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February 13, 2004 - 10:50am -- Anonymous Comrade (not verified)

I've noticed that the earth is quite a miserable place, run by capitalism and wars. Who wouldn't want to live in a perfect place like Utopia. In Greek, Utopia technically means "no place", but no place could be a wonderful place. Would it ever be possible to create such a place on earth, thus changing the way the human race is?

February 10, 2004 - 12:51pm -- hydrarchist

Chourmo, Il Cuore di Marsiglia. Jean Claude IzzoNoir set in contemporary Marseille where the protagonist - an ex-cop - must confromt both ex-colleagues and sundry national front supporters.

The New Economy Doug HenwoodThe key to Doug Henwood's talent is pretty simple: he just reads the statistics. rather than talkinbg through his arsehole, Henwood's leftism actually appears to be based on some studies of activity on earth, rather than just debonaire preoccupation about subsumption etc.

MP3 If I Should Fall From Grace with God Rum, Sodomy and the Lash both by The Pogues

Bajo Fondo Tango ClubArgentinian stylee. If you like the Gotan project you'd probably appreciate this.

February 10, 2004 - 12:32pm -- hydrarchist

Consequent to the discussion we had yesterday about where to go with the weblog, I'm going to provide a quick summary of the content areas that I'm actively following.

Abh's concern at the intimidatory factor of 'theory' can be addressed by locating the conceptual reflection in relation to factual incidents and on going 'campaigns', and that indeed is the idea behind the 'feature' proposal. Indeed, in answer to Ben's perplexity before the idea of the journal, this is exactly how I perceive it's purpose to be; a container in which fragments can be collected and put into an intelligible form and where short translations can find a home.

So here it is my worksheet:

- Expansion of and resistance to intellectual property laws, with emphasis on battles around patents and p2p.

- Immaterial labour and information economy. In Barcelona this May there beigins a fight against Forum 2004, a cultural festival modelled in some senses on the social forum. There is a broad campaign which is investigating the relations between culture and gentrification, bohemianism and city branding etc.

- The debate about precariousness in France/Italy/Spain and how that relates to discussions about labour in the US and casualization/flexibility in Ireland/UK. This year May 1st will be the focus for a Europe-wide mobilization around 'precarity' and lots of actions have been taking place already around transport, the reform of the law relating to intermittent labour in france's entertainment industry, campaign for a 'guaranteed income' etc.

Linked to this are the various inquiries and experiences in non-conventional organising, from the Hotlines inquiry into Call Centers, accounts from the fats-food/drink biz etc, the kind of thing found on http://www.prol-position.net/en/index.htm The one other area which I'd like to know more about is sex work, and what kind of conflicts are taking place. In Franmce there have been some amazing campaigns and actions confronting also how things have changed due to the rise in the number of migrant prostitutes etc. Does anyone have any good sources for info on this subject?

- Collaborative audio-visual production, bandidth pooling, collective authorship, copyleft licensing etc. This is basically practical work relating to the http://www.V2V.cc project and to a lesser degree http://www.ngvision.org

- Italian developments around grassroots communications, post-Genoa legal proceedings and the flotasam and jetsam that constitutes everyday life in Berlusconia.

- Ireland, EU enlargement etc. Seeing as there will be the first massive international mobilization in Dublin this coming May 1st, I'd like to give some visibility to the local struggles taking place there, parse through some of the debates about Europe and provide coverage.

Of course other amongst u are interested in these topics too, so this is not an attempt to seal of these themes but a signal that I'm following them, and would be interested in developing longer synthetic pieces in collaboration with others.

February 9, 2004 - 12:37pm -- hydrarchist

January Genoa - The true tale of Diaz school raid 307 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/01/08/1844208

Simon Ford, "Three Recent Books on The Situationis... 295 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/01/02/012200

The Wireless Commons Manifesto 188 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/01/02/0039213

Negri & Zolo, "Empire and the Multitude -- A Dialogue" 541 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/01/31/1410242

Nelson Mandela, "Bush is An Idiot" http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/01/31/179244

Black Bloc Makes Mark on San Francisco Streets http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/01/29/1955224

Stop the Madness of King George: Dispatch from San... http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/01/29/1742246

Olivier De Marcellus, "Commons, Communities & Move... http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/01/28/1518256

John Holloway, "Is the Zapatista Struggle Anti-Cap... http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/01/28/1336251

Anarchism and Leftism in Anti-Globalization Movements http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/01/26/217243

Bove & Empson, "The Dark Side of the Multitude" http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/01/24/1718210

