|
resurrecting my long dead LJ for one post only.
my domain name is being held ransom, which means my site is gone, along with all email, blog etc etc.
if anyone needs to contact me and has managed to track me down to here, well done! my email is:
casionovaatgmaildotcom
cripes. |
|
yo!
thanks to the people at rawserve.com I can now blog on my own server.
so to keep reading my blog just click:
www.casionova.com/blog |
|
me on at 9:45 then the YOUNG PROFESSIONALS!!!! (my fav band in melbs)
its a launch of an online zine by some fab peoples. should be a lovely shindig. not sure how much to get in but it'll be a pittance. plus its in a private venue so u can slip in some BYO booze, but leave yer knuckleheaded yobboes at home.
lots of other bands and an art exhibition
doors at 7, music starts 9.
www.pretendpaper.com for more info.
Pretend Paper Launch Party
patterson house
level 2
181 Smith St Fitzroy |
|
The CasioNova Project's Relationship with Deep Time
Civilisations rise and fall. CasioNova's civilisation is beginning it's collapse - perhaps it will be swift, the ascendency was damn fast and short, as far as civilisations go. Live fast, die young, leave a good looking corpse, as they say.
It is leaving a good looking corpse that is of concern for me - I have been immensely troubled by the shenanigans of our beloved leaders but their behaviour is the behaviour of many beloved leaders in the past, my mind can only get taken off contemporary atrocities by planning for the future. Planning for deep time. Not really that deep, just seven or generations is all I can get my head around.
Our corpse is our knowledge, our information, our records - of which the complete works of David Bowie is but a small part. The legacy our generation will leave, apart from the largest extinction event this planet has seen, a completely altered climate and a (only one word for it) shitload of toxic waste, is the most meticulously documented civilisation to have waxed and waned.
Initially my schtick was ensuring the robustness of this information to last generations and for post industrial peoples to have access to it. Lately it has become apparent that I haven't been thinking big enough. The way for our records to continue is through distributed computing - that is keeping the worldwide network of computers going. However, I forgot about Moores law. Oops.
Moores law is the fact that the complexity of electronic circuits double every two years. In simple terms computers get twice as powerful. Every year its 'nah, Moores law aint gonna happen', yet it does. This is damn interesting - for if Moores law persists we are facing the prospect of EXTREMELY smart machines in the moderately near future.
Many people think that humans will forego their bodies and upload themselves into the machines and become immortal. Perhaps, yet I have a hunch the scenario will be different, as we are very attached to our bodies and our bodies are an integral definition of ourselves.
Damn smart machines - the most likely outcome is sentience (I know it is THE question exactly what that means but hey, this aint a doctoral thesis). An intelligence greater than ours and of quite a different kind, my personal bets are on a sort of hive mind.
It is impossible to predict or comprehend what the next sentient intelligence on our planet will be like, perhaps it is best to ponder what it's, their, relationship to us will be like. The typical trash sci-fi response is that it will be like a god to us, I think this is fundamentally flawed and we can find relationships that are analogous within our current human experience. Instead of gods, think of dogs.
Woof. Since dogs are the only species that have co-evolved with us, and they are a species with a smaller brain, I am finding our relationship with dogs to be the only way my own puny brain can comprehend our likely future. Except next time around we are the dogs. Which isn't a bad thought - dogs seem pretty happy.
I know what you're thinking, isn't the imminent global economic collapse going to put a halt to electronic research and development and therefore Moore's law aint gonna be what it used to be? Possibly, but I doubt it because computer power is more than the nuts and bolts of the machines - it is also the software AND it is the networking of computers. Moores law only takes into account the complexity of individual circuits.
Software at the moment is quite clunky, due to it not being in corporations interest to pay programmers to spend a lot time making their code as fast and as efficient as possible. The open source movement in recent years has shown that software development can be in order of magnitudes faster if the code isn't kept secret.
This is the first stage - making computer code freely available, the next stage is code that writes code. In a post industrial world it will not be machines building machines but software writing software, this in conjunction with the vast power of distributed computing (imagine if every computer connected to the internet was dedicated to solving one equation) is how the next sentient intelligence will emerge.
