Friday 23 September 2011
Poster - Vision and Strategy
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| Collaborative work with team members Joel Alcorn, Jordan Lane, Damien Tammer and Steve Webster. |
Thursday 22 September 2011
Social Enter Prise - proposal
http://portal.sliderocket.com/AXYOC/My-Presentation-1
a short presentation outlining my proposal.
crank up the sound!
a short presentation outlining my proposal.
crank up the sound!
Wednesday 21 September 2011
from Production to Produsage
Axel Bruns
http://produsage.org
In this groundbreaking exploration of our developing participatory online culture, Axel Bruns (QUT) establishes the core principles which drive the rise of collaborative content creation in environments from open source through blogs and the Wikipedia to Second Life. He shows that what's emerging here is no longer just a new form of content production, but a new process for the continuous creation and extension of knowledge and art by collaborative communities: produsage. The implications of the gradual shift from production to produsage are profound, and will affect the very core of our culture, economy, society, and democracy.
In collaborative communities the creation of shared content takes place in a networked, participatory environment which breaks down the boundaries between producers and consumers and instead enables all participants to be users as well as producers of information and knowledge - frequently in a hybrid role of produser where usage is necessarily also productive. Produsers engage not in a traditional form of content production, but are instead involved inprodusage - the collaborative and continuous building and extending of existing content in pursuit of further improvement. Participants in such activities are not producers in a conventional, industrial sense, as that term implies a distinction between producers and consumers which no longer exists; the artefacts of their work are not products existing as discrete, complete packages; and their activities are not a form of production because they proceed based on a set of preconditions and principles that are markedly at odds with the conventional industrial model.
The produsage process itself is fundamentally built on the affordances of the technosocial framework of the networked environment, then, and here especially on the harnessing of user communities that is made possible by their networking through many-to-many communications media. By providing such functionality, network technologies have substantially extended the boundaries for the community of participants able to contribute to the produsage project. Indeed, even those members of the networked population who choose for the moment to remain users, simply utilising the 'products' of the produsage process as substitutes for industrial products, are always already potential produsers themselves - and recent developments have made it ever more easy, and in some cases even inevitable, for such users to become produsers (for example as their very patterns of usage become direct inputs to the continuing processes of produsage).
While produsage processes produce real outcomes, and while we could therefore describe produsage as a (commons-based, peer-to-peer) form of production, to understand the collaborative processes involved in produsage, and to examine their influence on the form and content of the information, knowledge, and creative work prodused in the process, our focus must turn elsewhere. An important consequence of this shift of focus, then, is also that we must revise our understanding of the outcomes of produsage process, distinguishing them from the products of the industrial model. Although produsage outcomes can substitute for conventional products, this dressing-up of the temporary outcomes of a continuing process as 'products' in their own right should not be misunderstood to indicate that these artefacts are anything but temporary, that they are anything other than artefacts. A physical product - and by extension, an informational product produced and distributed through conventional industrial models which are ultimately rooted in physical production paradigms - is defined by its boundedness; it is 'the complete package,' a self-contained, unified, finished entity. By contrast, the 'products' of the collaborative content creation efforts which we examine throughout this book are the polar opposites of such products: they are inherently incomplete, always evolving, modular, networked, and never finished. Their process of 'production' is a process of perpetual, ceaseless, continuous update, extension, and revision which operates not according to a predetermined blueprint or design, but is driven by the vagaries of user-producer interest in and enthusiasm for fixing specific problems or extending particular aspects of the project. Its outcomes are artefacts, not products.
The social, collaborative basis of the content creation communities engaged in produsage also indicates this; in produsage projects, the object of the communal effort is almost always as much the development of social structures to support and sustain the shared project as it is the development of that project itself. As Eric von Hippel notes in Democratizing Innovation, the object of such produsage is not simply information, but an information commons; in its full form, the information (knowledge, creative work) prodused by the community therefore exists not in abstraction from the social contexts of its development, as a stand-alone product, but exists only as directly embedded in such contexts, as a temporary artefact of continuing social processes of developing, extending, negotiating, and evaluating this shared content. Just as we do not speak of 'producing' our social networks (we build, extend, maintain, improve them), in collaborative content creation much the same observation applies: here, too, content creation is an act of maintenance and construction (of both content and the social relationships among participants) at least as much as it is one of production. Most participants in content creation communities will therefore see themselves exactly as that: as participants, not as producers. Although their behaviour in these communities may be 'productive' as their acts of participation accumulate, for some participants this may be only a corollary to their social use of the communal spaces, and to their engagement in the community.
Produsage: Key Principles
1. Open Participation, Communal Evaluation
2. Fluid Heterarchy, Ad Hoc Meritocracy
http://produsage.org
In this groundbreaking exploration of our developing participatory online culture, Axel Bruns (QUT) establishes the core principles which drive the rise of collaborative content creation in environments from open source through blogs and the Wikipedia to Second Life. He shows that what's emerging here is no longer just a new form of content production, but a new process for the continuous creation and extension of knowledge and art by collaborative communities: produsage. The implications of the gradual shift from production to produsage are profound, and will affect the very core of our culture, economy, society, and democracy.
In collaborative communities the creation of shared content takes place in a networked, participatory environment which breaks down the boundaries between producers and consumers and instead enables all participants to be users as well as producers of information and knowledge - frequently in a hybrid role of produser where usage is necessarily also productive. Produsers engage not in a traditional form of content production, but are instead involved inprodusage - the collaborative and continuous building and extending of existing content in pursuit of further improvement. Participants in such activities are not producers in a conventional, industrial sense, as that term implies a distinction between producers and consumers which no longer exists; the artefacts of their work are not products existing as discrete, complete packages; and their activities are not a form of production because they proceed based on a set of preconditions and principles that are markedly at odds with the conventional industrial model.
The produsage process itself is fundamentally built on the affordances of the technosocial framework of the networked environment, then, and here especially on the harnessing of user communities that is made possible by their networking through many-to-many communications media. By providing such functionality, network technologies have substantially extended the boundaries for the community of participants able to contribute to the produsage project. Indeed, even those members of the networked population who choose for the moment to remain users, simply utilising the 'products' of the produsage process as substitutes for industrial products, are always already potential produsers themselves - and recent developments have made it ever more easy, and in some cases even inevitable, for such users to become produsers (for example as their very patterns of usage become direct inputs to the continuing processes of produsage).
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| The produser |
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| The Information Commons of Produsage |
Produsage: Key Principles
1. Open Participation, Communal Evaluation
3. Unfinished Artefacts, Continuing Process
4. Common Property, Individual Rewards
Foldit!! gamers decode AIDS protein
Competitive Protein Folding
In 2008, University of Washington scientists released the game Foldit, hoping a sort of critical mass of gamers would mess around with proteins and, in the process, uncover some of their intrigue. (We have more than 100,000 types of proteins in our bodies alone.)
