Category: Art

Local Report

local report: home
For those of you wondering what I have been up to for the past month or so, here is your answer: Called, Whitman Local Report, this is a performance piece utilizing mobile phones to create a montage of video “reports” and phone “reports” all in real time (live).
I created some custom software that runs on the phones (Nokia 6710’s) to shoot and automatically upload video from the participant’s phones (30 of them) and more software to playback the videos as they come in (with some controls for play, pause, stop, next and previous).
Hans, my technical collaborator, took care of setting up an Asterisk server and queue to receive the phone in reports and play those out as they came in.
We have one performance to go, please tune into the live stream, come to the live event or check it out afterwards. The previous 4 are available now if you would like a taste.

Here is some press that I just came across: Art and Innovation Collide

ITP Winter Show 2004

ITP Winter Show 2004
Sunday, December 19 from 2 to 6pm
Monday, December 20 from 5 to 9pm

A two-day explosion of interactive sight, sound and technology from the student artists and innovators at ITP.

An oversized Greenwich Village loft houses the computer labs, rotating exhibitions, and production workshops that are ITP — the Interactive Telecommunications Program. Founded in 1979 as the first graduate education program in alternative media, ITP has grown into a living community of technologists, theorists, engineers, designers, and artists uniquely dedicated to pushing the boundaries of interactivity in the real and digital worlds. A hands-on approach to experimentation, production and risk-taking make this hi-tech fun house a creative home not only to its 230 students, but also to an extended network of the technology industry’s most daring and prolific practitioners.

Interactive Telecommunications Program
Tisch School of the Arts
New York University
721 Broadway, 4th Floor South
New York NY 10003

Take the left elevators to the 4th Floor
This event is free and open to the public

No need to RSVP

For questions: 212-998-1880
email: itp.inquiries@nyu.edu
http://itp.nyu.edu/show

Hillary support’s The INDUCE Act

I was dismayed to learn that Senator Hillary Clinton has come out and in fact co-sponsored Senator Hatch’s Induce Act. What follows is a draft of a letter that I am writing to Sen. Clinton to express my concern. I hope that others will do the same.

Here is some background material:
http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c108:S.2560:
http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,64315,00.html
http://techlawadvisor.com/induce/
http://www.corante.com/importance/archives/004563.html
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20040618-3906.html
http://www.futureofmusic.org/articles/INDUCEanalysis.cfm
http://action.eff.org/site/pp.asp?c=esJNJ5OWF&b=164928

Like your iPod, read this:
http://www.eff.org/IP/Apple_Complaint.php

Please comment on the letter as you see fit.

Dear Senator Clinton,

I was dismayed to learn that you have come out in support of Senator Hatch’s Induce Act. I hope that on further consideration of the issues that this bill covers that you change your stance to better reflect the opinions of your constituents and for the betterment of our society.

The Induce act as it currently is written does much to stifle free-speech, artistic and fair uses of media. Imposing legal responsibility on the makers of devices and software for illegal use such device or software will create a burden so great on manufacturers and creators of such programs that they will not develop or offer products that have potential for misuse.

I fear that by trying to curb the theft of copyrighted material you will instead be curbing the ability for individuals and groups with legitimate uses for the technology that enables such to use it. Being thoroughly immersed in an academic and artistic atmosphere, I am witness every day to fair uses of technology that would not exist today were such a law in existence. In fact I feel that the software that I am using to write this letter would not have been developed simply because it includes the ability to cut and paste text from any source into the document.

I believe that should this Bill become law that it will undo much of the progress of free-speech and alternative media creation that has been enabled by the internet, personal electronic devices, computers, tape recorders and so on. Furthermore it will be a giant step backwards and lead to increased power by the media and further relegate citizens to the role of consumer without a voice.

I hope that you will reconsider your position on this matter.

Thank you for your time.

Sincerely,
Shawn Van Every