"6 milliard of people facing 50.000 milliard of objects" Yann LE HEGARAT, CNIL
Timo Arnall: "What I really like about the Bricolabs proposal is the kind of low-tech hacking of everyday infrastructure. If the students come out of a bricolab course with an increased sensitivity to everyday, ubiquitous, technology infrastructures, that would be fantastic. If we could weave RFID into the mix, all the better."
Steve Cisler: "From my interaction with the different groups I think it takes a certain critical mass of what might be called social techno-hackers, and in many places you have the socially engaged without a lot of experience beyond email (if that) and you have the open source coders whose world is pretty much online. My guess is the Bricolabs people are a combination of both, or am I wrong?"
Jerneja Rebernak: "We stress community network development as bricolabs are being created, which indeedt focus on urban space in globalized societies, where agency is reclaimed as technology is not appropriated anymore (this would be a false paradigm when looking at bricolabs), but is created!"
Steve Cisler: "From my interaction with the different groups I think it takes a certain critical mass of what might be called social techno-hackers, and in many places you have the socially engaged without a lot of experience beyond email (if that) and you have the open source coders whose world is pretty much online. My guess is the Bricolabs people are a combination of both, or am I wrong?"
Jerneja Rebernak: "We stress community network development as bricolabs are being created, which indeedt focus on urban space in globalized societies, where agency is reclaimed as technology is not appropriated anymore (this would be a false paradigm when looking at bricolabs), but is created!"
objectives
Unless we find new ways of scripting new forms of solidarities with digital technology, it seems like we can envisage two roads that both lead to less dialogue, less communication, less innovation, less business opportunities, less sustainable options. The one focuses on control in a fundamentally flux wireless environment. The other focuses on hiding the technological complexity behind ever more simple user friendly interfaces. In both cases there is no learning by citizens on how to function within such a system, thereby opening up all kinds of breakdown scenarios.
Let us just say there is a window of opportunity.
For the first time we are capable of handling the entire chain of communication: hardware, software, content. Building our own hardware chain to light up a street, their street, any street. We got no more networks to hack. We can build our own now.
As ever these are important times. Times are always important. These coming five years however, are somewhat extra special. Once you light up the world, once you put a passive RFID tag on everything you can only go forward to an active RFID environment, where tags have some memory and battery power or power scavenging abilities. There is no more stepping lightly in these rooms. There is no stopping these technologies as the notions embedded in them - control, predictability, memory outsourcing - are deeply scripted in the western notions of techné.
Let us just say there is a window of opportunity.
For the first time we are capable of handling the entire chain of communication: hardware, software, content. Building our own hardware chain to light up a street, their street, any street. We got no more networks to hack. We can build our own now.
As ever these are important times. Times are always important. These coming five years however, are somewhat extra special. Once you light up the world, once you put a passive RFID tag on everything you can only go forward to an active RFID environment, where tags have some memory and battery power or power scavenging abilities. There is no more stepping lightly in these rooms. There is no stopping these technologies as the notions embedded in them - control, predictability, memory outsourcing - are deeply scripted in the western notions of techné.
"In effect, we have allowed a situation to develop that is like a civilization devouring its seed corn. If an enemy had set out to do this to us -- quietly arranging so that almost no school child in America can tinker with line coding on his or her own -- any reasonably patriotic person would have called it an act of war."- David Brin
mediawise means hardwarewise
Every new set of techniques brings forth its own literacy: The Aristotelian protests against introducing pencil writing may seem rather incredible now. At the time it meant nothing less than a radical change in the structures of power distribution. Overnight, a system of thought and set of grammar; an oral literacy dependant on a functionality of internal information visualization techniques and recall, was made redundant because the techniques could be externalised.
"The most profound technologies are those that disappear. They weave themselves into the fabric of everyday life until they are indistinguishable from it." (Weiser, Mark)
Imagine a car in Delhi. Picture the car, the engine and the tools to fix the engine, put it in the car and….drive. We see code, protocol and procedure. Would you not agree that mastering code, protocol and procedure is key to being mediawise?
