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H|U|M|B|O|T 1999-2004 CONTENT IV created by Philip Pocock 2001. http://www.humbot.org/static/new/content4.html

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Abstract

Installation

h|u|m|b|o|t

Screenshot: H|U|M|B|O|T installation, 'net

condition', Zentrum fr Kunst und

Medientechnologie, Karlsruhe, Germany,

1999-2000 with a team of hackers, datatects,

artists and architects assembled by Philip

Pocock.

An Aesthetics of Participation

rather than Consumption.

There are risks involved, of course,facing cybercinemastrategies. If an

author usurps his or her authorship,

sharing authority over the production

of media with audiences, as

unpredictable as human nature is.

Applying dated aesthetic criteria

stamped by an imperative of passive

audience consumption, cybercinema

cannot be measured. The value added by

a radical, and in some ways ancient,

rebalancing of consumption and

production, unfolding a new

participatory aesthetic into a

consumptive one, has far too few

precedents of its own in technological

media. Critics must rewind to

pre-literate, pre-technolgical, oral

and corporeal cultures, to imagine a

set of criteria which may be applied to

measure the value of a aesthetic

rebalancing consumption and productionby all participants, authors and

audiences alike.

Grammar for

Invention

"Rather than

discovering new,

isolated facts I

preferred linking

already known

ones together."

Source:

A.v.Humboldt,

"Personal

Narrative..."

Diagram:

FLATMOVIE [Green

- H|U|M|B|O|T]

interweave with

FLATBOOK [Yellow

- Humboldt] on

Internet screens

according to

parameters of

emotion, time,

situation and

keyword combined

with logs of

recent user

cybercinematic

travels at the

site.

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H|U|M|B|O|T 1999-2004 CONTENT IV created by Philip Pocock 2001. http://www.humbot.org/static/new/content4.html

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H|U|M|B|O|T audiences may passively

trace previous interactors on the site,

or lean forward and participate

themselves. If the dramaturgy falls

short due to an ingrained aesthetic

based purely on consumption of ourmedia, at least, a message encouraging

individual involvement in the

production of global culture is being

delivered, along with lyrical and

informational cybercinema. It may seem

chaotic, just too many interactions,

but essentially interactivity by

individuals in the consensual creation

of content (form and meaning) is as

crucial a tool to ensure personal

freedom and human rights as voting.

There is only an active vote, and

although it may seem lost in an ocean

of votes, it does have meaning. To

produce rather than consume political

leaders may be not much more important

in the unfolding century, as producing

rather than consuming our media

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