Futuresonic Social Technologies Summit

The speaker is an artist and professor. From Italy, lived and worked in the UK and US, now in Turkey - Iphigenie

I should probably say that I am now involved in some of the current (linked to the Leonardo Electronic Almanac) and future projects - what a bar discussion at futuresonic/future everything can enable, who kows? - Iphigenie

"At Futuresonic 2009, the visitors to the opening gala performance on 13 May 2009 were treated to a very special project co-commissioned and co-ordinated by the festival and the University of Manchester's Jodrell Bank Observatory. In the picture on the left you can see Teresa Anderson introducing Touch the Stars - a collaboration of the musician Mark Pilkington and astrophysicist Tim O'Brien, to mark the International Year of Astronomy and the 40th anniversary of Apollo 11 Moon landings. As the short description of the project tells us, "in space nobody can hear you scream, but that doesn't mean it is totally quiet". And although the sound in this YouTube extract leaves a lot to be desired, you can nevetheless tune in to the sound of space - or even possibly, the sound of silence, received directly from space via Jodrell Bank Observatory." - Martin Bryant from Bookmarklet

"I didn't give it much thought right after the event, but my experience of Futuresonic has so far appeared to always connect to some kind of a festival's anniversary. Back in 2006, when I attended it for the first time, the participants were trailing the city, carrying balloons with the Futuresonic logo. In 2006, the festival was in its tenth calendar year, so there was a good reason to celebrate. 2006, too, saw the first Social Technologies Summit. I vividly remember Last.fm debuting there. Geolocation and mapping have already been in the focus, and Stanislav Roudavski, a Russian-born, UK-based architect, artist and researcher, shared the insights into what now seems to make Performative Places. In 2006, I was able to review Manchester Peripheral before it officially debuted during the first Manchester International Festival, and it was pleasant to see David Gunn returning to Futuresonic in 2009, with Echo Archive commission from Opera North. Back in the day, David was involved in... more... - Martin Bryant from Bookmarklet

"Focusing on a wide array of themes such as the context of a rapidly changing planet, our evolving human / natural ecosystem, the growing global strain on natural resources, and the advancement of artistic methods on potential of technological infrastructures, the 10th edition of the FutureSonic festival spanning 14 years integrated a wide and impressive array of international speakers, workshops, exhibitions, and performances. Scattered around the bustling city of Manchester in the United Kingdom, the festival took into account both its local strengths and its global outreach to encourage debate and showcase a wide arrange of artistic projects that examined just how far we have come in these debates and how far we have to go to make sense of the evolving technological apparatus that surrounds us." - Martin Bryant from Bookmarklet

Photos by Toby Barnes - Martin Bryant

A great set of shots from the summit courtesy of Perry Bonewell. - Martin Bryant from Bookmarklet

The brochure was incomplete, as if it was missing a page esp. on the "digital futures" track. Not all the talks had a short entry or description, and not all speakers had a profile. This made trying to figure out what the talks on the program were about a bit tricky at times. (there was for example one sessions called "creative action and long term social change" but no description or anything - makes people less likely to risk going to that one) - Iphigenie

I didnt feel that it was that incredibly mono-cultural this year, not compared to other events esp. in tech. Perhaps it depends which sessions, but of course my path took me around people from france, the netherlands, finland, italy, brazil. I like the number of UK people, after all this is in the UK and certainly for me if I knew better what was available and who was doing what across... more... - Iphigenie

Arte.mov is a festival of mobile video art in Brazil that happens both in cinemas and museums but also on the street http://www.artemov.net/ - Iphigenie

oh, i remember this one - saw it at school. Is it art? :D - Iphigenie

http://www.bonkworld.org/skive... - this is both a research presentation and an information gathering tool - Iphigenie

Well it would be subverting time you know you ought to spend on something else :) - Iphigenie

I didnt "get" all of them, but that's not the point, the point is that out there people are asking the questions. They rarely seem to seep into the awareness of the users or analysts that form the most noticeable media community - it is a disconnect I have often noticed and pointed (often clumsily) because the world I had encountered at academic level or on the sysadmin/coding office, or in the corporate tech world seems so different from what is discussed in the social media sphere (or the mainstream media). - Iphigenie