Last year, we checked in on the project's progress, and principal investigator Zoran Popovic said that some 60,000 people worldwide had taken on the challenge. Popovic hoped the initial results his team reported on last year would convince those on the sidelines that scientific discovery games could actually lead to important breakthroughs.
In a matter of 10 days, gamers were able to do what biochemists have been trying to do for a decade: decipher the structure of a protein called retroviral protease, an enzyme that is key to the way HIV multiplies. Being able to see how this protein builds will likely help scientists develop drugs to halt that growth.
Last year, we checked in on the project's progress, and principal investigator Zoran Popovic said that some 60,000 people worldwide had taken on the challenge. Popovic hoped the initial results his team reported on last year would convince those on the sidelines that scientific discovery games could actually lead to important breakthroughs.
In a matter of 10 days, gamers were able to do what biochemists have been trying to do for a decade: decipher the structure of a protein called retroviral protease, an enzyme that is key to the way HIV multiplies. Being able to see how this protein builds will likely help scientists develop drugs to halt that growth.
AKT
Sawako and Panagiotis at AKT
http://www.akt-uk.com/
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| Tensor field streamlines |
Currently Sawako and Panagiotis are working as computational design researchers in Adams Kara Taylor based in London. They have worked on projects by well known architectural practices in the United Kingdom including Zaha Hadid Architects, Future Systems, and Foreign Office Architects in the development of architectural design involving complicated geometries. Their research aims in developing design solutions that respect criteria of structural efficiency and architectural intentions by interrogating the intrinsic properties of forms and their embedding space.
Panagiotis Michalatos
Studied Architecture at NTUA Athens Greece and graduated in 2001. He then went to Sweden to study at the art and technology course in Gothenburg a program jointly organized by Chalmers and IT-Universitet. His studies focused on the development of real time motion analysis software for interactive projections in public spaces, and development of a multi user real time architectural design software based on parametric objects that allows multiple people to work on the same model synchronically by employing a server client model.
Panagiotis worked as a programmer in the fields of interaction design and architecture and developed experimental computer games. He collaborated with choreographer Cristina Caprioli [CCAP] in Stockholm, developing software for her performances that generates patterns that react to or reinterpret the dancers’ movements.
Sawako Kaijima
In 2005, she graduated with a Master of Architecture from Massachusetts Institute of Technology after having previously studied in Keio University, Japan, where she earned her Bachelor of Arts in Environmental Information majoring in Media Design.
Her studies in MIT focused on developing design methodologies that aims to syntheses the multi-relational aspect of the design by means of digital computation. Specifically, she developed projects and design solution that are highly integrated with environmental information, which were presented at various schools including MIT, University of Pennsylvania, Architectural Association, and University of East London.
Panagiotis Michalatos
Studied Architecture at NTUA Athens Greece and graduated in 2001. He then went to Sweden to study at the art and technology course in Gothenburg a program jointly organized by Chalmers and IT-Universitet. His studies focused on the development of real time motion analysis software for interactive projections in public spaces, and development of a multi user real time architectural design software based on parametric objects that allows multiple people to work on the same model synchronically by employing a server client model.
Panagiotis worked as a programmer in the fields of interaction design and architecture and developed experimental computer games. He collaborated with choreographer Cristina Caprioli [CCAP] in Stockholm, developing software for her performances that generates patterns that react to or reinterpret the dancers’ movements.
Sawako Kaijima
In 2005, she graduated with a Master of Architecture from Massachusetts Institute of Technology after having previously studied in Keio University, Japan, where she earned her Bachelor of Arts in Environmental Information majoring in Media Design.
Her studies in MIT focused on developing design methodologies that aims to syntheses the multi-relational aspect of the design by means of digital computation. Specifically, she developed projects and design solution that are highly integrated with environmental information, which were presented at various schools including MIT, University of Pennsylvania, Architectural Association, and University of East London.
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| Design in a non homogenous and anisotropic space / Interrogating the stress tensor field |
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| “problem-formulation“ |
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| Sequence screenshots |
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| Field Interrogation |
biothing
biot(h)ing is a research-design laboratory whose structure derives from particular linkages between various disciplinary and technological nodes, promoting intra-specific creative relationships which in turn serve as a transformative tissue for the design process itself. An algorithmic articulation of the relation between the corporeal and incorporeal i s biot(h)ing’s attempt to engage with complexity. Away from individuations as subject or form, design is understood as genetic inscription. Parallel reality of the invisible code is a common ground for multiple actualizations.
www.biothing.org
alisa andrasek is an experimental practitioner of architecture and computational processes in design. In 2001 she founded biot(h)ing, a t rans-disciplinary laboratory which research focuses on generative potential of physical and artificial computational systems for design. Andrasek graduated from the School of Architecture, University o f Zagreb and holds a Masters in Advanced Architectural Design from Columbia University.
www.biothing.org
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| “swells: scripting logics“ |
Tuesday 20 September 2011
MUD's - multi user domains
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| Virtual think tank torrent diagram |
"Envisioning Cyberspace: The Design of OnLine Communities"
by Peter Anders
1996
Peter Anders is an architect, educator, and information design theorist. He has published widely on the architecture of cyberspace and is the author of Envisioning Cyberspace (McGraw Hill, 1998), which presents design principles for on-line spatial environments. He is currently a fellow of the University of Plymouth CaiiA-STAR Ph.D. program.
The development of the World Wide Web into an active, visual social environment poses unique opportunities for the design professions. Multi-user Domains, social meeting places in cyberspace, are mostly text-based virtual realities which use spatial references to set the stage for social interaction. Over the past year design students at the New Jersey Institute of Technology School of Architecture have investigated several text-based domains. In the course of their work, they envisioned and graphically portrayed these environments as immersive virtual realities through the use of computer animation. Their studies addressed issues ranging from the nature of symbolic motion to social/political structures of these domains.
Internet as Site
Multi-user Domains (MUDs) are mediated social environments on the Internet. Originally intended for role playing games such as Dungeons and Dragons, they have since developed into elaborate social settings serving on-line social and professional communities. Despite the spatial qualities of MUDs, few of them are visual. Instead, they are text-based virtual realities which require the user to rely on descriptions of space and motion to create an image of the domain.
The use of text is dictated by the MUD software. Currently there are a variety of MUD types which differ largely in their programming code. MOOs (MUDs Object Oriented), MUSHes (Multi-User Shared Hallucination), MUSEs (Multi-User Simulated Environment) are among the many hundred MUDs currently operating on the Internet. "MUD" and "domain" are here used to generically refer to these types.
