From rana_dasgupta at yahoo.com Tue May 1 10:04:30 2001 From: rana_dasgupta at yahoo.com (Rana Dasgupta) Date: Mon, 30 Apr 2001 21:34:30 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Reader-list] Chinese hackers target US In-Reply-To: <4.3.0.20010428170338.00a97b40@mail.sarai.net> Message-ID: <20010501043430.11528.qmail@web514.mail.yahoo.com> Chinese hacker groups ('Honkers') take national resentment of the US into their own hands... http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/world/americas/newsid_1305000/1305755.stm R __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Auctions - buy the things you want at great prices http://auctions.yahoo.com/ From sreejata at yahoo.com Wed May 2 15:06:15 2001 From: sreejata at yahoo.com (sreejata roy) Date: Wed, 2 May 2001 02:36:15 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Reader-list] check it out Message-ID: <20010502093615.34313.qmail@web11504.mail.yahoo.com> Dear All This is out of all present discussion,but this is interesting too! So check it out http://www.atavar.com/intimacy/intimacy08.html# Sreejata __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Auctions - buy the things you want at great prices http://auctions.yahoo.com/ From shuddha at sarai.net Wed May 2 17:11:03 2001 From: shuddha at sarai.net (Shuddhabrata Sengupta) Date: Wed, 02 May 2001 17:11:03 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Music/Science/Copyright Message-ID: <4.3.0.20010502170945.00a65670@mail.sarai.net> MUSIC - SCIENCE - COPYRIGHT/COPYLEFT An interesting case of how big business puts the screws on research and science, especially when it comes to copyright issues, and music. Should be of interest to all those amongst us who like music, and science, and dont like the smell of money Cheers Shuddha ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Scientists Drop Plan to Present Music-Copying Study By JOHN MARKOFF New York Times, April 27, 2001 Facing strong objections from the recording industry, a group of computer scientists who had successfully defeated an industry copy-protection system abruptly withdrew the paper detailing their research from a scientific conference yesterday. The dispute grew out of a technical contest created by a music industry standards organization last September that offered a $10,000 prize for anyone who could successfully remove a digital "watermark" from a musical recording. The four-part challenge put forth by the organization, the Secure Digital Music Initiative, was met by a group of computer scientists from Princeton and Rice Universities. But the scientists subsequently disputed the industry's claim that the technical details of their achievement could not be publicly disclosed because of limits established by the Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 1998. The dispute underscores an escalating conflict between advocates of freedom of speech and academic freedom, on one hand, and an industry that is trying to extend intellectual property rights into the digital world. The Princeton and Rice researchers have been in negotiations with the recording industry about their right to publish and although they said as recently as Wednesday evening that they hoped to reach an agreement that would permit them to present at least a portion of their findings, the talks collapsed. The industry has maintained that information developed as part of the research is proprietary and that disclosure violates the 1998 law, which restricts disclosure of methods used to break copy-protection systems. One scientist, Edward W. Felten, a Princeton computer scientist who also served as a technical expert for the Justice Department during the Microsoft antitrust trial, announced the group's decision yesterday at the conference, the Fourth International Information Hiding Workshop, in Pittsburgh. Standing outside a conference room, he read a statement explaining the decision. "Litigation is costly, time-consuming, and uncertain, regardless of the merits of the other side's case," Dr. Felten said. "We remain committed to free speech and to the value of scientific debate to our country and the world." In the afternoon the recording industry issued a statement, saying that the organization had not legally threatened the scientists. "The Secure Digital Music Initiative Foundation (S.D.M.I.) does not — nor did it ever — intend to bring any legal action against Professor Felten or his co-authors," the statement said. The organization said it sent a letter to the scientists because it had an obligation to the record companies who own the watermarking technology. A copy of the scientists' paper and a copy of the letter from a recording industry official were placed on the Web site of a freedom-of-speech advocate (www.cryptome.org) last Friday. The letter, written by Matthew Oppenheim, head of litigation for the Recording Industry Association of America, reads in part: "Any disclosure of information gained from participating in the public challenge would be outside the scope of activities permitted by the agreement and could subject you and your research team to actions under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act." Organizers of the conference said they were concerned about the effect of the industry's actions on academic freedom. "This was an excellent technical paper," said John McHugh, the chairman of the program committee and a senior member of the technical staff at the Software Engineering Institute at Carnegie Mellon University. "This was pure and simple intimidation. This paper didn't do anything that a bright technical person couldn't easily reproduce." Moreover, he said two French researchers, Julien Boeuf and Julien P. Stern, would present a similar paper today. Dr. Stern said he had successfully attacked three of the four watermarking techniques used in the challenge and would detail one attack. The technical founder of the conference said that he was skeptical about industry intentions in challenging the researchers, particularly since, he said, the basic digital watermark approach being pursued by the Secure Digital Music Initiative group had been disproved three years ago. "The specific echo-hiding techniques that S.D.M.I. wanted to keep secret were broken three years ago, so what is the fuss about?" the founder, Ross Anderson, a Cambridge University computer scientist, said. "The big embarrassing question for S.D.M.I. is why did they pick it?" Shuddhabrata Sengupta SARAI: The New Media Initiative Centre for the Study of Developing Societies 29, Rajpur Road, Delhi 110 052, India www.sarai.net From monica at sarai.net Thu May 3 10:18:30 2001 From: monica at sarai.net (Monica Narula) Date: Thu, 3 May 2001 10:18:30 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] more on the simputer Message-ID: Cyberspace for all (poor and illiterate communities particularly welcome) A prototype of Simputer, the "PC of the poor," was presented last week in Bangalore, India's Silicon Valley. Half-way between a PC and a hand-held device such as a Palm Pilot, Simputer ('Simple, Inexpensive, Multi-lingual comPUTER') offers all the functionalities of an ordinary PC, including internet facilities. But it also exhibits some very noteworthy differences: it is based entirely on a Linux operating system, does not consume energy (it works on the basis of three AAA batteries), speaks four languages and will be put on the market at a price which will not exceed $200 (E225). The Simputer project, which aims to "harness the potential of Information Technology for the benefit of the weaker sections of society," was conceived during the organisation of the Global Village, an International Seminar on Information Technology for Developing Countries, conducted during the Bangalore IT.com event in October 1998. Intellectual property for the device was subsequently transferred to a non-profit trust, the Simputer Trust, which was established by members of the Indian Institute of Science and the Encore Software company. Both the software and the hardware for the appliance have been provided as an open source technology. Simputer offers a number of technical novelties, and of course a very high degree of social relevance. For one thing, it will enable India's illiterate population (some 48 per cent of the country's one billion) to surf the web through a speech recognition device enabling basic navigation through the use of the software's menus. The speech dictionary currently supports four languages (English, Hindi, Tamil and Kannada) and can be customised to offer additional languages. Later versions will also offer wireless technology. The main raison d'être of the project is to equip rural communities, particularly schools and 'village councils,' with collective Simputer devices which can be accessed individually through the use of a smart-card. Possible applications are almost unlimited, including self-learning and tele-medical possibilities. The Simputer Trust is currently in the process of releasing production licences in both the developing and developed countries (at a price of $25,000 - E27,500- and $250,000 - E275,000- respectively) and it anticipates the product to hit the market within the next six months. While the exact implications of such a revolutionary device will need to be properly measured, Simputer may offer an appealing illustration of the possible nuances in the "spirit of freedom and alternative thinking" that was to characterise the internet: while Napster-like applications had shown the way in which the net could be used for mostly self-interested types of libertarian objectives, Simputer is probably the first concrete example of the way in which the internet can also support more public-spirited and socially inclusive objectives. The novelty is probably too exemplary not to be duly emphasised. Solon Ardittis a French/Greek national, is Co-Founder and CEO of Tradeyoursite.com, a European internet company offering an online trading market for the selling/buying of dot-coms and related assets. He previously worked for United Nations agencies and research institutes and is the author of over 30 publications on international migration, asylum and related issues. -- Monica Narula Sarai:The New Media Initiative 29 Rajpur Road, Delhi 110 054 www.sarai.net From saumya at sarai.net Thu May 3 16:07:40 2001 From: saumya at sarai.net (Saumya Gupta) Date: Thu, 03 May 2001 10:37:40 GMT Subject: [Reader-list] Future time Message-ID: <20010503.10374000@saumya.sarai.kit> The Clock of the Long Now As technological breakthroughs constantly accelerate the pace of contemporary society, the future has become difficult to imagine or define beyond the next few months. Danny Hillis - inventor, scientist, and creator of the world's fastest computer, the Connection Machine - sought to recapture the idea of the future, to break past the mental barrier of the millennium, to focus attention on the larger continuum at work, and to encourage a sense of responsibility about the future. So, he designed the world's slowest computer: the Clock of the Long Now, a clock meant to last for 10,000 years. The last ice age receded 10,000 years ago, after which civilization gradually evolved. That is, the history of mankind can be understood to stretch backward in time 10,000 years. Thus, the project of the Long Now places contemporary civilization in the middle of a symmetrical perspective that spans 10,000 years both back in history and forward towards the future. The Clock of the Long Now uses a binary digital-mechanical system with a patented serial-bit-adder instead of gears, the standard mechanism of clocks, which can wear down with time. Void of electronics, the clock - made of materials such as Monel Steel, Invar steel, tungsten carbide and synthetic sapphire - is precise to within one day in 20,000 years, self-corrects by 'phase-locking' to the noon sun, and measures the 26,000-year cycle of the procession of the equinoxes. It ticks once a day, bongs once a year, and the cuckoo comes out on the millennium. The Clock is only part of a project overseen by the Long Now Foundation, established in 01996. (Using a five-digit date is meant to encourage people to think in deep time and keep the foundation Y10K compliant.) The other major element is the 10,000 Year Library, which intends to address the issue of long-term collection and preservation of data, and to encourage others in like endeavors. The foundation's president is vanguard Stewart Brand, who founded, in 1968, the Whole Earth Catalogue and, in 1984, WELL (Whole Earth 'Lectronic Link), the first on-line community. He is also the author of the book The Clock of the Long Now, in which he describes the projects and explains the philosophy behind them. He maintains that society's temporal myopia is in need of correction to add balance and lengthen our attention span, to help us consider the long-term, measured in centuries. The high speed of change is deleterious for society at large: the focus on small, short-term goals creates large, long-term problems. The first step has been to build an eight-foot prototype for the clock. The goal is to have much larger versions of the clock, in an urban setting - for accessibility - and in the desert - for stability and permanence - along with the library. Recently purchased land adjoining Great Basin National Park in eastern Nevada will house a monumental scale clock inside white limestone cliffs at 10,000 feet elevation. Although the 10,000 Year Library does not actually exist yet, its first acquisition is already in the works. The Long Now Foundation is creating a modern "Rosetta Stone" to be known as the Rosetta Disk. The three-inch micro-etched Nickel disk will be a repository of linguistic information and a translation engine for 1,000 world languages. It promises longevity in the 2,000 to 10,000-year range. Jim Mason designed the Rosetta Disk, which uses nano-analog optical-storage technology, and it is being developed at Norsam Technologies and Los Alamos Laboratories with a grant from the Lazy Eight Foundation. Using analog coding means that platform-dependency is not a problem, nor are there the incompatibility pitfalls of myriad operating systems and applications. Only a microscope is needed to read the disk, and project workers are purposely keeping the encoding at a scale readable by a 1000X optical microscope. Thus, total disk storage capacity will be around 30,000 pages of text, which will begin at an eye-readable scale and taper down to nano-scale. In contrast to today's data -preserved on Web pages, magnetic media or digital files that will eventually be obsolete - the disk represents an effort to archive material essential for understanding our culture that will withstand the hands of time. From Philip.Pocock at t-online.de Thu May 3 18:08:14 2001 From: Philip.Pocock at t-online.de (philip pocock) Date: Thu, 03 May 2001 13:38:14 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] the dehli platform References: <3AF14248.C043ED8@t-online.de> Message-ID: <3AF15130.4DD24F02@t-online.de> hello in a few days documenta flies in with guests from around the globe - very few dehli-based people, no artists, it appears - to discuss or is it 'disclose' finishing democracy there. is there not a fine line between colonizing and globalizing? is 18th century romantic travel, as the british knew, a way to divide and conquer? isn't it easy for off-line minds to mistake that for the glocalizing effect of spaces such as this, where daily i touch base with dehli and appreciate some of my mail scans very much? i am curious about sarai's positi0n and plans concerning the india habitat center and the importation of art and lawyers and other experts to lecture about democracy. the list of speakers is at the www.documenta.de site. i find the whole thing rather curious that your initiative was not located by the expatriot indian cultural community, ironically in london where colonization reigned in the jet set days of 18th century travel. aside from the colonizing-globalizing, top-down importing versus emerging locall cultural production, one must wonder to a documenta visitor one must spend at least $20000 to fly around from platform one to five. otherwise like those back home we just have to accept what is said happened. that is not globalization. it is economics and a base for colonizing and centrally controlling the image of cultural producers in dehli from abroad. is this a dehli platform or a platform in dehli? i hope there is some serious dissent during the event. i would make thess points were i there. rather being lectured to by imports about truth and justice, the sentiments of melancholy and frustration, difficulties, and so on (transient emotions in vedic thinking) as it is billed on-line, would it not be better to hold a town meeting, conversation being the only way forward, or ar the locals there supposed to sit quietyl and swallow the words professed at them from the podium by guests flown in in style and leaving as quickly after they solve or smile about the serious conditions in the region? documenta is follwed in europe very closely. what we learn from the platform in dehli, the persons in charge, become professors here and represent unelected your general cultural production. don't let that happen without speaking and acting up. it is in my small view important that initiatives not based as maharaj's in london or berlin do not become accredited and empowered at the cost of the initiatives such as sarai in dehli for the future. the documenta will come and fly out and forget it. the few indian scholar expatriots will flourish, and the scene in dehli will be thereby only more unfunded. speaking out, speakers, films ouside the habitat center, perfrmances, alternative lectures, right outside the event, on the street, are important to stop any blindness would be fun and have meaning. this is not a reaction, but a meta-discourse, surrounding the india habitat center, ironically the space where the colonizers and those who will reap the benefits of 'being part of documenta' will fly in and fly out. cu, philip pocock From supreet at sarai.net Fri May 4 11:32:20 2001 From: supreet at sarai.net (Supreet Sethi) Date: 04 May 2001 11:32:20 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Microsoft argument that free software is a threat to business Message-ID: <874rv18xeb.fsf@lucky.sarai.kit> Craig Mundie's speech (Craig Mundie is VP, Microsoft) http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/exec/craig/05-03sharedsource.asp ESR's article presenting a counter argument http://linuxtoday.com/news_story.php3?ltsn=2001-05-02-019-20-NW-CY-MS Alan Cox's take on same subject http://www2.usermagnet.com/cox/index.html From supreet at sarai.net Fri May 4 11:43:12 2001 From: supreet at sarai.net (Supreet Sethi) Date: 04 May 2001 11:43:12 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] more on the simputer In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <87zoct7ibr.fsf@lucky.sarai.kit> If the software and hardware is opens source. Where is it. I want to dowload the software From shuddha at sarai.net Fri May 4 12:24:13 2001 From: shuddha at sarai.net (Shuddhabrata Sengupta) Date: Fri, 04 May 2001 12:24:13 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Fwd: CueJack Message-ID: <4.3.0.20010504122254.00b0b8c0@mail.sarai.net> Apologies for cross posting for all those who are also on the nettime list. But couldn't resist spreading the word about this free software counter surveillance application cheers Shuddha >From: "nettime's_anonymizer" >To: nettime-l at bbs.thing.net >Date: Thu, 3 May 2001 15:19:25 +1000 >Subject: CueJack >Sender: nettime-l-request at bbs.thing.net >Reply-To: "nettime's_anonymizer" >X-AntiVirus: scanned for viruses by AMaViS 0.2.1 (http://amavis.org/) > >CueJack - a free software product for the promotional >CueCat barcode scanner, is available at > >http://www.rtmark.com/cuejack/ >Created by digital artist Cue P. Doll and distributed >through RTMark, CueJack allows consumers to scan product barcodes >to learn "alternative information" about corporations. > >The CueCat scanner was shipped last fall to subscribers of >Wired and Forbes magazines and is distributed free of charge at Radio >Shack stores in the US. Using CueCat's bundled software, consumers >scan UPC codes on products and are whisked directly to company >webpages depicting tidily packaged images of the company and product. >A "software parody," CueJack allows this same consumerist scanning >technique to instead whisk users to webpages containing information >such as boycotts against the manufacturer, corporate misbehavior, >or company profits. The information CueJack displays comes from >sources all over the web. > >In addition to digging for information on scanned products, CueJack >also researches CueCat itself. CueJack displays pages >detailing the electronic privacy issues surrounding CueCat and the legal >actions taken by CueCat manufacturer Digital Convergence against Linux >developers. > >In a recent interview, Digital Convergence told Wired News that the company >is >interested in having Cue P. Doll develop CueJack as a plugin for the >next version of the bundled CueCat software - that is of course, if she will >modify CueJack's unflattering treatment of Digital Convergence. > >Originally released for Windows only, CueJack is now available >for both Windows and Linux. CueJack is open source and is distributed >under the GPL. > >CueJack: >http://www.rtmark.com/cuejack/ > >Wired News article: >http://www.wired.com/news/business/0,1367,43154,00.html > ># distributed via : no commercial use without permission ># is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, ># collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets ># more info: majordomo at bbs.thing.net and "info nettime-l" in the msg body ># archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: nettime at bbs.thing.net Shuddhabrata Sengupta SARAI: The New Media Initiative Centre for the Study of Developing Societies 29, Rajpur Road, Delhi 110 052, India www.sarai.net From supreet at sarai.net Sat May 5 14:10:27 2001 From: supreet at sarai.net (Supreet Sethi) Date: 05 May 2001 14:10:27 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] more on the simputer In-Reply-To: <87zoct7ibr.fsf@lucky.sarai.kit> References: <87zoct7ibr.fsf@lucky.sarai.kit> Message-ID: <87d79o9ojo.fsf@lucky.sarai.kit> I meant that if software they are using for enabling things like hindi etc. are available then why is'nt there a listing of software that is being used with appropriate URL 2 if any software they have produced, is at available any where on net Supreet Sethi writes: >|If the software and hardware is opens source. Where is it. I want to dowload the software >|_______________________________________________ >|Reader-list mailing list >|Reader-list at sarai.net >|http://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/reader-list From Philip.Pocock at t-online.de Tue May 8 00:13:34 2001 From: Philip.Pocock at t-online.de (philip pocock) Date: Mon, 07 May 2001 19:43:34 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] danger ahead Message-ID: <3AF6ECD2.CC28043F@t-online.de> read this! http://www.iht.com/articles/19062.htm front page today. wow, and the truthseekers are reconciling to import all the talent for the documenta dehli platform like coloniasts and i have no way of participating from here. the only local input is from officially sanctioned government sources. and read the article above for a taste of that politic. cold and gray day, philip From shuddha at sarai.net Wed May 9 17:05:09 2001 From: shuddha at sarai.net (Shuddhabrata Sengupta) Date: Wed, 09 May 2001 17:05:09 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Anti Nuke Protest In Delhi Message-ID: <4.3.0.20010509165830.00abd7c0@mail.sarai.net> All on the Sarai Reader List Apologies for Cross Posting if any of you have got this from other sources. This is a call for a silent public protest in Delhi against the Nuclear Tests by India and Pakistan on the third anniversary of Pokhran 2.Please do spread the word, and be there if you think that bombs kill people. The posting was originally done by Sonia Jabbar. You can find out more from her about the protest by e mailing her at - sjabbar at vsnl.com Cheers Shuddha ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Dear Friends, May 11 is the third anniversary of the Indian nuclear tests. Far from maintaining a fire-break after the tests, the government seems to be steamrollering ahead with its nuclear weaponisation programme. Obviously, huge investments in the Defence and Nuclear establishments will be at the expense of investment in Health, Food Security, Education and other social spending— a disastrous situation for a poor country like India. At a MIND meeting held last week, we decided to make Defence Spending and the Right to Information the focus of our campaign this year. Below is a copy of a "parcha" which will be printed in both English and Hindi to be distributed at a silent demonstration at Patel Chowk. Those of you who participated in the "Friday Campaign" after the tests in '98 will be familiar with the format of the demo. For the others, a brief description: We assemble on Friday May 11, by 5:15 pm at Patel Chowk , banners and placards in hand and stand silently around the circle facing the traffic which has to slow down as they come around. The visibilty is great and in the hour or so that we are there, thousands of commuters get to see our messages. Few volunteers stand at key points distributing the leaflets to people in buses and cars. Some also leaflet at the bus stands and make themselves available for discussions. Those of you who can volunteer to help in making the placards and banners please call Sonia at 4310511 and we'll set up a time in the next day or two to meet. These should be ready by Thursday May 10 at the latest. Those of you who have placards and banners left over-- hindi & english-- from past demos please also call me and let me know what you have. Obviously, we can have some general anti-nuke & peace stuff, but we must try & have the bulk of the messages about Defence spending. Those of you interested in doing street performance-- either a skit or songs-- can plan to do so. You could target the corners near the bus stands. But do let me know as soon as possible so that we can plan it properly. Come & participate fully. Let's make this May 11 a memorable one. Bring your spouse, your children, your friends, your grandmother, your dog... Let's shake that miserable, ossified, insensitive establishment out of its complacency!! Cheers! Sonia Shuddhabrata Sengupta SARAI: The New Media Initiative Centre for the Study of Developing Societies 29, Rajpur Road, Delhi 110 052, India www.sarai.net From monica at sarai.net Thu May 10 10:15:44 2001 From: monica at sarai.net (Monica Narula) Date: Thu, 10 May 2001 10:15:44 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Fwd: Beryl Graham on Indian new media culture Message-ID: From Patrice surfing the world from Seattle... The article is interesting enough but be warned that it also talks about Sarai! >X-Authentication-Warning: zelda.intra.waag.org: Host >daemon at localhost [127.0.0.1] claimed to be zelda.intra.waag.org >Date: Wed, 09 May 2001 13:07:48 -0700 >From: Patrice >To: >Subject: [Swlist] Beryl Graham on Indian new media culture >Sender: swlist-admin at waag.org >X-Mailman-Version: 1.1 >List-Id: >X-BeenThere: swlist at waag.org >X-AntiVirus: scanned for viruses by AMaViS 0.2.1 (http://amavis.org/) >Status: > >Hi Folks, > >You've probably know this, and chance is even big that it was on this or on >the Sarai Reader List. But one never knows... > >> >"Live from Bangalore" >> >A nice article on Indian new media culture, and accessorily on Sarai.net >I >> >chanced upon: >> > > > >http://switch.sjsu.edu/v6n2/articles/graham.html >> > >> > >> >Cheers > > >Patrice & Diiiino! -- Monica Narula Sarai:The New Media Initiative 29 Rajpur Road, Delhi 110 054 www.sarai.net From monica at sarai.net Thu May 10 16:32:15 2001 From: monica at sarai.net (Monica Narula) Date: Thu, 10 May 2001 16:32:15 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Platform 2 - documenta xi Message-ID: The Documenta XI Platform 2 - EXPERIMENTS WITH TRUTH: TRANSITIONAL JUSTICE AND THE PROCESSES OF TRUTH AND RECONCILIATION - has been humming in Delhi since Tuesday when the events began. Here they are doing a series of talks as well as a series of video screenings. The latter - quite a large selection of films - happens in a large gallery and happens simultaneously i believe. Basically, if you want to see a film, you can come into it at any point and leave at any other, and hope not to get distracted by the others flowing all around you. The more interesting, and i think for some readers of the list, more pertinent event - is the series of talks that are happening in an auditorium. (Here i must clarify that both the gallery and the auditorium are part of something called the India Habitat Centre which is a pleasantly designed cultural & office complex, but not the easiest space to enter if you do not have enough capital, cultural or otherwise). The speakers of the talks come from both India and abroad, and i will make a posting soon of the people who spoke and what they spoke about. Right now i am just informing everyone that its going on, and that it is one of the less attended cultural events i have seen. Except for some artists and academics, there is not much of the general public in view. All this to say that while Documenta (whatever its number) may be a big 'idea' in Europe, here - except for the few i mentioned - it is not something that many know or care about. This is not to say that the themes being addressed during the event are not relevant or that the speakers are not sufficiently engaging - in fact some difficult problems of interpretation - historical, or representational - are being addressed by some of the speakers. -- Monica Narula Sarai:The New Media Initiative 29 Rajpur Road, Delhi 110 054 www.sarai.net From pankaj at sarai.net Wed May 16 11:17:10 2001 From: pankaj at sarai.net (pankaj at sarai.net) Date: Wed, 16 May 2001 05:47:10 +0000 Subject: [Reader-list] Indian Convergence bill Message-ID: <20010516054710.A5416@black-satan> This is a text from today's (15.05.01) Hindustan times Really Scary! >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> PERHAPS IT was too good to last. Marking out your little outpost on the Net won't be as easy as saying HTML anymore. If the government has its way, you'll have to get a licence to post content on the Net. The Centre is moving ahead on the convergence platform to bring Internet, e-commerce and all IT-related services under a licence regime. Such a proposal has been included in the revised draft Communications and Convergence Bill likely to be introduced in the next session of Parliament. Apart from web content, whole swathes of the New Economy will come under the Bill's coverage. Unified messaging, call centres, tele-banking, e-commerce, tele-trading, tele-medicine, video conferencing etc would require the Centre's nod. The government's rationale? Chapter 7 of the draft Bill says such a step was taken because of the "necessity of serving the public interest, ensuring competition and preventing monopolies". The government would also decide on the number of licences to be granted. But experts say such a move could prove harmful to the high-octane IT industry. It would bring with it memories of red-tape and licence-fee fiasco associated with the licencing regime introduced in the telecom sector. Not only would licencing discourage Indian IT companies from expanding, licencing might also put off MNCs from shifting operations to India. Analysts say if Indian companies are forced to obtain a licence to transact electronically or even provide Net content services, they would rather invest or host their servers abroad, where no such permits are required. The Bill would be referred to the Group of Ministers (GoM) before being tabled in Parliament. This revised version of the Bill incorporates the comments and suggestions received after posting the draft Bill prepared by the sub-group on convergence on the >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> One of the key proposals in the draft Bill is the formation of an independent body, the Communications Commission of India—modelled on the US FCC. The body would oversee all regulatory and licensing operations of the telecom, I&B and IT ministries. -- X windows: It could happen to you. ................................ Pankaj Kaushal Proud to use GNU From ravis at sarai.net Wed May 16 12:44:34 2001 From: ravis at sarai.net (Ravi Sundaram) Date: Wed, 16 May 2001 03:14:34 -0400 Subject: [Reader-list] the new authoritarianism Message-ID: <3.0.6.32.20010516031434.00821100@mail.sarai.net> This came out in today's Indian express... Mumbai cops place obstacle on information superhighway, it's an ID Net users will need ID cards to access cyber cafes, foreigners, passports or flight tickets Express News Service Mumbai, May 15: The next time you walk into a cyber cafe in Mumbai, you won't be able to plug into a terminal unless you produce an identification card, swipe it and punch in a password. And if you're a foreigner, you will have to show your passport or flight ticket. This new vigilance-some are already calling it intrusion of privacy-represents the Mumbai police's bid to tap cyber crime and pornography. According to Deputy Commissioner of Police Manoj Lohiya, who heads the city police's Economic Offences Wing, identification required for the card could be a passport, driver's licence, ration card and for students, a college identity card. The card, to be issued for a fixed period, will be available at select cyber cafes and is valid all over Mumbai. The police have also appointed an IT advisory committee, comprising Internet professionals and VSNL officials, which will decide whether users applying for the I-D cards will be assigned a personal code or digital signature. The decision was taken at a meeting between Police Commissioner M.N. Singh and Information Technology (IT) experts last Friday. The police are yet to fix the date for implementing the scheme. However, they have authorised the Yehi Hai Mumbai Cyber Cafe's Association, which represents 200 of the city's 2,000-odd cyber cafes, to empower some cafes to issue the I-D card. Cafe owners and users are crying foul, saying the entire community is being targeted to nab a handful of criminals. Besides, several net users are students who can't afford a computer back home. Winston Lee, who owns a cyber cafe in suburban Bandra, says, ''The new system isn't practical. It will burden both users as well as cyber cafes.'' Another headache for cafe owners is the register they must maintain of customers, complete with their I-card number and details. Says Ram Devadiga, manager of Cyber Funcity, ''This will be an extra burden on us and users. We don't have the right to invade the privacy of our customers, they can do what they want to in the time they pay us for.'' But, fed up to the teeth with complaints of hacking, credit card misuse, death threats, pornography, morphing and terrorism, the police and internet administrators are taking a tough line. Videsh Sanchar Nigam Limited (VSNL) Director Amitabh Kumar said, ''We receive 40 to 50 complaints every day. But by then, it is too late. We can only locate the Internet Protocal (IP) address, which is usually a cyber cafe, and not the user.'' Anyone can enter a cyber cafe without any registration and send threats of murder and extortion or porn mail without being caught, adds Kumar. ''The owner does not know any details of the customers either, so there is no point in interrogating him.'' VSNL acknowledges it's easier to trace someone who hacks or misuses from home or office than from a cybercafe. From rana_dasgupta at yahoo.com Wed May 16 17:10:01 2001 From: rana_dasgupta at yahoo.com (Rana Dasgupta) Date: Wed, 16 May 2001 04:40:01 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Reader-list] the new authoritarianism In-Reply-To: <3.0.6.32.20010516031434.00821100@mail.sarai.net> Message-ID: <20010516114001.11711.qmail@web511.mail.yahoo.com> What is interesting about the article Ravi sent - as with most accounts of this issue - is that the statement of the problem ('hacking, credit card misuse, death threats, pornography, morphing and terrorism' ... 