a person’s status with a short comment can be more desired than an elaborate update on their daily lives. With such platforms as Facebook, private communication can be executed by the means of “private messages” while phatic communication can take place on the “wall” and through “status updates”. Platforms such as twitter provide solely for the need of phatic communication, enabling no private exchanges and limiting users to 140 symbols for status updates. Those small communicative gestures are not meant for exchanging meaningful information but for expressing sociability and maintaining interpersonal connections.

According to Vincent Miller it should not be assumed that “these phatic communications are ‘meaningless’, in fact, in many ways they are very meaningful, and imply the recognition, intimacy and sociability in which a strong sense of community is founded. Phatic messages potentially carry a lot more weight to them than the content itself suggests. However, although they may not always be ‘meaningless’, they are almost always content-less in any substantive sense. The overall result is that in phatic media culture, content is not king, but ‘keeping in touch’ is.” (3). In this spirit we can assume that the point of twitter is the maintenance of connected presence and sustainability of this presence, even though it is almost completely devoid of substantive content. The medium of twitter encourages the “disconnectedness” of communication. The above-mentioned 160 character limit and lack of private messages promote generic ‘announcements’ over dialogue or targeted conversation.

In the spirit of Marshall McLuhan we could even assert that when it comes to such electronic media as twitter or Facebook, “the user is the content”, as our phatic communication is a perfect source the marketing industry’s data mining. The shortness and density of communication enables for creating databases and key word searches. Lev Manovich argues that we are in the process of a shift from narrative forms (as novel/film) as the key form of cultural expression, to the database as the prominent cultural logic of the digital age. Narratives, he argues, are finite works with beginnings and endings. They can be also characterized by following a linear path which establishes cause and effect determined by an author. Databases, on the other hand, are “structured collections of data organized for fast search and retrieval by a computer” (4). Following this logic Miller concludes that:

“The movement from blogging, to social networking, to microblogging demonstrates the simultaneous movements away from communities, narratives, substantive communication, and towards networks, databases and phatic communion.” (5)

Manovich fits in perfectly within this observation, as he states that new media is dominated by cultural objects and products which:

“do not tell stories, they do not have a beginning or end, in fact, they do not have any development thematically that would organize their elements into a sequence. Instead, they are collections of individual items, with every item possessing the same significance as any other.” (6 )

This is essentially what twitter is all about – individual items, with every item possessing the same significance as any other. But if twitter helps us realize our needs for phatic communication while providing us with such a limited platform, what would you say about a 14 characters limit? Playing on twitter’s question: “what are you doing right now?” squeaker lets you tell your friends “what RU doing right now”. The authors hint you towards the possible uses of the platform:

What can you accomplish in 14 characters?

• - u cn use abbrs
• - no room 4links
• - … b creative

Squeaker is obviously meant as a parody of twitter. Join The Company, LLC. are the people behind both squeker and woofer. In case you hate small talk and don’t perceive being asked “how’s it going” (which is usually followed by the inquirer walking away without even waiting for your answer), you can shift to the latter platform. Woofer, while still playing on the concept of phatic communication, let’s you express yourself within… a minimum of 1400 characters. Join The Company, LLC. are not the only ones to parody twitter. If twitter is a microblogging site then woofer is a macroblogging site, while squeaker and flutter would be called nanoblogging sites. Flutter is an evil twin of twitter, enabling you to express yourself within the limit of 26 characters. “Let’s say my friend tweets something, like working on some new designs for the album cover and watching project runway in my underwear lol!” – the employee of fictional flutter explains that such a message could be automatically shortened by the site to “wrking 4 project underwear”. The joke mocumentary was created by the Slate Magazine to poke fun at our addiction to microblogging and the resulting shallowness of communication.

As with everything, it’s all about balance. I’m not a twitter user and I don’t really see where exactly its charm lies but I’m convinced it’s got to be somewhere out there. And I really don’t see anything harmful in a little small talk and announcing who had what for breakfast, as long as there are people who want to read about it. Phatic communication has been with us since the dawn of human kind. It might not be full of content but sometimes it’s nice to throw a solitary “man, the weather sucks”. Especially when you live in Amsterdam, where it seems to rain all the time.

References:

1. Malinowski, B. (1923) ‘Supplement 1: The Problem of Meaning in Primitive Languages’, in C. Ogden and I. Richards (eds) The Meaning of Meaning, pp. 296–336. London: Routledge & Keegan Paul. p. 315

2. Miller, V. (2008). New Media, Networking and Phatic Culture. Convergence: The International Journal of Research into New Media Technologies. 2008; 14; 387

3. Ibid.

4. Manovich, L. (2001) The Language of New Media. Cambridge, MA and London: MIT Press. p. 218

5. Miller, V. (2008). New Media, Networking and Phatic Culture. Convergence: The International Journal of Research into New Media Technologies. 2008; 14; 387, p. 396

6. Manovich, L. (2001) The Language of New Media. Cambridge, MA and London: MIT Press. p. 218, p. 213

Excerpts taken from The Language of New Media by Lev Manovich.

[pg. 40] “The principle of variability is useful in allowing us to connect many important characteristics of new media that one first sight may appear unrelated. In particular, such popular new media structures as branching (or menu) interactivity and hypermedia can be seen as particular instances of the variability principle. In the case of branching interactivity, the user plays an active role in determining the order in which already generated elements are accessed. This is the simplest kind of interactivity; more complex kinds are also possible in which both the elements and the structure of the whole object are either modified or generated on the fly in response to the user’s interaction with a program. We can refer to such implementations as “open interactivity” to distinguish them from the closed interactivity that uses fixed elements arranged in a fixed branching structure.”