If this scares the pants off you, it did initially for me but then again I have very short shorts, till I realised that human beings, well we suck. Currently we are committing what some term omnicide, killing everything. Throughout history we have proven to be a terribly destructive species. So as far as Artificial Intelligence goes, I think we have set a pretty high standard of evil and it will be unlikely a self aware machine would be able to even come close to our capacity of brutality.
More thoughts later...Current Music: Falco - Rock Me Amadaus |
|
i just whipped up a quick website for the resistor idea i outlined in the last two messages.
it b here:
http://resistor.casionova.com/
i set up a mailing list for it too, which is linked from the site.
also revamped some of the casionova.com site. a bit of a makeover, not quite finished and soon some decent content too.
and YAY!! FINALLY!! (i know i have said this before but this time its FOR REAL!) i got multitracking under linux. what that means is that recording the casionova album starts TOMORROW! and it will be ENTIRELY open source.
so much geekery. i AM a rockstar. honest .. really .. i am ... |
| » Resistor: supporting unfunded artists (part two) |
|---|
RESISTOR: a community organisation for unfunded artists
Charter
To supply financially disadvantaged artists with resources and information to facilitate the continuation of their practice and their engagement with the community.
----
Resistor is based around a website with information for artists and rotating online 'residencies' by artists, showing and documenting work that is unfunded and unsupported.
The ultimate goal of the organisation would be to obtain property to create a physical artist residency program.
The name 'Resistor' comes from the electronic component, a component that decreases voltage. Resistors have a huge range of values and are integral in any electronic circuit. We like to think that the function of the artist in society is like a resistor in a circuit, a tempering force, a slowing and lessing of power to provide space for contemplation, we are spread around to help things flow in the most humane manner and preventing other things from overheating and blowing up.
Resistor members, volunteers and staff will always be practicing artists, under no circumstances will an arts administrator to be employed by Resistor. If the organisation is to ever receive funds it will be used for infrastructure and to pay artists living allowances. The size of resistor body of staff (paid and nonpaid) must never exceed the number of people that can fit into Bill's larder. Resistor will exist as a support network, physical needs are to be donated by its members and the community.
Non-profit clause
The assets and income of the organisation shall be applied solely in furtherance of its above-mentioned objects and no portion shall be distributed directly or indirectly to the members of the organisation except as bona fide compensation for services rendered or expenses incurred on behalf of the organisation.
Dissolution clause
In the event of the organisation being dissolved, the amount that remains after such dissolution and the satisfaction of all debts and liabilities shall be transferred to another organisation with similar purposes which is not carried on for the profit or gain of its individual members.
Jun. 19th, 2005 @ 12:54 pm
|
| » RESISTOR: support network for unfunded australian artists. [part one] |
|---|
Here in australia if you are a full time practicing artist you would be either:
a) a 'legitimate' state funded artist
b) a commercially successful 'artist'
c) independantly wealthy
or
d) on the dole, (utter scum)
Well, odds are if you are a full time practicing artist it would have been d) for you. WOULD HAVE, up until the reforms of the last number of years in the winding up of the welfare state and in preparation for the changes in industrial relations that are happening right now. Presently the unemployed have now become not the result of economic and social forces but the blame for them. Yes if you don't have a job it is your fault and therefore you have to be punished. This makes sense in light of industrial reform because pretty much every worker in the country knows that unemployment is not what it used to be; ie. social security isn't secure and damn unsocial, so they have no option but to toe the line.
Australia now has the toughest unemployment system in the developed world. Part of this system is what is called 'mutual obligation'. Again another phrase that has emerged from an ultra-right think tank in the USA that has utterly no respect for reality, language or human beings.
Mutual obligation means that because society cannot provide you with meaningful/useful work you must therefore work a couple days of the week without any of the protection normal workers are entitled to and on no pay, in addition to fulfilling the myriad of other tasks that the unmenployed are required to do.
Since the system is administered by private companies, called 'job network members', who get money from boxes being ticked they often do not tell the unemployed what their rights REALLY are under the regulations and often sadly shove people off into spirit breaking work programs. In reality you have 6 weeks to choose a different task - it could be doing a course or volunteer work.
Volunteer work, most people I have met are volunteers in a sense, working for culture, the environment or social justice - pretty much every waking hour. Simple, just keep doing what one does and 'obligations' are filled. Not so if, like Melbourne, your city is so developed that every counter-culture activity has constructed large beuracracies (sic) around themselves, personally I found it extremely difficult to even get past the receptionist of all the non-profit community organistations I was interested in. And if one does it wouldn't be likely they would support your own activities or even just bloody well rubber stamp the damn form.
