urban inscriptions - malcolm mccullough
DESCRIPTION
keynote speech by Malcolm McCullough at The Mobile City conference Feb. 28 2008 at NAi Rotterdam, NetherlandsTRANSCRIPT
must “MEDIA” mean REMOTENESS ?
The urbanism of electronic communications
has seldom been encouraging. For whether
the word “media” implies passive
entertainments, global networking, production
software, or the attention economy of all of
these, it does tend to imply disembodiment;
and that implies trouble for space and place
as we know them. But what happens when
media become embodied in access, spatial in
operations, and place-based in content? In
particular, what happens when information
technology moves out beyond the desktop
into the sites and situations of everyday urban
life? What does it mean that content is
something you do, not something you are
given, and where do you go to do that?
OBIE best of show 2007Source: The OBIE awards
Timeline: place-based media
A recently popular image in the flyposting debatesSource unknown
Literary society (ca. 1885)Henry Collins Brown
Physical components of pervasive computing
Five trends in urban computing
Components of ambient information
Information foraging on the derive
Cached communication
Four kinds of writing
Epigraphic reading in PersiaSource: Geoffrey Nunnberg
Sao Paulo to ban billboardsSource: www.worldchanging.com
Timeline: pollution
Press kit feature on airportsSource: OAAA
Press kit feature on airportsSource: OAAA
Removing soot, Penn Station Pittsburgh, (ca. 1948)Source: The Carnegie photo database
QUESTION # 2
“How much information is pollution, that something can be done about?"
(6) 0% --> LITTLE all information welcomepollution just in the eyes of the beholder
(4) <--100%
MUCHtoxic data smog!
Audience text-in pollThe Interactive City, ISEA07
QUESTION # 1
“Which activity bonds urban spaces together most effectively?"
(6) SOCIETY: conviviality “third place” public assembly social navigationpresentation of self
(4) COMMERCE:
(especially shopping)
Audience text-in pollThe Interactive City, ISEA07
Ambient media planning
Dimensions of urban markup
Toward a new Epigraphy
Water Bottle LabelSource: The Henry Ford (Museums)