Brian Holmes, "Revenge of the Concept" http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/01/24/1340201

Absurd Responses vs. Earnest Politics http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/01/23/016235

Franco Barchiesi reviews "From Slavery to Wage Labour" http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/01/19/1822207

Pete Townshend: I told you so! http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/01/15/1615237

Rick Prelinger, "Strategies for Freeing Intellectu... http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/01/13/012208

Michel Foucault and Gilles Deleuze, "Intellectuals... http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/01/13/0056200

Wu Ming: Why Not Show Off About the Best Things? A... http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/01/10/0743256

February Space Shuttle Disappears on TV... Dan Rather Crest... http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/02/03/1129236

Summary of the Empire Debate http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/02/03/1244204

American Surrealists, "Surrealism Is Not For Sale!" http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/02/05/1331202

Yann Moulier-Boutang, "The Art of Flight" http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/02/07/1350202

Hydrarchist, "Instead of An Almanach" http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/02/12/1433253

Jason Adams, "The Constellation of Opposition" 338 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/02/13/1256254

Negri & Virno - Public Sphere, labour, Multitude; ... 312 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/02/13/1115252

Katsiaficas, "Subversion of Politics" review 357 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/02/16/2223203

Report on New York Peace March http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/02/17/2151227

Bernard Cassen, "On the ATTAC" http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/02/17/1931213

Negative Wisdom for Comrades in a Dark Time 240 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/02/17/1025201

Michael Hardt - A Trap Set For Protesters 380 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/02/21/184229

British Marxist Historian Christopher Hill Dies, Age 91 309 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/02/25/146210

Aufheben,"Picket and Pot-Banger Together: C... 244 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/02/27/1518253

March

Galese/Lioce March 2003

Rachel Corey Murdered 16 March

Mike Davis, "Slouching Toward Baghdad" http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/03/01/1951255

Toni Negri, "The Order of War" 410 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/03/03/1830251

Excerpt from "Revolutionary Writing" http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/03/03/225244

Chris Morris, "Bushwhacked!" 269 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/03/07/1322224

War Protestor Dies in San Francisco 229 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/03/20/0111212

Geoffrey Heard, "Not Oil, But Dollars vs. Euros" 1141 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/03/20/1330253

Blogger from Baghdad (Disappeared?) 286 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/03/20/1732214

Alex Callinicos, "Autonomism: Evading Power" 360 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/03/27/1416236

Look for Good SF and action on day X piece

April

Hegemony & Empire 310 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/04/02/0137226

"Empire For the Multitude?" 206 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/04/03/0615247

Franklin Rosemont, "On Robin Kelley's Freedom D... 256 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/04/03/1335248

Graham Seaman, "The Two Economies (On Software and... http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/04/03/1353215

Michael Lind, "The Weird Men Behind Bush's War" http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/04/05/1654203

"Punk and Autonomia" 231 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/04/08/1841217

David Martinez recounts the events at the Oakland Docks 196 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/04/10/1527259

Noam Chomsky, "Iraq Is A Trial Run" 268 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/04/11/2040201

Time for Revolution by Antonio Negri http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/04/13/0145200

What if a rifle cost the same as a care bears movie 253 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/04/14/1845221

Manifesto of Urban Televisions 290 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/04/16/173209

Peter Linebaugh, "No Blood for Hydrocarbons?" 205 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/04/24/2244245

Toni Negri Free After 24 Years of Exile and Prison 371 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/04/28/1841251

Peter Linebaugh, "May Day at Kut & Kienthal" 199 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/04/29/1723243

May War officially ends

Luca Casarini Pied in New York 1213 22 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/05/05/0734227

Biotic Baking Brigade Ricotta Division, "Sweet Dis... 360 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/05/10/175240

Saadi Youssef, "America, America" 227 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/05/10/227200

Jürgen Habermas, "Falling Idols in Iraq" 484 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/05/12/1342259

Jon Bekken, "Losing the 8-Hour Day?" 201 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/05/13/1313250

Call to Drive WTO From Cancun 462 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/05/14/2048214

Tommy Chong Busted for Selling Bongs 352 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/05/15/1412235

Proletariat or Multitude? A Postanarchist Critique...197 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/05/16/1736236

Toni Negri, "Dossier: Scattered Speculations on Value" 189 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/05/18/192245

Immanuel Wallerstein, "Empire and the Capitalists" 248 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/05/19/1923259

Jean Baudrillard, "The Violence of the Global" 269 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/05/20/1629222

A Call to Join and Contribute to the Establishment... 188 1 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/05/28/2016250

