<nettime-ann> Programmable Media: Open Platforms for Creativity and Collaboration

["Turbulence" <turbulence@turbulence.org>]

.
Programmable Media: Open Platforms for Creativity and Collaboration

A symposium organized and presented by New Radio and Performing Arts, Inc.,
hosted by Pace Digital Gallery, New York City.

PARTICIPANTS: John (Craig) Freeman, Tom Igoe, Cary Peppermint, Amit Pitaru,
Michelle Riel, Helen Thorington, and Mushon Zer-Aviv and Dan Phiffer.

Date: March 2, 2007
Time: 10 am to 3:30 pm
Venue: Multipurpose Room, 1 Pace Plaza, Pace University
Free and open to all
Registration: send an email to turbulence@turbulence.org
Contact: Helen Thorington (newradio@turbulence.org); Jillian McDonald
(jmcdonald2@pace.edu)

In July 2004 the not-for-profit media organization New Radio and Performing
Arts, Inc.  began the networked_performance blog to chronicle observations
that internet based creative practice is expanding due to the ready
availability of wireless, mobile, and GPS computational devices and the
emergence of the programmable web. We observe that artists, designers and
researchers working in digitally networked and programmable environments are
increasingly making projects that are media platforms, tools and services
which are open and contingent upon participation and the contribution of
content to realize them.

The March 2nd Symposium, Programmable Media: Open Platforms for Creativity
and Collaboration, hosted by Pace University, will explore two forms of
current practice. First, the creation of original software to create tools
and services for creative and social use, such as a freely available 3-D
drawing tool and musical instrument, or a public commons meta layer
conceived as a continuous public space for collaboration. Second, the
creation of original work using the tools available within open platforms
such as Second Life and MySpace to build community and raise awareness.

SCHEDULE

10:00 - 10:45 am	Introduction: Social Coding: Tools, Platforms,
Systems 

Helen Thorington: Turbulence.org, networked_performance blog
Michelle Riel: Siting this Symposium in current practice
Q&A (audience)

10:45 - 11:00 am	Transition

11:00 am - 12.20 pm	Roundtable 1:

Mushon Zer-Aviv + Dan Phiffer: The Social Space of the Net: ShiftSpace
Amit Pitaru: Sonic Wire Sculptor
Tom Igoe: Networked Objects: Email Clock & Air Quality Meter & others 
Discussion (with moderators)
Q&A (audience)

12.20 - 2:00 pm	lunch break 

2:00 - 3:20 pm	Roundtable 2:

Cary Peppermint: The Performative Space of the Net
John (Craig) Freeman: Participatory Installation Art in Second Life
Michelle Riel: Responsive Soft-Biological Systems
Discussion (with moderators)
Q&A (audience)

Participant Biographies:

John (Craig) Freeman is an artist and educator who uses digital technologies
to produce place-based virtual reality and site-specific public art. The
virtual reality work is made up of projected interactive environments that
lead the audience from global satellite images to immersive, user navigated
scenes on the ground. As one explores these virtual spaces, the story of the
place unfolds in a montage of nonlinear media. Freeman's work has been
exhibited internationally. He has recently introduced it into the 3-D
graphical world of Second Life. Freeman is currently an Associate Professor
of New Media at Emerson College in Boston. 

Tom Igoe teaches courses in physical computing and networking, exploring
ways to allow digital technologies to sense and respond to a wider range of
human physical expression. Coming from a background in theatre, his work has
centered on physical interaction related to live performance and public
space. His current research focuses on ecologically sustainable practices in
technology development. Along with Dan O'Sullivan, he co-authored the book
"Physical Computing: Sensing and Controlling the Physical World with
Computers," which has been adopted by numerous digital art and design
programs around the world. He is working on another book on networked
objects, for O'Reilly Media, due out in 2007. Projects include a series of
networked banquet table centerpieces and musical instruments; an email
clock; and a series of interactive dioramas, created in collaboration with
M.R. Petit. He has consulted for The American Museum of the Moving Image,
EAR Studio, Diller + Scofidio Architects, Eos Orchestra, and others. He is a
contributor to MAKE magazine and a collaborator on the Arduino open source
microcontroller project.  He hopes someday to work with monkeys, as well.

