Burning of NODE.London
From NodelWiki
Towards the end of June 2007, a bunch of people who thought it was worth poking over the ashes of NODE.London got together, drank, exorcised demons and burned the NODE.London 2006 evaluation report in a ceremonial deathing and re-birthing of NODE.London.
Here's a video.
And here are minutes of the meeting (thanks to Tim Jones for those)
[edit] Notes from the Burning of NODE.London beach party held on Wed 27 June 2007 @ bodydataspace, London Bridge.
Present
- Saul Albert
- Pippa Bailey
- Manjit Bedi
- Leanne Bird
- Ghislaine Boddington
- Byron Boroni
- Anna Clark
- Julie Freeman
- Lyndsey Housden
- Tim Jones
- Ann Light
- David Muth
- Hannah Redler
- Mamading Sessay
- Tindara Sidoti
- Gini Simpson
- Lewis Sykes
- Keith Watson
- Ed Whyman
- Lauren Wright
[edit] Members of the group introduced themselves, summarised their backgrounds/any experience of working on NODE.London to date, and said why they were here/what they believed NODE.London is. Statements included:
- pump new energy into media art scene in London
- wanted to see bigger audiences for media arts
- London/UK should have this approach/working model
- collaboration is needed
- enable and empower social innovation through technology
- catharsis
- giving practitioners access and exposure
- glorious folly, well-intentioned experiment and/or proactive socio-political activism
- participation
- support ethos ? practitioners connecting ? value of the knowledge/skills/enthusiasm exchange
- unstructured connections are positive
- network of digital creatives
- information collection/archive ? it?s very important what happens to existing data and this should be discussed
- structural experiment
- a proper network ? decentralised
- learn and share
- agree to differ and still move forward
- comfortable, valuable place if new in London/its media arts scene
- open +++
- website ++
- international attention that NODE.London has received
- connectivity between people
[edit] Previous issues/obstacles:
- different levels of experience in network - reinventing the wheel
- stabilising the working models and maintaining momentum
- NODE.London ?new faces? sessions had been positive in providing orientation to newcomers, but after the Season of Media Arts in March 06 it became harder to bring newcomers together with (exhausted) veterans in a fruitful way that allowed for an equal contribution from all
- Having 90 subscribers currently on vo_news-l, the 'Voluntary Organisers' list, was considered a good thing
- NODE.London?s ?immutables?, conceived to give consistent direction and a sense of purpose to the network after the Season of Media Arts in March 06, were discussed, inc. how these had possibly become problematic/restricting. These were that:
- NODE.London supports the realisation of distributed, rather than centrally curated, media arts activity in London
- its main activity focus will be a time-limited event Season or festival
- for future activities it will build upon the existing software tools constructed for the March 2006 Season, rather than starting from scratch.
[edit] Other discussions
The burning is conceived as a means to mark the moment of removing these restrictions and opening up a new ideas and lines of conversation. The ?wake? and refreshing of NODE.London is felt to be important.
The discussions touched on the idea of setting targets for large-scale activities for the future ? maybe in 2010.
The burning ceremony took place outside the b>d>s offices, and is viewable here: http://tinyurl.com/3a3z44.
Next Subscriber?s meeting: Monday 30 July 6.30pm ? 9.30pm. Everyone invited. Subsequent meetings to follow every month, at different venues across the city. Structural process for next meeting: 7 minutes quickfire presentations, 14 slides each.
[edit] What people can offer before next meeting, and (more generally) what they want:
[edit] Tim:
- Can offer: to sort out location for next meeting (to be in zone 1 or 2), To maintain discussion list
- Wants: to get someone to do quickfire presentation on Upgrade! international network, to see its possible relevance in relation to NODE.London (http://www.theupgrade.net/)
[edit] Ghislaine & Leanne/bodydataspace:
- Can offer: to present a quickfire session on networking/collaborative approaches they have used in the past, to explore whether these might be adopted as NODE.London moves forward; technical equipment as required; to promote the next meeting through their own network/e-mailouts etc.
- Wants: network to happen, a collaborative rather than competitive approach to be extended between media arts activists
[edit] Lewis:
- invited attenders to the Soundwaves closing party @ Kinetika Museum
- Can offer: input into visioning process for NODE.London
- Wants: common and uniting vision ? and process to explore how this can be realised
[edit] Gini:
- invited attenders to the SPACE media arts summer party, Thursday 5th July
- Can offer: to promote the next meeting through their own network/e-mailouts etc, a quickfire session on diversifying audiences
- Wants: NODE.London to work out how to diversify participating groups effectively; how the initiative/media arts in general can be made meaningful to more people
[edit] Tindara:
- Can offer: input into visioning process
- ?I want it to find a way forward?
[edit] Atty:
- Can offer: new process allowing people to submit new events onto NODE.London calendar on www.nodel.org
- Wants: new people to take the project forward, new and current events posted onto the node.london site
[edit] Saul:
- Can: subscribe anyone to nodel-discuss who?s not already on it
- answer questions to newbies
- point people in direction of where to find stuff
- a general welcome wagon
- will present a quickfire session on ideas for structure, software tools and structural development
- Wants: an active discussion list;
[edit] Keith:
- Can: help out on structural ideas
- and on ideas towards clearly ?re-launching? NODE.London ? PR input
- Wants: a Season of Media Arts to continue, and to be launched, and to be definite about it.
[edit] Byron:
- Can offer: a quickfire session re. computer aided statistical mapping software, with a colleague, Jeremy Williams
- Wants: to go onto discussion list, to research NODE.London working dynamic, wants: more of this, to happen quickly.
[edit] Lyndsey:
- may not be around but wants to go through ideas on paper and may be able to present example Dutch models of work
- wants: festival of new digital arts in London in 2010 ? production opportunities ? for artists to understand the commercial potential of their work Ed:
- wants: one large creative connecting network; to be ?pigeonhole ? free?
[edit] Pippa:
- extra pair of hands
- flexible working structure
- wants to participate ? and exposure to new ways of working
[edit] David:
- construction
- critical input
- wants: events to happen where thoughts can be shared and ideas articulated.
[edit] Hannah:
- will present a quickfire session on audience
- wants: NODE.London to keep going, for it to initiate projects that can raise funds/attract income, visitors etc.
[edit] Julie:
- will present a quickfire on structure and economics
- will promote through her other networks
- wants: to be part of it
[edit] Mamading:
- software development contribution
- to use alternative currencies to help development of networks and communities ? he is willing to present a quickfire session on this.
[edit] Summary
So, 8 quickfire presentations confirmed for next Subscriber?s meeting:
- Tim (Upgrade! network);
- Byron & Jeremy (statistics/software);
- Julie (structure/economics);
- Hannah (audiences);
- Saul (structural development/software tools);
- Ghislaine (structure/networks);
- Gini (diversity and audience development);
- Mamading (alternative currencies).
Each quickfire to be 7 minutes long with up to 14 slides. Structure will be 4 presentations/break/4 presentations, then collective discussion at end. More info on the Subscriber meeting 30-07-2007 page.
