[rohrpost] Snowden Archive UN|COMMONS
Hi rohrpostler, in den vergangenen Jahren war die Berliner Gazette darum bemüht, sowohl Debatten als auch praktische Prozesse zu stimulieren, rund um die Frage, wie ein verantwortungsvoller, nachhaltiger und nicht zuletzt demokratischer Umgang mit den Snowden-Dokumenten aussehen könnte und sollte. Bei der Berliner Gazette UN|COMMONS-Konference (22.-24.10. in Berlin) werden wir diese Themen aufgreifen im Rahmen von fünf Workshops, die fragen: Wie können wir die Post-Snowden-Welt gemeinsam gestalten? Dazu werden über 100 engagierte BürgerInnen aus Europa (und darüber hinaus) zusammenarbeiten an Storytelling-Projekten und Positionspapieren zu Treuhandgesellschaft für Big Data oder Leaks als Welterbe. Dazu bald mehr Info! Vor diesem Hintergrund ist es von großer Bedeutung, dass nun ein wichtiger Schritt in Richtung des Commoning der Snowden-Dokumente in Kanada unternommen worden ist, wo kürzlich das Digital Snowden Surveillance Archive eröffnet worden ist. Die Berliner Gazette hat in diesem Kontext einen Beitrag von David Lyon veröffentlicht: http://berlinergazette.de/utopien-post-snowden-welt Nun hat auch Andrew Clement, einer der Hauptinitiatoren des Archivs, darüber einen Text für die Berliner Gazette geschrieben, hier die deutsche Fassung: http://berlinergazette.de/archivierung-der-snowden-dokumente Untenstehend findet sich die Originalversion auf Englisch. Vielleicht hat jemand eine Idee für die Veröffentlichung unter einer Creative Commons license? Viele Grüße, Krystian -- *Public Matters* (working title) by Andrew Clement What Snowden has revealed is a complex, institutionalized system of mass surveillance that is deeply embedded within and operating through our state and corporate apparatus. Only through a major collective investigative effort drawing on multiple perspectives can we adequately come to grips with its scope, consequences and remedial possibilities. An archive such as the one we developed would be an essential resource in this effort. See https://snowdenarchive.cjfe.org https://snowdenarchive.cjfe.org/ Looking at ground breaking leaks, especially with regard to how society managed (or not) to archive them, we can learn from history. For me the most relevant prior leak that had great social significance was whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg's leak of the Pentagon Papers. Making public authoritative internal documents about the Vietnam War that showed that officials were routinely lying about the motivations and state of the war played an important role in public opposition to the war and the eventual US withdrawal. The Snowden documents have a similar potential power because they too show in detail shocking government activities and bald lying by public officials. Conditions are of course different than in 1971 when the Pentagon Papers became public. There was already a strong social movement opposing the Vietnam war to which the Pentagon Parers added fuel. At present, there is only a nascent, still quite weak social movement opposing state surveillance. The potential value of the Snowden leak is to help coalescing and broadening opposition Furthermore there appears to be have been more dissent in 1971 among the upper political strata than is the case now, making the challenge of changing direction even more formidable. *Public education about mass surveillance* I had several motivations in initiating the Snowden Surveillance Archive project, mainly having to do with helping to promote and inform the public debate around mass state surveillance. Now that we know our state security agencies are conducting fine grained surveillance of everyone's electronic activities, we as a society have very serious choices to make about the appropriate role for secretive security agencies in a democracy. If we do nothing, then we will have accepted de facto that our everyday lives are open to scrutiny by unaccountable government agencies. This I believe is inimical to the foundations of democracy and we run a high risk of becoming police states. Reining in these agencies and eliminating those aspects that are not justifiable is a very difficult, but necessary task. It can only be accomplished when substantial numbers are well enough informed about the existing surveillance practices and the threats they pose, to take effective remedial action. Given the secrecy and complexity of the practices involved, a pre-condition is public education about mass surveillance is vital. This is something that I have been pursuing in my research for several years, especially around the IXmaps.ca project that seeks to show people the paths their data takes across the internet and where it may be intercepted by the NSA. Firstly, I wanted a searchable archive of the Snowden documents for this research, so I could better locate and identify surveillance sites of the NSA and its Five Eyes partners that I could include in the on-going IXmaps work. It seemed like a pretty obvious idea,
