MachineMachine /stream - tagged with software http://machinemachine.net/stream/feed en-us http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss Sweetcron therourke@gmail.com Innovative websites as template for MFA research community http://ask.metafilter.com/mefi/196170 I'm looking for examples of websites that have successfully enhanced a research community (academic or artistic) with a dynamic online/social/mutual-portfolio presence. Blog and social media based hubs, perhaps, that showcase the possibilities of web portfolio/research integration for academic and creative purposes. I've been asked to help implement a website/blogging platform for a community of 20 MFA students.

Basically I'd like to gather up some examples of dynamic websites attached to academia (or similar i.e. the arts). These examples will be then passed on to my superiors with an eye to developing our own platform that takes the best… ]]> Fri, 16 Sep 2011 07:26:18 -0700 http://ask.metafilter.com/mefi/196170 The Philosophy of Software: Code and Mediation in the Digital Age http://www.leonardo.info/reviews/sept2011/berry_parikka.php Berry’s book is less one specific philosophical argument of what software is and what code does, but consists of chapters that illuminate different ways one can approach software and software culture philosophically. It gives a broad way of looking at the way in which code mediates and media is nowadays coded. As such, it indeed is good in tapping into various fields of philosophy: ontology (what is code as mode of abstraction from voltage differences to assembly languages), aesthetics and phenomenology (algorithmic art and how do we experience code), epistemology (how do we understand, make sense of code and how… ]]> Tue, 06 Sep 2011 04:15:28 -0700 http://www.leonardo.info/reviews/sept2011/berry_parikka.php How Digital Detectives Deciphered Stuxnet, the Most Menacing Malware in History http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2011/07/how-digital-detectives-deciphered-stuxnet/all/1 On June 17, 2010, Sergey Ulasen was in his office in Belarus sifting through e-mail when a report caught his eye. A computer belonging to a customer in Iran was caught in a reboot loop — shutting down and restarting repeatedly despite efforts by operators to take control of it. It appeared the machine was infected with a virus.
Ulasen heads an antivirus division of a small computer security firm in Minsk called VirusBlokAda. Once a specialized offshoot of computer science, computer security has grown into a multibillion-dollar industry over the last decade keeping pace with an explosion in… ]]> Wed, 13 Jul 2011 03:09:47 -0700 http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2011/07/how-digital-detectives-deciphered-stuxnet/all/1 Content For Users on the Move http://www.printmag.com/Article/Content-for-Users-on-the-Move What is a book, really? For that matter, what is an article, a record, or a movie? For each of these, I have a very clear picture in my mind that says more about when I came of age than about the content itself. When I think of books, my mind retrieves an image of my grandparents’ bookshelves, which I used to browse after school as a child. Records? I see the CD stacks of my teenage years, collected from local music shops and trading with friends. And somehow, thinking about movies still produces images of VHS tapes and memories… ]]> Wed, 13 Jul 2011 02:35:42 -0700 http://www.printmag.com/Article/Content-for-Users-on-the-Move GlitchWiki http://gli.tc/h/wiki/index.php/Main_Page This is the research wiki-webring for Glitch and other glitch/noise related content GLI.TC/H is an international gathering of noise & new media practitioners in Chicago & Amsterdam from September 29 thru October 03, 2010! GLI.TC/H is a physical and virtual assembly of artists, hackers, moshers, dirty mediators, noise makers, circuit benders, p/h/i/l/o/s/o/p/h/e/r/s, and those who find wonder in that which others call broken.
GLI.TC/H seeks: Realtime + time-based performances (audio/video), utilizing broken/bent technologies/strategies. Workshops, sharing knowledge of hardware/software hacking, cracking, breaking, kludging, piracy, & tool building. Artworks and Projects, artware, videos, games, films, tapes, code, interventions, screen-captures, systems, websites… ]]> Sun, 12 Jun 2011 15:59:07 -0700 http://gli.tc/h/wiki/index.php/Main_Page Webcam Karaoke http://ask.metafilter.com/mefi/180455 I would like to display Karaoke lyrics over a live webcam feed. This means I might need a skype (or equivalent) plugin that plays the music & lyrics, or find some karaoke software with the ability to display lyrics over a transparent background. (That is, to have windowless karaoke display, and run the webcam feed behind it. ) All the software (I can find) to play .CDG (karaoke lyric standard) files forces them to be played with an image background, or over a video file. (I am using a PC to do this job, but do have access to… ]]> Thu, 10 Mar 2011 06:05:36 -0700 http://ask.metafilter.com/mefi/180455 The interface and the machine http://darc.imv.au.dk/publicinterfaces/?p=261 Being that this conference is about public interfaces, it would be evidently meaningful to talk about interfaces, machines and humans. But instead of examining the present multifaceted overwhelming and immense quantity of interfaces that daily calls for our attention, I will try to examine the relationship between the machine and the interface in a media archaeological perspective, that will, hopefully, point towards the physicality of the machine, in contrast to the symbolic ordering that is prevailing in the current understanding of interface.

