Simon has pretty much covered the main points. I might just add
emphasis.
For background, I have written code as part of my art practice since
the 1960s and run teams doing this kind of stuff all the time. As
Simon points out, there are many diverse skills in programming and no
one person has them all. Real-time control, as in robotics, is just
one specialised branch - but one that many skilled programmers do not
know all that well. As with many aspects of life, creating and
building teams or social environments is as important as finding
technically skilled individuals.
Its a side issue to this discussion, but the central position of
programming WITHIN some modern art practice is also worthy of
significant attention.
Ernest Edmonds
On 25/07/2009, at 12:18 AM, Simon Biggs wrote:
> Hi Francis
>
> I sort of agree with you and disagree at the same time. I am an
> artist who
> programs. I regard programming as my primary medium – a form of
> writing. I
> consider computers themselves to be a form of writing, an
> augmentation of
> our capacity to make and interpret meaning. As an artist I put a
> lot of
> value on the capacity of the individual to make a difference, as
> you seem to
> do.
>
> However, I think it is naïve to argue that individuals produce work
> of value
> when isolated from others. Even when we are not aware of it we are
> part of a
> large team of people. Newton stated that to achieve you need to
> stand on the
> shoulders of giants. By this he meant that shifts in understanding
> require a
> lot of prepatory work and the efforts of the many, not the few. He
> recognised his theories depended on those of others.
>
> I have worked with computers since the 1970's and am familiar with
> how some
> of the chip-sets that have shaped the evolution of these systems
> have come
> into being. In the late 1970's important steps were made in VLSI. This
> depended on large teams of scientists, engineers and programmers
> creating
> miracles of minutarisation. That sort of working pattern remains valid
> today. It is important to remember that creating the technical
> systems that
> allowed for all those transistors to be packed onto such small
> wafers of
> silicon required major scientific and industrial resources. You
> cannot fly
> to the moon with a few mates. As we have seen, it is a massive
> undertaking
> requiring the dedicated human and material resources of nations.
> The same is
> true in the development of other technologies – in the development
> of ideas.
> The invention of the web is (erroneously) laid at the feet of one
> person
> (Berner Lees) but I think he would be the first person to admit
> that he
> couldn't have done it without the trillions of Euro's spent on
> CERN, where
> he worked. He was a product of that whole process. HTTP was too.
> The web is
> a complex system. Robots are also extremely complex systems.
>
> My son, who is 9, has built a few robots, programming them in
> Scratch and
> NXT. He is lucky as his teacher is a professor of computing here in
> Edinburgh and at Stanford. It is terrific to see him develop these
> skills at
> a young age and you do not want to upset his apple-cart, but
> sometimes he
> says it is easy to build robots. Happily, it is not difficult to
> show to him
> the actual complexity of the systems he is only skimming the
> surface of.
> When he recognises just how much is involved he is clearly struck
> with the
> immensity of the task. Happily, he seems up for it. Perhaps I
> should send
> him to Thailand?
>
> In short, the creation of culture (including technology) is an
> activity that
> involves us all.
>
> Regards
>
> Simon
>
>
> Simon Biggs
> Research Professor
> edinburgh college of art
> s.biggs@eca.ac.uk
> www.eca.ac.uk
> www.eca.ac.uk/circle/
>
> simon@littlepig.org.uk
> www.littlepig.org.uk
> AIM/Skype: simonbiggsuk
>
>
>
> From: Francis Wittenberger <director@culturebase.org>
> Reply-To: YASMIN DISCUSSIONS <yasmin_discussions@estia.media.uoa.gr>
> Date: Fri, 24 Jul 2009 18:40:21 +0700
> To: YASMIN DISCUSSIONS <yasmin_discussions@estia.media.uoa.gr>
> Subject: Re: [Yasmin_discussions] cyborgs skin and programmers
>
> hi Simon,
>
> i do not agree that "Programmers good enough to do this kind of
> work are
> thin on the ground"
> - while i am not saying that any 'web designer' is equipped to do
> 'robotics' but there are hundreds of thousand programmers who do
> relative low-level programming and hardware - the problem is that
> there
> is nobody around to define for them WHAT to do - this is what i
> mean by
> 'talkers' - for example on this and other 'new media forums' - most if
> not all of those who discuss aren't able to define (to a
> programmer) what
> they are talking about - in fact, i think even they probably have no
> idea what they are talking about .. but their talk seems to enable
> university and other grants, which they spend on living normal, non
> artistic , non creative, middle class lives - that is the problem.