The terms “open interactivity” and “closed interactivity” interests me because of how it relates to my thesis topic. I feel that my hypothesis advocates an “open interactivity” form of design where the conclusion is not set, computable, or arranged. It is an organic, abstract approach that is used to drive response and dialogue from a general user. This differs from “closed interactivity” such that a “closed” interactive model may refer to a kiosk machine. The interaction is built in a branching system such that depending on which choice the user makes, the choices will eventually lead to a final result. In an “open” model, the results are more indefinite. It has the potential to capture the unique individuality of who that person is and what difference they bring to a particular event/situation. “Open” interactive models have been more commonly used in new media art pieces where the interaction service is not limited to a utilitarian purpose. The interaction can display psychological and emotional attributes of a person or the general public. It can also explore the roles people play in society, illustrate how people react and engage when given a circumstance or environment, and draw reactions and awareness to a large-scale issue.

[pg. 44] “As the pioneer of interactive film making Grahame Weinbren argues, in relation to interactive media, making a choice involves a moral responsibility. By passing on these choices to the user, the author also passes on the responsibility to represent the world and the human condition in it.”

This thought by Grahame Weinbren is intriguing because it touches upon what it means to be responsible as a designer. He states that the act of making a choice entails moral responsibility. Our choices are catalysts that cause and influence situations and actions around us. In a closed interactive design, the influence is limited, such that what is influenced is theoretically contained. However, when the situation is an open interaction, then the possibilities are endless and the choices for the user may be harder to make and have greater consequences.

The reading for this week is “The Language of new media” by Lev Manovich is crucial for understanding of media evolution. From the first sight we might not even think about the complexity and the logic of new media structures. In his Book Manovich explores the phenomenon of new media vs. old media. He is stating that the logic behind new media, the laws of its structures are tremendously different from characteristics that were presented in old media. The author presents to the reader 5 main characteristics of new media which make it unique and very different from old media. Here are the main characteristics of new media:   

1 Numerical representations

2 Modularity

3 Automation

4 Variability

5 Transcoding

In my analysis I will be focusing on just only 2 aspects (characteristics) of new media: Variability and Transcoding.  Manovich sees the Variability to be very crucial, it is one of the main characteristics of our postmodern society when everybody is getting his own version of an images, sound etc. Variability manly became possible because of digitalization (all information in digital media are coded using binary data 0 and 1) and Modularity or postindustrial society (which means that all objects in digital media are composed as separate discrete units, which can be rearranged or recombined at any time. Numerical representation of data and Modularity leads to Variability of content. It’s much easier to reconstruct discrete elements of data from which new media consists and it will output a different version of an image or sound (the example is automatically generated WebPages, every time the page is generated by user’s demand it might have slightly different information and layout.  We might also think of “cultural industry”, consumers gained the power of creating what they want their products to be like (for example through Nike’s website customer can make his own color design of sneakers, submit an order and receive his unique product).

                According to Manovich Variability has its own principles such as:

1. All media elements are stored in media databases
2. Separation of the level of data or content and interface (we are able using the same data create different interfaces)
3. Media composition is automatically adjusted according to the unique information about user ( such as hardware type or browser)
4. Branching type interactivity (example: menu navigation options, user provided with choice were to go next)
5. Hypermedia. (one type of media is containing different elements of multimedia. For example power point presentation might not only contain text but also video and sound clips, which are separate media element connected together via hyperlinks)
6. Periodic Applets. (software is constantly updating, as a result users might have slightly different version of the same media)
7. Scalability. (this principle is overlapping with media customization which means that user can get the different level of details of certain media according to his demand or technical specifications of his hardware. For instance, the users with slow internet connection will get the textual view of web pages without flash, images or sounds. The producers of the content create different versions of their media products which varies in the level of details and file size)

Here are some other example of scalability described by Manovich: Wax Web, Stephen’s database-driven representation of film The Birds by Hitchcock.     

                Transcoding (to translate into different format) defined by Manovich as the most crucial factor of media computerization. New media is represented by digital data; it has its own computer logic and organization. The author stating that new media has two different layers behind it. Manovich calls it cultural layer and computer layer.  Under cultural layer we should see the structural organizations that make sense for the user (in other words the data is represented similar way as it was done in old media). However, we should take into consideration that digital media has a completely different structure and logic behind it. For example any color that we see on a computer screen is represented by a hexadecimal number which has nothing to do with the visual characteristics of any color (for instance web designers know that  # ffffff means white color,  and  # 000000 stands from black color).  From this examples it is apparent that discrete units from which new media are composed do not have any reference to what they represents, how many people, not having a specific knowledge would be able to figure out that # 000000  stands for black color, I think that nobody would be able to do it. This hexadecimal number is one of the examples of what should we think of when we are talking about computer layer. For Manovich it is very important to demonstrate to his reader the complex relationships between computer and cultural layers. These 2 organizational structures influence one another, with understanding of characteristics of new media (Numerical representations, Modularity, Automation, Variability, Transcoding) we should see that cultural layer is shifting.   

That title?  That’s about as creative as I’m going to get at the moment because I think my brain is fried.  I can easily say that reading Lev Manovich’s The Language of New Media was a painful experience, at least for me.  I’ve never enjoyed highly technical books of any nature and combined with the fact that this “technical topic” is one that I’m already confused by, I found myself having to re-read many of the passages and still unable to understand what he was talking about.  After reading the book, I read a review by Jeffrey T. Nealon of Penn State University, published in the spring 2003 issue of South Atlantic Review, in which he calls it ”an immensely readable book” (146).  I think I laughed like a crazy person.  Of course, he’s an English professor, so maybe he just has a better grasp of the English language? 

