[-empyre-] Layers of ISEA2011: Corporate/Financial (Murat Germen)

[xDxD.vs.xDxD]

Hi everyone,
still here at ISEA myself, i'd like to add to the current discussion with a
few remarks.
I will only explicitly list the "negative" items, and i want to point out
that these are counterbalanced by *tons* of positive ones. Yet negativities
should be assessed: i hope that an additional point of view is useful to
someone.

first of all: where are the people from Istanbul?!?!
I know that ISEA is a tendentially global meeting, but it would be soooooo
interesting to actually meet people from the place itself, be them
professors, students, artists... My feeling is that this was really
underrepresented. Or it could be that I missed out on some things (it can
happen). I would really like to know everyone's feelings about this.

a second thing which i really did not like was the feeling that the meeting
was split in half. many people left after the first weekend and that was
really a missed opportunity for me, as I really wanted to meet some of them.
Maybe timing and dates could be thought out a bit better next time?

then an easily solvable technical issue, but important nonetheless: has
anyone managed to get the wifi working with, let's say, Ubuntu+Firefox? The
controlled setup, the closed ports, the expired digital certificate which
signed the network forced me to a 1-hour session of
hacking/opening/tearing-apart. At last we did it, but when i asked to the
tech people their answer was quite remarkable: "No, it isn't going to work
with Ubuntu and Firefox, have you considered installing Explorer?"
?!?!?!?!?! Explorer? (and Explorer on Ubuntu?!?)  And: did anyone actually
have the same problem? Or is everyone on mac?

Then, about the corporate environment: i actually don't find anything wrong
with it. I actually found the people at the scanners and security always
kind and delicate, with that look on their face: "sorry, we have to do
this". My military boots made the scanner constantly ring and no-one said a
single word for it, or even cared to look what was in my pockets or even
bothered to look at what i was pulling out of them.
As for the aesthetics of it all: yes, i agree that it was not the maximum,
but it was perfectly tolerable. The underground-underground-rooms were cozy
in a way, and it was nice being in them, and felt very close to people.

prices: yes! 400 is way too much! and also the idea that you had to pay for
even a coffee at times was not really nice. But more than focusing on the
400 euros, i think that we really should focus more on the idea of
inclusion, and i thank all the people that are putting a highlight on this
concept: we might research how the whole system could really allow for a
more balanced form of auto-financing, maybe with higher costs for the ones
who have financial backing of some sorts, and low-to-none for students and
the ones without grants or budgets.


In Italy we are experimenting a wonderful concept with our workshops: we
call it "the Social Room", but in ISEA it could be called "the Social
Conference" or something: it is about providing free access to workshops to
people who provide service to the workshop. We've had a wonderful response
on this, with people bringing in anything from skills, to documentation, to
video/audio services to entire locations and equipment sets, and we gave
them back for free workshops with prices ranging from 100 to 2000 euros and
accomodation in a hostel built in a 15th century monastery.

Models can be designed to create access if we feel that it is a central
issue to be confronted.


I actually didn't like the answer "yeah, but this is a meeting for
professionals" that someone was giving out, and i hope that they really had
a chance to reconsider their point of view.


all this "negative" was paired by a wonderful atmosphere, the chance to
network, to meet people, to confront and to establish a continuous state of
debate and discussion. And that was truly worthwhile.

the main thing remains to understand how to really interact with local
territories and cultures. Istanbul, for example, has been a powerful test,
as the city is just so overwhelming and full of layers of cultures and
contexts piling up from thousands of years.

The key, possibly, could be to activate the city (or even a little tiny bit
of it) by creating *active* scenarios for local people and organizations.
For example by more explicitly supporting and exposing and hosting local
artists, labs, hackers, professors. I would have really liked, for example,
a more evident take on the state of the art of digital cultures in Istanbul
and Turkey, told by people from Istanbul and Turkey instead of hearing
people from ISEA talking about it. And I would have loved students,
professors, artists etc from the place doing really more active things, like
moderating, organizing, and the like. Again: it was such a massive
experience that I might have missed something along these lines, please let
me know if this is the case, as I would really be happy to know more about
it.

last day for today: we're giving our paper presentation at 2pm, and then off
to the next stop.  :)

:)

-- 
Salvatore Iaconesi
prof. Cross Media Design
University of Rome "La Sapienza"
Faculty of Architecture
Dept. of Industrial Design

salvatore.iaconesi at artisopensource.net
xdxd.vs.xdxd at gmail.com
salvatore at fakepress.net

skype: xdxdVSxdxd
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