The text interface is an efficient medium. It limits memory requirements for the computers and speeds up real-time interaction. It can also conjure an image with a well-crafted description. As a result, MUD users often prefer the verbal environment, arguing that it allows them freedom of interpretation. Some users insist that the introduction of graphics will reduce, rather than enhance, the MUDding experience.
Use of MUDs involves logging on to a computer server, often using Telnet or Gopher programs. Once on, the user types responses to text on the screen, say, the description of a room they have "entered". The user might type "N" to leave the room by going north. The scene then changes as a new space description is offered. Users move from place to place by using sequential commands or by teleporting directly to their destination.
Conversation on MUDs is formatted to simulate dialog in a book. If a user, Fred, types "Hey, there!, the computer configures this to read as "Fred says,'Hey, there!'". The result is that the user appears engaged in both the reading and creation of a novel. As users become more familiar with the commands, they gain a greater range of expression and action within the MUD.
Graphic MUDs are still a technical novelty and their success is mixed. Preliminary efforts (the Palace, World Chat and Alphaworld) are disappointing. The schematic quality of the contents and their graphics lack the poetry found in text MUDs. The ephemerality of MUDs also argues for spaces which are dynamic, responsive to their social and subjective nature. While text-based environments have an implicit, logical structure, their image as architecture is highly subject to the user. Current graphic MUDs, on the other hand, lose this depth by literally illustrating architectural environments. In many cases their illustration comes at the expense of poetry.
MUD Archeologies
In the spring and fall semester of 1995, my graduate and undergraduate students at the New Jersey Institute of Technology's School of Architecture surveyed ten MUDs on the Internet. This work was partially funded by an NJIT SBR grant for cyberspace research . The study was largely conducted in a CAD supported design studio and was carried out as a semester-long design assignment. The MUDs selected were social domains not overtly used for role-playing games. Their selection was limited to text-based MUDs to maximize the students' design opportunities.
The students, in teams of two, became citizens of their selected MUDs and explored the spaces described by the text. Typically, the team would divide the work between a navigator and cartographer. One operated the machine, "moving" from place to place within the MUD. The other charted locations of the places they visited. As the domains were mapped, these diagrams grew increasingly complex. This information was carefully documented to produce a log/sketchbook and a 3D logical adjacency model of the MUD.
These models, perhaps the first spatial documents of these MUDs, formed a schematic diagram of the domains' spaces. Their coding was intentionally simple. Cubes represented spaces which were accessed directionally, using N, E, S, W or Up and Down commands. Spheres indicated spaces accessible by teleporting or by invoking their names. Points of MUD entry were colored red. Spaces were linked with simple rod connections appropriate to the directions indicated. Other symbols varied from model to model depending on the specifics of the MUD.
The final results were surprising in their complexity. Resembling extremely large molecular models, they documented hundreds of spaces. In many cases the models had to remain unfinished since the MUDs contained many more spaces beyond their main structure. Since MUD structure is dynamic, many of them grew and evolved throughout the study.
Most MUDs mapped easily as flow-chart diagrams. Some, however, had spatial anomalies. A room in DreaMOO described as being west of another, was entered by going east from that room. The nested arrangement of the Chatting Zone spaces would not translate easily to a ball and stick model. The rigorous structure of HoloMUCK forced the creation pseudo-spaces just to allow movement through it.
Domain Structure
The logical adjacency model of each MUD has a distinct form, like a fingerprint. Often MUDs begin as a verbal diagram of a neighborhood (Jay's House), an existing town (The Chatting Zone) or even the Earth (Meridian). Once in place, citizens of the MUDs are invited to build their own rooms and buildings. Over time the configuration of the domain changes to the point that not even its operators, known as wizards, know the current shape of the community.
It is a participatory architecture, a kind of architecture without architects. There are constraints on building, however. The degree of freedom that builders have depends on the wizards. Some MUDs, like HoloMUCK or Jay's House, have stringent codes enforcing the "realism" of proposed additions. The ability to build rooms also is dictated by the wizards. Each citizen is allotted an amount of memory to build objects. This increases with the status of the citizen. Getting memory or status in MUDs is a symbolic and social issue, often a result of "who you know". In the study, some researchers achieved high-ranking builder status and eventually became wizards themselves.
Some domains were clearly based on physical models, often based on the hometowns of the administrating wizards. For example, The Chatting Zone is a cyberspace mapping of Ipswich, Ireland, hometown of the MUD's founder. While Meridian maps the entire planet, its point of entry is in Norway, home of its wizard. Oddly, Meridian's server is in Morristown, NJ!
Basing MUDs on actual physical models is an expeditious first step in starting the domain. It saves the wizard the effort of creating the spaces from scratch and lets him or her to make a "home" out of the domain. It also allows easy navigation of the space, keeping the directions simple and places memorable for its users.
JupiterMOO, developed by Pavel Curtis, is based on the layout of XeroxPARC in Palo Alto, California. Its mapping is so accurate that MUDders who visit the actual facility can find their way around the campus. LambdaMOO, one of the largest operating MUDs, was originally based on Curtis' personal apartment. In yet another case, MediaMOO incorporates the architecture of MIT's MediaLab. Its founding wizard, Amy Bruckman, whimsically added a floor to the building to provide space for a ballroom and partying facilities.
As a MUD community develops, the original stucture is elaborated, sometimes leaving the real-space reference behind. The resulting geometry can become complex and difficult to map. Most MUDders are allowed to build their own rooms once they have citizenship. These rooms are often independent of the main logical structure, hovering outside the domain. In DreaMOO, for instance, linking new construction to the main structure requires permission. Not only must the builder petition the wizards, but the creators of connecting spaces . It is a complicated affair, and none our investigators were able to link their work to the main structures.
This results in constructions which have non-directional connections to the main MUD. Most private spaces, often quite elaborate, can only be accessed by teleporting. Guests may enter these spaces only if they are invited by the owner. As a result, many of the private spaces of the MUDs remained unmappable because of access problems. Often the addresses for teleport access were simply unavailable.
The freedom allowed by wizards directly affects the MUD's structure. BayMOO, a SanFrancisco based MUD, has a laissez-faire approach and over time has evolved into a free-form branching structure. Its logical mapping reflects its incremental and unplanned growth. In contrast, Jay's Place has such severe "reality" requirements that descriptions of nearby cliffs had to be rewritten to reflect the actual rock composition.
Generally, MUDs in which the wizards exert the most control are more rigorously geometrical and easier to map. The looser structure of more participatory communities, like MediaMOO, make them initially more difficult to navigate. In MediaMOO, organizing spaces like Curtis Commons were later added to provide orientation for the users.