Despite the immense difficulty I had in actually reading the book, Manovich provides a lot of insight into the progression of new media from it’s earliest days until 2001 (when the book was published).  He constantly makes connections between old media items (analog) and their new media counterparts (digital)–for example, the page and the painting turned into the screen, a more interactive item, but a rectangular façade none-the-less.  Two-dimensional images that were on early computers became three-dimensional, allowing for more freedom in design, and film techniques such as cutting and splicing film into montages or painting on the film became digitized and can now be done on computers.  I found it interesting that the technology for creating  computer-generated images to go into live-action film became so advanced that editors had to actually degrade some of the quality to make the computer images blend better.

I found some parts of his book–the parts I could understand–truly fascinating.  I particularly liked his discussions on how the changes in technology impacted, or could impact society.  Early in the book he discusses Jaron Lanier’s vision of the future impacted by virtual reality where “locked in virtual reality caves, with language taken away, we will communicate through gestures, body movements, and grimaces” (59).  I had to laugh, thinking that as we sit in our offices in front of our computers with tools such as texting and Twitter we’re 140 characters away from no words at all, and often use emoticons to express our feelings rather than saying, “I’m happy,” or “I’m sad,” or “I’m angry.”  Although, I doubt it will ever get as bad as us communicating with grunts and grimaces as Lanier feared.

I also found his connection between what he calls “the logic of post industrial society” (41) and new media  an interesting one.  In a world where individuality on a mass scale is important, new media tools are produced on mass scales and distributed to users who can then customize them in numerous ways.  Almost every time a program is installed on a computer, for example, one of the first screens the user sees asks him to if he would rather have the generic (recommended) installation or the customizable option.

Overall I think if I understood the book more, I would have gotten more out of it beside the cultural references.  There was obviously a lot more to the book than those brief discussions.  However, my lack of understanding could just be because I don’t particularly understand computers on any level beyond ctrl+alt+del, and anyone with more technical knowledge may love the book.

.

O cara da foto acima se chama  Lev Manovich, é russo nascido em Moscou, crítico/professor/pesquisador na área de novas mídias e arte digital, professor no Departamento de Artes Visuais na Universidade da Califórnia, em San Diego, além de diretor do Laboratório para Análise Cultural no Instituto da Califórnia para Telecomunicações e Tecnologias da Informação (CALIT2) e do Grupo de Estudos Culturais do Software na mesma Universidade.

Se as credenciais e as funções acima não te dizem muita coisa, saiba que, além (ou acima) de isso tudo, Manovich é um pensador. Daqueles que se destacam pela capacidade de ir um poquito que seja adiante de seus colegas, e, por conta disso, ser citado, estudado, discutido, criticado pela maioria deles, o que o coloca como um dos principais pensadores da cultura digital e da sociedade pós-digital no cenário internacional.

Desde início da década de 1980 lecionando nos Estados Unidos, e desde 1992 na cadeira de  “new media art”, o russo usou esse background para definir de vez o que seria a linguagem dessa nova mídia num dos livros mais importantes da área nesta década: “The Language of New Media“, de 2001, considerado “a mais sugestiva e ampla história da mídia desde Marshall McLuhan” – McLuhan, por sinal, outro pensador, esse dos mais importantes do século passado.

Neste livro – que assim como toda obra de pesquisador (e pensador) da cultura digital que se preze está disponível para download gratuitamente – Manovich aponta cinco características fundamentais que caracterizam a nova mídia, que  representa uma nova metalinguagem cultural com um impacto comparável ao da escrita e a do cinema. A saber:

1. Representação numérica: tudo é bit, é dado, e pode ser representado por números e por funções matemáticas.

2. Modularidade: todos os elementos se integram, porém sem perder sua individualidade, podendo ser acessados de forma independente dos outros elementos.

3. Automação: Parte da ação humana pode ser substituída por processos automatizados através de rotinas desempenhadas pelo computador, ainda que a atuação humana é indispensável para a programação destas rotinas.

4. Variabilidade: um mesmo elemento pode existir de várias formas.

5. Transcodificação: Como tudo é bit, tudo pode ser transformado e convertido em outro formato. Os objetos produzidos nesta nova mídia podem sofrer contínuas alterações em sua estrutura.

A ideia de trabalhar estes cinco aspectos é, talvez, o que dá base ao livro. Não é algo inédito, mas a profundidade e a clareza (caro aos bons escritores/pesquisadores) com que Manovich trabalha com estes aspectos abriu a cabeça de muita gente para o melhor entendimento do que seria a tal nova mídia. E, de quebra, nos faz ter alguma certeza de que estamos passando por um período histórico  de transformações gigantescas na cultura, na tecnologia e em tudo o mais que nos roda, o que nos leva a ter diversas (boas) dúvidas sobre para onde isso tudo nos levará.

***

E porque diabos Manovich aparece por aqui hoje?

Porque ele esteve no Brasil nas últimas semanas para palestrar do File, Festival Internacional de Linguagem Eletrônica, e na Universidade Mackenzie, ambos  em São Paulo, onde deu uma Aula Magna sobre seu novo projeto Estudos Culturais do Software. A palestra no File foi gravada e publicada  aqui, junto ao Fórum do Cultura Digital citado na postagem anterior à esta.