"Electronic techniques recognize no contradiction in principle between transmitter and receiver. Every transistor radio is, by the matters of its construction, at the same time a potential transmitter; it can interact with other receivers by circuit reversal. The development from a mere distribution medium to a communications medium is technically not a problem. It is consciously prevented for understandable political reasons. The technical distinction between receivers and transmitters reflects the social division of labor into producers and consumers."
http://excerpter.wordpress.com/2006/10/21/hans-magnus enzensberger-constituent s-of-a-theory-of-the-media-1970/ ( via Jerneja Rebernak)
http://excerpter.wordpress.com/2006/10/21/hans-magnus enzensberger-constituent s-of-a-theory-of-the-media-1970/ ( via Jerneja Rebernak)
towards generic infrastructures
In his 1930 text The Revolt of the Masses Ortega Y Gasset elaborates on the "one the fact which, whether for good or ill, is of utmost importance in the public life of Europe at the present moment. This fact is the accession of the masses to complete social power."( THE REVOLT OF THE MASSES, by Jose Ortega y Gassett, 1930) This social power is for him determined by actual presence, corporeal visibility:
"Perhaps the best line of approach to this historical phenomenon may be found by turning our attention to a visual experience, stressing one aspect of our epoch which is plain to our very eyes. This fact is quite simple to enunciate, though not so to analyse. I shall call it the fact of agglomeration, of "plenitude." Towns are full of people, houses full of tenants, hotels full of guests, trains full of travellers, cafes full of customers, parks full of promenaders, consulting-rooms of famous doctors fun of patients, theatres full of spectators, and beaches full of bathers. What previously was, in general, no problem, now begins to be an everyday one, namely, to find room. That is all. Can there be any fact simpler, more patent more constant in actual life?"
For Ortega social power is asserted through physical presence, citizens asserting themselves as individuals, not behaving according to certain socio-cultural rules of genre forcing them into not being there, or at least not seeming to be. As they become visible in the streets, their very presence can be offensive. What will happen if citizens start mapping their own street infrastructures, energy supplies, pollution levels?
This movement of digital technology towards our everyday life and our daily encounters in the streets, which are themselves becoming a digital territory, a hybrid space made up of services and communication protocols, is - as we have seen - currently being negotiated by the logistics, retail, telecommunications and security industries. Wireless is increasingly pulling in all kinds of applications, platforms, services and objects (RFID) into networks. Many people communicate through mobiles, blackberries, digital organisers and palmtops. Cars have become information spaces with navigational systems, and consoles like Nintendo DS have wireless capabilities and Linux kernels installed. We are witnessing a move towards pervasive computing as technology vanishes into intelligent clothing (wearables), smart environments (which know where and who we are) and pervasive games. We will see doors opening for some and closing for others. Mimicry and camouflage will become part of application design. iPods will display colors and produce sounds that correspond to your surroundings.
But there is an intrinsic autonomous trajectory in this hybrid space that is currently being explored and evidenced - not in applications - but in programming and design principles.
Processing.org (an open source programming language and environment for images, animation and sound) - started out as a programming environment for visuals, and is now moving away from the screen to produce the conceptually sound and working Arduino board: "an open-source physical computing platform based on a simple I/O board and a development environment that implements the Processing/Wiring language."
Usman Haque, Bengt Sjolen and Adam Somlai Fisher - architects and programmers shaping both locative media theory and practice - are working on Asus(brand) Wl-Hdd, wireless hard disk boxes to make up as Linux computers in order to disperse them, like smart dust, into our streets.
Lee Thorn spearheads the Jhai PC, a low cost, low power wireless linux box. According to Steve Cisler: "They opened up the hardware design for others to use, and one designer worked on that one as well as Negroponte's machine. He said that there may be about 100 low cost project under way (with rather thin support) around the world."
Open Beacon "offers a wide range of use cases such as visitor or item tracking and wireless remote control with a free self-contained and low-cost RFID design."