Lou Reed sells "Heroin" to Nissan 259 1 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/05/29/113240

June

G* Reports http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/06/05/1433235 - bibble http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/06/02/1553258 - disobbedienti http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/06/02/1040243 - usine raid http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/05/30/1842210 - early report http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/05/22/1320247 - WIPE Out

Nicholas Spencer, "Historicizing the Spontaneous R... 194 1 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/06/11/1611236

Bernard-Henri Levy, Superstar of the Chattering Classes 232 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/06/16/1612214

The Piqueteros in Argentina are Back in the Streets 164 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/06/29/0956247

Né qui, né altrove - Migration, Detention, Deserti 188 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/06/19/1242220

Mario Tronti, "The Strategy of Refusal" 186 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/06/19/1419219

Q by Luther Blissett - review by Stewart Home 378 1 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/06/23/0812228

Randall Amster, "Anarchism as Moral Theory" 183 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/06/28/2133212

Intermittenti June 26th, no? Intermittents Appeal: Art Without Artists is Democ... 84 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/08/30/177246

Teachers etc. Class War escalaters in France http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/06/14/1535244

Economic & Philosophical Background to the Auto... 263 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/06/30/1322226

Alan Wald, "Are Trotskyists Running the Pentagon" 204 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/07/01/0053207

Thessaloniki

July

Konrad Becker, "Free Media Camp Vienna" 224 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/07/01/2130221

Excerpt from "Domain Errors" 299 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/07/02/0710205

Excerpt from "Behind the Blip" 499 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/07/02/1438223

Crisso and Odoteo, "Barbarians: The Disordered Ins... 298 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/07/05/2019245

A discussion with Sylvere Lotringer 223 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/07/06/0648247

Zouhair Yahyaoui, Tunisian Cyber-Prisoner, Honored 174 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/07/06/0718243

Saul Newman, "Anarchism and the Politics of Ressen... 319 1 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/07/10/1520239

Slavoj Zizek Shills for Abercrombie & Fitch 954 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/07/11/2157255

British Student Dies Visiting German Fascists 213 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/07/12/222238

The Fugs, An Encore After Forty Years 235 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/07/15/1330246

G. William Domhoff reviews Todd Gitlin's Letter... 230 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/07/17/157259

Fanon, Humanism & Immanence 202 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/07/18/178252

Dissembly Language: Unzipping the World Summit on ... 245 1 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/07/22/0123234

Guinness Stout: From English to Corporate Colonial 219 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/07/22/0153220

Michael Hardt & Antonio Negri, "Marx's Mole Is Dead!" 186 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/07/24/0248201

EZLN Expels NGOs 176 3 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/07/26/219241

"Break the Chains Conference," 310 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/07/27/2129245

Toni Negri, "The Ripe Fruit of Redemption" 285 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/07/30/138212

August Placanica accident

Scott Fleming live from Bagdad http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/08/05/015209

Kolinko - The Subversion of Everyday Life http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/08/09/0126221

Juliana Fredman on how to break a ceasefire. http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/08/11/1737224

Anarchist Black Cross Report from Break the Chains http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/08/14/1737205

Gilberto Gil, "Free Software and the Development o... http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/08/20/178230

SCO challenge to Linux

subRosa, "Tandem Surfing the Third Wave" http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/08/21/1153233

Bob Black, "A Study in Floccinaucinihilipilification" http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/08/21/125223

60's Radical Kathy Boudin Paroled After 22 Years 257 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/08/21/1615202

Ammiel Alcalay Reviews the Third Black Panther Fil... 172 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/08/21/1712212

Juliana Fredman and the virgin mary in the West Bank http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/08/21/2036241

Antasofia, Unpublished Interview with Noam Chomsky... 404 1 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/08/26/1855222

Giorgio Agamben. Stato di eccezione. 142 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/08/28/1447254

Chomsky and Foucault Debate Human Nature 432 4 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/09/01/1526244

September

Said Dies RIAA begin prosecutions Cancun

"Schwarzenegger's Sex Talk" 184 2 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/09/02/151256

NY Times Reviews Play "Trumbo" 321 1 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/09/06/1550253

Andreas Broeckmann, "Notes on the Politics of Soft... 180 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/09/10/1354233

Pentagon Screening of "Battle of Algiers" http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/09/10/14 `28217

Todos Somos Lee 157 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/09/11/2030201

Subcomandante Marcos, "The Slaves of Money" 184 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/09/13/1758226

Writers Bloc, "Cancun Victory" http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/09/17/006257

