|
Castellano
· Català
·
|
|
|
|
|||||||||||||||
Reference projects and worksThere are a number of works which may be considered references for a-pam(del nas) for their inclusion of similar or alternative concepts or approaches. They are usually works we have analysed, used as participants and worked and discussed with other people through the workshops. Webtracer
Freeware software created by nullpointer/Tom Betts to map sites. It builds a map of links between nodes using graphical representation criteria which enhance clarity and a real-time optimization system which refines and corrects the structure as it is being created in order to obtain the clearest possible organisation. In contrast, a-pam(del nas) creates a map which becomes increasingly more complex and difficult to read. This is because it is not intended as a study tool but sets out rather to offer an experience of the local viewpoint during exploration of a complex structure. www.nullpointer.co.uk/-/webtracer
Anemone
Software by Benjamin Fry which forms part of his research into the achievement of organic visualisations of huge volumes of data. It uses a 3D tree to show the structure of directories and documents of a site, increasing the thickness of the node associated with the site in accordance with its popularity. The traffic between nodes is indicated with additional lines of other colours. In a-pam(del nas) we have adopted some of Anemone's characteristics, such as taking the most visited nodes into account and eliminating those which are visited less frequently. http://acg.media.mit.edu/people/fry/anemone/
Visual site map
An experimental cartography system created by Xia Lin (Drexel University) which depicts a website in the form of a compact map of adjacent regions of colour. In our case we discarded solutions that divide the screen into zones because we were interested above all in observing the structure of links.
Visual Thesaurus
This system creates a dynamic, interactive graph of connections to show the semantic relationships between words. Though not designed to represent structures of sites, we feel it approaches the type of philosophy underlying the a-pam(del nas) project.
Starrynight + SpiralThese are systems of graphic representation of the contents of Rhizome's dynamic data base focussing on themes related to electronic and net art. Both are based on using visual metaphors: in one case, constellations of contents related in such a way as to look like a starry sky; in the other, a spiral along whose timelines articles are organised chronologically. In a-pam(del nas) we try to avoid excessively obvious visual metaphors but are aware of the forceful effect that certain solutions can contribute. At the moment, unfortunately, you must be a
registered user of Rhizome
to gain access to these two systems:
Inxight
A dynamic map-type system of hypertextual structure data (usually a website) generated by means of a hyperbolic projection. Its most interesting feature is the fact that, as we search its structure it shows in detail only the region of contents nearest to out centre of interest, while minimising the rest. Inxight shares with a-pam(del nas) the characteristic of concentrating on the local viewpoint and on the radial expansion method of presenting the main node and its links, though we resolve this question in precisely the opposite way, expanding the second plane until it fills the entire screen. The Web Stalker
Software created by I/O/D which facilitates a highly unconventional way of experiencing the Internet, a far cry from the usual user graphics interfaces and standard browsers. It is a significant reference for us and one we have used not only in several workshops but also as a system with which to "analyse" our own works. a-pam(del nas) resembles The Web Stalker because it also reads data from the HTML code and uses the <A> label to develop a map of nodes and links. There are two main differences however. The first is that The Web Stalker treats all the nodes in the map equally, whereas a-pam(del nas) accentuates the local viewpoint and applies different forms of representation according to distances from the principal node. The second difference is connected with the construction process. In The Web Stalker the user provides an initial URL and from there the system "pulls the thread" of the links; in a-pam(del nas) the user has to guide the map's construction at all times, choosing which of the linked nodes should be developed. Furthermore, in a-pam(del nas) several users can intervene in the map simultaneously.
Eden.Garden.1.1A project created by Entropy8Zuper! based on software which takes the HTML labels of a page and builds a world in which each of these labels is represented by an animal or plant or some other type of image, constructing a three-dimensional environment which can be navigated in the first person. The problem of mapping data extracted from the HTML code and its subsequent visual representation interests us greatly. For the time being however in a-pam(del nas) we concentrate on solely two types of label (<a> and <img>) and resolve the problem in a rather literal way, though we do not discard deeper investigation into this subject in the future. eden.garden1.1.projects.sfmoma.org RiotSoftware created by Mark Napier which acts as an alternative browser, recombining the text, images and links of the last web-pages visited by the users. Riot works over any browser, modifying it accordingly. The author's role in a work such as this is difficult to define and Riot highlights the intrinsic difficulty in any attempt at control over intellectual property. The collage concept interests us less with a-pam(del nas) given that, while it is indeed produced, it is limited to the first level nodes and lost almost immediately. Aspects we do have in common with Riot however are the appropriation of contents by means of the deep reference and the desire to intensify debate over the control of intellectual property. Borges: Los dos reyes y los dos laberintosThis story by Jorge Luis Borges is an essential reference in any reflection on mazes, especially when discussing the viewpoint of the explorer in a labyrinthine system. The argument is simple: the King of Babylon abandons the King of the Arabs in an extremely complex labyrinth from which he can only escape by entrusting himself to Allah. Some years later the Arabs invade Babylon and take its King to his own, personal labyrinth, the desert, from where he is unable to leave and eventually dies. The local viewpoint of the person in the maze increases his or her disorientation, the references are always too near making it difficult to find the way out. But the opposite case is equally disorientational or more so. The desert's (apparent) lack of references leaves us without clues to help us become orientated. With a-pam(del nas) we offer a system in which the user only has useful information from that which is too close, and even though the structure as a whole can be seen this vision is too chaotic to be orientational. The user thus experiences the double sensation of being in a maze and in a desert at the same time. BORGES, J. L. The Aleph (Collection of short stories). Alianza Editorial 1988 socialfiction: generative psychogeography i .walkThe Dutch collective Socialfiction have been developing their own variety of the Situationists practice of drifting for some time now. In 2002 they issued a call for the application of generative psychogeography using algorithms (which indicate the decision to be taken at each road junction). The call received proposals from collectives all over the world. A more recent creation by Socialfiction is walk, a programming language for the coding of algorithms to be applied while walking around the city. In a-pam(del nas) we also propose the practice of Situationist drifting as another method of navigating the www. It is for this reason that, a priori, we do not offer the contents of the pages we hit, instead visualising them only through the images and texts of their links. We set out to emphasise the act of browsing as an action of travelling through a structure of connections rather than a search for some specific content, and how that very act of browsing is used to build the structure that we are exploring. SOCIALFICTION. Generative psychogeography as a tool for the construction of a hive mind uses the example of the ant colony (autonomous ants explore the surroundings, finding the best routes) which it extrapolates to the urban environment, proposing a line of action which could lead us to a form of collective intelligence. SOCIALFICTION. Algorithmic noise as free culture. Report/appraisal of the "Hot summer of psychogeography 2002" organised by Socialfiction. SOCIALFICTION. Algorithmic Psychogeography The generic principle applied to the city walk. |