O Caderno Link, do Estadão, que não é bobo, aproveitou para entrevistá-lo e perfilá-lo, não necessariamente nesta ordem. Na entrevista, que foi publicada originalmente aqui, dentre outras coisas, Manovich aproveita pra provocar os pesquisadores de cibercultura dizendo que “offline e on-line” são a mesma coisa, e que não faz mais sentido usar o termo “cibercultura” para falar da atualidade. Aqui abaixo, reproduzo na íntegra a entrevista, feita pelo repórter Rafael Cabral.

A interatividade é um mito?

Você deve estar se referindo a declaração que eu fiz no meu livro The Language of New Media, publicado em 1999. Eu falei isso como uma reação às discussões sobre novas mídias, que na época giravam exclusivamente em torno da tal “interatividade” e se limitavam a isso. Todas as experiências culturais, no fundo, podem ser definidas como uma forma de interação. O que eu quis dizer é que toda comunicação intermediada por um computador é interativa, por isso precisávamos desenvolver termos diferentes para os diversos tipos de interatividade.

Por exemplo?

No meu livro Software Takes Command (licenciado em Creative Commons e disponível para download), eu proponho uma alternativa. Para simplificar: nós não temos que analisar os objetos concretos, e sim as interações. Devemos seguir os internautas enquanto eles navegam por um site e analisar os caminhos pelos quais andam, em vez de apenas analisar o conteúdo do site. Devemos seguir os jogadores enquanto eles estão ligados em um game. Com isso, poderemos usar a tecnologia para captar traços de personalidade e emoções das pessoas enquanto elas lêem um livro, assistem a um filme e interagem com as novas mídias.

Qual a peculiaridade da interatividade digital?

A interatividade digital, intermediada por um software, é um novo capítulo da história da cultura humana. Alguém que lê um texto não-interativo pode também construir sua própria versão dele, mentalmente. Mas isso pode ser feito de forma real nos meios digitais. Um videogame que você joga é totalmente diferente do videogame que eu jogo. A probabilidade de nos movermos pelos mesmos caminhos, passarmos pelos mesmos desafios exatamente na mesma sequência, é próxima do zero.

Você vê algum tipo de narrativa participativa que já integre totalmente seus usuários?

A dos games. Os primeiros videogames usavam o que eu chamo de “interatividade fechada”, na qual os usuários podem acessar alguns dados e outros não. A partir dos anos 90, vários artistas mudaram para uma forma diferente, a “interatividade aberta”, em que o software ou site responde diretamente às ações dos jogadores. Em jogos em 3D, por exemplo, o jogador é livre para se mover em qualquer direção no seu mundo 3D. Eles foram extremamente bem sucedidos e dominaram a indústria na década passada. Cada jogo é único.

Online e offline se tornaram a mesma coisa?

Sim. Nos anos 90, só se falava de “virtual”, “ciberespaço” e “cibercultura”. Éramos fascinados pelas possibilidades que os espaços digitais ofereciam. O “virtual”, que existe à parte do “real”, dominou a década. Agora, a web é uma realidade para milhões, e a dose diária de ‘ciberespaço’ é tão grande na vida de uma pessoa que o termo não faz mais muito sentido. O mundo alternativo tão falado na ficção cyberpunk, nos anos 80, foi perdido. O “virtual” agora é doméstico. Controlado por grandes marcas, tornou-se inofensivo. Nossas vidas online e offline são hoje a mesma coisa. Para os acadêmicos que ainda usam o termo ‘cibercultura’ para falar da atualidade, eu recomendo que acordem e olhem para o que existe em volta deles.

[Leonardo Foletto.]

P.S: Quem tem dificuldades de ler em inglês e quiser mais informações sobre “The Language of New Media”, eu recomendo a leitura da resenha de Diego Kerber, meu colega no Lapjor, na UFSC, disponível aqui, produzida logo depois de quando ele apresentou o livro nas reuniões mensais do grupo.

Atualização 29/08: Cícero Silva, do Software Studies, passou via comentários o link certo para a palestra de manovich na Mackenzie, em São Paulo.

]]> http://damiansutton.wordpress.com/2009/08/17/photography-cinema-memory-the-crystal-image-of-time/ Mon, 17 Aug 2009 15:08:13 +0000 damiansutton http://damiansutton.wordpress.com/2009/08/17/photography-cinema-memory-the-crystal-image-of-time/ http://rafaelgoomes.wordpress.com/2009/08/02/exposicao-file-10-nurbs-proto-4kt/ Sun, 02 Aug 2009 03:39:10 +0000 rafagoom http://rafaelgoomes.wordpress.com/2009/08/02/exposicao-file-10-nurbs-proto-4kt/

O Festival Internacional de Linguagem Eletrônica, FILE, visa a divulgação do desenvolvimento tecnológico, tendo o homem como centro da questão. A cada ano a exposição se supera em mostrar como o ser humano pode criar novas formas de interação com a tecnologia e as modelar conforme suas necessidades, sem se esquecer da simplicidade, questões estéticas e, por que não, divertidas.

Com esta edição, o FILE completa dez anos com o título FILE 10 NURBS PROTO 4KT. Cada parte do título tem sua explicação: NURBS, ou Non Uniform Rational Basis Spline, é a técnica da computação gráfica desenvolvida no século XX para representar superfícies lisas, que, de acordo com Lev Manovich, autor do texto de abertura do Catálogo do FILE deste ano, pode tornar-se juntamente com outros recursos da computação gráfica em uma nova ferramenta para a teoria cultural do século XXI; PROTO é referente a “Protomembrana“, performance do artista catalão Marcel.lí Antunez Roca, que abriu a exposição e fez parte da programação do Hipersônica Performance; e 4K é o formato de super alta definição em que o filme “Enquanto a Noite Não Chega”, de Beto Souza, será transmitido simultâneamente para Estados Unidos e Japão, tornando-a assim Transcontinental.

