Level 3 Studio Practice Blog

MySpace lets users share data

2008-05-09T08:43:00.002+01:00

The deal means that anyone with a MySpace profile can now share content with any web site. That includes things like photos, video, public profile information, friends' lists and text...

MySpace claims their initiative "throws open the doors to traditionally closed networks by putting users in the driver's seat of their data and web identity".

It also allows them to collect more info about you, which is handy...

I like having separate accounts for some things, because it allows me to manage them independently from each other. If my eBay account was linked to my MySpace account, it might be possible for people who I trade with to find out extra information about me, that I didn't want them to know.

Computer update

2008-05-06T22:41:00.002+01:00

This weekend was spent trying desperately to get everything back.

Basically, the harddrive was fucked. An installation had gone wrong, managed to break windows to the point of not booting, and take everything with it.

Fortunately, I managed to get most of it back, although I re-downloaded the site from my server anyway, so I was using the last working version and not some dodgy, possibly corrupt thing. For some reason, the entire contents of the adverts folder was deleted, which included the source .FLA files. I have no idea why this has gone... if it had been the last thing I was working on I might have understood it, but it wasn't - it seems to have been chosen at random. Still, it should be possible to download the published .swf files from the website and use SWF Decompiler to regenerate them.

I also came across a few corrupt images and files, but so far, nothing that can't be undone. Still, it justifies why I re-downloaded the main site.

Now I have to try reinstalling everything, which will take ages. So far, I guess I'll lose about 5 days working time due to this crash, which is really frustrating, pushes me right up to the deadline on Friday.

AHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

2008-05-02T00:34:00.001+01:00

It's a week until the deadline for my studio work.

And my computer won't boot.

It gets stuck before it loads windows, so there's something pretty wrong.

All my work is on there.

Luckily, it should be possible for me to download a lot of stuff from the site, and anything else is either old or too new to have been backed up. This has never, ever happened before.

At least my journal isn't on there because then I'd be pretty stuck.

But I'm still kicking myself for not having another back up. And I have to wait until this weekend to get the harddrive looked at (to see if it's possible to save anything!) and then I'll have to reinstall everything - which will take about a day. Great.

Just another big bit of stress I really didn't need.

comments

2008-04-29T19:05:00.001+01:00

“My answers got all messed up”

“I’m confused; my answers seem to be mixed up. Ah! You’re tricking me! I know the truth!”

“I’ve actually been sitting here for ages seeing what other people have written”

“I typed in one thing and something else appeared. I'm not sure what's going on!!! My first instinct was that the site was broken, but then I came back a day later and my information had changed AGAIN! Very confusing stuff...”

“I found I gave my information away really easily (without really knowing who I’ve given it to) just because I've done it before with MySpace and Facebook, I found the questions interesting, not the normal ones asked by social networking sites.”

“It looks like a real networking site until it starts messing up your answers.”

“I kind of liked becoming another person”

“I didn’t like other people being able to see the things I wrote, even though it was anonymous.”

“I ended up with all these answers that weren’t my own! It made me feel like I’d been tricked. It made me feel a bit cross because it wasn’t just me on the page.”

“I signed up and got a profile page, but the answers were wrong. Then I realised that the other answers came from other people. It felt weird knowing that other people would see my information like this (Question: Did you read the terms and conditions?). I didn’t read the terms, I’m so used to just accepting them!”

“It really showed me how easily people can get the stuff you post online.”

“I didn’t like the questions. They were too personal and strange.”

My banner ads

2008-04-25T09:52:00.003+01:00

I decided I'd try making my own banner ads, mainly so that I had a bit more control over the content of them, and it made them into my own work. I found that people were expecting the banners not to be real because of the nature of the site. This is fine, but I was planning to use real banner ads, and I don't want to accidentally cause someone to sign up to a dodgy site.

The banners I made can be viewed online here.

Although I'm happy with most of the results, they were quite time consuming to make. It would probably be quicker to use the fake banner ads I downloaded and edited before, and change the destination so that they point to pages that say "yeh, right, like you'd really get a free laptop". I will keep the layouts for these pages quite simple so that the focus is on the text, and so that they don't detract from the message of hooami.

Little changes

2008-04-23T16:46:00.003+01:00

I've nearly finished the design for the front page of hooami. In this post, I described how I wanted to make my site look more like Bebo, MySpace and Facebook. I've now finished the design, including the text to make it look more genuine. Sod all the coding I've been doing over the past few months, the copy was one of the hardest things I've done!

In the end, I came up with:

hooami is for everyone

Anyone can join hooami, simply complete the sign up form and upload a photograph of yourself. You don’t even need a valid email address*!

Private property

hooami doesn’t try to connect you with friends or strangers, hooami is all about you.

Fashionable

hooami lets you customise your page layout so that it truly represents you, without having to write the code yourself.

Totally unique

hooami knows that every one of its users is unique – which is why every user needs their own unique profile address.

* Sign in and profile removal requests require the email address entered in the sign up process

I followed the examples set out on Facebook, but completely changed the titles and features to fit my site. I wanted to keep it short so people could read it quickly and easily, and then move on to the sign up page.

I also changed some of the codes - for the header and footer, so that this is included from bas files. That means that if I want to update the footer info, I only need to change one file instead of all of them.

While researching questions for my FAQ, I came across this on MySpace:

How do I add color, graphics, & sound to my Profile page?>

Now, bearing in mind I'd just been looking at MySpaces safety tips Remind your teens to be careful about adding strangers to their friends list", the following sentence seemed a little odd:

If you do not know HTML, you can reach out and make a new friend by asking someone who has color, graphics, and/or sound on their Profile page how they did it. People on MySpace are friendly and always willing to help, so just ask! This is a great way to meet new people!

On the safety page, it says not to speak to strangers and to be aware that what you post on myspace can be seen by anyone. Yet here, Myspace is actually encouraging people who want to customise their page - frequently children - to speak to a stranger in order to do it! Talk about mixed messages! A far better approach would have been to direct people to websites that teach you html, or books. Or, they could make a quite guide for people - not only does that increase site traffic, it stops children googling "myspace layouts" which provides a list of websites ripe with popups/popunders and a whole lot of banner ads.

Identityswapdatabase

2008-04-16T11:14:00.003+01:00

Identityswapdatabase is a collaboration between net artists Olia Lialina and Heath Bunting.

The site loads with two images of girls facing each other. In the bottom right are some animated links, which display the text in several different languages - English, Russian, French, German and Spanish. This has a strange effect because you often end up clicking on a link to see what it is before the animation has got back to your language.

Clicking donate takes you to a page where you can donate your information to the project. The scrolling languages are used again, and users are asked to fill in various information about themselves including height, weight, mother tongue, and credit history.

I couldn't get past this stage because it kept telling me my jpg image wasn't a jpeg... but presumably the identity would be added to the database after this.

There is also a search page, which looks visually similar to the donate page. However, instead of giving an identity to the site, users are looking for one. Searching loads a page - not unlike a dating website or the profile search on MySpace - which ranks identities according to how well they match the search criteria.

The site has many similarities to my work, but also many differences.

Similarities:

People give away their identity to the site
Similar upload process, but less detailed questions
idea of people swapping identities

Differences:

Site design marks it out as separate - where as I wanted my site to be visually similar to social networking sites
No opt out - once you're there, you're there... I would have liked to have done that for my site, but there was institutional nervousness about this. Besides, it's unlikely to be used
focus on national identity (use of language, asked in questions) reminds you of the physical world, where as I wanted users to believe they were acting in the virtual world.
can view other people's profiles
Profiles listed together

Parents' views on social networks

2008-04-12T12:18:00.002+01:00

Parents' views on social networks

Of course, this is slightly biased, being from parents who read and post to the BBC website themselves, rather than parents who don't use the internet or keep track of what their children use the internet for.

Q&A: Children and safer net use

2008-04-02T22:53:00.001+01:00

Q&A: Children and safer net use

As noted above many children with profiles are below the minimum age set, but not actively enforced, by the sites themselves.

Because it's easy to lie on the internet - as the "CEOP online safety tips for parents" box to the right of the main article points out. It is difficult for websites to prove that someone is as old as they say they are - especially an 11 or 12 year old posing as a 13 year old.

Some of the things in the article just struck me as being basic parenting skills, rather than being specific ways to reduce the risks posed to children online:

Every report on net safety stresses that parents have a huge role to play in monitoring their children and educating them about responsible web use....

Finally, parents also need to realise that even though children have a greater understanding of the risks that does not mean they stop taking risks.

So Last Year ...

2008-03-29T00:20:00.000Z

So Last Year ...

Future shock? That's what we got when we asked teens to talk about what they thought has become passe in their lifetimes.

What I have been doing

2008-03-27T23:22:00.002Z

Short version: a lot of writing and testing code.

Long version:

Changed the sign up process to two pages

Page one asks for basic info like email address and username
Page 2 asks questions...

Changed the questions so that they are more open
As a result of this I had to make 2 new databases to store the information
Added a function so that if you try to visit a profile page that doesn't exist it takes you to the sign in page and automatically fills in the username you entered
A login on the front page (which isn't the front page yet)
Altered the profile pages to fit the new questions/answers
When someone enters an age below 18, they get an under 18 profile

This involves the text being blacked out - black text,black background
The text can still be highlighted, so the text is also scrambled so it can't be read
(The black lines were meant to make people who looked at the under 18's profiles feel like they were doing something wrong)

Added a script so that the user can change the design of the profile page - based on presets

What I still need to do:

Write the copy for several pages on the site
Try to think of more pages to add to develop the work!

For example, I read a tutorial about how to save a web page to a PDF, which would allow people to print their pages out more easily. I don't know if this would work with my site though!

Add real banner adverts to increase the authenticity

The Fundamentals of Digital Art

2008-03-25T23:28:00.001Z

My notes:

Ed Burton - software artist - http://sodaplay.com/

Software to represent how children draw - takes a drawing and converts it into an image that looks like it was drawn by a child
Life of the software - people spend time engagiing
Gallery and Fine Art establishments are "a parasite on the back of" engaging with the software.
Fine art doesn't give software art a home, it's left to places like the Science Museum

Panel discussion

There's a reluctance to see digital art for what it is
Is used as a tool for learning
Digital art is being adapted into other practices
Digital artists (from net artists to software artists) are connected by the technical (equipment, coding languages)
Generational thing - for a new generation interacting with this technology is second nature, it's completely natural

Will there still be a place for digital art when everyone has this second nature?

Institutional divide between traditional and digital - traditional art gets a light, open space, and new media gets a dark room
Allows people to reach a large audience, collaboration - an arts and craft ethos!
Marginalisation - is it possible for Digital Art to engage with the Fine Art world?
Ed was approached by a gallery to sell a limited edition CD Rom - thereby turning something free and democratic and widely available into an art comodity

This contrasts the popular open source movement where knowledge is accumulated and shared
But this open source approach doesn't work for galleries and auction houses.
It is what has happened to video art
The long tail - it makes more sense to sell alot of many things than to sell a lot of a few things

The role of the user. Without the user the work doesn't exist.

you can say the same for a painting, but we all know that when you leave the room it does still exisit.

The art work is trying to incorporate interactivity
Duchamp needed the viewer to interact
When is digital art good?! When you like it!

