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An echo of early net.art initiatives, the contemporary INC was established in Amsterdam in 2004, in effort to extend research "to design, activism, art, philosophy, political theory and urban studies and [it] is not confined to the Internet alone...the INC maintains that the Internet can only be understood at the conjuncture of these various fields and lines of inquiry." This site is an amazing resource for research and reflection on new and emergent network cultures. The politics of search engines, Wikipedia, social networks, bitcoin, Internet of Things, Gaming and more! The ongoing conferences are backed with anthologies of related essays, most made available for free download on their site. Institute of Network Cultures "Publications" n.d. accessed April 25, 2014. http://networkcultures.org/wpmu/portal/publications/

The new science of social networks is demonstrating how personal interconnections can affect our health. Ideas and habits that influence health for better or for worse can spread through social networks in much the same way that germs spread through communities. Komaroff, Anthony. "Social networks can affect weight, happiness." Harvard Medical School. December 16, 2011.

I found this a little unusual and not exactly what I was expecting for part of my Meta-Data links. But I thought it was relative and intriguing. The reading section titled "Half-Inch Tape Network" discussed the interaction between guerrilla tape and media and commercial cable programs. Points of interest surfaced about the development from the first television to cable to video cassettes and the underground distribution of tapes. "The half-inch tape network has strong similarities to the shape and ambitions of the Internet, which was being developed at that same time, and one might easily see the similarities between the 'alternative channels' created by the half-inch tape network and websites like YouTube" (15 of 20). This research lead me to find the launch of the VHS mode permitted to some YouTube videos in honor of the video cassette's 57th birthday. In the article(s) provided, each mentions something about the warping of visuals in the video, white flecks and a kind of buzzing that is featured. I have also provided a link to an example of the VHS mode on a YouTube video. Prigg, Mark. Mail Online, "Google reveals new 'VHS mode' for YouTube as video tape celebrates 57th birthday." Last modified April 16, 2013. Accessed February 5, 2014. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2309482/Google-reveals-new-VHS-mode-YouTube-video-tape-celebrates-57th-birthday.html. LINK FOR VIDEO EXAMPLE: http://youtu.be/wbesAd3YxaE?t=38s LINK FOR ANOTHER WEBSITE'S INFO: http://techcrunch.com/2013/04/15/youtube-adds-tape-mode-to-select-videos-in-celebration-of-video-casette-recorders-57th-birthday/

Russian net artist, Olia Lialina, one of the trailblazers in this new medium,approached from background in film and theory. Her website, linked above, was also the first network based art gallery, causing much feedback (positive and negative) from offline / online artists. You'll find Lialina's net.art works from the 1990s below her bio and cv information.

Another noteworthy supporter of Internet based artworks is Turbulence. Here, in the archives, dated chronologically by year (96 - 04 for this assignment) an array of artists works commissioned by this wing of New Radio and Performing Arts, Inc, a project that started in 1981 to support artists' experiments with earlier forms of networked media.

This animated video by designer Melih Bilgil provides a concise, relatively easy to understand motion graphic animation about the Internet's infrastructure. Key technological inventions are detailed with a series of highly legible icons that Bilgil developed while studying Communication Design. Faced with inherently technical and sometimes challenging descriptions of various networking protocols and systems, this narrated visualization is an effective supplement to the histories relayed in the Cybernetic Counterculture texts. Melih Bilgil. "History of the Internet" Vimeo posted 2009. https://vimeo.com/2696386 Accessed February 11, 2014

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T2GRAVpbDds Somewhat related

Documentation of one of several "satellite art" projects that emerged in the late 1970s and early 80s. Artists taking advantage of residency opportunities with NASA to access various telecommunications networks! Here a project of Kit Galloway and Sherrie Rabinowitz, a platform for this duo's query "what can people separated by distance do together through technology?" --- this 'sculpture' is fascinating to me in the ways that it illustrates the allure of contact, the social practice of technology. Of course the novelty-spectacle of an activity that is now commonplace is also humorous! "Excerpts from a Hole-in-Space - the mother of all video chats" posted by Larry Press March 15, 2008. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QSMVtE1QjaU Accessed February 7, 2014