Fredric Jameson, "Fear and Loathing in Globalization" http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/09/19/1330238

On Coercion & Conformity after 9/11 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/09/21/1518240

Peter Linebaugh, "On the Bicentennial of the Exec... http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/09/21/1559258

"Should Anarchists Support Suicide Bombers?" 258 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/09/22/1849201

Telestreet Rome, "Giving Sky the 'Boot' " 244 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/09/23/1852245

Mustafa Barghouthi, "Tribute to Edward Said" 421 4 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/09/25/1818210

Edward Said Dies

Toni Negri, "The Multitude and the Metropolis" 449 0 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/09/27/1429245

October

Sergio Bologna Reviews Steve Wright's Storming ... 313 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/10/01/1334204

Mike Davis, "Is It Just About Schwarzenegger?" http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/10/02/1814215

Jason Read, Micro-Politics of Capital http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/10/02/1820216

Peter Linebaugh, "Rhymsters and Revolutionaries" 288 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/10/03/195224

Linebaugh's London Hanged http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/10/03/1929219

Brian Holmes, "Maps for the Outside" 184 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/10/10/0141258

Freemasons of the Future - the Semantic Web 198 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/10/10/0211215

Zabalaza, "A Platformist Response to 'Post-Anarchism' " 186 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/10/10/1220218

Trevor Ngwane, "South Africa: Sparks In The Township" 151 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/10/13/0511242

Eben Moglen, "Freeing the Mind: Free Software and ..430 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/10/12/2233203

John Zerzan, "Globalization and Its Apologists: An... 418 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/10/13/1331216

Eben Moglen, "The dotCommunist Manifesto" 263 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/10/12/2237257

"Anarchists Plot to Storm the Palace" 235 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/10/21/164258

Bill Weinberg, "How the Anti-War Movement is Blowi... 294 9 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/10/24/1550202

"Rouge Steel Sold to Russians" 353 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/10/25/153254

John Buchanan, "Bush-Nazi Link Confirmed" 310 1 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/10/27/1725223

Norbert Trenkle, "Crisis Theory in a Crisis Society" 177 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/10/28/189219

Raoul Vaneigem, "Refusals and Passions" 230 0 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/10/29/1424205

George Caffentzis, "Freezing the Movement: Posthum...177 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/10/29/153254

November Florida Jason Adams, "Postanarchism in a Nutshell" 333 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/11/11/1642242

Hakim Bey, "Post-Anarchism Anarchy" 302 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/11/10/1250253

Is Capital taking over Linux? 198 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/11/09/1240257

Jesse Cohn and Shawn Wilbur, "What's Wrong with Po... 208 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/11/08/2320211

Mario Tronti, "Workers and Capital" 167 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/11/08/223255

Ryan Griffis Reviews Domain Errors 191 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/11/04/2156239

Noam Chomsky, "Dominance and Its Dilemmas" 194 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/11/19/2058226

Miami FTAA, "The Capital of Violence and the Viole... 748 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/11/20/1529222

Subcomandante Marcos, "EZLN: 20 &10: Fire and Word" 229 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/11/20/1520250

ESF: Another Venue is Possible: Negri vs Callinicos 170 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/11/20/1134253

Toni Negri, "From the Dangerous Classes to the Dan... 284 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/11/26/178245

David Harvey, "Questions About the New Imperialism" 176 1 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/11/30/1757211

Noam Chomsky, "The Devil's Accountant" 187 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/11/30/1747229

December Saul Newman, "Derrida's Deconstruction of Authority" 185 1 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/12/02/1320242

David Martinez, "500 Miles to Bablyon" 120 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/12/03/1156255

LibreSociety Manifesto 139 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/12/09/1956235

George Dafermos, "Which Information Society?" 100 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/12/10/025201

WSIS: Seizing — You Can't Beat the Feeling! 96 1 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/12/10/1632229

Iraqi Oil Workers Expel KBR 178 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/12/12/164223

Loren Goldner, "Didn't See the Same Movie" 104 3 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/12/15/1352210

Gruppe Krisis, "Manifesto Against Labour" 155 2 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/12/17/1410233

Martinez from Baghdad 70 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/12/18/2212237

WSIS -- "We Seize" Press Release http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/12/05/2218208

War breaks Out/Find San Francisco analysis

Sundry

Ramor Ryan, "Writers as Freedom Fighters" http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/05/12/0614201

George Caffentzis, Greek Interview, Part 1 http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/05/08/2310252

Another Tony http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/04/27/0526249

George Cafentzis examines the argument for the Eur... http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=03/04/09/2354256

February 8, 2004 - 10:30am -- Anonymous Comrade (not verified)

I shouldn't be doing this...

