[Air-l] FW: ::fibreculture:: Fibreculture::Brisbane_2003::fibrepower:
Danny Butt
db at dannybutt.net
Mon Jul 7 20:14:36 PDT 2003
Hi
I thought Air-l members may be interested in this.
Cheers
Danny
--
http://www.dannybutt.net
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Fibreculture::Brisbane_2003::::::::::
fibrepower::
Currents in Australasian New Media Research and Internet Culture
::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
July 11, 12, 13th:::2003
Fibreculture
http://www.fibreculture.org
Brisbane::Powerhouse - Centre for the Live Arts
New Farm Park, Brisbane QLD Tel: 3358 - 8622
::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
Fibreculture::Brisbane_2003::::::Fibrepower::Schedule & Themes
Three day Meeting
Fri July 11, Sat 12, Sun 13th
Powerhouse: Courier Mail room
Fibreculture :: in association with critical new media studies
sections in universities across Brisbane, invites you to a meeting in
July 2003 on theory, policy, practice, and education in New Media and
the Internet. Fibrepower :: Currents in Australasian New Media
Research and Internet Culture will bring together practitioners in the
academy and industry from around Australia and New Zealand to
participate in critically informed debates about new media and its
cultures. It follows the ANZCA03 conference
(see http://www.bgsb.qut.edu.au/conferences/ANZCA03/index.html -
9-11 July at QUT Gardens Point Campus, Brisbane).
:: Theme of the 2003 Fibreculture Meeting :: fibrepower::
In academic and popular discourses, new media, the Internet, and
'virtual reality' are often described as just this - a 'virtual' reality,
an Other, a 'cyberspace' which is somehow disconnected from the 'real'
and secondary to 'life' experiences and issues. It is rarely accepted in
the dominant Internet discourses of commercial and social culture
that the truth is vastly different. New media and networked
technologies currently pervade our lives and connect us ever more
closely and solidly as citizens of networked society.
If information and knowledge, in the new economy, are 'power', then
the copper, optical, or wireless fibres spanning the networks are
conduits for this power; they are full of power, and powerful. Their
daily influence and the network's influence on human society is real
and tangible. Fibreculture:: wants to address this continued
insistence on conceptualising networked life and Internet cultures as
a separate, second-rate or exotic reality, a dichotomy which obscures
fact and prevents any in-depth engagement with and critique of the
power of 'fibre' over and in our everyday lives.
Set in a literal and figurative locus of power from the previous,
industrial, era, ::fibrepower:: will engage with a range
of themes that disclose the unseen power of fibre-culture in the
informational age. Outcomes of this event will include a high profile
public forum, an online publication of refereed articles, and deeper
connections between new media industries, the academy and
others. The meeting will be held at the Brisbane Powerhouse from
July 11-13, 2003.
(For reports from past fibreculture meetings and updates on
fibreculture 2003, please see the Website at
http://www.fibreculture.org/.)
::::::::::::
FRIDAY nite JULY 11th
7 p.m. Welcome and Registration
8 p.m. Session 1: Fibrepower in the Regions
:: Headed by Gerard Goggin
Public forum with Guest Speakers, Panelists, and Q&A (TBA)
In Australasia regional and rural areas continue to miss out on
reliable and fast access to the global networks. This contributes
significantly to the growing digital divide, and carries important
implications for public and private policy. How can we increase the
fibrepower of the regions, and what are current examples of best
practice?
Gerard Goggin (g.goggin at uq.edu.au) is a postdoctoral research
fellow in the Centre for Critical and Cultural Studies, University of
Queensland. He is writing a book entitled *Networked Imaginings:
Cultural History of Australian Internet*, and has long had an interest
in rural and regional internet and telecommunications (not least from
living in the country himself).
plus
:: Introduction to the Fibreculture List & its Open Session,
M/C Collaboration, fc Webjournal, and other Fibreculture activities
with Geert Lovink, David Teh, Axel Bruns, and other list facilitators.
**10 p.m. OPENING Art & Music
:: Digital Literacies :: New Media Arts Exhibition
:: Guest djs and vjs. No host bar.
In conjunction with the conference, Fibreculture and fineArtforum are
offering an online gallery space set up as an opportunity for artists
to explore critical literacies and conference themes.
An A4 gallery of resonant works will also be displayed at the meeting
venue providing opportunity for practitioners and attendees to
respond visually to the fibrepower themes both beforehand and
during the discussions. Organized by Jane Turner.
---
::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
Fibrepower::Weekend Schedule - Discussion Sessions
Brisbane Powerhouse - July 12th and 13th
SATURDAY JULY 12th
8 a.m.::Registration
8:45 a.m.::Welcome
9 - 10:45 a.m.::Session 2: Intellectual Property-Intellectual
Possibilities
:: Headed by Esther Milne and Kate Crawford
The exercise of intellectual property rights can stifle the generation of
intellectual property. The U.S. Digital Millennium Copyright Act
(DMCA) has been abused on any number of occasions. How can
copyright be reconfigured for the networked age? How can creative
rights be protected, and innovation ensured? How can fibrepower be
harnessed to drive intellectual possibilities? What measures,
policies and action should be implemented to protect indigenous
cultural heritage and intellectual property?
