ARTBASE (3)
PORTFOLIO (2)
BIO
Rob Myers is an artist and hacker based in the UK.
I have been creating images of the contemporary social and cultural environment through programming, design software and visual remixing since the early 1990s. My work is influenced by popular culture and high art in equal measures. My interest in remixing and sampling has led to my involvement in the Free Culture movement. I have been involved in the public consultation regarding the Creative Commons 2.0 and CC-UK licenses. All my visual art is available under a Creative Commons license.
My interest in programming has led to my involvement with the Free Software movement. I developed the Macintosh version of the Gwydion Dylan programming language compiler. All my software is available under the GNU GPL.
I have been creating images of the contemporary social and cultural environment through programming, design software and visual remixing since the early 1990s. My work is influenced by popular culture and high art in equal measures. My interest in remixing and sampling has led to my involvement in the Free Culture movement. I have been involved in the public consultation regarding the Creative Commons 2.0 and CC-UK licenses. All my visual art is available under a Creative Commons license.
My interest in programming has led to my involvement with the Free Software movement. I developed the Macintosh version of the Gwydion Dylan programming language compiler. All my software is available under the GNU GPL.
Re: Copyright and licensing of new media art
On 19 Mar 2006, at 19:38, Jon Meyer wrote:
> How do you create an artwork which can be sold in the fine art gallery
> context (e.g. in limited editions of ten or twenty), but which can
> also participate in the remix culture (be published on the web, open
> source, granting freedom to other to mash, etc.).
You could use the Street Performer Protocol and release the work as
Free Software or Free Culture once some or all of the edition has
been purchased:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Street_performer_protocol
Or you could follow the GPL to the letter and allow the people who
buy the edition to share the source code with others:
http://www.gnu.org/licenses/licenses.html#GPL
> Is it possible to have a single work exist in both contexts? Or must
> you make the web version a poor cousin to the version sold in a
> gallery? Also, when a collector buys a work through a gallery, what do
> they actually get? A PC? A CDROM? A contract? But then what if the
> object exists on the web?
A CD ROM is always good. With a certificate. Fetish, fetish. :-)
> I'm asking because I've recently started pondering whether some kind
> of special new media art copyright could be created which would let
> you address both contexts with a single work.
>
> The Creative Commons Sampling Deed is an interesting place to start.
> The Sampling Deed grants remix permission - it gives anyone freedom to
> mash-up or transform your work both for commercial and noncommercial
> purposes. It also grants people the freedom to perform distribute or
> copy the whole work in a noncommercial context.
Sampling is an interesting license. To my mind it is the only one of
the CC licenses that embodies an existing "social contract" (that of
sampling musicians), and it is the only CC license written by the
people who wanted to use it (Negativland). It is closest to how
artists actually want to use art.
But it is not "Free" in the Stallmanian sense, and it does not solve
many of the problems Lessig identifies in "Free Culture":
http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html
http://www.free-culture.cc/
> For any commercial use - it's back to a one-on-one negotiation between
> the creator and the licensee, which is great for a piece of music, but
> doesn't address what you sell in an art gallery.
So possibly use Attribution-Sharealike (BY-SA), which is a copyleft
license:
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.5/
> Is it possible to start with the sampling deed and create a new
> copyright with a commercial use clause that achieves something like:
It is a bad idea to write a new license. There are too many already. :-)
> 1) This work exists freely on the web, anyone can look at it, the
> source code is published, people can remix, modify and mash it.
> However, use of the free work cannot be labelled or presented as an
> artwork, in a gallery, museum, or other art context.
Attribution-ShareAlike-NonCommercial comes close to this, although a
nonprofit gallery could show it.
And NonCommercial sucks. It just adds an extra layer of permission
culture. :-)
> 2) There are N certificates/shares(?) which are fungible (i.e. which
> can be bought and sold without getting the artist involved) and which
> grant the holder permission to label their use of the work an artwork
> and present it in an art context.
>
> Obviously the wording is pretty fuzzy, but is this a crazy notion?
> Anyone with other ideas/suggestions?
There is a mailing list for CC license questions (cc-license-discuss)
which has CC staffers and various self-appointed experts (hi ;-) ) on
it:
http://creativecommons.org/discuss#license
If you want to keep economic control over the work (and not get to
use derivatives commercially), either BY-NC or BY-NC-SA is
appropriate. If you want to actually make your work part of "the
commons" or "the gift economy" and get modifications back, BY-SA is
appropriate. If the work is code, the GPL is best for that.
But wanting to have a work that is displayed online and sold for
presentation in a gallery is a separate issue from taking a position
on how art should be positioned socially in a free culture. Can you
explain why you want the work to participate in remix culture and
what you hope to get from or contribute by this?