We currently think about how a work was produced and not what it is
Works delay engagement
It takes time to know a piece and change the relationship with it

Keeping things open
Money - artists could create alternative markets like the music industry
Relationships with organisations

People producing technology can bring interesting ideas to these companies

Artists manipulate software and technology

I found the talk very interesting, discussing a number of issues that were relevent to my work and my opinion on digital art, particularly the involvement of the user and the marginalisation of digital art within the fine art world. It was a good evening for £6 - and we had free drinks after :D And Vivienne Westwood walked past me.

I also found it interesting to see the audience (Most of the audience were in there 40s or 50s.)- I didn't really know what to expect, having been to artists' talks before and been the youngest person there. I think I was expecting a larger number of people to be my age - but then maybe people my age don't want to spend a night listening to people talking.

Lost in MySpace: How a generation of children are being raised online, spending 20 hours a week on the internet

2008-03-24T13:23:00.000Z

Lost in MySpace: How a generation of children are being raised online, spending 20 hours a week on the internet

GRR!!!

2008-03-22T11:38:00.001Z

Trying to work on the website is made considerably more difficult when my server isn't working properly!!!

I can access the FTP and upload the files, but as they are .php and I have to have them online to make sure they work, I can't check if what I'm uploading actually works! So I've blind coded as much as I can and now I will have to go and find something else to do until the site is working again!

BBC article: Phorm 'illegal' says policy group

2008-03-18T12:06:00.001Z

BBC article: Phorm 'illegal' says policy group

I think this sums it up best:

Richard Clayton, treasurer at Fipr, said: "The Phorm system is highly intrusive; it's like the Post Office opening all my letters to see what I'm interested in, merely so that I can be sent a better class of junk mail.
"Not surprisingly, when you look closely, this activity turns out to be illegal.

Communities in Cyberspace

2008-03-16T18:34:00.001Z

Identity and deception in the virtual community

Judith S. Donath

Identity is essential for understanding and evaluating communication.

Yet it is also ambiguous
Many of the traditional markers of identity are absent
One body = one identity

There are signals of false or fake identity

These may become clearer over time
Assessment signals - signals we use to judge something. A large bouncer in a bar signals strength. Assessment signals are reliable because the sender must possess a certain trait for us to believe it.
E.g. a CV. An impressive job history can be written down without actually experiencing it. Statements made during interview conditions are ASSESSMENT signals - one would have to exemplify their knowledge.

So it is quicker and easier to judge an applicant by the CV
BUT the chances of deception are higher
It is worth making the extra effort to interview a candidate because it will save the company money/time in the long term.

Consequences - lying for a waitressing job is less serious than lying about having extensive medical experience
Interpreting cyberspace is harder than every-day physical encounters with people

Basic ID:

The account name - often an email address

This can validate/void an identity - a post describing the corporate responsibility of a company has more influence - validity - if it is from an email address of that company (email@thecompany.com) than if it comes from a free email provider like google or hotmail.
Presumptions may be made on the email address. I remember seeing an email from a large communications company to some temp staff who had completed a short-term job for them. The emails had been provided in the application stage. Most receivers' emails were along the lines of "firstname.surname@somewhere.com", but one was "iamastudmuffin@freeemail.com", which seemed a little informal for a professional work context.

Voice and Language:

Two forms off expression, those that are intentionally "given" and those that are accidentally "given off"

Writing "I am female" is easy, it is much harder for a man to sustain a voice and reactions of a female.

It is easy to use alternate email addresses, but linguistic traits are harder to disguise
Language adapts to use - online, many people use "text speak", which comes from text messages (which used to be charged on a per character basis - therefore "u" costs a third of "you"). Abbriviations are often used for common phrases LOL (laugh out loud), WTF (what the fuck), OMG (oh my god), AFK (away from keyboard), etc - yes that was deliberate! Now, this is often mimicked by "older" members of communities (it tends to be younger and more inexperienced internet users that use these abbreviations) - "OMGWTFBBQ!" is one of the examples

"localised" abbreviations often occur too - the author of this book uses the examples of MOB (mother of the bride) and ONNA (oh no not again!) from a pregnancy related chatroom. I frequently shorten my website name (kiss-my-art) to KMA when I'm "talking" to someone over the internet, and this is true of many of my website/design projects. The same is true of other online communities - members of deviantart.com will know that DA is a shortening of the website name.
Another example the author gives is the use of the caps lock. WhErE wOrDs aRe TyPeD lIkE tHiS, a way of identification for a certain group of people. Which in my opinion is stupid - it takes about 3 times as long to write! Users are also berated for TYPING EVERYTHING IN CAPITALS, the online equivalent of shouting. When I'm chatting online, I find myself apologising for typing things in capitals by accident, like it might offend someone!

Signatures:

Most deliberate statement of identity
An electronic business card

Trolls - people looking to start and argument or flame war on a board.

Category deception - gives the impression of being a particular type of person to manipulate people's interpretations.
Deception is only spotted when the actions of the troll and the expectation of the audience are strongly at odds with each other.
"Compared to the physical world, it is relatively easy to pass as someone else online since there are relatively few identity cues.

Identity can be stolen just by using someone's name to make a post - an identity thief doesn't even have to go as far as copying someone's writing style.

Individual identity deceptions are often omissions, not commissions
A common reason for using a pseudonym is privacy concerns

the internet is an open space, and you cannot control what other people are reading
Who uses pseudonyms?

people who are embarrassed by the content of their message
People who are posting personal data
People who are posting about illegal activities.

Being able to track someone's activity online isn't necessarily a bad thing

it can help online communities gain a better understanding of the person
Identity is no longer one sided
However, this might mean that people are more careful to manage their online persona, maybe using multiple identities

Web based homepage presents a crafted self presentation

shows how one wants to appear - this can be quite revealing in itself

e.g. knowing someone's real physical appearance and seeing their description of themselves.

It is easy to discard and online persona

but many people become attached to them and don't want to throw them away

Mouchette (again)

2008-03-14T15:17:00.001Z

While researching Mouchette for my seminar, I found this page, which provides a detailed description and analysis of the site.

When Mom or Dad Asks To Be a Facebook 'Friend'

2008-03-11T00:08:00.002Z

When Mom or Dad Asks To Be a Facebook 'Friend'

"Don't get me wrong," said Yeamans, who is a computer information systems major. "I love my parents, but there are some parts of my college experience that I want to keep to myself."

Then why post it on the internet?

Lily Goldberg, 17, a junior at Gaithersburg High School in Montgomery County, said having parents on Facebook just seems weird.

My parents don't have Facebook, and my sister squealed when my mum suggested she might get one (although it would probably last about as long as her interest in Skype and MSN did). What my sister didn't know, is that I sometimes showed pictures of her to my mum, because while my mum doesn't have Facebook, I do. And right-clicking and saving an image to email to my mum to show my sister looking a little worse for wear on new years eve was very easy, and very fun. And that's why you don't post pictures on the internet if you don't want them spread around.

For Taylor Janney, the choice to friend or not to friend her mom, Karen, was not an option when she got her Facebook account a year ago. It was the only way the 15-year-old was allowed to be online.

And that's how it should be. The EU don't need to spend £42 million to keep people informed. Parent's need to be aware of what their children are posting online, and being a "friend" on facebook is an easy (and free) way to do that. Although...

Still, just when parents think they've cracked the code, one note of caution: Being "on" doesn't necessarily mean you're "in."

Students say a little fiddling with the privacy controls, and those pictures from Saturday night? Never existed.

Unless you have me for a sister...

BBC article: Ad system 'will protect privacy'

2008-03-06T16:39:00.002Z

Article: Ad system 'will protect privacy'

So despite all the worry about people actively posting information about themselves on the internet, companies are planning on tracking our day-to-day use of the net and collecting information on us. If we can't be trusted to post information about ourselves by ourselves, then why should these companies be allowed to track what we do without us knowing?!

On its website, Phorm's chief executive Kent Ertugrul, said Phorm ignored form fields on websites, numbers with more than three digits, e-mail addresses and secure web pages.

Mr Davies said the onus would be on Internet Service Providers to ensure customers had enough information about the scheme in order to have "informed consent".

Ok, so it attempts to keep data secure. But how do you know that it is? I don't want an automated script to be responsible for my private data, I want to be responsible for it. I want to be able to choose if I'm watched or not. I have a Facebook account, and I know Facebook spies on me and allows other people to spy on me, but I knew that when I signed up. I don't want a program on my computer that tracks my searches, and I should be able to opt out. My ISP is frankly crap, and I don't trust them (BT broadband) to provide me with the correct information so that I can opt out (anyone who has just had their phoneline changed to free weekend calls will know how BT like to hide things - like everything else being more expensive - in the small print).

He said research BT had carried out had shown that customers did want more relevant advertising as a result of their surfing habits being tracked online.

They didn't research me. Because I don't. I thought I'd ask my friends what they thought.

Yes - I'd rather have adverts that were relevant to me
No - I hate when you realise something is spying on you
Yes - As long as they're not in your face all the time, I don't have a problem
No - I don't need to be encouraged to spend money, and I don't want people watching me
No - I wouldn't want a program tracking me

Tell us about you

2008-03-05T19:38:00.003Z

When I was looking around adaweb (where Wonderland was hosted) I came across a page called "tell us about you".

The page has a green background, with "tell us about you" repeated over it. The form mainly asks normal questions, but some of the answers are a little odd. For example, "I attend: grade school, high school, undergraduate studies, graduate studies, mass". Some of the questions are a little unusual too - for example, describing what relationship the bowels of your machine have to you and what kind of collar you wear.

Pressing submit doesn't seem to do anything. Pressing refuse resets the form. Pressing the "compare" button takes you to a page of statistics that show graphs and percentages of what people have answered. It doesn't seem to be "comparing" anymore though, because I've submitted about 5 forms now and the number of forms submitted stays the same (870). I find the statistics interesting (for example, that 10% of people were visiting from Antigua and Barbados - presumably because it was the first option on the form), but I think the questions are what interests me the most.

While there are some humorous answers that can be given, they have to be selected from one of the options. I find this really limiting, I would prefer to choose my own answer. I found the way the questions worked on the Wonderland pages much more interesting in terms of responses because you could see people had entered all kinds of things. Limiting the options prevents this from happening, which is something I need to be aware of, and something that I can see is already occurring in my work. People are given the option to enter longer answers, but often they only put one word. In some cases, I limit what they can enter, and I'm worried that users might be as frustrated with this as I am...

I think that maybe if I used larger text boxes, it would encourage a more detailed answer (the boxes would be larger and therefore need more text to fill. I also think that having more open questions, like "what are you worrying about?" will promote a more open, more detailed response than closed ones like "Can you lick your toe". Having the option to enter longer, more detailed responses might make me feel happier with out come of the work itself.

On another note - I have no idea if this form is a piece of net art or an actual survey. The only information I have been able to find out it is this:

adaweb (http://adaweb.com) is pleased to announce the release of interface
4.0, featuring a new look and feel and a completely rethought navigation.

with the launch of interface 4.0, adaweb also introduces "usage"
(http://adaweb.com/usage/), a new dimension in the site, which will be in
development throughout the month of august.  "usage" is adaweb's backstage
area, where you can have access to information on the site.

currently available is
- part one of our survey (http://adaweb.com/usage/survey_you/ ) "tell us about
you--tell us about us"
From http://adaweb.walkerart.org/usage/reach/news.html

I suppose that is the good thing about net art - that it makes you think anything could be art.

BBC Website: EU extends net safety programme

2008-03-03T11:20:00.002Z

EU extends net safety programme

£42 million to make parents pay attention to their kids!

"As more and more European children and adolescents use online technologies at home or at school, they, their parents and their teachers need to be informed about the opportunities and risks they face," said Jose Barroso, EC president in a statement.