Mesmo que você não entenda de tecnologia irá querer ver as instalações da exposição. Luzes, sons e imagens que se formam com um simples toque, ou tudo isso combinado, é o que você irá encontrar esse ano. Longe de ser uma exposição vazia e ao mesmo tempo cheia de tecnologia, neste décimo aniversário o FILE convida o espectador a interação e eternização, deixando sua imagem fazer parte da exposição ou até criando a trilha sonora para a experiência coletiva.

Este ano literatura e cultura pop se encontram no mesmo ambiente cultural e tecnológico. A obra Drama House, de Alexandra Dementieva (Bélgica), tem como base a “Comédia Humana”, de Balzac, realista francês. Sua instalação conta oito contos interligados que reagem a uma campainha, que quando tocada, inicia a narrativa em uma das janelas. Moving Mario, de Keith Lam (China), não tenta reproduzir o jogo de Super Mario Bros, mas sim repensar a relação jogo/jogador com objetos tradicionais do jogo original. O FILE GAME também trás jogos que repensam a já tão discutida posição passiva do jogador. O diferencial é o destaque dado a jogos produzidos em nosso país, que são de grande qualidade não só gráfica, mas tecnológica e narrativa.

Quem for à exposição, que fica em São Paulo até o dia 30/08, poderá experimentar um pouco do futuro tecnológico que não está muito longe. Em sua turnê e no Tim Festival de 2007, a cantora Björk utilizou a ReacTable, mesa de som produzida em 2003 e apresentada no FILE de 2007.

Para saber mais, visite o site oficial do FILE. A exposição fica na Galeria de Arte do Sesi, Av. Paulista, 1313 das 10:00 ás19:30.

Começa hoje a 10ª edição do FILE, considerado o mais importante evento na área de arte e tecnologia da América Latina e responsável por inserir o Brasil no cenário da mídia arte.

O festival traz anualmente  grandes nomes nacionais e internacionais do meio que vem produzindo e repensando arte digital. Entre os artistas desta edição, estão presentes coletivos e até mesmo acadêmicos, especialistas neste novo contexto de convergência de linguagens.

Um exemplo é o russo Lev Manovich, referência entre os teóricos da área, que já esteve presente em outra edição do FILE no país, retorna para ministrar um workshop sobre “Analítica Cultural”, seu mais novo conceito sobre análise na área da arquitetura, literatura, fotografia e cinema.

Outro importante destaque desta edição é o artista espanhol Marcel. lí Antúnez Roca que estará apresentará seu trabalho pluralista “Protomembrana”, que utiliza narração verbal, animação gráfica, música e iluminação. Roca é reconhecido mundialmente por suas performances mecatrônicas e instalações robóticas.

Porém o evento de maior peso será a transmissão simultânea, pela primeira vez na história, de um filme de superalta definição – resolução aproximadamente de 8 milhões de megapixels – para Brasil, Japão e Estados Unidos. O longa “ Enquanto a Noite Não Chega”, dirigido por Beto Souza, foi produzido especialmente no formato 4KT (super alta definição) e tem como tema principal o fim da vida, segundo Josué Guimarães, de mesmo nome.

Acesse a programação completa no site oficial do FILE.

Role: FILE 2009 – Festival Internacional de Linguagem Eletrônica

Quando: 28 de julho a 30 de agosto

Horário: às segundas-feiras, das 11h às 20h, de terça a sábado, das 10h às 20h e aos domingos, das 10h às 19h.

Paga: Na faixa

Pico: Centro Cultural FIESP Ruth Cardoso

Endereço: Av. Paulista, 1313

Mais informações: (11) 3146-7405 / (11)3146-7406

Para agendamento de grupos: de segunda-feira a sexta-feira, das 10 às 13h, e das 14 às 17h, pelo telefone (11)3146-7396 / falar com Leni.

Obs: Próximo a estação de metrô Trianon-Masp

* Programação sujeita a alterações sem aviso prévio e são de responsabilidade do estabelecimento.

The Language of New Media by Lev Manovich (full text)

Data Beautiful//Lev’s Blog

http://www.sinsign.com/weblog/archives/2007/07/radically_remediating_dinner_t.html

By Anne Helmond (cc) non-commercial name attribution

Paradiso was enlightened last Sunday by the presence of a true Digital Media apostle: Lev Manovich, the renowned professor of Visual Arts from the University of California, San Diego, came to give a lecture on Cultural Analytics. His lecture was part of a one day conference, Archive 2020, organized by the Dutch expertise centre for e-culture, Virtueel Platform.

Manovich used the intriguing title Activating the archive or data dandy meets data mining, in which he referenced Dutch media theorist Geert Lovink who previously described the fetish of data collection by individuals and institutions. Manovich’s talk centered on the massive digitization efforts of existing cultural assets by institutions all over the world, from ARTstor to Google Books and BBC motion gallery (and even China’s CCTV). As Manovich argues, no human being will ever be able to keep track of all this data. However increasingly measures are taken in which the digital preservation of cultural assets is turning into an obligatory act (hence the fetish reference). Moreover this institutionalized digitization is accompanied since, let’s say 2005, by the rise of huge amounts of user generated content. As Manovich mentions, the number of images uploaded every week to Flickr is likely to be larger than all objects contained in all art museums of the world. This development sees a parallel expansion of the professional cultural universe. This rapid growth of a professional universe can mainly be seen in newly globalized countries foremost due to the growth of software tools which made for the instant availability of cultural news. Everyone now has access to the same ideas, information and tools: there are no more centers and provinces. Manovich even argues that the students, cultural professionals and governments in newly globalized countries are often more ready to embrace the latest ideas than their equivalents in the “old centers” of the world.

