The Creative Animal Goes Online (Part A)

The Creative Animal Goes Online 1.0
Mitch Goodwin
NM1102 New Media & the Creative Economy
James Cook University | Townsville
School of Creative Arts
Fear Learn ReactMobilise
01 05 09

Mitch Goodwin
“A critical reassessment of the role of arts and culture within today's network society
seems necessary. Let's go beyond the "tactical" intentions of the players involved. The
artist-engineer, tinkering on alternative human-machine interfaces, social software or
digital aesthetics has effectively been operating in a self-imposed vacuum.
Science and business have successfully ignored the creative community. Worse still,
artists have been actively sidelined in the name of "usability", pushed by a backlash
movement against web design led by the IT-guru Jakob Nielsen. The revolt against
usability is about to happen. Lawrence Lessig argues that Internet innovation is in
danger.”
Gert Lovink & Florien Schneider, | A Virtual World is Possible : From Tactical Media to Digital
Multitudes | Public Netbase: Non Stop Future, New Practices in Art and Media | Revolver |
Berlin

Apollo 11 | NASA | 1969
“Planet Earth is blue …”
(Space Oddity, David Bowie, 1969)
Screening Room
The Celestial Animal
Sputnik 1 | USSR Space Agency | 1957
“They could build a platform in space and drop nuclear
bombs on us!” (The Right Stuff, Kaufman, 1983)

Mitch Goodwin
The Birth of the Network
A Blue Planet, Note Paper and Pop (Goes) Culture
New Tools for the Cyber Animal
Pixels, Swarms, & Widgets
Nomadic Information
Databases, Algorithms and Content Portals
References
Organisations, Events & Festivals
Impermanence| Goodwin | Gold Coast | 2000
The Web is Not the Internet
Hypertext & Interaction on the Digital Savannah

Sputnik 1, October 4, 1957
• The first object to be successfully deployed into the
Earth’s orbit
• Used a modified Intercontinental Ballistic Missile (IBM)
propulsion system
• Developed in secrecy, it dramatically escalated
tensions between East and West
• Sparked the “Dawn of the Space Race” and effectively
put the United States’ military on notice
Sputnik 1 | USSR Space Agency | 1957
The Creative Animal Goes Online
Mitch Goodwin 020509

Information Processing Office, 1958
• In response to Sputnik 1 and further launches which were
to follow, Dwight Eisenhower kick started Information
Processing Office (IPTO) in 1958.
• It’s brief was to develop a communications network which
would withstand a nuclear attack and allow the US military
to “coordinate a response”. (www.livinginternet.com)
• IPTO and its affiliate Defence organisation ARPA provided
large amounts of funding to US research institutes to
develop advanced computer and network technologies.
R7 Rocket | USSR Space Agency | 1957

Information Processing Office, 1958
The institutions involved in this research :
• Carnegie-Mellon University
• MIT
• RAND Corporation
• Stanford Research Institute
• SystemDevelopment Corporation
• University of California at Berkeley, Santa Barbara,
and Los Angeles
• University of South Carolina
• University of Utah
These would eventually become the first “nodes” of what
we call the ‘internet’ today.
MIT | Massachusetts, USA | 1953

The Universal Network, 1960
“It seems reasonable to envision, for a time 10 or 15 years hence, a
'thinking center' that will incorporate the functions of present-day
libraries together with anticipated advances in information storage
and retrieval.
The picture readily enlarges itself into a network of such centers,
connected to one another by wide-band communication lines and to
individual users by leased-wire services. In such a system, the speed
of the computers would be balanced, and the cost of the gigantic
memories and the sophisticated programs would be divided by the
number of users.” (www.livinginternet.com)
J.C.R. Licklider | IPTO Director | 1962

Packet Switching, 1964
• The telephone network in the 1960s was the same the
analogue system we use today.
• This system is a “fixed connection” between one user and
another user, this was referred to as an “always on” technology
• Packet switching on the other treated the network as a
process of discontinuous digital systems that separates
information into small “packets” of data and releases them
onto a network to be re-assembled at the other end.
(Streeter, T (2004) www.uvm.edu.au)
Life Magazine | June 1950

• This is known as a “distributed network” and had no
centralised control mechanism, therefore it was capable of
withstanding any form of disruption – or attack.
• This was developed by Paul Barran at the RAND corporation as
a part of a “survivable communication systems” research
project funded by the US Air Force.
• The durability of the packet switching theory convinced the US
Military to invest in the development of a network of digital
computers that would eventually become ARPAnet.

