Imagined Homeland

For me, my imagined homeland has been for quite some time a lost continent within me. I have found myself dreaming of Atlantis, but that is not my homeland---it is only a metaphor for my homeland, an undefined terrain that is strangely enough linked to my current encounter with the digital technology of the Internet and its implications for identity.

What is the homeland but a place where we can be ourselves in the full disclcosure of ourselves? Homeland is inextricably linked to Identity, and becaause this new technology offers us a place where Space and Time are virtual, we slip into the virtual presence of ourselves, a defining moment where we might discover ourselves by surprise or by serendipity.

I have much the same feeling when I compose music, or, better, when I improvise without any notion of where I am going, but discover myself in bits and pieces along the way. I am scattered in those pixels... in that binary flashing of zeroes and ones... in the code that is somehow a new DNA of Being.

My homeland is at once ancient and the future. It is full of wonder and silence... of fullness and emptiness... I look for borders and there are none... only the outskirts of myself with vacant lots and rolling prairies.

The Wizard of Courant

Jefferson Han has the future of computing in his hands. Like the wizard in the tale of the Sorcerer's Apprentice, Mr. Han has transformed the computer into your slave rather than you being enslaved by the physical environment that is based on the old typewriter technology. Jeff Han is a Research Scientist at NYU's Courant Institute and an article in Fast Company, a leading edge technology and web design publication, celebrates Han as the guru of future computing. Observe!



If you would like an alternative view of his presentation at the TED Conference in Monterey (Technology, Entertainment & Design), check out Remapping the Universe at Fast Company's website. Once there you can click on the article in Fast Company that describes the fabulous work of Mr. Han. His demo has become one of the all-time hits on YouTube.

The Water Buffalo Movie

Among the most moving recent stories of the Internet was how it served as the catalyst for Robert Thompson's loving gesture of giving the gift of a Water Buffalo to a small, poverty stricken family in China that consisted of four people in which each member of the family was a different generation.

Robert Thompson is a violinist and composer who moved to the Yunnan province in China to get married. Now he blogs (Robert Thompson's Still Point), and reaches out to his surroundings in an effort to create change and share the common bonds that unite us as fellow travelers on this small blue marble in this brief moment against the backdrop of eternity. One of the most poignant messages is the simple principle of Do it Now.

He began his Odyssey of the gift of the water buffalo when he appeared on Philip Greenspun's Weblog investigating the claim of a website that a donation of $250 would provide a poor family in China with a water buffalo that provides a means for livelihood in farming for fifteen years or more. But upon reading further, the website explained that there were was no water buffalo or needy family. The claim was made as a metaphor to illustrate how much a small donation would mean to farming families in Asia.

Philip Greenspun asks Robert Thompson if given the money could he buy a water buffalo and give it to a family in need. He agrees, and in this simple journey he buys the water buffalo and discovers an extraordinary family. Thompson documents this journey in a short video he titles 4 Generations. Underlying this simple, eloquent documentary is Thompson's narrative and original music he composes and performs adding depth and presence to the the singular moment of giving the gift of a water buffalo in China.

This is a story that is beautiful in its pure simplicity and takes on a certain lustre through Thompson's narrative and the music he creates and performs that echoes through the moments eloquently. One gets the sense that his music provides him with a special way of seeing and knowing. This special sensibility gives him a special way of relating to the world and to the people of this story. It almost carries the essence of a fairy-tale, a "once upon a time there was a family..." magical quality that makes us all realize that if only we would do something rather than just talk about it, we could make a difference in the world.

Web2.0 and Internet2

Web 2.0 marks a new era in Internet practice where the spirit of the new digital technology is to create an atmosphere of creative exchange and sharing of ideas, resources, and content development.

Internet2 is a consortium of institutions that are exploring leading edge ideas in the use of multiple site sharing for purposes of scientific and artistic development. Projects are defined and produced, usually within time specific constraints, since I2 exchanges are based on high speed broad band connections that move data along the I2 highway with little or no traffic or impediments. This affords a multichannel approach of sending several channels of audio and several channels of video that can be freely edited, mixed, and processed by the partipants of the project, creating new and different experiences at each site from the same resources.

From a communication and artistic standpoint, Internet2 emerges with characteristics of a new medium, containing powerful possibilities for multimedia production, imaginative new forms and structures, and collaborative processes that form new relationships and practices among artists, scientists, theorists, technologists, and digital multimedia creators.