How does a digital Earth govern itself? Through what jurisdictions, what rights of the citizen-user, what capacities of enforcement, and in the name of what sovereign geographies? In fact we simply do not know. But in the face of fast-evolving cyberinfrastructures that outpace our inherited legal forms on the one hand, and a multigenerational arc of ecological chaos on the other, we need to find out quickly: we need to design that geopolitics.
schedule: http://designgeopolitics.org/dg2011/
SCHEDULE
(subject to change)
THURSDAY, JUNE 2
9:30 Designing the Century: Futurity's Past
Benjamin H. Bratton, Norman Klein, Geoff Manaugh
11:00 Network Polis: Promise/Peril
James Fowler, Adam Bly, Metahaven (video from Netherlands)
Break
1:30 “Force is a Diagram of Forms”: Architecture, Emergence, Emergency
Hernan Diaz-Alonso, Teddy Cruz, Jordan Crandall
3:00 Data as World, World-Image, World-Making
Lev Manovich, Kelly Gates, Molly Wright Steenson
FRIDAY, JUNE 3
9:30 Planetary Data, Planetary Governance
Larry Smarr, Charlie Kennel, Naomi Oreskes
11:00 Design and Post-Humanism
Ed Keller, Vernor Vinge, Rene Daalder
Break
Tricia Wang (video from China)
1:30 The Agency of Code: Form, Tool, Policy
Casey Reas, Ricardo Dominguez, Elizabeth Losh
3:30 Geophilosophy, Geoaesthetics, Geopolitics
Manuel De Landa (video from Spain), Peter Krapp, McKenzie Wark
:
Thursday, May 26, 2011
Sunday, May 15, 2011
new book: "The Filter Bubble: What the Internet Is Hiding from You"
A number of books about software society and software society is steadily on the rise - and we are softwarestudies.com are happy about this. Here is one more:
The Filter Bubble: What the Internet Is Hiding from You
Eli Pariser (Author)
Hardcover: 304 pages
Publisher: Penguin Press HC, The (May 12, 2011)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1594203008
ISBN-13: 978-1594203008
See an interview with the author by Maria Popova: The Filter Bubble: Algorithm vs. Curator & the Value of Serendipity, May 12, 2011.
I have not read the book yet - just looked at the interview. As it is usually the case with all popular books which have "How" or "What" in their subtitle, some of the arguments maybe over simplified.. This the challenge of writing about software culture - how can we have an intelligent discussion about very complex algorithms and software systems which, because of their complexity and parametric nature, do not contain "biases" or "ideologies" in a simple 20th century media sense.
Thursday, May 12, 2011
Kindle version of Software Takes Command
.prc version of Software Takes Command (11.20.2008 version) is now available:
PRC | version for Kindle and other e-readers
(.pdf and .doc versions are available on softwarestudies.com/softbook )
This format is readable not only by Kindle and the recent Kindle Apps, but also by many other e-readers.
The transcoding was done by
Zoltán Dragon
Assistant Professor
Department of American Studies
Institute of English & American Studies
University of Szeged, Hungary
Many thanks, Zoltán!
PRC | version for Kindle and other e-readers
(.pdf and .doc versions are available on softwarestudies.com/softbook )
This format is readable not only by Kindle and the recent Kindle Apps, but also by many other e-readers.
The transcoding was done by
Zoltán Dragon
Assistant Professor
Department of American Studies
Institute of English & American Studies
University of Szeged, Hungary
Many thanks, Zoltán!
Monday, May 9, 2011
lecture abstract for "Visual Archives in the Digital Age" (Bremen, June 14-16, 2011)
Comparison between 128 paintings by Piet Mondrian (from 1904-1917) and 168 paintings by Mark Rothko (from 1934-1970).
---------------------
Lev Manovich
Cultural Analytics:
Visualizing patterns in art, photography, cinema, TV, animation, print media, games, comics, maps, and user-generated content.
The explosive growth of cultural content on the web including social media and the digitization work by museums, libraries, and companies since the 1990s make possible fundamentally new paradigm for the study of both contemporary and historical cultures. We can use computer-based techniques for data analysis and interactive visualization employed in sciences as well as the artistic techniques developed in media and digital art to analyze patterns and trends in massive cultural data sets. In 2007 we have established Software Studies Initiative (softwarestudies.com) at University of California, San Diego (UCSD) and California Institute for Telecommunication and Information (Calit2) to begin putting this vision into practice.
Cultural analytics presents a new opportunity for digital cultural archives which today typically provide only search interface for the users. Instead, we can explore the collections of any size using new visualization techniques to reveal interesting cultural patterns which until now escaped the attention of researchers and curators.
I will show examples of our visualization of art, photography, film, animation, motion graphics, video games, magazines, web sites, and other visual media. This work is done in colloboration with The Getty Museum, the Austrian Film Museum, Magnum Photos, Netherland Institute for Sound and Image, San Diego Museum of Contemporary Art who were interested to use our methods to explore patterns in their media collections in new ways. The presentation will include our largest project to date - analysis and visualization of 1,000,000 Manga pages.
