Re: [-empyre-] Opening remarks on new media history

[Alan Sondheim <sondheim@panix.com>]

On Sun, 4 Jan 2004, Chris Chesher wrote:

> Another way to define new media studies is to say it is research (which
> includes both production and analysis of others' work) into expressive
> events that change not only the content, but also the mode of
> communication.
>
> When a communicational event is relatively conventional, we can't talk
> about it in as new media. Where it deviates from conventional
> standards, it becomes a new media event: it creates a new medium, and
> it is this dimension of innovation that becomes the object of focus for
> new media studies.
>

What is a 'communicational event' - and what is meant by 'conventional
standards'? Many painters certainly deviate from conventional standards -
from Richter, say on -

And a communicational event - do you mean an enunciation? This is also
unclear to me. And why is every deviation a new medium? It would seem to
me that deviations would be constrained by all sorts of things -
technologies for example - so that there might be cdrom art, mp3 art,
robotic art, etc.

In other words, does stepping into a semiotic/communications paradigm
change anything except move the same problems into another domain?

- Alan