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'Netwurks' and the 'NETS' Project

The world of devices that screen flows - of light or sound, of water or information - their attraction, their impact, their strengths & vulnerabilities

NETS Project Coordinators

Valerie Kirk
Annie Trevillian
Sharon Peoples




SUBSCRIBING TO NETWURKS

Up to 100 participating artists/students can dialogue here about Nets - with their posts and comments - by joining Netwurks.

A post doesn't need to be too polished in the first instance. It is a simple matter to return to radically edit it later if desired.

It is a simple process to add images and videos, however, to avoid clogging the blog, an accessible image gallery can also be maintained on a personal website, the link to which can be included in a relevant post.

Ongoing help with using Netwurks can be provided. Difficulties encountered and general queries can be posted to the blog.


THINKING ABOUT NETS

The function of any net is to separate defined items of interest from a specific flow. They are intrinsically mysterious.

Is the function of a facial veil to screen out or to invite the external gaze?

Blinds and net curtains are covert street surveillance systems, sometimes revealing pretty images, other times odd behaviour. If insiders leave the light on, they are exposed and the outsider hidden from view.

When do those nets that are being strung across the flows of cyberspace - the 'firewalls' - change over from being defensive (stopping 'incoming') to being aggressive? How can the misdeeds of their creators be detected by the outsider?

Nets of lies and half-truths are woven over events, winding up as 'history'. Before becoming spoken words, means of expression are continually modified by a host of personal and institutional restraints.

Micro-nets block contagions. Fishing nets haul in 'by-catch' (marine 'collateral damage') with their targeted prey. Good nets, bad nets?








June 23, 2009

SLIPPING THROUGH CRACKS - SATIRE

According to the report on the implementation of 'Green Dam' by the Open Net Initiative at the University of Toronto's Munk Centre for International Studies:

"If implemented as proposed, the effect would be to increase the reach of Internet censorship to the edges of the network, adding a new and powerful control mechanism to the existing filtering system."

Language tricks can get around censors and mock them at the same time. Chinese activists have become masters of satire and symbolism. This drawing by a Chinese blogger uses the visual language of Japanese anime.

Green Dam Girl is an internet avatar figure. She’s holding a rabbit, which is the software’s logo, and carrying a bucket of paint. On her cap is an image of the river crab, a homonym for the word “harmony” in Chinese (the Chinese government calls censorship 'harmonization').

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