Fwd: RHIZOME_RAW: Prix Ars for the arse? Open letter to the .net jury members 2000

Sat, 29 Apr 2000 13:36:26 +0200

>Date: Sat, 29 Apr 2000 09:13:21 +0200
>From: "Alvar C.H. Freude" <af_lists@assoziations-blaster.de>
>Reply-To: alvar.freude@merz-akademie.de
>Organization: http://www.assoziations-blaster.de/english/
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>strider@construct.net,
>         jito@eccosys.com, markoff@nytimes.com, net.info@prixars.orf.aec.at,
>         christine.schoepf@orf.at, gabriele.strutzenberger@orf.at,
>         judith.raab@orf.at, info@prixars.orf.aec.at
>CC: list@rhizome.org, nettime-l@BBS.THING.NET, syndicate@aec.at,
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>         olia lialina <olialia@teleportacia.org>
>Subject: RHIZOME_RAW: Prix Ars for the arse? Open letter to the .net jury 
>members 2000
>Sender: owner-list@rhizome.org
>
>The Prix Ars Electronica 2000 in the category .net goes to a
>Science-Fiction Writer. Strange world. Who should understand this?
>
>But let's start my comments with some other facts:
>
>
>1.
>The jury meeting was announced to be on April 14 - 16, 2000 (see
>http://prixars.orf.at/text/general11.htm). But it happened the weekend
>before. You can imagine, that the most artists are working until the
>deadline ...
>
>
>2.
>It seems that the jury doesn't know their own rules.
>
>Quote from http://prixars.orf.at/text/net1.htm
>  "This category is open to all artistic-cultural
>   Internet activities, including Web sites, MUDs,
>   MOOs, online games, etc. The determining factor
>   is that the work has been conceived/realized
>   exclusively for the Internet."
>
>There are two winners who doesn't fit into this: The winner of the
>Golden Nica, Neal Stephenson, didn't won the price for any net project,
>he won for his books. The second price goes to "TeleZone", a project
>which includes an installation. But on
>http://prixars.orf.at/text/net1.htm is written:
>
>  "If the content of the work is linked to an
>   additional interface, e.g. an installation,
>   please enter it in the category for Interactive
>   Art."
>
>Additional, it is interesting that the Prix Ars Electronica is awarded
>this project, which is one the of the Ars Electronica Center' projects
>...
>
>
>
>hm, hmmm!
>
>
>
>But back to the jury's rash decision. That the jurors said the entries
>were disappointing in terms of both quantity and quality is a knock fear
>in the face of all artists, who worked a lot of months on their
>projects. It is possible, that the jury didn't understand at least some
>of the works? net.art is not (or at least shold not) like a TV!
>
>
>
>Let's have a look on some of the honoured works:
>
>
>Electrica on http://www.skoop.com/ doesn't exist!
>
>  --
>  >nslookup www.skoop.com
>  Server:  localhost
>  Address:  127.0.0.1
>
>  *** localhost can't find www.skoop.com: Non-existent host/domain
>  --
>
>
>
>http://www.voyd.com/gab/
>
>oh oh, oh no!
>
>Nothing to say against the content, but it seems that the jury was so
>enthusiastic of the nice top menu created with the SiteBrain Wizard
>(http://www.thebrain.com/). Next year I collect all of the most cool,
>most beautiful and free tools for creating a website's navigation,
>collect some texts and win the prix ars? Perhaps with this the jury is
>satisfied. Stupid.
>
>
>http://www.zeitgenossen.com/
>oh no part II!
>
>Is the Prixars mutanting to an award for the most beautiful Flash site?
>
>
>"The Exquisite Corps"
>http://www.repohistory.org/circulation/exquisite
>
>A community writing work like a lot of others since the last seven
>years, with the exception that there are no hot'n'cool Flash graphics
>...
>
>
>It is noticeable that all honoured works are made with lots of graphics
>and animations, most of them are using Flash. But where are the contents
>and concepts? "Community forming, user input and feedback, links,
>manageable complexity" is written about the criterias on the entry
>regulations. But where can someone find this criterias on the winners
>projects? I am sure, that there were at least some other projects on the
>net which fit in this categories. For myself I can only talk about the
>contribution of Dragan Espenschied and me --
>http://www.assoziations-blaster.de/prixars/ -- which has tousands of
>users, a database consisting of more then 20 MB pure text (this is more
>than the most Flash sites containing in graphics and sound together),
>tousands of lines of server side scripting code (not including all the
>HTML files) and so on. And the jury yammers about the low quantity ...
>
>Aaah, perhaps the "loading, please wait" message is missing. Yes, it was
>really stressing me to speed up the blaster so that he precess a hit in
>20 milliseconds. What a Crud!
>
>
>It seems for me that the jury was not very interested in understanding
>projects which needs more then a little bit viewing and clicking.
>
>Yes, I know that the really literary contributions "<i hate sf traffic"
>and "Spring Forward, Fall Backward" came from you, dear jury.  What
>would Neal Stephenson say to this? Everybody is allowed to tax one's own
>brain ... ;-)
>
>
>Do you want more quantity in each project, dear jury? Sorry, but this is
>not really possible for a non profit project! Remember that you
>criticize the "vast flows of venture capital available to start Internet
>enterprises, virtually anyone with any skill or interest in the Net has
>increasingly been spending his or her waking hours pursuing commercial
>rather than artistic endeavors"
>(http://prixars.orf.at/press/eng/netstat.htm). You can't compare a non
>profit artistic work with multi million dollar websites!
>
>As an example: we work since more then one year on the Blaster, some
>months fulltime, but sometime we have to sleep ...
>
>
>
>Are you worry about that the number of entries to the prix this year
>declined so much? Have a look on the last year's winner, and you see the
>reason of this decline!
>
>
>What on earth you were looking for, dear jury, to have been thus
>"disappointed"?
>
>The .net category is not the same as Interactive Art with the difference
>that the works are using the net. Don't expect TV. Don't expect visual
>art. Don't expect virtual 3D environments. Expect net.art, whatever this
>might be.
>
>
>
>And now, whats the solution? What can we learn from this?
>There are two solutions:
>
>   - rename the .net category in
>     "cool web graphics, 3D or flashing environments"
>   - throw out all the visual oriented members of the jury
>
>
>Uups, the winner is a writer. What deals he with the net? Aaah, surely,
>he was only chosen because the jury want to antagonize the net.art
>community. You may select no winner the next time, if you are the
>opinion that the entered works are not good enough, so you get no stress
>because of such a stupid decision ...
>
>
>Ciao
>   Alvar
>
>
>--
>Alvar C.H. Freude
>alvar.freude@merz-akademie.de
>
>Blast-Dich-Fit:
>http://www.assoziations-blaster.de/
>http://www.assoziations-blaster.de/english/
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