[-empyre-] wearable technology

[Johannes Birringer]

dear all

[Susan Ryan schreibt]
>>
But wearable devices have a stake in treating us all the same and thus all having the same,
sleek "digital look."
>>

hmm, surely I would have thought the opposite, no matter what stake wearable devices might have and I don't think they do have one.

In my experience, and there are separate areas then of discussion, namely the everyday or such sectors such as the medical, or the firefighters
or the police or border guards,   and then fashion (and sports) and then, say, the performing arts, where for example Michèle Danjoux, our designer
in the DAP-Lab creates & designs costumes with integrated "technologies" for the performers and they are all different; 
and thus perhaps one needs to look carefully at what is worn and how, and what can be worn that is technologically interactive or proactive, needed or useless, 
adorning or playful and "degraded," as Hito Steyerl might say when she so wonderfully writes about the need for "low resolution" against the commodity
fetishisms implied by Susan....
but to come back to her remark, none of the
dancers or actors in our pieces has the "same sleep digital look" -- and what is that, a digital look? -- nor do people I meet on a daily basis
dress the same at all, I see massive differences and idiosyncracies, also related particularly to ethnic and cultural contexts, urban and rural contexts,  and 
varied realms of self expression or self performance (and the other ways, name when folks do not perform). 

respectfully
Johannes Birringer
DAP-Lab
London
http://www.brunel.ac.uk/dap