'threats of murder and extortion or porn mail') always seems either completely trivial compared to the draconian solution - or completely wild. Even those advancing these counterthreats seem unable to state the threats in a convincing way. But in addition to the predictable sanctimoniousness about pornography there seems to be a strong class element to the description of the situation in Bombay that is presumably a major concern for the powers that be there. I think a lot of this is about the disruption to class hierarchies that happens when armed guards around your house become completely ineffectual in preventing outsiders from communicating with you whenever they wish. why else this double mention of death threats in the article? In a city where fabulous inequalities of wealth and a number of high-profile examples have made the threat of kidnapping/blackmail/murder/etc a part of the self-imagination of the elite, it does not seem too surprising that the easy access the Internet provides should be used to take advantage of this. Just how easy this access is must alarm the police, whose hard work to keep the city segregated has no power over cybervilains. (Presumably the Internet also allows would-be blackmailers to know much more about the misdemeanours of their targets than ever before.) Is it fanciful to take this still further into class and caste anxieties about the promiscuous 'mixing up' of different people in the public space of a cybercafe, especially a public space that allows some people to think about lewd or criminal things whilst others work dutifully on their history coursework. or, worse still, mixing up in a virtual space where the traces of class and caste may be considerably effaced. How can you tell when the cybershadow of an untouchable has fallen across you? __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Auctions - buy the things you want at great prices http://auctions.yahoo.com/ From shuddha at sarai.net Wed May 16 18:10:25 2001 From: shuddha at sarai.net (Shuddhabrata Sengupta) Date: Wed, 16 May 2001 18:10:25 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Documenta 11 Delhi Platform Message-ID: <4.3.0.20010516180941.00af7100@mail.sarai.net> REPORT ON PLATFORM 2_DOCUMENTA 11 Experiments with Truth: Transitional Justice and the Processes of Truth and Reconciliation India Habitat Centre, New Delhi May 7-12, 2001 Dear Friends on the Reader List, This is a brief report of impressions garnered during some days spent at Platform 2 of Documenta 11 in New Delhi.Phillip Pocock has already written in his concerns about the event and its location in Delhi, and Monica has made a preliminary posting as well. For those of you who are unfamiliar with Documenta, it is one of the most important contemporary art events/expositions in the world and is held every five years at Kassel, Germany. The next Documenta (the 11th) is scheduled for June-September 2002.More information on Documenta 11 is available at www.documenta.de As part of the process leading up to the event the curatorial team of the next Documenta have organised a series of meetings, designated as Platforms, in different parts of the world, with different themes.The first Platform titled 'Democracy Unrealised' is in two parts in Vienna and Berlin. The Vienna event is over (March/April 2001) and the Berlin event is scheduled for October 2001.Platform 3 (Creolite and Creolization) is scheduled for St.Lucia in November, 2001 and Platform 4 is scheduled for Lagos in March 2002, under the theme, 'Under Siege- Four African Cities, Freetown, Johannesburg, Kinshasa and Lagos'. The fifth and final Platform will coincide with the exhibition itself in Kassel (June-September 2002). As is evident from the rather weighty title given to the New Delhi platform (Experiments with Truth: Transitional Justice and the Processes of Truth and Reconciliation) the ideas and themes that were taken up for discussion in the platform were often contentious, reflective of the violent histories in the South Asian subcontinent, The Balkans, the Middle East and in Africa that were being addressed by the speakers and interlocutors in the various panels. At the heart of a most of the discussion were questions that could be broadly titled as follows : 1. does speaking the truth about violence necessarily lead to reconciliation 2. must reconciliation be sought in all cases, or is there a case for avoiding the process of reconciliation 3. what are the different ways of speaking the truth in society-the legal, the extra legal, the personal narrative, the historical 4. where is the domain in which reconciliation can be sought ? - the political realm, in civil society, or, in culture 5. what is the status of statements that fall outside the rhetoric of accusation/shame, victim/oppressor, are they transcendent or are there ways of escaping the task of making hard ethical choices 6. is the role of the victim or the oppressor contingent and provisional, or are these frozen and permanent categories 7. what are the different representational strategies that can be deployed to make images or artistic interventions in situations of conflict/war/genocide 8. Is it enough to indexically invoke images of violence and articulate the difficulty of evoking them. How may violence be interrogated in art practice 9. what are the different sites in which violence leaves its traces on memory - the archive, folk narratives, personal testimonies 10. how may we rehearse, recall and perform difference without necessarily getting locked into the attrition that is demanded by situations of conflict. (This is a list of questions that I have come up with based on my understanding of what was being discussed. It is by no means comprehensive or exhaustive. Others are welcome to add to or dispute the contents of this list.) Personally, i found it quite interesting that so many people stayed on to listen to what were obviously quite demanding and contentious presentations. Many in the audience were artists. It is not often that in an arts related milieu in delhi that you can find a space for serious reflection. This is because of the iron separation between 'display' and 'discourse' that rules our cultural life. Another term for this is 'dumbing down'. In the face of this, a substantial part of the time spent in the Delhi Platform took the form of a welcome degree of 'smartening up'. Quick, agile, thinking or intensive and imaginative intellectual engagement is (or should be) as much a part of an artist's or cultural practicioners tools as is a penchant for the bright gesture, or the telling image. One without the other leads either to sterile academism or to sterile formalism. This event was a welcome reminder of the necessity for a third space for a productive encounter between theory and practice.For too long have we suffered a climate of art practice that prides itself on its unwillingness to be thoughtful or intelligent. The 'inverse snobbery' of the artist towards the demanding vocation of asking difficult questions needs to end, as does the patronizing condescension of the intellectual for the artist. Having said that, one would have thought that more amongst the speakers would have taken the trouble to relate or inform their presentations with a sense of the contemporary political/social/cultural context that they were encountering in india. The 'Asymmetry of Ignorance' between Europe/North America and the rest of the world was quite visible. The audience always knew (or was expected to know) something of the history of the holocaust or of the course of European intellectual history, or even of the history of ethnic conflict in Africa or the middle east. But many speakers made little (barring token attempts to invoke Gandhi's notion of 'Experiments with Truth') effort to relate their concerns with their listeners lives and environments.Perhaps one function of events like this is act as gentle reminders of the need of transcultural intellectuals to enlarge their horizons of curiosity. More Later... Shuddha Shuddhabrata Sengupta SARAI: The New Media Initiative Centre for the Study of Developing Societies 29, Rajpur Road, Delhi 110 052, India www.sarai.net From jeebesh at sarai.net Fri May 18 10:12:36 2001 From: jeebesh at sarai.net (jeebesh at sarai.net) Date: Fri, 18 May 2001 04:42:36 -0000 Subject: [Reader-list] cybercafes... Message-ID: <200105180442.GAA13834@mail.intra.waag.org> The new policing-desire for identity cards, or some form of identification mark for access to cyber-cafe is quiet a intriguing phenomenon. The very site of the cyber-cafe, its location, its silent acoustics, diverse navigational routes, many hands on keyboard, occasional print-outs is giving some people cold shivers. Was it the same when the cinema hall emerged? Probably yes. The rhetoric of `public safety`(around fire), `public health` (around sanitation) and `public morality` (around the un-restrained content of the flickering image) was mobilised to contain and regulate the cinema exhibition and provide for paths for states entry into this space. But the interiority of the spectator inside the dark chamber remained unfathomable, an unknown dark world. Radio made for an possible interesting world of many to many conversations. But, with the practice of hard licensing on transmisssion this possibility was contained. The radio listener did not quiet carry any aura. But with cyber cafes, the dark unfathomable ghosts of the cinema hall and the un-realised posssibility of multiple conversation has got overlapped and jeopardised the stable consensus of the media-space. (and that too without entertainment tax!). This move from stable media to an un-stable media needs to be protected. What are people doing inside these spaces? whatever they are doing, it is creating quiet a degree of restlessness and panic. and that is good for public health and public morality! The way the stable-media ran a prosecution campaign againist a school kid for posting material onto a website was just amazing. This kid was named a `cyber criminal`, an attempt was made to create a great moral panic around the `pornographic` nature of the kids thoughts. The shrinks joined in, the police was giving each other bravery awards, the journalist was busy thinking about our great society, the school principal was quick to issuse expulsion orders, and the kid was put inside the juvenile delinquent home. Why this panic and then an obsence prosecution of an school kid to create consensus around the containment of the un-stable media? Any ideas. From jeebesh at sarai.net Fri May 18 11:47:21 2001 From: jeebesh at sarai.net (jeebesh at sarai.net) Date: Fri, 18 May 2001 06:17:21 -0000 Subject: [Reader-list] identity and dispossesion Message-ID: <200105180617.IAA16399@mail.intra.waag.org> While attending the Documenta conference a problem kept on disturbing me. The clashes between irreconciliable views are increasingly giving rise to a massive annhilation of population and ideas. How do irreconcilable or incompatable cosmologies begin a dialogue. Or can there be a position outside these identities? Further is it possible to have a dialogue without slipping into a larger identity (`national`, or vague `we are all the same humanism` - these positions can only work with a high degree of enforced historical amnesia). Finally, what can be the possible vantage point from where you can imagine a possible aufheben? Yesterday a small sound byte from a film suddenly opened a new door to this predeliction. Prof J.P.S. Oberoi, while explaining the possible philosophical underpinning of the complex matrix of overlapping lived practices and cosmologies found in many subaltern subcultures said that the equality maybe arises out of shared notions of incompleteness, what one owes to the world and in dispossesion, i.e not as haves but as have-nots of culture. What struck me was the simplicity of the formulation and its ability to allow a radically different way of entering a dialogue. I am yet to workout the implication of this mode of thinking but maybe some of you can give it a try... From shuddha at sarai.net Fri May 18 13:34:14 2001 From: shuddha at sarai.net (Shuddhabrata Sengupta) Date: Fri, 18 May 2001 13:34:14 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Untouchable Cybershadows Message-ID: <4.3.0.20010518133134.00ac7b80@mail.sarai.net> UNTOUCHABLE CYBERSHADOWS This is in response to the postings that have already been made by Pankaj Kaushal, Ravi Sundaram and Rana Dasgupta on this list alerting us to the imminent dangers to the 'public domain' of cyberspace in India. Rana's telling terminal question - "How can you tell when the cybershadow of an untouchable has fallen across you?" is very pertinent. Following from Rana's argument, I think that the perceived threat of 'contamination', and the drawing up of draconian regimes to wipe out such contamination in cybercafes and in cyberspace is not unlike the great fear of the lower castes having access to the 'code' of Sanskrit that beset the pundits of previous times. They would defile the code with the pollution that comes with being lower caste bodies speaking the code. Similarly, the Indian corner of 'cspace' needs to be protected from unruly and unpredictable usage practices and patterns in public spaces. There is every likelihood that the clinical cyber-ram-rajya-utopia of acres of medical transcription, html sweatshops and software export processing zones so beloved of our rulers may be contaminated by 'bad boys and girls looking at bad websites on the internet in streetcorner cybercafes'. In a little known story in the Ramayana, Ram in deference to the consensus of the brahmins in his court(oce he was back in Ayodhya and had established Rram Rajya) condemned the untouchable Shambuk to death , because he had dared to deploy Sanskrit. The impure person speaking the code of the masters has always been seen in the glorious tradition of high culture,as nothing less than a capital crime. Today, Information Technology is the new code of the masters. The Sanskrit of our times. And just as the language of the gods was always in danger of being sullied and polluted by the hordes, so too must the whole arena of Information technology be sanitized. We might consider the global regimes of surveillance and sanitization that now surround us (viz the pioneering internet related legislations in Australia, Italy, Singapore and UK) as instances of a sweeping international pandemic of a peculiarly 'Sanskritic' paranoia with the purity of code. Purify the code at the places where it has the greatest traffic (in India - the Cybercafes) and make sure that only those who wear the sacred thread of a licence can actually use the code. (the licencing regualtions, of which, more shortly) The threat to the free space of the public domain of cyberspace comes at two ends and this posting is an attempt to further discuss the two ends of the threat.Both ends seem to reflect a state apparatus gone insane.Unfortunately we all have to deal with this insanity, it is already begining to deal with us on the streets.In a quickly forgotten incident that distracted our attention a few months ago, a young man in Okhla was gunned down in cold blood as he slept by crack commandoes of the Delhi Police (with you, for you, always) . They had come to the conclusion that HE was the terrorist who had let off a few rounds in the Red Fort. And how did they come to this conclusion - he frequented a cybercafe far too frequently. The Control over Content : A Law, A Guideline and A Draft Bill (Two and a Half ways to choke freedome in cyberspace) Here what we have to alert ourselves to is the immense weight of legislation that is shortly to be brought to bear on the space of creation and dissemination of media content. We are talking about An existing and a would be law and a set of guidelines. First the Law The Information Technology Act of 2000 (which is now law, and people are being arrested under its provisions) in its now notorious clauses 66 and 67 criminalized 'hacking' and 'publishing of information which is obscene in electronic form'.Clause 80 of the same Act empowers police or state officers or to enter and search a Public Space (read Cybercafes) in pursuit of cyber criminals or would be cyber criminals. The language of the state in this regard is chilling , and I quote from the 13th Chapter (Miscellaneous) of the IT Act 2000 "Section 80. Power of police officer and other officers to enter, search, etc. (1) Notwithstanding anything contained in the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973, any police officer, not below the rank of a Deputy Superintendent of Police, or any other officer of the Central Government or a State Government authorised by the Central Government in this behalf may enter any public place and search and arrest without warrant any person found therein who is reasonably suspected or having committed or of committing or of being about to commit any offence under this Act" Explanation.—For the purposes of this sub-section, the expression "public place" includes any public conveyance, any hotel, any shop or any other place intended for use by, or accessible to the public." To read the IT Act 2000 online (or to download it) go to - http://www.mit.gov.in/itbillonline/it_framef.htm Now the Guideline After this we have already witnessed the promulgation of the Guidelines and General Information for the Setting Up of Submarine Cable Landings for International Gateways for the Internet (issued by the Ministry of Communications, Government of India) which makes provision for the interception of all and any messages and routine surveillance of data and regulations on encryption and limitations to privacy - all in the name of the national interest, public order, morality and the security of the state. To view the 'Guidelines' - go to - http://www.naavi.com/cl_editorial/edit_12aug00_1a.html Jeebesh Bagchi, in 'A Chronology of the Media and the State in India' ( the Sarai Reader 01 - pgs. 127 - 132 or (www.sarai.net/journal/pdf/127-132%20(law).pdf) has drawn a very succint picture of the scenario till here. Examining the ways in which the various media have been dealt with state in India from the end of the nineteenth century onwards. With the drawing up of the draft of the Communications and Convergence Bill we enter a qualitiatively new scenario.And since this posting has been occasioned Up till now, the control (in so far as content creation is concerned) has been retrospective. The IT Act enables prosecution, but only AFTER the offending website has been published and found by the cyber-informers who work for the Indian state (zealous and stupid journalists who act as guardians of public morality and state security, zealous and stupid cyberwarriors - the growing army of 'counter-hackers', dying to be on the payroll of the vigilant state, and some zealous and stupid so called feminist organisations that are more keen on censorship than they are in any form of human liberation). However, if the new Communications and Convergence Bill becomes law, then the control will be excercised PRIOR to the act of actually uploading anything on to the internet. The new italian cyberlaws require any person uploading content on to the web to register with the state as a journalist. This is similar to the system of 'accreditation' of journalists, which is one way of keeping controls in place over the print medium. But the C & C Bill goes one step further. It asks that anyone transmitting any media rich content over any device (read audio or video streaming) now must obtain a license from the soon to be formed 'Communication Commission of India'. Now suppose you are running a website and you want to upload streaming audio content on to the site, and you havent bothered to pay the license fee to the Communications Commission of India, which means you havent given any undertaking about the nature of your content. Suppose you have collected MP3 files from 'free music' sites or have actually gone to the trouble to record someone making music in their basement or in the open air and are uploading such files. Now suppose that some of these songs content material that is objectionable. For instance it could be a Baul Folk song containing what woud be considered by some 'obscene' and 'scurrilous' lyrics. Then you are liable to be prosecuted on three counts. First, for streaming audio ontent without having the license to do so. Second, for disregarding copyright conventions in your streaming audio content Third, for communicating 'obscene' content. In each of these cases you are liable to imprisonment ofr three to five years, and fines can be levied to the tune of fifty, ten, five or three crores, depending upon the seriousness of your transgression. This means that anyone who is happily streaming audio or video, or wants to do so in the near future, had better be prepared for a spell as a guest of the Government of India, and have just received a bequest for fifty crores with which they can pay the fine. If you think I am joking, take a look at the draft bill (and its wonderful language) at http://www.mit.gov.in/convergence.htm I am posting choice and chilling excerpts, in an accompanying post, that might save you the bother of ploughing through many pages of legales. But I am sure that are many other lethal provisions whose implications I have not been able to fathom lurking throughout the draft. And further, note also that it empowers the state to intercept any message that may be transmitted on any network anywhere, and that in times of war of national emergency the state may take over any communication network or content application provider anywhere. The draft bill has now been cleared by the GoM (Group of Ministers) and should hit parliament in the monsoon session.Where it will no doubt receive unanimous support from right,left and centre. The only way to make a few semi-comatose MPs to dither before they append their signatures is to make a sufficient amount of noise in what is nowadays called Civil Society. THe IT Act is History. No one made any noise at that time. We know what that has meant. Each piece of draconian legislation learns its draconian way from its predecessor. And if you thought that the C&C Bill was the end of the road, think again.Lurking in the corridors of the Ministry of Information Technology is the Semiconductor Design Bill. Which takes the regime straight into the hardware, into the question of whether or not the chips that you are using have the right kind of circuit design. In the near future, surveillance of what you do will be built into the machines that you use. All that is required is for the state to mandate that you can only use a machine which has a certain kind of chip built in, or added to it. This could mean that the computer that you use will be itself open to monitoring, by law. This is analogous to the 'registration' and 'licensing' of typewriters, photocopiers and cyclostyling machines that was once considered necessary in certain peoples democracies of eastern europe.What a way to go. So, we will all soon have identity cards to enter a cybercafe (which will allow remote digital monitoring of our individual time online) licenses to upload web content and stiff punishment if you are an unlicensed content provider institutionalized frameworks for surveillance and censorship mechanisms to block offending sites at the gateways and submarine cable landing stations and mandatory chips in our machines What else do we need? Meanwhile, a public spirited groups of citizens have filed a Public Interest Litigation in the Delhi Courts asking for all cybercafes to have mandatory patrolling and to be fitted by law with filters to ensure that people cannot access unsavoury sites.The Hindustan Times of May 1, 2001 carried a piece detailing the PIL. I quote from the HT article 'Smut cookies don’t crumble ' by Ravi Visvesvaraya Prasad.(for the full text of this article go to http://www.hindustantimes.com/nonfram/010501/bigidea.asp) "...In March, public interest litigation was filed in Delhi High Court against the cabinet secretary, the police commissioner of Delhi, the Delhi government, and the union ministries of Communications, Science and Technology, Home Affairs, Information and Broadcasting, Human Resources Development, and Social Welfare, Justice and Empowerment. The petitioners wanted the government to formulate procedures to prevent Indians, especially minors, from accessing pornographic websites as well as those advocating drugs, alcohol, and tobacco. They wanted the government to direct all Indian internet service providers (ISPs) to install filtering software at their gateways to prevent access to such websites. They also wanted all cybercafés and educational institutions to compulsorily install filtering software on their computers to "prevent exposure to inappropriate material that is sexual, hateful, or violent in nature, or encourages activities that are dangerous or illegal". They sought compulsory licensing of cybercafés by the government, and demanded: "At cybercafés, children below 18 years of age should be allowed to surf the internet only when they produce a permission letter from their parents, attested by a gazetted officer". The petitioners also wanted all cybercafés to maintain complete records of all the websites, chat rooms and bulletin boards visited by each one of their customers. Admitting the PIL, a division bench consisting of Chief Justice Arijit Passayat and Justice D. K. Jain directed the cabinet secretary to "hold a meeting of various ministries and file an affidavit indicating the definite stand taken by the government."..." Surely, this meeting has been held. Measures will be taken. Meanwhile, No public interest litigations. or campaings, to protect the privacy, freedom of expression. or right to information of the surfing citizen are anywhere in sight.Given the sanctimonious zeal of our judiciary, this censorious argument is likely to be the winning argument, and the ad-hoc police measures being followed in Bombay will soon become part of the acceptable, the routine, the everyday. Like the censor ceritificate before a film screening in the cinema, like the dishwater in our tv sets, like the boredom in the airwaves. Meanwhile, we will all be outcastes and untouchables in cyberspace.And the state will be looking out for our cybershadows. Shuddhabrata Sengupta SARAI: The New Media Initiative Centre for the Study of Developing Societies 29, Rajpur Road, Delhi 110 052, India www.sarai.net From shuddha at sarai.net Fri May 18 13:35:51 2001 From: shuddha at sarai.net (Shuddhabrata Sengupta) Date: Fri, 18 May 2001 13:35:51 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Excerpts from Draft Communications and Convergence Bill Message-ID: <4.3.0.20010518133418.00aca590@mail.sarai.net> BELOW ARE SOME SELECTIONS FROM THE DRAFT OF THE COMMUNICATIONS AND CONVERGENCE BILL< PREPARED BY THE MINSITRAY OF INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY< GOVT. OF INDIA This is an appendix to the earlier posting "Untouchable Cybershadows" The Full text of the Draft Bill is available at http://www.mit.gov.in/convergence.htm --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Some Definitions from PRELIMINARY, Chapter I (2) "application service" means the service provided by means of one or more network services and includes such other services as may be prescribed. (3) "broadcasting service" means a content application service for providing television programmes or radio programmes, to persons having equipment appropriate for receiving that service regardless of the means of delivery of that service, (6)"communication" means the process of conveyance of content through transmission, emission or reception of signals, by wire or other electromagnetic emissions. (7) "communication service" means a network service or an application service; or a content application service. (8) "content" means any sound, text, data, picture - still or moving, other audio-visual representation, signal or intelligence of any nature or any combination thereof which is capable of being created, processed, stored, retrieved or communicated electronically". (9) "content application service" means an application service which provides content and includes such other services as may be prescribed; (10) "customer premises equipment" means any equipment, apparatus or instrument alongwith its connecting link upto the interface unit located at the customer premises connecting with the network infrastructure facility. (11) "encrypted" means treated electronically or otherwise for the purpose of preventing intelligible reception by unauthorised persons; (12) "frequency" means frequency of electro-magnetic waves used for providing a communication service; (14) "free-to-air broadcasting service" means a non encrypted broadcasting service made available for reception by receiving equipment commonly available to the public without requiring payment of a subscription fee; (15) "license" means a license issued by the Commission under Chapter VII or Chapter VIII of this Act; (16) "licensee" means any person who has been granted a license; (17) "licensed service" means a service licensed under this Act; (18) "Member" means a Member of the Commission appointed under sub-section (3) of section 6 and includes the Chairperson; (19) "network infrastructure facilities" means any element or combination of elements of physical infrastructure used principally for, or in connection with, the provision of network services, but does not include customer premises equipment and includes such other services as may be prescribed; (20) "network infrastructure facility provider" means a person who owns or operates any network infrastructure facility; (21) "network service" means a service for carrying communications by means of guided or unguided electromagnetic radiation and includes such other services as may be prescribed. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Codes and Standards, from Chapter V 21. The Commission shall by regulations from time to time specify programme codes and standards which may include inter alia practices - (i) to ensure that nothing is contained in any programme which is prejudicial to the interests of the sovereignty and integrity of India, the security of State, friendly relations with foreign States, public order or which may constitute contempt of court, defamation or incitement to an offence. (ii) to ensure fairness and impartiality in presentation of news and other programmes. (iii) to ensure emphasis on promotion of Indian culture, values of national integration, religious and communal harmony, and a scientific temper. (iv) to ensure in all programmes decency in portrayal of women, and restraint in portrayal of violence and sexual conduct; (v) to enhance general standards of good taste, decency and morality. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ From Penalties and Adjudications : Chapter X Penalty for transmission, distribution etc. in contravention of the provisions or without license. 35. If any person transmits or distributes any communication or performs any service incidental thereto by the use of a network infrastructure facility, communication service or wireless equipment which is not licensed or which has been established or maintained or operated in contravention of the provisions of the Act or any rules, or regulations made thereunder, such person shall be liable to a penalty which may extend to rupees ten crores. Penalty for delivery of content through facilities or equipment not licensed under the Act. 36. If any person delivers any content for transmission or accepts delivery of any content sent by the use of network infrastructure facility, communication service or wireless equipment knowing or having reason to believe that such facility, service or equipment has been established or has been maintained or operated without a license or in contravention of the provisions of this Act or any rules or regulations made thereunder, such person shall be liable to a penalty which may extend to rupees ten crores. Penalty for failure to Register Agreements 37. If a service provider who fails without reasonable excuse to register an agreement which is required to be registered as provided for in section 29 he shall be liable to a penalty which may extend to ten lakh rupees. Penalty for failure to comply with the decision, direction or orders of the Commission. 38. If any person wilfully fails to comply with any decision, direction or order of the Commission, such person shall be liable to a penalty which may extend to rupees five crores, and in case of a second or subsequent failure with a further penalty which may extend to rupees ten crores, and in the case of continuing failure with an additional further penalty which may extend to rupees two lakhs for every day during which such failure continues. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- From INTERCEPTION OF COMMUNICATION AND PUNISHMENT FOR UNLAWFUL INTERCEPTION Chapter XIV Interception of communication and safeguards against misuse 63. (1) Notwithstanding anything contained in Section 69 of the Information Technology Act, 2000 and subject to the prescribed safeguards, the Central Government or a State Government or any officer specially authorized in this behalf by the Central Government or a State Government, if satisfied that it is necessary or expedient so to do in the interests of the sovereignty and integrity of India, the security of the State, friendly relations with foreign States or public order or for preventing incitement to the commission of an offence, may direct: (i) any agency of that Government to intercept any communication on any network facilities or services; (ii) any service provider that any content brought for communication by or communicated or received by him shall not be communicated or shall be intercepted or detained or shall be disclosed to that Government or its agency authorized in this behalf: Provided that press messages, data or information intended to be published in India of correspondents accredited to the Central Government or a State Government shall not be intercepted or detained: (2) The service provider shall, when called upon by any agency, which has been directed to carry out interception under sub-section (1), extend all facilities and technical assistance for interception of the content of communication. (3) Any service provider who fails to assist the agency referred to in sub-section (2) shall be punished with imprisonment for a term, which may extend to seven years. (4) Save as otherwise provided under this section any person who intercepts any communication or causes any communication to be intercepted or discloses to any person, any content shall be punishable with imprisonment which may extend to five years or with fine which may extend up to ten lakh rupees and for a second and subsequent offence with imprisonment which may extend to five years and with fine which may extend up to fifty lakh rupees or with both. (5) For the purposes of this section 'intercept' means the aural or other acquisition of the contents through the use of such devices or means as considered necessary. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- from OFFENCES AND PUNISHMENT, Chapter XV Punishment for provision of unlicensed services 64. (1) Save as otherwise provided in this Act, any person who, without a license, owns or provides any network infrastructure facility or provides any communication service or knowingly assists in the transmission or distribution of such service in any manner including,- (a) collection of subscription for his principal, (b) issuing of advertisements to such service, (c)dealing in or distribution of equipment for decoding programmes, shall be punishable with imprisonment which may extend up to five years, or with fine which may extend up to rupees five crores and in subsequent offence such fine may extend to rupees ten crores, or with both. (2) Any person who, without the permission of the service provider and with the intent to defraud, diverts any signal or decodes any content or deals in decoding equipment for such purpose shall be punishable with imprisonment which may extend upto five years, or with imprisonment which may extend to five years and with fine which may extend upto rupees five crores and in subsequent offences to a like term of imprisonment and to fine which may extend to rupees ten crores. (3) Any person who, knowingly benefits from any unauthorised diversion or tampering with any communication service or network infrastructure facility with the knowledge that such service or facility is unauthorized or tampered, shall be punished with imprisonment for a term which may extend to two years, or with fine which may extend to rupees two crores, or with both. (4) Any person who, abets or induces the making of any unauthorised diversion or tampering with any communication service or network infrastructure facility shall be punished with imprisonment for a term which may extend to two years, or with fine which may extend to rupees two crores or with both. (5) Any person who, having already been convicted of an offence under sub-section (3) or sub-section (4) is again convicted thereunder, shall on every such subsequent conviction, be punished with imprisonment for a term which shall not be less than six months but which may extend to five years, and with fine which may extend to rupees five crores or both. Punishment for possession of wireless equipment or use of spectrum in contravention of the Act 65. (1) Any person,- (a) who possesses any wireless equipment in contravention of the provisions of section 5; (b) who uses a radio frequency which he is not authorised to use under this Act, shall be guilty of an offence and shall be punishable with imprisonment which may extend to three years or with fine which may extend to rupees two crores, or with both. (2) When any person is convicted for an offence punishable under this section, all wireless equipments or any part thereof in respect of which the offence has been committed, shall be forfeited to the Central Government. (3) Any wireless equipment confiscated which has not been claimed by anybody shall be the property of the Central Government. (4) Any officer specially authorised by the Central Government or the Commission in this behalf may search any building, vehicle, vessel or place in which he has reason to believe that any wireless equipment in respect of which an offence punishable under this section has been committed is kept or concealed and take possession thereof. Punishment for sending obscene or offensive messages 66. Any person who- (a) sends, by means of a communication service or a network infrastructure facility, any content that is grossly offensive or of an indecent obscene or menacing character; or (b) sends by those means, for the purpose of causing annoyance, inconvenience or needless anxiety to another, content that he knows to be false or persistently makes use for that purpose of a communication service or a network infrastructure facility, shall be punishable with imprisonment for a term which may extend upto three years or with fine which may extend to rupees two crores or with both. Attempt to commit offences 67. Whoever attempts to commit or abets the commission of any offence, under Chapter XIV or under this Chapter shall be deemed to have committed such offence and shall be punished with the same punishment provided for such offence. Court competent to try offences. 68. No court inferior to that of a Court of Session shall try any offence under this Act. Offences to be cognizable. 69. Notwithstanding anything contained in the Code of Criminal Procedure 1973 every offence punishable under this Act shall be cognizable. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Provision for State Take Over of Communication Networks from MISCELLANEOUS, CHAPTER XVII Taking over control and management of Communication Service or network infrastructure facility in public interest. 72.(1) In the event of war or any calamity of national magnitude, the Central Government may by notification for a limited period, in public interest, take over the control and management of any communication service or any network infrastructure facility connected therewith, suspend its operation or entrust any agency of that Government to manage it in the manner directed by the Government for such period as provided for in the notification. (2) If it appears necessary or expedient to do so, the Central Government may, in public interest, at any time request the Commission to direct any licensee to-- (a) transmit in its broadcasting service specific announcements, in such a manner as may be considered necessary; (b) stop any broadcasting service which is prejudicial to sovereignity or integrity of India, security of the State, friendly relations with foreign States, or to public order, decency or morality, or communal harmony. (3) On the issue of such directions by the Commission it shall be the duty of the licensee to ensure strict observance of such directions. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Shuddhabrata Sengupta SARAI: The New Media Initiative Centre for the Study of Developing Societies 29, Rajpur Road, Delhi 110 052, India www.sarai.net From rana_dasgupta at yahoo.com Fri May 18 15:46:02 2001 From: rana_dasgupta at yahoo.com (Rana Dasgupta) Date: Fri, 18 May 2001 03:16:02 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Reader-list] Documenta in Delhi Message-ID: <20010518101602.27145.qmail@web513.mail.yahoo.com> Just wanted to build on Shuddha�s last point about the �Asymmetry of Ignorance� at Documenta. Like him I was somewhat dismayed at the general ignorance about India on the part of the visiting artists and scholars, particularly given the title: "Experiments with Truth: Transitional Justice and The Process of Truth and Reconciliation". Partition, an event that fell squarely under this rubric, was something they had little conception of ("I never knew it was such a big deal" said one visitor) and the Babri Masjid events, equally relevant to 'Reconciliation', had to be explained from scratch. In the light of this, the determination to discuss "Truth and Reconciliation" in "New Delhi" "because of Gandhi" seemed a bit Hollywood. There seemed to have been no briefing on any of these issues by Documenta themselves and very few gestures were made in presentations towards things South Asian. They wanted to talk about 'global' cases such as Rwanda and South Africa - and Delhi was just a place to do so. On the whole there was not enough shared ground between locals and globals for much flow of knowledge back into Documenta�s own thinking. For me this demonstrated well the imperviousness of the agenda of the imperial academic/artistic network to the truly local. The imperial agenda might be deeply concerned with � I hate this word but anyway � the Other � as an object of concern and suspicion, as a bleeding object of melancholic and self-righteous contemplation, or as a receptacle for charitable feelings. But that Other has already been constitued by certain iconic places and personalities by the imperial meaning system (from CNN to university departments), and one should not mistake the fascination for these things for a bucolic curiosity in just anything faraway. In fact this always-already-constituted nature of the Other makes the voice of the local almost unheard in the imperial fanfare. The claim of some exceptional artists and academics to �authentic� knowledge based on their courageous journey from far-off places to NYU or Columbia gives them a special platform within this complex; but as NYU professor Manthia Diawara made clear at Documenta, even these people must make highly strategic compromises with the structures they work within in order to be listened to (�if I print a book in Africa, no one�s going to read it, but if I print a book through NYU Press it�s a masterpiece�). It is clearly not enough to say intelligent things for one�s thought to impact at the global level. When Partition or the Babri Masjid are so clearly not an important part of the imperial meaning system it�s difficult to imagine what language could be employed here in Delhi that would have an impact on the work, concerns or self-conception of Documenta. Given one�s inevitable involvement in a global space as soon as the Internet becomes one�s platform, I think these questions of how one communicates across this divide and speaks meaningfully to audiences that have already written the script for the speaking other (the pathos of inequality, the pathos of disappearing traditions, the high drama of competing imperial philosophies etc etc) become important for us all. Of course at some level this inability to communicate arises out of simpler stories of gaps of language and wealth. One New York academic I was speaking to on the last evening handed her card to a local Delhiite with a sincere though unschooled interest in the issues of the conference, asking him 'Are you often in New York?' Even before his incredulous �No� she must have known the answer, but maybe it�s easier for the jetsetting academic to pretend she thinks that everyone is a jetsetter. Otherwise the inequality of the discourses that purport to address equality and reconciliation becomes too obvious. __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Auctions - buy the things you want at great prices http://auctions.yahoo.com/ From shuddha at sarai.net Fri May 18 17:06:34 2001 From: shuddha at sarai.net (Shuddhabrata Sengupta) Date: Fri, 18 May 2001 17:06:34 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] The Spread of Ideas and Censorship:MEME to YOUYOU to ALLALL Message-ID: <4.3.0.20010518165633.00a88160@mail.sarai.net> Anyone Interested in the ways in which ideas travel and re-route themselves around the roadblocks of censorship would find the notion of 'Memes' valuable. What is a Meme ? Here's a handy definition. Notice how information theory, biology, genetics, epidemiology and social patterns coalesce in this idea. Someone sent me a meme, and as it is in the nature of memes to spread, this one is spreading, MEME: (pron. `meem') A contagious information pattern that replicates by symbiotically infecting human minds and altering their behavior, causing them to propagate the pattern. (Term coined by Richard Dawkins, a geneticist, by analogy with "gene".) Individual slogans, catch-phrases, melodies, icons, inventions, and fashions are typical memes. An idea or information pattern is not a meme until it causes someone to replicate it, to repeat it to someone else. All transmitted knowledge is memetic. For more of this delicious soup - check out 'Electric Escape' the Memenetic Lexicon Website at http://www.digiserve.com/eescape/library/memetic-lexicon.html#MEME Enjoy ! and spread all memes that come to you. The system will crash someday with an overloading implosion of meaning/meming :) Cheers Shuddha Shuddhabrata Sengupta SARAI: The New Media Initiative Centre for the Study of Developing Societies 29, Rajpur Road, Delhi 110 052, India www.sarai.net From Philip.Pocock at t-online.de Sun May 20 20:00:45 2001 From: Philip.Pocock at t-online.de (philip pocock) Date: Sun, 20 May 2001 15:30:45 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] article mentios sarai and =?iso-8859-1?Q?=F8thers?= Message-ID: <3B07D513.536C2732@t-online.de> hello here is a n article mentioning sarai. does anyone know something about the project by dr. sugata mitra, also mentioned? url: http://switch.sjsu.edu/v6n2/articles/graham.html philip From raqs at vsnl.com Mon May 21 12:49:12 2001 From: raqs at vsnl.com (raqs at vsnl.com) Date: Mon, 21 May 2001 12:49:12 +0530 (IST) Subject: [Reader-list] Fwd: DV Journalism Message-ID: <20010521071912.A84AE1DFB82@webmail.vsnl.com> An embedded and charset-unspecified text was scrubbed... Name: not available Url: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20010521/6a16a341/attachment.pl From drazen at location1.org Mon May 21 13:31:25 2001 From: drazen at location1.org (Drazen Pantic) Date: Mon, 21 May 2001 13:01:25 +0500 Subject: [Reader-list] Live ASCII Streaming Message-ID: <3.0.6.32.20010521130125.0088ec60@del2.vsnl.net.in> Live ASCII Streaming of Video 1. Introduction The Internet, with its architecture, infrastructure and media characteristics, is a challenging arena for video experimentation and dissemination. The concept of moving images, sound and text over decentralized TCP/IP network lead to the development of Web, streaming technologies and recently pear_to_pear (P2P) standards. Due to basic characteristics of Internet traffic and communication, net streaming is - and always was - different from one_to_many full broadcast quality distribution channels. And regardless of strong commercial tendency to bring Internet streaming to - in terms of known business and conceptual commercial models - safe heavens of "network television", audio/video presentation on the Internet still remains something different. One of the experiments in using Internet technology in representing video material is ASCII streaming, in which illusion of the motion is brought to experience by moving ASCII text based images, within the fixed raster matrix on the screen. ASCII streaming does not try to bring Internet multimedia streaming close to "broadcast quality", but goes into totally different direction: representing video as the sequence of moving images composed of ASCII letters. 1.1. History From the early presence of personal computers and low resolution character based printers, one of the very first applications was printing pictures and photos as ASCII characters, presenting visual images as the matrix of letters. With the development of high quality printers, ASCII pictures almost disappeared. 1.1.2. ASCII Art Ensemble Recent effort of bringing the sensibility and esthetics of absolute technologies into realm of current practices and technological development is work of ASCII Art Ensemble, [1]. ASCII Art Ensemble has taken the task of converting seminal pieces of film and video into the ASCII movies: the sequence of text segments - characters representations of the movie frames. They have developed software for converting video into ASCII files as well as the first ASCII player. Player was developed as Open Source Java Applet. Similar work on creating the Java applet that allows the user to display an animation of ASCII text is available on [2], although author does not provide source code, and require a his name and URL to appear in the accompanied Web page. 1.1.3 HasciiCam Major step forward towards live ASCII streaming has been made by Jaromol and the group around dyne.org, [3]. Their product, Hasciicam..."makes it possible to have live ASCII video on the web. It captures video from a tv card and renders it into ASCII, formatting the output into an html page with a refresh tag or in a live ASCII window or in a simple text file as well, giving the possibility to anybody that has a bttv card, a linux box and a cheap modem line to show a live ASCII-video feed that can be browsable without any need for plugin, java etc. Hasciicam's source code is released under the Gnu Public License." ...(taken from [3]). 2. Live ASCII Streaming Implementation The following (ASCII) scheme shows the flowchart of the implemented live streaming: |video feed | v +------------|-------------+ | Linux box with: | | - bttv video card | | - hasciicam software | -------------|-------------- | V ,-----------. ,-' ASCII file `-. ( (10-15 frames/sec)) `-. ,-' `-----------' | V +-------------+ | Web server | +-------------+ | V ,-------------. ,-' ASCII Java `-. ( player ) `-. ,-' `-------------' 2.1. Encoding Encoding (converting analog video feed into the sequence of ASCII files) has been done on a Linux box with video card and software (bttv) package that enables digitizing and importing of video material through composite/S-video input. HasciiCam package decomposes video in the sequences of frames and converts frames into corresponding ASCII file. An example of one such file taken from the live feed from live cam in front of Location One, could look like [4]. 2.2. Java Player ASCII output from the Hasciicam is then sent to the http server that is to deliver content to Web users. But, st it is obvious from [4], the output is not directly suitable for presentation as the ASCII video feed. Few additional features were needed: * more realistic user experience and clear representation of the ASCII feed in a form of a movie; * platform independence, so that this relatively light video presentation could be played on variety of computers and computing devices; In order to accomplish those goals we have developed a small, open source Java player for live ASCII feed, ASCIIMATOR. Player has been developed starting from ASCII Art Ensemble Asciimator player, but different nature of live streaming has forced substantial changes of Java code. The player is available as open source and free software, under Gnu Public License, [5] The demonstration of the live feed from the cam in front of the Location One is available on [6]. 2.3. Portability and Playing on Handheld Devices The player software and described practice has been developed having in mind handheld devices (Palmtops, WAB phones, DoCoMO cells in Japan etc) that can handle Java code. ASCII streaming on such devices is fully justified by the low resolution screens and generally modest computing power, not sufficient to decompress highly compressed movies. [1] http://www.ljudmila.org/~vuk/ascii/aae.html [2] http://www.ericharshbarger.com/java/ [3] http://ascii.dyne.org/ [4] http://204.181.65.31/ascii/aka [5] http://location1.org/documentation/Asciimator.java [6] http://204.181.65.31/ascii/ --- You are currently subscribed to tacticalmedia as: rsundar at del2.vsnl.net.in To unsubscribe send a blank email to leave-tacticalmedia-163032H at forums.nyu.edu From shuddha at sarai.net Mon May 21 14:54:17 2001 From: shuddha at sarai.net (Shuddhabrata Sengupta) Date: Mon, 21 May 2001 14:54:17 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Monkey Man: Delhi's first Cyborg? Message-ID: <4.3.0.20010521145337.00a8a9c0@mail.sarai.net> Some Thoughts on the Monkey Man: Delhi's first Cyborg? Here are a few stray and random thoughts about the Monkey Man phenomenon that has beset parts of East Delhi. A brief re-cap for those on this list who are not from Delhi. a couple of weeks now, sightings of a strange creature, who some say is a primate,some describe as humanoid, masked, hemeted or furry, not very big, (five feet or so) with flashing red and green eyes,and extraordinary powers of movement (the abilitiy to jump between buildings and fly) has been menacing eastern Delhi and adjoining the adjoining industrial areas of Uttar Pradesh state.This figure, called 'Monkey Man' or 'Naqabposh' (the masked one) appears at night and usually attacks people sleeping on rooftops. He/It is described as unusually strong and he leaves scratches on the skin with sharp metallic claws. In a tv interview a scared resident of east delhi - a young man attributed the monkey man's powers to a 'computerized system' : flashing bulbs, and an array of buttons that he presses to help him fly away. Is the 'monkey man' or the 'masked one' Delhi's first cyborg? As of now three people (including a preganant woman) have died in night stampedes that occurred when someone raised an alarm in their vicinity. A mob of vigilantes, patrolling a crossroad, have attacked and seriously wounded a person driving a car late at night because he had a helmet in his back seat (they thought that he might be the 'helmeted' attacker), several people have turned up with scratch marks and other injuries at clinics and hospitals and quite a few people have been arrested on the charges of spreading rumours. 3000 armed policemen and 'Rapid Action Force' paramilitaries are patrolling large parts of East Delhi. Vigil is being maintained, not only in neighbourhoods, but apparently also on public telephone booths, where people make calls to police control rooms with news (hoaxes or apparently real reports) with news of 'Moneky Man' sightings. Parts of Delhi are beseiged by a strange fear.. What I find amazing is that in the entire discussion about the Monkey Man, no one seems to talk about this palpable sense of fear that many people feel in our city. The 'Monkey Man' may or may not be a real threat, but a strange combination of atavistic primate imagery, high tech gadgetry and the darkness that engulfs the city during power cuts, have created an image of the other powerful enough to have people stampeding to death and want intense police patrolling in their neighbourhoods. The character of violence in our city - bombs in the cinema, masked and mysterious terrorists in public spaces, sudden and unexplainable attacks by policemen - is so impersonal and yet so intimate, so routine and yet so endemic, that it seems to have demanded the existence of an embodied locus of fear. The twist of 'computerized technology' signals the deep roots that the technological imaginalry has takne into the unconsious life of Delhi. And as Radhika Chopra, a socioloigist has said, this is one way in which the 'invisible parts of the city' those dark, power cut and mosquito laden swamps east of the river, make themselves heard and known. Perhaps this is what the 'Monkey Man' is all about. The congealment of routine violence and the invisible making itself visible, picking strands frorm folklore, mythology, and a science fiction imaginary that percolates into the slums through television serials, b grade horror movies comics and other forms of popular culture.That cicruclates through rumours and random anonymous calls made to harass the police from public phone booths. This is an urban contemporary form of cultural expression making sense of the violence of everyday life. I think it needs to be understood and treated with respect.The way in which the mainstream media has been treating the phenomenon, first with derision, then with condescension, and finally be asking for strict police measures only means that the elite are not the terrorised in the city. The 'Monkey Man' will never step into their barricaded colonies. Fear only belongs to the outer edge of Delhi. As I drive from karkardooma crossing to Patparganj depot, i see a forty foot high statue of an armed and vigilant Hanuman, the monkey god of hindu mythology.This popular and benign monkey divinity, whom one calls upon when confronted by ghosts and unknown terrors of the night, seems hardly a match for the diminutive humanoid simian wearing a helmet who has been terrorising Mandaoli - an urban village that nestles under the shadow of the Karkardooma Hanuman statue. I wonder what other terrors the city has in store for us, a ghostly car that mows down the people who sleep on pavements, androids who gas slums, telephone spirits who spread whispers of fear, vampires in night shelters and cyborg terrorists battling it out with robo-cops in the old city. The nights of Delhi seem strangely portentious.Menawhile the deployment of armed, helmeted and masked paramilitaries - the 'Monkey Men of the State' continue, as do the search orders and the raids.And the injuries from close brushes with the police forces, outnumber the scratches of the Monkey Man. Shuddhabrata Sengupta SARAI: The New Media Initiative Centre for the Study of Developing Societies 29, Rajpur Road, Delhi 110 052, India www.sarai.net From ravis at sarai.net Mon May 21 14:59:30 2001 From: ravis at sarai.net (Ravi Sundaram) Date: Mon, 21 May 2001 14:29:30 +0500 Subject: [Reader-list] Economist on the Indian New Economy Message-ID: <3.0.6.32.20010521142930.007a1c50@mail.sarai.net> This came out in the Economist...A good sense of the future of the 'new economy' as seen by international capital The Economist May 5, 2001 U.S. Edition May 5, 2001 U.S. Edition UNTIL a few months ago, Marc Vollenweider was a partner in the Delhi office of McKinsey, that most patrician of management consultancies. Mr Vollenweider, who is Swiss, is still in Delhi, but in a line of business that sounds almost plebeian by comparison: back-office work. He and his partner (lured from running the Delhi arm of IBM's research centre) have set up Evalueserve, a firm that undertakes various business processes for clients in Europe and North America, offering cheaper, better and faster service than they can deliver themselves. Mr Vollenweider and his partner, Alok Aggarwal, were seduced by an irresistible proposition. First-world companies do lots of things that are expensive and necessary, and yet peripheral to their "core competence". The main requirement for these tasks is an intelligent English-speaking workforce--which India has in abundance, at a small fraction of rich-country wages. So why not ship the work electronically to India, which missed out when the West sent much of its manufacturing to China and other points east? With admittedly suspicious precision, Mr Vollenweider has calculated that a typical western bank can outsource 17-24% of its cost base, reducing its cost-to-income ratio by 6-9 percentage points, and in many cases doubling its profits. Such calculations have created a new industry in India that could, in theory, transform commerce in the developed world. The fizziest forecasts have come from Michael Dertouzos, director of MIT's Laboratory of Computer Science. He reckons that India has some 50m English-speakers who could each earn $20,000 a year--making a total of $1 trillion, twice India's current GDP--doing "office work proffered across space and time". Other predictions are more restrained, but still heady. NASSCOM, India's main association of information-technology companies, thinks India will employ 1.1m people and earn $17 billion from what it calls IT-enabled services by 2008. A report to the Electronics and Computer Software Export Promotion Council (ESC), a government body, sees the industry's exports to America growing from $264m in 2000 to over $4 billion in 2005 (see charts). Yet India has been doing white-collar work for the rest of the world long enough to know that reaching targets such as these will not be easy. The new-born industry is already old enough to have tasted failure. "Indian entrepreneurs look at riding the wave," says Sanjay Jain, a partner in Accenture, a consultancy. Earlier waves were the power industry, telecommunications and dotcoms. "Now the latest buzzword is IT-enabled services," he says--what this article will term teleworking. Charismatic captives The first riders of this particular wave have been of two types. One is "captive" operations of big western companies looking to reduce back-office costs without outsourcing. The other is more fleeting arrangements between western clients and subcontractors in India, often brokered by middlemen. The first sort, which provide the bulk of employment in the business, have prospered. GE Capital Services opened India's first international call centre in the mid-1990s. It now employs more than 5,000 people, whose jobs range from such relatively simple tasks as collecting money from delinquent credit-card users to such complex ones as data-mining. Swissair and British Airways have centres that run frequent-flyer programmes and the handling of errors in computer messages. American Express has a big back-office operation near Delhi. Such companies often save 40-50% by shifting work from their home base to India. The savings may grow, because India's telecoms costs, which are higher than in rich countries, are falling thanks to liberalisation. Shipping out more sophisticated services could also produce higher savings, because the salary gap between, say, an American or an Indian accountant is larger than that between an American high-school graduate and an Indian college graduate doing the same job. Money is not the only attraction. No company will direct white-collar work to India for long if it does not get standards of service at least as high as those it is used to at home. Many Indian teleworking bosses claim to raise service quality. eFunds International, part of a company spun off from Deluxe, the biggest American printer of cheques, says that in Gurgaon, a suburb of Delhi, it has cut the number of errors in data processing for one client by 90%, and also cut the number of days taken to close the client's monthly accounts from five to three. Rajeev Grover, eFunds' head of "shared services", says that Indian teleworkers outperform Americans in similar jobs because they treat them as serious careers, and also because they are better-educated than their American counterparts, who are often college drop-outs. Shifting office work to India can also provide an opportunity to upgrade technology and service. Citigroup, an American financial giant, has an affiliate in Mumbai called e-Serve International, which employs 2,000 people to provide such services as the processing of documentation for letters of credit and the handling of questions over money transfers. e-Serve says that the time needed to respond to inquiries about global money transfers has been "drastically cut". WebTek, a subsidiary of Germany's Dresdner Bank, plans to use a shift in accounting work from London to Delhi as a chance to introduce "thin client" technology, which plucks from a computer only new data needed when a change is made, instead of always having to pick up an entire screen of data.Insecure independents Independent teleworking outfits have had a rockier time than captives. Too many crowded into the field too fast. One popular offering is medical transcription, in which companies convert dictation by doctors in America into written medical records. The report for ESC (conducted by Stevens International Consulting) estimates that India has 200 medical-transcription firms employing 10,000 transcribers. America sends enough work to India to employ only 6,000 of them. Bidding for business through middlemen, India's glut of medical transcribers has driven the price of a line of transcription from 12 cents to as little as three, undermining both quality and profitability. Many firms in the business have gone bust. A similar fate awaits some of the call centres that sprang up in the wake of GE's success. Indian promoters hoped that, by filling a few rooms with speakers of mellifluous English, and by hooking them up to a bit of bandwidth, they could scoop up business from the American mid-west, from Ireland and from other call-centre clusters in rich countries. One entrepreneur tried to swap his sewing machines for handsets. But few bothered to set up marketing operations in their target countries, and many could not convince potential customers that they could do the job. Capacity use at Indian call centres is "abysmally low," says Mr Jain of Accenture. He estimates that some $75m-100m of investment is idle. There will, however, be life after the shake-out. Stevens expects the value of outsourcing in America of medical transcriptions to double by 2005 to $4 billion, outstripping capacity. India could take as much as two-thirds of that increase, providing work to 45,000 transcribers. Similarly, outsourcing of work handled by call centres (now transformed into "contact centres" that can handle e-mail, fax and other media as well) is expected to go to India. Jones Lang LaSalle, a property firm, reports that people cannot put up fast enough the buildings needed for such centres. Into this arena is stepping a new breed of entrepreneur, flaunting international savvy, management finesse and venture-capital finance. He does not skimp on bandwidth or any other technology; and nobody can describe his premises as a data sweatshop. His employees are encouraged to ponder careers with the company, and might even own stakes in it. He aspires to the professionalism of a GE or an American Express, but aims to serve many masters. Messrs Vollenweider and Aggarwal belong to this breed. So does Sanjeev Aggarwal (no relation), who set up Daksh.com, a contact centre that now employs 500 people. Yet another is Raman Roy, who left GE Capital Services to set up Spectramind, which has a similar-sized workforce. None of these firms is much more than a year old. Many of the charismatic captives are themselves joining the ranks of the independents. eFunds (no longer part of Deluxe) has landed a second client and is eager for more; e-Serve is scouting avidly. British Airways and Swissair are selling services outside their groups. All are eyeing the $200 billion of "business-process outsourcing" that Dun & Bradstreet, a research firm, says is farmed out by companies worldwide. They see no reason why India should not claim a big chunk of that. Mr Roy divides the teleworking pie into five slices, in ascending order of value: * data entry and conversion, which includes medical transcription; * rule-set processing, in which a worker makes judgments based on rules set by the customer. He might decide, for example, whether, under an airline's rules, a passenger is allowed an upgrade to business class; * problem-solving, in which the teleworker has more discretion--for example, to decide if an insurance claim should be paid; * direct customer interaction, in which the teleworker handles more elaborate transactions with the client's customers. Collecting delinquent payments from credit-card customers is one example, sorting out computer snags is another; * expert "knowledge services", which require specialists (with the help of a database). For example, a teleworker may predict how credit-card users' behaviour will change if their credit rating improves. Mr Roy's taxonomy, broad as it is, could be extended to just about any service that is deliverable over fibre-optic wire. Indian animators are putting virtual flesh on the skeleton ideas of American film makers. Indian lawyers are doing research for British and American firms. Indian engineers are designing construction projects and testing car parts for foreign clients. At the most rarefied end of the spectrum, Indian scientists are conducting basic research and development for western firms. In some cases, the availability of low-cost, high-quality expertise in India could transform the economics of the industries that they serve. Most of the new entrepreneurs are aiming for the higher rungs of the value ladder, where competition is scarcer, returns are generous, and new technology does not threaten to make them redundant. Technologies that enable computers to interpret voice and handwriting, for instance, could eliminate the simplest "data capture" jobs, such as converting handwritten documents into electronic form. To avoid being swamped by copycats, Mr Vollenweider says he is erecting "as many barriers to entry as I can"--one of which is not to say much about what exactly he plans to sell. The sales pitch is similar to that of India's software houses, which have built an $8 billion business on the quality and price of Indian programming talent. There are differences, though, which work both for and against Indian teleworking. One is that, unlike software, where the shortage of manpower has long been acute (at least until the technology recession took hold), teleworking has ample scope to increase output, even at the top end. India "churns out vast numbers of PhDs," says Mr Roy. Another is that recession is less likely to hurt teleworkers, and may even help them. Cuts in IT investment by customers are leaving Indian software programmers idle. But teleworking firms are offering to reduce the cost of back-office processes that are indispensable. Thus, while the notoriously profitless Amazon.com has cut customer-service jobs in Seattle, it has added positions in Gurgaon through Daksh.com. Why, then, are teleworkers collecting merely millions, rather than the billions that their cousins in software make? People in the business say it is easy to persuade chief executives of the virtues of doing white-collar work in India, but rather harder to convert those who must actually execute the change--"the people whose world you're going to shrink," as Mr Roy calls them. They find any number of excuses to resist, especially if the prospective contractor is independent rather than captive.Dead lines Excuses are not hard to find. India has a reputation, partly deserved, as a place where nothing works: the power cuts out and the telephone lines crackle and die. The services provided by the teleworkers are as exotic to most Indians as lychees are to most Americans: few Indians have chequebooks, let alone the 12,000 variations available to Deluxe's customers. Credit cards are even rarer. Then there is confidentiality, a particularly big issue in health-related services. It is hard enough to keep up privacy standards at home; to trust strangers thousands of miles away seems to many foolhardy. The issue is not merely theoretical. Some American medical-transcription firms refuse to outsource work to India on grounds of privacy, despite potential savings of up to 50%. To overcome the problem, the new breed of teleworkers invest a lot in reassurance. The office of Spectramind in Delhi, for example, is as slick as anything in Silicon Valley. Two generators back up the municipal power supply, and another generator backs up those two. If one telecom line breaks down, others take over. Sound-absorbent ceiling tiles are imported from America, and the name tags of Spectramind's workers report their blood types, in case anybody needs an on-the-job transfusion. In the quest for seamless connections with their clients, call centres often give their staff American pseudonyms and train them to speak like Americans, a practice that has become something of a national joke (and a badge of shame, in the eyes of some commentators). The workers at Daksh, a Sanskrit word that the company translates as "utter preparedness to act immediately with supreme urgency", sometimes, refreshingly, use their real names in handling inquiries from customers of their clients. The new teleworkers increasingly try to absorb the specific corporate culture of their clients. Sanjeev Aggarwal, Daksh's chief executive, talks not of outsourcing but of "co-sourcing". When Daksh signs up a client it sends over a ten-man team to learn its procedures and study its culture. On its return, the team becomes the client's "ambassador for driving the entire work ethic." For example, one person at Daksh "almost reports" to Bill Price, Amazon's vice-president of customer service, says Mr Aggarwal. Mr Price agrees. Daksh's Gurgaon centre, he says, "is virtually part of our operation". Fulfilling Amazon-style promises to customers is not second nature for workers who have probably never shopped online for anything in their lives. Firms in the business, therefore, train all the time. At Daksh, training is not part of the "human-resources" function but a department in its own right. India is such a tough place to operate in, the new firms argue, that only a local outfit can deal with the hassles. But many are still poor at attracting foreign clients. Some are simply not trying hard enough: they have built up impressive operations at home, but they have so far neglected to establish strong marketing arms in the countries in which their main prospective customers are to be found. Former captives such as e-Serve and eFunds have an edge over the local start-ups. Their international networks are denser and their pockets deeper, a comfort to clients looking for long-term relationships. Whatever the fate of the individual enterprises chasing it, the pot of gold is too alluring to be ignored. Consider two examples from outside mainstream "business-process outsourcing". Crest Communications, a Mumbai-based company, spent four years and a couple of million dollars training special-effects artists and building a 40-seat computer graphics studio for them. To exploit this fully required further investment: the acquisition eight months ago of an independent Hollywood producer called Rich Animation, which has produced films such as "Swan Princess". Rich/Crest's next feature will be written and dubbed in Los Angeles, but Crest's animators will do most of the rest, creating the look of the film from the sketches that Rich sends over. Crest promises savings big enough to change the economics of film making. "Mad" Max Madhavan, head of international business, claims that Crest can produce a film like "Toy Story 2" for little more than half its American cost. The acme of teleworking occupies a spanking new building in a technology park near Bangalore--the John F. Welch Technology Centre, which is to double GE's research and development capacity within three years. (GE, incidentally, now employs more people in India than in America.) Less than two years after opening its doors, the centre employs 600 people, nearly a third of them with PhDs. GE plans to double that number by October. "The pipeline of advanced scientists is unlimited," says the facility's director, Jean Heuschen. The abundance is such that GE can deploy 60 scientists on its plastics business alone. They are available at a cost that makes some projects that would have failed the profitability test more viable. "Now you have finance people who like R&D," says Mr Heuschen, with glee and wonder. "All of a sudden they say, give me more." With accolades like this, white-collar work may shift to India even faster than some forecasters expect. Consider exlService, a teleworking outfit started in 1999 by Gary Wendt, ex-head of GE Capital. Mr Wendt later became boss of Conseco, a financial group in Indiana, and soon persuaded it to buy his Indian firm for $53m. Exl is now doing a roaring business: Conseco plans to shift 2,000 jobs from Indiana to India, saving over $30m a year. In America these jobs suffered from high turnover and quality problems over customer service. If moving to Exl solves these problems, as well as saving money, other American companies seem sure to join the stampede that is turning India into the world's back office. From monica at sarai.net Tue May 22 10:34:32 2001 From: monica at sarai.net (Monica Narula) Date: Tue, 22 May 2001 10:34:32 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] downloads and privacy Message-ID: I hat to be replicating material but i am hoping this cross posting is from a not so common list :) (the replicating meme, hopefully not auto-toxic...) Here is Josephine Bosma's text from the mediafest list. cheers Monica maybe its common knowledge, but maybe some of you are interested: "As you will see on the page below, if you use the RealNetworks RealDownload, Netscape/AOL Smart Download, or NetZip Download Demon utilities in their default configuration . . . EVERY TIME you use one of these utilities to download ANY FILE from ANYWHERE on the Internet, the complete "URL address" of the file, along with a UNIQUE ID TAG that has been assigned to YOUR machine, and in the case of Netscape's SmartDownload only YOUR computer's individual Internet IP address, is immediately transmitted to the program's publisher. This allows a database of your entire, personal, file download history to be assembled and uniquely associated with your individual computer . . . for whatever purpose the program's publishers may have today, or tomorrow. VERY IMPORTANT: When I re-examined my findings in the face of RealNetworks' insistence that I was absolutely wrong about my conclusions, I caught something that I had missed before: My exact personal name and private eMail address was being sent back to RealNetworks whenever I downloaded a file." look for the rest of this text on: http://grc.com/downloaders.htm -- Monica Narula Sarai:The New Media Initiative 29 Rajpur Road, Delhi 110 054 www.sarai.net From rana_dasgupta at yahoo.com Tue May 22 10:54:55 2001 From: rana_dasgupta at yahoo.com (Rana Dasgupta) Date: Mon, 21 May 2001 22:24:55 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Reader-list] Globalisation and biodiversity Message-ID: <20010522052455.3137.qmail@web513.mail.yahoo.com> Attached is article from BBC site which looks at a perhaps less conspicuous aspect of globalisation: the gradual erosion of local biological particularities in favour of a (much less diverse) global bioculture. this is said to happpen partly through human design and partly as an inadvertent side-effect of global commerce. perhaps somebody who knows more about this than me can give some indication as to: --the extent to which anything that is happening now is new or different (such species exchange is as old as human trade). --the extent to which ecosystems can adapt to accommodate new species etc. --the rate at which new species are born, compared to existing ones dying out. It seems difficult to assess the seriousness of the Crazy Ant's slaughter of land crabs without understanding the inherent ability of the systems to accommodate change. [I leave aside the plausible connection