Exactly, children won't listen to someone old telling them not to post this or that on myspace when that older person has no idea what myspace actually is! Many children are there to make friends, or chat to their friends who are already on myspace. Even if many kids are aware that you should add people you don't know, they still post publicly available information on the internet - often without realising it. If your page is private, you can maintain a certain amount of anonymity, but the minute you post something on your friend's page which isn't private, that anonymity starts to slip.

Which is why sites like myspace and facebook need to change their policies to make every page private, and to not display mobile numbers or emails on profile pages. Myspace does this to an extent (no under 14s can register although it isn't hard to lie, and 14 and 15 year olds have their pages set to private automatically - but you're not an adult until your 18, right?).

Artist: Julia Scher - Wonderland

2008-02-28T09:35:00.003Z

Scher's work focuses on surveillance and monitoring techniques, often seeking to expose their use. She is a multimedia artist, producing online, installation, and performance based works.

Wonderland

1998 installation, Andrea Rosen Gallery

Navigating through the website was difficult, because a component used in the original director file is no longer available, which results in to errors on each page. However...

One page explains how to create a clone of yourself - for "when one of you isn't enough"

http://adaweb.walkerart.org/~scher/products/discover/index.html

The proposed simplicity of creating a clone is rather sinister - you could wake up one day, think, "I have too much to do today, I need another me to help out" and clone yourself, by scraping, planting and growing. Because the process comes across as being so simple, it makes you worry about how casually it could be done - would people think about the implications of growing an army of 50 of us? What would they even be? The piece refers to how much we play god now - abortions, genetic engineering, cloning.

At the bottom of the page is a form, where users can decide if they are afraid of the future, if they abuse themselves, and what advances in technology scare you. Pressing "order" (ordering a product or commanding the website to do something?) takes you to a typical "thank you" page - albeit with a sinister overtone "your answers have been sent home" (sounds like a mothership, which is probably a suitable comparison for all the products that do collect information on us), and clicking the image there leads you to discover what scares people about technology.

In itself, that's quite frightening. The answers must be stored somewhere, but did you think about that when you filled in the three part form? I didn't... I didn't know what was going to happen next, but I filled it in anyway. I didn't know my response was going to made public, but it has been... and I don't really mind because it has just been added to a long list of other anonymous responses (or has it? I can't see my answers there... maybe they are made up by the artist? But then they seem to be referring to current issues....) So what are people scared of?

That I am Vice President of a software company and yet cannot understand MS Word.
postings of first and last names on the internet
Those that try to get rid of other technologies
Caller ID... food radiation... permanent makeup... stealth missles... undetectable video alteration... new, improved detergents
nothing
CORRUPTNESS
one's I'll be too old to enjoy
evesdropping devices
The Net. It transmits info which may or maynot be factual. It may prove to be too much of a temptation for society to live with. We may not be advanced enough to handle the technology we have created.
headless humans
we are getting to close to eachother
No death

Another page, http://adaweb.walkerart.org/~scher/products/tint/index.html, also posts information to this public space. This time, people consider what they need to be protected from. While a lot of people had entered "clones" on the previous question, I don't think it was as predominant an answer as "myself" was to this question. Among other answers like "bad people" and "thieves", someone had answered "protection", which I found interesting. One of the books I have been reading discussed how anti-virus and firewall manufacturers drive the fear of getting a virus on your computer. According to the author, it is also in the interests of the media to promote this fear. After all, if I read my news on the BBC website for free, I don't need to buy a paper. If I can watch my favourite shows online, I won't be watching them on TV. But if I think that going online will have all my valuable data destroyed within one second, I'll carry on buying my papers and watching TV. Yet, my family were online for years without anti virus software, and even longer without a firewall, and the only "bad" software that made it onto the computer was a dialer which loaded porn pop ups. A google search for the solution and it was gone again. I once read on an online forum (ironically) that the safest computer is an offline one with no CD/DVD/floppy drive. True, but it's also pretty useless...

Another page, http://adaweb.walkerart.org/~scher/products/insecure/index.htmlconsiders people's insecurities. "Do you know what you want?" (Probably not), "are you satisfied with who you are?" (well, you shouldn't be), " What do you need to change most about your personality?" (Nothing, I'm great - but wait a minute, that suggests arrogance - so I need to change that. And if I think I might need to change something, then I'm probably insecure, better change that too...). Again, the answers make for interesting reading.

All these answers have been posted on the same page, with links to the original pages above each question. Scher poses two other questions, "What are your WEAKNESSES?" and "What is it about HUMAN interaction that makes you most afraid?", and the answers people have given are listed below.

Clicking on the door at the very bottom of the page leads you to a black screen. Moving the mouse over this reveals an image, but the whole image cannot be seen. A link returns you to the home page. Exploring the site more reveals another set of questions and answers similar to those above.

I think that what makes Scher's work successful is:

Consistency within the site and appearance of a company - use of pink and grey (pink is often a theme in Scher's work, a reference to the body? Or a "nice" colour that becomes sinister? - sugar coating)
Use of images - particularly those of children:
Leading questions that still produce a variety of answers
Use of language - similar to advertising language, persuasive.

Banner ads

2008-02-20T13:01:00.002Z

I have now implemented the new design for my website across all the pages. I am now much happier with it, as it certainly looks more like a social networking website than previously. I hope that this familiarity will encourage people to submit data to the website.

However, I am concerned about the banner ads, which I downloaded and manipulated. I did this because I was concerned about associating a company with my website. I was also worried that users might consider the ads part of the art work and expect them to be fake, and that placing real ads might result in someone clicking on an advert and the potential damage this could do to their computer.

After seeing the ads in place, I now feel that because they look exactly like real banner ads - only without the functionality, I might as well place real ads on the site. I also feel like I am creating the illusion of the adverts, and that the real thing would support my site much better.

Bearing this in mind, I looked up the companies who make these adverts, and their terms and conditions for having them placed on a website. Most had requirements like the advert must be placed within the top 150pixels of a web page. I could also choose form a whole variety of adverts - pop unders, banners, pop overs, hovering link things... Great. Most of these companies simply said that as long as there was nothing illegal, pornographic, racist etc on there then it was ok. And I would have to submit my site to them before it would be accepted.

And I would get about 10p for every 1000 ads shown, which I calculated would take me 70,000 banners to get back the cost of my domain name. Bargain.

I'm still not sure whether I want to use real ads or my pretend ones, but it's not a decision I have to take immediately, but I will bear it in mind.

Artist study: Alexei Shulgin - Desktop IS

2008-02-19T20:36:00.003Z

Desktop IS

desktop is the main element of a human - machine interface
desktop is your window to the digital world
desktop is your first step into virtual reality
desktop is a reflection of your individuality
desktop is your everyday visual environment
desktop is an extension of your organs
desktop is the face of your computer
desktop is your everyday torture and joy
desktop is your own little masterpiece
desktop is your castle
desktop is a seducer
desktop is a reliever
desktop is your enemy
desktop is your friend
desktop is a psychoanalyst
desktop is your little helper
desktop is your link to other people
desktop is a device for meditation
desktop is the membrane that mediates transactions between client and server
desktop is a substitute for so many other things

desktop is a question
desktop is the answer

Described as the "first international online desktop exhibition", Desktop IS ran from October 20 1997 - April 20 1998. People could email in screenshots of their desktop, and the project includes the desktops of many net artists such as Rachel Barker and Natalie Bookchin.

The phrase "a picture is worth a thousand words" springs to mind...

It is interesting to see the similarities and differences between the desktops - although some are no longer online. It is like a snap shot into someone's life, a glimpse at their personality. It makes you think about what an outsider would see when they looked at your desktop (anyone looking at mine would see a big mess of folders and images, saved to the desktop because I am too lazy to file them properly. Also, a lot of unhelpfully named programs, which are drivers for a variety of my peripherals - a result of having to format my computer and then realising I was missing most of the software discs for gadgets like my skype phone and my MP3 player).

I like the fact it causes you to consider these strangers, especially as this is something that I would like to achieve in my own work. I find it interesting that you begin to form an opinion of the person by what they have saved on the desktop, and this is something I hope people can also experience by looking at my work - they start to gain an understanding of people based on the information they have submitted to the website.

However, as Chris Locke writes, there is a key difference:

It's not emails, avatars or homepages, the facades we throw up onto servers, that display our identity on-line--it's the desktop, the messy space we live in, that holds the elements of our on-line selves.

(Link: Beyond interface)

Unlike posting on a forum or on a social networking site, the desktop is not intended to be public. When we offer an identity to the public we decide which parts to disclose. For example, I might want people to know I'm an art student when I'm posting on an art related website, but on a forum about a music festival, that's not as important (arguably, the information we do give out - even intentionally - can be misinterpreted. I use "13" as part of my screen-name because it is my birthdate and my lucky number. Other people read this and presume I'm 13 years old. Actually, I chose the number because it wasn't linked to my age - I wouldn't be so foolish as to forget I get older!). The desktop is comparatively more private, seen only by people who are physically in front of the computer. This privacy means the files and documents that are located there can reveal a lot more about a person than their description of themselves.

However, despite this intimacy, Shulgin still requires users to post the image of their desktop online, moving it from the private to the public. With the knowledge that this intimate space is going to be shown to the world, many people might be tempted to do a little housekeeping before sending the screenshot. This is the same as editing an identity in order to post it online: we would still want ourselves to be presented in a certain way.

One of the things I find interesting is looking back to what desktops used to be like 10 years ago. The size of the screenshots is tiny compared to what people use now. The graphics are often low quality. Desktop IS is not just a snapshot of people's computer-based lives, it's a piece of net history too.

Logo

2008-02-19T16:57:00.003Z

Logo version 1:

Logo version 2:

I created two versions of the logo for the website, but from the start I was concerned that the second one - with the smiley face - didn't convey the same message as the first concept. I wanted the logo to act as a traditional logo is meant to - to symbolise the company and what it stands for - for example, YouTube's logo has a box that looks like a TV, and myspace's logo is three people showing that its purpose is communication and friendship. Like the other social networking sites, I wanted to keep it simple.

I decided to turn the double "o" into eyes - although this idea was very obvious, I also felt it would represent some of the ideas I wanted to communicate with the piece. The eyes are intended to suggest that someone is watching you, which ties in with my theme of trying to raise awareness of the personal data that people put online.

I consulted some of my friends to make sure the idea was coming across successfully:

oh sugar buns! says (17:42):
yeh...wel the first looks more serious and jst bein the eyes..cud kinda focus ppl to think about what ppl can look at

I'm fighting this feeling but it never stops, I'm still waiting and I'm stuck with this feeling, will it ever stop, I keep trying says (17:53):
the first one a think...I think the mouth draws attention away from the whole being stared at effect and without the mouth you don't know what the reaction is...like cos its smiley you feel sorta safe, without it you don't know

--- If you're not turned onto politics, politics will turn on you --- says (17:53):
1st one
i dont like the smile
online social networking isnt a happy place

beautiful angel of death says (18:00):
yeah focus on the eyes, its more prying
the mouth detracts from the eyes

| : Ðeîvu : | says (18:01):
the one with the smile looks to .. jokie.. not seroius

Stand Tired Procedure - ANON DELIVERS! says (18:06):
First one
I think the smile makes it odd

Bebo bully victim in suicide bid

2008-02-18T20:01:00.000Z

Bebo bully victim in suicide bid

Website design

2008-02-18T14:25:00.003Z

Considering the requirements outlined in the previous post, this is the completed design as it currently stands.

