[-empyre-] farewell -empyre-

[melinda R]

our time  is drawing to a close rapidly -an hour left on australian EST.

thank you to our stellar guests  for coming to the (dinner) party this
month, you are all amazing!
and to you our distributed community for your participation ..we have
generted a .75 meg archive of discussion this month..an empyre
record.,!! its been great..Thanks christian  for being co-facilitator
this month, for your grand overviews,  your attention to detail and
the work youve done on bringing this discussion along to its temporary
conclusion.. as we started the month saying.. nothing ever really
ends..

however  it is my very last /last /last ever  empyre month!!

so i'd like to bid -empyre- farewell
it was an exciting and satisfying month for me for number of reasons..
 although i haven't been a very active participant  it has touched on
my areas of passion..that of soft space..thats what thsi list has
always been about for me.. an immersion in software softness, where my
collision settings are variable, where my communications are almost
psychicly conveyed  to a community is distrivbuted across the planet .
15 years later and im still thinking this technology thing  is strong
modern magic..
i continue to be  amazed at peoples smartness, generosity - and
willingness to type a lot

i can feel the nostalgia rolling in.... seeing a loose group of
associates and friends grow to become a huge mature community, the
joys and horrors of running a list  -the amazing dialogues generated,-
the  bun fight with documenta  and how we can laugh about it now.. the
generosity of all our guest sand our subscribers,. the really really
nasty threats from abusive posters and those few people we had to
ban..  the breath and depth of the discussions, the willingness to
address both straightforward and complex issues, the overwhelming
greatness of it all

:I
ive loved the  six yeras of -empyre- from jan 2002 when I invited
Olliver Dyens to discuss Chair et Metal (Metal and Flesh) -his book
that examined  the technologically induced transformation of our
perceptions of the world and the emergence of a cultural biology. what
along time ago that was.

and the other joy has been all the great people whove  facilitated
this list over the years- Adrian Miles (AU) Rebecca Cannon (AU)  Jim
Andrews (CA) Felix Sattler (AU/GER) Tracey Meziane (AU) Marcus Bastos
(BR) Sérgio Basbaum (BR), Nicholas Ruiz III (USA), Renate Ferro (USA)
Tim Murray (USA)  Jason Nelson( USA/AU)  Michael Arnold Mages (USA)
and  my longest -empypre- collaborator Christina McPhee (USA)  who has
steered the list in so many wonderful and astute ways. you have all
done such a service to the global community in donating your time and
energy to this this living -empyre- organism.. lovely getting to know
you all  through this medium.. perhaps one day i wll meet up with
those of you  ive never met offline .

well thats it
 empyre will be moving off my subtle.net domain soon into a nice new
home, and i hear rumours that there are several energetic new
facilitators joining the team and that the australian content and
connection  is still very strong ..

thanks everyone for everything
love ya
 xxx Melinda