If the strongest point of the N. Katherine Hayles’ seminar was her superb framing of the theoretical issues, the strongest aspect of Lev Manovich’s talk was that it seemed to gain more and more momentum as time went on. Which is to also say, Manovich got into the swing of things a tad more slowly. … Continue Reading
University of Sussex, but not as we knew it
A rather different University of Sussex than the one I recounted on my visit in January for an event dedicated to Roger Silverstone (and the naming of a new Silverstone Building on campus). The riot police shown in the clip embody the University’s apparently heavy-handed philosophy around how to respond to student protest. Students were … Continue Reading
Hayles: technogenesis, distributed cognition and hyperattention
I thoroughly enjoyed N. Katherine Hayles’ seminar earlier this afternoon at London Southbank University, as part of a double bill with Lev Manovich. Hayles’ talk was rich, and certainly full of more insights than I can recount here. But a couple of basic and I think very interesting ideas were at the core of the … Continue Reading
N. Katherine Hayles and Lev Manovich double bill in London
Recently I wrote about an enticing forthcoming conference at Swansea University on The Computational Turn, which, alas, I was unable to attend. Well, good news has arrived for us all in London, and indeed, the South East of England. The two keynotes of that conference – N. Katherine Hayles and Lev Manovich – have been … Continue Reading
You can count on coal, if not media
For some reason, I just find the whole idea of mining coal as a stable support for the uncertainties of television production hilarious. Also funny, of course, is the stark contrast implied between the grittiness of mining for coal (going down a mineshaft, the need for canaries as a warning system) and the superficiality of … Continue Reading
Recalling the OU (Open University), through already-hazy hindsight [part 2]
This is the second of a two-part post. See the first post. A very nice feature of the campus (using these photos is leading me to talk much more about the campus itself than I intended, but there you go) was its landscaping. Much of the landscaping being implemented during my time at the OU … Continue Reading
Recalling the OU (Open University), through already-hazy hindsight [part 1]
Last week, I visited my former place of work, The Open University in Milton Keynes (hereinafter ‘the OU’) for a couple of meetings. And it reminded me that I had intended to write down a few reflective thoughts about this rather odd but special place, which I left at the end of December 2009. Now, … Continue Reading
The iPad in incredible, amazing, unbelieveable and gorgeous adjectives
This edited video by Neil Curtis gives a nice 180 second overview of the over-the-top adjectives used by Steve Jobs and associates at the recent launch of the new Apple iPad. No repeated scenes here, this was all really in there – and some amazing, wonderful, unbelievable adjectives were even left out. Not that this … Continue Reading
Computing arts and humanities matter
A couple of months ago I noticed this intersesting event, The Computational Turn, which will be held at Swansea University on 9 March 2010. The conference promises a slightly unconventional take on the ‘arts and humanities’, considering the ways in which digital or computation-based technologies and techniques are fundamentally transforming the means and forms through … Continue Reading
Easy how-to guide on constructing a news clip
This is really brilliant stuff. Charlie Brooker on his excellent BBC show Newswipe (which I think is easily superior to The Daily Show) encapsulates how to construct a news clip. It rests on the idea of news clips having an easily recognizable form; which reminds me of the classic debates in studies of media effects … Continue Reading