“We will soon be living in an era in which we cannot
guarantee survivability of any single point. However, we
can still design systems in which system destruction
requires the enemy to pay the price of destroying n of n
stations. If n is made sufficiently large, it can be shown that
highly survivable system structures can be built...”
Paul Barran | On Distributed Communications | 1964
Sputnik Stamp | USSR | 1957

For here
Am I sitting in a tin can
Far above the world
Planet earth is blue
And there's nothing I can do
Space Oddity | David Bowie |
Mercury records | 1969
Apollo 11 Moon Landing
• Designed on paper and built from existing technology
• The 1st test of “a truly global network”
• The encoding and decoding of data into multiple signals
• Fails safe design to ensure continual transmission
• International network of “nodes”
• Mix of cable and satellite technologies

Lunar Surface Communications | Apollo 11 | 1969 Michael Collins | Apollo 11 | 1969

NASCOM | Apollo 11 | 1969

Apollo Television Links | Parkes, NSW, Australia | 1969
PMG microwave dishes |
Parkes, Australia | 1969

TV Transmission Centre | Sydney, Australia | 1969NASA Control Centre | Houston, USA | 1969

The (Collective) Cultural Explosion
Simultaneously a cultural revolution was taking place in North
America and Europe (1967-1969):
• The push into space driven by the threat of nuclear conflict,
escalated the 1950’s Cold War paranoia;
• The nostalgia for a “back to nature” existence (ie the birth of the
environmentalmovement)was born out of the Apollo missions
and a general mistrust of centralised government;
• The graphic television imagery of the war in Vietnam and the
consequent political demonstrations in Paris and Washington were
sound tracked by the music of Dylan, Hendrix, the Rolling Stones
and the Beatles. UFO Coming : Liverpool Love Festival |
Liverpool, England | 1967

Therefore the language and semiotics of space travel, music and
psychoactive drugs were freely exchanged and often closely intertwined :
• An eruption of global cultural production - film, music and the
contemporary visual arts - each of them radicalised by politics and
ideology;
• Radio syndication and satellitetelevision amplified the sense that the
world was a finite space;
• The proliferation of LSD and marijuana and cultural texts which site
their influence and detail their perceptive benefits, reinforced the
notion of the “shared experience”;
• In western society at least, a global collective cultural identity was
formed.
Vegetarian Vegetable from Campbell's
Soup II | Andy Warhol | New York |
1969

The Web Is Not the Internet
Hypertext & Context on the Digital Savannah

Hypertext Mark-Up Language (html)
Tim Berners-Lee
“If a CERN experiment were a static once-only
development, all the information could be written in a big
book. As it is, CERN is constantly changing as new ideas
are produced, as new technology becomes available, and
in order to get around unforeseen technical problems.
When a change is necessary, it normally affects only a
small part of the organisation. A local reason arises for
changing a part of the experiment or detector.
At this point, one has to dig around to find out what other
parts and people will be affected. Keeping a book up to
date becomes impractical, and the structure of the book
needs to be constantly revised.” (Berners-Lee, 1989)
Information Management : A Proposal
Tim Berners-Lee | CERN |
March 1989

Hypertext Mark-Up Language (html)
Tim Berners-Lee
“The sort of information we are discussing answers, for
example, questions like -
• Where is this module used?
• Who wrote this code? Where does he work?
• What documents exist about that concept?
• Which laboratories are included in that project?
• Which systems depend on this device?
• What documents refer to this one?
The problems of information loss may be particularly
acute at CERN, but in this case (as in certain others),
CERN is a model in miniature of the rest of world in a few
years time.” (Berners-Lee, 1989)

Information Management : A Proposal
Tim Berners-Lee | CERN |
March 1989

Scan of original document (with note on paper) | Tim Berners-Lee | CERN | March 1989

Darwin and Moore’s Law
The Awakening of the Digital Creative
In March of this year, the world wide web turned 30 years
old.
If it was a traditional media format technology (think CD,
DVD, Blu Ray) it would be in only it’s 3rd possibly 4th life cycle
and more than likely well on the road to extinction.
As a system it does not have a peer. The nearest
comparative example is the humble telephone book which
incidentally, the web still fails to comprehensively replace.
However the web is more than an index, it is a content
provider, a venue, a tool.
The web has become
the hunting ground,
the gallery wall, the
Sunday market and
the communication
backbone of the 21C.
“
”

