Hacking/ArtAlternative Browsers

AK/FA 2100

The following slides focus on Browser Art and a few projects that incorporate elements of hacking, chance and the aesthetics of code. With respect to activism and hacking, have another look at the projects discussed in last week’s lecture (Digital Media, part 3). Also, have another look the works of Alexi Shulgin, Mark Napier etc. as discussed in Digital Media, part 1).

Browser Art

• Web Stalker: alternative web browser

• Inspired by free-software movement

• “Technological innovation was class warfare” - Mathew Fuller

• Content in the public sphere

The Web Stalker is a software application for reading and manipulating information on the World Wide Web. It scans the hyperlinks on WWW-pages, displays their HTML code as the Web Stalker agent is analysing the pages, and maps the hyperlink structure in evocative graphics, allowing for a surprising look at the underside of the Web. The Web Stalker, free to download from the I/O/D website, is a unique example of the re-visualisation of data-space at a deep level by artists. It proposes that a new, speculative engagement with software as a key locus of contemporary culture is both essential and fruitful.

http://framework.v2.nl/archive/archive/node/work/default.xslt/nodenr-128483

http://bak.spc.org/iod/

Browser Art

• Mark Daggert

• Blur Browser

http://www.flavoredthunder.com/dev/browser-gestures/#

Browser Art

• Mark Daggert

• History Browser

http://www.flavoredthunder.com/dev/browser-gestures/#

Browser Art

• Web Tracer

http://www.nullpointer.co.uk/-/webtracer2.htm

Browser Art

• Wrong Browser

• Jodi

http://wrongbrowser.com/

Browser Art

• Wrong Browser

• Jodi

http://wrongbrowser.com/

Info War

• Ars Electronica, 1998

• Examined how informational, social and political phenomena interact

• Hacking had a prominent place in the festival

http://www.aec.at/infowar/index.html

Info War• Electronic Disturbance

Theater

• Ricardo Dominguez

• inspired by Gran Fury and Bertolt Brecht

• extending the body’s field of action

• SWARM

• FloodNet http://www.thing.net/~rdom/ecd/EDTECD.html

Info War

• Mongrel

• exposed dynamics of race and class

http://www.mongrelx.org/

Info War

• etoy - Toywar

• celebrated victory against corporate power using grass roots power of the Internet

http://www.etoy.com/

Info War

• Trebor Scholz

• 79 Days: compares media debris about the Yugoslav War

http://collectivate.net/projects/

Crank the Web

• Jonah Brucker-Cohen

The idea behind Crank the Web is to combine ancient forms of automation with today's digital telecommunications technology. All bandwidth should be free and everyone should have access to the fastest speed connection. It is up to you to physically crank your bandwidth so that your internet connection will rely on your personal strength, not personal wealth.

http://www.coin-operated.com/

Crank the Web

• Jonah Brucker-Cohen

The idea behind Crank the Web is to combine ancient forms of automation with today's digital telecommunications technology. All bandwidth should be free and everyone should have access to the fastest speed connection. It is up to you to physically crank your bandwidth so that your internet connection will rely on your personal strength, not personal wealth.

http://www.coin-operated.com/

Every Icon• John Simon Jr

• Tension between its automation and impossibly gradual results

• Will take several hundred trillion years to realize all combinations

Aesthetics ofError

• JODI: Joan Heemskerk and Dirk Paesman

• confusion and technical breakdown

• range of projects that address issues of interactivity, transparency and usability

• often confusing, frustrating and futile

• http://wrongbrowser.jodi.org

• http://404.jodi.org

• http://asdfg.jodi.org

• http://text.jodi.org

• http://oss.jodi.org

• http://www.runme.org/

• http://www.irational.org/cgi-bin/front/front.pl

Net/Code Art Websites