No, I SHOULD be sleeping.

If I sleep, then, I can be a productive worker in the factory where I have been assigned by a temp agency. I did not sleep last night; last night I worked.

For twelve hours.

Tonight I will be working again.

For twelve hours.

I don't get paid very much; and a portion of what I do earn goes to the temp agency I am working through, not to me.

I've been working at the same factory for just about a year now. I don't do much; just pick things up and place them in boxes or - in the case of those boxes - on shippong skids. Over the last two months, efficiency experts came through: and now, we workers must often simultaneously do tasks assigned to TWO people previously. That is a more productive use of our time. The efficiency experts are operating on the premise that it is cheaper to break workers than it is to fix and upgrade machinery to a higher level of efficiency... workers do not require a capital investment which must repay itself.

Over this past year, I have bought computer and photographic equipment to replace that which I parted with in the years when I was doing the field work for my research project, "The Origin of Writing" (see: Sunrise Faces Sunset Mist in Semiotext[e] Canadas).

Did I say replace? Well, I had NOTHING then like I've scraped together now... because for years and years I was doing things like, canvassing door-to-door for Greenpeace and various other groups while moving city-to-city, just to check things out here and there; and wandering around wild obscure places here in Canada, just to see them and take a few photographs here and there... ...and reading all the post structuralism I could get my hands on, to continue theorizing away with reference to a rather obscure alignment of deconstructionalist language theory with my own personal and almost life-long interest in (photographic) images.

Good thing that I did; all of that work became very useful when I unexpectedly found myself shifting my focus onto my current research project - deals with tens of thousands of years of image writing produced by the First Nations of North America... an existential form of production that is undocumented and suppressed by the dominating EuroCulture which has quite successfully assigned itself the right to define what knowledge can be said to be... for the last few hundred years.

Now that I am actually working, I can regain that investment of time in a rediscovery of all the things I had philosophically set myself to doing over those years. And I can share all that work with those here and elsewhere that might be interested in such things because, I actually managed to get my first credit card last month - and with it, I a purchased a web site.

In fact, I've gotten togther all of the technical means of production that I need to put together my research, and present it to interested others. So, that's what I am doing.

I'm at www.OriginOfWriting.com and, although there isn't very much there yet, there will be.

But, I should be sleeping now...

February 6, 2004 - 7:55pm -- Anonymous Comrade (not verified)

well ther there aint much but to make money or hang with friends and in one way or another money is involved. it is easy to live without paying for it, maybe uncomfortable, an even holding a job while doing it. but how long until it comes to you, or you stumble upon the whole ideal that money is eveywhere. so then, do it while it doesn't hurt anybody, then if it comes, although by yourself, it is up to you to make that decision. until then... think planet, and nature.

January 31, 2004 - 6:05pm -- hydrarchist

Sustainability, the Produser Class, and Limitations of Mere Access

V2V functions as a storage and distribution mechanism within a broader schema of an autonomous communications infrastructure. Combined with wireless mesh networks (1) and low power terrestrial transmission (a la Telestreet) (2) such a system can provide a basic outlet for communication without state endowment. This emerged despite rather than because legal and media policies advanced by the state. Instead it has been commodity competition to provide the basis for such a system - PC manufacturers and telecom competitors trying to sell surplus bandwidth and hardware.

This possibility should give us pause to evaluate current proposals made to attenuate conditions of media concentration, and specifically the legalize of pirate television in the framework of community access television. Token concessions in this direction by the funding of community access type "open channels". Such programmes have existed in Germany, Netherlands, Denmark and Sweden since the 1980s, usually funded by some percentage of the license (1% in Germany) fee or a flat sum (5 million in the Netherlands). Despite the existence of nearly 2000 such stations in the United States - financed by local cable franchises contracts - they have not slowed the immiseration of the public sphere. Cost limitations keep these initiatives marginalized, specifically: (i) lack of funds to pay people to work full-time on the production of programs, particularly those which do not follow common-garden political genre formats which are a likely by-product of other activities. (ii) inferior visibility compared to media outlets that invest huge sums in promotion, environment-saturation etc. which they can do because of their advertising budgets (and sales and licensing revenue of course).