By Anne Helmond (cc) non-commercial name attribution

All in all this has lead to an explosive growth of cultural production. This has again lead to some intriguing questions and problems: “What does it mean to be a (video) artist today and what does it mean to do cultural criticism in such a world of superabundance? Before cultural theorists and historians generated theories and concepts about relative small data sets. But how can you track “global digital cultures” with billions of cultural objects? As Manovich argues, we need some new methods to track these developments in our cultural imagination. We need a new methodology for the study of cultural processes and artifacts – including cultural production, sharing and consumption. As Manovich explains, to analyze large cultural data sets of cultural information we can apply tools already employed in the sciences to analyze big data. We can create interactive visualizations and dynamic maps of large cultural data sets to find new patterns – and to generate new theoretical questions. Traditional boundaries disappear as visualization can be seen as esthetic statements about the world, so as forms of art (see for instance Stefanie Posavec’s literary organism). Forms of cultural data mining are already starting to rise up as we are slowly shifting from a world of new media into a world of “more media”. In this respect Manovich states ‘culture has become data’. This data (including media content and people’s creative and social activity around this content, i.e. social media) can be and will be mined and visualized.

Manovich explains his new methodology of ‘cultural analytics’ as the use of data mining and interactive visualizations of large sets of cultural data in the humanities context. Manovich introduced the idea of cultural analytics first in 2005 and you can find more information about this method at softwarestudies.com.

Manovich argues that if you have an interesting idea today, you can be sure someone has the same idea somewhere else. Thus it makes no more sense to experience and study these single events. We need to start studying trends and patterns in culture instead of individual projects of ideas and concepts. We need to look at these projects in a larger context of global cultural production.

But how do you put this in practice? We need to represent and work with individual cultural objects and then work to larger and larger datasets. The key differences between existing work in culture visualization and Manovich’s approach, lies in the fact that most research projects now are driven by the existing data. Manovich wants to create techniques which can be used for much larger data sets. In contrast his methodology uses the computational analysis to generate new metadata. In this way one now creates the metadata around the objects, not the patterns inside. Manovich proposes to appropriate software from hard sciences and use them to look at work of arts and cultural works.

He gives examples of a few research projects he has worked on focusing on modern art. You can for example use software to analyze large datatsets of paintings. In this way a computer can ‘see’ whether a painting is realist or modernist (by measuring grayscale, particles, forms etc). Along these lines you can analyze the development of visual culture over time. By means of image processing you can describe the paintings qualitatively in terms of numbers. We can now make new distinctions on the basis of these outcomes; a trend line. In this way one generates new questions. As Manovich states, this method is not about answering old questions. Instead it offers new visions concerning the development of modernism from realism to modernism.

Manovich did a similar project which analyzed 165 paintings by Mark Rothko using a visual super computer to extract computational data. These are all examples of easier and sometimes more productive ways to look at culture. We can get a lot of data from these methods, Manovich says. Also, born digital media is highly interactive, and it is easy to record user interaction and user statistics. We can now use these techniques to ask different questions. This could be very interesting for, for instance, reception theory; we can now analyze the actual patterns of interaction with culture.

Manovich also expanded his analysis to movies, analyzing the variance in shot lengths in movies showing a “development over time”. The average shot length of feature films between 1900-2008 gives some interesting insides into the differences in cultural history in different countries, comparing France, the Soviet Union, the US etc. (in which the Russians proved most extreme or avant-garde prone with Vertov at the one extreme and Tarkovksi at the other…).

These kind of tools would also be able to ‘go around’ the canon. Where in normal science the focus is mostly on the canon, now we can do art history about larger contexts. But unfortunately it is mostly the canon that has been digitized. We should thus expand the canon in our digitization efforts, argues Manovich. But we can not archive everything…Therefore Manovich states we should archive equal amounts of ‘important’ canonical art and ‘random art’ to balance, in his words, ‘the important stuff wit the non important stuff’.

The critique of the audience focused mainly on the problem of how one can quantify qualitative issues? For Manovich seems to propose a shift from qualitative to quantitative analysis. As Manovich replied, quite pragmatically: it is going to happen anyway, it is what social scientists are doing. With these techniques we can do more than with a simple manually descriptive qualitative analysis. For computers can analyze things we cannot: they can find similarities and differences in similar and likely objects. And in a way the question stays ‘how do we see?’ The brain is also a kind of computer, Manovich says. Do we analyze that different from a computer?

But, on the other hand, won’t we loose a sense of meaning if we analyze culture like a thing? Manovich argues that this is of course a complementary method, we should not throw away our other ways of establishing meaning. It is a way of expanding them. And it is also an important expansion, for how is one going to ask about the meaning of large datasets? We need to combine the traditionally humanities approach of interpretation with digital techniques to find out more. And again, meaning is not the only thing to look at. It is also about creating an experience. Patterns are the new real of our society.

You can find an interview with Lev Manovich held by Virtueel Platform here and an article explaining cultural analytics here.