HoloMUCK illustrates the extremes of control. Its server is located at McGill University in Canada. HoloMUCK's predecessor was called Flux. Originally, its wizards had developed an open MUD, placing minimal restrictions on building proposals. As the MUD developed, the configuration became more and more complex. The founding wizards felt that the illogical nature of the spaces made the MUD unusable. As a result, navigation depended more and more on teleporting and the illusion of the larger MUD structure was lost.
HoloMUCK was recreated using geometry clearly derived from a generic Canadian small town. Two main roads intersect to provide orientation and a river runs through it. The wizards have created one of the most controlled MUD environments found in the study. As in Jay's Place, HoloMUCK's planning stresses the realism of the domain. If a closet were opened to reveal an aircraft hangar, the wizards would not allow its construction in the main MUD structure.
If the failure of the original HoloMUCK was due to its spontaneity, the new MUD suffers from its stifling control. HoloMUCK's wizards have tried to resolve this by letting builders do what they like outside the "city limits". Lying outside the main structure is a free-zone in which spaces may follow any or no logic at all. As a result, most new construction lies outside the rigorous and isolated core, TANSTAAFL.
"Reality " Checks
The failure of some MUDs is due to problems other than politics. MUD size is largely determined by the number of spaces and objects programmed by the citizens. The number of rooms vastly outnumbers the users - especially the number logged on at one time. A paradoxical result is that MUDs with the greatest number of builders seem to have the lowest density population. This explains the apparent vacancy of many MUDs. While there are pockets of activity, large portions of the MUD often remain unused and rarely visited.
Unsuccessful rooms are like unsuccessful Web homepages. Once built they are rarely modified. Visitors may "hit" on a space once or twice, but without novelty or companionship to engage them, they rarely return. Our researchers found that few fellow MUDders knew the domains as well as they. Many citizens had not explored the main structure since their first few visits.
MUD activity centers on the entry, where users begin their sessions. In the MUD it often appears as a lobby, a town square or visitor center. In LambdaMOO, it is a closet. The area immediately around the entry is also populated but occupancy drops of sharply thereafter. MUDders often prefer teleporting to their destinations rather than sequentially moving through the labyrinth of rooms.
The problem is exacerbated by privatization. As mentioned, private spaces are often not spatially linked to the main MUD structure. The Chatting Zone and the University of MOO apparently have a great number of rooms in which private socializing occurs. Many citizens enter the MUD only to teleport directly to their rooms. In some MUDs citizens enter directly into their rooms, often staying there to monitor the MUD. This depletes the activity in the public portions of the MUD . There usually aren't enough users logged on to support this stratification.
This polarization between entry and private rooms results from poor spatialization and design. Real cities don't have single points of entry. Their periphery is open to the traffic of commerce and the population. Even the most private spaces in a city are part of its spatial structure. MUDs, while seemingly based on reality ignore some fundamental truths of community planning. Teleportation is a symptom of the problem, but not its cause. HoloMUCK forbids teleportation because its wizards feel teleporting destroys the sense of physical community. This solution is misconceived. Teleportation is merely a user's way around a problem of design.
The graphic representation of a domain offers solutions to these problems. If visitors can "see" the extent of the MUD, they might be more inclined to explore it. Presently, the text medium blinds users to distant spaces and blinkers their experience. It limits their exploration to sequential plodding from space to space. They are only aware of the rooms immediately adjacent to themselves.
Teleportation is preferred to this movement once destinations are known and citizens are familiar with their domains. However, social activity diminishes as teleporting increases. Teleportation does not allow for the chance encounters and discoveries offered by the illusion of actual movement.
Possible resolutions would include incorporating the private spaces into the main structures of the MUDs. Limiting access to these spaces to spatial motion may also improve activity in the main structure. However, the burden of access should be lightened by providing more access points to the MUD. This would shorten the distance to a destination. If more than one entry is used, each will serve as a node of activity, creating the equivalents of neighborhood pubs and hangouts.
Random entry at these points would also stimulate exploration and interaction. Once the main entry has a critical mass of occupants, additional visitors could be let in elsewhere to spread activity to the lesser frequented areas. It could revitalize the MUD community.
Envisioning Cyberspace
The next phase of the study was to create two visions of the MUDs: one from a consensus of the subject MUD community; the other a personal interpretation by each investigator. In both cases the ambiguities of the text were used to spark the design process.
After the creation of the logical adjacency models, the investigators interviewed several of their fellow MUD citizens. This came naturally from the mapping phase. Many friendships had been made in the course of charting the domains. Other MUDders were curious about the project and would periodically check on its progress. The wizards were impressed, at times flattered, by the dedication of the researchers to their domains. The citizens were generally enthusiastic about helping with the study.
The results of the interviews were mixed and initially disappointing. The original aim of this phase was to arrive at a consensus vision of what the MUD would be like as a three-dimensional environment. By having the MUDders elaborate on their domains, it was hoped that enough detail would be generated to visualize the spaces. This proved difficult at best.
In only a few cases did respondents provide useful information. When asked to elaborate on a series of spaces, one woman faxed sketches she had made to illustrate what she imagined them to be. This was an exception to the rule. Largely, the responses, though well-meaning, generated no more than the descriptions already provided by the MUD iteself. The MUDders were not prepared to embellish these texts and were bemused by the researchers asking such "obvious" questions.
This phase of the study contrasted the researchers' interests with those of their fellow MUDders. The project had been created with the aim of envisioning these cyberspace communities. Most MUDders don't question the use of text, treating it as a given while logged onto the domains. Some feared losing the richness of text to the newer graphical MUDs. To them the MUD is about social interaction, not the setting.
Many MUD citizens value the subjectivity of the text and bridle at the definition of the MUD space with a fixed design. Anarchitecture seemed preferred over an architecture. This became a theme many of the researchers incorporated into their own designs. Some projects merged text with graphics to provide a hybridized environment, others developed methods to allow MUDders to customize their image of the domains.
In the final phase of the project, the researchers were to individually generate a vision of their MUDs. They were to incorporate anything they might have learned in the course of the study, but were not bound by the information generated in the interviews. Each student was asked to use this opportunity to express a unique quality of being online. This was an effort to define the qualities of cybereal architecture.
The sequence of spaces encountered in the rendition had to match the layout of the logical adjacency model. The models became the focus of much debate since the illusion of space and motion had not been challenged to that point. The logic of the MUD structure (orientation, connection and location) is verifiable, but the nature of the spaces and connections is subject to debate.