Autonomous media projects remain stuck in chronic financial insustainability - thriving for some years before lack of resources takes its toll. At this point one of three things happens. Either they professionalise, accepting standard market practices [Liberation, Tageszeitung, the Village Voice], become dependent on institutional support [via arts councils or EU funded programs] which have consequences for the political content, or simply disappear. The modern cultural worker in many ways epitomizes the typical casualized figure: multi-skilled, mobile, short-term or freelance contracts. Likewise independent media projects themselves are precarious, ephemeral, dependent on the contribution of voluntary labour (self-exploitation or necessary virtuosity?) and small amounts of borrowed or collective fixed capital. Thus media and communication workers are confronted with two unyielding material challenges: the need to finance their own personal self-reproduction and the cash needed to ensure their projects survival. Where can it come from?

Zombie Scarcities in the Era of Abundance Ratings, however unscientific their manufacture, determine advertising revenues. Strangely this premise is not sustained in the criticism of the media itself. Rather than an annex to the world of entertainment, television and celebrity, advertising occupies a determinant position in the world of cultural production - 50% of RAI's revenues (approx 2.2bn) in 2000. Mediaset is simply an advertising business that operates television stations to this end (2.4 bn in 2002). Access to viewers', or users', attention and the chance to influence desires is the 'commodity' that has value and is traded (3). Exposure to advertising comprises a loss of autonomy even where we subjectively 'socialise' many the messages received. More pertinently, maintenance of a fictitious scarcity in broadcast spectrum so as to preserve these advertising markets guides legal regulation. In addition we are asked to pay for the pleasure of this imposition in the form of a television license: 'l'abbonamento' (4).

Initially the license was defended as a means of financing audiovisual production without the constant intrusion of advertising. This was the BBC 'Reithian' model championed by those who envisioned TV as an instrument for education, opposed to practice in the US where attainment of advertising revenues determined viability. In Italy the license fee has existed since 1954 and is currently around 100 euros for the estimated 20 million households - a notional total of 2 billion euros. The 'subscription' - in fact involuntary and blind to consumption of RAI's output - provides no respite from advertising - users get taxed for owning a television as well as having their attention sold to the marketeers of consumer desire.

Reclaim the Media - Abolish RAI The distinction between "professionals" assembling programming and "passive" users consuming ads to perpetrate the model has no technical basis. Our society is permeated by communications networks where media production equipment is diffuse, the digital output shareable - as regards modification, distribution and transmission - and the costs of coordination low, that TV need no longer be the domain of specialists. The barrier to this decentralization remains the question of the wage, of how the media producer can feed herself.

By RAI's admission nearly 20% currently refuse to pay the license. Let's practice and advocate allocation directly by users to people working as cultural producers whom they regard as producing pleasurable or useful things, moments or knowledge. Instead of a centralized information apparatus we would have a diffuse and variegated output, independent editors assembling the results thematically and according to sensibility, interest, perversion or prejudice. Assuming that people's satisfaction can find unexpected expressions means leaving the form - individual, collective, formal - to reflect the manifold character of diffuse social creativity and dissatisfaction. Potential recipents then would include investigative journalists, painters, film-makers, 16 year old punks, fanzine publishers, software programmers, handmade book printers, street poster designers, all types of dancers and clowns, neighborhood theatre troope's, breakfast radio presenters, local and national news teams etc. Instead of a centralized information apparatus we would have a diffuse and variegated output, independent editors assembling the results thematically and according to sensibility, interest, perversion or prejudice.

RAI and Mediaset can battle it out for the advertising.The pretense that RAI functions as an independent observatory and producer of non-commercially determined programming is a joke. The sum of the usual clientelism and lottizzazione. In fact, as every Italian knows, the notion of impartiality in RAI rests on the fact that different political rackets control the stations. The dire nature of Berlusconia should not force us to succumb to the project of Restoration advanced by the pathetic 'opposition'.

'Free' Production and the Universal Income Media producers inhabit precarious circumstances and their abilities are subordinated - the practice of their craft is not self-determined. Their jobs lack benefits and guarantees, are prone to periods of un/under-employment and often have no formal workplace organization. A guaranteed income would address these problems which are not general rather than unique to cultural work and provides a space for collective recognition. Repurposing the license may be somewhat corporatist but is immediately feasible. It can also provide the basis for an independent communications sphere capable of challenging the endemic corruption, bringing news of struggle and articulating the language for new social relations. --------------

(1) See for example the various projects at http://www.locustworld.com/

(2) On this subject see: http://www.telestreet.it/

(3) See on this "Pay For Play", Salon, 14 March 2001, http://dir.salon.com/ent/feature/2001/03/14/payola/index.html

(4) The private system's analogue to the license fee is arguably the charge for Pay TV, where the same perverse logic of paying the provider in order for them to sell your attention is executed. One useful response exploiting the infrastructure of 'mere access' is the decryption and retransmission in the clear of such programming. See: Anon, Telestreet Rome -Giving Sky the 'Boot', at http://slash.autonomedia.org

January 30, 2004 - 6:45pm -- Anonymous Comrade (not verified)

it's funny in a coughing matter to know that if the air could do anything it would hopefully choke us all. in this time ther is no use for anything but action or inter action, but that seems that you can only info share on the internet, it can only be said that ther is one individual, but there is individuals in individual groups. it must be all about location. what the hell is up with america... east coast especially.