>
> i would suggest to aggregate funds by not granting to those who are
> unable to excel and define what what they are talking about , and
> dedicate the rest of the money to programmers and engineers who
> otherwise end up hungry on the commercial market just because they are
> not good 'talkers' enough to get academic grants.
>
> i also do not agree to the concept of "employing a single
> programmer is
> not going to get you very far" - if you take a close look - every good
> invention , just as any good software originate from a single mind or
> a tiny team. every efficient software was written by one person.
> unlike
> microsoft and alike who make money from deals and speculations
> creating
> ever-in-progress waste they call 'software'.
> compare that to the fact that every chip has tiny and efficient low
> level code that is virtually 100% fully debugged and error free and is
> result of work by a single programmer or a tiny team - this is why
> chips
> and CPUs work unlike 'MS office' that is forever "one version short of
> being finished"
>
> no computer or phone , or a hard disk would work today without every
> part being close to perfect on its own - the problem lies in the
> inability of programmers to link with artists (or free their own
> mind by
> other means), and the inability of academics and artists to pinpoint
> what type of integrated sub-systems to compile of the parts;
>
> the cases in which things work are the cases where the programmer was
> somewhat an artist, or an artist who pushed himself to actually
> code his
> creative thought.
>
> i do agree that more then one person or programmer would be
> required to
> realize a robotic project, but that is also true to publishing a book
> for example - normally a small team lead by a visionary is the best
> way.
>
> blindly accepting (or promoting) the idea that many top programmers
> and
> lots of rare resources are a must to make an innovative step - is bad
> for us who want to get down to the work and innovate - because every
> time we approach an institute or company they think to themselves
> 'i better
> keep distance from those crazy artists who need millions of dollars
> and
> for their crazy future projects' - while in fact - no more then a
> team
> of 3-4 developers and 1-2 artists are required to prototype ANY
> invention
> and the funds can be as low as really basic requirements - after all,
> true artists and creative people do what they do out of urge - and not
> for the money :)
>
> - -
>
> regards from thailand,
> francis
>
>
>
>
>> Programmers good enough to do this kind of work are thin on the
>> ground and
>> valuable. I wish we had a few. I mean, we do, but they are all busily
>> employed on well funded research projects and have very little
>> time for more
>> speculative and less well funded work. Those that do are special.
>> We could
>> do with a lot more.
>>
>> I missed your call for a robotics programmer so am not sure what
>> you were
>> looking for, but one observation I would make about development
>> work in this
>> field is that employing a single programmer is not going to get
>> you very
>> far. Robotics is one of the most multi-disciplinary and demanding of
>> technical areas. You need different kinds of programmers for
>> different
>> aspects of the systems (sensing algorithms are very different to
>> those
>> required for motor control). You also need engineers with various
>> skill-sets
>> as well as specialists from other areas (computational
>> linguistics, computer
>> vision, networking, micro-electronics, psychology, etc).
>>
>> Regards
>>
>> Simon
>>
>>
>> Simon Biggs
>> Research Professor
>> edinburgh college of art
>> s.biggs@eca.ac.uk
>> www.eca.ac.uk
>> www.eca.ac.uk/circle/
>>
>> simon@littlepig.org.uk
>> www.littlepig.org.uk
>> AIM/Skype: simonbiggsuk
>>
>>
>>
>> From: <director@culturebase.org>
>> Reply-To: YASMIN DISCUSSIONS <yasmin_discussions@estia.media.uoa.gr>
>> Date: Fri, 24 Jul 2009 11:19:15 +0700
>> To: <yasmin_discussions@estia.media.uoa.gr>
>> Subject: [Yasmin_discussions] cyborgs skin and programmers
>>
>>
>> Sawasdee
>>
>> re. Digital Skin
>>
>> MAF Thailand (2005)
>> http://culturebase.org/home/thailand/MAF05/viewpage.php?