Poetry in Motion
Motion in a MUD is an illusion created by the text sequence . MUDders issue directional commands to get from place to place. If no directional options are available, they can use the name of the destination to get there. However, teleporting differs little from conventional MUD movement. Both result in a space description with options for exits.
Motion by the user is entirely symbolic. The symbolism of motion is crucial to the MUD experience. It implies that the user is situated and complicit within the MUD environment. Movement brings the user into the MUD psychologically. It is integral to the MUD's immersive nature.
The investigators were encouraged to view this motion critically, seeing themselves as stage managers in a play. This manager has a unique position in a production. Unlike the actors or audience, the manager is not immersed in the environment. He charged with realizing the illusion. The students were to create the illusion of motion without necessarily mimicking it.
Several students explored motion in their visualizations. In all cases, the work was presented as computer animations rendered with AutoDesk's 3D studio. While CAD animations are still a novelty in architecture schools, the dynamic, ephemeral qualities of MUDs demanded the medium. Fades, pans, animation, change of viewing angles, morphing and other cinematic methods became common practice by the end of the study.
These techniques were specifically used to address the illusion of motion. For example, fading into another scene is similar to the experience of reading the description of a space. Entering into an unknown space was also presented as motion seen through the back of the head - like a video camera pointed out the back of a car. The viewer doesn't know where he or she is until the room has already been entered.
Some investigators interpreted motion relativistically. Rather than the viewer moving around the space, the space would move around the viewer. This reflected the actual user sitting in a chair while manipulating the MUD environment. This was demonstrated in animations where, although the viewer changed direction, only the setting moved while the "sky" did not.
In other cases morphing techniques were used to transform distant buildings into closer buildings, providing a dreamlike quality to the motion. One project by George Wharton III proposed that the MUD was always the same space and that the viewer was fixed. The illusion of motion was provided by a continual morphing of the MUD envelope. "Architectural" ripples in the envelope internally created the illusion of passing buildings.
Morphing can create motion effects in other ways. If rooms transform themselves into a user's destination, a non-spatial movement is effected. One researcher , Susan Sealer, devised buildings which changed shape at the user's whim. Going from one space to another was equated with reshaping the point of departure. In another experiment she changed the focal length of the software cameras. By dynamically reducing the focal length, the original scene was reduced to a point. The succeeding scene seemed to engulf it as it came into view, ultimately replacing the preceding space.
Another investigator, Tom Vollaro, presented his MUD as empty space filled with flying shards of matter[ill.3] When the user wanted to enter a space, the shards would collect around him as though drawn by a magnet until the space was formed. This resulted in a graceful ballet of fragments - shattering and reforming as the user "moved" through the MUD.
Society and Self
The user's identity while online is represented by a character called an avatar. Avatars often do not have the same name as their owner sometimes disguising the user's identity . The result is a masque which retains the role-playing character of the earlier MUDs. Much has been written on the subject of identity and its effect on MUD communities.
Several researchers focused their work on the avatar's presence in the MUD. As with motion, presence can be viewed relativistically. Presence is a subtle interaction between the self and the environment and several avatars were designed to manifest this relationship.
One investigator , Dana Napurano, associated light with this issue. When moving from place to place in a text-based MUD, the user activates the descriptions of the rooms. That space is "illuminated" by reading the text. This illumination would remain constant until one avatar met another and engaged in conversation. At that point the light emanating from one avatar focused upon the other, casting the rest of the space into shadow. Attention and forgetting were both illustrated by this simple gesture.
While many avatars in the study were humanoid in shape, there were significant exceptions. In an independent project by one student, the setting of the MUD was invisible and avatars were abstract, illuminated forms [ill. 4]. When an avatar entered a new space, its color changed. Groups of avatars in a space formed constellations of light, intensifying their color while in dialog. Cyberspace was envisioned as a universe of human constellations.
In another case an investigator created a user interface for MUDding. One side of the screen offered a menu of masks, the other showed a nightclub scene[ill.5]. The scene was populated with floating masks of various colors. By selecting a mask from the menu, the user could take on the point of view of any of the avatars in the night club. The user could theoretically maintain a dialog with himself by shifting between masks.
Despite the personal mediation of the avatar, MUDs can be surprisingly affecting. Communication seems intimate because of its unearned familiarity. Typing messages alone in a room to another online is similar to a phone conversation. As a result the researchers made a number of friends and acquaintances on MUDs throughout the study period. Some continue to maintain contact.
On a larger scale, these bonds can create subgroups within a larger MUD. These can operate as special interest groups and develop political power. For example in the University of MOO, the wizards' capricious pranks were causing the MUD citizens to call for their removal. Some were even planning to create a new MOO in protest. In other MUDs, social harmony can create enduring loyalties.
The researchers of DreaMOO discovered that a number of their compatriots online were refugees from the now-defunct Metaverse MUD. Metaverse, a fairly elaborate MUD charged its members a fee for use. Apparently, it was not successful and the server was put to other use. As a result the stranded populus of Metaverse were left to wander cyberspace to find a new home. Our researchers discovered a number of refugees reminiscing about their old domain.
As a tribute to their many MUD compatriots, the researchers presented their analyses and video animations over the Internet on March 8, 1996. They used a color version of CU-SeeMe software to provide live coverage of an event held on the campus at NJIT. Each team presented its results ias part of an online dialog with the remote onlookers. The homepage used for the presentation will be used as a gallery for the products of the study. It is planned to have links to the entry points of all MUDs in its display. In this way, MUDders may enter other domains by passing through the homepage way-station. This form of cybereal stepping stone is intended to provide a larger structure for MUDding.
The development of a truly spatial cyberspace will draw on the talents of many disciplines including the fine arts, theatre and architecture. The work done by these students offers the possibility of a new area of architectural endeavor. Architects, trained in spatial design, community planning, aesthetics, graphic communication and the use of computers are in a unique position to contribute to this effort. As spatial MUDs are being created, the input of these skills will be vital to creating a rich, cultural setting for future mediated societies.
The development of the World Wide Web into an active, visual social environment poses unique opportunities for the design professions. Multi-user Domains, social meeting places in cyberspace, are mostly text-based virtual realities which use spatial references to set the stage for social interaction. Over the past year design students at the New Jersey Institute of Technology School of Architecture have investigated several text-based domains. In the course of their work, they envisioned and graphically portrayed these environments as immersive virtual realities through the use of computer animation. Their studies addressed issues ranging from the nature of symbolic motion to social/political structures of these domains.
Internet as Site
Multi-user Domains (MUDs) are mediated social environments on the Internet. Originally intended for role playing games such as Dungeons and Dragons, they have since developed into elaborate social settings serving on-line social and professional communities. Despite the spatial qualities of MUDs, few of them are visual. Instead, they are text-based virtual realities which require the user to rely on descriptions of space and motion to create an image of the domain.