January 27, 2004 - 2:38pm -- hydrarchist

http://www.ufficiostampa.rai.it/azienda/bilancio/bilancio.htm

http://www.ufficiostampa.rai.it/azienda/cover_strutt.htm1.

In the merry month of May From my home I started, Left the girls of Tuam Nearly broken hearted, Saluted father dear, Kissed my darlin' mother, Drank a pint of beer My grief and tears to smother, Then off to reap the corn, And leave where I was born, I cut a stout blackthorn, To banish ghost and goblin, In a brand new pair of brogues, I rattled o'er the bogs, And frightened all the dogs On the rocky road to Dublin.

Chorus: One, two, three, four five, Hunt the hare and turn her Down the rocky road And all the ways to Dublin, Whack-fol-lol-de-ra.

2. In Mullingar that night I rested limbs so weary, Started by daylight Next mornin' light and airy, Took a drop of the pure, To keep my heart from sinkin', That's an Irishman's cure, Whene'er he's on for drinking. To see the lasses smile, Laughing all the while, At my curious style, 'Twould set your heart a-bubblin'. They ax'd if I was hired, The wages I required, Till I was almost tired Of the rocky road to Dublin. Chorus: 3. In Dublin next arrived, I thought it such a pity, To be so soon deprived A view of that fine city. Then I took a stroll All among the quality, My bundle it was stole In a neat locality; Something crossed my mind, Then I looked behind; No bundle could I find Upon my stick a wobblin'. Enquirin' for the rogue, They said my Connacht brogue, Wasn't much in vogue On the rocky road to Dublin. Chorus:

4. From there I got away, My spirits never failin' Landed on the quay As the ship was sailin'; Captain at me roared, Said that no room had he, When I jumped aboard, A cabin found for Paddy, Down among the pigs I played some funny rigs, Danced some hearty jigs, The water round me bubblin', When off Holyhead, I wished myself was dead, Or better far instead, On the rocky road to Dublin. Chorus:

5. The boys of Liverpool, When we safely landed, Called myself a fool; I could no longer stand it; Blood began to boil, Temper I was losin', Poor ould Erin's isle They began abusin', "Hurrah my soul," sez I, My shillelagh I let fly; Some Galway boys were by, Saw I was a hobble in, Then with a loud hurray, They joined in the affray. We quickly cleared the way, For the rocky road to Dublin. Chorus:

January 26, 2004 - 10:21am -- hydrarchist

It's in the home that consensus grows up: family and television are the basic tools to create consensus and social control. If we want to traverse the trajectories of television consumption we have to become the media in the space of communication flux. In the last ten years we have witnessed a process of diffusion regarding communication technology, wider accessibility to media tools, and an increased awareness of one's expressive possibilities. This situation favours the mutation of the consumer into the producer. The consumer, following her own natural instinct towards consuming, develops the expertise that allow her to find online the shows of her favourite soap opera or the lastest Hollywood movie, and download them easily at home. This increasing experience in Internet Computer Technology and sharing introduces the consumer to networks where not only pirate materials circulate, but also independent productions. These independent productions belong to a realm which is an alternative to the market in commodities.

Examples of these alternative networks are New Global Vision (www.ngvision.org) and V2V (www.v2v..cc). The aim is to collect and distribute videos on the Internet using peer-to-peer networks. Both the projects suggest the Creative Commons license as a way to protect the productions and the authors.

V2V has the following aims:

1. To use an audio-video compression algorytm (codec) within a format (.avi, .mov, etc) which may be used on every OS (linux, windows, mac, ...) and which is free software. The developers of V2V are waiting for the release of the OGG THEORA codec, currently the suggestion is VP3.