I spent much more time in the study group than assumed and expected in NTHU today. We are organizing ourselves, including 4 master students and 1 phd student to discuss information sociology related topics, and today is the first time gathering. Cynfox is doing a great job to coordinate everyone, to form this interesting chord. Shih is joining because he’s involved in digital music composition and production, Cheng is joining because of cinema, Gia-ming couldn’t attend this time, and me. The intersection of all of us is Prof. Chang and The Language of New Media by Lev Manovich.

Today we are bootstrapping our group and getting into the introduction & chapter one. I provided the background history of Rhizome.org and Nettime-l, which were the overall background of Lev Manovich and his writing. Using Vertov as example, Lev is discussing how to reclaim the exact moments theorists and researcher should be there to document down in the first decade of new media. Now is almost the end of the decade since he wrote it in the mailing lists and discussion to and fro shaping the early day paradigms of the new media.

I read the book before. Last time I remember is in hospital. The book accompanied me till I lost it. So today I am very glad to share with all about my questions jumping out immediately after re-visit it. Besides share the stories, I especially concentrate on the different participants’ situation & their modes, and tries to take care of those psycho-social syndromes. After that I feel very tired. And need a sound good sleep.

Reading the classic is not a problem. The problems would be the context of trust for real authentic collaboration. That’s a huge difference with other study groups I guess.

Il linguaggio dei nuovi media

Come già osservato, il problema oggi non è più creare l’immagine giusta ma trovarne una già esistente.

Lev Manovich, Il linguaggio dei nuovi media, Edizioni Olivare, Milano 2002, p. 360

Lev MAnovich

Il cinema si è sempre basato sul campionamento: il sampling del tempo. Il cinema campionava il tempo 24 volte al secondo. Per questo possiamo affermare che il cinema ci ha preparato all’arrivo dei nuovi media. Bastava quindi prendere quella rappresentazione già discontinua e quantificarla. Ma questa è una fase puramente meccanica. Il cinema ha saputo realizzare un salto concettuale molto più difficile, il passaggio dal continuo al discontinuo.

Lev Manovich, Il linguaggio dei nuovi media, Edizioni Olivares, Milano 2002, p. 73

CAMINO A LA INMATERIALIZACION

Los medios digitales han cambiado totalmente las estructuras de concepción y creación de la cultura, antes de estos la cultura iba evolucionando a base de la creación de nuevos conceptos, nuevas modas y nuevos estilos artísticos. Sin embargo hoy en día la función no es conseguir propuestas originales, la novedad ya no es un valor.

En este cambio cultural es importante destacar dos conceptos: la inmaterialización (digitalización) y el acceso directo al material y a la edición.

El medio digital ha eliminado la materialidad de tiempos pasados, antiguamente todo dependia de un soporte material que impedia su facil expansión y su “apropiación”. Por lo que la relación entre obra espectador era unidireccional, la obra se expandia pero llegaba a su fin en la lectura.

Hoy en día esta relación ha cambiado debido a que la digitalización y los nuevos medios han multiplicado la expansión. Internet se ha convertido en una biblioteca abierta a todo el mundo, desde cualquier parte podemos acceder y descargar información que de una manera física abria sido impensable. La ideologia de la web 2.0 es justamente esta, la creación de un espacio para compartir datos y conociemientos mediante internet.

En cuanto a el acceso al material y a la edición, nos enfrentamos a un sistema de difusión del cual podemos descargar contenidos, que aunque a menudo ponga limitaciones, por otra parte tenemos las herramientas para burlarlas.

Así pues tenemos un contenido digital transformable y unas herramientas de manipulación al alcance de todos.

CAMBIO DE ESTRUCTURA MENTAL COMUNICATIVA

Nuestras estructuras mentales han cambiado y han reestablecido dos realidades; sabemos que hay cosas que son posibles en el mundo digital pero que en la vida real no. El medio digital ha reconducido la evolución de la cultura y ha acelerado su ritmo.

La concepción de algo existente y no material es algo que hace unas decadas era impensable para la mayoria de personas. A traves de un ordenador nos conectamos con el mundo, recibimos información, la transformamos y asi mismo la reemitimos. El esquema de comunicación emisor-receptor ha cambiado, el receptor es a su vez interprete y re emisor, multiplicando asi el proceso comunicativo, haciendo de la expansión de la información algo interminable.

El material digital permite una intervención directa, si pensamos en intervenir una obra material esto implica el re-hacerlo. Mientras que digitalmente podemos modularizar la información y reorganizarla o cambiarla. Hoy solo necesitamos usar un par de teclas para extraer y reubicar contenido como queramos.

CONCEPTO DE AUTOR

La digitalización se convierte pues en una liberación de los contenidos, ya no hay obras impermeables, todo es vulnerable de ser desglosado y reestructurado. Por lo tanto se transformael concepto de autor y de espectador. Los espectadores se convierten usuarios al tener la capacidad de generar nuevas formas, usando información ya hecha para su desarrollo.

Asi pues entre todos creamos una cultura y asistimos a una democratización ya que todos podemos compartir conocimientos, ya no solo setrata de consumo sino tambien de aportación.
Participamos remezclando la cultura continuamente.

Lev Manovich plantea este concepto como una nueva forma de enfrentarse al conocimiento, una nueva forma que resulta negativa para un sector social que se siente mas como con el sistema tradicional de autor y propiedad. El hipertexto reconfigura estos conceptos.