Although I have been told I should not waste my brains on hippie-ish, open-ish, artsey stuff, it all seems very relevant, compelling and engaging to me, in a way discussions about being a pro blogger dont. I like people who ask questions, even when it is questions that seem pointless to me - and when the questions make me go "hang on here..." it's a win :D I might be a scientist and... more... - Iphigenie

Are likes enough encouragement for you? ;) - Meryn Stol

done - might make some people wish they'd been there, it was one of these "serendipity" events where everyone seems smarter and more informed than you (well, me) and things are said and questioned. I'll go again. (I think futuresonic now owes me an invite for next year :D) - Iphigenie

"ISEA2009 will be concerned with Engaged Creativity in Mobile Environments. The incessant change of physical and virtual environments under the influence of global capital and mass migration as well as the fluidity of personal and social relationships effected by digital information and communication technologies has come to determine the life experience for billions of people. These societal and technological conditions radically and rapidly alter the ways we communicate, inter- and transact, how we make meaning of the world and ourselves, and how we conduct our lives along dramatically changing fault lines of the private and the public. Digital technologies as the fuel of global capital have not only effected dynamic and increasingly precarious labour relations. They underpin and challenge the negotiation of political and economic, social and cultural, religious and territorial conflicts and the re/organisation of society and its spaces alongside changing notions of democracy,... more... - Iphigenie from Bookmarklet

Ireland's closer than you think, just a short ferry away - perhaps FF can help us find cheap accommodation :D - Iphigenie

"Here at the acoustics research centre at the University of Salford, we hope to discover how and why people react the way they do to the sound around them using a revolutionary combination of mobile phone technologies. This allows members of the public to carry out sound surveys themselves, something that until now had not been possible. By uncovering the determining factors of a particular sound environment that makes a person feel a certain way, be it happy and relaxed or sad and uneasy, spaces can then be enhanced acoustically, ensuring public spaces serve and are appreciated for their intended use. Project members will make recordings of the sound around them at locations of their choice and enter their opinions and feelings about them using their mobile phone. We are running the pilot project until the end of May and need as many members of the public as possible to test our project and to help us further our research." - Iphigenie from Bookmarklet

This will be a very interesting research. Sound when combined with certain environment do seems to have effect but i think the sound can only enhance the mood by itself. Lot depends on the state of your mind. - Ashish

first there was a lady/girl also here from Opera North, but I forgot to write her name down - anyone have it? - Iphigenie

The echo archive approach is interesting in part due to the cool, very accessible software - but the other aspect is the sense of something referring to a place and time, with sounds, shapes etc. all taken from that one place. I wish there was a toolkit to repeat the process for one's own place - Iphigenie

"We are a loosely associated group of artists who engage with new media. Rather than being brought together by a shared sense of identity (eg as migrants), we are artistically driven (as opposed to led) by the highly charged and moving human stories, events and histories around us. And by the urge to delve into the deeper causes and links which underlie these narratives, both local and global. To pursue this, our artistic preference is to engage with a range of artists and communities for whom these migrant issues resonate. Although a significant number of our collaborators will therefore originate from migrant backgrounds, to achieve the deconstruction of white perspectives towards alternative engagements, we involve selected people and artists from other backgrounds. All artists, who contribute at different levels (and invariably have their own practice) in some cases become involved with the project in parallel to their own thematic base. This was the case for Keith Piper and... more... - Iphigenie from Bookmarklet

Post from Jamais Cascio's blog, including audio of the notorious heckler! - Martin Bryant from Bookmarklet

I missed all that! - Iphigenie

It was great - they had to eject her from the building. She was drunk and spouting global warming-skeptic rubbish. I have nothing against people expressing that viewpoint but it wasn't the time or place. - Martin Bryant