In the introduction to this conference it is being stated that “in the case of… ]]> Mon, 10 Jan 2011 04:53:12 -0700 http://darc.imv.au.dk/publicinterfaces/?p=261 Lev manovich: software culture. the common grammar of media http://www.digicult.it/digimag/article.asp?id=1794 Professor of New Media Art at the University of California, both artist and graphic designer, Lev Manovich does not need further presentation. His first book “The language of New Media” (it came out in Italy in 2002 in the Olivares Edition) was one of the main reference points for many theorists, artists, communicators and designers, that were already well settled down in the “new technology” sector. Ten years later, thanks to the digital diffusion, grammar was already consolidated in the capitalism era and Lev Manovich decided to analyze and study that which today is seen as our “interface with the… ]]> Mon, 13 Dec 2010 19:12:00 -0700 http://www.digicult.it/digimag/article.asp?id=1794 How Video Games Are Infiltrating—and Improving—Every Part of Our Lives http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/151/everyones-a-player.html Games are sneaking into every part of our lives -- at home, school, and work. Cisco, IBM, Microsoft, and even the Army depend on games. and Pretty soon, you'll be a part of one. We guarantee it.

If Schell's vision seems a little, well, out there, consider this: Much of what he discusses already exists, having infiltrated our culture and our business landscape in ways that are barely recognized. Sure, 97% of 12- to 17-year-olds play computer games, but so do almost 70% of the heads of American households, according to the Entertainment Software Association. The average… ]]> Wed, 08 Dec 2010 08:46:00 -0700 http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/151/everyones-a-player.html Big Ball of Mud http://www.laputan.org/mud/mud.html#ShearingLayers The notion of SHEARING LAYERS is one of the centerpieces of Brand's How Buildings Learn [Brand 1994]. Brand, in turn synthesized his ideas from a variety of sources, including British designer Frank Duffy, and ecologist R. V. O'Neill.
Brand, Page 13

Brand quotes Duffy as saying: "Our basic argument is that there isn't any such thing as a building. A building properly conceived is several layers of longevity of built components".

Brand distilled Duffy's proposed layers into these six: Site, Structure, Skin, Services, Space Plan, and Stuff. Site is geographical setting. Structure is… ]]> Sun, 18 Jul 2010 06:09:00 -0700 http://www.laputan.org/mud/mud.html#ShearingLayers Inside Code: A Conversation with Dr. Lane DeNicola and Seph Rodney http://www.3quarksdaily.com/3quarksdaily/2010/06/inside-code-a-conversation.html
posted by Daniel Rourke

A couple of weeks ago I was invited to take part in a panel discussion on London based, arts radio station, Resonance FM. It was for The Thread, a lively show that aims to use speech and discussion as a tool for research, opening up new and unexpected angles through the unravelling of conversation.

The Thread's host, London Consortium researcher Seph Rodney, and I were lucky enough to share the discussion with Dr. Lane DeNicola,…

]]> Sun, 13 Jun 2010 21:25:00 -0700 http://www.3quarksdaily.com/3quarksdaily/2010/06/inside-code-a-conversation.html Triumph of the Cyborg Composer http://www.miller-mccune.com/culture-society/triumph-of-the-cyborg-composer-8507/ Along with his work on synthesis, or using machines to create sounds, Cope had dabbled in the use of software to compose music. Inspired by the field of artificial intelligence, he thought there might be a way to create a virtual David Cope software to create new pieces in his style.

The effort fit into a long tradition of what would come to be called algorithmic composition. Algorithmic composers use a list of instructions — as opposed to sheer inspiration — to create their works. During the 18th century, Joseph Haydn and others created scores for a… ]]> Fri, 12 Mar 2010 04:09:00 -0700 http://www.miller-mccune.com/culture-society/triumph-of-the-cyborg-composer-8507/ Open-Source A Movement in Search of a Philosophy http://www.cddc.vt.edu/host/delanda/pages/opensource.htm by Manuel DeLanda The plan of the essay is as follows. I will begin with a few definitions of technical terms ("source code", "compiler", "operating system") which are necessary to follow the rest of the paper. I will then discuss a few of the ideas put forward by open-source philosophers (Richard Stallman, Eric Raymond) focusing not on their weaknesses but on their practical consequences. In particular, Stallman's achievements go beyond the creation of programs and involve the design of a contract (the GNU General Public License, or GPL) which has been arguably as crucial to the success of the movement… ]]> Fri, 19 Feb 2010 07:37:00 -0700 http://www.cddc.vt.edu/host/delanda/pages/opensource.htm The dark side of the internet http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2009/nov/26/dark-side-internet-freenet In the 'deep web', Freenet software allows users complete anonymity as they share viruses, criminal contacts and child pornography. The modern internet is often thought of as a miracle of openness – its global reach, its outflanking of censors, its seemingly all-seeing search engines. "Many many users think that when they search on Google they're getting all the web pages," says Anand Rajaraman, co-founder of Kosmix, one of a new generation of post-Google search engine companies. But Rajaraman knows different. "I think it's a very small fraction of the deep web which search engines are bringing to the surface. I… ]]> Tue, 08 Dec 2009 08:14:00 -0700 http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2009/nov/26/dark-side-internet-freenet Simon Biggs http://littlepig.org.uk/ Website and interactive portfolio of artist ]]> Fri, 30 Jan 2009 09:02:00 -0700 http://littlepig.org.uk/