between the closing down of national boundaries and the extension of the concept of 'illegal immigration' into nature itself. It's apparently World Biodiversity Day today so I'm trying to think about nature rather than culture...] ^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^ Conservationists have warned that exotic species of animals and plants are causing havoc around the globe after escaping, often with human help, from their native habitats. To mark Tuesday's World Biodiversity Day, the World Conservation Union has issued a list of the 100 worst invasive alien species. Looking down the list, one finds the attractive-sounding water hyacinth and the rosy wolfsnail; the brown tree snake and the feral pig perhaps less so. But, whatever one thinks of their looks, all have proved destructive pests when taken out of their natural environments and introduced into new habitats. The South American water hyacinth does indeed have lovely purple flowers; but on five continents it has spread from ornamental ponds to choke waterways, stop boat traffic, fishing and swimming, and prevent sunlight and oxygen from reaching plants in deeper water. Intention or accident Some pests were originally spread deliberately by humans; the small Indian mongoose was taken from Asia to the West Indies to control rats, but it has wiped out several native birds, reptiles and amphibians, as well as carrying rabies. Others spread accidentally, hitchhiking in ships' holds or packing cases. Crazy ants, so called because of their erratic movements, killed three million land crabs in 18 months on Christmas Island in the Indian Ocean. The World Conservation Union is calling on such bodies as the World Trade Organisation to recognise the threat posed by globalisation of trade - and even by development aid, as agricultural materials can contain the seeds of exotic weeds. It also wants sea and airports to watch out for invading species, and says authorities must be ready to act quickly when an infestation is detected. __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Auctions - buy the things you want at great prices http://auctions.yahoo.com/ From monica at sarai.net Tue May 22 13:06:10 2001 From: monica at sarai.net (Monica Narula) Date: Tue, 22 May 2001 13:06:10 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] why we like to download Message-ID: I have requested Shuddha to excerpt and post on the reader list from his reading at the url that Jospehine Bosma mentioned. For some people on the list this might seem like a strange thing to do - after all anyone can go check out things on the url themselves. However, i think it might be relevant for many on the list who are located in places where low bandwidth, erratic connectivity and high costs might deter them from reading online. The fact that a listserv is basically downloadable email based is also perhaps why many people would join a discussion list - at least that's a reason why i have joined lists! I would request all those people who send in urls to also give some excerpts and annotations for those not so wired... cheers Monica -- Monica Narula Sarai:The New Media Initiative 29 Rajpur Road, Delhi 110 054 www.sarai.net From shuddha at sarai.net Tue May 22 13:19:09 2001 From: shuddha at sarai.net (Shuddhabrata Sengupta) Date: Tue, 22 May 2001 13:19:09 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] downloads and privacy In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <4.3.0.20010522131746.00b53a30@mail.sarai.net> MORE ON DOWNLOADS AND PRIVACY This is a follow up from Monica's forwarding of Josephine Bosma's post on Steve Gibson's analysis of "privacy violations". I went to the Steve Gibson site mentioned in the posting http://grc.com/downloaders.htm - and after wading through much (fascinating, but difficult geeky stuff about the detective work done by Gibson around the question of how RealNetworks actually keeps tabs on people who have downleaded stuff from them). What I could make out is as follows. For any media files downloaded using RealNetwork software, the software itself generates a unique code that marks out the specific download session and the specific computer being used and then sends this information back to RealNetworks. This means that RealNetwork then has a bank of data about the download activities of specific computers and the individuals associated with them. What is to prevent a corporation such as RealNetwork from farming out this data to 1. corporations that might be interested in an ongoing surveillance of individual's internet usage for the purposes of building very nuanced and detailed 'consumer profile' 2. state agencies that need and want to know our online habits I am appending below the concluding parts of Gibson's findings so that those of us who do not have the time or the facility for actually going to the site can get some idea of what he is saying But what strikes me after all this is that - Given, that in India, proposals for actually having physical identification cards for cybercafe usage (refer: Ravi Sundaram's earlier posting 'the New Authoritarianism" ) are being put into practice, I would not be surprised if a large scale violation of online privacy is also actually taking place. Is there any way of finding out whether or not internet usage pattern data is being sold or given to the government or to private parties by corporations? I know that it is unlikely that any such 'understanding' would be public knowledge, but given the penchant that such entities have for bureaucratic records, perhaps there would be some 'Memorandums of Understanding' floating around somewhere? Any ideas where? Cheers Shuddha --------------------------------------------------- from Steve Gibson's site - http://grc.com/downloaders.htm In Summary . . . So what does it all mean?... For most people, the main issue revolves around whether or not a report of every file downloaded with those utilities is transmitted back to their home base . . . and there's just no question any longer that unless deliberately disabled by the user, this is being actively done. If that bothers you, you may wish to immediately remove these downloading tools from your system. Any of these file download spies may be removed through Windows' standard Add/Remove Programs feature located in the Windows Control Panel. You will find them listed as "Netscape SmartDownload", "RealDownload", and "NetZip Download Demon". An additional privacy risk involves whether, to what degree, and to what end, historical file downloading profiles are being compiled about individuals, whether or not they are known by name and address and "personally identifiable." Netscape has been completely silent on this issue, whereas RealNetworks has gone absolutely ballistic over my pointing out what it has apparently lied about and what it could be doing with the data that has been sent to its servers. As I have repeatedly stated, I have no evidence, information, or knowledge either way. But trust is what it all boils down to, and RealNetworks' record on that score seems to be getting shakier with every passing day. Why is a unique ID tag being transmitted at all? I can only address that larger question by asking: "If these companies do not care about us in any unique way — separate from everyone else (as they claim) — then WHY are they going to all the trouble of uniquely tagging every user's computer and deliberately transmitting not only that unique ID tag, but also — in the case of Netscape — sending the user's Internet IP address with each and every download file report?" This is not required for the purpose of identifying what files are downloaded "in aggregate", or learning when their downloading program is installed or removed from the host computer . . . contrary to what seems to be stated in their various license agreements. Therefore, it is difficult to understand the motivation behind collecting personal data which is, on its face, unnecessary for the stated objective. One Final Observation: The stated purpose behind all of this download profiling (in their respective licenses) is to inform these vendors about the files we are all (collectively) downloading so that they can provide some sort of additional, useful, or auxiliary information to us (this is never really made clear). Yet, the date shown for the NetZip Downloader (version 1.0.62 — which was captured in the outbound TCP/IP data packet shown above) is December 7th of 1998. So, this data gathering has presumably been underway since before that date. That's been quite a while. When does the payback for all these years of "aggregate" user profiling begin? And who receives the value? And, moreover, given the highly dynamic nature of Internet content, does the whole idea of collecting such data really make any sense anyway? It makes one wonder what's really going on here . . . doesn't it? Shuddhabrata Sengupta SARAI: The New Media Initiative Centre for the Study of Developing Societies 29, Rajpur Road, Delhi 110 052, India www.sarai.net From Harwood at scotoma.org Tue May 22 01:37:23 2001 From: Harwood at scotoma.org (Harwood) Date: Mon, 21 May 2001 22:07:23 +0200 Subject: [Reader-list] Linker - Software as Culture Message-ID: Descartes: (1596-1650) Probably near Ulm on the Danube has a fever. After a day spent in intense philosophical speculations he falls asleep in an agitated state - three dreams later and his vision produces Cartesian Co-ordinates and within them one of the multiple Origins of maps. This period is dominated by deadly epidemics and during his time in Paris he would have witnessed 60,000 deaths in Lyon from Typhus and 25,000 deaths in Limogues. Linker construction: Note#1 October 98 (Getting user input) Do_Linker_Actions me, ancestor_Descartes TheMouse_location = point(the mouse_Horizontal ,the mouse_Vertical) The.Content_Name = the_name_of_User Content repeat with cnt = 1 to count(This.Content_Name.coordinate_list) if(TheMouse-location is inside( The.Content_Name.coordinate_list))then The.Point_inside = cnt if(the mousedown)then DoContent(theType) end if end if end repeat end Cartesian Co-ordinates are used to input the mouse user position on most windowing enviroment. Guy Debord, a key Situationist theorist, has caught a cold, some 300 years after Descartes. His infection started after walking around Paris making a series 'psycho-geographic guides' in the rain. Recording his aimless wanderings, Debord cuts up and reconfigures a standard Paris map. Reflecting street-level desires and perceptions, mapping alternative itineraries and attempting to subvert what Descartes origin had become. 1988 Stefan Szczelkun walks around cities and produces a series of Collaborations called Duet's. Two people collaborating took a series of 24 "aimless" pictures over the day revealing the subjective city, Harwood among them leaves early due to a stomach ulcer. Spring 1998 Mongrels begin attempting to subvert Descartes origin. Walking around Hull and struck by the lack of finds in the emotional fossil record. Take it upon themselves to fill in the space by making emotional maps of the city with other Mongrels met along the way. Richard; "We could make maps of fear or maps of lust." Matsuko; "let's plot emotional states onto the position of things." Harwood; "let's go for a long aimless walk's about nothing and go nowhere." We work four days and calibrate the information into a geography of social Class. Linker construction: Note#1 May 98 (a specific need) We have a specific need that we found doing workshops. We want to have dialogues that allow us to produce fast artefacts of digital culture with other mongrels. A crucial thing we have found in workshops is that people want to produce something that looks good, and means something, but don't want to have to invest months in teaching themselves up to know something like Photoshop or Director. We don't particularly want to knock these programs, but they're cultured up to be useful really only to experts. Harwood; "let's go for a long aimless walk's about nothing and go nowhere." We work four days and calibrate the information into a geography of social Class. Linker construction: Note#1 May 98 (a specific need) We have a specific need that we found doing workshops. We want to have dialogues that allow us to produce fast artefacts of digital culture with other mongrels. A crucial thing we have found in workshops is that people want to produce something that looks good, and means something, but don't want to have to invest months in teaching themselves up to know something like Photoshop or Director. We don't particularly want to knock these programs, but they're cultured up to be useful really only to experts. February 2001 - lost somewhere in Delhi feeling well and thinking about this article. I pick up the map; a practical tools for merchants and governments to carve up territory for themselves and plan military campaigns. Wipe the scum of the city from my mind: a usual activity for most of us, a "common sense" that can help amass someone an empire a small business, transport people half way around the world against their will. This forgetting offers us a temporary blindness that allows us to go about our daily lives, walking past the rich-sick-homeless-no-hoper-beggars or the building built on the glories that meant other peoples' pain. Linker construction: Note#3 November 98 (Linker a device for a subjective "Knowledge-Map") We need to make some sort of Subjective knowledge-maps that can draw together the invisible structure of fear, lust and happiness that underpine our experience of the city. Fear imprisons people - divides up territory every bit as much as the very real razor wire you see on a ride around the city or the urinated lifts and deserted corridors of north London. I now forget the map and remember the journey, as I also forget the software that wrote this text. It seems software exists in some form of invisible shadow world of procedure something like the key we find in maps. Software is establishing models by which things are done yet, like believing the objectivity of maps, we forget that software is derived from certain cultural, historical and economic trajectories. Software like the map, can never just be a tool; In the invisibility of it's construction it is always drawn and positioned. Linker construction: Note#3 January 99 (Linker Basics) In order to make Linker work for as many people as possible, we need to explore creativity reduced to Selection, Naming and Linking - Try to illuminate everything else from the creative act. Take nine images, not ten or eight but nine - the upper limit of gestalt grouping. Create a layout or "knowledge-map" structured into an easily remembered instrumental [3][3] grid. Alpha-numerically order the grid according to the users filename entries so the map elements can be arranged on the screen. E.G [[1] = a, [2] = b, [3] = c ], [[4] = d, [5] = e, [6] = f], [[7]= g, [8] = h, [9] = I]] I follow the menu items of Software like I followed the map of Delhi moving from place to place transfixed by the representation I see before me, while seeing nothing of the social geographies from which they were emerged and on which they act. I ignore the built-in bias - the implicit totalitarianism of prescribed functions and procedures - instead I am transfixed by the outcome of my interaction with applications. I forget the program in order to get on with this article so I can go home - love the wife - bath the boy - walk the dog. Linker construction: Note#4 February 99 (Content totalitarianism) Linker will be content totalitarianism. From Linkers initial layout, the software will enable you to create sixteen links from each map image to a sound, image, text, video clip or to other parts of the map or again to other maps and different scale views of the map with a single click. Reduce objectifying the interface to the user to the minimum. No menu items like File, Edit, View, and their subsets; Cut; Paste, Save As, open - all removed. Although maps depict what is actually visible, they also visualise what is invisible in everyday experience and through the selectivity of the mapmaker, certain elements are shown and given relative importance whilst others are not. The map it seems is an abstract visual composition for finding my way round, a godly view from a vertical rather than horizontal plain, usually drawn at a constant scale across its surface. Software also attempts to visualise and structure creative processes and procedures along "helpful" lines. It objectifies interface content for the user. Imposing invisible constructs within their work, reducing it to a series of binary choices that are hierarchically defined and through the selectivity of the programmer certain elements are shown and given relative importance whilst others are not. Linker construction: Note#5 March 99 (Content totalitarianism continued) Linker should work in series, no binary choices. The difference between two and three is as large as the difference between the map and the experience the city. Lets make absolutely sure we do not waste pixels. Interface = the least effective difference. The apparent confidence I feel, when looking at a map points toward a graphic illusion of our experienced urban space. It is so compelling over and above its use as a method of knowing where I was - where I will be - where I'm going. It is also obvious that maps present only one possible version of the earth's surface, a fiction constructed from factual observation derived from Descartes origin. This fiction maps itself onto the cities exterior - the city image as a mediated concept, the city as seen from elsewhere. Out of the put-put and walking down to Sarai, 29 Rajpur Road Delhi India I realise the cab driver could not read the map? I could have been showing him an engineering drawing of the Boeing 747 - he does not care. This city is navigated by asking the way. The map is in the exchange between people finding their way and recognising places. "That's where I got married, That's were the riot took place, That's where I lost my virginity, that's Delhi Gate where the British re-took the city" Linker construction: Note#6 April 99(Inconsequential interface) Process: Take four uses of Linker and calculate the (Pixels-UsedFor-InterfaceDisplay) divided by (Pixels-UsedFor-ContentDisplay) to give the % of interface in the total visual experience of using Linker. Yields that that early implementations of the Linker interface are averaging %5 of the total visual experience of the user. Final interface reduces this to %1.08 of the total visual experience of the user. Map-Directory ={Nine images at 640x480= 2764800 pixels} + Image-Directory ={Ten images at 320x240 pixels = 768000 pixels} + Video-Directory ={ Five Videos 320x240 pixels at static state = 384000 pixels} + Text-Directory = {Five texts of 100 words 12 pixels height with 2 pixels between each line = 259200} + Sound-Directory = {revealed within other content types} Total content = 4176000 = (Video-Directory + Text-Directory + Map-Directory + Sound-Directory + Image-Directory) Interface for user : Map-And-Links = {(Border-Area = 20160)+ (Link-Lines1920)} Content-Action-Signifiers = { Nine-Content-Types = 1204} Borders-Images = {11200} Borders-Video = {5600} Borders-Text = {5020} File-Text-Edit-Mode = {12000} Total interface = 45104 = (Map-And-Links + Content-Action-Signifiers + Borders-Images + Borders-Video + Borders-Text + File-Text-Edit-Mode) ((100 / Total content pixels) * Total interface pixels) = 1.08 The interface is %1.08 of the total visual experience of the user. The modern map presupposes a certain worldview, a specific visual geography, one that takes a kind of birds eye view. The map is a scale drawing not an exact reproduction, it is a symbolic representation by an agreed set of symbols figures, lines and shading. Software also presupposes the user to have a certain world-view - a high point in it's marketing potential. Software is a systematic modelling of the creative process not an exact reproduction of that process. Software is a symbolic representation of creative processes by an agreed set of symbols and processes of interaction. Linker construction: Note#7 May 99(Multimedia equivalent of a throw-away camera.) Place the contents in data-type folders and start. Formal simplicity - explained in ten minuets to people not familiar with computing. It's clear and deliberately constrained. This constraint makes it quick and turns the implicit totalitarianism of prescribed options into an opportunity to learn quickly. Links between content drawn on the top of the data. So the user can see where the link goes. Not hidden in some symbolic operating system somewhere. Download it get on with it: http://www.linker.org.uk Post script: Linker 1.0 workshops were run by Mongrel in the UK, Australia, New Zealand, USA, France and Holland working with various groups from indigenous and ethnic peoples to white majorities, the unemployed, art students, war veterans and friends and family. Harwood will be working at the Waag for the next year to produce the online version of Linker which will be implemented in Sarai India Australia and London Busit. Harwood at scotoma.org Tel +31 (0) 20 365 9334 MONGREL http://www.mongrelx.org HARWOOD DE MONGREL TATE GALLERY SITE: http://www.tate.org.uk/webart/mongrel/home/default.htm/ WASTE_WORDS THEIR WEIGHT& FREQUENCY IN LONDON'S MUNICIPAL RUBBISH http://www.heise.de/tp/deutsch/kunst/waste/index.html Linker site http://www.Linker.org.uk -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: text/enriched Size: 12833 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20010521/91be8d26/attachment.bin From rana_dasgupta at yahoo.com Tue May 22 16:26:25 2001 From: rana_dasgupta at yahoo.com (Rana Dasgupta) Date: Tue, 22 May 2001 03:56:25 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Reader-list] downloads and privacy In-Reply-To: <4.3.0.20010522131746.00b53a30@mail.sarai.net> Message-ID: <20010522105625.26383.qmail@web511.mail.yahoo.com> It�s all about the size of your database **************************************** Further to Shuddha's mail... I hope Steve Gibson is not surprised at what he has discovered. Everyone is collecting this information and it�s very unlikely that anything will be put in their way because it is the very foundation of the much vaunted �new economy�. Marketing is in general a very crude activity. For every 100 people who see a Nike ad in a place like Delhi, I would imagine that 99 will never buy a [genuine] Nike product. This waste drives marketing guys crazy since they are usually paying for their marketing by the number of people who see it. The Internet raises the prospect of marketing that is much less wasteful � and this is its key usefulness for retailers. This is not just because it makes it possible to easily obtain the kind of banal demographic data (sex, income, age etc) that only poor suckers who decided to enter the post-purchase competition would surrender before. This would be to greatly underestimate the power of networking. The revolution comes because now all your behaviour can be crunched together with everyone else�s behaviour to develop highly accurate predictive models of your tastes and desires. In this scenario it�s simply not relevant whether you�re 12 or 65, French or Chinese. All that�s important is how your behaviour matches with other behaviours. Just say you have previously bought John Coltrane, the Harry Potter books, Abba, Foucault and a DVD of Grease - on the net. A site like Amazon knows hundreds or thousands of other people who have made these purchases. When it proposes that you try Zizek and Talvin Singh, it does so based on massive processing power. Amazon also offers you the option of giving them more information about your tastes so that their recommendations can be even better. What separates Amazon from smaller retailers is that Amazon has enough data from its own customer base to generate these kind of correlations. Smaller retailers do not. How can they compete with the extraordinary precision of Amazon�s recommendations? By buying the same service from a broker of preference information. These companies � BeFree (www.BeFree.com) etc � network many small sites together and collect purchase histories across the whole network, allowing each small retailer to benefit from a really big database. These brokers are of course doing very well, since personalisation is what everyone wants to offer. The issues of privacy are legion. If OJ Simpson�s credit card purchases were invoked in 1996 as proof of his character in his trial (he had ordered a porn film on his AmEx) think how much more eloquently these databases could speak now. I am sure that the kind of correlations that link reading Shakespeare, listening to lounge music and watching the Matrix could also be established between such interests and (for instance) terrorist behaviour, and that the state could use them to trawl for people who might succumb to such behaviour in the future. This is to say nothing of the more everyday unpleasantness of living in a world where networked computing (and genomic knowledge) creates an environment that is always making predictions about you � from the kind of magazine you want to buy to the age at which you will contract some nasty genetic disease. Whatever happens, I don�t believe that civil liberties groups will succeed in achieving anything more than a palatable formulation of data gathering because the kinds of efficiencies that marketing on the Internet will be able to bring have already come to be seen as essential to the functioning of the economy. Just as has always happened before the surrendering of a realm of privacy in the name of convenience ("I don't want to have to surf through Amazon - I want it to tell me what i like") will become orthodoxy. __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Auctions - buy the things you want at great prices http://auctions.yahoo.com/ From shuddha at sarai.net Tue May 22 17:52:43 2001 From: shuddha at sarai.net (Shuddhabrata Sengupta) Date: Tue, 22 May 2001 17:52:43 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] downloads and privacy In-Reply-To: <20010522105625.26383.qmail@web511.mail.yahoo.com> References: <4.3.0.20010522131746.00b53a30@mail.sarai.net> Message-ID: <4.3.0.20010522174739.00adb4a0@mail.sarai.net> Following from Rana's post on the marketing-driven profile farming that goes on in the internet. How long before a new form of identity politics raises its head. "nike buyers of the world unite, you have nothing to lose but your reeboks". Perhaps this is happening already. Through consumer loyalty programmes and online consumer clubs and affinity groups based on the kind of cliks that you make online. And of course, there could be epassports and e-citizneship schemes, based on online loyalty and participation in e-governance programmes, that are based (positively) on how much of your online time you spend on patriotic websites and how much time (negatively) you spend on anti national and prurient sites? ;) Shuddha Shuddhabrata Sengupta SARAI: The New Media Initiative Centre for the Study of Developing Societies 29, Rajpur Road, Delhi 110 052, India www.sarai.net From shuddha at sarai.net Wed May 23 13:16:06 2001 From: shuddha at sarai.net (Shuddhabrata Sengupta) Date: Wed, 23 May 2001 13:16:06 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Virtual Sit Ins and Electronic Disturbances Message-ID: <4.3.0.20010523130634.00adf480@mail.sarai.net> VIRTUAL SIT INS AND ELECTRONIC DISTURBANCES Apologies for Cross Posting to those already on the Nettime List. This is an interview excerpted from a posting by Florian Schneider on "Virtual Sit Ins against Deprotation" on Nettime earlier today. The interview, itslef, with Ricardo Dominguez, offers a very interesting take on what practical everyday political action can be like on the Internet. A well coordinated virtual sit in,cannot be construed as 'Illegal', yet, can be quite crippling to the target. Think of what it could imply in terms of a sudden silent virtual sit in on the Sardar Sarovar Dam Website, or on any of your favourite ministry or media business sites. Read, and circulate Cheers Shuddha ------------------------------------------------------------------------ ------------------------------------------------------------------------- RELOAD REALITY Interview with Ricardo Dominguez on the eve of the online-demonstration against the Lufthansa Deportation.Class Q: Ricardo, what the heck is a "online-demonstration"? A: It is a method of allowing a networked community to gather on a site, or several different URLs of site, or different sites and create a disturbance of collective presence in a non-violent manner. Online-demonstration tools, or Virtual Sit-in tools, use the reload or refresh function on every public browser to call on a particular page or pages of the site that being protested over and over - taking into account how many people around the planet are participating and for how long they participate. This re-loading of URLs of the protested site creates a slow down of the site's normal distribution speed - the more people join the online-demonstration the slower the site will become. In the same manner that a thousands of people doing a traditional sit-in in an office building will slow down the movement of the people inside. The sit-in does not destroy the walls of the building or the floor, or hurt the people inside, but - it does cause a great deal of disturbance because the collective presence of the protest community shifts the daily routine towards a political and symbolic space. The VR Sit-in does exactly the same thing on a digital level - the big difference is that anyone with an on-line connection anywhere in the world can participate at the same time. Q: Did it ever work? A: Yes a number actions since 1998 have created a change in policy or a reexamination of the low-intensity warfare conditions that many marginal communities around the world have faced. During 1998 the Electronic Disturbance Theater in solidarity with the Zapatistas in Chiapas, Mexico created deep symbolic pressure on the Mexican government by creating a great deal international press about VR Sit-ins and what the Zapatistas were calling for. Since that time Mexican dictatorship of PRI has fallen and the call of the Zapatistas has gained more ground in Mexico - in fact the Zapatistas were able to march into Mexico City and speak before congress - a great victory. In 1999 two important on-line actions took place. The electrohippes (from the UK) did a major action against the WTO meeting in Seattle that gathered about 500,000 people around the world that added to energy that was flooding the streets. This created even more press about the issues that the were bring such large protests onto the streets. Several other important actions around WTO and recently FTAA have followed - each adding just a bit more weight to the bodies on the streets. Also, the famous Toywar, that occurred in December of 1999 where a number of groups like rtmark, the thing, and EDT did a VR Sit-in along with a number of other actions to support the net.art group etoy.com against eToys.com, the now dead toy .com, that attempted to take that net.art groups domain name. By Jan 15th, 2000 eToys.com relented and ended the legal proceedings against etoy.com. Recently, The Living Wage protest at Harvard, used a VR Sit-in component and the day after the digital action Harvard gave in. Just a few days before the President of Harvard stated that he would never give in to the Living Wage protesters demands for 10.25 and hour wages for the workers or even sit at table to discuss benefits for them Harvard - now he is sitting at the table. Q: What characterizes or determines the success of e-protest? In terms of efficiency, is there a difference between online activities and what we know from the offline world? A: The same characteristics that determine the offline actions go for e-protest. Making sure the information of when, where, how ,and most importantly why, is distributed to the widest circles possible. Making sure that the tools are accessible to as many people as possible and that the tools are available on a number of servers around the world - so no single server has to maintain the entire action. That is why we have also pushed for client-side tools in conjunction with server side tools. If at all possible making sure that e-protest is just one element of a much larger and long term strategic protest. The e-protest is more efficient if it functions as a symbolic leverage node for the actions taking place on the ground - the virtual and real should link up and energize each other - the e-protest without the street actions becomes meaningless. (Of course, as in the Toywar, if the protest site exists only on-line, like eToys.com - then the nature of the ground actions would be quiet different or almost non-existent.) It is also important to leverage the media heat that e-protest creates by making sure that the issues and reasons for the protest are the dominant information that appears in the media and not just the nature of e-protest - is it legal or illegal, is it DoS (Denial-of-Service) or not? - each activist involved must always place the reason for the action at the forefront of discussion, interview, or presentation. The nature of the e-protest in terms of its digital quality should be just a side issue and nothing more. Q: A "Hacktivist" is a hybrid of a hacker and a activist. How did you become an "Hacktivist" and why? A: I was a member of Critical Art Ensemble (CAE) from 1987 to 1995. During that time I also worked with Act Up, Tallahassee - that's where CAE was born. So between these two types of projects the idea of Electronic Civil Disobedience (ECD) emerged as possible space for future of activism. I became deeply involved in attempting not only to imagine it, but to see it be put into practice. I then started to teach my self technology at Thing.net, Blast.org, and 1994 became a founding member of the New York Zapatistas - it was the Zapatistas who became for me the fulcrum of what ECD could be in practice. In response to the Acteal Massacre of December 22, 1997 where 45 Zapatista women and children were killed by Mexican paramilitary troops armed U.S. Drug War weapons - The Electronic Disturbance Theater came into being after we received an e-mail from an Italian netstrike group calling for a manual reloading of sites of the Mexican government for 4 hours. Then Brett Stalbaum and Carmin Karasic built the Zapatista FloodNet which automated the process - then along with theorist and activist Stefan Wray we did a year long series of VR Sit-ins against the Mexican Government and attempted to develop the protocols and practice of ECD: transparency, linking virtual and street actions, non-violence, open source code, and simple tools. At one minute after midnight on January 1, 1999 EDT released the Disturbance Developers Kit (DDK) that would allow anyone to create e-protest - by that time the media had started to call us Hacktivist. EDT never named its self that - but, it stuck and now a whole movement has emerged. Q: Some people think, that the "virtual" is just a substitute of reality, something unreal and therefore worse. What do you answer to such objections? A: I don't think any type of activism wrong, be it virtual or real. What is important is that we attract as many different people to participate in the work and help with actions in whatever manner we can and whatever manner they can. E-protest can make our gatherings and actions glocal - not just local or global, but both at the same time. Also, sometimes, people who have families and need to work, or are homebound, or don't have enough money to travel to join the street action - can also participate and show their support - they should not be left out, because they can only join the e-action and not the street action. E-protest is just one more tool that we can add to our pile of tactics - it is not a strategy. E-protest is an active poster, an active puppet in the streets, or music to call the people to action - it is just a tool and nothing more or less than that. Q: On the other hand, the internet seems to be widely overestimated. How not to raise hopes, which are not fulfillable or satisfiable? A: Again, e-protest is a simple tactic - it will not resolve the issues that we all face today just because it on the Internet. The Internet is not a way to some utopia or apocalypse - no one should place their hopes on it. But, the Internet can become an ante-chamber of shared questions and spaces where perhaps this time as the Zapatistas say, "the apple will fall up." After all this is Mayan Technology. Q: Lufthansa AG argues, that their servers are so strong, and the activists so weak, that there won't be a visible or even remarkable effect of the demonstration. Would you worry about that? A: No, not at all. It does not matter how big or strong AG servers are - it is very difficult to stop symbolic actions in conjuction with media distribution about the actions and its connections with the long term work of activist before this action and after this action. The on-line demonstration is just a focus point for the community - it is not about crashing servers. EDT went up against the Pentagon, the Frankfurt Stock Exchange, and the Mexican goverments web servers - we never crashed any servers - no matter what myths have developed around our actions. We did create a great deal of media response and distribution about our cause, the Zapatistas - which was the main trajectory of the actions. On-line actions are not about technical efficiency - but about symbolic efficacy. The Zapatistas have become the dominant infomation war, or better said, InfoPeace community with poetry against arms, words above war, and gestures that go beyond the bounds of what technology can accomplish. "We saw that our silence was shield and sword which wounded and exhausted those who want to impose the war. We saw our silence make Power which simulates peace and good government slip time and again, and make their powerful death machine crash time and again against the silent wall of our resistance. We saw that each new attack they won less and lost more. We saw that by not fighting, we were fighting." --Fifth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle, (The Zapatistas, 1999.) Shuddhabrata Sengupta SARAI: The New Media Initiative Centre for the Study of Developing Societies 29, Rajpur Road, Delhi 110 052, India www.sarai.net From monica at sarai.net Thu May 24 11:50:23 2001 From: monica at sarai.net (Monica Narula) Date: Thu, 24 May 2001 11:50:23 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Call for entries for Sandbox Message-ID: +++++++++++++++++ CALL FOR ENTRIES SANDBOX MAGAZINE #10: INCARCERATION & SURVEILLANCE + INSTALLATION/PERFORMANCE EVENT PROJECTED RELEASE DATE: OCTOBER 2001 http://www.sandboxarts.org Freedom is a relative concept. Anyone with access to a newspaper these days knows that the total population behind bars in the US is currently approaching 2 million; that prisons are increasingly