See the page live

My original aims and how I met them:

a white background - in place
2 columns - in place
At least 1 advert/page - I have two adverts per page, which were taken from myspace customisation sites. I manual removed the links to the original websites, so that the animation/interactivity remains. I also removed the logos and company branding from these adverts. There are several different adverts which are generated at random using Flash
Menu at the top - currently there is no menu in the design but this should be easy to implement later.
Toc, help, contact, etc at the bottom. - in place, though some links don't actually function correctly yet.
Login on the top left column - in place
Strong emphasis on the "point" of the site - in my case, users. - I included a "people already on hooami", which is a php script that displays 3 peoples first names and profile pictures at random on the front page. There is a similar feature on the Myspace homepage, but clicking on the images takes you to the users page. This will not happen on my site.
A header section with the logo in the top left - Done
A simple colour scheme, probably involving blue, grey and one other colour. - blue, grey and bright green at the moment.
An obvious way for people to sign up - myspace has a bright orange button and facebook has a green one. - The bright green button is in place and there is a sign up box above the login on the right
Emphasis on sharing the site with friends - not yet although I intend to implement this

2008-02-11T17:29:00.000Z

I decided one of the easiest ways to make my site feel like a social networking site was to make the layout and appearance similar to that of the most popular networking sites. I always intended to do this, but perhaps doing so now would make the work more satisfying in terms of the aims I have.

I started by looking at 4 sites, which all turned out to be surprisingly similar: Bebo, Myspace, Facebook, and YouTube.

Bebo screenshot:

Analysis:Bebo has a 2 column layout with a think black header, and a grey footer section. The colour scheme is black, red and white, with some elements of grey. There are a lot of rounded corners. The left column is thicker than the right. The front page doesn't really have much organisation, apart from thte navigation and login being at the top. Most of the front page is dedicating to promotional material - adverts, videos, promoting puser profiles, Bebo related news. The ToC, contact, help etc is in the bottom footer. It also includes a section about online safety, probably a reference to Bebo's audience - 10-13.

Myspace screenshot:

Anaysis: I really dislike Myspace's layout.

But anyway. There are 2 columns, and again the left is thicker than the right. There is a blue header, with the logo in the top left. There's a lot of negative space in the header, except for a search bar and "privacy, help and signup" links. The menu is at the top under the header. Below this are videos and adverts, followed by the login in, and a promotional box allowing you to search for friends who already use myspace. There are 3 advertising blocks on the page, plus promotional sections for music, specials, and videos. There is also a "cool new people" section which displays random profiles of users who presumably just signed up (as if you care). The bottom section has a help box - which is easily missed because it looks like google's adwords advertisments. Below this is a footer, which has FAQ, ToC, About etc links. The "sponsored links" section is obviously influenced by what you enter in your profile, because mine had 6 references to "art". And one for "crush".

Overall, the layout is busy and cluttered, especially compared to Bebo's smooth and simple design.

Facebook screenshot (not actually the front page because that doesn't look like any other page)
Analysis:Facebook has 3 columns, with the centre being the thickest, and the source of the main content. Again, there is a header section with the logo on the right and some key links. Below this is a search, and the personalised applictions. There's is one banner ad on the left hand side (which is related to things on the page - mine's showing skiing because it's picked up my friend's skiing photos). The right column display updates and notifications, meaning it is easy to see if anything "important" is happening. There is an "invite your friends" section - because someone might be missing out. Below that is an option to give a gift, today's being a "love duckie". You have one freegift when you sign up and they cost $1 after that. At the bottom of the page is a footer with toC and privacy links, as well as information for businesses, developers and advertisers

YouTube screenshot:

Analysis:YouTube has a very minimal layout. The logo is in the top left again, beside links to "sign up" and "login". The navigation is also in this top section, along with a video search and an option to upload videos. Below this, promoted videos and "other videos being watched right now" are shown - to try and tempt you into watching them. Featured videos are listed below. The layout reflects youtube's content: videos are the main focus here. The smaller, righthand column starts with an advert (for a film, appropriately enough). Below this is the login section - much lower on the page than on the other websites. Below this is a news section which also includes a competition. At the bottom is another search section and the usual help, toc and your account links. There is also a link to "face the candidates" - promotion for the US elections.

From these examples, I believe my social networking site should have:

a white background
2 columns
At least 1 advert/page
Menu at the top
Toc, help, contact, etc at the bottom.
Login on the top left column
Strong emphasis on the "point" of the site - in my case, users.
A header section with the logo in the top left
A simple colour scheme, probably involving blue, grey and one other colour.
An obvious way for people to sign up - myspace has a bright orange button and facebook has a green one.
Emphasis on sharing the site with friends

Young warned over social websites

2008-02-08T17:17:00.001Z

Young warned over social websites

Strangely, the report says that:

Some 71% of 2,000 14 to 21-year-olds said they would not want colleges or employers to do a web search on them before they had removed some material.

Yet the poll at the side of the page indicates 70% of people haven't posted something on the internet which they later regretted.

"We have to help teenagers wise up to every aspect of the internet age they're living in. It may be fun but unfortunately it is not the safe space many think it is."

Of course, the easiest solution is to force the owners of social networking sites to make all profiles private by default. Users should have to opt OUT of privacy, not opt in.

False Identity Generator

2008-02-08T17:02:00.000Z

False Identity Generator

For the times when a real identity just isn't for you!

How can I make people realise they are being manipulated?

2008-02-06T15:39:00.000Z

I think the best way to answer this question is to think about what I'm trying to achieve...

What am I trying to achieve by randomising data?

Make people realise they give out this personal data, the kind of information they give out, and how easy it is to access this data.
Make people consider how they present themselves and construct an identity online (possibly consider how true/false this presentation is) and how this impacts on others' views of them.

Does randomising the data achieve this?

Maybe. The way the site currently looks might suggest there is something odd going on and cause people to think twice about giving out information (but without actually signing up, which isn't what I want). Perhaps really personal information needs to be requested in order to make the work have more of an impact. If they realise the wrong information is the data from other users, this might make people realise that their data can be seen - and misused - by others.
Maybe. The work doesn't really cause anyone to consider how they present themselves online (currently, it's too basic). They might realise what you say impacts on how other people perceive you if they realise the data is from other users.

Is there a better way of making people realise these things?

Change the questions. Either

Ask more personal questions, but change the answers in some way. Allow a longer, more open response.
Only allow certain, limited answers, which force people to categorise themselves within the criteria which I decide.

Make it look more like a social networking site, with thing like adverts, developing the colour scheme and adding pages (home page, etc) - something I planned on doing anyway

Douglas Davis

2008-02-05T09:43:00.000Z

From Tilman Baumgartel's interview with Douglas Davis in Net Art 2.0.

Davis on The World's First Collaborative Sentence:

[After being asked to create an online work for part of an exhibition] I immediately thought of the keyboard, the means of interaction allowed by the web but not in video or any other "flat art". The huge difference between broadcast TV and the web is the keyboard. With that people can say anything; they have full expressive capacity. This means a more intense and personal link could occur between me and the audience.

Davis' video work explored the link between him and the viewer- in one piece he asked them to touch the screen which showed his hands, and think about whether they were actually touching. Davis continued this theme in his net art piece, Metabody (which appears to be offline now), where visitors can upload an image of their body to the collection - which also includes Davis' body.

This idea of touch reminds me of Mouchette, where one of the pages was a picture of a tongue licking the screen, and text which asked the viewer to lick the screen back. Marshall McLuhan said that each technology we invent acts as an extension to ourselves. The internet extends our ability to communicate. The keyboard extends our voice or our hands. The monitor extends our eyes... yet even though these extensions act as a barrier, physical contact is a very intimate thing, and there is still something unnerving about the request to "touch" someone else - even if the sensation is virtual.

Romancing the anti-body

2008-01-31T21:06:00.000Z

Romancing the Anti-Body: Lust and Longing in Cyberspace

Lynn Hershman Leeson

"Before being truly plugged into or grounded in cyberspace, a person must create a mask. It becomes a signature, a thumbprint, a shadow, a means of recognition. The justification for this disguise is similar to that for tribal coverings; masks camouflage the body and in doing so liberate and give voice to virtual selves."

Howard Rheingold - The Virtual Community: Homesteading on the Electronic Frontier - people seem to need depersonalised communication in order to forge personal relationships.
When you log on to a computer the first thing to do is create an identity, through a name, a personal profile, an icon or a mask. This also defines the audience, space and territory.
Example 1: The Strange Case of the Electronic Lover

"Joan" was crippled and mute, (and female in the male dominated online world of the 1980s) and the computer was a lifeline for her.
Joan forged many close friendships, particularly with other female users
Joan was eventually unmasked, and revealed to be Alex, a psychiatrist from New York. Many people felt betrayed by him/Joan

Example 2: A woman was stalked online, and began receiving threatening messages.

The stalker was caught but no case was brought due to lack of evidence
This example shows the problems of online identity, where villains can be invisible

Lynn Hershman Leeson also considers identity in her artwork

She created another identity, Roberta, and created a life for this character, including placing an advert for a housemate
She made an installation in a hotel, which was a collection of objects that implied someone's identity. People could get the key to the room and have a look. In the end, one visitor called the police and the objects were removed. Hershman Leeson said this seemed like a fitting ending.

Requirements for degree show

2008-01-26T21:25:00.000Z

3 -5 networked computers - dependant on availability of machines, size of space, number of plugs)

Plug sockets (enough for monitors too)
Internet connection for each machine
Keyboards and mice for each machine
Cable locks - security

Wall mounted monitors

Preferably flatscreen
Wall strong enough to support

Other considerations

Light space
Log on usernames and passwords
Someone needs to turn computers on/off - or are they always turned on?
Able to access other websites? - Don't mind, as long as someone/a program can reset the page regularly
Able to access other programs (aside from web browser)? - Prefer not to have access to other programs

Not work

2008-01-26T16:39:00.000Z

...but funny anyway, probably because I just wrote an essay on Internet archiving. Some of these examples make you wonder what possible use old websites will be in the future?

To the internet in 1996!

http://www.msu.edu/~karjalae/internet96.htm?hoho

Perhaps I could display my work like this...

2008-01-26T15:02:00.000Z

Display options: Research 2

2008-01-24T16:33:00.000Z

Photographs of screen based installations from the 2007 Venice Biennale.

Weird little stools and a table set up. Seemed a little...odd considering the computers showed videos, which meant you were sitting there for a while, and it wasn't exactly comfortable. The location was a little odd anyway, it seemed to be someone's house!

Monitors (TVs) on plinths. However, I would have to consider where I would locate the keyboards and mice. Would there be seats? - in which case it's more like a table than a plinth. This set up also draws attention to the monitor itself and makes it a prominent influence on the work. I want the computer to remain a tool for displaying the work, rather than becoming the actual work itself, I think this set up would not be practical for me.

Wall mounted screens. This would depend largely on the type of monitor I have available. A CRT monitor is a lot more pronounced than a flat screen, but flat screens are more expensive. It may be that with the resources I have available I would have to use CRT monitors.

This work also illustrates another consideration - dark or light space? A lit screen in a darkened room means that what's on the screen is the focus, and not the computer/monitor itself. However, this would also make it troublesome to see the keyboard and mouse, which might deter people from looking. Also, I often find that being in a dark space with strangers can be rather uncomfortable, and as I want to deter as few people as possible from entering their data, I think a lighter space would be more suitable.

(I think the second photograph might actually be upside down. Nevermind, you get the idea...)