The use of text is dictated by the MUD software. Currently there are a variety of MUD types which differ largely in their programming code. MOOs (MUDs Object Oriented), MUSHes (Multi-User Shared Hallucination), MUSEs (Multi-User Simulated Environment) are among the many hundred MUDs currently operating on the Internet. "MUD" and "domain" are here used to generically refer to these types.
The text interface is an efficient medium. It limits memory requirements for the computers and speeds up real-time interaction. It can also conjure an image with a well-crafted description. As a result, MUD users often prefer the verbal environment, arguing that it allows them freedom of interpretation. Some users insist that the introduction of graphics will reduce, rather than enhance, the MUDding experience.
Use of MUDs involves logging on to a computer server, often using Telnet or Gopher programs. Once on, the user types responses to text on the screen, say, the description of a room they have "entered". The user might type "N" to leave the room by going north. The scene then changes as a new space description is offered. Users move from place to place by using sequential commands or by teleporting directly to their destination.
Conversation on MUDs is formatted to simulate dialog in a book. If a user, Fred, types "Hey, there!, the computer configures this to read as "Fred says,'Hey, there!'". The result is that the user appears engaged in both the reading and creation of a novel. As users become more familiar with the commands, they gain a greater range of expression and action within the MUD.
Graphic MUDs are still a technical novelty and their success is mixed. Preliminary efforts (the Palace, World Chat and Alphaworld) are disappointing. The schematic quality of the contents and their graphics lack the poetry found in text MUDs. The ephemerality of MUDs also argues for spaces which are dynamic, responsive to their social and subjective nature. While text-based environments have an implicit, logical structure, their image as architecture is highly subject to the user. Current graphic MUDs, on the other hand, lose this depth by literally illustrating architectural environments. In many cases their illustration comes at the expense of poetry.
MUD Archeologies
In the spring and fall semester of 1995, my graduate and undergraduate students at the New Jersey Institute of Technology's School of Architecture surveyed ten MUDs on the Internet. This work was partially funded by an NJIT SBR grant for cyberspace research . The study was largely conducted in a CAD supported design studio and was carried out as a semester-long design assignment. The MUDs selected were social domains not overtly used for role-playing games. Their selection was limited to text-based MUDs to maximize the students' design opportunities.
The students, in teams of two, became citizens of their selected MUDs and explored the spaces described by the text. Typically, the team would divide the work between a navigator and cartographer. One operated the machine, "moving" from place to place within the MUD. The other charted locations of the places they visited. As the domains were mapped, these diagrams grew increasingly complex. This information was carefully documented to produce a log/sketchbook and a 3D logical adjacency model of the MUD.
These models, perhaps the first spatial documents of these MUDs, formed a schematic diagram of the domains' spaces. Their coding was intentionally simple. Cubes represented spaces which were accessed directionally, using N, E, S, W or Up and Down commands. Spheres indicated spaces accessible by teleporting or by invoking their names. Points of MUD entry were colored red. Spaces were linked with simple rod connections appropriate to the directions indicated. Other symbols varied from model to model depending on the specifics of the MUD.
The final results were surprising in their complexity. Resembling extremely large molecular models, they documented hundreds of spaces. In many cases the models had to remain unfinished since the MUDs contained many more spaces beyond their main structure. Since MUD structure is dynamic, many of them grew and evolved throughout the study.
Most MUDs mapped easily as flow-chart diagrams. Some, however, had spatial anomalies. A room in DreaMOO described as being west of another, was entered by going east from that room. The nested arrangement of the Chatting Zone spaces would not translate easily to a ball and stick model. The rigorous structure of HoloMUCK forced the creation pseudo-spaces just to allow movement through it.
Domain Structure
The logical adjacency model of each MUD has a distinct form, like a fingerprint. Often MUDs begin as a verbal diagram of a neighborhood (Jay's House), an existing town (The Chatting Zone) or even the Earth (Meridian). Once in place, citizens of the MUDs are invited to build their own rooms and buildings. Over time the configuration of the domain changes to the point that not even its operators, known as wizards, know the current shape of the community.
It is a participatory architecture, a kind of architecture without architects. There are constraints on building, however. The degree of freedom that builders have depends on the wizards. Some MUDs, like HoloMUCK or Jay's House, have stringent codes enforcing the "realism" of proposed additions. The ability to build rooms also is dictated by the wizards. Each citizen is allotted an amount of memory to build objects. This increases with the status of the citizen. Getting memory or status in MUDs is a symbolic and social issue, often a result of "who you know". In the study, some researchers achieved high-ranking builder status and eventually became wizards themselves.
Some domains were clearly based on physical models, often based on the hometowns of the administrating wizards. For example, The Chatting Zone is a cyberspace mapping of Ipswich, Ireland, hometown of the MUD's founder. While Meridian maps the entire planet, its point of entry is in Norway, home of its wizard. Oddly, Meridian's server is in Morristown, NJ!
Basing MUDs on actual physical models is an expeditious first step in starting the domain. It saves the wizard the effort of creating the spaces from scratch and lets him or her to make a "home" out of the domain. It also allows easy navigation of the space, keeping the directions simple and places memorable for its users.
JupiterMOO, developed by Pavel Curtis, is based on the layout of XeroxPARC in Palo Alto, California. Its mapping is so accurate that MUDders who visit the actual facility can find their way around the campus. LambdaMOO, one of the largest operating MUDs, was originally based on Curtis' personal apartment. In yet another case, MediaMOO incorporates the architecture of MIT's MediaLab. Its founding wizard, Amy Bruckman, whimsically added a floor to the building to provide space for a ballroom and partying facilities.
As a MUD community develops, the original stucture is elaborated, sometimes leaving the real-space reference behind. The resulting geometry can become complex and difficult to map. Most MUDders are allowed to build their own rooms once they have citizenship. These rooms are often independent of the main logical structure, hovering outside the domain. In DreaMOO, for instance, linking new construction to the main structure requires permission. Not only must the builder petition the wizards, but the creators of connecting spaces . It is a complicated affair, and none our investigators were able to link their work to the main structures.
This results in constructions which have non-directional connections to the main MUD. Most private spaces, often quite elaborate, can only be accessed by teleporting. Guests may enter these spaces only if they are invited by the owner. As a result, many of the private spaces of the MUDs remained unmappable because of access problems. Often the addresses for teleport access were simply unavailable.
The freedom allowed by wizards directly affects the MUD's structure. BayMOO, a SanFrancisco based MUD, has a laissez-faire approach and over time has evolved into a free-form branching structure. Its logical mapping reflects its incremental and unplanned growth. In contrast, Jay's Place has such severe "reality" requirements that descriptions of nearby cliffs had to be rewritten to reflect the actual rock composition.
