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Introduction

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| August 13, 2012

1.    September 10 – 16: Introduction

Introduction to the Open Source Studio (OSS) project. Visiting Artist Randall Packer will be on-site to meet with students individually and to attend the first group session. We will overview the project, concepts, topics, the OSS Website, open source concepts, accounts, communications tools, mobile media, online discussion, social media integration, publishing, archiving, etc. We will discuss some of the larger issues of open source technique and ideology, and how this concept applies to studio practice.

Schedule:

  • Individual Sessions (9/12, 9/13)
  • Group Session/Lunch/Technical Review (9/14, 12- 1 PM PDT, on-site)
  • Group Session (9/14, 1 – 4 PM PDT, on-site)

Discussion Forum: Introductions

Recommended Reading:

Works for Review:

For Next Week

  • No individual sessions
  • Required readings (Sarbanes, Ascott)
  • Discussion Forum (Privacy)
  • Micro-project (blog post, “Imaginary Project”)
  • Live class meeting, Adobe Connect, Friday 1-4 PM PDT

Notes:

Technical Orientation:

OSS Overview:

  • we are all artists working in a collective virtual studio
  • the boundaries are made transparent for the cross-pollination of research
  • you are also building your own net studio
  • net tools apply to OSS as well as your practice in general
  • we are all contributors to OSS, a process of collective research
  • documentation is critical to the process
  • shared research, knowledge, teaching: the social nature of OSS
  • opportunities for publishing / artistic production from the process
  • revised concept of the studio as space of shared production
  • open source = full transparency (issues of private vs public)
  • spirit of collaboration and the collective process
  • OSS results in the archival documentation of the course and dialogue for future retrieval
  • the syllabus: weekly topics provide context, conceptual focus, and guest speakers (review)

The OSS LMS

  • a collective database
  • categorization and tagging (concept cloud)
  • integration and publishing (posts, forum, updates, social media)
  • member activity/profiles
  • the discussion forum
  • the syllabus: topics and notes
  • the user manual
  • ongoing OSS development

Projects

  • OSS meta-project: tracking the activity, publishing, a sociological investigation
  • Micro-projects: bootstrapping the use of OSS tools and techniques
  • Midterm hyperessay: final project proposal with description and media
  • Final project: broad possibilities for social and artistic implications and publishing, with focus toward online media, local and remote, live interaction, viewer participation. The goal is to bridge or extend each student’s practice with the potential of the medium. OSS is itself a meta-project we all participate in, which can be used for individual projects
  • Final exhibition: live broadcasted, published online

Getting Started

  • OSS accounts, avatar, profile
  • repository accounts: vimeo, soundcloud, flickr
  • OSS communications: posts, discussion forum, updates
  • external communications: Skype, Adobe Connect, Livestream
  • social media: Facebook and Twitter, integration is ongoing investigation

The Workflow

  • readings and artworks: uniquely selected from recommended list for discussion and presentation
  • asynchronous discussion: focused on assigned and student topics
  • blog writing, an online, multimedia journal: posting, sharing on Facebook
  • individual critiques: I will check in with each student bi-weekly
  • the micro-projects: experimenting with the techniques
  • live seminar: culmination of the week with presentation, discussion, guest speakers

Resources

  • syllabus notes in the extended nots section
  • recommended readings / online artworks (copy readings from library for your own use)
  • OSS Resources (tools, media centers, online forums, help discussion boards, etc.)
  • collaborative dialogue in the OSS Forum and social media (make use for your research!)
  • Contexts course taught by Nathan Ruyle for visual, interaction, social media design

Special Projects

For Discussion

 

 

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