Mirko Tobias Schaefer

The issue of liveness raises a set of question in the field of ICT. Aspects of live transmission and real-time social interaction can be witnessed in many Internet and Web-applications: video conference applications, web cams and voice-over-IP facilitate real-time tele-presence. Other applications allow musicians to connect online and perform together “live” while being geographically apart. Streaming video emulates the “live” transmission of events expanding a local audience to a potential multitude of viewers on the Web.

However, when approaching liveness and ICT, the aspect of real-time has

to be considered. It addresses the phenomenon of information and computing processes being executed in real-time. Here the demo-scene can serve as an appropriate example to point out the quality of real-time processes. As a computer subculture, the demo scene revolves around the creation of moving images. In opposition to common video files, which are computed in real-time, that means a computer creates these images from a small program rather than just replaying them from a file. Using the demo-scene as an introductory example, I will present how real-time as technical design is exceeding the concept of “live transmission”. Showing further examples (electronic trading, surveillance, web cam porn, computer games, etc.) I will point out how “liveness” and real-time unfold in contemporary information society.

My talk has to be considered as an exploratory presentation of a variety of aspect in ICT that might be fruitful for a discussion on liveness. I cannot present a systematic research nor do I provide a theoretical approach to said phenomenon. However, I hope my presentation will draw attention to questions of technical design and media practises in order to start a fruitful discussion on issues of liveness.

Texts

Introduction to demos at Digitalcraft.org

http://www.digitalcraft.org/index.php?artikel_id=411

Koenig, Aaron. 2004. Coole Kunst im Rechner. Die Zeit 29/2004

http://www.zeit.de/2004/29/T-Demo-Programmierer?page=all

Green, Dave. 1995. Demo or Die. Wired Magazine, 07/1995

http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/3.07/democoders.html

<http://grass.untergrund.net/pixelstorm_hi.pdf>

On electronic trading:

Stokes, Jones. 2009. The Matrix, but with money: the world of high-speed

trading. Ars Technica, July 28 2009.

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2009/07/-it-sounds-like-something.ars

Field trip to the exhibition Opening: The Show

We are invited to the exhibition Opening: The Show by Maurice Bogaert in the Centrum Beeldende Kunst Utrecht (CBKU) around the corner of Janskerkhof, at Plompetorengracht 4. Opening: The Show is a virtual exhibition in the sense that what is shown is actually not there. What the audience sees is a live broadcast of an exhibition that looks like it takes place within the space of the CBKU but in fact happens at six different art venues in and around Utrecht. Each venue individually curated an exhibition in a scale model representing one sixth of the CBKU exhibition space. In the CBKU the audience sees an exhibition that does and does not take place in the CBKU gallery.

Opening: The Show opens at January 28 at 2010 with a screening of art video’s (“Scotty, What About the Beamer?”). The next day, during our seminar, the artist Maurice Bogaert will show us around and explain his work.