Jaromil is reverse engineering all kinds of old systems instead of creating new ones for the sake of it.
The OScar project (http://www.theoscarproject.org/ ) is building an open car.
We are at a crossroads where artists and designers are not only increasingly taking control over the very principles and materiality of the 'networkwaves', but also are more determined to make local applications for everyday use. The convergence of highend EU projects like Haggle - opportunistic computing top down - and citizen designed networks like Hivenetworks - opportunistic computing bottom up- is becoming real in its technological and scaling aspects. According to Alexei Blinov (Hivesnetwork.net) a project is to "liberate embedded computers for artistic use", we can now see the network as a content structure Ie "no longer only a connectivity structure through which access to the global internet is facilitated".
This movement of digital technology towards our everyday life and our daily encounters in the streets, which are themselves becoming a digital territory, a hybrid space made up of services and communication protocols, is - as we have seen - currently being negotiated by the logistics, retail, telecommunications and security industries. Wireless is increasingly pulling in all kinds of applications, platforms, services and objects (RFID) into networks. Many people communicate through mobiles, blackberries, digital organisers and palmtops. Cars have become information spaces with navigational systems, and consoles like Nintendo DS have wireless capabilities and Linux kernels installed. We are witnessing a move towards pervasive computing as technology vanishes into intelligent clothing (wearables), smart environments (which know where and who we are) and pervasive games. We will see doors opening for some and closing for others. Mimicry and camouflage will become part of application design. iPods will display colors and produce sounds that correspond to your surroundings.
But there is an intrinsic autonomous trajectory in this hybrid space that is currently being explored and evidenced - not in applications - but in programming and design principles.
Processing.org (an open source programming language and environment for images, animation and sound) - started out as a programming environment for visuals, and is now moving away from the screen to produce the conceptually sound and working Arduino board: "an open-source physical computing platform based on a simple I/O board and a development environment that implements the Processing/Wiring language."
Usman Haque, Bengt Sjolen and Adam Somlai Fisher - architects and programmers shaping both locative media theory and practice - are working on Asus(brand) Wl-Hdd, wireless hard disk boxes to make up as Linux computers in order to disperse them, like smart dust, into our streets.
Lee Thorn spearheads the Jhai PC, a low cost, low power wireless linux box. According to Steve Cisler: "They opened up the hardware design for others to use, and one designer worked on that one as well as Negroponte's machine. He said that there may be about 100 low cost project under way (with rather thin support) around the world."
Open Beacon "offers a wide range of use cases such as visitor or item tracking and wireless remote control with a free self-contained and low-cost RFID design."
Jaromil is reverse engineering all kinds of old systems instead of creating new ones for the sake of it.
The OScar project (http://www.theoscarproject.org/ ) is building an open car.
We are at a crossroads where artists and designers are not only increasingly taking control over the very principles and materiality of the 'networkwaves', but also are more determined to make local applications for everyday use. The convergence of highend EU projects like Haggle - opportunistic computing top down - and citizen designed networks like Hivenetworks - opportunistic computing bottom up- is becoming real in its technological and scaling aspects. According to Alexei Blinov (Hivesnetwork.net) a project is to "liberate embedded computers for artistic use", we can now see the network as a content structure Ie "no longer only a connectivity structure through which access to the global internet is facilitated".
bricolabs
Bricolabs aims to build a global platform to investigate the new loop of open content, software and hardware for community applications, bringing people together with new technologies and wireless connectivity, unlike the current dominant IT focus which is on security, surveillance, transparancy and control.
Bricolabs is a collaborative exchange between Brazilian, Indonesian, UK, Chinese, Indian and Dutch open source experts, exploring mutual interest in distributed generation of tools, and soft/hardware skills. We focus on knowledge exchange, development of new business models and the building of a critical discourse for the current generations of young artists, designers and social scientists. The idea is to draw on the expertise of all experimental places that have the conceptual grasp of taking advantage of low tech and the full loop of open content, software and hardware for working locally in the communities and globally as no longer a countermovement against wild capital, IP and patents but a parallel one.