Smaller scale wall mounted screens in a lighter space. The screens have become a lot more prominent - as shown through the fact they have been made to look identical. These a flat screens again, an show another factor I have to consider - flat screens have a much lower viewing angle than CRTs do. Considering there may be more than one person viewing each screen, a CRT may be more suitable as it would allow more people to see what is happening from different angles. However, I don't feel this benefit overrides the advantage of the screen being less prominent against the wall.

With both CRT and LCD screens, I would have to consider what height to place them on the wall. Too low and people would have to bend over to interact with the computer, and this may discourage people from using the work. Too high and people would have to lean back to see, which would be uncomfortable. However, it would allow people standing behind the user to see more comfortably, and the screen could be angled down slightly. I could also consider having the monitors at different heights.

Another possible installation idea is the floor. I quite like this idea as it is different to the places monitors are normally seen (sitting or standing). However, as shown in the photograph above, the user would have to sit down to view the work, which might be uncomfortable and discourage people from looking at the work. It would also make it harder for anyone standing behind the user to be able to see what is happening.

While totally impractical for my exhibition, I really liked this set up because you had to stand where the last edge of the box should be to get the full effect. However, this caused problems, with a large queue of people waiting to see the work.

Sophie Calle's work used a series of wall mounted monitors. The space was wide and short, so this set up made the best use of the space. The monitors were roughly head height, which made it comfortable if you were standing. The videos were quite long, and there was space for people to sit if they preferred. Many people were happy sitting on the floor, although there were a few chairs available (but not many - maybe 5. It didn't look like a cinema).

Again, a series of wall mounted flat screens, mounted side by side, each showing a different video loop.

Display options: Research

2008-01-23T16:58:00.000Z

Nam June Paik:

The More the Better, (1988) Three channel video installation with 1,003 monitors and steel structure; color, sound; approx. 60 ft. high.

Arc Double face (1985) Three channel video installation with forty two monitors and metal structure.

Installation view Modulation in Sync: Jacob's Ladder, 2000
"The Worlds of Nam June Paik"
Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York 2000
Photo J Huffman

Perhaps a little...extravagant for me, although it does show that a monitor doesn't have to be on a desk or a table just because that's where we're used to seeing it. However, while I appreciate the need for spectacle, I don't want the presentation of the computers to become the work itself, or be seen as more important than the work: it is still mealy a tool for display. Also, I need to consider the fact that people will require input devices (mice and keyboards and possibly a webcam) which means the monitors have to be suitable for viewing and accessible.

Perhaps this is the answer:

http://www.jeffrey-shaw.net/html_main/frameset-works.php3

Basically, it's a monitor which is controlled by a wireless keyboard. It scrolls along the tracks and displays a piece of net art. While not suitable for my work (being only one piece), it is different to a room full of computers showing various artworks. However, the device is limited in that it only has one screen and one keyboard, meaning only one user can be in charge at a time. This can be seen better on the website linked to above, where videos of the browser in action are available.

Imagine...Blogging & Second Life

2008-01-22T17:09:00.000Z

The section on blogging from the recent BBC1 programme on the internet in the Imagine series, presented by Alan Yentob.

Second life

Telegraph: One in four teens 'at risk' on Facebook

2008-01-12T18:12:00.001Z

Telegraph article: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2008/01/07/nsex107.xml

Panorama - One Click From Danger

2008-01-12T17:28:00.000Z

Panarama investigation into the dangers of social networking sites, focusing on the risks to children. Slightly exaggerated in my opinion (And I'm not the only one. Two), making it sound like the minute a child logs on to the internet they are bombarded by messages from pedophiles, it does draw attention to some of the risks of social networking. What particularly "interested" me, was the account of the girl who added a man on myspace who followed her to the Tate Modern on a school trip. It just goes to show that even while you may keep your personal data and information only within the access of your friends, posting information on your friends pages is still risky.

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

BBC News: Cyber thieves target social sites

2008-01-12T17:08:00.000Z

Article: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7156541.stm

Nothing really new, but raising the profile of the risks of posting sensitive data on the internet.

David Porter, head of security and risk at Detica, said the apparent familiarity of social network sites, which often help people build connections with people who share their interests and outlook meant many people were cavalier with their personal information.

Responses

2007-12-06T09:34:00.000Z

I've linked the website to my friends who were online last night to get some responses. Most people thought I'd linked them to the wrong thing ("is it meant to be a sign up thing?!"), which can probably be attributed to the lack of an "about" page explaining what the site is and does (or at least what it is pretending to be).

Other people filled in the details happily and then got confused when their information was swapped ("why am I female?!"), which this conversation highlights (it's just a shame she knew who's answers she had got!)

(01:08) oh sugar buns! :
erm i confused
my last kiss appears to be mr manners
(01:09) JãÐe! "Memory IS RAM!" - Don't fuck up:
Oh right
(01:10) oh sugar buns! :
my answers seem to b mixed up with er hannahs
(01:12) JãÐe! "Memory IS RAM!" - Don't fuck up:
Oh
(01:12) oh sugar buns! :
lol okkk...are u tricking meeee
i knw the truth
lol

I had one person refusing to sign up because there wasn't any porn.

And one friend passed on the details to their friend, who filled in the form and THEN wondered what her email address was used for (even though this is explained on the T&C page), which shows exactly what I wanted, that people will sign up to anything and don't realise the kind of information they give out - even though you had to agree to the terms and conditions which she hadn't read before continuing... It makes me wonder what I could put in there - you will give me all your money!

(23:01) beautiful angel of death:
whats her email address used for?
(23:03) JãÐe! "Memory IS RAM!" - Don't fuck up:
Nothing
It's just to help me identify people if they want their stuff deleted
(23:03) beautiful angel of death:
ok
(23:03) JãÐe! "Memory IS RAM!" - Don't fuck up:
I can remove it now if she wants
(23:04) JãÐe! "Memory IS RAM!" - Don't fuck up:
i think I can remove just the email...
(23:04) beautiful angel of death:
its ok, she was just wondering

Annnnnd... more media coverage about Facebook and MySpace photos being used against people:

Murder and Web expose sordid side of student life.

Here comes another bubble

2007-12-05T02:01:00.000Z

Yes it is 2am, and I'm trying to get the sign up thing to work with everything else. Apparently it doesn't work in Internet Explorer which being the most used web browser is something of a problem.

What I've been doing

2007-12-03T12:10:00.000Z

I haven't posted anything for a week and haven't posted anything about MY work for longer than I can remember... So this is what I've been up to.

Writing the T&C

I had to explain what I would be using people's data for
That other people may see it but not "personal information" such as name or email address
That none of the fields were compulsory
That I will delete the data at their request

Working on the "back end" (collaboratively, because I didn't know enough PHP to be able to carry data from one page to the next or access random data)

Scripts to save the data entered to a database
Scripts to save the user's profile name with their photograph so the correct photograph is associated with the correct profile - collaborative bit
Scripts to upload and resize the image
Scripts to collect random data from the database - collaborative

Working on the design of the site

Trying to remain similar to social networking sites
Not making the design a focus: the data/idea is important

Screenshots of what I've been doing:

Writing the T&C:

Random data selection script - this script defines the "random row" function which looks up a random user

And this bit tells the script which rows should be randomised, and where the username and image id is located

This is the error that comes up if you don't enter a user name. A similar error comes up if the T&C isn't checked

And other username suggestions are provided if the one you picked has already been taken

This makes it all sound easy. It hasn't been. Trying to get the various bits to work together has been really hard. A nice list of problems that need fixing:

Data removal request script needs to be written
The sign up page currently moves on to the photo page whether the T&C box has been checked or not and currently still signs users up to usernames that are already taken
Footer needs to be added to pages with a contact link for feedback etc

Mouchette

2007-12-03T00:32:00.000Z

Mouchette.org is the homepage of a 13 year old suicidal girl from Amsterdam. She describes herself as an artist - because she heard that all you have to do to be an artist is say you're one. She dedicates pages to her parents - an animated .gif of a heart moving with the word "papa" seemingly scratched into it represents her father. Flies are a constant theme in the work - her name means "little fly".

Each page allows the user to interact with the website and Mouchette herself. The website was started in 1996 and is still busy today, with user entries as recent as yesterday. For example, In Flesh and Blood, visitors can describe how touching the monitor feels. There is something rather sinister about this - perhaps it is the intimate photograph of Mouchette licking the screen. Perhaps it is the social wrongness of physical contact. Yet this is a digital image on a computer. Mouchette is not really licking the screen. The visitor would not really be touching her. The title (digital flesh&blood) combined with this image illustrates the virtual nature of the internet, and the lack of a physical presence.

This raises questions of reality, truth, identity. Who is Mouchette? It is now widely known that the website was not made by a 13 year old girl from Amsterdam, that this is an avatar. But the responses it solicit are (presumably) genuine. This is concerning - the suicidal interests of Mouchette have attracted people experiencing similar emotions, and in turn, people offering assistance. This idea maybe shocking

This Interview with Mouchette has some interesting statements about the project:

I was very amused by the phenomenon of the personal homepage, which I immediately experienced as a popular "genre" in that medium. I am the kind of person who thinks that art is never where you expect it, and that art is only in the eye of the beholder: a true descendant of Marcel Duchamp.

For me identity is something that exists between the "I" and the "you", it's not just a personal investigation. Mouchette is constructed by her public. When they love her, when they insult her, they make her who she is. And I design everything like this: words as questions, identity as an empty space where people project their desire.

I think net.art is a form of public art, art for the public space, it should be accessible for any kind of public, at any level. Let the curators and the art institutions see Mouchette as art if they can, but if they can't, it's only their problem. I'm not going to exhibit my artistic pedigree and references to make my work fit into their frame of mind. They are the ones who should change their frame of mind and understand what the internet public already sees very clearly. So if there is some crossing over to be done, it's on the side of the art institutions, who should find a new place between the net.artists and the public.

Art in the public space should be enjoyed by the passing people without any reference to the art context, that's what I meant. It can be integrated in the street context to such a point that it's not even seen as art, but still experienced as something meaningful, or useful, or disturbing etc... When envisioned through the art context, the standpoint is different and what makes it an artwork is a particular mixture of the
work itself and the public participation to the work. That's why I don't
see a contradiction between general public and art public: it's just a
different standpoint for the same work.

Conceptual Art

2007-12-02T17:23:00.000Z

Conceptual Art
Paul Wood
Tate, 2002

"Conceptual art" poses a problem from the start

Why produce a form of visual are premised on undercutting the two principle characterisitics of art as it has come down to us in Western culture:

the production of objects to look at
The act of contemplative looking

Moves from modernist painting to postmodern work, where anything and everything can go in a gallery (!)
Argumentative legacy

Even the name is a problem!

Roots in Fluxus

George Maciunas

"Purge the wold of bourgeois sickness, "intellectual", professional and commercialised culture; purge the world of dead art, imitation, artificial art, abstract art...promote living art, anti-art, promote non-art reality to be grasped by all peoples, not only critics, dilettantes and professionals."

Asger Jorn (Cobra and Situationist International groups)

"Visual art was a useless medium for creativity and thinking"
Instead, "art" should merge with social life in the city, becoming inseparable from action and thought

Ian Burn proposed Conceptual art was transitional; out of the art world and into a widerfield of engaged cultural practice.

Facebook takes lead over Myspace

2007-11-27T23:20:00.001Z

http://socialnewswatch.com/facebook-myspace-alexa/

BBC: How to make friends on Facebook

2007-11-27T22:43:00.001Z

Another article by Rory Cellan-Jones about social networking for over 40s.