Certain technological developments, moments of genius and
lateral thinking have determined this new landscape:
• The invincibility of Barren’s (re)distributed network;
• The “free” and “open” ethos of Berners-Lee’s ground
breaking design;
• The swift adoption of malleable language protocols ;
• Academic and corporate interest in the protection and
promotion of these principles thus enabling a relative
explosion of development and innovation.
Interface Image Processor (IMP) |
Leonard Kleinrock | ARPAnet |
August 1969

The web as a medium has expanded at an exponential rate
due to profound technological developments but also
critical cultural conditions :
• The desire for perceptive clarity (ie advancements in
resolution of digital imaging tools);
• The “viral architecture” of content (video), comment
(blogs) and rhythm (mp3);
• The interpretation of graphical interfaces (operating
systems, flash controllers and browser iconography).
• Combined with a remarkable rate of personal
adoption and social acceptance.
Web 2DNA Art Project | baekdal.com | 2008

Pixels, Swarms & Widgets

Convergence
Devices | Delivery Methods | Storage | Global Ethics

The Digital (NM) Artist
The facilitation of artistic practice through convergent technologies

©opyleft

"Creative Commons provides free tools that let authors, scientists, artists, and educators easily
mark their creative work with the freedoms they want it to carry. You can use CC to change your
copyright terms from "All Rights Reserved" to "Some Rights Reserved."
We're a non-profit organization. Everything we do — including the software we create — is free.“
Lawrence Lessig | Founder | Creative Commons
©opyleft

Remixology
Obey Giant Boing Boing Banksy

“Media literacy merges with science and creativity to generate a
third networked culture which places special value on design
thinking, laboratories as working spaces, the idea of process rather
than instrument, the blurring of boundaries between professional
and amateur (the concept of pro-am), innovation as a driving force
for knowledge and the commons as a research tool.”
Pedro Jimenez | ZEMOS98 | Gestión Creativo Cultural
Remixology

Access
Open (the) Source | P2P | The Wiki | Take the “Gallery” to the Street

End of Part One

Part Two (Next Time) :
Nomadic Information
Databases, Algorithms and Content Portals
References
Organisations, Events & Festivals
Art Versus Commodity
The Politics of P2P & the Value of Public Media

• Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, Bebo and the like all offer the cultural
vultures and social stalkers the venue to co-opt language, means-test
their personality and appropriate other people’s ideas.
• In many ways, social networking sites are the toilet doors and phone
boxes of the contemporary web experience.
• Falsifying emotion and twisting perspectives they are the junkyards of a
bourgeoning social construct.
• They restrict innovation, dictate a sanitised sense of visual style, and
push a conservative bias which leaves little room for individuality, self
expression and certainly - creativity.
• Web 2.0 – or 2nd generation web applications – are in their infancy, and
like all circus attractions (see reality television) we have been absorbed
into the car wreck of their naive exuberance.
• But for the moment, all of us it would appear, are along for the ride.
Research Task

• Obviously they are mechanisms for self promotion, and many artists
use them as devices to sell their work or promote an event.
• So where do the practitioner’s reside?
• What web sites offer a wider audience the opportunity to be informed,
feel the force of creative intellect and explore the power of an idea?
• Artists, designers, musicians, film makers, poets, photographers and
writers have all created compelling content – where is it?
• They may be in the form of an online folio, a discreet piece of
technology which uses the web to propagate art or in the form of a
collective who work under an agreed manifesto.
• They may be a part of a content portal, connected by geography, or
discipline, or language or politics ….
• But they have one thing in common, they work, display and share their
creativity online.
Research Task
Internet Universe | San Diego
Supercomputer Centre | 2008

• In groups of four use the web to find a web (of artists).
• Perhaps each group member can start in a different discipline.
• Don’t rely on conventional portals such as YouTube or Flickr.
• What do these artists do, what are they saying?
• Who is commenting on the present or reflecting on our collective
experience via digital tools?
• Are there artists or technologists who are using the tools of digital media
to create new art forms or extend on the practices of what has gone
before?
• You will be given 30 minutes to make a short list of URLs.
• Then you will be required to make a short 5 minute presentation of
these URLs to the rest of the class.
Research Task
TV Art for tyhe Digital Generation |
MoMA | New York| 2009

The Creative Animal Goes Online (Part A)

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