run by for-profit companies whose motivation is the bottom line rather than the rehabilitation of prisoners; that the majority of inmates are members of ethnic minorities who are behind bars for non-violent offenses; that executions have reached an all-time high and that the US Supreme Court is currently questioning the constitutionality of executing mentally retarded prisoners. On the outside, personal freedoms are also increasingly threatened. Much of our so-called "public space" is now under permanent surveillance through the use of sophisticated technologies which are not readily available to ordinary citizens. The question is, what are visual artists, writers, activists, film-makers, photographers, culture jammers, media artists, hackers and performance artists doing to respond to this situation? How is this being documented, analyzed and counteracted? We are particularly interested in current & innovative work, especially involving inmates. Sandbox Open Arts is a not-for-profit arts organization which is entirely volunteer-run. Please note that Magazine participants receive 2 copies and event participants receive 2 copies. Other than this Sandbox is not in a position to pay contributors for either publication or performance. However, we are strongly committed to producing and promoting contributors' work in a professional manner within the limitations of our budget. Submission guidelines: Include article outline and any supporting materials necessary including articles, reviews, recordings etc., as well as SASE if submitting by mail. Submission deadlines are as follows: Project Proposals for both magazine & event - June 1 First Drafts - June 20th Final Drafts - July 20th Tentative release - November 1st Please send all materials to Sandbox PO Box 150098, Brooklyn NY 11215 sandbox at echonyc.com http://www.sandboxarts.org -- Monica Narula Sarai:The New Media Initiative 29 Rajpur Road, Delhi 110 054 www.sarai.net From arunmehtain at yahoo.com Thu May 24 18:51:56 2001 From: arunmehtain at yahoo.com (Arun Mehta) Date: Thu, 24 May 2001 18:51:56 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] how to become a hacker In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <5.0.2.1.2.20010524184304.02061fc0@202.54.15.1> hacking gets such bad press, that i am whispering (if all caps is shouting, then, i imagine, all small should count as whispering ;-) on a more serious note, http://tuxedo.org/~esr/faqs/hacker-howto.html is excellent advice for anyone wishing to be a computer professional with a long-term future. already we begin to see that the people who just did a "3-month course" and got jobs or even went abroad as a result, are finding themselves unemployed -- there are, unfortunately, no short cuts, and competition, even in this high-growth sector, will be fierce. arun Arun Mehta, B-69, Lajpat Nagar-I, New Delhi -- 110024, India. Phone +91-11-6841172, 6849103. http://members.tripod.com/india_gii To join india-gii, a list which discusses India's bumpy progress on the global infohighway, mail india-gii-subscribe at cpsr.org _________________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Get your free @yahoo.com address at http://mail.yahoo.com From sam at media.com.au Sat May 26 07:39:36 2001 From: sam at media.com.au (s|a|m) Date: Sat, 26 May 2001 12:09:36 +1000 Subject: [Reader-list] Rogue States - Content Call... Message-ID: <5.0.2.1.0.20010526110427.0328c080@hutch.com.au> Hello :-) We seem to be getting bombarded every week with more and more calls for participaton, calls for contributions, calls for entries... and here is another one (which you may already know about): Rogue States is the 'reader' being produced for our Media Circus event here in Melbourne. We want to make Rogue States another origin point for activism to explore the need to bridge differences and boundaries especially within disciplines and thought-lines, but also amongst those of us involved with processes of 'resistance'. We are looking for positive stories, inspiring stories, stories which describe a different future from the one those who are opposed to the 'rogue states' seem to be creating for us. Also, it is hoped that these exchanges and involvements will help further with developing new networked collectives and reactivating old networks... Anyhow - I should stop now, but before I do, I want to stress that we are really interested in developing closer connections with peoples and groups in our region - which includes you at Sarai. We'll come up with a name to describe our selves - but this is a hard one... Anyhow - look forward to receiving contributions from you. The Rogue States call follows below: Thanks, Sam. -- ROGUE STATES READER We are producing a Reader for the Media Circus. The event happens in Melbourne from the 13th to 15th July, 2001, and will be comprised of screenings, workshops, forums and exchanges. Call for content: This is a call for printable content to be considered for inclusion in the Reader which will aim to present a snapshot of the state of the international media circus and provide views and ideas on how we can identify and tackle the sensorial bombardment, establish mental defence shields and develop our own media to challenge the established and propagate new stories in our community. Here are a list of words and phrases which will provide further guidance as to the nature of content we are calling for: transnational protests and the alt.media and alt.art machines; counter-culture-corporations and their tricks; public relations, think-tanks, robot-artists, automatic journalists and traitor academics; getting nasty - surveillance and censorship; misrepresentations, deceptions and lies; new and converged media, hackers, viruses; political arts, hip-hop, graffiti, and comedy. We are especially keen to give space to stories from the invisible - from new people and people who are outside the outside - from the colonies, the remote regions and the developing and 3rd worlds. So we ask you to go berserk. We do not have much time. Maybe you know of content in the public-domain compatible with being re-published in Reader or maybe you want to write something fresh. Don't forget images. Our deadline for content is 15 June 2001. Here's how you get involved: If you have content which you want to be considered for inclusion or have any queries relating to content - please email . All messages sent to this address will be sent to the editorial collective. Once printed, the Rogue States will be distributed internationally to key media activist groups and cultural organisations. The publication will be in English however its content will call in to 'copyleft' and we would welcome repurposing and translations as long as the moral rights of the author and the publication is respected. About Us There is a small collective of volunteers who are organising MediaCircus and the publication of the Reader. We are genuinely interested in fostering a strong progressive and critical media culture and come from various places but are currently based in Melbourne. Our past and current involvements cover a broad range of media and cultural practice and activism, including melbourne.indymedia, S11 protests, National Young Writers Festival, exploring the sociology of activism, organising screenings and events, and facilitating email lists. We are students, academics, media makers, writers and people wanting to create a more sustainable future. Some of us do stuff with SKA TV, Voiceworks, Radio 3CR, Friends of the Earth and The Paper. Some of our names are Nik Beuret, Marni Cordell, Sam de Silva, Aizura Hankin, Alex Kelly, Rachel Maher, Lachlan Simpson and Karen Eliot. =============================== from small things more small things grow... www.thepaper.org.au -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20010526/fcdac038/attachment.html From menso at r4k.net Sat May 26 19:14:35 2001 From: menso at r4k.net (Menso Heus) Date: Sat, 26 May 2001 15:44:35 +0200 Subject: [Reader-list] Virtual Sit Ins and Electronic Disturbances In-Reply-To: <4.3.0.20010523130634.00adf480@mail.sarai.net>; from shuddha@sarai.net on Wed, May 23, 2001 at 01:16:06PM +0530 References: <4.3.0.20010523130634.00adf480@mail.sarai.net> Message-ID: <20010526154435.A56003@r4k.net> On Wed, May 23, 2001 at 01:16:06PM +0530, Shuddhabrata Sengupta wrote: > VIRTUAL SIT INS AND ELECTRONIC DISTURBANCES > Apologies for Cross Posting to those already on the Nettime List. This is > an interview excerpted from a posting by Florian Schneider on "Virtual Sit > Ins against Deprotation" on Nettime earlier today. The interview, itslef, > with Ricardo Dominguez, offers a very interesting take on what practical > everyday political action can be like on the Internet. A well coordinated > virtual sit in,cannot be construed as 'Illegal', yet, can be quite > crippling to the target. These so called virtual sit-ins are also known under another name, Denial of Service attack, or DoS for short and Mr Dominguez is quite wise to not name it so. Instead of just being a fight against a specific target (a sit-in in front of an office building as Mr Dominguez likes to see it) it takes along a great deal more than that and is actually more comparable to blocking an entire street or block instead of just one office. Imagine my www.peopledontlikemysite.com is hosted on a shared webserver, together with 10 or 20, perhaps even 100 other customers. If someone would launch such an attack the server would go beserk,it is not just not able to serve the target site anymore but *none* of the sites, thus damaging the 10, 20 or hundred other customers just as badly (or all the other shops and offices in the street). Now imagine the target website is running on it's own dedicated webserver (a city block) in my serverfarm (a city) connected to the internet on a 33 mbit line (the bridge connecting the island the city is on to the rest of the world). If the attack would be on a large enough scale the bridge would be so flooded with traffic for this one part of the city that nobody can reach any other part of the city anymore, thus doing *all* the shops and offices in that city (customers in the serverfarm) harm. DoS attacks are considered the lowest of the low, any moneky can do it and sadly enough there's not much that can be done against it. The saddest thing though is that these so called hacktivists don't even seem to realize this, perhaps they just don't care. I guess all is fair in love and getting your name in the newspaper... As far as the legal issues are concerned: I am quite certain that legal action can be taken against these so called virtual sit-ins since it is quite clearly disturbing normal network operations and done with malicious intent. The problem is getting proof and since all the floods are distributed across the net it can be quite hard to figure out what were genuine requests and what not so most simply won't bother since it will cost only more time and money then the attack already did. Then comes the other, perhaps most important question: who are they to disturb services for the rest of the world just because they don't agree with something? If people have a problem with KLM arilines next, fine with me, take it to the court, but if it prevents me or others from getting tickets online they will only piss people off making themselves more infamous than their target. Honestly, I wish these peoplke would spent their time in more constructive ways of fighting for their cause. > Think of what it could imply in terms of a sudden silent virtual sit in on > the Sardar Sarovar Dam Website, or on any of your favourite ministry or > media business sites. It would have as result that the government will have you arrested for disturbing behaviour, getting crowds to follow you and electronic sabotage. Exit Shuddha, getting locked up forever for an action that will be forgotten by the rest of the world the day after. As for the media websites, they will make you the bad guy and I would agree with them. Just because a site lists content you don't like doesn't mean you have the right to silence it. Imagine people would not like what you think and silence you for that Shuddha... The beauty of the net is that for any site saying something you don't like you can start 10 that say something the other site doesn't like, get that in the media and you'll probably earn more respect that with a lame sit-in. Just my 2 rupees, Menso > Read, and circulate > > Cheers > > Shuddha > ------------------------------------------------------------------------ > ------------------------------------------------------------------------- > RELOAD REALITY > Interview with Ricardo Dominguez on the eve of the > online-demonstration against the Lufthansa Deportation.Class > Q: Ricardo, what the heck is a "online-demonstration"? > A: It is a method of allowing a networked community to > gather on a site, or several different URLs of site, or > different sites and create a disturbance of collective > presence in a non-violent manner. Online-demonstration > tools, or Virtual Sit-in tools, use the reload or refresh > function on every public browser to call on a particular > page or pages of the site that being protested over and over > - taking into account how many people around the planet are > participating and for how long they participate. > This re-loading of URLs of the protested site creates a slow > down of the site's normal distribution speed - the more > people join the online-demonstration the slower the site > will become. In the same manner that a thousands of people > doing a traditional sit-in in an office building will slow > down the movement of the people inside. The sit-in does not > destroy the walls of the building or the floor, or hurt the > people inside, but - it does cause a great deal of > disturbance because the collective presence of the protest > community shifts the daily routine towards a political and > symbolic space. The VR Sit-in does exactly the same thing on > a digital level - the big difference is that anyone with an > on-line connection anywhere in the world can participate at > the same time. > Q: Did it ever work? > A: Yes a number actions since 1998 have created a change in > policy or a reexamination of the low-intensity warfare > conditions that many marginal communities around the world > have faced. During 1998 the Electronic Disturbance Theater > in solidarity with the Zapatistas in Chiapas, Mexico created > deep symbolic pressure on the Mexican government by creating > a great deal international press about VR Sit-ins and what > the Zapatistas were calling for. Since that time Mexican > dictatorship of PRI has fallen and the call of the > Zapatistas has gained more ground in Mexico - in fact the > Zapatistas were able to march into Mexico City and speak > before congress - a great victory. > In 1999 two important on-line actions took place. The > electrohippes (from the UK) did a major action against the > WTO meeting in Seattle that gathered about 500,000 people > around the world that added to energy that was flooding the > streets. This created even more press about the issues that > the were bring such large protests onto the streets. Several > other important actions around WTO and recently FTAA have > followed - each adding just a bit more weight to the bodies > on the streets. > Also, the famous Toywar, that occurred in December of 1999 > where a number of groups like rtmark, the thing, and EDT did > a VR Sit-in along with a number of other actions to support > the net.art group etoy.com against eToys.com, the now dead > toy .com, that attempted to take that net.art groups domain > name. By Jan 15th, 2000 eToys.com relented and ended the > legal proceedings against etoy.com. > Recently, The Living Wage protest at Harvard, used a VR > Sit-in component and the day after the digital action > Harvard gave in. Just a few days before the President of > Harvard stated that he would never give in to the Living > Wage protesters demands for 10.25 and hour wages for the > workers or even sit at table to discuss benefits for them > Harvard - now he is sitting at the table. > > Q: What characterizes or determines the success of > e-protest? In terms of efficiency, is there a difference > between online activities and what we know from the offline > world? > A: The same characteristics that determine the offline > actions go for e-protest. Making sure the information of > when, where, how ,and most importantly why, is distributed > to the widest circles possible. Making sure that the tools > are accessible to as many people as possible and that the > tools are available on a number of servers around the world > - so no single server has to maintain the entire action. > That is why we have also pushed for client-side tools in > conjunction with server side tools. If at all possible > making sure that e-protest is just one element of a much > larger and long term strategic protest. The e-protest is > more efficient if it functions as a symbolic leverage node > for the actions taking place on the ground - the virtual and > real should link up and energize each other - the e-protest > without the street actions becomes meaningless. (Of course, > as in the Toywar, if the protest site exists only on-line, > like eToys.com - then the nature of the ground actions would > be quiet different or almost non-existent.) > It is also important to leverage the media heat that > e-protest creates by making sure that the issues and reasons > for the protest are the dominant information that appears in > the media and not just the nature of e-protest - is it legal > or illegal, is it DoS (Denial-of-Service) or not? - each > activist involved must always place the reason for the > action at the forefront of discussion, interview, or > presentation. The nature of the e-protest in terms of its > digital quality should be just a side issue and nothing > more. > Q: A "Hacktivist" is a hybrid of a hacker and a activist. > How did you become an "Hacktivist" and why? > A: I was a member of Critical Art Ensemble (CAE) from 1987 > to 1995. During that time I also worked with Act Up, > Tallahassee - that's where CAE was born. So between these > two types of projects the idea of Electronic Civil > Disobedience (ECD) emerged as possible space for future of > activism. I became deeply involved in attempting not only to > imagine it, but to see it be put into practice. I then > started to teach my self technology at Thing.net, Blast.org, > and 1994 became a founding member of the New York Zapatistas > - it was the Zapatistas who became for me the fulcrum of > what ECD could be in practice. > In response to the Acteal Massacre of December 22, 1997 > where 45 Zapatista women and children were killed by Mexican > paramilitary troops armed U.S. Drug War weapons - The > Electronic Disturbance Theater came into being after we > received an e-mail from an Italian netstrike group calling > for a manual reloading of sites of the Mexican government > for 4 hours. > Then Brett Stalbaum and Carmin Karasic built the Zapatista > FloodNet which automated the process - then along with > theorist and activist Stefan Wray we did a year long series > of VR Sit-ins against the Mexican Government and attempted > to develop the protocols and practice of ECD: transparency, > linking virtual and street actions, non-violence, open > source code, and simple tools. > At one minute after midnight on January 1, 1999 EDT released > the Disturbance Developers Kit (DDK) that would allow anyone > to create e-protest - by that time the media had started to > call us Hacktivist. EDT never named its self that - but, it > stuck and now a whole movement has emerged. > > Q: Some people think, that the "virtual" is just a > substitute of reality, something unreal and therefore worse. > What do you answer to such objections? > A: I don't think any type of activism wrong, be it virtual > or real. What is important is that we attract as many > different people to participate in the work and help with > actions in whatever manner we can and whatever manner they > can. E-protest can make our gatherings and actions glocal - > not just local or global, but both at the same time. Also, > sometimes, people who have families and need to work, or are > homebound, or don't have enough money to travel to join the > street action - can also participate and show their support > - they should not be left out, because they can only join > the e-action and not the street action. E-protest is just > one more tool that we can add to our pile of tactics - it is > not a strategy. E-protest is an active poster, an active > puppet in the streets, or music to call the people to action > - it is just a tool and nothing more or less than that. > > Q: On the other hand, the internet seems to be widely > overestimated. How not to raise hopes, which are not > fulfillable or satisfiable? > A: Again, e-protest is a simple tactic - it will not resolve > the issues that we all face today just because it on the > Internet. The Internet is not a way to some utopia or > apocalypse - no one should place their hopes on it. But, the > Internet can become an ante-chamber of shared questions and > spaces where perhaps this time as the Zapatistas say, "the > apple will fall up." After all this is Mayan Technology. > > Q: Lufthansa AG argues, that their servers are so strong, > and the activists so weak, that there won't be a visible or > even remarkable effect of the demonstration. Would you worry > about that? > A: No, not at all. It does not matter how big or strong AG > servers are - it is very difficult to stop symbolic actions > in conjuction with media distribution about the actions and > its connections with the long term work of activist before > this action and after this action. The on-line demonstration > is just a focus point for the community - it is not about > crashing servers. EDT went up against the Pentagon, the > Frankfurt Stock Exchange, and the Mexican goverments web > servers - we never crashed any servers - no matter what > myths have developed around our actions. We did create a > great deal of media response and distribution about our > cause, the Zapatistas - which was the main trajectory of the > actions. > On-line actions are not about technical efficiency - but > about symbolic efficacy. The Zapatistas have become the > dominant infomation war, or better said, InfoPeace community > with poetry against arms, words above war, and gestures that > go beyond the bounds of what technology can accomplish. > "We saw that our silence was shield and sword which wounded > and exhausted those who want to impose the war. We saw our > silence make Power which simulates peace and good government > slip time and again, and make their powerful death machine > crash time and again against the silent wall of our > resistance. We saw that each new attack they won less and > lost more. We saw that by not fighting, we were fighting." > --Fifth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle, (The Zapatistas, > 1999.) > > Shuddhabrata Sengupta > SARAI: The New Media Initiative > Centre for the Study of Developing Societies > 29, Rajpur Road, Delhi 110 052, India > www.sarai.net > > > _______________________________________________ > Reader-list mailing list > Reader-list at sarai.net > http://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/reader-list -- --------------------------------------------------------------------- We don't know, but rather suspect that twelve-sided dice are involved somewhere.... - TheRegister.co.uk on Scientology --------------------------------------------------------------------- From patrice at xs4all.nl Sat May 26 22:43:26 2001 From: patrice at xs4all.nl (Patrice) Date: Sat, 26 May 2001 10:13:26 -0700 Subject: [Reader-list] Virtual Sit Ins and Electronic Disturbances In-Reply-To: <20010526154435.A56003@r4k.net> Message-ID: On 5/26/01 6:44 AM, "Menso Heus" wrote: > > > > On Wed, May 23, 2001 at 01:16:06PM +0530, Shuddhabrata Sengupta wrote: >> VIRTUAL SIT INS AND ELECTRONIC DISTURBANCES >> Apologies for Cross Posting to those already on the Nettime List. This is >> an interview excerpted from a posting by Florian Schneider on "Virtual Sit >> Ins against Deprotation" on Nettime earlier today. The interview, itslef, >> with Ricardo Dominguez, offers a very interesting take on what practical >> everyday political action can be like on the Internet. A well coordinated >> virtual sit in,cannot be construed as 'Illegal', yet, can be quite >> crippling to the target. > > These so called virtual sit-ins are also known under another name, Denial of > Service attack, or DoS for short and Mr Dominguez is quite wise to not name > it so. Instead of just being a fight against a specific target (a sit-in > in front of an office building as Mr Dominguez likes to see it) it takes > along a great deal more than that and is actually more comparable to blocking > an entire street or block instead of just one office. (etc) I am very, very glad that Menso has taken upon him to make the point on this list which 'bona fide' hackers have made over and over again these past three years against the Ricardo Dominguez ( & 'Electrohippies') brand of so-called 'hacktivism'. It has been a thankless task, few non-techie activists would listen, we were branded reactionaries, etc etc, and that's why, I for my part, have stopped doing it, in writings and in public at last. There is nothing to add to what Menso wrote, save may be, that it is also interesting (however entirely 'taboo' in our circles) to look at the personal motives and manners of 'public hacktivists', like Mr Dominguez. My gut feelings are they're not good and that Mr Dominguez may best be described as (one of the) 'pronouncement people' - which to me, is not a compliment. (I wrote about that before, in nettime, so I won't rehash further) As I see it, the main protagonist of 'public hacktivism' for the moment, are RDom cs & the Electrohippies; RTMark; and The Cult of the Dead Cow Hackers, this representing a kind of spectrum going from "bad" to "good". Other protagonists include No Borders/Kein Mensch ist Illegal (tending to side with RDom), and the Critical Arts Ensemble (against - superbly deconstructed Rdom years ago). Before engaging in, or even supporting, any form of 'hacktivism' I would enjoin all of you to give a good look at the matter, gather information, and think before acting. Cheers from Seattle, Patrice & Diiiino! From sreejata at yahoo.com Sun May 27 20:46:27 2001 From: sreejata at yahoo.com (sreejata roy) Date: Sun, 27 May 2001 08:16:27 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Reader-list] Journal of Visual Culture - Call for Papers Message-ID: <20010527151627.40472.qmail@web11502.mail.yahoo.com> For the more arty of you, this might be worth bearing in mind as a place to get your work published perhaps cheers! sreejata ------------------------------------------------------- Journal of Visual Culture - Call for Papers The Journal of Visual Culture is a new international, refereed journal being launched in April 2002 as a site for astute, informative, and dynamic thought on the visual. The journal will publish work from a range of methodological positions, on various historical moments, and across diverse geographical locations. It will promote research, scholarship, and critical engagement with visual cultures. The Journal of Visual Culture will be essential reading for academics, researchers and students engaged with the visual within the fields and disciplines of: * film, media, and television studies * art, design, fashion, and architecture history * visual culture * cultural studies and critical theory * gender studies and queer studies * ethnic studies and critical race studies * philosophy and aesthetics * photography, new media, and electronic imaging * critical sociology * history * geography/urban studies in comparative literature and romance languages * the history and philosophy of science, technology, and medicine Call for Papers Articles should be between 5-7000 words. Reviews (which must be approved in advance with either the Reviews or Events Editor) should be between 800-1200 words. Four copies of the manuscript should be submitted, typed in double-spacing on one side of A4 paper only and must include an abstract of 100-150 words on a separate sheet. Authors will be asked to provide a diskette of the final version. Submissions will be refereed anonymously by at least two referees. The journal uses the Harvard system of referencing with author's name and date in the text and a full reference literature in alphabetical order at the end of the article. Articles for the journal should be addressed to either: Raiford A. Guins, University of California, San Diego, Department of Literature, 0410, 9500 Gilman Drive, La Jolla, California 92093-0410, USA Email: raygun81 at aol.com or Joanne Morra, School of Art, Publishing and Music, Oxford Brookes University, Headington Hill Campus, Oxford OX3 0BP, UK Tel : +44 (0)1865 484960 �ax: +44 (0)1865 484952 Email: gmorra at brookes.ac.uk Reviews Editor Simon Ofield Email s.ofield at mdx.ac.uk Events Editor Rob Stone Email r.stone at gold.ac.uk Contact information: Jane Makoff Sage Publications 6 Bonhill Street London EC2A 4PU UK Tel: +44 (0)20 7374 0645 Fax: +44 (0)20 7374 8741 Email: jane.makoff at sagepub.co.uk __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Auctions - buy the things you want at great prices http://auctions.yahoo.com/ From geert at xs4all.nl Sun May 27 14:55:09 2001 From: geert at xs4all.nl (geert lovink) Date: Sun, 27 May 2001 19:25:09 +1000 Subject: [Reader-list] something for india? Message-ID: <000a01c0e702$9d4a0a80$c900000a@bigpond.com> Peekabooty challenges online censorship By Ann Harrison Network World File Sharing Newsletter, 05/14/01 http://www.idg.net/crd_idgsearch_2.html?url=http://www.nwfusion.com/newslett ers/fileshare/2001/00768553.html A new peer-to-peer tool called Peekabooty, could defeat attempts to censor controversial Internet traffic. Developed by the Cult of the Dead Cow (CDC), a group of hackers best known for creating security tools to exploit holes in Microsoft software, Peekabooty allows Web pages to be distributed directly between computer systems. People living in oppressive regimes can use the Peekabooty client software to request prohibited Web pages from Peekabooty clients in other more liberal parts of the world. The request is sent through a distributed network of servers that dispatch a software agent to access the Web page and grab the content. The material is then sent to the requesting party in a compact and encrypted form, which its creators say cannot be filtered out using conventional technology. In many counties, ISPs are liable for hosting illegal content and essentially do the government's bidding. But like the P2P file swapping system Gnutella, Peekabooty hosts exchange information without a central server. Since it is highly distributed, it will be difficult to control and shut down. Peekabooty, for example, could frustrate efforts by the Chinese government to block news sources critical of its policies, or be used in other Asian nations that censor Web sites run by opposition political parties. It also could be used in counties, such as Australia, which blocks access to pornographic material, or France, which restricts Nazi memorabilia. Even if you do not like the stuff being blocked censorship is censorship. If Peekabooty could defeat government filtering systems, perhaps it could also circumvent attempts by libraries in the U.S. to censor controversial Web content. A third of the libraries in this country use filters to block Web sites, and it is only a matter of time before clever users find ways to hack this pernicious practice. The CDC's best-known tools to date are BackOrifice and BackOrifice2000 which lets hackers and security analysts probe for weaknesses in computers running Microsoft operating systems and take them over. The hacker group typically launches its new tools at the Defcon security conference and the developers plan to introduce Peekabooty at this year's show, which will take place in Las Vegas in July. As in years past, I plan to attend. -- Ann Harrison is a technology reporter in San Francisco. She can be reached at ah at well.com. From geert at basis.desk.nl Mon May 28 05:49:46 2001 From: geert at basis.desk.nl (geert) Date: Mon, 28 May 2001 10:19:46 +1000 Subject: [Reader-list] Journal of Visual Culture - Call for Papers References: <20010527151627.40472.qmail@web11502.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <021f01c0e73e$692fc1e0$c900000a@bigpond.com> thanks. please note how how the so-called visual culture discourse is strategically positioning itself in difference with new media, the digital etc. I find that unacceptable. > It will promote research, > scholarship, and critical engagement with visual cultures. it will not reach its goal if it leaves out such an important part of the contemporary world. the visual today cannot be understood if it is not brought into a relationship with the technological changes. otherwise it is just an institutional continuation of old disciplines like film, television, art history etc. > * film, media, and television studies * art, design, > fashion, and architecture history * visual culture * cultural > studies and > critical theory * gender studies and queer studies * > ethnic > studies and critical race studies * philosophy and > aesthetics > * photography, new media, and electronic imaging * > critical > sociology * history * geography/urban studies in > comparative > literature and romance languages * the history and > philosophy > of science, technology, and medicine please be sceptical about such a list. visual culture is a kampf begriff, a strategic concept used in institutinal contexts, in most cases AGAINST the study, practice and possibilities of new media. My visits to a variety of art schools and universities has led me to this (sad) conclusion. In Holland and Germany the introduction of "visual culture" has been a desaster, full of silly contradictions (the most obvious one of course being the place of non visual cultures such as sound and music which the visual culture burocrats of course include (!) in their definition). there are really better terms and ways to do interesting stuff. best, geert From epk at xs4all.nl Tue May 29 02:43:09 2001 From: epk at xs4all.nl (Eric Kluitenberg) Date: Mon, 28 May 2001 23:13:09 +0200 Subject: [Reader-list] Journal of Visual Culture - Call for Papers In-Reply-To: <021f01c0e73e$692fc1e0$c900000a@bigpond.com> References: <20010527151627.40472.qmail@web11502.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: hi all, At 10:19 +1000 28-05-2001, geert wrote: >thanks. please note how how the so-called visual culture >discourse is strategically positioning itself in difference >with new media, the digital etc. I find that unacceptable. Hear, hear!! >> It will promote research, >> scholarship, and critical engagement with visual cultures. > >it will not reach its goal if it leaves out such an important >part of the contemporary world. the visual today cannot >be understood if it is not brought into a relationship with >the technological changes. otherwise it is just an >institutional continuation of old disciplines like film, >television, art history etc. > I totally agree! I get really sick, tired and bored with this visual culture crap, and someone has to do the odd job of putting an almost dead horse out of its misery. The whole concept is just complete crap, and nothing less. I say this being employed by an institution (De Balie) that recently organised a crap conference around this %$#%$#% concept called - oh what horror - %#$#^%%&* Visual Culture @%@$%^&* >:-0 http://www.visualculture.nl Luckily I managed to convince my colleagues not to continue on this hopeless track... There is no sense in flogging a dead horse, but this horse, most unfortunately, is not dead yet. The problem is very obvious, actually. 1 - Almost all culture is somehow visual - to say visual culture is to almost say "culture" - Imagine: "What is your discipline? Oh, I am involved in culture!" - #%^$#% that does not make sense.. 2 - One of the premises of VC is that contemporary culture is becoming more and more visual, that visual codes proliferate throughout society, and break the boundaries between *high* and *low* cultures. Well, yes of course they do! But society and culture have always been permeated by visual codes that travel in all kinds of manners. Secondly the difference between *high* and *low* culture is one that was created by a bourgeoisie that was looking for a device for class distinction in an age of mass-production, as much as the concept of the self-contained artist is a product of the industrial age (despite Vasari). So, there is no point being made at all - it just sounds nice. 3 - Culture, with the emergence of the internet has not become more visual at all. NO it has become LESS visual!! Culture in the age of digital network technology has not become more visual, it has become more TEXTUAL. If anything take a look at all the recent discussions and confusion on nettime about textual culture and textual practices. 4 - Geert is absolutely right when he says that visual culture as a new academic discipline cannot work if it is not brought into interplay with a critical analysis of technological developments and their economic and power structures. It will become another form of *organised innocence* - completely unacceptable in view of the magnitude of problems caused by the current constellations of power and economic disparity that dominant media and ICT discourses and practices serve to uphold. 