Cary Peppermint is a conceptual artist who works with digital technologies
and performance art. He is assistant professor of art at Colgate University
where he teaches courses in the theory and practice of digital art.
Peppermint distributes his ongoing network performances through an
independent website of information-art called "Restlessculture.net."
(http://www.restlessculture.net) The focus of Cary's work is the creative
inquiry into the cultural effects of an increasingly interconnected,
information-based global culture and the setting of information free through
accessible, searchable, database-driven new media objects and performances.
His net.art includes some of the first real-time, interactive performances
realized via CU-SEEME and early internet browser technologies. Cary's latest
works engage the concepts of wilderness, space, the American frontier, and
environmental ethics and explore how new media technologies both limit and
expand our conceptions of nature and the environment, questioning how we
live and make art with and in nature. He has curated two international
exhibitions of digitally infused eco-art, "Technorganic" and "Wilderness
Information Network." Cary exhibits internationally and has been the
recipient of numerous awards, including a Franklin Furnace Performance
Grant, Experimental Television Workshop Grant, and NYSCA's Decentralization
Grant. His work is in the collections of the Walker Art Center, Rhizome.org
at the New Museum for Contemporary Art, The Whitney Museum of American Art,
and Computer Fine Arts.

Dan Phiffer is a new media hacker from California, interested in exploring
cultural dimensions of inexpensive communications networks such as voice
telephony and the Internet. Drawing on his computer science background,
Dan's software projects seek to provide meaningful creative opportunities
through intuitive user interfaces. Dan now lives in Brooklyn, New York and
is pursuing a Masters from NYU's Interactive Telecommunications Program.

Amit Pitaru is an artist, designer and researcher of Human Machine
Interaction (HCI). Amit cross-palliates his work between a wide range of
fields; As an artist, he develops custom-made musical and animation
instruments, and has recently exhibited/performed at the London Design
Museum, Paris Pompidou Center, Sundance Film festival and ICC Museum in
Tokyo. Amit is also a designer with particular interest in Assistive
Technologies and Universal Design. He is currently commissioned by the
MacArthur Foundation to write a chapter for an upcoming book on his recent
work - creating toys and software that are inclusively accessible to people
with various disabilities. As an educator, Amit develops curriculums that
focus on the coupling of technology and the creative thought process. He
regularly teaches at New York University's ITP and Cooper Union's Arts
department.

Michelle Riel is associate professor of new media and chair of the
Teledramatic Arts and Technology Department at California State University
Monterey Bay. Riel collaborates with turbulence.org on the
networked_performance blog, documenting and presenting on emerging work that
is both networked and live. She is an award winning designer and NEA
commissioned net artist. Her current work, antSongs, is a responsive music
system collaborating with ants to explore issues of sustainability,
community, and globalism.

Helen Thorington is an award winning writer, sound composer and media
artist. Thorington is founder and co- director of the independent media
organization, New Radio and Performing Arts, Inc., whose projects include
the national weekly radio series, New American Radio, Turbulence.org
(1996-present), and the networked_performance blog (2004-present).
Thorington publishes and presents internationally on these projects. She is
currently teaching in the Department of Arts and New Media at Emerson
College.

Mushon Zer-Aviv was born in Israel in 1976. He has been involved in and
initiated cross-media projects in art, design, comics, animation, online
culture and media activism. Co-founder of Shual.com design studio. A teacher
at Shekar College of Design & Engineering. An active contributor to
Pixelsurgeon.com, Exego.net and Maarav.org.il online magazines. Curated BD4D
Tel-Aviv and started Upgrade! Tel-Aviv events, both series aimed at creating
and developing the Israeli new-media creative network. Mushon is currently
studying at NYU's Interactive Telecommunication Program.


Jo-Anne Green, Co-Director
New Radio and Performing Arts, Inc.: http://new-radio.org
New York: 917.548.7780 . Boston: 617.522.3856
Turbulence: http://turbulence.org
New American Radio: http://somewhere.org
Networked_Performance Blog: http://turbulence.org/blog
Upgrade! Boston: http://turbulence.org/upgrade 



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