We build on the:
- Brazilian expertise gathered in the process of establishing Points of Culture (Pontos de Cultura) "free-software studios, built with free software, in hundreds of towns and villages throughout Brazil, enabling people to create culture using tools that support free cultural transmission." and will introduce a next phase of focus and scope: bricolabs.
- Dutch expertise of organizing a Virtual Platform of various organizations dealing with new media. The Dutch new media scene started from underground initiatives and grassroots projects. In ten years seed money from the Ministery of Culture has helped to create a vital innovative environment where former initiatives of hackers and squatters are now centers of expertise that do consultancy for museums, libraries, education, cultural institutions.
- UK practice of Interdisciplinary Arts where the focus on the intersection between the arts and other disciplines including art and science, art and technology and art and industry, has led to a deepening of cross-links between practitioners, large and new funding frameworks (NESTA), paradigm shifts in Humanities Research agendas and a wide range of networked events. A series of placements in art and industry contexts has been brokered this year, including ADOBE, HP, and the BBC, as well as in the Pontos de Cultura network in São Paulo creating scope for convergent ideologies and collaborative exchange.
- Indian expertise of Sarai and Cybermohalla. Jerneja Rebernak: "The Sarai new media research centre based in New Delhi, India has been active since 2001 consisting originally from intellectuals based at the Centre for the Study of developing societies (CSDS), the autonomous artists group Raqs media collective and partnering with the exchange programme at the Waag society, the centre for old and new media based in Amsterdam. Sarai's points of interest are critical research on urban societies in South Asia, history and politics of technology, free and open source software, environmental studies, visual culture and media practices whose focus became information and communication technologies. Sarai has more than hundred collaborators, independent fellows and employees and has been expanding as an international network of academic researchers, artists and creators of technologies. However the hyper intellectual research didn't lack corporeal ground, but has been persistently validated through performance in the urban settlements of New Delhi. The Cybermohalla project consists of three local media laboratories, unfortunately at this moment only two are fully operating, since mass neighborhoods demolitions occurred in early 2006. Sarai's role as builders of sustainable and inclusive community with focus on media education helps generate a creative environment for working class youth that reflect and imprint their urban condition through digital forms and technology."
- Indonesian expertise of Common Room, Bandung, Ruangrupa, Jakarta and House of Natural Fibre, Yogyakarta. The objective of the Education Focus Program (EFP) of Cellsbutton#01 (2007) is:
Bricolabs is a collaborative exchange between Brazilian, Indonesian, UK, Chinese, Indian and Dutch open source experts, exploring mutual interest in distributed generation of tools, and soft/hardware skills. We focus on knowledge exchange, development of new business models and the building of a critical discourse for the current generations of young artists, designers and social scientists. The idea is to draw on the expertise of all experimental places that have the conceptual grasp of taking advantage of low tech and the full loop of open content, software and hardware for working locally in the communities and globally as no longer a countermovement against wild capital, IP and patents but a parallel one.
We build on the:
- Brazilian expertise gathered in the process of establishing Points of Culture (Pontos de Cultura) "free-software studios, built with free software, in hundreds of towns and villages throughout Brazil, enabling people to create culture using tools that support free cultural transmission." and will introduce a next phase of focus and scope: bricolabs.
- Dutch expertise of organizing a Virtual Platform of various organizations dealing with new media. The Dutch new media scene started from underground initiatives and grassroots projects. In ten years seed money from the Ministery of Culture has helped to create a vital innovative environment where former initiatives of hackers and squatters are now centers of expertise that do consultancy for museums, libraries, education, cultural institutions.
- UK practice of Interdisciplinary Arts where the focus on the intersection between the arts and other disciplines including art and science, art and technology and art and industry, has led to a deepening of cross-links between practitioners, large and new funding frameworks (NESTA), paradigm shifts in Humanities Research agendas and a wide range of networked events. A series of placements in art and industry contexts has been brokered this year, including ADOBE, HP, and the BBC, as well as in the Pontos de Cultura network in São Paulo creating scope for convergent ideologies and collaborative exchange.