Here's a tour of a MUD in action. Every time I read the Dibbell article I wonder about what this sort of 'gameplay' looks like. I decided to search one out on Youtube. This video provides a voice-annotated tour that illustrates the Multi-User Dungeon in its starkly abstract textual form. The impersonal nature of text as letter-forms distributed across a network, aligning with the affordances of anonymity, but there's also the thrall of live communication. Words are powerful and the seductive qualities of connection transcend the medium at hand. "Let's Show! MUD: Part 3: Grand Finale" Posted by FrogurtX. June 29, 2009. Accessed February 27, 2014. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oQJ2xG0LdVo&list=PLgVWAwe9s2rJhafD0gv2mo-W9d0bvh6sl

The Circle by David Eggers is an interesting take on social networks and the possibility of a future dystopia cyber landscape. It is about a young woman who starts working at a facebook/google like company called The Circle and looses her private life her job. This novel is similar to design fiction in presenting what could possibly happen in the future, but in this case it is a negative view. If you are interested in context collapse, social media, communication and interaction this book is really interesting. I have linked to a 45 minute audio recording in which David Eggers reads a excerpt from his book. Here is a better summary of the entire story if you like the exerpt: "When Mae Holland is hired to work for the Circle, the world's most powerful internet company, she feels she's been given the opportunity of a lifetime. The Circle, run out of a sprawling California campus, links users' personal emails, social media, banking, and purchasing with their universal operating system, resulting in one online identity and a new age of civility and transparency. As Mae tours the open-plan office spaces, the towering glass dining facilities, the cozy dorms for those who spend nights at work, she is thrilled with the company's modernity and activity. There are parties that last through the night, there are famous musicians playing on the lawn, there are athletic activities and clubs and brunches, and even an aquarium of rare fish retrieved from the Marianas Trench by the CEO. Mae can't believe her luck, her great fortune to work for the most influential company in the world-even as life beyond the campus grows distant, even as a strange encounter with a colleague leaves her shaken, even as her role at the Circle becomes increasingly public. What begins as the captivating story of one woman's ambition and idealism soon becomes a heart-racing novel of suspense, raising questions about memory, history, privacy, democracy, and the limits of human knowledge" E

Eggars, David. The Circle. Knopf, 2013.

This beautifully animated four-minute mini-film provides a simple yet profound response to a poignant question: What is the connection between social networks and being lonely?

Nice! This is very powerful example of critical media practice. Augmenting traditional rhetorical appeals and persuasive gestures with the affordances of digital animation and sound design.

Comparing the site in 2007 to the way the site is now in 2014, it definitely looks dated and like it is still in the process of being developed. The thing that sticks out as looking the most dated and out of place is the "ways to shop" menu on the left side column that features large and stylistically ill fitting icons with their category names. In comparison to the current version of Etsy that is designed and branded with aesthetics in mind, the basic homepage layout and awkward use of color and icons make it appear bare and the lack of style or design suggest the brand was still new and had yet to develop a distinctive style.

Yes, I see what you mean ---the old site seems a product of the Web 2.0 craze, a rather non-descript template, while the icons , older still, whiffs of geocities sites even! It's interesting to see the development of Etsy's brand as well as to speculate on what other factors were at play. Emerging in mid 00s, it might be fun to trace out other 'genres' of Web 2.0 that bear influence on Etsy's aesthetic genealogy---online auctions? social networks?

This is a project that could be categorized as design fiction. The artist/architect Mark Shepard explores the possible ways in which the proliferation of 'sentient cities', urban environments equipped with many, many networked sensing devices, might jeopardize privacy and increase unsolicited data collection. He does this using the affordances of fiction, designing and building functional prototypes for an imagined 'near-future' context. This sort of 'critical making' is a strong supplement to traditional modes of scholarship which Shepard also pursues. Mark Shepard "Sentient City Survival Kit" 2010 http://www.survival.sentientcity.net/info.html Accessed January 25, 2014

Radical Software was created in the 1970s by Beryle Korot, Phyllis Gershuny, and Ira Shneider to create a network of video sharing. This site has PDF files of the Eleven issues published and distributed by Radical software between the years 1970 and 1974. The website also provides the history of The Raindance Corporation which was created in 1969 by a radical media activist and artist by the name of Frank Gillette. The general Idea behind Raindance Corporation was to created a collection of works and ideas for "implementing communication tools in the project for social change." The website also discusses in detail the intent of Radical Software and fight towards creating a world of free and accessible information.

thanks, this is an excellent example of primary source document, the actual artifact providing visual detail of its historical context that escapes easy translation. This site is equipped with a well organized search and browse function, too!