Generally, MUDs in which the wizards exert the most control are more rigorously geometrical and easier to map. The looser structure of more participatory communities, like MediaMOO, make them initially more difficult to navigate. In MediaMOO, organizing spaces like Curtis Commons were later added to provide orientation for the users.
HoloMUCK illustrates the extremes of control. Its server is located at McGill University in Canada. HoloMUCK's predecessor was called Flux. Originally, its wizards had developed an open MUD, placing minimal restrictions on building proposals. As the MUD developed, the configuration became more and more complex. The founding wizards felt that the illogical nature of the spaces made the MUD unusable. As a result, navigation depended more and more on teleporting and the illusion of the larger MUD structure was lost.
HoloMUCK was recreated using geometry clearly derived from a generic Canadian small town. Two main roads intersect to provide orientation and a river runs through it. The wizards have created one of the most controlled MUD environments found in the study. As in Jay's Place, HoloMUCK's planning stresses the realism of the domain. If a closet were opened to reveal an aircraft hangar, the wizards would not allow its construction in the main MUD structure.
If the failure of the original HoloMUCK was due to its spontaneity, the new MUD suffers from its stifling control. HoloMUCK's wizards have tried to resolve this by letting builders do what they like outside the "city limits". Lying outside the main structure is a free-zone in which spaces may follow any or no logic at all. As a result, most new construction lies outside the rigorous and isolated core, TANSTAAFL.
"Reality " Checks
The failure of some MUDs is due to problems other than politics. MUD size is largely determined by the number of spaces and objects programmed by the citizens. The number of rooms vastly outnumbers the users - especially the number logged on at one time. A paradoxical result is that MUDs with the greatest number of builders seem to have the lowest density population. This explains the apparent vacancy of many MUDs. While there are pockets of activity, large portions of the MUD often remain unused and rarely visited.
Unsuccessful rooms are like unsuccessful Web homepages. Once built they are rarely modified. Visitors may "hit" on a space once or twice, but without novelty or companionship to engage them, they rarely return. Our researchers found that few fellow MUDders knew the domains as well as they. Many citizens had not explored the main structure since their first few visits.
MUD activity centers on the entry, where users begin their sessions. In the MUD it often appears as a lobby, a town square or visitor center. In LambdaMOO, it is a closet. The area immediately around the entry is also populated but occupancy drops of sharply thereafter. MUDders often prefer teleporting to their destinations rather than sequentially moving through the labyrinth of rooms.
The problem is exacerbated by privatization. As mentioned, private spaces are often not spatially linked to the main MUD structure. The Chatting Zone and the University of MOO apparently have a great number of rooms in which private socializing occurs. Many citizens enter the MUD only to teleport directly to their rooms. In some MUDs citizens enter directly into their rooms, often staying there to monitor the MUD. This depletes the activity in the public portions of the MUD . There usually aren't enough users logged on to support this stratification.
This polarization between entry and private rooms results from poor spatialization and design. Real cities don't have single points of entry. Their periphery is open to the traffic of commerce and the population. Even the most private spaces in a city are part of its spatial structure. MUDs, while seemingly based on reality ignore some fundamental truths of community planning. Teleportation is a symptom of the problem, but not its cause. HoloMUCK forbids teleportation because its wizards feel teleporting destroys the sense of physical community. This solution is misconceived. Teleportation is merely a user's way around a problem of design.
The graphic representation of a domain offers solutions to these problems. If visitors can "see" the extent of the MUD, they might be more inclined to explore it. Presently, the text medium blinds users to distant spaces and blinkers their experience. It limits their exploration to sequential plodding from space to space. They are only aware of the rooms immediately adjacent to themselves.
Teleportation is preferred to this movement once destinations are known and citizens are familiar with their domains. However, social activity diminishes as teleporting increases. Teleportation does not allow for the chance encounters and discoveries offered by the illusion of actual movement.
Possible resolutions would include incorporating the private spaces into the main structures of the MUDs. Limiting access to these spaces to spatial motion may also improve activity in the main structure. However, the burden of access should be lightened by providing more access points to the MUD. This would shorten the distance to a destination. If more than one entry is used, each will serve as a node of activity, creating the equivalents of neighborhood pubs and hangouts.
Random entry at these points would also stimulate exploration and interaction. Once the main entry has a critical mass of occupants, additional visitors could be let in elsewhere to spread activity to the lesser frequented areas. It could revitalize the MUD community.
Envisioning Cyberspace
The next phase of the study was to create two visions of the MUDs: one from a consensus of the subject MUD community; the other a personal interpretation by each investigator. In both cases the ambiguities of the text were used to spark the design process.
After the creation of the logical adjacency models, the investigators interviewed several of their fellow MUD citizens. This came naturally from the mapping phase. Many friendships had been made in the course of charting the domains. Other MUDders were curious about the project and would periodically check on its progress. The wizards were impressed, at times flattered, by the dedication of the researchers to their domains. The citizens were generally enthusiastic about helping with the study.
The results of the interviews were mixed and initially disappointing. The original aim of this phase was to arrive at a consensus vision of what the MUD would be like as a three-dimensional environment. By having the MUDders elaborate on their domains, it was hoped that enough detail would be generated to visualize the spaces. This proved difficult at best.
In only a few cases did respondents provide useful information. When asked to elaborate on a series of spaces, one woman faxed sketches she had made to illustrate what she imagined them to be. This was an exception to the rule. Largely, the responses, though well-meaning, generated no more than the descriptions already provided by the MUD iteself. The MUDders were not prepared to embellish these texts and were bemused by the researchers asking such "obvious" questions.
This phase of the study contrasted the researchers' interests with those of their fellow MUDders. The project had been created with the aim of envisioning these cyberspace communities. Most MUDders don't question the use of text, treating it as a given while logged onto the domains. Some feared losing the richness of text to the newer graphical MUDs. To them the MUD is about social interaction, not the setting.
Many MUD citizens value the subjectivity of the text and bridle at the definition of the MUD space with a fixed design. Anarchitecture seemed preferred over an architecture. This became a theme many of the researchers incorporated into their own designs. Some projects merged text with graphics to provide a hybridized environment, others developed methods to allow MUDders to customize their image of the domains.
In the final phase of the project, the researchers were to individually generate a vision of their MUDs. They were to incorporate anything they might have learned in the course of the study, but were not bound by the information generated in the interviews. Each student was asked to use this opportunity to express a unique quality of being online. This was an effort to define the qualities of cybereal architecture.