5 - If anything, I have an academic background in art history. For me *visual culture* is merely an extension of iconography - the study of morphological evolution of visual systems in the arts, and iconology - the study of the evolution of meaning properties and semantic networks within visual systems in the arts (such as symbolism in various epochs of art history). Here these analytic tools, which to be clear are most useful and important for the study of visual systems both within the arts as beyond, are extended in their reach to encompass objects of study not pertaining to the realm of the arts. This seems hardly a profound move, and indeed the only context in which this extension might be seen as a radical move is in the academic context, where *visual culture* moves out of the confines of traditional art history. However, even here many respected art historians have moved *beyond the brillo-box* so to speak and started to apply traditional analytic tools and practices to new study objects, and very succesfully so. In short, even in the not so revolutionary academic context, the whole thing is merely stating the already obvious, so why turn it into a *new discipline*, if only for the most lowly of motives, which I will not ascribe to anyone here. 6 - The VC concept finally completely fails to do justice to all the communicative practices and sound-based practices that are such an essential ingredient of our current media-ecology - I will just mention a few terms here: telephony, mobile phones, SMS, radio, streaming audio / net.radio, MP3, chat boxes, e-mail, non-visual html, web archives and hypertexts, ascii culture, text-based MOOs.... Get the picture?? Nothing much *visual* here - so do you want to study contemporary media culture without all these phenomena?? Let's please burry this concept. best wishes, Eric From shuddha at sarai.net Mon May 28 18:17:52 2001 From: shuddha at sarai.net (Shuddhabrata Sengupta) Date: Mon, 28 May 2001 18:17:52 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Linguist Chaos on the Internet? Message-ID: <4.3.0.20010528181442.00a8c8f0@mail.sarai.net> Hi all, An interesting essay pondering the question as to whether the Web is becoming or has been dull and anglocentric, and arguing for a bit of online linguistic chaos. Enjoy ! Shuddha -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Things That Matter: Waiting for Linguistic Viagra By Michael Hawley Would you rather be blind or deaf? I love those classic conversation starters. Has Earth been visited by extraterrestrials? Does President Bush need to carry money? Why is it that, after making love, men fall asleep and women wake up? Let's focus on the blind/deaf question. Genius overcomes many difficulties. As evidence, we have the pantheon of blind and deaf artists, ranging from Beethoven to Goya to Milton to Ray Charles. According to neuropsychologist and author Oliver Sacks (in his book Seeing Voices), whether it's better to be blind or deaf depends on how old you are. For an adult, blindness and deafness are about equally problematic. But for a child, there is no question: it's better to be blind. Anyone who has had the opportunity to teach a deaf child knows this. Hearing is the primary channel through which we receive language, and all of those incoming words downloaded into our brains carry a wealth of emotional and cognitive apparatus that structures and empowers our imagination. Language is the mind's opposable thumb. Whether it is a book, a pencil or a computer, technology deeply affects the way we learn, and interact and create with, languages. The word "hello" came to prominence in English because of the telephone. Or consider the emergence of mass public literacy. It wasn't born in a vacuum. It is largely a technological by-product of the printing press—and it's been greatly affected by the rise of television and other media that compete for our attention. The question is, how will future information tools influence our relationship with languages? David Sarnoff, an early president of RCA, believed that the broadcast of radio and television would spread English as the world's unifying language. It did and it does. More recently, the World Wide Web has further fostered English as the global lingua franca. Visit a developing country and you find that people seeking better lives see two clear paths: learning English and mastering computer skills. The two are intertwined. Historically, technology has had a huge impact on the use of language. Around 1811, the steam engine collided with the printing press, and the result was as explosive then as the collision of computers with the telephone network is now. The rotary-driven steam press printed hundreds of times faster than any other available technology—so fast that publishers couldn't afford to feed enough paper into those voracious machines. In the 1850s, some clever Germans invented a cheap pulp papermaking process. The new stuff became known as newsprint, since that's largely what it was used for, and with the force of this flow, the modern newspaper took shape. Soon it became clear that paper was no longer the scarce resource. Nor were printing presses, or even news. The scarce resource? Readers. In 1858, only one in 20 British army recruits could read. Other European societies had similar levels of literacy. And so, in countries across Europe, as well as in America, policymakers began mandating more systematic schooling. By 1900, literacy among British recruits had jumped to more than 85 percent and the novel had become a mainstream art form. Mass public literacy, therefore, was an outgrowth of a burst of technology that liberated a huge quantity of text, and then encouraged an ensuing ballet of sorts among policymakers, educators, authors and printers. If steam engines plus printing presses ignited a literacy revolution in the 19th century, what might be the combined effect of computers and telecommunications today? When the Web first self-assembled like the world's biggest set of tinker toys, the eyeopener was that the words and images on your screen were coming not just from your own local disk, but from disks on computers sprinkled all over the planet. As more and more bits piled up, the personal computer became like a soup strainer to filter chunks of useful information from the great wash of bits. Search engines like Yahoo! and AltaVista were followed closely by pidgin translation systems, which are interesting even in their fledgling state—and which will need to improve dramatically after two billion people in China and India come roaring online. What nobody can predict, of course, is what new intelligences will spin out of this computer-driven, massively global engine of cause and effect. Or how these developments will influence the language we speak. We may be in for some real surprises. Will this process cause sophisticated artificial intelligence to finally burst onto the scene? Will the lingua franca dumb down from English into a sort of Internet Esperanto? Will cultures colliding online spur interest in other languages? On the face of it, the prospects for another technology-induced upgrade in the popular use of language are not good. For one thing, computers have evolved into visual media. They are more deaf than they are blind: aural and linguistic interfaces lag far behind visual ones. What's worse, computers are coming out of an increasingly Anglocentric culture. Even at universities, fewer and fewer departments teach foreign languages and fewer students study them. Shockingly large numbers of U.S. elected officials have never traveled out of the country. The erosion of foreign-language study is a melancholy sight: there is nothing like learning another language to help you know your own more deeply. Whether it is calculus or Cantonese, you think differently in other languages, and those differences matter. This linguistic ignorance dismays me because I love words. In fact, I'm a word nerd. I get a kick out of tossing a few odd ones into my column, just to see if the pervicacious editors will weed them out. Back in the late 1980s, I created one of the first computer dictionaries (with entries from Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary) on a NeXT computer. At the time, it was exciting to have hot-and-cold running definitions at your fingertips. You could click on any word that aroused your curiosity and my "Digital Webster" program popped up the definition. Isn't that the essence of the educational itch? First, having the appetite to know more; and second, actually satisfying that appetite. One engineer used the dictionary to build an unbeatable Scrabble-playing program. Someone else tried to automatically translate the newswires into rap. I never got around to throwing Digital Webster at the New York Times crossword puzzle, but that kind of word play was what we hoped computer dictionaries would unleash. Sadly, it wasn't. Recently, it seems as if information technology has become a sleeping pill for this sort of creative and constructive language hacking. Today's computers no longer come with a first-class, built-in dictionary; that feels like a step back. There are, of course, dictionaries online. But although you can graze these canned Web dictionaries, you can't write programs to chew through them and do interesting things. The programmatic interfaces are closed. The pattern formed by networked PCs—the glut of Windows software, the lowest common denominator of Web servers—has become too much like the one-way information delivery of dumb cable television, and not as inviting even to word hackers like me. And writing teachers always bellyache about the insidious ways that word processors engender choppy, sloppy writing. Maybe this is a lull. Maybe the current landscape of ugly displays, poor typography and flaky networks is too primitive compared to a beautifully printed magazine. But when the displays get really good, and when network connections are always available, like the air that we breathe—will we then see the emergence of a Napster of books to really shake things up? Can you imagine some hacker selling shoebox-sized pirate copies of the Library of Congress? Perhaps we will wake up in a decade or two and the prevailing online language will be Cantonese. Perhaps it won't matter because computer and telephonic translation will have become so fantastically frictionless that worrying about Chinese copyright ripoffs will be superfluous. Ask to watch a spaghetti Western in Italian, and the system will not only translate the language on the fly, it will add the extra hand gestures, too. And maybe, if the biotech wizards get their way, we won't need all those clunky computers. I'm waiting for a linguistic Viagra pill that instantly makes you fluent in Italian, at least for an hour or two. It's important to communicate. It's important to have a lingua franca. But it's also important to think differently. The most fertile, thriving cultures have a balance of order and chaos, with constant ferment. But today's computer media are flat and Anglocentric. Things are a bit too stuck, a bit too ordered. Both within the machines and across the network, we could enjoy a little more linguistic turmoil. Michael Hawley is the Alex W. Dreyfoos assistant professor of media technology at the MIT Media Lab. Shuddhabrata Sengupta SARAI: The New Media Initiative Centre for the Study of Developing Societies 29, Rajpur Road, Delhi 110 052, India www.sarai.net From monica at sarai.net Mon May 28 17:30:19 2001 From: monica at sarai.net (Monica Narula) Date: Mon, 28 May 2001 17:30:19 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] European Treaty on Cybercrime Message-ID: Following is a pretty fluffy write-up on the European Treaty on cyber crime gleaned from the hallowed pages of the Observer. But worth reading in the context of the recent discussion on what governments are feeling impelled to do to their citizenry. cheers Monica *********************** Cybercrime treaty's a secret policemen's ball The Networker: John Naughton Is the net a genuinely subversive technology? The honest answer is that we don't know yet. Early signs were promising. Email and the Web enabled new and less restricted forms of communication and publishing. Thomas Paine's dream of a society in which everyone could have their say seemed about to be realised. The traditional gatekeepers of opinion could be sidestepped or marginalised. Communities of activists could be organised and co-ordinated via the net. Governments suddenly found it impossible to keep secrets. Even authoritarian regimes struggled to control the flow of information across their frontiers. It was a libertarian dream come true. But freedom is indivisible, and the open, unregulated nature of cyberspace offered opportunities not just to decent folks like you and me but also to unsavoury characters- money-launderers, tax dodgers, pornographers, paedophiles, hackers, virus-writers, terrorists and the like.  The net represented two different kinds of menace to the established order. It facilitated freedom of expression, increased the flow of ideas and information and generally made it more difficult for governments to control the public agenda. But it also provided unprecedented opportunities for the aforementioned hoodlums and thus a challenge to law enforcement and tax collection, not to mention 'national security'.  From the outset, therefore, it was clear to the established order that this unruly medium would have to be brought under control. But this raised a tricky problem: citizens rather like the net- so much that they took to it in megadroves. The business world also took to the net, as the marketplace of the future. So democratic governments have had to tread war- ily when trying to bring the net back under (their) control. The lessons of Prohibition - when the US government tried to stamp out another activity popular with the citizenry - loomed large in policymakers' minds. If their repressive goals were to be achieved, some persuasive rationale had to be invented for circumscribing internet users' new-found freedoms.  This is where the dark side of the net comes in handy. If you are (say) a Home Secretary who seeks draconian powers to control the net, your best strategy is to scare the citizenry by exaggerating the risks from criminals and paedophiles to justify those powers. Since nobody knows the extent of criminal use of the network, you are unlikely to be challenged on empirical grounds. Blunt assertions from policemen and spooks are all you need. This was how the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act was pushed through - giving Ml5 access to every digital packet flowing through a British ISP's servers.  Unsubstantiated assertions about online crime are also the basis for a much more sweeping curtailment of civil liberties now in the legislative pipeline - the European Treaty on Cybercrime. It reads like a secret policeman's wish list. Among other things, it gives sweeping powers to security services to monitor everything people do online, and it places incredible burdens on ISPs. It was cooked up behind closed doors at the Council of Europe and will be approved by the end of this year, no matter who wins the election. And I'm willing to bet there won't be a word about it in any party manifesto.  John.Naughton at observer.co.uk -- Monica Narula Sarai:The New Media Initiative 29 Rajpur Road, Delhi 110 054 www.sarai.net From joy at sarai.net Tue May 29 04:23:05 2001 From: joy at sarai.net (Mrityunjoy Chatterjee) Date: Tue, 29 May 2001 04:23:05 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Virtual Sit Ins and Electronic Disturbances Message-ID: <4.3.0.20010529040318.00a99c50@mail.sarai.net> I have few things to mention regarding Shuddha and Menso's posting. In India very often we can see campaigns on TV and other media against protest, strike and sit-in etc. In most of these campaigns we can see how so called 'others' are affected by the protest or strike etc. Even the news agencies also interview the 'others' to discredit the act of protest or strike. I am not saying that others are not affected but we need to see closely the definition of the word 'others'. Others are not unknown celestial objects. They are only the part of the society. Creating opinions in favour through spreading the word is only a part of a larger thing to be done. Similarly protests and strikes are also part of that. Just by sharing the issues or creating opinion is not enough, one has to do some thing to shake the reluctant authority. Sit in is one such non-violent way to push the authority. During the WTO summit in Seattle we saw the effectiveness of such act. We can always argue about the philosophy of the protesters but they had an global impact that we can never deny. Joy From supreet at sarai.net Mon May 28 17:56:41 2001 From: supreet at sarai.net (Supreet Sethi) Date: 28 May 2001 17:56:41 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] How cell phone works Message-ID: <87bsodhd6m.fsf@lucky.sarai.kit> * Electronic Serial Number (ESN) - a unique 32-bit number programmed into the phone when it is manufactured. * Mobile Identification Number (MIN) - a 10 digit number derived from your phone's number. * System Identification Code (SID) - a unique 5 digit number that is assigned to each carrier by the FCC. While the ESN is considered a permanent part of the phone, both the MIN and SID codes are programmed into the phone when you purchase a service plan and have the phone activated. All cell phones have special codes associated with them. These codes are used to identify the phone, the phone's owner and the service provider. Let's say you have a cell phone, you turned it on, and someone tries to call you. Here is what happens to the call: * When you first power up the phone, it listens for an SID (see sidebar) on the control channel. The control channel is a special frequency that the phone and base station use to talk to one another about things like call set-up and channel-changing. If the phone cannot find any control channels to listen to, it knows it is out of range, and displays a "no service" message. * When it receives the SID, the phone compares it to the SID programmed into the phone. If the SIDs match, the phone knows that the cell it is communicating with is part of its home system. * Along with the SID, the phone also transmits a registration request, and the MTSO keeps track of your phone's location in a database -- this way, the MTSO knows which cell you are in when it wants to ring your phone. * The MTSO gets the call, and it tries to find you. It looks in its database to see which cell you are in. * The MTSO picks a frequency pair that your phone will use in that cell to take the call. * The MTSO communicates with your phone over the control channel to tell it what frequencies to use, and once your phone and the tower switch on those frequencies, the call is connected. You are talking by two-way radio to a friend! * As you move toward the edge of your cell, your cell's base station will note that your signal strength is diminishing. Meanwhile, the base station in the cell you are moving toward (which is listening and measuring signal strength on all frequencies, not just its own one-seventh) will be able to see your phone's signal strength increasing. The two base stations coordinate themselves through the MTSO, and at some point, your phone gets a signal on a control channel telling it to change frequencies. This hand off switches your phone to the new cell. As you travel, the signal is passed from cell to cell. Roaming If the SID on the control channel does not match the SID programmed into your phone, then the phone knows it is roaming. The MTSO of the cell that you are roaming in contacts the MTSO of your home system, which then checks its database to confirm that the SID of the phone you are using is valid. Your home system verifies your phone to the local MTSO, which then tracks your phone as you move through its cells. And the amazing thing is that all of this happens within seconds! From geert at xs4all.nl Tue May 29 05:01:28 2001 From: geert at xs4all.nl (geert lovink) Date: Tue, 29 May 2001 09:31:28 +1000 Subject: [Reader-list] telecenters in brasil Message-ID: <025a01c0e813$7bfa5580$c900000a@bigpond.com> from: Richard Kyle (richard at telecentros.org.br) NEWS FROM BRASIL - ICTs for educational, personal,social and business development TELECENTROS BRASIL AND REGENCY FOUNDATION INSTITUTIONAL PROFILE: To provide greater public access to information and communication technologies(ICTs)for educational, personal,social and business development MISSION STATEMENT: To implant Sustainable Community Telecenters in existing Community Centers servicing low income communities , and supply information and communication services at an affordable cost, to people who would otherwise have little or no opportunity to use or to learn to use these technologies ACTIVITIES: Telecentros Brasil began operations in Brasil in October 2000. Already 1 Research and Development(R&D) Sustainable Community Telecenter (TCS) has been implanted in Sao Paulo and more are planned for the state of Sao Paulo this year. In its fourth month of operation the R&D unit managed to achieve sustainability..and with approx 500 paying users every week and with a healthy waiting list..things look set to continue well. The TCS is fast becoming an important center for the community ...users,instructors, administrators and Community Center visitors are willing to complete the various questionaires that Telecentros Brasil are supplying..so valuable information about the community is being collected to help to improve the social and economic impact of the TCS service. The R&D unit also provides the model to replicate the process in other states throughout Brasil. Each TCS will be equipped with 12 new PCs ( 1 Server of 550 MHZ and 64K of RAM and 11 PCs of 500 MHZ and 32K of RAM), 2 new Inkjet Printers, 1 new Fax Machine and 1 new scanner together with new computer desks and associated furniture. All equipment is provided fully insured against theft and natural disasters. At present, the 3 Basic Telecentros Brasil products are - a Basic Computer Course covering Word, Windows, Excel and Internet 1; an Intermediate Course covering Internet 2, Access, PowerPoint, Basic Coral Design and Front Page; and an Advanced Course covering Web design, Advanced Coral Design, Illustrator and Photo Shop. The 32 hour Basic course is spread over 2 months and runs 6 days a week, 12 hours a day. Users pay a total of US$20 each, over a 2-month period. The local University train the course instructors, 3 for each TCS. The TCS allocate Sundays for emails, general internet access, studies, online services etc. Users receive a comprehensive manual and, those who successfully complete the course/s, also receive a certificate issued and signed by Telecentros Brasil and the local University. The certificate is valued both by users as well as by potential employers. New courses are constantly being sourced by Telecentros Brasil in order that each TCS can offer a varied mix of courses to the community,(eg administration, accountancy, cooperatives, construction, cooking, cosmetics, hairdressing, marketing, reception,restaurant,security, etc) which will be charged out at US$20 each. The Telecentros Brasil Job Opportunity Database is in the process of being completed and alliances are being developed with various business and professional associations to assist the TCS users in obtaining future employment. Telecentros Brasil have designed and developed its own Internet Portal(see http://www.telecentros.org.br) which carries information on Education for all ages, Business and Professional Courses, Health, Public Services, Human Rights, Citizenship, the Environment, Jobs, Help Groups etc - all in Portuguese. Telecentros Brasil personnel in conjunction with the local Universities will advise and assist TCS Administrators. The latter will be responsible for the success of each TCS's sustainable operation. A Telecentros Brasil Operating Manual, an Instructors Manual, a Maintenance Manual incorporate all procedural aspects for the administration and management of the TCS, together with recommended practices for the supply of value added services. Work has already begun in a number of the other states to implement Telecentros Amazonas, Telecentros Bahia, Telecentros Brasília, Telecentros Paraná, Telecentros Rio Grande do Sul and Telecentros Santa Catarina; each of the participating states to set up appropriate associations to implement and manage the work of the TCS. Meanwhile, Telecentros Brasil is now working with a further 28 Community Centers in the East side of Sao Paulo....and is seeking to raise $US707,280 (ie $US 25260 for each TCS) to instal a TCS in each of the 28 Community Centers. Contact: Humberto Moreira, Executive Director, Telecentros Brasil Rua Cardeal Arcoverde 1745 CJ 66B Pinheiros - Sao Paulo- SP CEP 05407-002 Tel 11 3816 6070 Fax 11 3815 3861 ---------------------- REGENCY FOUNDATION ESTABLISHED in 1990 in the United Kingdom, Regency Foundation, is a not-for-profit organization working with the United Nations and its agencies (www.regency.org). Regency is primarily a knowledge provider disseminating information in developing countries and emerging market economies. Regency recently produced a major publication entitled Telecommunications in Action - in conjunction with the ITU (International Telecommunication Union, a UN agency) - to raise awareness of the practical applications and benefits of information and communication technologies (ICTs), and to encourage the implementation of ICT related projects. This was followed by the Telecommunications in Action Congress Program, a series of live and video conferences in which senior representatives from Government, United Nations agencies, the World Bank, the InterAmerican Development Bank, NGOs and the private sector, examined and shared experiences concerning practical ICT solutions in many fields including agriculture, commerce, education, energy, environment, governance, health, manufacturing, social welfare, tourism and transportation. Beginning in 2001 Regency Foundation has turned much of its energies to putting the more practical applications and proven experiences of modern information and communications applications into action, in the service of low income peoples..... Hence the founding of Telecentros Brasil. From shuddha at sarai.net Tue May 29 15:09:15 2001 From: shuddha at sarai.net (Shuddhabrata Sengupta) Date: Tue, 29 May 2001 15:09:15 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Fwd: Re: Fwd: Sarai? Message-ID: <4.3.0.20010529144858.00a8bf00@mail.sarai.net> Dear Readers, Below is the result of a word frequency distribution test carried out by Graham Harwood on the entire body of writing on the Reader list until now. A word frequency test analyses how many times a given word is used in any body or bodies of text. for another excercise by Harwood along the same lines, see >WASTE_WORDS THEIR WEIGHT& FREQUENCY IN LONDON'S MUNICIPAL RUBBISH > >http://www.heise.de/tp/deutsch/kunst/waste/index.html enjoy , and ponder Shuddha >Word frequency carried out on the entire Sarai List > >use [word,number_uses] > >Sarai:texttable.txt > >ability 8 able 14 aboutplease 3 above 11 abroad 5 abruptness >3 absence 4 absolute 4 absolutely 7 academic 4 academics 3 accept >4 acceptable 5 acceptance 3 accepted 3 access 16 accessed >5 accessible 6 accessing 4 accomplish 3 according 9 account >5 accounting 3 accounts 8 accredited 3 accused 7 achievement >3 acquisition 4 across 10 act 11 action 8 active 4 actively >5 activist 4 activists 6 activities 7 activity 4 actually 11 adapt >3 add 7 added 5 addition 3 additional 6 address 15 addressed >7 addresses 3 adds 3 adequate 7 adjoining 3 admiration 3 ads >3 advance 3 advanced 3 advantage 7 advertising 5 advice 4 advocates >3 aesthetics 3 afford 6 affordability 3 affordable 3 africa 3 again >14 against 18 age 8 agencies 7 agitated 3 ago 7 agree 4 agreed >3 agreement 3 agreements 3 ahead 5 aims 4 air 9 alan 3 alarm >3 alert 3 alike 3 alive 3 allow 10 allowed 7 allowing 4 allows >7 almost 12 alone 4 along 12 alternative 6 although 9 always >13 amazed 3 amazing 6 america 5 american 8 americans 4 among >10 amongst 7 amount 7 analog 3 analysis 5 analysts 3 andor >3 animation 4 announced 4 announcements 3 anonymous 3 answer >9 answers 3 anxiety 4 anybody 5 anymore 3 anyone 22 anything >16 anyway 9 anywhere 6 apart 4 apologies 8 apparatus 4 apparently >4 appear 3 appeared 6 appears 6 append 3 appetite 3 apple 5 applet >3 appliance 3 application 8 applications 8 applied 3 apply >3 applying 3 appointed 3 appreciate 3 approach 3 appropriate >4 approved 6 apr 4 april 8 architechture 3 archive 5 area 3 areas >6 arena 4 arent 3 argue 4 argument 5 arguments 3 arises 3 armed >4 arms 3 around 28 arrest 3 arrested 8 arrived 4 art 13 article >16 articles 7 articulate 6 artificial 5 artist 7 artistic 4 artists >12 arts 4 arun 9 asia 4 asian 3 aside 3 ask 3 asked 6 asking >8 assembly 3 assigned 3 associated 5 association 4 asymmetry >3 atmosphere 3 attached 3 attack 3 attacker 3 att >empt 15 attempted 3 attempting 6 attempts 6 attended 3 attention >8 attitude 3 attract 3 audience 5 audiences 3 audio 5 august >5 australia 4 author 9 authorised 5 authorities 3 authorized >3 authors 3 automatically 4 availability 5 available 18 avoid >3 aware 6 away 12 back 20 background 3 backpack 3 backpackers >3 backward 3 bad 10 bagchi 3 ban 5 band 3 bandwidth 5 bangalore >5 bank 6 barons 4 barrier 4 barriers 5 base 8 based 20 basic >11 basically 5 basis 5 bastions 3 batteries 4 battle 3 bazaar >3 bear 3 became 7 because 25 become 18 becomes 8 becoming 8 before >22 began 4 begin 7 beginning 5 begun 3 behalf 7 behaviour 3 behind >6 believe 11 believed 3 believes 3 believing 3 belongs 3 below >9 benefit 6 benefits 4 berlin 4 beset 3 besides 5 best 6 better >16 between 25 beyond 6 big 17 bigger 4 biggest 3 bill 9 billion >6 billions 3 binary 3 birds 3 bit 9 black 3 blindness 3 block >3 blocks 3 blood 3 blurry 3 bodies 5 body 5 bombay 4 bombs 3 bono >3 book 8 books 6 born 5 bosmas 3 both 21 bother 3 bothered >4 bothers 4 bottom 3 bound 3 boundaries 3 box 4 boxes 4 boy 3 boys >3 brand 5 branded 4 brands 4 break 6 breaks 4 bridge 4 brief >4 bright 3 brilliant 3 bring 10 bringing 4 britain 3 british >9 broad 3 broadcast 5 broadcasting 4 broke 4 broken 3 brought >8 browser 3 bucks 3 buddies 3 build 6 building 10 buildings 4 built >9 bulk 3 bumpy 3 business 9 businesses 3 bust 3 buttons 3 buy >10 buyers 3 buying 3 cable 6 cafe 4 cafes 5 calculate 3 call >12 called 18 calling 6 calls 4 came 14 camera 3 campaign 4 cannot >9 cant 9 capabilities 4 capable 3 capacity 4 capita 4 capital >5 capitalism 3 caps 3 capture 3 car 7 card 12 cards 7 care >7 careers 3 carefully 3 carried 3 carry 7 carrying 3 case 12 cases >8 cash 6 caste 4 category 3 caught 6 cause 4 causes 3 causing 4 cd >5 censorship 6 center 3 central 10 centrally 3 centre 20 centres >4 cents 5 centu >ries 3 century 7 ceo 3 certain 10 certainly 4 chain 3 challenging >3 chance 5 change 11 changed 4 changes 3 chapter 5 character >7 characteristics 4 charge 4 charges 5 charts 3 chat 3 cheap >6 cheaper 5 check 7 cheers 14 chicago 4 chief 5 child 4 children >6 chilling 3 china 5 chinese 4 chip 3 choice 6 choices 3 choke >3 choose 4 choosing 3 church 3 cinema 6 circuit 3 cities 7 citizen >3 citizens 3 city 14 citys 4 civic 3 civil 8 claim 7 claimed >6 claims 4 clandestine 6 class 10 classes 3 clear 5 clearly 9 click >3 client 6 climate 3 close 8 closer 4 closing 3 clubs 4 cnn 3 code >10 codes 3 coding 3 coffee 3 coinage 3 coincide 3 coins 3 cold >7 collaborative 3 collected 3 collecting 4 collection 6 collective >4 college 6 colonies 3 colonization 3 columbia 3 combination >4 combinations 3 come 16 comes 8 comfortable 3 coming 6 comment >5 comments 3 commerce 3 commercial 5 commission 6 commissioner >3 commit 3 committed 5 committee 4 commodity 4 common 8 communal >3 communicate 4 communicated 3 communicating 3 communication >7 communications 5 communities 6 community 13 companies 13 company >7 compared 4 compares 4 compelling 3 compete 3 competing >3 competition 8 complete 8 completely 9 complex 9 comply 3 composed >3 composition 3 compositions 4 comprehensive 3 compressed >4 compulsory 3 computer 22 computers 15 computing 6 concealed >4 conceived 3 concentrated 3 concept 8 concepts 3 concern >5 concerned 4 concerning 5 concerns 3 conclusion 4 concrete >6 condemned 3 condemning 3 condescension 3 conditions 7 conducted >3 conference 6 confidence 3 conflicting 3 confronted 3 connected >5 connecting 4 connection 12 connections 5 connectivity >4 connectivitythere 3 consensus 3 consenting 3 consequences >3 conservation 3 consider 6 considerably 4 considerate 3 considered >8 constant 5 constantly 4 constitute 3 constrained 3 construct >3 constructed 3 construction 4 consultancy 3 consu > >mer 6 consumers 4 contact 5 contain 5 contained 8 contemporary >8 content 19 contents 6 context 5 continue 9 continued 3 continues >3 continuing 5 contract 4 contractor 3 contrary 3 contribute >3 contributes 3 contributions 3 contributors 4 control 17 controlled >4 controlling 4 controversial 3 conventional 3 convergence >4 conversation 4 conversations 3 convert 3 converting 3 conveyance >3 convince 3 convinced 5 convincing 3 conviviality 3 cooperation >3 copies 5 copy 7 copying 3 copyright 7 core 3 corner 3 corners >4 corporate 6 corporation 3 corporations 6 correct 3 correctly >3 corridors 3 cost 10 costly 3 costs 9 cotton 3 coud 3 couldnt >4 count 3 counter 6 countless 5 countries 11 country 11 counts >3 couple 6 course 17 courses 3 court 5 courtney 3 courts 3 cover >3 coverage 3 cow 5 crash 4 crazy 7 create 15 created 12 creates >7 creating 10 creation 5 creative 5 creativity 5 creator 4 creators >3 credit 10 crime 9 criminal 6 criminalized 3 criminals 4 critical >4 criticised 3 criticism 4 critique 3 crores 4 cross 8 crucial >3 cspace 5 cu 4 cultural 10 culture 20 curiosity 3 current >11 currently 11 customer 5 customers 6 cut 7 cuts 8 cutting 3 cyber >6 cybercafe 6 cybercafes 6 cybershadow 3 cybershadows 3 cyberspace >6 daily 9 danger 3 dangerous 7 dangers 3 dark 4 darren 3 dasgupta >10 data 12 database 6 date 10 david 4 day 15 days 14 dead 4 deal >8 dealing 3 deals 4 dealt 4 dear 4 death 6 decade 5 decay >3 december 5 decent 3 decentralized 3 decide 7 decided 7 decision >3 decisions 5 declare 3 deep 6 deeper 3 deeply 4 defend 3 defending >3 define 4 defined 4 definition 4 definitions 3 degree 8 dehli >3 delhi 42 delhis 3 deliberately 5 delighted 3 delinquent 3 deliver >7 delivered 3 delivery 4 demand 6 demanded 4 demands 3 demo >3 democracy 5 democratic 3 demographic 3 demon 4 demonstrated >3 demonstration 4 denial 3 density 4 deny 3 departments 3 depending 3 d > >epict 3 deploy 4 deployed 3 deputy 3 describe 6 described >5 describes 3 description 4 design 9 designed 6 designers 3 desires >3 destroy 5 details 4 detained 3 determine 3 determines 3 develop >4 developed 15 developers 4 developing 21 development 10 developments >4 device 9 devices 5 devoted 3 dialogue 4 dictatorship 3 dictionary >3 didnt 7 die 3 died 3 difference 6 differences 5 different >16 difficult 13 difficulty 3 digested 3 digital 18 dim 3 direct >6 directed 4 direction 6 directions 4 directly 6 director >4 discipline 4 discourage 3 discouraged 3 discourse 5 discovered >5 discuss 11 discussed 4 discusses 3 discussing 4 discussion >14 disease 3 disk 3 dismal 3 display 5 dispute 3 disregard >3 dissemination 5 dissidents 3 distance 4 distracted 3 distribute >5 distributed 8 distributing 3 distribution 10 disturbing 3 divergent >3 diverse 6 dives 3 divide 10 divided 5 divides 3 doctors >3 documenta 7 documentation 4 documents 3 doesnt 6 dog 4 dollar >3 dollars 9 domain 10 dominant 5 dominated 4 dont 18 door 4 doors >3 dotcom 3 dotcoms 3 double 4 dowload 3 down 17 download >6 downloaded 4 downloading 4 downloads 5 draconian 4 draft >5 dramatic 3 drastically 3 drawing 5 drawn 4 drive 7 driven >5 drivers 3 driving 5 due 7 duly 3 during 13 dying 4 each >17 earlier 7 early 10 earn 3 earned 3 ears 3 earth 6 ease 3 easier >5 easily 7 east 5 eastern 5 easy 9 ecommerce 3 economic 8 economics >4 economy 10 edge 3 editing 3 education 8 educational 6 effect >8 effective 6 effectively 3 efficiencies 3 efficiency 4 efficient >6 effort 7 eg 3 eight 4 either 16 electronic 5 electronically >4 electronics 4 element 5 elements 6 eliminate 3 elite 5 elites >4 else 13 email 15 embedded 3 emerge 3 emerged 4 emerging >4 emotional 3 employee 4 employees 3 employing 4 employment >3 empower 3 empowered 3 enable 4 enabled 3 enables 4 enabling >4 encoding 3 encounter 3 encountered 3 encourage >4 encouraged 3 encourages 3 encryption 4 end 14 ended 3 ends >4 enemies 3 energy 4 enforced 4 enforcement 3 engine 3 engineering >5 english 11 englishspeaking 3 enjoy 6 enjoyed 3 enmeshed 3 enough >16 ensemble 3 ensure 4 ensuring 4 enter 8 entered 3 entering >3 enterprises 3 entertainment 5 entire 13 entirely 6 entities >3 entity 3 entries 3 entry 4 environment 6 equality 4 equipment >4 equity 3 equivalent 5 erosion 3 erratic 6 error 3 escaping >3 esmtp 5 especially 10 essential 3 established 9 etc 20 ethnic >4 europe 6 european 6 even 30 evening 3 event 13 events >6 eventually 3 ever 9 every 22 everybody 4 everyday 9 everyone >10 everything 6 evidence 3 evil 4 evolve 3 exact 4 exactly >6 examining 3 example 12 examples 5 excellent 5 except 6 excercise >3 excerpts 3 exchange 9 excitement 3 excuse 3 executions 3 executive >3 executives 3 exhibition 4 exist 7 existence 5 existing 6 exists >3 exotic 3 expand 3 expanding 4 expect 6 expected 4 expecting >3 expects 3 expense 3 expenses 3 expensive 9 experience >8 experienced 4 experiences 3 experimentation 3 experiments 6 expert >3 experts 6 explain 5 explained 3 explains 3 exploit 3 explore >3 export 4 exposes 3 exposing 3 exposure 3 express 5 expression >6 extend 3 extended 3 extending 3 extension 3 extent 5 extortion >3 extra 4 extraordinary 3 extremely 4 eye 3 eyes 6 face 12 faced >3 facilities 5 facility 3 facing 3 fact 17 factions 4 facts 4 fail >3 failed 5 fails 4 failure 5 fair 5 fairly 7 fall 4 fallen 4 falls >3 false 3 familiar 5 families 5 family 7 famous 4 fans 3 far >12 farming 3 fascinating 3 fascination 3 fast 8 faster 4 fastest >3 fate 3 favor 3 favour 3 favourite 3 fax 3 fear 7 feature >3 features 5 february 3 federal 4 fee 5 feel 10 feeling 3 feet >3 fell 3 felt 5 females 3 few 24 fiction 4 field 3 fifth 4 fifty >5 fight 4 fighting 3 figment 6 figorg 5 figure 5 figures 7 file >9 files 9 filesharing >3 fill 3 film 12 films 4 filtering 4 filters 3 filthy 3 final >5 finally 7 financial 4 find 23 finding 9 findings 4 finds 5 fine >5 fined 5 finished 4 fire 5 firm 3 firms 3 first 24 firstly 4 fit >4 fits 3 five 12 fix 6 fixed 5 fjord 3 flaunting 3 flawed 3 floor >3 floppy 3 florian 3 flourish 3 flow 4 flowers 3 fly 3 focus >6 folk 3 folks 5 follow 5 followed 4 following 9 follows 4 fonts >3 food 5 force 6 forced 6 forces 6 foreign 5 forget 3 forgot >3 form 15 formalism 3 formation 4 formed 3 former 4 forms >6 formulate 3 formulation 3 forward 7 forwarded 4 forwarding 4 foul >3 found 19 foundation 5 founder 3 four 8 frame 3 france 3 francisco >3 free 17 freed 3 freedom 8 freely 5 freenet >8 freenetgnutellafilesharing 3 freeware 4 french 4 frequency >5 frequently 4 friday 3 friendlier 3 friendly 4 friends 8 front >3 frustration 3 full 8 fully 5 fun 4 function 6 functions >3 fundamental 6 furi 3 further 12 future 23 gain 4 gained 3 gallery >3 gap 6 gas 3 gatekeepers 3 gateways 4 gathered 3 gathering 4 gave >3 geert 3 gene 3 general 13 generally 3 generated 3 generation >4 generations 3 generators 3 germany 3 gestures 3 get 21 gets >5 getting 10 ghosts 3 giant 3 gibson 3 gigantic 3 give 15 given >12 gives 5 giving 8 global 15 globalization 3 globe 3 gmt 5 gnu >5 gnutella 5 goal 4 goals 4 god 6 going 15 gold 3 gom 3 good >16 goods 5 got 12 government 19 governments 6 gradual 3 gradually >3 graham 3 grand 3 granted 5 graphic 3 graphics 3 grease 3 great >14 greater 3 greatest 5 greedy 4 greenwich 3 grey 3 grid 5 grossly >3 ground 4 grounded 4 group 10 groups 13 growing 6 grows 3 growth >4 guess 3 guidelines 3 guilty 3 guy 5 guys 5 guzzled 3 guzzling >3 habitat 4 hacker 3 hacking 5 hadnt 3 half 12 halfway 4 hand >13 handheld 8 handle 3 hands 8 happen 9 happened 4 happening >11 happens 7 happy 5 hard 14 hardly 4 hardware 13 harwood >3 harwoods 3 hate 4 haven > >t 5 haves 3 head 5 headaches 3 heads 4 health 6 heard 4 hearing >3 heart 5 heat 3 heck 3 held 6 hell 4 hello 4 help 21 helping >5 