And I can't help noticing that most users of these sites are people you would not think needed them - students with very active social networks all living in close proximity.

This made me chuckle to myself, as my housemate and I regularly use Facebook to communicate, which presumably stemmed from us using MSN to talk to each other from different rooms. I also talk to people I see regularly at Uni. I think the main advantage with commenting people on sites like Facebook and Myspace is that it allows you to communicate with someone without the social embarrassment of having to disturb them to show them an interesting website. It means when they next log in - at their convenience - they can see what you wanted to show them and maybe reply back. The other advantage is group systems, which allow a whole group of friends to discuss something rather than having to go to the trouble of all getting together. For example, my sixth form friends, who are now spread out across the country at various Universities, can organise a get-together for the summer holidays or at Christmas. Each of us can add the dates we are free and see when others are available, without having to get together in the first place to organise the next meeting.

Article: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/6699791.stm

Identity research

2007-11-26T15:05:00.000Z

An Introduction to Cyberculture

David Bell

Chapter 5 – Community and Cyberculture

Howard Rheingold - "words on a screen are quite capable of... creating a community from a collection of strangers."
Split between people who argue cyberspace re-enchants community (real life community is eroded) and those who argue online communities are damaging real life community.

However, Wellman and Gulia (1999: 167) argue that this debate is problematic because:

It is Manichean (two totally opposing viewpoints)
It is presentist (lacks the history of community)
It is unscolarly (based on anecdote)
It is parochial (forces a separation between real life and online

What does community mean today?

Bell and Valentine (1997: 93) - "Community is a word we all use, in many different ways, to talk about...what? About belonging and exclusion, about 'us' and 'them'. It's a common-sense thing, used in daily discussions, in countles associates, from "care in the community" to the Community Hall; from "community spirit" to the "bussiness community"... Many of us would lay claim to belonging to at least one community, whether it is the lesbian and gay commmunity or just the local community where we live. The term community is not only descriptive, but also normative and ideaological. It carries a lot of baggage with it.

Detraditionalisation (shift to a post traditional society) leads to disembedding which is linked to globalisation.

Globalisation: Series of processes that have forged a sense of increasing connectedness between people and places dispersed around the world.
All kinds of things now move speedily around the world: people, ideas, images, commodities, technologies, money.
Thus, all these things and therefore our experiences of them are disembedded - no longer rooted in place, but characterised as global flows.
We rework our sense of who we are in relation to the global flows that we come into contact with.
We can choose who we want to be from these flows.
Some critics argue that this has severe social implications, making us:

schizophrenic
giving us a depthless experience

There is an innate human desire for association and identification. The internet is the ideal site to play with our identities.

Detraditionalisation frees us from old obligations, and lets us give community a postmodern make-over.
The Internet offers us a safe place to make communities in.
Is the internet the solution to this decentralisation, disembedding, globalising uncertainty or part of the problem?

Heather Bromberg (1996: 147) - "It does seem clear that people make use of this technology to combat the symptoms that are characteristic of... the ''postmodern sondition'. The technologies themselves are highly characteristic of the postmodern by virtue of their fluidity and malleability. Ironically, however, it is their fluid and malleable nature which leads them to be used to combat that condition"

Rheingold (1999: 414) - "In cyberspace, we chat and argue, engage in intellectual intercourse, perform acts of commerce, exchange knowledge, share emotional support, make plans, brainstorm, gossip, feud, fall in love, find friends, and lose them, play games and metagames, flirt, create a little high art and a lot of idle tale. We do everything people do when they get together, but we do it with words on computer screens, leaving our bodies behind. Millions of us have already built communities where our identities commingle and interact electronically, independent of local time or location."
Rheingold (1999: 423) - "You can't simply pick up a phone and ask to be connected with someone who wants to talk about Islamic art of California wine, or with someone with a three year old daughter or a 30 year old Hudson; you can, however, join a computer conference on any of these topics, then open a public or private correspondence with the previously unknown people that you find in the conference."
What is the difference between a community and a market sector?
As people fracture their sense of self into making online selves, they paradoxically produce a portfolio of singularities.
Being sick of others reminds us that membership of online communities is elective and selective, as is withdrawal.

BBC: Too old for networking

2007-11-23T11:40:00.000Z

As a 40-something Technology Correspondent, determined to keep up with my younger colleagues, I felt duty bound to find out. So I got myself a profile on MySpace, bebo and Facebook.
...
After a few days I can't help noticing one thing about my virtual social life - I don't seem to have many friends.

Which is the main reason why people my age do sign up to Facebook and Myspace - because all our friends have one and we don't want to be left out of that circle. "oh, we sorted out all the details on Facebook". If you want a voice, you've got to be in that circle too.

Soon my phone is twittering with every detail of their mundane lives.
"Not much happening right now. About to take a shower," says Suburbman
"Up at dawn, back hurting. read the Guardian online," is the thrilling news from TopDoc.

But how much of what we talk about every day is as mundane as this? Just because it's a new way of communicating doesn't mean what's communicating is actually interesting/exciting (the medium is the message).

Interesting to see someone writing about trying to break the generation gap rather than just accepting it's there. When my mum suggested she might get a Facebook account so she could be my sister's friend, my sister firmly objected (something to do with the photographs of her drinking perhaps? Or the eternal shame of your parents being involved with any aspect of your life when you're 17? Personally I didn't care, my mum would get bored of Facebook just as fast as she got bored of MSN and the Skype phone, when she realised the only people she talked to were me and my sister).

Cellan-Jones concludes:

I have decided I am too old to Twitter and too mature for Myspace. Some things are best left to the young.

Only because "the young" have grown up with computers and mobile phones as methods of communication. We don't understand why "thank you" letters have to be "real" letters and not emails.

Although Twitter does seem stupid to me too. I will chose when I want to know what my friends are doing, not the other way around. Perhaps 20 is too old for social networking too.

Article: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/6690569.stm

Identity Research

2007-11-21T12:30:00.000Z

Identity by Zygmunt Baugman. Polity Press, 2006

You don't think to question identity until you don't fit in.

Circumstances force you to question it
Exposure to different ideas from different communities

Identity is something that is invented, not discovered
Online (virtual) communities cannot replaced "real" communication

Cannot give substance to personal identities

Social recognition is needed for happiness
Two forms of identity:

Those who compose/decompose identity at will
Those who cannot choose their own identity

imposed by others
stereotyping, humiliating, dehumanising

Most people are "suspended" somewhere between the two

Identity can be a dream or a nightmare, no telling when one will turn into the other

liquid

With globalisation, identity becomes a heated matter
We are now passing from the "solid" to the "fluid" phase of modernity, and fluids are so called because they cannot keep their shape for long, and unless they are poured into a tight container they keep changing shape under the influence of even the slightest forces
Identity is trying to work out "who am I?"
Modern technology keep people in touch without the discomfort of actually being touched
Visual mobile phones won't be successful

Even the closeness of virtual visibility will deprive mobile chatting of the main advantage for which it was so enthusiastically embraced by the millions who crave to keep in touch while keeping their distance at the same time.

Not genuine communication
Messaging is safer, less risky
Audial and messaging communications are free from body language semiotics

Identity is a hopelessly ambiguous idea
Identities are for wearing and showing, not storing and keeping
Identity is ambivalent
Identity is confusing

BBC: Finding myself through online identities

2007-11-19T09:16:00.001Z

Until now my online presence has been carefully managed and controlled, and although you can find out anything you care to ask about my views, politics, lack of religious belief and opinions on technology and the internet the persona that emerges from the last twenty years of online activity keep as much hidden as it reveals.
I rarely talk about my personal life, and reveal few details of my family or close relationships.
Now that is changing.

Our modern conception of privacy and of the nature of the individual is a product of the industrial age that is now passing, so it should not surprise us that we are finding new ways of constructing an identity online.
As I spread myself around over the network, updating my Facebook profile, commenting on MySpace, flying through Second Life, blogging, twittering, updating my calendar and posting photos and videos and audio I am finding a new way to be Bill Thompson.
I wonder what he'll be like?

Ok, so he hasn't exactly "found" himself yet, and the article doesn't really say anything I didn't already know - so he has a myspace and a facebook and a bebo? So does my sister, what's new? The article seems to be more about celebrating the different ways he can inform people about himself than an actual identity. Still, interesting to see someone else's view on identity on social networking sites.

Article: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/6654337.stm

Web Theory

2007-11-16T20:32:00.000Z

Web Theory: Introduction

Robert Burnett and P. David Marshall

Routledge, 2003

Identity:

Godwin (1997a) the Net is “the first medium that combines all the powers to reach a large audience that you see in broadcasting and newspapers with all the intimacy and multi-directional flow of information that you see in telephone calls. It is both intimate and powerful”
- It is this conjunction of power and intimacy that reveals the complex nature of the web
Stone (1996): “The identities that emerge from these [Internet] interactions – fragmented, complex, diffracted through the lenses of technology, culture and new technological formations – seem to be... more visible as the critters we ourselves are in the process of becoming, here at the close of the mechanical age”
Turkle (1995): “In the story of constructing Identity in the culture of simulation, experiences on the Internet figure prominently, but these experiences can only be understood as part of a larger social context. That context is the story of eroding boundaries between the real and the virtual, the animate and the inanimate, the unitary and the multiple self, which is occurring both in advanced scientific fields of research and in the pattern of everyday life. From scientists trying to create artificial life to children morphing through a series of virtual personae, we shall see evidence of fundamental shifts in the way we create and experience human identity. But it is on the Internet that our confrontations with technology as it collides with of sense of human identity are fresh, even raw. In the real time communities of cyberspace, we are dwellers on the threshold between the real and the virtual, unsure of our footing, inventing ourselves as we go along.”
Poster (1990) claims that in cyberspace, “the self is decentered, dispersed, and multiplied in continuous instability”
A study of internet use by Nie and Erbing found that the more hours people spend online the less time they spend with real people
- People reported spending less time with or talking on the phone to family and friends
  - BUT: maybe they are talking to these people online?
  - And the phone acts as a virtual mediator of communication too, so that shouldn't count, because one would presume that the amount of face to face contact reduced when the telephone was invented?
    - What about the use of VOIP (too recent for the book). Does that count as a phone of the internet?
  - Another survey found people enlarged their network of friends
    - And the same survey showed that they used internet based communication to enrich relationships
  - (Although, the surveys questioned different people, and asked different questions and were both dependant on estimations provided by the samples, so are not accurate)
Goffman (1959) The Presentation of the Self in Everyday Life
- ongoing process of negotiation and information management
  - where the individual is trying to influence the impresion others develop as a way of influencing their attitudes and behaviour
  - Espressions are given and given off
    - given off = theatrical and contextual, unintentional
    - gives = more intentional, and easier to manipulate
  - Like a performance game, impressions are the result of a performance
Dominick (1999) found that home pages employ similar strategies of self presentation to interpersonal self presentation.
- Use of links as a social association
- Defined by interests
- Positive reinforcement through contacting them (email, forums, guestbooks)
Key feature of the web is the audience as users who contribute content
- goes beyond “browsing” or “surfing” and into immersion
- It is as much about looking, reading, observing as it is about the empowerment to produce
Comparisions to photography:
- Homepages are like photographs
  - A celebration of display
  - Both reconstruct a private, personal world
  - Distance and aura of both technologies have been broken down by popular use
Personal home page is like a garden – a production of the self for public consumption
McLuhan – extension of the body through technology
Conclusion:
- Allure of the web is that is is an extension of the self unattached to the body
- One can transform via avatars and handles
- Personal website are examples of how the web blends private and public aspects of our lives

Plan

2007-11-15T22:58:00.001Z

My plan for how the pages will work, to get it clear in my head as much as anything else! Now to code it...

