[-empyre-] Theoretical arphids

[msdm <paularoush@gmail.com>]

Hi everyone, as a guest contributor to this month's discussion I'd like to
thank everyone that is joining in, and to complicate things a bit by
bringing in additional contributions from the  Tagged presentation I
attended at ENGAGE/ HCI2006 conference, Queen Mary University London (11-15
September)

The discussion on mobile media has already picked up with interesting points
of dissent  which might benefit from the additional layer of identity
critique and theory that emerges every time one talks about arphid.

These notes were collected  during the workshop Designing the Not Quite Yet,
organised by Ann Light (researcher based at QMUL) and Gini Simpson (Space
Media Arts Coordinator) and briefly summarises presentations by Armin
Medosch, mute-dialogue, processing plant, C6, boredomresearch and moi-self,
offering a sneak preview of the exhibition that opens 6 October at Space
(http://www.spacemedia.org.uk)
 
Before presenting arphieldRecordings (http://www.odeo.com/channel/8535), I
did my spyveillance act, note-laptopped a bit, photobitted another
(accompanying photos at http://www.msdm.org.uk), and what I lost in
immediacy (felt like a camwoman, loggin in all the bits of what might have
been a ³quite not there yet² afternoon), I gained in documentation.

So here they are, the latest to emerge in parallel to the rfid rampant
industry, the new generation of theoretical arphids. These are arphids about
rfid. These arphids speculate on rfid and rfid making, about the politics of
rfid, about modes of tracking and other rfid hegemonies.
 
Armin Medosch (http://www.scansite.org/scan.php?pid=302) who wrote the essay
for the Tagged catalogue contextualised the topic of arphid, gently
reminding us that the sun that for so long has been radiating frequency
waves has now become part of a commercialised magneticscape at the service
of tracking commodities and people; another point he emphasised is the
uneven tracking, the divide between the voluntary adoption of arphids
amongst high tech consumers moving in a seamless environment, while at same
time arphid is made compulsory to asylum seekers.
 
The arphid divide was also part of Yasser Rashid¹s presentation of Origins &
Lemons by mute-dialogue (http://www.innovatelab.net/mute-dialogue ) in which
they critique how objects are tracked in the global commodities market. In
the foreseen installation- a recreated market stall- arphids are placed
inside the objects, invisible from audience. As they are scanned their
history is made visible, as well as privacy and ethical concerns surrounding
tracking. Objects chosen are socially and politically loaded. The market is
used as a social practice, namely of black market. Issues of race and
society in the markets of east London are also fore grounded. The question
being: what remains in the periphery of id? The irony here consists in using
rfid to track things that most commonly survive in the consumptive market by
avoiding being tracked. A fake Louis Vuton handbag engages a playful
narrative on the tracking of the clandestine.
 
Louis-Philippe Demers (http://www.processing-plant.com) likely places
arphids amongst other calm technologies, and with his project iTag makes a
statement about the similarities between the apple mp3 players that everyone
carries around and the chips that similarly can be used as plug and play:
just put it on and listen to the music. No need for a user manual.
Mix ipod with arphid toys and behind it reappear the  American Army and
Wal-Mart, the real forces behind what are both user-friendly and
profile-driven objects. Essentially, the confluence between efficiency and
privacy intrusion.  Itag will be installed in the Hollywood grocery store in
Mare Street (next to the Space building), where the objects in the store
shelves will be tagged. Handheld rfid reader picked up from Space, will read
the trail of sounds ³broadcast² by the items, and as you walk around the
aisles, these arphids will talk around you, like a  shopping-list muzak
soundtrack.
 
C6 (http://www.antisystemic.org) in the speech that delivered live the essay
The Freemasons Of The Future Are Lurking In The Wardrobe, unzipped the
ideologies embedded in the identity industry of western art and science.
With a proliferation of rfid aids reducing human beings to 0-dimensional
points in a 2d space, and redoing for identity what television did for the
imagination, C6 aim to critique the theory of spimes (the time+space gizmos)
that repackages the idea of a 4th dimension with a simultaneous
de-policisation and re-estheticisation of identity probes. Attempting just
that, the freely distributed copies of The Islamic Millennium enhanced with
a ?we are reading you tags¹ explicitly track the Bin Laden fans that dare to
pick it up. These are now part of the uk branch of the distributed Library
project (http://dlp.theps.net).
 
To bring home the point that arphid theory can be heavy indeed, Paul Smith
with Vicky Isley of boredomresearch (http://www.boredomresearch.net/)
showed the diagrams for their new work realsnailmail, that uses snails to
perform the functions of an email server. The estimate that a snail would
take 13.2 years to go from London to New York, makes it impractical to
operate the system in the real world. Instead, snails with injectable pet
idchips glued to their shells will be restricted to a transparent aquarium
allowing for the live tracking of the slowest email delivery system. For a
period of time, the email experience will have a physicality of its own,
with the creatures carrying the burden of the message.
 

looking forward to your comments
>forever yours
>>>>>paula
http://www.msdm.org.uk