The avatar of new media, Ted Nelson, is always worthy of (re)consideration. YouTube brings his great project Xanadu to life (in a manner of speaking) with these brief demos.
Xanadu Spaces
ZigZag Data Structures
For the very tortured history of Xanadu, check out Gary Wolf’s article in the June 1995 issue of Wired magazine. And if you’re interested in what starts the Nelson story, checkout the great Computer Lib/Dream Machines.
Thanks to Elaine Froelich for this link to software engineer Brad Neuburg’s interesting blog. Clear examples of good research questions to ask yourself.
Electronic Arts Intermix is a great resource for anyone interested in video and electronic art. In addition to an extensive catalog of work, artist biographies, articles, books, and other references, the site includes “A Kinetic History” of the organization which in many ways is the history of video and electronic art in the last thirty years.
New Yorker music critic Alex Ross has just published The Rest is Noise: Listening to the Twentieth Century. A superb, accessible writer, Ross charts the social and cultural influences that shaped the music of the last century.
We sometimes forget that “multimedia” does not begin and end with the digital. Oral culture was multimedia. We see the remnants in theater, performance art, and opera today. Take a look at this preview of the Lincoln Center Festival presentation of Bernd Alois Zimmermann’s Die Soldaten opera. Unlike most performances in which the audience remains in a fixed position, the audience in the cavernous Park Avenue Armory move with the performers.
Adobe Blurs Line Between PC and Web analyzes the new AIR software development system from Adobe that merges conventional applications with the internet to give users access to programs and files from anywhere. Go here for more info from Adobe.
Check out an early competitor, Aviary, that’s managed to create a usable suite of web-based apps that include image, video, and music programs.
Not much context, but stunning visions of a “new city” created entirely in a digital environment by Imaginary Forces for the MOMA show: “Design and the Elastic Mind”. Check out the show review here as well as a slide show here. While we’re at it, check out this interesting video by another firm included in the show, Front Design.