[-empyre-] fundamentals

["Jim Andrews" <jim@vispo.com>]

some of the main things about digital writing--concerning poetry--that occur
to me at the mo.

compared with the expense of print, it's great. if you do visual poetry in
color, print gets even more expensive compared with the net.

print poetry in canada doesn't get beyond the border much. a print run of
1000 is well-done. the net is wonderful for its international dimensions.
both as a means to get one's work out there and to see what is happening
elsewhere.

as a distribution medium, it has a great deal to recommend it over print for
poets.

print is wonderful. but it hasn't been at my disposal. the tools of
production and dissemination are now no longer held only by a few. that is
very important.

beyond distribution advantages...

print cannot handle animation or the executable or the sort of interactivity
of the executable.

the digital brings different arts and media into closer proximity. anything
digitizable blends on the same screen.

not only does it bring different arts and media into closer proximity, but
it brings things like mathematics and poetry closer together.

i have a harder time finding a cd in my collection than something indexed by
google in moscow. the net is my library.

you can create alternatives to the book of poetry that the world has never
seen before and that no print publisher could ever help you with. status of
self-publishing? ha, the individual can do things no publishing company can.
let them catch up.

if you are multiple, the media/um will accomodate (and even encourage) your
multiplicity rather than shut you down.

the world is adapting slowly to digital writing as to new extensions of the
mind and body; we get blood and human intelligence running through the new
extensions of humanity so that they may move with generosity, imagination,
articulate intelligence, and compassion.

the guitar; the electric guitar.
the pen; the digital pen.

the lettriste isou said (1947) "Each poet will integrate everything into
Everything." that integrative passion of poetry is aided and abetted by the
integrative nature of the digital.

ja
http://vispo.com