Saturday, May 7, 2011
The Digital Humanities: Beyond Computing
The Digital Humanities: Beyond Computing
special issue of Culture Machine (Open Humanities Press)
"There seems to be a vague sense among digital humanities scholars that this emerging field should be concerned with, and engaged in, thinking the humanities differently. However, there is no significant agreement about what this might actually mean.1
Is the encounter between the humanities and digitality sufficient to make the humanitites ‘different’, or ‘new’?" (from the introduction by Federica Frabetti)
special issue of Culture Machine (Open Humanities Press)
"There seems to be a vague sense among digital humanities scholars that this emerging field should be concerned with, and engaged in, thinking the humanities differently. However, there is no significant agreement about what this might actually mean.1
Is the encounter between the humanities and digitality sufficient to make the humanitites ‘different’, or ‘new’?" (from the introduction by Federica Frabetti)
Friday, May 6, 2011
Reading Machines: Toward an Algorithmic Criticism
Stephen Ramsay. Reading Machines: Toward an Algorithmic Criticism. 2011.
book description from University of Illinois Press:
Besides familiar and now-commonplace tasks that computers do all the time, what else are they capable of? Stephen Ramsay's intriguing study of computational text analysis examines how computers can be used as "reading machines" to open up entirely new possibilities for literary critics. Computer-based text analysis has been employed for the past several decades as a way of searching, collating, and indexing texts. Despite this, the digital revolution has not penetrated the core activity of literary studies: interpretive analysis of written texts.
Computers can handle vast amounts of data, allowing for the comparison of texts in ways that were previously too overwhelming for individuals, but they may also assist in enhancing the entirely necessary role of subjectivity in critical interpretation. Reading Machines discusses the importance of this new form of text analysis conducted with the assistance of computers. Ramsay suggests that the rigidity of computation can be enlisted in the project of intuition, subjectivity, and play.
book description from University of Illinois Press:
Besides familiar and now-commonplace tasks that computers do all the time, what else are they capable of? Stephen Ramsay's intriguing study of computational text analysis examines how computers can be used as "reading machines" to open up entirely new possibilities for literary critics. Computer-based text analysis has been employed for the past several decades as a way of searching, collating, and indexing texts. Despite this, the digital revolution has not penetrated the core activity of literary studies: interpretive analysis of written texts.
Computers can handle vast amounts of data, allowing for the comparison of texts in ways that were previously too overwhelming for individuals, but they may also assist in enhancing the entirely necessary role of subjectivity in critical interpretation. Reading Machines discusses the importance of this new form of text analysis conducted with the assistance of computers. Ramsay suggests that the rigidity of computation can be enlisted in the project of intuition, subjectivity, and play.
Thursday, May 5, 2011
Computational Culture, a journal of software studies
Computational Culture, a journal of software studies is an online open-access peer-reviewed journal of inter-disciplinary enquiry into the nature of computational cultural objects, practices, processes and structures.
The journal's primary aim is to examine the ways in which software undergirds and formulates contemporary life. Computational processes and systems not only enable contemporary forms of work and play and the management of emotional life but also drive the unfolding of new events that constitute political, social and ontological domains. In order to understand digital objects such as corporate software, search engines, medical databases or to enquire into the use of mobile phones, social networks, dating, games, financial systems or political crises, a detailed analysis of software cannot be avoided.
A developing form of literacy is required that matches an understanding of computational processes with those traditionally bound within the arts, humanities, and social sciences but also in more informal or practical modes of knowledge such as hacking and art.
The journal welcomes contributions that address such topics and many others that may derive and mix methodologies from cultural studies, science and technology studies, philosophy of computing, metamathematics, computer science, critical theory, media art, human computer interaction, media theory, design, philosophy.
Computational Culture publishes peer-reviewed articles, special projects, interviews, and reviews of books, projects, events and software. The journal is also involved in developing a series of events and projects to generate special issues.
The Editorial Group
Matthew Fuller, Goldsmiths
Andrew Goffey, Middlesex
Olga Goriunova, London Metropolitan
Graham Harwood, Goldsmith
Adrian Mackenzie, Lancaster
http://computationalculture.net
For initial enquiries, please contact: m.fullerATgold.ac.uk
The journal's primary aim is to examine the ways in which software undergirds and formulates contemporary life. Computational processes and systems not only enable contemporary forms of work and play and the management of emotional life but also drive the unfolding of new events that constitute political, social and ontological domains. In order to understand digital objects such as corporate software, search engines, medical databases or to enquire into the use of mobile phones, social networks, dating, games, financial systems or political crises, a detailed analysis of software cannot be avoided.
A developing form of literacy is required that matches an understanding of computational processes with those traditionally bound within the arts, humanities, and social sciences but also in more informal or practical modes of knowledge such as hacking and art.
The journal welcomes contributions that address such topics and many others that may derive and mix methodologies from cultural studies, science and technology studies, philosophy of computing, metamathematics, computer science, critical theory, media art, human computer interaction, media theory, design, philosophy.
Computational Culture publishes peer-reviewed articles, special projects, interviews, and reviews of books, projects, events and software. The journal is also involved in developing a series of events and projects to generate special issues.
The Editorial Group
Matthew Fuller, Goldsmiths
Andrew Goffey, Middlesex
Olga Goriunova, London Metropolitan
Graham Harwood, Goldsmith
Adrian Mackenzie, Lancaster
http://computationalculture.net
For initial enquiries, please contact: m.fullerATgold.ac.uk
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