Whiskey Tango Foxtrot am I going to do?  Our rules and regs for this one are super broad.  It has to bridge online and offline networks.  And it has to do with the DNC.  Awesome.  That’s like saying, we need a thing to do stuff, and it has to do with the color blue.  What?  Seriously?  I’m a touch frustrated by this one.  I’ve got no idea.

Stream of thought…

Sponsors…Superdelegates…corporate accountability…

My desire to make a political statement is completely absent with this.  I want to make plenty of political statements, but I don’t know what this needs to end up being.  In a way it’s the lack of requirements on the…physical presence of the final product that gets me.  Sure, you could look at it like it’s super easy because you can do anything you want, but this just lacks all form of sense.

It’s too fucking broad, I guess is what I’m trying to say.  But alas, feces occurs.  One must do what one must do.

I guess I have to start with defining the networks I’m trying to connect.  So what I’m thinking is the offline networks of sponsors or delegates or superdelegates or something.  For some reason that just seems best…slash easiest.  Then connecting them with the online network of…people online.  I like the idea of faux creating a site that allows for the bidding of superdelegates.  For instance take a panoramic picture of the pepsi center and over each seat information of a superdelegate pops up and you can see their corporate connections and how much it would cost to buy their vote.

But then I don’t necessarily enjoy that because it makes a commentary I don’t really like about superdelegates.  While I see their purpose as useless at best, I don’t necessarily want to make that kind of commentary about them.

So the next idea I had was to create a scene in flash that represents standing at the podium with a speech in front of the person on paper with sections highlighted that correspond to each sponsor and the candidate mentioning the sponsor in their speech…but what is this really connecting?  The online network of politically interested people with the offline network of sponsors?  Seems pretty fucking dumb, really.  Who the hell knows.

It’s due in like 2 and a half weeks.  Hopefully the weekend before the project I’ll have an idea.

~J

With the eharmony thing started, project two is taking shape.  Soon I’m going to make a page to place all the images from the evolving project, so they can all be located in one spot, with a more thorough discussion and dissection of my ideas here on the main page.

I think.

Here’s how I’ll be progressing:  Recreate webpages in such a way as to make fun of them, society at large, or just be childish (hey, gotta be good at something!) In a second part of project 2, I will learn a new photoshop technique that creates graffiti by way of affecting font…not sure how it works yet, but it’s bookmarked!  I’ll be learning soon.  As the graffiti text comes to shape I will then place it over prominent webpages, combining the graffiti you’d see on a fence or billboard in physical space, with the online images you’d see of those same things.

The third and final piece to project two (if at all possible) is to create a flash app of some sort where users can actually draw.  This will allow them to create their own graffiti on different webpages that I provide.  The graffiti they can create will not be very robust, nor will the drawing program, but it gets the point across.

I think.

I just want to capture and deface already existing web images.

~J

I’m recreating sites to add social commentary to pop-culture, but the thing is — the Yesmen take things so seriously, and have real political goals. I just want to be sarcastic and smarmy. So below, take a look at unHarmony. Comments encouraged and welcomed.

Now, part of me doesn’t really care at all whether it’s some form of social or political protest, advocacy activism, or simply trying to make people uncomfortable, but I tend to like it all. Or at least I like the idea of doing it all. So when I heard about tactical media, I was super excited. Info about it Here at Wikipedia.

It’s been compared to culture jamming which, aside from also sounding particularly cool, is based upon the principle of trying to either steal or inhabit space normally occupied by mass media — you know, jam culture transmissions. Rad.

Wikipedia (which is never wrong) says that a slogan often adopted by tactical media participants and activists is “don’t hate the media, become the media.” So what we’re now talking about is essentially being the media for subversive purposes. Daddy like. I work in media, I should be able to figure this out. I desperately want to abandon my original project idea, especially after doing some research about subversive/alternative/activist/tactical media. I really love the idea of culture jamming if for no other reason than, if on a minute scale, it makes it harder for establishment to tell people what to do. I hate it when establishment tells me what to do if for no other reason than I question their motives. In some sense, and in some cases I suppose my motives and their motives could be similar or even identical — but at least mine are mine.

So that being said, I really love the idea of abandoning my project and trying to figure out how best to venture into a world of tactical media to cause disruption. I suppose for this I need to venture into the world of The YesMen. I’ll try not to copy them, or step on the toes of others in the class venturing on the same lines…but to me that seems right now to be my best option.

~J

I especially love the way everyone can interpret art in their own way, or situations in their own way, or even static stories their own way in order to tell a different story each time — a story that speaks to them more than the one anyone else tells.

So I’m not sure exactly what to do for this project I’m working on.  I’m trying to create an image collage of sorts to allow for some interactive art where people can tell their own story by interpreting an image I put together.  Though one of my favorite things about art is social disruption (peaceful.)  So how do I do that?

No freaking idea.  But here are some basic images I’ve started appropriating so far.

So it’s not so much appropriating other net artists, but more appropriating the works of others as filtered through google searches for terms related to storytelling, then changing them in a way that makes me think of stories (the wispy outline) then allowing users to employ one of the greatest phenomenons the Internet has spawned: commenting, to tell their own story.

The dude abides.

Do research…find out fun things about artists, expand my art-knowledge, find what kinds of art I really actually like!

I’ve been to the smithsonians and the louvre and other museums and galleries and seen famous paintings and statues, average paintings and statues, and below average paintings and statues.   For my tastes, these things are all far too static to really be THAT interesting.

On the other hand though, I absolutely love photography, but I introduce a double-standard here.  I love photography in all its static glory.   I suppose to me the lack of ability to apply any sort of “post-effect” is disheartening.  Adding things like filters and effects, and adding image distortion (and audio distortion now that I think of it) is really exceptionally cool.  So the fact that I can take a photograph and make it an HDR image (search flickr for HDR images) or I can simply Ansel Adams some sort of nature photograph, is really excellent to me.  You can’t do that to a statue.

But I guess there’s the rub.  Maybe you just have to take pictures of famous things and then remix those.  The ideas of remix is so much cooler to me than static art.

I think.

~J

The best idea came in around 4p, just as work was winding down and I was getting ready to head to class. Make my voicemail a RickRoll. I had toyed with the idea of calling various people, and businesses and Rickrolling them by phone. However, the idea was brought to my attention that perhaps I should set my voicemail to act as a Rickroll. I dug the idea, still do, but alas nobody that calls me would get it. Stinks.

So coming up this Friday (April somethingorother) is First Friday and the Santa Fe artwalk. I think I be going. DOM (Denver Open Media) has a superb CD exchange where mix CDs are made, and exchanged. Show up, drink free beer, exchange the mix CD you made, leave with 20 new mixes. What I’m thinking of doing is taking Rick Astley’s song, and then “mixing it” through various forms of mediation. As in, play it through a phone and record it, play the song once forward and once backward and then mix those. Play it through great speakers, but wrap tinfoil loosely around the speakers, and record it. That sort of stuff.

Any other cool ideas?

is that its much more malleable than other forms of art.  sure, wet clay is malleable, but once it actually becomes what’s socially and culturally accepted as art, there’s no changing.

the fact that one can tak two things very un-art (or maybe one quasi-art, and one not art) and make it art, is incredibly impressive.

while not exactly public art, dotwalk is definitely personal art, highlighting the innate ability of art to be different for everyone.

ch-ch-check out socialfiction.org for more — <a href=”http://socialfiction.org/index.php?search=dot+walk”>.Walk</a>