heres 6 hidden 3 high 16 highly 8 highprofile 3 hindi 6 hindu >3 hindustan 3 historical 9 histories 5 history 17 hit 5 hits 4 hold >5 hollywood 4 holy 4 home 16 honest 3 honestly 3 hooked 3 hope >10 hopefully 3 hopes 3 horizontal 4 hospitable 3 host 8 hot 4 hotel >5 hour 4 houri 3 hours 5 house 7 households 4 houses 4 how >34 however 14 html 7 http 28 huge 5 human 11 humans 3 humidity >3 hundred 3 hundreds 4 hurt 4 ibm 4 ibms 3 idea 14 ideas >13 identification 4 identify 3 identity 8 ie 3 ignorance 3 ignore >5 ignored 3 iii 3 illegal 7 illfated 4 illiterate 3 illusion >5 image 10 images 6 imaginary 3 imagination 9 imaginative 3 imagine >14 immediate 3 immediately 7 impact 5 implementation 3 implemented >6 implication 3 implications 3 importance 5 important 15 importing >3 imposing 3 impossible 3 impression 3 impressive 3 imprisonment >4 improve 3 improved 4 improving 5 improvised 3 incentive 3 include >7 included 3 includes 6 including 9 inclusive 3 income 3 increase >4 increasing 3 increasingly 7 incredibly 4 incriminating 3 indeed >5 independence 3 independent 9 indeterminate 4 india 33 indian >21 indians 5 indias 7 indicate 3 indication 3 indigent 3 individual >8 individuals 4 industrial 8 industries 5 industry 9 inefficient >3 inequalities 3 inexpensive 3 infecting 3 inferior 3 influence >5 info 3 infohighway 3 inform 3 information 26 informed >3 infrastructure 6 inherent 4 initial 5 initiative 33 initiatives >3 initiator 3 innovative 4 input 5 insensitive 3 insistence >3 inspiration 3 install 6 installed 4 instance 7 instead >10 institute 4 institutions 4 insurance 3 integration 3 intel >4 intellectual 9 intelligence 4 intelligent 5 intended 3 intense >3 intention 4 interaction 3 intercept 3 interception 3 interest >10 interested 13 intere > >sting 21 interests 8 interface 5 international 12 internet >30 interpret 3 interpretation 4 intervene 3 interview 5 into >37 introduced 5 invention 3 inventiveness 3 invest 6 investigative >3 investment 4 invisible 5 invited 3 involved 8 involves 6 ip >4 iron 4 islands 3 isnt 14 isps 5 issue 15 issued 5 issues >12 issuse 3 ist 3 italian 7 italy 6 itll 4 itself 15 ive 3 jain >3 james 3 january 4 japan 3 jaswinder 8 java 4 jeebesh 7 jeebeshs >3 job 6 jobs 5 john 5 join 7 joined 3 joke 3 josephine >3 journalism 4 journalist 6 journalists 7 journey 4 joy 3 july >4 june 6 jungle 3 just 27 justice 9 justified 3 kaushal 3 keen >4 keep 9 keeping 6 keeps 5 kept 3 kerala 3 key 8 keyboard >3 keyborads 3 kid 3 kids 5 kill 3 killed 5 kind 14 kinds 7 kinkos >3 knowledge 16 kohli 8 la 6 labor 3 labour 3 lack 8 ladder >3 lajpat 3 lakh 3 land 4 landing 3 language 12 languages 8 large >15 largely 3 larger 9 largest 3 last 15 late 8 later 12 latest >3 latter 4 laugh 4 launched 5 law 15 laws 4 lawyers 6 lead >4 leaders 3 leading 3 leads 3 leak 3 learn 9 learned 4 learning >4 learns 3 learnt 3 least 14 leave 7 leaves 6 leaving 5 left >10 legacy 3 legal 12 legislation 3 less 19 let 11 lets 6 letter >4 letters 3 level 7 levels 3 liable 4 liberal 3 liberticide >5 liberties 4 libraries 3 library 5 libre 4 licence 5 licences >4 licencing 3 license 9 licensed 4 licenses 4 licensing 5 lies >3 life 11 light 7 lights 3 like 34 likely 6 limewire 3 limitations >4 limited 10 limits 3 line 15 lines 11 linguistic 3 link 7 linking >3 links 4 linux 12 list 33 listed 5 listen 4 listeners 3 listening >5 lists 7 literacy 3 literally 4 little 18 live 9 lived 3 lives >5 living 9 load 4 lobby 5 local 13 localhost 3 locals 3 located >5 location 5 locked 3 logs 3 london 7 long 17 longer 6 longterm >5 look 20 looked 6 looking 9 looks 7 los 3 lose 6 lost 7 lot >10 lots 8 lounge 3 love 7 lovel > >y 3 low 11 lowcost 3 lower 5 loyalty 3 lucky 3 m 5 machine >11 machines 6 made 29 magazine 4 mail 19 mailing 7 main 9 mainly >3 mainstream 6 maintain 5 maintained 3 maintaining 3 maintains >4 major 13 majority 4 make 27 makers 4 makes 17 making 22 males >3 man 6 manage 5 management 4 manager 3 managers 3 mankind 4 manner >5 mantra 3 manufacture 3 manufacturers 4 many 27 map 3 mapping >3 march 8 marginal 4 mark 4 market 10 marketing 6 marks 4 markup >3 marx 3 mass 4 massive 10 masters 3 match 4 material 12 materials >5 math 3 mathur 4 matrix 4 matter 7 may 32 maybe 8 meagre 3 mean >10 meaning 4 means 23 meant 9 meanwhile 3 measured 5 measures >5 mechanism 4 mechanisms 4 media 42 median 3 medical 5 medicine >3 medium 8 meet 5 meeting 9 meetings 3 mehta 8 member 4 members >12 membrane 3 meme 3 memory 7 men 6 menacing 3 mental 4 mention >6 mentioned 9 mere 3 merely 6 message 4 messages 9 met 3 methinks >3 method 4 methods 3 metres 3 michael 3 microsoft 7 mid 4 middle >8 middlemen 3 midst 3 might 19 mile 4 military >3 militaryearlyindustrial 3 milk 3 million 8 millions 6 mind 8 minds >5 mining 3 ministers 3 ministries 3 ministry 5 minor 4 minute >3 minutes 4 miscellaneous 3 miserable 4 missed 3 missing 3 mistake >4 misuse 4 mob 3 mobile 5 mobilised 3 mode 3 model 6 models >6 modem 3 modems 4 modern 5 modes 3 modest 3 modify 3 moment >5 money 10 monica 27 monster 3 month 3 monthly 3 months 12 mooching >3 moral 5 morality 5 morphing 3 most 22 mostly 7 motivation 5 move >4 moved 3 movement 7 movie 3 movies 5 moving 7 mp3 5 mr 3 much >26 multi 3 multilingual 3 multimedia 3 multiple 3 multiply 3 mumbai >3 municipal 4 murder 3 museum 3 music 11 must 22 muzzle 4 muzzling >3 myriad 3 myself 6 mysterious 3 myths 3 name 14 named 5 names >6 napster 4 narula 25 nation 3 national 18 natural 5 nature 17 near >8 nearly 4 necessarily 4 necessary 10 necessity 4 need 30 ne > >eded 7 needs 14 negative 3 negotiate 3 neither 3 net 16 netscape >3 nettime 7 network 12 networked 4 networks 6 netzip 3 never >14 neverending 3 news 17 newspaper 5 newspapers 3 newton 4 next >16 nice 4 nickel 3 nigam 3 night 5 nike 3 nine 4 nobody 6 node >3 non 3 none 3 nonviolent 3 nor 5 north 3 note 14 noted 3 nothing >16 notice 4 notion 3 notions 3 notwithstanding 5 novel 4 november >6 nowhere 4 nuclear 3 number 18 numbers 7 object 3 objective >4 objectives 3 obscene 4 observation 4 obtain 4 obvious 6 obviously >7 occurred 4 october 7 odd 3 off 10 offence 3 offences 3 offer >10 offering 3 offers 7 office 11 officer 3 officially 3 offline >6 often 9 ok 4 old 14 older 5 once 13 ones 9 online 22 only >34 onto 7 open 15 opened 5 opening 3 openly 3 opens 3 opensource >3 operate 3 operates 3 operating 6 operation 3 operations 3 opinion >5 opportunity 8 opposed 4 optic 3 optimism 3 option 3 options >4 order 15 ordered 3 orders 5 ordinary 3 organisation >5 organisations 4 organise 3 organised 3 organization 4 organizations >3 original 6 originally 5 originators 3 others 16 otherwise 9 ours >3 ourselves 6 out 41 outcasts 3 outcome 4 outer 3 outlets 3 output >4 outside 10 outsiders 3 over 25 overall 3 overcome 4 overreacting >3 owes 3 owner 3 owners 3 owns 4 package 3 packaged 3 padlocked >3 page 7 pages 8 paid 4 pakistan 4 palm 3 panic 4 pankaj >3 parallel 4 paris 4 park 4 parking 3 parks 3 parliament 8 part >22 participants 3 participate 4 participating 4 participation >4 particular 8 particularly 12 parties 6 partition 4 partly 3 parts >8 party 3 pass 5 passed 3 passing 3 passive 3 past 8 patented >3 paths 4 patrice 5 patrolling 3 pattern 4 patterns 4 pay 10 paying >7 payment 3 pays 3 pc 5 peace 5 penchant 3 penetration 4 people >37 peoples 7 per 8 perceived 3 percent 5 perception 3 perceptions >3 perfectly 3 perform 4 performance 5 perhaps 19 period 5 periodic > >al 5 permanent 3 permission 8 person 14 personal 15 personalities >3 personally 7 persons 9 perspective 3 pertinent 5 petty 3 phase >3 phenomena 3 phenomenon 5 philip 7 phillip 3 philosophical 3 phone >9 phones 4 photocopiers 4 photographic 3 photos 3 physical 8 pick >5 picture 6 pictures 3 pie 3 piece 8 pieces 3 pilot 3 pinch >3 place 16 places 9 plain 3 plan 5 planning 3 plans 4 plants >3 platform 11 platforms 3 play 6 player 4 playful 3 playing >3 please 10 plug 3 pocock 8 poetry 3 point 13 pointing 3 points >10 police 13 policies 3 policy 5 political 8 politically 3 politics >4 pool 3 poor 12 popular 4 population 13 porn 4 pornography >4 portals 3 posed 3 position 5 positions 4 positive 3 positively >3 possession 3 possibilities 8 possibility 8 possible 17 post >11 posted 5 postfix 3 posting 18 postings 3 potential 12 potentially >4 pounds 3 poverty 5 power 18 powerful 10 powers 3 practical >4 practice 9 practices 7 pradesh 3 precisely 3 precision >3 predicated 3 predict 3 predictions 4 predominantly 3 prefer >4 prehistory 3 preliminary 3 premises 3 prepared 4 prescribed >3 presence 5 present 13 presentation 4 presentations 4 presented >7 presenting 3 president 7 press 13 pressure 8 presumably 3 pretend >3 pretty 7 prevent 7 preventing 5 previous 6 previously 4 price >8 prices 4 prime 4 princess 3 principal 3 print 6 printed 5 prison >3 prisoners 3 prisons 3 privacy 6 private 14 probably 11 problem >13 problems 10 procedure 4 procedures 5 proceedings 3 process >16 processes 8 processing 7 processors 3 produce 7 produced >6 producer 5 producers 5 producing 5 product 10 production >10 productivity 4 products 8 profession 3 professional >10 professionals 3 professions 3 professor 3 profile 3 profit >5 profitable 4 profits 5 program 6 programme 4 programmer >3 programmers 6 programmes 6 programming 3 programs 10 progress >5 prohibitive 3 project 9 projects 8 proliferation 3 > >promises 7 promote 4 promoters 3 promoting 4 promotion 4 pronounced >3 proof 3 proper 3 properly 3 property 10 proposal 3 proposals >5 proprietary 3 prosecution 3 protect 6 protected 5 protects >3 protest 3 protested 3 protesters 3 protests 3 protocol 3 protocols >3 prototype 3 provide 12 provided 7 provider 7 providers 3 provides >6 providing 6 provision 5 provisions 5 psyche 3 psychological >3 public 27 publication 6 publicity 3 publish 5 published >5 publisher 3 publishers 7 publishing 6 pulled 3 punishable >3 punishment 4 purchase 4 purchased 3 pure 4 purity 3 purpose >11 purposes 4 pursuit 3 pushed 3 put 16 puts 3 putting 7 quality >9 quarterly 3 queries 3 question 13 questioning 3 questions >11 queues 3 quick 7 quicker 3 quickly 10 quiet 3 quite 14 quo >3 rabbit 3 radical 4 radio 7 radius 3 raise 5 raised 4 raises >3 raising 3 rajpur 33 raju 4 ram 3 rana 11 ranas 4 range 8 rank >3 ranks 3 rarely 3 rate 5 rather 14 rational 3 ravi 8 ravis 5 raw >3 reach 4 reached 4 reaches 5 reaching 3 reaction 3 read 19 reader >13 readerlist 3 readers 3 readership 3 readily 4 reading >8 readressing 3 ready 10 real 15 realdownload 3 realisation >3 realise 3 realised 3 reality 9 really 13 realm 5 realnetworks >3 reason 10 reasonable 7 reasonably 3 reasons 6 reassured 3 receive >4 received 14 receivers 3 receives 3 recent 10 recently 8 recognise >3 recognition 8 recognize 4 recompense 3 reconciliation 5 record >7 recorded 3 recording 3 recordings 3 records 5 recouped 3 red >6 reduce 5 reduced 5 reducing 4 references 3 referred 3 reflecting >3 reform 4 refresh 4 refuges 3 refuse 3 regard 4 regardless >4 regards 11 regime 7 regimes 5 register 4 registered 3 registration >3 regularly 3 regulation 4 regulations 6 related 10 relation >5 relations 6 relationship 4 relative 6 relatively 4 release >5 released 6 releases 3 releasing 3 relegating 3 relevance >3 relevant 8 reliable 3 religion 3 >religious 3 remain 5 remained 3 remains 3 remember 4 remote 3 remove >3 removed 3 render 3 rent 3 repeat 3 repeatedly 3 replacing >4 replicates 3 report 9 reporters 3 reporting 3 reports 5 repository >3 represent 8 representation 5 representational 3 representing >3 represents 4 reproduction 6 repsite 3 request 5 requested >4 require 6 required 9 requirement 4 requirements 4 research >5 resist 3 resistance 3 resources 5 respect 5 respectively 3 respond >3 response 7 responses 3 responsibility 3 rest 10 restrained >3 restrictions 3 result 7 results 7 return 7 returned 3 revenue >4 review 3 revolution 5 revolutionary 3 reward 3 rewriting >3 rhetoric 3 rich 6 richard 4 ride 3 riemens 3 right 16 rights >9 rigid 3 risk 7 rituals 3 river 4 road 34 roadblocks 3 roads >3 robert 4 rock 4 role 4 room 4 rooms 4 rough 3 routine 4 rs >3 rules 8 run 15 running 7 runs 3 rupees 5 rural 3 sacred 3 salary >3 sales 3 same 25 san 3 sanchar 3 sanskrit 3 sarai 30 sarainet >20 saraithe 19 satellite 3 save 7 saving 3 savings 3 scale 6 scarce >3 scarcity 4 scared 5 scary 4 scenario 4 scene 3 scheme 4 scholar >3 school 5 schools 5 science 7 scientific 3 scientist 3 scratch >4 screen 6 screenings 3 screens 3 script 3 sealing 3 search >9 searchers 3 seattle 3 second 12 secondly 3 secret 4 section >8 sections 4 sector 5 secure 3 security 6 seem 13 seemed 3 seems >19 sees 5 segment 4 segments 3 selection 4 self 6 sell 5 selling >5 seminar 3 send 7 sending 4 sends 4 sengupta 16 sensational >3 sense 12 sent 10 sentenced 3 sentences 3 september 4 sequence >3 sequences 3 series 8 serious 7 seriously 4 seriousness 3 serve >8 server 8 servers 5 serves 3 service 11 services 10 serving >3 session 5 set 15 sethi 12 sets 5 setting 5 settop 3 seven >6 several 10 severe 3 sexual 4 shadow 4 shady 3 shake 3 shall >3 shame 3 shape 3 share 7 shared 6 sharing 7 sharp 3 sharply >3 shelters 4 shield 3 shif > >t 3 shifting 3 ships 3 short 7 shot 3 should 23 show 9 showing >5 shown 11 shows 5 shrink 3 shuddha 17 shuddhabrata 16 sick 3 sides >3 sign 5 signals 3 signature 3 significant 6 signs 3 silent >6 silicon 4 silver 3 similar 9 similarly 3 simple 11 simplest >3 simplicity 3 simply 8 simputer 5 since 16 sincere 3 singapore >3 singh 10 single 11 sit 5 site 13 sites 10 sits 3 sitting >4 situation 6 six 4 size 4 skin 3 slashdot 3 slaughter 4 sleep >3 slick 3 slow 5 small 15 smartdownload 3 smile 3 smog 3 smtp >4 socalled 3 sociability 3 social 14 societies 16 society >13 societys 3 sociological 3 soft 3 software 30 softwares 4 sold >6 solely 3 solution 6 solutions 7 solve 3 solved 3 some 47 somebody >3 somehow 5 someone 14 something 21 sometime 3 sometimes 7 somewhat >5 somewhere 8 song 3 songs 4 soon 14 sophisticated 4 sorry 6 sort >10 sought 5 sound 9 sounds 5 source 16 sources 4 south 6 space >21 spaces 6 spanking 4 spare 3 speak 10 speakers 6 speaking >8 speaks 4 special 5 specialists 3 specific 9 specificyou 3 specify >3 specs 3 spectrum 4 speech 10 speed 6 spend 7 spends 3 spent >6 spiritied 3 spirits 3 split 3 spoke 3 spoken 5 spots 4 spread >7 spreading 4 spring 3 square 4 stable 3 staff 3 stage 3 stance >3 stand 5 standard 9 standardization 3 standards 6 stands 5 star >3 start 9 started 6 starts 3 state 19 stated 3 statement 3 states >10 static 3 station 3 stations 4 stay 5 stayed 3 stefan 4 step >8 stepped 3 stern 3 steve 5 stiff 3 still 22 stipulations 3 stock >3 stop 9 storage 4 store 5 stored 4 stories 6 story 10 straddles >3 straight 3 strange 6 strangewhat 3 strategic 4 strategies >3 strategy 3 streaming 4 street 8 streetlevel 3 streets 3 stretched >3 strict 3 strikes 3 striving 3 strong 8 struck 4 structure >5 structured 3 structures 4 struggle 3 students 5 studio 3 study >17 stuff 6 stupid 3 style 3 su 4 subaltern 3 subject 8 subjective >3 submi > >tting 3 subscribe 4 subscribers 3 subscribing 3 subsequent >3 substantial 3 substantially 3 substitute 3 subvert 4 succeed >3 success 9 successfully 3 such 34 sudden 4 suddenly 4 suffer >3 suffered 3 sufficient 4 sufficiently 3 suggest 3 suggests 3 suit >4 suitable 3 sundaram 6 supply 5 support 7 supported 5 supporting >5 supports 3 suppose 3 supposed 3 supreet 13 supreme 3 sure >11 surely 3 surf 6 surfing 3 surprised 4 surprising 3 surveillance >10 survive 7 suspended 3 swap 3 switch 4 sword 3 syche 3 symbolic >3 system 26 systems 10 table 4 tactic 3 tag 5 take 24 taken >11 takes 6 taking 7 talent 3 talk 9 talking 6 talks 5 tamil >3 tampering 3 tapism 3 target 4 targets 3 task 3 taste 5 tate >4 taught 3 taxpayers 3 tcpip 3 tea 3 teach 3 teacher 4 teaching >3 team 5 tears 3 tech 3 technical 13 technique 3 technological >9 technologies 7 technology 17 teeth 3 tehelkas 4 tel 3 telecom >4 telephone 6 telephony 3 television 6 tell 10 telling 7 temporary >3 ten 4 term 12 terminal 3 terminals 3 terms 11 terrible 3 terrific >3 territories 3 territory 3 terrorism 3 terrorist 3 terrorists >3 test 4 tests 3 text 9 texts 4 than 24 thank 4 thanks 4 thats >9 theme 3 themes 4 themselves 19 then 24 theorist 3 theory >9 thereby 3 therefore 13 therein 3 theres 5 theyd 3 theyll 4 theyre >5 thick 3 thickly 3 thin 4 thing 15 things 18 think 33 thinking >16 thinks 8 third 9 though 7 thought 11 thoughts 6 thousands >7 threat 7 threaten 3 threatened 5 threats 4 three 10 thrice >3 through 24 throughout 3 throwaway 3 thrown 3 thu 3 thus 11 ticket >3 tickets 4 till 5 time 31 times 10 title 6 titled 3 today >13 todays 5 tofts 3 together 8 told 5 tom 3 tone 3 too 20 took >9 tool 3 tools 10 top 7 topic 3 total 6 totally 3 touch 4 tough >3 towards 8 town 3 towns 3 toy 3 trace 3 traces 3 track 3 trade >9 trading 4 traditional 4 traditions 3 traffic 10 training >3 transactions 3 transce > >nd 3 transcribing 3 transcription 4 transfer 4 transform >5 transformation 3 transformed 4 transitional 5 translate >3 transmission 3 transmitted 5 transmitting 3 transnational >3 transparency 4 transparent 3 transport 3 travel 8 travelling >3 treated 5 tremendous 3 trial 3 tried 7 trigger 3 trouble 6 true >11 truly 3 trust 5 truth 11 try 15 trying 19 tuesday 3 turn >5 turning 5 turns 4 tv 10 twelvetimes 3 twenty 3 twice 6 two >24 type 4 types 8 typical 3 typically 3 uk 5 ultimately 4 unable >7 under 23 understand 8 understanding 8 understood 6 unemployed >3 unequal 3 unfortunately 4 unified 3 unimultiverse 3 union 4 unique >4 uniquely 3 unit 5 united 4 universal 3 universe 4 university >6 unknown 7 unless 5 unlicensed 3 unlike 4 unlikely 5 unlimited >4 unmediated 3 unpredictable 3 unrealised 3 unsubscribe 4 until >11 untouchable 4 unusual 3 unwillingness 3 up 35 upcoming 3 upfront >3 upgrade 3 upon 10 urban 6 urbanism 3 urge 5 url 9 urls 4 usage >9 usb 3 use 28 used 23 useful 7 usefulness 3 useless 4 user >12 users 13 uses 8 using 15 usual 4 usually 11 utilities 3 utopia >3 utopian 3 vague 4 valid 4 valley 5 valuable 6 value 9 values >3 variety 5 various 12 vast 3 vehicle 4 vendor 3 vendors 4 venue >3 version 9 versions 5 vertical 3 very 30 via 4 viable 3 vicinity >3 video 12 videos 4 videsh 3 view 14 viewing 4 views 6 vigilant >4 village 8 violations 3 violence 5 violent 3 virtual 9 virtually >5 virtues 3 visible 8 visited 3 visitor 3 visual 7 voice 5 voices >5 volunteer 4 volunteers 3 vsnl 7 wages 3 waited 3 waiting 4 wake >4 walk 6 walking 3 wall 4 walls 3 want 21 wanted 4 wants 6 wap >3 war 9 warm 3 warned 3 warrens 3 wary 3 washington 3 waste >6 wasteful 3 watched 3 watching 6 water 4 waves 3 way 33 ways >15 wc 3 weak 3 wealth 7 wear 3 web 20 webcasts 3 website >13 websites 4 wed 3 week 5 weeks 3 weight 4 welcome 9 well 30 west >5 western 4 weve 3 w > >hatever 13 whats 5 when 32 whenever 4 where 32 whereas 3 wherever >4 whether 11 while 20 whilst 3 whispers 3 white 6 whole 13 whom >6 why 19 wide 5 widely 4 wider 3 willing 3 wind 3 window >3 windowing 3 windows 6 winning 3 wipe 3 wire 4 wireless 6 wisely >3 wish 8 wishes 4 withdrawal 3 within 14 without 27 witnessed >4 woman 3 women 6 wonder 6 wont 9 word 10 words 7 work 28 worked >5 workers 7 working 13 works 14 workshops 3 world 32 worlds >4 worldwide 5 worry 3 worse 6 worst 4 worth 4 wouldbe 3 wouldnt >3 wounded 3 wow 3 write 10 writer 3 writers 5 writes 4 writing >6 written 8 wrong 6 wrote 13 x 5 xxxxxx 3 y2k 3 yahoo 4 year >14 years 22 yes 7 yesterday 6 yet 12 york 7 youd 4 youll 5 young >7 youre 8 yourself 5 youve 3 zealand 3 zero 4 > > >Word = some Use = 47 > >H > > > > >Harwood at scotoma.org > >Tel +31 (0) 20 365 9334 > > > > >MONGREL > >http://www.mongrelx.org > > >HARWOOD DE MONGREL TATE GALLERY SITE: > >http://www.tate.org.uk/webart/mongrel/home/default.htm/ > >WASTE_WORDS THEIR WEIGHT& FREQUENCY IN LONDON'S MUNICIPAL RUBBISH > >http://www.heise.de/tp/deutsch/kunst/waste/index.html > >Linker site > >http://www.Linker.org.uk Shuddhabrata Sengupta SARAI: The New Media Initiative Centre for the Study of Developing Societies 29, Rajpur Road, Delhi 110 052, India www.sarai.net From Harwood at scotoma.org Tue May 29 07:07:28 2001 From: Harwood at scotoma.org (Harwood) Date: Tue, 29 May 2001 03:37:28 +0200 Subject: [Reader-list] Human-Computer Oscillation In-Reply-To: References: <20010527151627.40472.qmail@web11502.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: I hope this is useful as a bridge between the Programmers and the other elites at Sarai Human-Computer Oscillation and the need for calories. The foundation of this report is the human sensing-system's contribution to the physical geography of the body: the orientation of the body in space, an awareness of spatial relationships and an appreciation of the specific qualities of different places and different things, both currently experienced and removed in time. The body's sensing systems offer important media through which space and time are experienced and made sense of in computer interface. Yet also, each sense system seems to offer its own distinctive character to that experience and physical geography in general. In particular contexts, a certain sense and specific style of operation of that sensing may play a dominant role in establishing geographical meaning and the meanings of particles of data from computer systems. Thus the multisensual nature of geographical experience is not even within interface but variable across space and time, between individuals and communities, between cultures and periods of time. Physical geography is always changing, and any general characteristics recognized are always specific to the need for calories and complex local economic and social systems arising from that need. The human user's sensing systems express themselves within the brain though complex states of fluctuating voltage happening in conjunction with chemical processes. This electro-chemical complexity around the user's synapses eventually formulates itself into a symbolic-world. The structure and nature of this symbolic-world does not concern this report. It will suffice to say that one exists. The first challenge of Interaction with an operating computer is to funnel this symbolic world of the user into physical actions that force locator devices from one state to another. The velocity and frequency of this force can then be monitored or measured by setting up constant states of voltage in the locator devices concerned. The fluctuations of voltage can then be used within logic gates. E.g. Keyboard. (Thus when the letter "K" is pressed down on the keyboard through the physical force of the user the voltage goes high (usually more then 2.4v in TTL or CMOS logic) and when released the voltage goes low (less then 2.4v). This information is then logged in a register within the host machine). This state of voltage is then available through the selectivity of software (interface) as a Basic Interaction Task (BIT). The computer may be preprogrammed to display this BIT on a monitor (cathode ray tube) by deflecting the path of three electron beams (Red, Green, Blue) by means of electro-magnetic coils. The path of these electrons is accelerated toward the phosphor-coated screen made of heated silicone (glass) by means of a high positive charge applied near the face of the tube. Typically the charge needed is 15,000 to 20,000 volts. Eventually the electrons hit a specific grouping of phosphors transferring their kinetic energy into the phosphors atoms, making them jump to a higher quantum-energy level. In returning to their previous quantum levels, these excited electrons give up their extra energy in the form of light - usually aimed at the user's visual system. The user's visual system uses photo-receptors situated in the Ocular mechanism (eyes, with intrinsic and extrinsic eye muscles, as related to the vestibular organs, the head and the whole body). This system explores and finds convergence in the form and colour of its targets and the spaces in between them, thus converting the variables of the structure of ambient light back into complex states of fluctuating voltage located around the user's synapses and thus back into the symbolic world of the user. This example represents here the oscillation between the user and the machine's complex states of fluctuating voltage. Having established a reliable link or oscillation. We can now move on, pulling out of this process a specific subject for further exploration. Tasks Tasks are a specific chore or duty to be done. They exist on either side of our oscillation and are preprogrammed by the user's or computer's environment. E.g. The computer has a chore or duty when first initialized: electricity is resisted in certain ways so as to make it pass down the roots of least resistance to measure other voltages through capacitance in order to check that its environment (working conditions) fit within its predefined order. The human unit, needing calories in order to feed the energy demands of its sensing systems, has the task of appropriating value that it can exchange for food, processing this vegetative produce, digesting it and turning it into complex states of fluctuating voltage. So we have the human unit oscillating with the computer unit and both preprogrammed with sets of tasks. The side of the equation that interests us here, is how the computer recognizes a BIT in its oscillation with the user. With a BIT, the use of an interactive system enters a unit of information that is meaningful in the context of the application. How large or small is such a unit? For instance, does moving a device a small distance enter a unit of information? Yes, if the new position is put to some application purpose, such as repositioning an object. No, if the repositioning is just one of a sequence of repositioning as the user moves the cursor to place it at the top of a menu item. Here, it is the menu item that is the unit of information. The space between what is treated as a BIT and what is not allows for the objectification of a user-task. Objectification, within this text, represents our ability to see a thing as different from ourselves. This in turn allows us to explore and transform the thing at a spatial range from ourselves, seemingly leading to a sense of ownership of the thing (not necessarily individual ownership but ownership in general mediated through present economic cultures). This separation of our selves and object is achieved through a multitude of ritual practices, software interface being just one. So it can be said: the user's objectification of content in computer interface relies on the selective translation of user force through locator devices. (This selective translation is of course predefined by the programmer's need for calories and the relative social and cultural parameters in which this need arises.) Software (interface) requires the recognition of BITs on the part of the user in order to allow the user to objectify content within the interface. Example locator device: mouse. Locator devices are either absolute or relative. Absolute devices such as a graphics tablet have a frame of reference, or origin and report position relative to that point of origin. An absolute device can be used to specify an arbitrary large change in position without contact with the tabletop. This allows it the ability to transcribe things that are already objectified into the computer (such as tracing a plan or a drawing). Relative devices on the other hand such as the mouse, trackballs and velocity-control joysticks have no absolute origin and report only changes from former positions. Relative devices cannot readily be used for transcribing real world coordinates into the computer. The Mouse The mouse having no absolute origin is a relative device containing two states at the top level (working and not-working) and two parameters (movement and button-states),each containing one further variable of (time-in-between-states). E.g. Top-level-states-of-a-mouse (not-working [nothing], working [variables-of-a-working-mouse ([movement, timing-of-movement], [button-states, timing-in-between-button-states]]) The objectification of content within interface (a user-task) in a mouse input can be carried out through the repression of both: the timing-of-movement variable and the timing-in-between-button-states variable and filtering the button-states by mapping rectangles of interest through the movement variable. Expressed: repeat while happening If ( within Mapped-Rectangle-of-Interest ) then if( = down)then do-something-useful end if end if end repeat This allows the user to experience selection of content in the interface outside of a continuous time-frame. The repression of the time-based variables of the mouse allows the user to feel in charge of a process and not incidental to one that is already happening. The next step to objectification in an application interface is to only record those movement events that are significant to the interface and nothing else. This is done in a windowing environment by using icons to represent files, applications and menus. This objectification in interface allows the user to see software structures as part of a fixed, environment that is external from themselves. The production and exchange of value within capitalism requires such a process takes place. The user's contact-time with an application is made into something more definite, constant, or in other words, an object. We then objectify it, i.e. replace the process (the entire subjective and 'objective' range of the user's contact-time with the application) by another object. Objectification within this model is a kind of meta-system transition. Normally in a meta-system transition we create a new process which controls the old one(s). In objectification the new process controls not the old ones, but the objects representing these processes. The most common form of objectification is definition. In interface design for instance, algorithms are defined as computational processes that we expect to be executed in a certain fixed manner by the user. Having established a reliable model of one specific aspect of objectification in interface design the report reader may like to consider the following questions. Q: What are the consequences for the appropriation of value within capitalist systems if we interfere with this objectification process within interface design? Q: Having established that the selective reading of the user's input data through the mouse helps lead to objectification of content within interface, what happens if we create software that acts on all possible variables within mouse interaction? Harwood at scotoma.org Tel +31 (0) 20 365 9334 MONGREL http://www.mongrelx.org HARWOOD DE MONGREL TATE GALLERY SITE: http://www.tate.org.uk/webart/mongrel/home/default.htm/ WASTE_WORDS THEIR WEIGHT& FREQUENCY IN LONDON'S MUNICIPAL RUBBISH http://www.heise.de/tp/deutsch/kunst/waste/index.html Linker site http://www.Linker.org.uk -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: text/enriched Size: 11475 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20010529/4d50bbd4/attachment.bin From Harwood at scotoma.org Tue May 29 07:15:56 2001 From: Harwood at scotoma.org (Harwood) Date: Tue, 29 May 2001 03:45:56 +0200 Subject: [Reader-list] Word frequency Message-ID: As shudda posted I did a analysis of the Sarai List and what I found was surprising. You bunch of liberals. When I input a specific word like state. It pulls all the sentance's with the word in. Maybe I should calculate who is controlling the list by looking at the number words input by each of us? The law clearly state that the publishers of periodical news on the web who are not 'professional' journalists or write on behalf of them could be fined for up to 250 dollars and arrested for up to two years, and accused of the 'clandestine press' crime. But i still think that because of the complete lack of transparency of the indian state, many things are enforced without the public necessarily getting to know about them and the other matter of the fact that there is very little discussion even when they do. But we are aware of censorship by the state to what it thinks is 'antinational' and how this is considered acceptable by so many, even otherwise conflicting, factions. 8 million users, 77 percent were from the federal captiral New delhi and the state capitals. " But governments are trying hard to change this pattern: not only the national government, but several states. Andhra Pradesh has received international attention for trying to promote Internet penetration, education, and use; other such states include Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, and Kerala. It praises states for putting government information online, and for promoting material in local languages. While the article repeatedly stresses that enormous barriers remain and government efforts have shown little impact, it ends on an upbeat paragraph: "by empowering constituent groups that make up India's civil society: the media, nongovernment organizations, businesses, political groups, and other nonstate actors," the Internet can "invigorate the world's largest democracy. No saint, statesman or scholar has ever done this for them, and certainly no merchant. When it was over, and the tribe was in a state of excitement at the event which they had witnessed, the master said: 'Does anyone wish to speak' The first disciple said: 'In the cause of Truth I feel myself constrained to say something to these people. All programmers need to be licensed with the state. Then, in my dazed state, the torment and anger of theP P class=MsoNormalSPAN style="msospacerun: yes" SPANpast eleven years passed through my agitated mind. It is the realisation of our own past historyP P class=MsoNormalSPAN style="msospacerun: yes" SPANas a nation state, the realisation of, if you will, the socalledP P class=MsoNormalSPAN style="msospacerun: yes" SPANpostcolonial experience so wonderfully described for us by, forP P class=MsoNormalSPAN style="msospacerun: yes" SPANinstance, Abdul Razzak Gurnah, the writer from Zanzibar, in hisP P class=MsoNormalSPAN style="msospacerun: yes" SPAN"Admiring Silence". I think the interesting thing that Rana is pointing out is that the real issue that bothers power corporate or state is the formation of ungovernable communities itself and the proliferation of horizontal as opposed to vertical communities. The state and coproate interests can police the interent in the way that they do, because the methodology of control that they deploy has already been tried and tested on the streets. answers are in the sequence they reached my desktop! cheers Monica ====================== I guess I'm zeroing in on Steve Jobs's recent statement that the digital divide is "just a new sticker we use to cover up a more important word: poverty. This is the kind of access that state and corporate will love here, and will engender technologies and practices that suit this end. Actually, the Net is being looked primarily as a `broadcast medium` for state and corporate a la newspaper, radio and television rather than what it is. * Are there any government or even private initiatives to get Indians online Jeebesh Actually it was the state that got online first, and then released access. com Status: What is interesting about the article Ravi sent as with most accounts of this issue is that the statement of the problem 'hacking, credit card misuse, death threats, pornography, morphing and terrorism' . Even those advancing these counterthreats seem unable to state the threats in a convincing way. Both ends seem to reflect a state apparatus gone insane. Clause 80 of the same Act empowers police or state officers or to enter and search a Public Space read Cybercafes in pursuit of cyber criminals or would be cyber criminals. The language of the state in this regard is chilling , and I quote from the 13th Chapter Miscellaneous of the IT Act 2000 "Section 80. htm Now the Guideline After this we have already witnessed the promulgation of the Guidelines and General Information for the Setting Up of Submarine Cable Landings for International Gateways for the Internet issued by the Ministry of Communications, Government of India which makes provision for the interception of all and any messages and routine surveillance of data and regulations on encryption and limitations to privacy all in the name of the national interest, public order, morality and the security of the state. Examining the ways in which the various media have been dealt with state in India from the end of the nineteenth century onwards. The IT Act enables prosecution, but only AFTER the offending website has been published and found by the cyberinformers who work for the Indian state zealous and stupid journalists who act as guardians of public morality and state security, zealous and stupid cyberwarriors the growing army of 'counterhackers', dying to be on the payroll of the vigilant state, and some zealous and stupid so called feminist organisations that are more keen on censorship than they are in any form of human liberation. The new italian cyberlaws require any person uploading content on to the web to register with the state as a journalist. And further, note also that it empowers the state to intercept any message that may be transmitted on any network anywhere, and that in times of war of national emergency the state may take over any communication network or content application provider anywhere. All that is required is for the state to mandate that you can only use a machine which has a certain kind of chip built in, or added to it. And the state will be looking out for our cybershadows. a couple of weeks now, sightings of a strange creature, who some say is a primate,some describe as humanoid, masked, hemeted or furry, not very big, five feet or so with flashing red and green eyes,and extraordinary powers of movement the abilitiy to jump between buildings and fly has been menacing eastern Delhi and adjoining the adjoining industrial areas of Uttar Pradesh state. state agencies that need and want to know our online habits I am appending below the concluding parts of Gibson's findings so that those of us who do not have the time or the facility for actually going to the site can get some idea of what he is saying But what strikes me after all this is that Given, that in India, proposals for actually having physical identification cards for cybercafe usage refer: Ravi Sundaram's earlier posting 'the New Authoritarianism" are being put into practice, I would not be surprised if a large scale violation of online privacy is also actually taking place. As I have repeatedly stated, I have no evidence, information, or knowledge either way. contrary to what seems to be stated in their various license agreements. Therefore, it is difficult to understand the motivation behind collecting personal data which is, on its face, unnecessary for the stated objective. One Final Observation: The stated purpose behind all of this download profiling in their respective licenses is to inform these vendors about the files we are all collectively downloading so that they can provide some sort of additional, useful, or auxiliary information to us this is never really made clear. After a day