Image Upload

2007-11-14T20:29:00.001Z

I have decided to give users the option to upload pictures to accompany their profile. The end result currently looks something like this:

I plan to add some text to explain what kind of photos should be uploaded, and also include a disclaimer (in addition to the one I intend to place on the front page). I will also place a restriction on the size of the image because I don't want really large images to be uploaded (but first I have to work out how to code that....)

Currently the code looks like this (with a simple breakdown of the more important elements):

BBc: Social networkers warned of risk

2007-11-12T16:16:00.000Z

Another news article warning people about the data they use on the internet, and how people use the information on Social Networking sites - to search for their boss, former partners, etc (spying?).

(more focused towards wireless broadband and storing passwords safely. Interestingly, provides a link telling you how to hack someone's computer)

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7090096.stm

New sign up form

2007-11-11T23:22:00.001Z

This is the second version of the sign up form for the website. I changed it for a number of reasons:

Regarding the data protection law (even though it appears the work is theoretically legal):

People might be put off by the number of questions
People might be put off by the nature of the questions

I wanted to try to reflect the fragmented nature of identity, and the way people reflect themselves through the information that they provide

The previous form was finding out facts about people
(Hopefully) the newer form will allow people to express their personality - how they want to present themselves - more than the original form could

Some of the new questions (What makes you happy?) are more open-ended and allow for a more personal response

Gaining a certain level of personal response is important because I intend to mix up people's data randomly. I hope that this will cause people to realise:

Similarities and differences between their "identities" and other people's
How easy it is to adopt a different persona and how quickly / often identity changes

The issue of identity theft and how easy it is to obtain data about people

The fragmented and fluid nature of identity
How people present themselves on the internet

I am still debating whether or not to include "email address" as a field, as this is the easiest way people can be identified from the data that they provide. However, I think it is an important field because it allows me a way of contacting the people who use the website. At this stage it is easier to build a field for email and remove it later if I wish.

While some of the other questions are taken from the previous version of the sign up form, others are taken from questionnaires that people fill out by email, on MySpace, Facebook, and other social networking websites. Many of these questionnaires are used to obtain sensitive details about people. For example, some emails providing people with "nicknames" or "porn star names" ask for information such as first pets name and Mother's maiden name, which combined together make something funny, like Fido Jones, while also providing interested parties with details frequently used as bank security questions or passwords.

Identity theft article in the Guardian

2007-11-06T20:22:00.000Z

Huge picture so it can actually be read.

Data protection

2007-11-02T11:28:00.000Z

There is the possibility of people be identified (either by email or a combination of the data), therefore this is "personal data". For the collection of this data people need to give their consent. They should be informed who is collecting the data and why before they sign up or enter their details.

The problem is doing this in a way that doesn't put people off entering their details.

Alternatively, the data could be anonymised, so that is not personal data as such.

Depending on how the work takes shape, this may not be practical

Provided the data is only used for what people were told it would be used for there is no problem. However, the dangers of publishing certain data e.g. the names, ages, and emails of children need to be considered.

The minimum age to sign up with my website is 18, however, as with any website, people can fill in inaccurate information.

If the data is collected only for personal use (studies) and not sold or shared, the Information Commissioner's Office does not need to be notified.

The other consideration is keeping the data secure and safe to prevent access from anyone else.

A week spent worrying that my work isn't legal and considering adapting it, for nothing!

Thinking about it...

2007-10-29T21:44:00.000Z

Baker's work has more than one similarity (collecting data) to mine.

Social networking sites, while free to use, must be making a profit somewhere. And that somewhere is from the collected audience who tell companies exactly what it is they are interested in. Sports? Ok, football adverts for you. Music? Gig adverts for you. They can target people by their age, gender, location, interests, jobs...

And again, all this information is given to these websites for free, allowing them to make a tidy £5billion profit (pocket money to Microsoft though).

It's not just technology giants who cash in. Myspace music offers signed and unsigned artists the chance to interact with fans, for free. It's not hard for a band that sounds like the Arctic Monkeys to search for "Arctic Monkeys" on myspace and send "friend requests" to everyone who might like them too (and people who aren't interested). If they're playing a gig at Zee Bar at Chichester Uni they can search for students and inform them about the gig to try and drum up a higher attendance (yes, that did happen) which may lead to higher CD sales and more interest in the band.

Of course, if you have enough money, you could just buy the whole damn social networking site in the first place. Funny how all the TV shows advertised on myspace are owned by Newscorp...

So, how much is your information worth?

Artist: Rachel Barker

2007-10-28T19:01:00.000Z

Rachel Baker is a network artist based in London and is a member of irational. Her work, TM Clubcard Project (1997) can be viewed using the link below:

http://www.irational.org/tm/clubcard/

Clubcard asks people to register their details on the website in order to gain points or rewards "as they surf". The site is a parody of loyalty schemes such as Tesco's clubcard and Sainsbury's rewards (or, today, Nector points). Clicking the register link takes you to a page with lots the usual text boxes to fill in - name, organisation, address, email, date of birth etc.

Scrolling down, however, reveals some less than normal questions, for example, "Which do you prefer, shopping, driving, or sex" and "are you clean or dirty".

Users can select their cleanliness and preferred activity from a drop down box (I would be interested to know how many of the Marks and Spencer's shoppers selected "dirty").

The form continues, asking "Do you often give your personal data to marketers? (yes, no, or yes but I lie)" and "How much is your personal data worth to marketing agents?" (again, I would be interested to see what people filled this in as - presumably as everyone who filled this in was happy to give out their details so freely, it isn't worth much to them, but it's worth considerably more to the marketing company). Users are also enticed with the offer to collect points from visitors to their website. Points for doing nothing? Ok! And extra traffic heading the way of the loyalty scheme, it's a win-win! Users also have the option to add their details to the pdf database - which is then displayed on the website (either Sainsbury's or Tescos depending on which version of the website the user was on at the time).

Example of the information Baker has collected:

Exploring the site further reveals a an "internet superstore" page, with images which link to different net art sites, and text apparently ripped from the tesco website (or at the least parodies of the website). The sainsbury's website has a number of yellow buttons offering extra reward points for posting the URL on your website and the store directory with the same links as the tesco version.

The first page of the website itself echoes Tesco's promotional material: blue and white strips with red boxes (I refused to buy the economy sheets from Tesco because they were blue and white and I didn't want my bedroom to look like part of their ever expanding empire). Baker has also used logos and images from Sainsbury's and Tesco, and received letters from both stores legal team.

Letter from Tescos

Letter from Sainsburys

For me, the site is interesting because it invited people to submit data while clearly parodying the supermarkets loyalty schemes - themselves designed to collect data. It is interesting (for me especially, as I embark on a similar data collection strategy) to see that people have been submitting their data to the website. Bakers site forces you to consider the information you give out about yourself, and the value of this information:

Personal data - name, address, age etc

to help them profile their customers for their own advertising

to help them profile customers for other companies, e.g. if Tescos says 99% of its customers are elderly ladies, they can select products that target elderly ladies or have companies market products in a way that appeals to elderly ladies.

Shopping habits

Allow the store to recommend me similar products (often wrong, why would I be interested in pillows when I already bought them?)
Allow the store to see trends within certain geographical areas
Allow them to see what is popular
Allow them to tell suppliers what is popular
Allow them to determine future offers, e.g. buy one get one half price encourages me to spend 50% more on something than I would have done before
Allows them to advertise me related services, e.g. if I buy a car steering wheel lock, I might be interested in car insurance; telling me to spend £50 in the shop to get 5p off a litre of petrol encourages me to buy petrol from them too.

...And all that because I want a few "points" - which themselves do nothing more than encourage me to buy £5 worth of tomatoes I didn't want or need...

Baker is right to ask the question "how much is your data worth?" because if the public had the marketing sense of Tesco and Sainsbury's they would be selling this information to them, not giving it out for free.

Identity research continued again...

2007-10-26T23:44:00.000+01:00

From Media Culture: Cultural studies, identity and politics between the modern and the postmodern.

Douglas Kellner

Postmodern identity, continued:

Identity from image, style and fashion:

Highly fluid
Multiple
Mobile
Transitory

Postmodern self

Loses anxiety for immersion in euphoric fragments of experience and frequent change of image and identity

Jameson (1984) claims anxiety disappears.

Identity crises still occur and can be acute (gender confusion – teenagers idolising Boy George)
When ones image and identity changes frequently, there is anxiety over whether the new identity will be accepted (validated)

Advertising

Utopian image, a new, more attractive, more successful, more prestigious you by purchasing certain goods
Magical self transformation, metamorphosis
Individuals taught to identify with values, role models, and behaviour (from a certain product)

Postmodern is a mixture of styles

Traditional and modern aspects
Lack of dominant culture
Mixture of aesthetic styles and strategies in advertising

Fragmented culture

Postmodern aesthetics in advertising is risky because of fragmentation

Multidimensional, polysemic, ideologically coded, open to a variety of readings

Identity is not lost in a postmodern culture, but it is subject to

New determinations and forces
New styles, possibilities, models and forms.

Therefore, it is unstable and constantly restructured

Modern identities were more stable
Today's society is more accepting toward identity changes

The quest for identity is more intense than ever

Rebellion against producing identity soley as an individual
Increased emphasis on group, tribal, national – collective identity

E.g. woman, gay, white, or a combination of all three

Media figures use identity as a construct (look, image, style)

Michael Jackson

The boundary between black and white
Male and female
Adult and youth

Madonna

Girl and woman
Glamorous and "normal"
Blonde, brunette, red head….

Dramatic shifts in image and style suggest identity is a construct, something one produced, that could be modified at will

Personal identity (as shown by celebrity identity) is fraught with contradictions and tensions

Media culture doesn't create a subject or force people to behave as subjects, it creates identities and positions for individuals to identify with specific figure, images, or positions
A resource for identity
New modes of identity in which look, style and image replaced action and commitment

In premodernism, who you were was defined by what you did, what kind of person you were – morals, political viewpoint etc
Today it is how you look, your image, your style: how you appear

MUD (multi user domains) on the internet allow people to take on completely alternate identities

Swapping genders, races, classes, professions…
Some people have multiple identities
Sherry Turkle: "the self is not only decentered but multiplied without limit

Identity research continued...