1) Attention and findability are in very limited supply, and good things can be crowded out - in many places you find what they want to promote and push. Yes, some things rise later ("cult" movies, books etc - all things that did not get promoted by their publishers at the time, but slowly did get found more and more) but for a few that do, how many don't and disappear? - Iphigenie

Joelle, getting back to your original point about homogeneity crowding out the 'good stuff', consider that at least part of what we regard as 'quality' results of a search or recommendation engine is serendipity and surprise. The 'Beatles and Bach' problem is reasonably well known in the literature, even if many choose to ignore it (ie. FF recommendations are mostly useless, since I can't 'hide' or 'down vote' people I don't want recommended to me). - Michael R. Bernstein

This was a quick overview of several projects which were trying to highlight, illustrate, or amplify issues and effects of things in the networked world, through approaches that were part technology, partly artistic (note: I missed some at the beginning due to non-matching session times) - Iphigenie

Ooh, Thwonk looks very interesting... - Michael R. Bernstein

Katie Lips asking first question - Lots of exciting technologies have been discussed. Why isn;t mobile exploited as much as it should be? - Martin Bryant

By the way, I thought Katie was a great panel moderator - Iphigenie

Jamais Cascio's slides from the keynote. - Martin Bryant from Bookmarklet

Photos taken by Sarah Hartley. - Martin Bryant

The notes are nowhere near as clear as the liveblogging! The Unconference was run on the Open Space model, and session conveners were asked to summarise their group's output on the Etherpad. - Mark Wallace

Frank Kresin has made his slides available here: http://www.slideshare.net/kresin... - Mark Wallace

It's been quite a couple of days and now the Social Media Summit is over - so time for the conversation to start. I'm going to take a few hours (and get a good night's sleep) to let all we've heard settle a little before blogging again. Inevitably, given my journalism work, I viewed a lot of what I've seen and heard through the lense of someone concerned with the distribution and accessibility of news and information. But there were so many themes and concerns which arose outside of these concerns just going to prove how valuable it is to hear different ideas, viewpoints, philosophies, people, professions etc. I feel suitably exposed! - Martin Bryant from Bookmarklet

Considering this conference is as much about the social, public and art spheres as technology, I think it is not just in technology where women struggle to get the attention - Iphigenie

Meryn: I was in a CS clan/notclan - and it didnt feel alll that much fun to me. Perhaps it has improved since 1999 :D I did not relish the 15 year olds in love with me for months, or the stalkers, or all the muppets in game that went "you're a girl?????" on and on (shut up i am trying to blast you) - or the weird thing people tended to say at RL meetups... or the people that expected you to be someone's girlfriend, and not the queen of Italy (a game map, not the country) - Iphigenie

As something of a blogging obsessive, the opportunity to spend two days writing about some of my favourite topics at the Futuresonic Social Technologies Summit was too good to pass up. On Thursday morning at the Contact Theatre, Sarah Hartley and I set up a ‘blogging booth’ at the back of Space One in the Theatre. A bit of sweet-talking to the technical staff even gained us a 4-way plug socket to charge our laptops. Being the seasoned journalist, Sarah opted to cover the Summit in a considered, reflective way - picking out the key stories and serving them up in easy-to-digest packages. I, meanwhile, being a real-time web junkie with the attention span of a fly with ADD, decided to liveblog the sessions. - Martin Bryant from Bookmarklet

My reflections on using FriendFeed as a liveblogging platform. Has anyone else tried this? How did you find it? - Martin Bryant

will put up notes later, battery too low now - Iphigenie

still haven't... I know... - Iphigenie

Graph charting 'right to talk about tech startups' taken by Sarah Hartley at one of the sessions today. I'd like to know more about this one! - Martin Bryant from Bookmarklet

i wonder if we might see some of the speakers jump in later at some point, and perhaps respond... one can dream - Iphigenie

The BBC speakers have read the liveblog of their talk and tweeted a link to it, which was nice. - Martin Bryant

On the panel for the plenary we have Jamais Cascio, Sarah Hartley and Adam Greenfield - chaired by Drew Hemment. They're going to pull together the discussions of the last two days. - Martin Bryant

And we're done! - Martin Bryant