- Indian expertise of Sarai and Cybermohalla. Jerneja Rebernak: "The Sarai new media research centre based in New Delhi, India has been active since 2001 consisting originally from intellectuals based at the Centre for the Study of developing societies (CSDS), the autonomous artists group Raqs media collective and partnering with the exchange programme at the Waag society, the centre for old and new media based in Amsterdam. Sarai's points of interest are critical research on urban societies in South Asia, history and politics of technology, free and open source software, environmental studies, visual culture and media practices whose focus became information and communication technologies. Sarai has more than hundred collaborators, independent fellows and employees and has been expanding as an international network of academic researchers, artists and creators of technologies. However the hyper intellectual research didn't lack corporeal ground, but has been persistently validated through performance in the urban settlements of New Delhi. The Cybermohalla project consists of three local media laboratories, unfortunately at this moment only two are fully operating, since mass neighborhoods demolitions occurred in early 2006. Sarai's role as builders of sustainable and inclusive community with focus on media education helps generate a creative environment for working class youth that reflect and imprint their urban condition through digital forms and technology."
- Indonesian expertise of Common Room, Bandung, Ruangrupa, Jakarta and House of Natural Fibre, Yogyakarta. The objective of the Education Focus Program (EFP) of Cellsbutton#01 (2007) is:
"to establish connections and interactions between communities, creators and artist with interest in new media. ?A second innovative aim is to make a connection between universities with expertise in technology and media artists/theorists who are interested in new media art and technology. ? The connection between art, technology and community is one of our main responsibilities. We try to build a bridge between new media artists and their communities; the people around them." (Deanna Herst)
The Indonesian context brings expertise on business models in an environment with no cultural funding, all kinds of genres and output (vj, festivals, clubs, exhibition, clothing stores…) Moreover, the new media scene has been politically very important and active in recent Indonesian history, taking an active role in devising tactical and strategic performative play-action.
Bricolabs will investigate the potentialities of the combination of open societies, open hardware and open labs. Its aim is to create a brand neutral and non-proprietary generic infrastructure. Following the wikipedia definition of generic drugs:
Bricolabs will investigate the potentialities of the combination of open societies, open hardware and open labs. Its aim is to create a brand neutral and non-proprietary generic infrastructure. Following the wikipedia definition of generic drugs:
a generic infrastructure is bioequivalent to a brand or proprietary infrastructure with respect to electric and applicationcodynamic properties.
The concept of generic infrastructure claims that only by educating all citizens about
increasing connectivity will grow a realistic acceptance of new nano, sensor and bio technologies and increase abilities of individuals to work on principles of these technologies not from closed, ever increasing (allegedly) simple interfaces - but from a position of greater understanding and more complexity.
increasing connectivity will grow a realistic acceptance of new nano, sensor and bio technologies and increase abilities of individuals to work on principles of these technologies not from closed, ever increasing (allegedly) simple interfaces - but from a position of greater understanding and more complexity.
Bricolabs links:
LaMiMe: LaMiMe, Laboratório de Mídia da MetaReciclagem, bricolab, São Paulo is the first spearhead to develop the functional artistic, community, organizational and business models. LaMiMe in São Paulo will include some pontos de cultura ("cultural hotspots") as testing environments to what is developed in LaMiMe, for instance, wi-fi to Cidade Tiradentes, east side São Paulo.
URL : http://www.bricolabs.net
Bricolabs.pdf :
URL : http://www.bricolabs.net
Bricolabs.pdf :
Contact:
Rob van Kranenburg :
kranenbu@xs4all.nl
Felipe Fonseca : felipefonseca@gmail.com
Bronac Ferran : bronacferran@googlemail.com
Pictures on this site by Johanna Aiofe
Felipe Fonseca : felipefonseca@gmail.com
Bronac Ferran : bronacferran@googlemail.com
Pictures on this site by Johanna Aiofe