2007-10-21T11:31:00.000+01:00

Postmodern identity:

From Media Culture: Cultural studies, identity and politics between the modern and the postmodern.
Douglas Kellner

Postmodern Identity:

Identity becomes more unstable

Pace, extension, and complexity of modern societies
Discourse claims identity is a myth/illusion

Frankfurt School
Baudrillard
Post structalists:

Identity is a construct of language and society
Really is it fixed

The autonomous, self reflective subject is fragmenting

Social processes which rationalise, bureaucracise, and consumorise
Mass society and media culture – Imploded into masses (Baudrillard 1938)

Subject is in flux

Anxiety no longer experience, hysteria takes over instead
Postmodern theorists favour media culture as the cause:

Implosion of identity
Fragmentation of the subject

E.G. The film Pretty Woman

Prostitute meets "prince charming"
Transforms herself

Fashion
Cosmetics
Dictation
Style

New personality, new identity = getting her man
The message:

To be successful, to transform your identity, to be a new, better you, you must concentrate on image, style and fashion

Identity research

2007-10-19T15:29:00.000+01:00

From Media Culture: Cultural studies, identity and politics between the modern and the postmodern.
Douglas Kellner

Premodern Identity:

fixed, solid and stable
identified by social role
unproblematic and not subject to reflection or discussion

Modern identity:

becomes more mobile, multiple, personal, self-reflexive, subject to change and innovation
still social and “other” related
- A mother, a daughter, a Brit, a scientist, a teacher
- A combination of these roles
- Identities still fixed and limited though boundaries are expanding
Self-conciousness
- one can choose and make an identity as possible roles expand
- However, as they expand, one must gain recognition for this identity to be valid
- A process of mutual recognition.
Anxiety
- made the wrong choice?
- Aware (an anxious) of ability to change
- Aware (an anxious) of the need for validation
- Ones identity cannot be out of date (modernity = innovation, change) - fragile
- Only in a society of identity anxiety could an identity crises occur
identity in modernity linked to individuality
- goes against traditional identity of the tribe
- mass media makes it about appearance, look, style
  - paradox – everyone tries to look different and “individual” but it all comes from mass culture in the first place

To be continued....

Second page

2007-10-11T10:32:00.000+01:00

Again, I tried to keep to general questions, the kind that you normally get asked when you sign up to a social networking site.

I sed a mix of drop down lists (age, country), check boxes (display age), radio buttons (gender), and normal text inputs (post code). I wonder why radio boxes are called radio buttons?

Radio buttons got their name from the physical buttons used on radios to select preset stations - when one of the buttons was pressed, it would pop out when another button was pushed in.

Interesting.

I used the drop down lists or menus for options where there would be a wider selection of answers.

Too old for this sort of thing - because people who are over 35 like to write that on the page... I guess it's funny.

Under 18 pretending to be over 18 - because it doesn't take a genius to work out hat by lying about your age on the sign up form, you can get the full profiles only available to adults instead of the limited ones designed to protect children.

Another drop down list:

Took ages to come up with all those country associations

Spiderpig

2007-10-10T21:46:00.000+01:00

Let me tell you a story about a kid named Spidey...

"We learnt the community sustains and promotes itself. I enjoyed seeing comments like "we made the newspaper", because I may have started this group as a joke, but the community took ownership, the pictures and threads were a constant source of enjoyment and I thank everyone who participated. Community is king."

Aww, community spirit.

Sign up page

2007-10-08T17:08:00.000+01:00

I made a looong list of all the things that facebook, myspace and bebo ask for when you sign up:

Name (first name, surname)
Age or DoB (and whether or not to display it/display when it's your birthday)
Gender
Region or country
Post code
Email address
Home town
Education history
Employment history or job
Relationship status
Religion
Mood
Have to do a CAPTCHA test (wobbly image, illegible to computers)
Accept Terms and Conditions
Upload a profile picture
Albums and photos
Choose a song
Make friends :)

So this is the first page of my own website:

I tried to choose general questions, like the real social networking sites did, but also to show it wasn't wuite real, I included "nickname" and "pornstar name" - the idea for that actually came from social networking sties anyway, where people fill in chain mail like quizzes about themselves, and those are regularly some of the questions. Actually, the quizzes are a way for people to find out information about you that might be used for passwords (e.g. mother's maiden name, first pet etc).

I couldn't upload the page because it doesn't actually work yet because there is no script to post the information anywhere!

Identity on the internet

2007-10-01T20:36:00.000+01:00

How do you get "an identity" on the internet?

Social networking sites (Bebo, Myspace, Facebook, Xanga etc)
"Web 2.0" (Flickr, YouTube, Digg)
Email
Forums/BBS/Chats
MSN
Your own website (but no one does that anymore because that costs money (hosting, domain) and/or you need techical knowledge (HTML), and why bother when you can have basically the same thing for free using a combination of all the above?!)

Sooo social networking sites:

MySpace:

6th most popular site on the internet
80% of visits to social networking websites are to MySpace
Over 200 million users
It's arguable that having a myspace is more important now than having a website is.
Generally teenage fanbase

Facebook:

Started off for university and college students only, expanded to "high schools" and recently everyone.
Largest number of university and college age users of any social networking site
39million active members worldwide
7th most popular website
A recent poll put it as the number one visited website for over 50% of American 17 - 25 year olds
The largest network is London (over 1 million members)

Bebo:

85th most popular English language site
11th most popular site in the UK and the number 1 site in Ireland
Third most popular social networking site
Younger users than other networking sites, typically 13/14 years old

So... I guess I have to make my own social networking site?

Artist study: 0100101110101101.org

2007-09-25T17:37:00.000+01:00

Eva and Franco Mattes - Internationally known as 0100101110101101.org is a couple of restless European con-artists who use non-conventional communication tactics to obtain the largest visibility with the minimal effort.

A spoof movie campaign, stealing other people's websites and spreading a computer virus in the name of art are just some of their projects.

Life Sharing is a real-time digital self-portrait. Started in the year 2000 and active uninterruptedly until 2003, Life Sharing is 0100101110101101.ORG's personal computer turned into a real time sharing system. Any visitor has free and unlimited access to all contents: texts, images, software, 01's private mail... Privacy is stupid.

The work is no longer online (at least, not that I could find - it appears to have just disappeared off the face of the Internet, as so many things often do), so 0100101110101101.org have regained their privacy.

I find it interesting that a group as secretive as 0100101110101101.org (secrecy is/was something of a necessity considering much of their artwork verges on illegal) would offer their lives up in this way. In the "feedback" section on the website, Steve Deitz writes:

I have had the experience of e-mailing 0100101110101101.ORG about a meeting and having a stranger from Boston reply whether he should come to New York to meet me then also.

For me, this highlights the kind of personal communication that the internet is used for on a daily basis. When you send an email, how do you know you mate on the other end isn't posting it all over the internet? How do you know your mate doesn't have the person you're slagging off sat right beside them? This medium is frequently used as a substitute for face to face communication, yet it is nowhere near face to face...

Life Sharing is like a self portrait made using information - which makes it sound just like any other personal website. But it isn't, because this information is gained from communication with friends - the portrait is painted by the communication with those who you know, right before the eyes of the viewer (voyeur is a more appropriate word for this invasion of privacy)

Yet Life Sharing isn't a traditional self portrait because it allows you to interact with it. You can become 0100101110101101.org; email Steve Dietz, use their bank details...

Tilman Baumgärtel in the feedback section:

Of course, this self-portrait leaves almost as much open as it conceals: for despite all its openness, it does not reveal what the two people look like who are working at this computer

Artist study: Sophie Calle

2007-09-22T19:04:00.000+01:00

Everyone's favourite artist from the Biennale (French Pavilion).

Wikipedia article on Sophie Calle:

a French writer, photographer, installation artist, and conceptual artist... Her work frequently depicts human vulnerability, and examines identity and intimacy. She is recognized for her detective-like ability to follow strangers and investigate their private lives. Her photographic work often includes panels of text of her own writing...

Although much of her work employs voyeurism, Calle has allowed her own life to be put on display as well. She became so intrigued by following her unwitting subjects that she wanted to reverse the relationship, and become the subject herself. She asked her mother to hire a private detective to follow her, without the detective knowing that she had arranged it, with the hopes that his investigation would provide photographic evidence of her existence.

The work shown at the Biennale was called "Take Care Of Yourself". The title came from the last line of the subject itself, an email written to Calle by her lover calling off the affair. Calle asked 102 women (chosen for their professions - sex analyst, clown, comedian, dancer, singer, crossword maker) to read the email and interpret it as they saw fit. She photographed each of the women, and filmed many of them reading the email. No, reading isn't the right word... mocking the email. Richard Dorment from the Telegraph describes the humiliation:

One by one these wicked, clever women step forward to make mincemeat of the poor sap, who may never be able to show his face in public again.

Our group of female visitors felt that the man in question had got exactly what he deserved. After all, had he told Calle face to face (the irony of the line that email was face to face was picked up by many of the readers) or over the phone, the artwork would never have been able to come into existence. Using a medium that can be distributed globally at the click of a button was clearly not a wise move on his part.

Tateshots: Venice Specail - Sophie Calle

Photographs: (of course I lost my notebook with the person whose response I photographed, so I don't know what some of these actually are anymore....)

Above: The email has been highlighted, analysed, deconstructed

Above: The piece on the left is the email translated into a barcode. The right is in Morse code. There was also an embossed print with the email in braille. In the interview on the Tate website, Calle reveals that she realised that language was an issue (much of the work was in French). These pieces provided a break from the language which I could barely read (even though I forgot my barcode reader and couldn't read that one anyway...damnit)

Above: This photograph is an example of how many of the responses were organised: a photograph of the woman (frequently portrayed covering her face), how they used or responded to the email (either a print or video, and included in the book below the image). The responses covered the walls, some at eye level, some way above head height (causing you to look up, putting the woman in a position of power over you)

Above and below: One section of the exhibition was dedicated to the videos Calle had collected. They were set out in a line on the wall, each little screen displaying a different video with no audio. The larger screen displayed one video and audio (with English subtitles). Sadly, we only had time to sit and watch 2 responses, but I could happily have sat all day and watched these women interpreting the letter.

One of the things that interested me was the fact that Calle called this exhibition "take care of yourself" - showing her way of coping was to make the man feel stupid, to ridicule him. A fellow visitor commented that it was slightly weird and obsessive of Calle to have collected all these responses, yet I found it interesting that this is exactly what people do when they are dumped: they turn to friends and family for support. They don't put it in a Pavilion at the Biennale but then how many of us get to exhibit there anyway?

The other factor that Calle seemed to highlight was how easily communications over the internet (much of which is still text based - chat rooms, forums, email etc) can be copied/intercepted and multiplied. A simple typo in the email address can send a love letter to a stranger; a click of a button can forward an email to 100 women for ultimate humiliation. Intimate details, painful emotions, sent using a medium also used for mass distribution...

So, what am I going to do this semester?

2007-09-22T18:15:00.000+01:00

One of the issues I have continually come up against over the past year is that of identity. (Ideally) On the Internet, you can communicate with anyone from anywhere at anytime. This raises issues of globalisation, identity, truth, textual communication... which I have made into a handy spider diagram. Because that's how my mind works.

Identity on the Internet diagram

Note: This is a scan of the diagram, and the file is rather large (to enable my bad handwriting to be as legible as possible). Total file size is just over 1mb, which will be fine on broadband but take around 5 minutes to download on dial-up)

So... I have a lot of text on the diagram and now I just need to come up with an idea (the hard part). So now I need to find some artists. Oh how convenient I have a nice long list from the Biennale to start with :)

Back from the Biennale

2007-09-21T18:25:00.000+01:00

I had this idea it would be a waste of time jetting off to Venice. A week of sculptures and paintings and maybe a video installation if I was lucky.

I was just a little bit wrong. The majority of the work at the Biennale was screen based/projected. Most of it was video. Some of it was digital art. Russia filled an entire pavilion with digital art installations and the Fins included a net art piece. Screen media was so extensive Kate Madden was going to scream if she saw "another bloody video installation". But it's given me a great deal of confidence about the way I'm working, crammed in with all these traditional artists at University. The English catch on slowly.

However, I did manage to lose my notebook with all the artists I liked written in it, so I'm limited to what I can remember seeing (but then again, if I'd already forgotten one day later it obviously wasn't that impressive...)

Photographs from the Venice Biennale 2007