So for all those hard working artists and activists under the thumb of this ultra-right government and facing broken spirits, extreme poverty and no way in hell of being able to generate income a teensy bit of help is at hand...
To fulfill your mutual obligation you can do volunteer work for a non-profit community organisation. So let's form one, all it takes is a couple of like minds and a charter to declare you are non-profit. The organisation purpose is to support unfunded artists, it's first task is to validate artists practice by signing them onto a six month program of volunteer work, the work is to be the continuation and development of their own artistic practice, providing a valuable role in our cut throat community.
Everyone involved in the organisation is an artist. The organisation operates on good-will, not money. You sign my form, I sign yours. Get it?
For the organisation I will put up a web-page, listing artists and their work and various links folk like us would like to know about to survive, and am very happy to commision works by other artists involved in the organisation. :)
..... part two is the charter.
reply if you are interested!
[continued in next post]
Jun. 19th, 2005 @ 11:38 am
|
| » [review] film |
|---|
I went c.c.c.Krazy today with the moolah. Splurged BIGTIME on a new pair of underpants! Five dollars! (email me privately to find out exactly what kind of underpants CasioNova wears).
Then, wait for it, I went to the movies! This is SATURDAY night too - NOT 5 dollar films on a monday morning. Twelve bucks on sheer decadent entertainment! Holy Dooley!
It was my first trip to the Astor cinema (since I am now on this side of town and can get home). One of the last of the old cinemas, I am not sure of it's history but it is art deco - I presume the revival (50's, 60's?) not the original deco period, like the Tachinsky cinema in Amsterdam (if in that town do check out that cinema - spectacular!), still it is damn fab cinema, and yes ONE SCREEN and a balcony.
Oh, this was going to be a movie review, not a movie house review. The Astor always shows two films for your ticket price and always decent ones. Tonight it was The Incredibles and Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.
I know, I broke my personal trade embargo on the U.S.A., which covers it's contemporary cultural products - though cut me some slack because the Astor shows films months after the initial release. Funnily enough I saw The Incredibles on the merits of playing with my nephews computer game of the said film - the game had charm and wit and was pretty cool.
Well, since being so utterly disgusted with the FatherLand the Incredibles actually reminded me of the great things of U.S. culture. With this film it also seems that U.S. animation has finally come of age, or rather 3D english speaking computer animation has come of age. Ultra fab production design - think the artist Shag, with classic Thunderbirds and James Bond, also the sound captured the style with the Bond style string section.
Characters were very good - the little chap was identical in speech and behaviour to another nephew of mine (apart from the super hero powers). The clincher for The Incredibles, like any creative endeavour, is that the basic premise is bloody great.
Not normally a film I would see but am damn glad I did - I was entertained!
As for the main attraction for me, Hitchhikers, though probably very true Douglas Adams vision for the film, it was kinda flat. I think the main reason for this was the editor of the film was not editing for comedy, there were some great gags of course but often their impact was reduced by too quick a cut to the next bit of narrative, I imagine all fans have seen it, if like me you haven't, do go - it will provide you with another and possibly better visual reference for Adam's work. For the rest - read the books then get the video.
(and yes I DO go to the movies on a Saturday night by myself - hey I WAS planning on spending the evening recompiling my Linux kernel, so I'm not as nerdy as you think ;) )
Jun. 18th, 2005 @ 04:57 pm
|
| » [suomi] why finns are fab reason #1734 |
|---|
quote from Sami Pennanen aka Unidentified Sound Objects:
"The pristine clear hi-fi stadium size sound is good for
things the people with stadium size egos produce. We the little
people prefer listening to the voices in the lint in our pockets."
------------------------
from phinnweb mailing list.
original interview:
from http://www.loop.cl/index.php?
option=com_content&task=view&id=926&Itemid=59
Jun. 17th, 2005 @ 03:05 pm
|
| » [gig] friday 17th june @ barbukka |
|---|
smith st - fitzroy (melbourne, ozland)
me on 10:30
go genre everything 9:30
rose turtle ertler electric ukulele lady 11:30
Jun. 16th, 2005 @ 03:46 pm
|
|
|
|
![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif?v=92.1){kind=small}
casionova's journal