10:45 a.m. Morning tea & coffee
11:15 - 1 p.m.::Session 3: Information Warfare
:: Headed by Steve Stockwell and Geert Lovink
Weapons of mass destruction may remain elusive - but weapons of
mass disinformation are evident in any political or military conflict, if
you know where and how to look. Information warfare adds to the
firepower of conventional weapons arsenals. How do we disarm the
information warriors? How do we distinguish freedom of information
fighters from info-terrorists? How do we keep truth from becoming a
battlefield detainee?
1 p.m.LUNCH
2:00 - 4 p.m. ::Session 4: Fibre Access Geopolitics Wired
:: Headed by Guy Redden
Much has been made of the distributed nature of the Internet. Does
this make it a means through which previously unheard voices can
carry, enhancing democracy? Or is it more that network capitalism
can now get its tentacles everywhere, determining access and usage
on its terms? This session invites critical appraisal and geopolitical
interpretation of the spread of informational networks. How does the
digital divide play out across space, class and ethnicity? Is access a
luxury? With Google in China and aol.com in Australia and
numerous other mergers and shifts, who controls the networks? With
concentration/convergence, will there be an enclosure of the
networks, new ways of constraining and exploiting their use to the
detriment of the 'online commons'? Will distributed fibrepower
continue to give an edge to international activism, indigenous rights,
direct democracy/publishing, and other mobilisations against the
centralisation of power? At least relative to other media?
Consideration also needs to given to how these matters can be
regulated. Is it time for a United Networks alongside the United
Nations and who would hold the veto rights?!
____
4 p.m.:: Warchalking Walk - Methods & Details
Bring laptop with a wireless modem installed.
Anyone with knowledge, please attend.
____
7 p.m. Fibreculture dinner (optional)
__
SUNDAY JULY 13th
9 a.m. Registration
10 - 11:45 a.m.::Session 5: The Internet Is Not Virtual
:: Headed by Axel Bruns
The myth of a separate, containable 'cyberspace' persists despite all
evidence to the contrary. Rather than perpetuating new age visions of
leaving the body behind to virtually 'inhabit' cyberspace, it is
important to begin to realise that cyberspace, or fibrespace, already
envelops society; is society. What are the implications of this fact?
For example, how can disciplines like teaching and publishing turn to
integrating Internet content, literacies, and technologies as part of
their core activities rather than as an adjunct afterthought? In doing
so, how can this 'fibrepower' be released from the strangleholds of
outdated mythologies?
11:45 LUNCH
12:45 - 2:30 p.m.Session 6 ::Teaching Fibrepower::
:: Headed by Molly Hankwitz and Danny Butt
Debates over technology and education are often couched in
between the university sector hanging on to its critical freedom,
authority and scholarship vs. government policy directions which are
pushing higher education, among other sectors, into more corporatized,
privatised spheres. Meanwhile, schools, colleges, and universities
are struggling to keep up with the pace of technology. Teaching
methods and approaches to cybercultures lag behind and students
are often forced to take the initiative into their own hands if they hope
to build useful skills sets and acquire an understanding of new
media. Whole communities miss out on participating if they cannot
make their voices heard. How can teaching institutions redress this
situation? What are some excellent practices?
2:30 - 3 p.m. Afternoon Tea
3 - 4:45 p.m.::Open Session::
No set topic. Discussion about the direction of fibreculture.
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
REGISTRATION:
Three-day registration includes attendance at all sessions,
lunches, morning and afternoon teas. All prices include GST.
:: Three-day registration
$27.50/$55.00
:: Opening nite forum and art exhibition only
$10.00/$15.00
(Prices are for students and other concession cardholders /
non-students)
Pre-registration forms are available from the fibreculture website:
http://www.fibreculture.org/
Late registration will be possible during the meeting.
Cheques, cash and money orders only, thank you.
::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
For more information and to subscribe to the fibreculture list:
See http://www.fibreculture.org/
::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
For more inf. contact meeting organizers:
Axel Bruns
snurb at snurb.info
Molly Hankwitz
m.hankwitz at qut.edu.au
Thank you to all participants and sponsors, John Hartley,
QUT, UQ Media & Cultural Studies, M/C, fAf, Brisbane Powerhouse,
Karen Hands, David Cox, Anna Zagala, and Jo Gray.
Fibreculture 2003 sponsors:
QUT Creative Industries Faculty
http://www.creativeindustries.qut.edu.au/
-
UQ Media and Cultural Studies Centre
http://www.emsah.uq.edu.au/
-
M/C - Media and Culture
http://www.media-culture.org.au/
-
fineArt forum
http://www.fineartforum.org/
-
Australian Network for Art and Technology
http://www.anat.org.au/
-
Brisbane Powerhouse - Centre for the Live Arts
http://www.brisbanepowerhouse.org/
-
Fibreculture is served by:
Myspinach
http://www.myspinach.org/
:::::::::::::::::::
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