- Rob.
> How do you create an artwork which can be sold in the fine art gallery
> context (e.g. in limited editions of ten or twenty), but which can
> also participate in the remix culture (be published on the web, open
> source, granting freedom to other to mash, etc.).
You could use the Street Performer Protocol and release the work as
Free Software or Free Culture once some or all of the edition has
been purchased:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Street_performer_protocol
Or you could follow the GPL to the letter and allow the people who
buy the edition to share the source code with others:
http://www.gnu.org/licenses/licenses.html#GPL
> Is it possible to have a single work exist in both contexts? Or must
> you make the web version a poor cousin to the version sold in a
> gallery? Also, when a collector buys a work through a gallery, what do
> they actually get? A PC? A CDROM? A contract? But then what if the
> object exists on the web?
A CD ROM is always good. With a certificate. Fetish, fetish. :-)
> I'm asking because I've recently started pondering whether some kind
> of special new media art copyright could be created which would let
> you address both contexts with a single work.
>
> The Creative Commons Sampling Deed is an interesting place to start.
> The Sampling Deed grants remix permission - it gives anyone freedom to
> mash-up or transform your work both for commercial and noncommercial
> purposes. It also grants people the freedom to perform distribute or
> copy the whole work in a noncommercial context.
Sampling is an interesting license. To my mind it is the only one of
the CC licenses that embodies an existing "social contract" (that of
sampling musicians), and it is the only CC license written by the
people who wanted to use it (Negativland). It is closest to how
artists actually want to use art.
But it is not "Free" in the Stallmanian sense, and it does not solve
many of the problems Lessig identifies in "Free Culture":
http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html
http://www.free-culture.cc/
> For any commercial use - it's back to a one-on-one negotiation between
> the creator and the licensee, which is great for a piece of music, but
> doesn't address what you sell in an art gallery.
So possibly use Attribution-Sharealike (BY-SA), which is a copyleft
license:
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.5/
> Is it possible to start with the sampling deed and create a new
> copyright with a commercial use clause that achieves something like:
It is a bad idea to write a new license. There are too many already. :-)
> 1) This work exists freely on the web, anyone can look at it, the
> source code is published, people can remix, modify and mash it.
> However, use of the free work cannot be labelled or presented as an
> artwork, in a gallery, museum, or other art context.
Attribution-ShareAlike-NonCommercial comes close to this, although a
nonprofit gallery could show it.
And NonCommercial sucks. It just adds an extra layer of permission
culture. :-)
> 2) There are N certificates/shares(?) which are fungible (i.e. which
> can be bought and sold without getting the artist involved) and which
> grant the holder permission to label their use of the work an artwork
> and present it in an art context.
>
> Obviously the wording is pretty fuzzy, but is this a crazy notion?
> Anyone with other ideas/suggestions?
There is a mailing list for CC license questions (cc-license-discuss)
which has CC staffers and various self-appointed experts (hi ;-) ) on
it:
http://creativecommons.org/discuss#license
If you want to keep economic control over the work (and not get to
use derivatives commercially), either BY-NC or BY-NC-SA is
appropriate. If you want to actually make your work part of "the
commons" or "the gift economy" and get modifications back, BY-SA is
appropriate. If the work is code, the GPL is best for that.
But wanting to have a work that is displayed online and sold for
presentation in a gallery is a separate issue from taking a position
on how art should be positioned socially in a free culture. Can you
explain why you want the work to participate in remix culture and
what you hope to get from or contribute by this?
- Rob.
Re: Marshall McLuhan, "actual destroyer of our civilization"
On 18 Mar 2006, at 22:30, Jim Andrews wrote:
> 'history is over'.
Yes, I remember when people used to say that.
- Rob.
> 'history is over'.
Yes, I remember when people used to say that.
- Rob.
Re: Re: An Interpretive Framework for Contemporary Database Practice in the Arts
On 25 Feb 2006, at 15:48, Myron Turner wrote:
> But I'm not sure I am convinced by his argument that speed is the
> differentiating element in current information technology.
As an aside, for Paul Virilio speed is the differentiating element in
contemporary society.
> But the issue for the ancient Sumerian, if he had wanted for some
> reason to communicate his data to others, was not speed alone. By
> showing his tablets to his neighbor, he could very speedily
> communicate his data, just as he very speedily could tell his
> neighbor what what on his mind by talking face to face with him.
To take a non-database example, it was only possible to render
fragments of fractal sets by hand when they were first discovered.
The speed of computer calculation allowed the Mandlebrot set to be
rendered not just once but many times in less than a human lifetime.