Looking back onto the history of Myspace, the design of the site 10 years ago, in 2004, does look very dated and old. Within today's digital world, simplicity seems to be the dominating characteristic of most online spaces. Myspace circa 2004, however, floods the viewer with link options for browsing, blogging, gaming, listening and other avenues. The color-scheme and grid implementation also seem very elementary. The overall appearance of the site almost has a corporate feeling to it. As though the user might be signing onto their company's server, or company discussion board. Myspace was very link-heavy, though blocks of text are absent from the homepage. The only images that are presented are links to member's profiles, and a few advertisements. Within the abundance of links, many of them do work, and take you onto another part of the website. There aren't any interesting features that require any sort of tinkering to get working on the homepage. A few clicks can take you to the music page, where one would assume that they could listen to some tunes, but they would be sadly disappointed. Many of the featured bands haven't updated their sites since 2005, and their music players don't load. One of the blocks within the homepage reads "cool new people", a headline that I immediately remembered, and made me feel embarrassed all at the same time. The use of the word "cool" seems forced when looked at in this context today, and is not current in the slightest. There also seems to be an abundance of exclamation points within small blocks of text near the bottom of the page, which again, feel forced. Nothing stayed the same between 2004 and 2014. The new Myspace is geared entirely towards music, and seems to almost completely abandon many of the social aspects that they once pushed so relentlessly. The Myspace logo stayed mostly the same, though small differences could be detected.

Thanks this is a fun site for consideration. Early presence in the social network genre, displacing Friendster, then displaced itself by Facebook, only to adapt, as you point out, to a predominantly musically centered audience. I find this interesting to think about in relation to many other user-generated content sites, which have, it seems, ramped up the 'social' aspects in recent years --- survival and resistance--- The excessive use of 'cool' and of exclamation points is perhaps irony long since faded in effect?

Like the old websites accessed through the Wayback machine, this is another great archival resource for research. Primary source documents offer direct reflection of the language and design from a specific point in time, without the inherent filtering of such content through secondary sources. Specifically, like Radical Software, Whole Earth Catalog was a critical tool within the networked countercultures of the 1960s / 70s. Here, you can skim through digitized collection of Whole Earth Catalogs, subsequent "CoEvolution Quarterly" , "Whole Earth Software Catalog" and other pursuits. Identify recurrent patterns along with curious or lesser known topics of these cybernetically inclined thinkers. The site itself is a remediation of the magazine as "evaluation and access device," using popular categories of the original for navigation. "Whole Earth Catalog: Access to Tools and Ideas" Accessed February 2, 2014. http://www.wholeearth.com

"The GNU Project is not limited to the core operating system. We aim to provide a whole spectrum of software, whatever many users want to have. This includes application software. See the Free Software Directory for a catalogue of free software application programs."

I followed some links from the net.art year in review reading assigned, clicked around, and found this cool collection. Stolen fragments of famous pieces of art. Although the documentation was of course displayed and shared via web, what connects it to the topic of internet art seems to be the concept of fragments. That though having a piece of rock from a famous piece of art may not be much, when collected together these fragments form a commentary on something bigger, perhaps the absurd "value" Deshamps (for instance) objects are set at.

Nice, thanks. Fragmentation is a more tangible idea with which to understand technical aspects of the internet, like 'packet switching'. Related to the abstraction of fragments, there are resonant connections between Performance, Conceptual Art, the push towards 'ephemerality' in the 1960s and the ways in which those ideas resurface with new media and internet art in the 1990s. 10100101110101101.org making that connection explicitly. Please be sure to add the bibliographic citation at the end of your posts.