2. To share not only final video productions but also raw footage to allow collective editing.

3. To decentralize access to the archives through the use of RSS feeds.

4. To use peer-to-peer networks such as edonkey or bittorrent to disseminate videos.

These mechanisms facilitate the circulation of content between independent producers and are a opportunity for the sustainability of innitiatives such as the Street Televisions in Italy. To fill up and create a daily palimpsest is in fact the most expensive need for independent TV. Several experiences in this field show us the simple possibility of building an antenna, transmitter and amplifier from which to start broadcasting. To broadcast not only to obtain a corner in the mediascape but to change the nature of the mediascape itself. This vision is not feasable if it is not supported by a network, as there soon becomes a need for content. This can be provided by a local space of production or by collective pool from the net. To integrate and to cross several media (TV, radio, Internet) is to create paths and time-space tunnels in a flux which attempts to drown us.

The motivations behind independent media projects are highly differentiated: desire to reconstruct the public sphere; interest in experimentation and the development of media production skills; longing to tell new stories in different ways; will to develop a mass medium to counterpose a critical political message to that emanating from the commercial broadcast networks. Obviously Italy's curious blend of political and media power is even somewhat particular.

Beyond Mere Access

V2V functions as a storage and distribution mechanism within a broader schema of an autonomous communications infrastructure. When combined with wireless mesh networks and low power transmission (a la Telestreet) such a system is capable of providing a basic outlet for communication to all. The irony is that this potential has emerged in spite rather than because of the legal and media policies underpinned by the state. Instead it has been the commodification of personal computers and later bandwidth which have provided the rudimentary basis for such a system.

This possibility should give us pause to evaluate the typical proposals made to rectify or alleviate conditions of media concentration, and specifically on the current legal proposals to legalize pirate television and normalise it in the framework of community access television. Such a system has existed in the United States for twenty years - known as PEG (Public, Educational and Governmental) channels - and provides access for non-commercial broadcasters to cable and satellite systems. Thousands of these channels exist but they have scarcely attracted any audience attention at all. Why?

(1) lack of funds to pay people to work full-time on the production of programs, particularly those which do not follow common-garden political genre formats which are a likely by-product of other activities.

(2) The imbalance in user motivation stemming from lack of visibility in comparison to media outlets investing huge amounts of money in promotion, environment -saturation etc. which they can do because of their advertising budgets (and sales and licensing revenue of course).

Sustainability Thus, autonomous media projects remain stuck in a quagmire of chronic financial insustainability - they can thrive for some years before the lack of resources takes its toll. At this point one of three things happen. Either they professionalise and accept standard market practices [Liberation, Tageszeitung, the Village Voice], become dependent on institutional support [via arts councils or EU funded programs] which have consequences for the political content, or simply disappear. The modern cultural worker in many ways reflects the typical casualized figure: multi-skilled, mobile, short-term or freelance contracts. Likewise independent media projects themselves are precarious, ephemeral, dependent on the contribution of voluntary labour (self-exploitation or necessary virtuosity?) and small amounts of borrowed or collective fixed capital. Thus media and communication workers are confronted with two unyielding material challenges: the need to finance their own personal self-reproduction and the cash needed to ensure their projects survival. Where can it come from?

The TV License/Arts Council At its inception the television license was defended as the only means of financing audiovisual production without the constant intrusion of advertising. This was the Reithian model championed by those who envisioned tv as an instrument for education, opposed to that in evidence in the US where stations advertising revenues determined what programs could or could not be produced. In Italy the license fee has existed since 1954 and is currently set at almost 100 euros for each of the estimated 20 million households - a notional total of 2 billion euros. The inaptly named subscription - which is in fact involuntary and is legally required without consumption of RAI's products - provides no safety from advertising however. Thus users get the worst of all worlds: they are taxed for owning the means of reception, and then their attention is given to the manufacturers of consumer desire to be saturated. That fund has been used to maintain a 'public' media under the model of clientelism and rival political party mouthpieces. That system has now been put in crisis by the extension of Berlusconi's control over the CDA and the eviction of presenters like Santoro.

By way of comparison, in the Netherlands, a country of 16 million people, there are 330 community radio stations and 100 community television stations, most of which also have an Internet presence. They operate year round with a public service remit on a non-profit-distributing basis and are locally controlled and accountable. The Dutch licence fee service agency distributes £5M per annum in structural support to the community broadcasting sector. The total turnover of the sector is near to £25M per annum with the remainder coming from local grants, sponsorship and advertising. The average community radio station has a turnover of £60,000. Community television services in the Netherlands operate at a similar economic level by mixing text, still images and teletext with a limited amount of moving image production. The Dutch community broadcasting sector sustains some 500 jobs but involves more than 25,000 active volunteers.

http://italy.indymedia.org/news/2004/01/469551.php

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