Speed here makes what would otherwise be impossible (not exist)
possible (exist).
This speed has had a great impact not just on maths, but on science
(the genome project for example), and culture (synthesisers,
samplers, and computer graphics) in general.
> I really don't have answers as to what distinguishes digital
> culture from earlier technogologies. It seems to me more than just
> differences of degree--greater speed, greater numbers, more
> geography. My feeling is that it has to do with networking and the
> nature of networks and how networks have been organized.
Speed, perfect reproducibility, and the follies of Wired magazine. :-)
- Rob.
> But I'm not sure I am convinced by his argument that speed is the
> differentiating element in current information technology.
As an aside, for Paul Virilio speed is the differentiating element in
contemporary society.
> But the issue for the ancient Sumerian, if he had wanted for some
> reason to communicate his data to others, was not speed alone. By
> showing his tablets to his neighbor, he could very speedily
> communicate his data, just as he very speedily could tell his
> neighbor what what on his mind by talking face to face with him.
To take a non-database example, it was only possible to render
fragments of fractal sets by hand when they were first discovered.
The speed of computer calculation allowed the Mandlebrot set to be
rendered not just once but many times in less than a human lifetime.
Speed here makes what would otherwise be impossible (not exist)
possible (exist).
This speed has had a great impact not just on maths, but on science
(the genome project for example), and culture (synthesisers,
samplers, and computer graphics) in general.
> I really don't have answers as to what distinguishes digital
> culture from earlier technogologies. It seems to me more than just
> differences of degree--greater speed, greater numbers, more
> geography. My feeling is that it has to do with networking and the
> nature of networks and how networks have been organized.
Speed, perfect reproducibility, and the follies of Wired magazine. :-)
- Rob.
Re: Naked Code
Quoting "T.Whid" <twhid@twhid.com>:
> I think that drawing analogies btw sketchbooks or whatever and source
> code is deeply flawed.
Leonardo's notebooks. More comments than code. :-)
> I can't think of any analogies that would work btw traditional art
> making... except perhaps, a mold for a sculpture? original template
> for a print?
Notebooks. Preparatory sketches. All the stuff you were meant to show at art
school to illustrate your thinking processes.
> That may work but most artists working in those mediums wouldn't dream
> of allowing those things to be let loose in the wild since forgeries
> would be produced.
>
> Forgeries don't seem to be what Jason is weary of.
You haven't made it in the art world until you're popular enough to be forged.
That's what authentication committees are for. :-)
- Rob.
> I think that drawing analogies btw sketchbooks or whatever and source
> code is deeply flawed.
Leonardo's notebooks. More comments than code. :-)
> I can't think of any analogies that would work btw traditional art
> making... except perhaps, a mold for a sculpture? original template
> for a print?
Notebooks. Preparatory sketches. All the stuff you were meant to show at art
school to illustrate your thinking processes.
> That may work but most artists working in those mediums wouldn't dream
> of allowing those things to be let loose in the wild since forgeries
> would be produced.
>
> Forgeries don't seem to be what Jason is weary of.
You haven't made it in the art world until you're popular enough to be forged.
That's what authentication committees are for. :-)
- Rob.
Re: Naked Code
Quoting "T.Whid" <twhid@twhid.com>:
> I think that drawing analogies btw sketchbooks or whatever and source
> code is deeply flawed.
Leonardo's notebooks. More comments than code. :-)
> I can't think of any analogies that would work btw traditional art
> making... except perhaps, a mold for a sculpture? original template
> for a print?
Notebooks. Preparatory sketches. All the stuff you were meant to show at art
school to illustrate your thinking processes.
> That may work but most artists working in those mediums wouldn't dream
> of allowing those things to be let loose in the wild since forgeries
> would be produced.
>
> Forgeries don't seem to be what Jason is weary of.
You haven't made it in the art world until you're popular enough to be forged.
That's what authentication committees are for. :-)
- Rob.
> I think that drawing analogies btw sketchbooks or whatever and source
> code is deeply flawed.
Leonardo's notebooks. More comments than code. :-)
> I can't think of any analogies that would work btw traditional art
> making... except perhaps, a mold for a sculpture? original template
> for a print?
Notebooks. Preparatory sketches. All the stuff you were meant to show at art
school to illustrate your thinking processes.
> That may work but most artists working in those mediums wouldn't dream
> of allowing those things to be let loose in the wild since forgeries
> would be produced.
>
> Forgeries don't seem to be what Jason is weary of.
You haven't made it in the art world until you're popular enough to be forged.
That's what authentication committees are for. :-)
- Rob.