[rohrpost] MediaArtHistories Master - DanubeU: International low residency program in New Media Arts
The MediaArtHistories MA at Danube University is the only international Master of Arts program focused on preparing art professionals and researchers through a deep exploration of the diverse histories of Media Art, Science and Technology. The program is a two-year low-residency, either 90 or 120 ECTS Masters degree offered in English. In addition to individual study and project work at your home location, students gather 2-3 times a year for intense ten-day seminars with internationally noted media artists and scholars. These enriching sessions take place at Danube University or another European location relevant to the community of media art, such as Linz, Austria, Karlsruhe and Berlin, Germany. Since its beginnings in 2006, Danube Universitys prestigious MediaArtHistories MA has offered its students both a deeper critical comprehension and a practical orientation regarding the most important developments of contemporary art, by building on its faculty network of renowned international theorists, artists, and curators. The connections and community that are formed during the ten-day modules are maintained with online networking and project collaboration throughout the year. www.donau-uni.ac.at/mah == BRAIN TRUST Faculty of the MediaArtHistories program have included: Lev MANOVICH, Christiane PAUL, Roger MALINA, Andreas BROECKMANN, Jens HAUSER, Jeffrey SHAW, Jussi PARIKKA, Sean CUBITT, Paul SERMON, Oliver GRAU, Christa SOMMERER, Edward SHANKEN, Frieder NAKE, Machiko KUSAHARA, Nat MULLER, Gunalan NADARAJAN, Monika FLEISCHMANN, Margit ROSEN, Martina LEEKER, Christopher LINDINGER, Kathy Rae HUFFMAN, Knowbotic Research, Wolf LIESER, Andreas LANGE, Christopher SALTER, Darko FRITZ, Morten SONDERGAARD, Irina ARISTARKHOVA, and others. == CONTENT - Courses cover subjects such as net art, interactive, telematic and genetic art as well as the most recent reflections on nano art, bio and transgenic art, video games, early computer graphics and animation, VR, AR Intelligent Environments, hacktivism and tactical media, performance, glitch art and the art of interfaces and robotics. Media Art History offers a basis for understanding evolutionary history of audiovisual media, from historic examples such as the Laterna Magica of the 17th century to the algorithmic art of recent decades. It introduces to the main festivals and market. Key approaches and methods from Image Science, Media Archaeology, Sound Studies and the History of Science Technology and Digital Gender Theory are explored in depth. == DANUBE UNIVERSITY - located 70km from Vienna in the UNESCO world heritage Wachau region, Danube University is the only public university in Europe specializing in advanced continuing education by offering low-residency degree programs for working professionals and life-long learners. The Universitys Center for Image Science is housed in the Göttweig Monastery, a 14th century building remodeled to fit the needs of modern media arts research in singular surroundings. The Department for Image Science holds important resources of the field like the largest international archive of digital art: www.digitalartarchive.at and the MediaArtHistories Conference Archive www.mediaarthistory.org/maharchive == STUDENTS - MediaArtHistories coursework is held in English. Acceptance into the program requires either a Bachelors degree (or higher), or equivalent relevant work experience. Students may travel to Europe twice a year for ten-day blocks of study, or can be eligible for student visas for year-round residency. Thus, working professionals can maintain their usual employment, and students entering directly after a Bachelors degree will have opportunity to gain valuable career experience while they study. International students to our program have come from locations including Canada, Hong Kong, Ukraine, USA, Spain, Japan, Brazil, Iceland, Russia, Egypt, Germany, Austria, Korea and Mexico. www.donau-uni.ac.at/mahstudents MODULES Aug 29-Sept 8, 2015 December 1-10, 2015 May 5-10, 2016 October 1-10, 2016. == APPLICATION (digital) and FUNDING POSSIBILITIES - application form, a letter of motivation, copies of previous degree(s), copy of passport and a Europass CV. An application interview is required, which may be conducted in person or through internet videoconferencing. Resources for funding possibilities and estimated costs: www.donau-uni.ac.at/mah/funding www.donau-uni.ac.at/mah www.donau-uni.ac.at/dbw/referenzen MediaArtHistories on Facebook: www.facebook.com/groups/377264145713664/ -- rohrpost - deutschsprachige Liste zur Kultur digitaler Medien und Netze Archiv: http://www.nettime.org/rohrpost http://post.in-mind.de/pipermail/rohrpost/ Ent/Subskribieren: http://post.in-mind.de/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/rohrpost/