>> menu_item=A_festival
>> _theme
>> http://culturebase.org/home/thailand/MAF05/viewpage.php?
>> menu_item=B_maf_imag
>> es
>>
>> re. Cyborgs discussion
>>
>> everybody here TALKING about cyborgs but funny enough there were ZERO
>> programmers responding to my call "seeking hardcore programmer"
>>
>> i wonder what is this discussion all about and who is going to do the
>> work;
>>
>> it seems there is not a single hardware engineer or a serious
>> programmer
>> reading this list - or?
>>
>> perhaps the heads of departments, historians, academics,
>> philosophers and
>> talkers should unite with a FUND to hire programmers to do something
>> about all this talk..?
>>
>> hope to hear opinions
>>
>> best regards from thailand
>> francis
>>
>> Re.
>>> Hi Avi
>>>
>>> Thank you for your "Digital Skin".
>>> If Cyberspace is our skin, our body is a Network-body and a flat
>>> screen. If my memory is good, this made you say in a previous post
>>> that we are all cyborgs. At the same time there is a resistance to
>>> that. Actual matter resists to being resumed to digital matter.
>>> Thickness resists to being resumed to 2-dimensions. Physical bodies
>>> resist to being resumed to images. This resistence interests me.
>>> Things are not just flowing. They also scratch and scream. And
>>> cyborgs
>>> are not just the bright future of a superhumanity !
>>>
>>> In the 1970s, Jean-François Lyotard wrote about "The great ephemeral
>>> skin" in his book Libidinal Economy (Theories of Contemporary
>>> Culture). He was describing it as a carnal extrusion and a virtual
>>> membrane where the world and our desires would meet. It is
>>> "ephemeral"
>>> because it is in constant mutation. Cyberspace is like this "great
>>> ephemeral skin", just as language is.
>>>
>>> Here is an intersting artwork where the human body is scanned,
>>> fragmented and recomposed through machines and softwares which
>>> pervert
>>> the idea of mapping (GoogleEarth)
>>> http://www.locurto-outcault.com/index.html
>>>
>>> Best
>>>
>>> Stéphane
>>>
>>> Le 22 juil. 09 à 07:12, Avi Rosen a écrit :
>>>
>>>> Hi Stéphane,
>>>> Very interesting subject "Epithelia, Creative Skins"...
>>>> I made some artworks on this theme: "Digital Skin 2" -
>>>> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WIO5bnV4i6E
>>>>
>>>> "The Cyberspace is an extension of the human foot, eye and the
>>>> skin.
>>>> The
>>>> electronic gadgets and the data sphere are Galactic immediate Torus
>>>> like
>>>> extension of the human central nervous system, and the stage of
>>>> 'Digital
>>>> Skin' performance. It creates virtual extension of Marcel Duchamp's
>>>> unfinished "Big Glass" piece, his voice (manipulated by the
>>>> speed of
>>>> light)on the video explains it. The transparent Cyberbody (digital
>>>> mummy) is
>>>> located eternally in cyberspace superposition. The departure and
>>>> arrival are
>>>> compressed to a singularity(Paul Virilio), on the digital skin's
>>>> surface.
>>>> 'Digital Skin 2' video sequence is bricolage of my endless virtual
>>>> voyages (
>>>> 'Digital Skin' is another example of such trajectory) in
>>>> cyberspace,
>>>> superimposing personal data on public data base (Goggle Earth and
>>>> Sky). My
>>>> body digital data strips, merged with the Earth and cosmos digital
>>>> data
>>>> strips produced by the satellites and telescopes. The
>>>> digitalization
>>>> of the
>>>> universe and our body transformed it to a flat image displayed
>>>> on the
>>>> computer monitor ('Digital Skin').The digital video sequences are
>>>> the MEME
>>>> for further construction \deconstruction of cyber audiovisual
>>>> mutual
>>>> memory
>>>> and universal knowledge."
>>>>
>>>> Best,
>>>>
>>>> Avi Rosen,
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> This is the first time I contribute to this discussion. I am a
>>>> visual
>>>> artist and art theorist. I am wrighting a book about skin as a
>>>> creative process ( "Epithelia, Creative Skins", "Les peaux
>>>> créatrices"
>>>> in French).
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> _______________________________________________
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