Aun estamos en el debate sobre la autoria por lo cual se establecen nuevas formas de evación,
Los derechos de propiedad ya no son tan controlables como lo eran anteriormente. Se promueven legislaciones anticopia y antiapropiacion pero no son suficiente.

Por lo que en el proceso de asimilación de esta cultura emergente, se tendrá que cambiar el concepto de concepción. Resulta incomodo exponer un trabajo en internet a sabiendas de que sera copiado o editado. Tambien está ese factor económico que envuelve el funcionamiento de la sociedad en general, nos preocupa que otro tenga beneficios a costa de nuestra idea o de nuestro trabajo.

Se trata pues de una nueva mentalidad en la que se concibe un espacio de participación abierta, formando parte activa en esta dinamica de la cultura de la remezcla.

REMIX Y COLABORACIÓN

Partiendo de este intento por evolucionar el concepto de autoria y aceptar en funcionamiento de la sociedad mediante las nuevas tecnologías. Y asi mismo contribuir en la creación de este nuevo espacio. Muchos artistas se han apropiado de esta estetica del remix, conviertiendo un enemigo o “deformador” de su trabajo, en nuevas vias de creación y de interpretación de sus obras.

Bjork esta continuamente investigando en tecnologia y experimentando nuevas formas de creación, de sus canciones se realizan mezclas continuamente. Hay un grupo frances que solo se dedica a hacer mezclas de sus canciones, luego en su pagina en internet las cuelgan para que te las puedas descargar gratuitamente. Hasta que punto tienen derecho a difundir estas canciones? El hecho de la intervención otorga una autoria? Cuando intervienes algo esta claro que has puesto algo de tu parte, pero esto no implica una apropiacion total, pienso que si se cambiara la mentalidad y se dejara de lado este concepto, ya podríamos hablar tranquilamente de intervenciones, interpretaciones o colaboraciones. Aunque si recordamos el factor economica, todo esto no es mas que una “utopia” o un “jipismo” en el que todos vamos a compartir desinteresadamente.

Continuando con Bjork, para compararlo con el caso de los DJ franceses, tenemos el ultimo disco VOLTA en el cual Bjork ha invitado a otros artistas para que realicen un remix de su single “Innocence”, obteniendo un doble CD con sus canciones, mas las colaboraciones de los otros artistas.

Esta seria una nueva forma de afrontar y reencaminar la acelerada “Cultura del Remix”.

The Work Of Art In The Age Of Mechanical Reproduction by Walter Benjamin (1892-1940):

Walter Benjamin observes how art is received and valued in our contemporary society, how the age of reproduction brought changes to how we view an image. Throughout history works of art were reproduced, but the age of mechanization, with the invention of lithography followed by photography, brought this on a massive scale.

The acceptance of mass-production creates belief that the reproduced is sufficient to the original even though the artwork has an absence of traditional and ritualistic references during its historical existence.

New media brought new values, a departure from tradition and a new way to contemplate art. The concept of authenticity changed its relevance in new media. The sense of uniqueness, especially with film and photography, is stripped from the original object.

Art objects throughout history had been linked to cultural rituals. In the age of mechanical reproduction this link was broken. Because of reproduction, art became more accessible to the masses, it was published and exhibited on a greater scale. The context of viewing has changed with mass production and consumption along with a loss of mental contemplation “The greater the decrease in the social significance of an art form, the sharper the distinction between criticism and enjoyment by the public… the conventional is uncritically enjoyed and the truly new is criticized with aversion”(12). Art acquires a political significance.

Walter Benjamin mentions Eugene Atget and his iconic images of the streets of Paris, how his images “become standard evidence for historical occurrences”. I think that nowadays the role of photography has greatly expanded, it has many facets – political, historical, scientific, artistic, advertising…- There are different processes intervening in the final result, image manipulation has expanded greatly and photographs are now usually quite far from a record of reality.

“Rue de Seine” Eugene Atget 1924

Walter Benjamin questioned the comparison between film and a painting, as they don’t share the same language. New media brought us a different dimension to how man represents his environment: “film has enriched our field of perception with methods which can be illustrated by those of Freudian theory”(13). The analysis of film brings us to talk about its artistic and scientific uses of photography as it represents a manipulated version of reality using techniques such as slow motion and close-ups that focus on the hidden details of familiar objects, giving us extra information.

The way Walter Benjamin talks about photography aids the thought of photography establishing itself as a valid medium to document live and history, this is helpful for my project as I am using photography as a means to document a part of history through the architecture and machinery of the 19th and 20th century. He also speaks about photography as a scientific tool of recording, in some way this concept can create a parallel to the analysis of digital art where science and art are closely related.

In the early nineteenth century there are numerous studies on the problems of sense of perception and expression in art.  Gyorgy Kepes wrote a well distributed book called “Language of Vision” in which he discussed the manner of interpretation of art through psychology, philosophy, art and science. He uses the Bauhaus movement as an art example. The principal thesis of this book stated that our vision of the world is alterable, that it changes as we further refine our visual means.

In our contemporary time Lev Manovich talks about how artists try to show us our world in a new way in his essay “Hybrid Media”,  artists nowadays have new tools, a new language, to express a vision of our world; artists are using hybrid media to express, as he says, “visions that are fully appropriate for our time of rapid social, technological and cultural change”.

In my case, I am attempting to bring together the old and the new by using new tools ‘of the new language’ such as digital imaging, using HDR and Photoshop to achieve my desired results and at the same time I am using old tools such as traditional photography in an effort to represent and capture time. It will be referencing a very important time in our history, the industrial revolution, and it will be observed from our contemporary visual time.