RE: [-empyre-] Re: trends in airport novels

["Cristiano Bianchi" <cristianobianchi@yahoo.com>]

I've been following this for a while, but I still don't quite get it.
And I'm not that thick. What is the problem? That we can create content
but don't control the medium? That VRML is less fashionable than
ShockWave3D (or the other way round)? That things that work in IE don't
necessarily work in Netscape? Oh, come on. This is the medium of
uncertainty and temporality. Want something that lasts and is
consistent? Sculpture is then as close as you can get. Marble better
than bronze and wood. But, hey, don't leave it on an open space: rain
can add some unexpected blurring effects.

When I do architecture I do control only the sharpness of my pencil.
Eveything else is up to engineers and builder. And we often are not
quite on the same wavelenght. But so what? Not sure either that Mozart
thought of the Zauberflote the same way Karajan did it. Or that Brahams
would agree with Maurizio Pollini playing his concertos. Stop the
control freak. If you want certainty and work that lasts, this might
call for a career shift.

All the best.

Cristiano

PS I had personally to do with Web3D for a while. It struck me that NONE
of the people making decisions had anything to do with a commercial
venture that had to live out of the surviving of web3d open standards.
How do you explain that? Of course open standards are slow moving. Too
amatorial?

> -----Original Message-----
> From: empyre-admin@imap.cofa.unsw.edu.au 
> [mailto:empyre-admin@imap.cofa.unsw.edu.au] On Behalf Of 
> Brendan Howell
> Sent: 25 March 2002 21:28
> To: empyre@imap.cofa.unsw.edu.au
> Subject: Re: [-empyre-] Re: trends in airport novels
> 
> 
> On Mon, 25 Mar 2002, Auriea Harvey wrote:
> 
> > some commercial 3d engine. i'd never rule out using vrml but Open
> > standards usually equates to inflexible, slow moving, 
> > paaasssssssseeeeeeeé ........
> 
> Doch!  Passe?  Like TCP/IP, HTML, MIDI, XML, MP3, MPEG, JPEG, 
> etc etc. Yeah, I suppose some (like MIDI) are outdated and 
> uncool but they are still prevalent.  It took TCP/IP about 25 
> years to become trendy.  Show me a proprietary standard that 
> has lasted as long.  Even, show me a software company that 
> has lasted as longer than 15 years.  I can only think of 
> about 2 or 3.  
> 
> In any case, I don't think it's a problem of open versus proprietary. 
> Either way you can get good quality stuff.  I think the issue 
> is more one of adoption.  Until a technology reaches a 
> critical mass, it's scope is limited.  You can use 
> proprietary tech in proprietary situations like galleries but 
> in the public space (like the net) it usually makes more 
> sense to use public standards of communication.  Of course 
> sometimes proprietary tools become widely adopted (like 
> flash) and open standards die quietly in obscurity and 
> standards food fights.  Anyone update their gopher site lately?
> 
> Which brings me to another point, or more of a question.  
> People seem to be lamenting the problems of presentation with 
> net art.  Some seem frustrated by the lack of control over 
> the browser and screen and all the details that can change 
> the final rendering of a work.  It begs the
> question:  Is the lack of control over presentation a bug or 
> a feature?  I can only think of one artist who exploits the 
> idiosyncracies and differences between 
> browsers/screens/plugins and that's jodi.  Is this part of 
> the essence of 'the digital sublime' or just a fact of life 
> in the digital world?  Are there other people working with this theme?
> 
> Also, I don't mean to limit this to just a discussion of web 
> standards. There are some similar problems with say video 
> standards.  But sometimes transferring video from from one 
> mode to another can change the look or add strange glitch 
> effects.  Sometimes a headache but sometimes pleasing...
> 
> -Brendan
> 
> 
> 
> _______________________________________________
> empyre mailing list
> empyre@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au http://www.subtle.net/empyrean/empyre
>