spent in intense philosophical speculations he falls asleep in an agitated state three dreams later and his vision produces Cartesian Coordinates and within them one of the multiple Origins of maps. " Matsuko; "let's plot emotional states onto the position of things. italic MapDirectory ={Nine images at 640x480= 2764800 pixels} + ImageDirectory ={Ten images at 320x240 pixels = 768000 pixels} + VideoDirectory ={ Five Videos 320x240 pixels at static state = 384000 pixels} + TextDirectory = {Five texts of 100 words 12 pixels height with 2 pixels between each line = 259200} + SoundDirectory = {revealed within other content types} Total content = 4176000 = VideoDirectory + TextDirectory + MapDirectory + SoundDirectory + ImageDirectory Interface for user : MapAndLinks = {BorderArea = 20160+ LinkLines1920} ContentActionSignifiers = { NineContentTypes = 1204} BordersImages = {11200} BordersVideo = {5600} BordersText = {5020} FileTextEditMode = {12000} Total interface = 45104 = MapAndLinks + ContentActionSignifiers + BordersImages + BordersVideo + BordersText + FileTextEditMode 100 Total content pixels * Total interface pixels = 1. I am sure that the kind of correlations that link reading Shakespeare, listening to lounge music and watching the Matrix could also be established between such interests and for instance terrorist behaviour, and that the state could use them to trawl for people who might succumb to such behaviour in the future. Harwood at scotoma.org Tel +31 (0) 20 365 9334 MONGREL http://www.mongrelx.org HARWOOD DE MONGREL TATE GALLERY SITE: http://www.tate.org.uk/webart/mongrel/home/default.htm/ WASTE_WORDS THEIR WEIGHT& FREQUENCY IN LONDON'S MUNICIPAL RUBBISH http://www.heise.de/tp/deutsch/kunst/waste/index.html Linker site http://www.Linker.org.uk From shuddha at sarai.net Tue May 29 14:55:40 2001 From: shuddha at sarai.net (Shuddhabrata Sengupta) Date: Tue, 29 May 2001 14:55:40 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Word Frequency List on Sarai Reader List Message-ID: <4.3.0.20010529144524.00a69f00@mail.sarai.net> Dear Friends, This is a result of a word frequency test applied to the postings on the Discussion List. It makes for very interesting reading Cheers Shuddha >This is the result of of putting together all the sentances containing the >word arrest(ed) > > >When will the rest of us begin to wake up When the gentlemen from the >cybercops come knocking on our doors Cheers Shuddha ALERT CHINA 26 >April 2001 Wave of repression against web dissidents SOURCE: Reporters >sans frontières RSF, Paris RSFIFEX In a letter to Jia Chunwang, Chinese >minister of public security, RSF protested the arrest of Lu Xinhua and Guo >Qinghai. > >According to the Information Centre for Human Rights and Democracy, he was >formally arrested on 20 April for "subversion". > >" Four web dissidents are currently jailed in China: Qi Yanchen, chief >editor of the online magazine "Consultations", arrested on 2 September >1999 and sentenced to four years in jail see IFEX alerts of 21 September, >13 July, 26 and 5 June, 17 and 3 March and 26 January 2000 and 3 September >1999; Huang Qi, creator of the website www. > >Notwithstanding anything contained in the Code of Criminal >Procedure, 1973, any police officer, not below the rank of a Deputy >Superintendent of Police, or any other officer of the Central Government >or a State Government authorised by the Central Government in this behalf >may enter any public place and search and arrest without warrant any >person found therein who is reasonably suspected or having committed or >of committing or of being about to commit any offence under this >Act" Explanation. > > The law clearly state that the publishers of periodical news on > the web who are not 'professional' journalists or write on behalf > of them could be fined for up to 250 dollars and arrested for up to > two years, and accused of the 'clandestine press' crime. >According to the Information Centre for Human Rights and Democracy, he was >formally arrested on 20 April for "subversion". > >First the Law The Information Technology Act of 2000 which is now law, >and people are being arrested under its provisions in its now notorious >clauses 66 and 67 criminalized 'hacking' and 'publishing of information >which is obscene in electronic form'. > >A mob of vigilantes, patrolling a crossroad, have attacked and >seriously wounded a person driving a car late at night because he had a >helmet in his back seat they thought that he might be the 'helmeted' >attacker, several people have turned up with scratch marks and other >injuries at clinics and hospitals and quite a few people have been >arrested on the charges of spreading rumours. > >H > >Harwood at scotoma.org > >Tel +31 (0) 20 365 9334 > > > > >MONGREL > >http://www.mongrelx.org > > >HARWOOD DE MONGREL TATE GALLERY SITE: > >http://www.tate.org.uk/webart/mongrel/home/default.htm/ > >WASTE_WORDS THEIR WEIGHT& FREQUENCY IN LONDON'S MUNICIPAL RUBBISH > >http://www.heise.de/tp/deutsch/kunst/waste/index.html > >Linker site > >http://www.Linker.org.uk Shuddhabrata Sengupta SARAI: The New Media Initiative Centre for the Study of Developing Societies 29, Rajpur Road, Delhi 110 052, India www.sarai.net From shuddha at sarai.net Tue May 29 20:54:49 2001 From: shuddha at sarai.net (Shuddhabrata Sengupta) Date: Tue, 29 May 2001 20:54:49 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Privacy, Surveilance and Identity Cards Message-ID: <4.3.0.20010529205321.00a8cbd0@mail.sarai.net> Dear Readers, I have been looking recently at all the ways which we are being looked at by the unblinking eye of the state. Partly, this came about as a result of the recent postings on this list regarding privacy issues, and my own earlier queries about the ways in which online and offline life are sometimes coterminous. Also, I have been reading a book by Simon Davies, called : "Big Brother - Britain's Web of Surveillance and the New Technological Order". (Pan, 1996) ISBN 0 330 33556 1 The book offers a very detailed insight into new technologies of surveillance and the impact that they are having and can have on our everyday lives. For a very comprehensive review of this book, I would recommend a visit to a review essay by Ian Lloyed on the website of the Journal of Information, Law and Technology at http://elj.warwick.ac.uk/jilt/BookRev/3lloyd/default.htm Anyway, having read and thought about all this, I wondered if it would be at all useful to check if similar things were happening in India. My assumption was, they can't be happening here, how can the huge technological infrastructure necessary for a massive surveillance state be set up in Indian conditions. Unfortunately, I have to inform you all, that my preliminary (and superficial) investigations on the web in this regard, proved my assumption absolutely wrong. I want to share with you my findings, There are very comprehensive plans being made for a massive "citizens database" to be owned and operated by the state. For some reason (intra-governmental) this could not be done in sync with the recently conducted census, but census data will no doubt be used for building this data base. This excercise will climax in a scheme variously called NISHAN (national identification system home affairs network) or the INDIA CARD, by which all citizens will have to carry identity cards containing all relevant information (including legal records) about them, identifying photographs and bio metric date (data about their body measurements, hand prints etc.) The Union Ministry of Home Affairs has commissioned Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), a software consutancy multinational based in India, to do a feasability study for the National ID card scheme.The TCS report suggests that the whole excercise be made market friendly, and that the state actually make money out of it by selling information that it gathers about citizens to corporate bodies,. This will no doubt be seen as a gem of 'self sufficiency' inducing mechanisms of state control. To find out more about NISHAN read the following news reports : (Dataquest Magazine) http://www.dqindia.com/content/top_stories/101022206.asp (Hindustan Times)http://www.hindustantimes.com/nonfram/170900/detFEA03.asp There is another proposal (the INDIA Card Scheme)put forward by a private Bangalore based company (Shonkh Technologies International Ltd.) which will no doubt be a major player in terms of making a bid for actually executing this scheme on an India wide basis. to find ou more about this, visit the Shonkh Technologies website at http://www.shonkh.com/indiacard.html In fact the first instance of a comprehensive national computerized identity card system has been tried out in Thailand where it is now in operation. It is not always the industrialized west that takes quickest to the dissemination of high tech surveillance schemes on a 'nation' wide basis. Modernizing elites in the so called 'Third World' are often better placed (due to lack of constiutional safeguards to privacy, or lack of awareness at the public level of privacy issues) to put in place 'technologies of mass surveillance'. For an analysis of the politics of Privacy and Surveillance, go to the Privacy International Website at http://www.privacyinternational.org/ for a good summary of the politics of Online Privacy Issues, go to the Global Internet Liberty Campaign (GILC) webpage on "Privacy and Human Rights" at http://www.gilc.org/privacy/survey/ For an "India Country Report on Privacy Issues" at the GILC site, go to http://www.gilc.org/privacy/survey/surveyak.html#India Now , an identity card scheme always looks innocuous, but its implications are very dangerous. Information about each of us is scattered in various data banks, these could be - police records, medical records, electoral registers, taxation records, etc. Their collation in a single database, means (I) the entries in one set of data can influence other, unrelated parameters. (let me give you a hypothetical example - for instance, a centralized electoral roll could register whether or not someone has voted in any electoral excercise, I for instance, don't vote. now if 'not voting' were ever to be rendered a disqualifying factor in any other circumstance - applying for a passport, a phone, a gas connection, applying for a job - then my non voting behaviour would show up, every timne i did either of those other things. So I go for a job interview, I am asked for my NISHAN/INDIA card, which I submit, it reveals that I have not voted. So, I get disqualified as a non active citizen, I dont get the job. (II) a huge invasion of privacy gets legitimized, suppose i am HIV positive, and my medical records register that on to my card, I try and get a house on rent, new regulations stipulate that all landlords have to have prospective tenants cross checked at the local police station, how do they do that, simple they ask for your NISHAN card, and run it across their machine which hooks up to the centralized database, and of course it reveals that I am HIV positive.The landlord, the police station knows i am HIV positve, I dont get to be the tenant they choose. Consider that the Indian Constitution does not recognise the Right to Privacy as a fundamental right. Consider also that the state will (if this scheme gets underway) to farm and manipulate data about citizens Consider also that those who will not get the cards (perhpas they are emigrants or refugees) will now have to face considerable police harrassment at day to day levels because they will not be able to produce their cards when they are stopped on the streets. For more on ID cards ( A FAQ, campaigns against ID cards and personal testimonies against ID cards) go to http://www.privacy.org/pi/activities/idcard/ (in the Privacy International site) Cards and Databases are only one part of the excercise in surveillance. In a fascinating document, that I came across recently, there is clear indication that the surveillance trade in India is going to be a real boom industry. theres is an expected annual increase demand of 25% each year in the sale of closed circuit television cameras in India in the next few years. This is big money. Surveillance Cameras are already making their entry into our lives at various major traffic intersections and in all of central new delhi, as well as in banks, apartments, offices and industrial areas. If you couple pattern recognition systems on to video surveillance footage, then you have the surveillance camera meeting the identity card in a database somewhere in a government mainframe. It is most likely that people like you and me will get caught in the corssfire between the huge arrays of data produced by "citizen databases" and surveillance technologies. for a excerpt from a report pn Surveillance Equipment and the rising demand for it in India go to http://www.policeinindia.com/fire.htm Incidentally, the kind of people who sell surveillance equipment are also often the kind of peoplke who sell torture equipment (electrical applaiances) which goes under the name of 'crime control' equipment. If you look hard enough on the internet you will find the same companies selling this kind of stuff in India, Turkey, Brazil, and other developing democracies. Finally, I would like to mention the fact that the information gathering apparatus acts concretely and at the most everyday and intimate level. Police stations across the country are now going to ask us about (i) the people who visit us or work in our homes (ii) the strangers we meet and befriend (ii) guests who happen to be non indian nationals they need to know all this for the sake of something called national security... failure to give this information over, we are told, are offences punishable with imprisonment, and fines or both. If you want to know what a police identification form of a 'floating population' looks like -download this marvellous form prepared by (in this instance, the cybersavvy) Chandigarh Police at - http://www.privacy.org/pi/activities/idcard/ http://chandigarhpolice.nic.in/vschandigarhpolice/b_form_4.pdf national security = personal insecurity Cheers Shuddha Shuddhabrata Sengupta SARAI: The New Media Initiative Centre for the Study of Developing Societies 29, Rajpur Road, Delhi 110 052, India www.sarai.net From Philip.Pocock at t-online.de Wed May 30 23:06:49 2001 From: Philip.Pocock at t-online.de (philip pocock) Date: Wed, 30 May 2001 18:36:49 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] earlier mail to okwui enwezor Message-ID: <3B152FAA.C7E066A1@t-online.de> hello list i havent had time to digest all the disparaging remarks in okwui enwezor's rebuttle. here is a mail i sent to him personally minus one paragraph concerning a seperate issue. i am back on-line in a few days. philip pocock Subject: crisis of exhibiting Date: Fri, 11 May 2001 23:16:14 +0100 From: Philip.Pocock at t-online.de (philip pocock) To: okwui enwezor hello mr. enwezor in the mail as well came one from dehli from a fery vigorous group of architects, media artists, cyberfeminists, urbanists, film theorists, free software people and others, some able to afford entry into the habitat center. their website is worth looking into - www.sarai.net. they are not government appointees, they are sponsored by the langlois foundation, they are indiguneous and will deal with the situation after the indian ex-partriots leave to harvest benefits in europe. there seems to me to be a grave confusion between colonialization and globalization. i am not able to afford to attend this documenta, the first two platforms dealing with unfinished democracy and now truth and reconciliation, since an around-the-world jet is quite costly. that cost was in fact the fuel that the british used to colonize part of the planet. it has its strategic roots in ceasar's famous dictum: 'divide and conquer'. as a canadian i know this first-hand. our land is enormous and only the ironically termed 'connected' ones could fly around and govern. it is again, not global at all, to require physical presence and transport costs. it is very regrettable that there is no telnet, or Q&A on-line, or video streaming for your platforms. it would have been very useful to pick up mohammed ali's media theory when in zaire a billion people got his massage and message. the virtual media, have penetrated the most remote areas on the western map, and in 1997 at makerere university or small hotels in uganda, we had no trouble connecting and transmitting our videos to dx. i never attended the show, except for 2 or 3 days whne i spoke there on day 63. globalization is anyone, anywhere, anytime. it is not like the have and have not of air travel and time away from one's current primary situation. i would very much like to discreetly discuss the possibility of correcting the situation leading to poor attendence and the importing of experts to exotic locations that apparently have little bearing on the matters being lectured. dicussion and discourse is the only way forward. media diffusion is the remedy for the fog machines used by the previous imperialist regime. i receive my documenta by email from reports from politically and culturally active persons having had the chance to attend in austria and today from dehli. please consider that the critique you will incur if this is not a process, and an emerging learning one, and is instead a strategy, then documenta 11 is a colonialist undertaking. all the makings are there. - central foreign control. - importing of experts for a closed period to 'tell it like it is' without listening or attending to the local interests, be they the obvious fascits dangers to the democratic process in austria (which will always be unfinished in my humble opinion as we have now the network paradigm radically changing economics, international politics and person-to-person genderless, colorless, statusless multi-cultural communication) or the spiritual dimension of truth which underpins india's identity even today. importing experts was how britain gave colonialist architecture to parts of africa and india, where upon their departure, the big and little offices, and the crowded wicket areas were inherited by what political science sutdents in kampala told me was 'black colonialism'. exporting benefits for the few and depersonalization of those remaining 'behind'. when the team leaves a platform, what effect has it had? for kassel, certainly there will be traces. for those foreign experts, certainly acllaim and economic gain, such as new professorships, etc. but for those left working behind, how did you presence make a difference, give them a profile internationally? what sort of research on site went on? even hollywood sends detailed crews to scout a location for even hidden dimensions. in india there are so many wonderful cultural producers, some living as swami database programmers in the himalayas, others in collaboratives getting started in dehli and calcutta. where is their presence? in a colonial scheme, nowhere. - limited democracy. if it cost money to vote, nobody would go to the polls. airfare to dehli is not insignificant to most. the habitat center is also not possible for those in dehli who would be great participants in any discussion fostered for truth, reconciliation and democracy, unfinished or unfinishable. information wants to be free. democracy depends on that, and is why it remains unfinished. there is plenty to think about, and here in an improvised unrehearsed mail is a call to correct the course and dispell the confusion of colonialism with an open global approach to planetary art and culture practise. i give you credit for pinpointing the current crisis of exhibiting. it is almost impossible for an artist to exhibit given the forms and methods at present. i have this in my own situation with curators at ps1 and opportunist career-based artists. until the artist, and again giving you credit, the curator becomes invisible in the process or prodcution, meaning will not escape the fog of possessive art strategies. wish i had been there, or been able to follow live online, like another several million disenfranchised documenta guests. such an arm should have been in gear long ago so that the local community could be present as well. it is here that i receive such mails.... a snippet from dehli today: ------ The more interesting, and i think for some readers of the list, more pertinent event - is the series of talks that are happening in an auditorium. (Here i must clarify that both the gallery and the auditorium are part of something called the India Habitat Centre which is a pleasantly designed cultural & office complex, but not the easiest space to enter if you do not have enough capital, cultural or otherwise). The speakers of the talks come from both India and abroad, and i will make a posting soon of the people who spoke and what they spoke about. Right now i am just informing everyone that its going on, and that it is one of the less attended cultural events i have seen. Except for some artists and academics, there is not much of the general public in view. All this to say that while Documenta (whatever its number) may be a big 'idea' in Europe, here - except for the few i mentioned - it is not something that many know or care about. This is not to say that the themes being addressed during the event are not relevant or that the speakers are not sufficiently engaging - in fact some difficult problems of interpretation - historical, or representational - are being addressed by some of the speakers. ------ i hope to invisibly help you get the message over the borders to everyone in the world. cu, philip pocock From raju at linux-delhi.org Thu May 31 12:00:25 2001 From: raju at linux-delhi.org (Raju Mathur) Date: Thu, 31 May 2001 12:00:25 +0530 (IST) Subject: [Reader-list] E-mail users warned over spy network Message-ID: <15125.58625.50203.816884@mail.linux-delhi.org> E-mail users warned over spy network [excerpt] Computer users across Europe should encrypt all their e-mails, to avoid being spied on by a UK-US eavesdropping network, say Euro-MPs. The tentacles of the Echelon network stretch so far that the UK's involvement could constitute a breach of human rights, they say. The Euro-MPs have been studying Echelon for almost a year, after allegations that it has been used by the US to commit industrial espionage against European firms. They conclude that Echelon - whose existence is not officially acknowledged - is reading millions of e-mails and faxes sent every day by ordinary people. http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/world/europe/newsid_1357000/1357264.stm -- Raju Mathur raju at kandalaya.org http://kandalaya.org/ From Okwui at aol.com Wed May 30 19:57:20 2001 From: Okwui at aol.com (Okwui at aol.com) Date: Wed, 30 May 2001 10:27:20 EDT Subject: [Reader-list] Re: Documenta11's New Delhi Message-ID: <88.734f489.28465d48@aol.com> Dear all, I have followed with keen interest some of the postings on this site around Documenta11’s second platform in New Delhi. Despite the imprecision of much of the commentary, I wish to draw one simple conclusion, namely that critique in all its aspects (intellectual, practical, and otherwise) is a healthy thing in all matters of public debate. This therefore is the principal reason for this response: to correct the unfortunate perception of what in the ongoing discussion has passed for discourse. There is evident satisfaction from this end that there exists now a concrete basis to scrutinise the work of a cultural behemoth such as Documenta, in the full glare of public discourse. When I put together the program of Documenta along three years ago, it seemed already clear that for Documenta11 to have any meaning as a public event, one must do more than evoke the name of its public feature, but must rather move towards building a different sort of public sphere that does not assume apriori, the notion that it already exists either as a public institution or as an exhibition. If one could stop for a moment, qua Homi Bhabha to ask: "What is the location of culture today?" Or to frame it in another way: "what is the location of contemporary art as it is presently circumscribed within the general logic of the today's global condition?" This question goes further than simply rephrase an already wornout notion that comes with certain theological aspects of the virtues of global capitalism and its attendant consequences for how we experience, theorise, historicise culture today, but effectively engages the fundamental problem of how we must all think about and position ourselves around "global" exhibitions. In confronting this predicament as a curator, I wanted to move the exhibitionof Documenta11 a bit off from the logic of the mega event that has been central to its very identity, and instead to settle and concentrate on a series of smaller, more intimate public debates, that is to say to evolve the entire critical operation of the exhibition into a series of discursive events instead of one grand event. To do so one also needed to interrogate the parameters of artistic discourse upon which large scale international/global exhibitions assume their legitimacy. Obviously, I have more than a curatorial interest in this inquiry. I can therefore state that my interest is also both practical and intellectual. I do not merely share in the simplistic notion of certain belated and dunderheaded forms of institutional critique and pseudo-globalist moralising such as has been smuggled into this discussion by Mr. Phillip Poccok’s odious contribution (I shall return to that later) that takes a wild scatter shot approach into the dark as one way of unsettling the so-called global/colonial hegemony (a clearly confused conflation), rather the object of any serious discourse must work first to establish and declare its method. It is here that I must remind our readers that the platforms in New Delhi, like in Vienna, Berlin, St. Lucia, and Lagos are manifestations of our intent to establish the grounds and method of our discourse. It does so not merely to displace and deterritorialise Documenta’s given mass public nature in Kassel, but to bring to question whether it is in fact tenable under the prevailing conditions of globalisation to view an important venue such as Documenta as a closed circuit in the larger global interest or as a vessel to simply absorb and assimilate subaltern knowledge. Therefore, I want to place full emphasis on the idea that to reconstitute the debate of this event, its impressive record notwithstanding, we must also be willing to make tenuous the grounds of Documenta’s legend, namely its very impenetrability by other forums and spaces of knowledge production, other audiences, and other ways of knowing and living and producing culture within the current global juncture. I can even confidently insist that it is not Documenta11’s ambition to make an art exhibition, but instead to focus on taking the measure of the processes out of which culture emerges not as product, but as a complex of critical ideas to be worked through, translated and interpreted. If this means risking being a touch prolix, so be it, the better not to relapse into thinking of exhibitions as purely spaces where the grounds of a materialist notion of object relations are exhibited and consumed. This means then we need to ask a simple question; "what kind of public sphere is an exhibition such as Documenta?" I will first concede that such a public sphere brings with it pressing demands for what it’s content should be and who should contribute to it. On all counts the five constellations that represent the principal thrust of Documenta11’s platforms are simply an experiment where the result does not rest on the universal or general acceptance of each scenario. Instead, the five platforms provide an opportunity to conduct our research and work in a transparent, public manner. This means, that we also need to develop a more complex understanding of what an international public is with regards to Documenta’s averred claim that it is the "most important international exhibition of its kind". Given this averredness, do we take it as a general matter of historical accuracy that all acts of naming, claims for itself, a priori, the significance that is inscribed in that naming? I think not. We live in a complex and complicated world and increasingly as curators, intellectuals, artists, scholars, etc. we are called upon by an enlarged global public sphere to define and render with greater precision the ground upon which the agency of our individual work rests. To do so then, one must do more than appropriate the globalist legitimation which exhibitions like Documenta claim for themselves and begin to develop and constitute in Pierre Bourdeiu’s sense the field of a general curatorial discourse that does not merely instrumentalise art and append it to discourse and vice versa. This seems to me one central misunderstanding of our work in New Delhi. From the perspective of someone based in Delhi, one may try to understand and sympathise with the anxiety and even the resentment towards a project such as Documenta11’s, especially in what may be seen as its principal presumption, namely to bring its discourse to an India it has no historical relationship with. But I cannot share in the rather surprising hint of Indocentrism that has lurked into the interpretation of the events. My remarks here mainly concern two postings by Monica Narula and Mr. Phillip Pocock. I begin with Ms. Narula’s claim that India Habitat Center where the exhibition and symposium were held is "not the easiest place to enter if you do not have enough capital, cultural and otherwise", while this observation at its base may be seen as true, my contrary observation is that given the complex system of class and caste in India, in fact Ms. Narula’s materialist deployment of marxist theory in her reading of culture and capital appends to itself a consciousness of a wellworn stereotype which pits on the one side the decadent, privileged West and on the other the exploited, underprivileged, excluded periphery. We need a better theory to grapple with this dilemma asthe distinguished economist Amartya Sen reminds us in his book "Development as freedom." Freedom's viccissitudes alows us the critical agency to work through via honest debate the ways to confront the basic fact that there is great abuse, injustice and inequity against marginal states, economies, and cultures in the present global arrangement. But in the critique of such abuse, inequity, and injustice we need sharper, more principled, sophisticated and analytical methods to confront the ways transnational, supranational, and powerful states undermine the basic rights of the less powerful. Having said that, the critique of Documenta11’s platform in Delhi on this ground seems to me misplaced. The fact is quite basic and clear, we worked very closely with Dr. Alka Pande the curator of the exhibition gallery at India Habitat Center to organise the symposium and exhibition. Dr. Pande was not only an excellent interlocutor and partner but also a careful, sensitive and highly informed guide through the convoluted system of patronage and competition that is part of the daily reality of a large cosmopolitan capital city like Delhi. She worked quite hard not only to organize all our efforts as a co-organiser, but wanted above all to make The India Habitat Center a hospital place for all and sundry. It was our abiding wish that the symposium and exhibition reach a wide spectrum of people in the art community, the academic and university community and an interested general public. The symposium was free of charge (including lunch), no one was turned away and the Delhi media (television, web magazines, newspapers, magazines, radio, journals) covered the event vigorously. In fact, I was surprised and taken aback by the amount of coverage. The second point concerning Ms. Narula’s statement is that this is the least attended cultural event she has seen in India, flies in the face of the fact that hundreds of people registered for the conference with attendance from a diverse grouping of people which included students, activists, filmmakers, artists, academics, members of the diplomatic corps, etc. The symposium over the course of its five days continuously had attendance that was diverse, with some attendees coming from Bombay, and other cities. As a veteran of many conferences in Africa, Latin America, North America, Asia, and Europe, this number on a steady basis over five days is remarkable and people in Delhi said as much for the public of symposiums in the city. I do not know therefore know which barometer Ms. Narula uses to measure attendance. Besides, it was never the stated goal of the platforms to produce a rock concert. My next point concerns her second posting about "the general ignorance of India on the part of visiting artists and scholars", what’s evidently saddening about this point is that again it recapitulates another assumption about intellectuals as knowing, worldly, and in full possession of knowledge of all places on this planet. A cursory reading of Amitav Ghosh's "The Iman and the Indian" would give us pause in this direction. God forbid that I should be a full master of the history of Germany as a prerequisite for my appointment three years ago as the artistic director of Documenta11. In the guise of agreeing with Shuddha’s more nuanced evocation of what he calls "the asymetery of ignorance" Ms. Narula forgets that such assymetery is merely a notation on the larger disjunction between intellectuals who work in very specific fields and the more general, albeit touristic, sense of knowing where you have traveled to. In fact, if she had cared to stay through the course of the conference she would have learned that many speakers made quite concrete and intellectually sound observations about India, namely the five Indian’s who presented papers in the conference: Urvashi Butalia, Dilip Simeon, Rustom Barucha, Shahid Amin, and Gurjot Mahli; secondly Alfredo Jaar spoke about his work on the Bhopal disaster, while Mahmood Mamdani’s talk also reflected this very question. Of the 20 presentations a number of speakers either spoke directly on or evoked India. Why is that seen as insufficient. Every intellectual exchange allows the possibility for the broadening of what Shuddha exhorts "transcultural intellectuals" to do namely to "enlarge their horizon of curiosity." Such enlargement is not merely reserved for visiting scholars to India. I will conclude on this point by merely remarking that Babri Masjid and Partition in India as two cleavages in contemporary India’s painful memory points to the simple fact that within the discourse of the platform in Delhi, India’s experience is not unique. On the Hollywoodness of Ghandi’s Experiments with Truth, a general sense of historical precision may remind our dear panelist that Ghandi’s truth is not an Indian truth, but a personal quest, an act of individual examination of consciousness and truth. I must also remind her that Ghandi’s conception of non-violence was formulated in South Africa and deployed to full effect in India, a truly transcultural philosophy if there is one. About the centrality of Partition and Babri Masjid, it may be important to recall the commentary of a South Indian in the audience during the very last session of the symposium who insisted that in Kerala and in South India from where she comes that Partition and Babri Masjid are seen exactly as a North Indian problem that does not concern them. Urvashi Butalia was obviously right in pointing out to her that that is not the case given the ascendancy of Hindu Majoritarianism in India. I wish to note also that we should do away with the gratuitous notions of imperial/truly local cleavage that oftentimes informs the discourse on difference. On this count I thought it was not only ungracious, but also an unnecessary cheap shot on the part of Monica in the caricature of the jetsetting academic from New York she painted at the end of her posting. Contrary to that caricature, non of the speakers are jetsetting academics. We should also begin to realise that there is nothing glamorous about traveling in cramped economy seats, deprived of sleep, and basic necessities and still arrive to engage and contribute in a measured and worthwhile manner to a professional debate. I do not believe that we need to stoop to the level of disparaging guests to make the real important point of inequality of access, the muteness of non-hegemonic voices in the all important questions around which a viable transcultural discourse is constructed. I come presently to Mr. Pocock, on whose postings, I frankly do not want to expend much thought or energy. Suffice it to say that Mr. Pocock seems clearly avid to play the game of hubris which only the most tin-earred, self-appointed minders of the gates against imperialism, colonialism, or other such nonsense he espouses, can adopt. But what makes his ludicrous attempt at pompous indignation unsavoury is his sudden swerve into that crooked road of race baiting. Like all intolerant demagogues and bigots his suggestion that the invited Indian speakers are government appointees flies in the face of the facts and makes little sense. However, what is truly remarkable is the fact that members of Sarai as hosts of this forum shy away from the fundamental issue of challenging Mr. Pocock’s idea that the diasporic Indian speakers (there are in fact only two) like my colleague Dr. Sarat Maharaj and Prof. Mahmoud Mamdani are " foreigners of Indian origin with questionable roots". We have heard plenty of this sort of racist talk in European politics and media lately in Italy (Northern League, Forza Italia, National Alliance), Belgium (VlamBlok); Austria (Freedom Party), France (National Front), Great Britain (British National Front, Tory and remember Enoch Powell’s "rivers of blood" speech or Lord Tebbitt’s "Cricket Test"). In each of these examples, "foreigner" is the short hand for mindless intolerance and much violence both to civil discourse and the body. My question to Mr. Pocock is: what sort of Indian is good enough in your questionable roots test? And by what degree should their foreignness determine their exclusion or inclusion in areas of discourse they otherwise are highly qualified to speak on? On the account of "foreigners of Indian origin" he may do well to read the book of one such foreigner, the distinguished Mahmoud Mamdani. His book "From Citizen to Refugee" on the fate of Ugandan Indians after their expulusion by Idi Amin may yet give Mr. Pocock a measure of what claims of foreignness may indeed accomplish. On the part of Documenta11’s platforms, I am under no illusion that it’s very premise will neither be challenged nor questioned. That’s par for the course and we welcome every honest, fair, and informed critique. In fact we not only welcome such critique, it is already clearly inscribed in the very logic of the platforms as discursive areas of passionate intellectual, artistic, and civil debate. I thank you all for your time. Okwui Enwezor Artistic Director Documenta11