The sequence of spaces encountered in the rendition had to match the layout of the logical adjacency model. The models became the focus of much debate since the illusion of space and motion had not been challenged to that point. The logic of the MUD structure (orientation, connection and location) is verifiable, but the nature of the spaces and connections is subject to debate.
Poetry in Motion
Motion in a MUD is an illusion created by the text sequence . MUDders issue directional commands to get from place to place. If no directional options are available, they can use the name of the destination to get there. However, teleporting differs little from conventional MUD movement. Both result in a space description with options for exits.
Motion by the user is entirely symbolic. The symbolism of motion is crucial to the MUD experience. It implies that the user is situated and complicit within the MUD environment. Movement brings the user into the MUD psychologically. It is integral to the MUD's immersive nature.
The investigators were encouraged to view this motion critically, seeing themselves as stage managers in a play. This manager has a unique position in a production. Unlike the actors or audience, the manager is not immersed in the environment. He charged with realizing the illusion. The students were to create the illusion of motion without necessarily mimicking it.
Several students explored motion in their visualizations. In all cases, the work was presented as computer animations rendered with AutoDesk's 3D studio. While CAD animations are still a novelty in architecture schools, the dynamic, ephemeral qualities of MUDs demanded the medium. Fades, pans, animation, change of viewing angles, morphing and other cinematic methods became common practice by the end of the study.
These techniques were specifically used to address the illusion of motion. For example, fading into another scene is similar to the experience of reading the description of a space. Entering into an unknown space was also presented as motion seen through the back of the head - like a video camera pointed out the back of a car. The viewer doesn't know where he or she is until the room has already been entered.
Some investigators interpreted motion relativistically. Rather than the viewer moving around the space, the space would move around the viewer. This reflected the actual user sitting in a chair while manipulating the MUD environment. This was demonstrated in animations where, although the viewer changed direction, only the setting moved while the "sky" did not.
In other cases morphing techniques were used to transform distant buildings into closer buildings, providing a dreamlike quality to the motion. One project by George Wharton III proposed that the MUD was always the same space and that the viewer was fixed. The illusion of motion was provided by a continual morphing of the MUD envelope. "Architectural" ripples in the envelope internally created the illusion of passing buildings.
Morphing can create motion effects in other ways. If rooms transform themselves into a user's destination, a non-spatial movement is effected. One researcher , Susan Sealer, devised buildings which changed shape at the user's whim. Going from one space to another was equated with reshaping the point of departure. In another experiment she changed the focal length of the software cameras. By dynamically reducing the focal length, the original scene was reduced to a point. The succeeding scene seemed to engulf it as it came into view, ultimately replacing the preceding space.
Another investigator, Tom Vollaro, presented his MUD as empty space filled with flying shards of matter[ill.3] When the user wanted to enter a space, the shards would collect around him as though drawn by a magnet until the space was formed. This resulted in a graceful ballet of fragments - shattering and reforming as the user "moved" through the MUD.
Society and Self
The user's identity while online is represented by a character called an avatar. Avatars often do not have the same name as their owner sometimes disguising the user's identity . The result is a masque which retains the role-playing character of the earlier MUDs. Much has been written on the subject of identity and its effect on MUD communities.
Several researchers focused their work on the avatar's presence in the MUD. As with motion, presence can be viewed relativistically. Presence is a subtle interaction between the self and the environment and several avatars were designed to manifest this relationship.
One investigator , Dana Napurano, associated light with this issue. When moving from place to place in a text-based MUD, the user activates the descriptions of the rooms. That space is "illuminated" by reading the text. This illumination would remain constant until one avatar met another and engaged in conversation. At that point the light emanating from one avatar focused upon the other, casting the rest of the space into shadow. Attention and forgetting were both illustrated by this simple gesture.
While many avatars in the study were humanoid in shape, there were significant exceptions. In an independent project by one student, the setting of the MUD was invisible and avatars were abstract, illuminated forms [ill. 4]. When an avatar entered a new space, its color changed. Groups of avatars in a space formed constellations of light, intensifying their color while in dialog. Cyberspace was envisioned as a universe of human constellations.
In another case an investigator created a user interface for MUDding. One side of the screen offered a menu of masks, the other showed a nightclub scene[ill.5]. The scene was populated with floating masks of various colors. By selecting a mask from the menu, the user could take on the point of view of any of the avatars in the night club. The user could theoretically maintain a dialog with himself by shifting between masks.
Despite the personal mediation of the avatar, MUDs can be surprisingly affecting. Communication seems intimate because of its unearned familiarity. Typing messages alone in a room to another online is similar to a phone conversation. As a result the researchers made a number of friends and acquaintances on MUDs throughout the study period. Some continue to maintain contact.
On a larger scale, these bonds can create subgroups within a larger MUD. These can operate as special interest groups and develop political power. For example in the University of MOO, the wizards' capricious pranks were causing the MUD citizens to call for their removal. Some were even planning to create a new MOO in protest. In other MUDs, social harmony can create enduring loyalties.
The researchers of DreaMOO discovered that a number of their compatriots online were refugees from the now-defunct Metaverse MUD. Metaverse, a fairly elaborate MUD charged its members a fee for use. Apparently, it was not successful and the server was put to other use. As a result the stranded populus of Metaverse were left to wander cyberspace to find a new home. Our researchers discovered a number of refugees reminiscing about their old domain.
As a tribute to their many MUD compatriots, the researchers presented their analyses and video animations over the Internet on March 8, 1996. They used a color version of CU-SeeMe software to provide live coverage of an event held on the campus at NJIT. Each team presented its results ias part of an online dialog with the remote onlookers. The homepage used for the presentation will be used as a gallery for the products of the study. It is planned to have links to the entry points of all MUDs in its display. In this way, MUDders may enter other domains by passing through the homepage way-station. This form of cybereal stepping stone is intended to provide a larger structure for MUDding.
The development of a truly spatial cyberspace will draw on the talents of many disciplines including the fine arts, theatre and architecture. The work done by these students offers the possibility of a new area of architectural endeavor. Architects, trained in spatial design, community planning, aesthetics, graphic communication and the use of computers are in a unique position to contribute to this effort. As spatial MUDs are being created, the input of these skills will be vital to creating a rich, cultural setting for future mediated societies.
Friday 16 September 2011
Kaos Pilots
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q5lJn1fdQDU&feature=results_main&playnext=1&list=PLF4230DE60647177F
http://www.kaospilot.dk
General Info
The KaosPilots was founded in 1991 in Århus, Denmark. It grew out of a youth organization called the Front Runners, a truly novel initiative, who worked with cultural and social projects.
The KaosPilots is a self-governing institution comprised of two parts: the school and a consultancy. The purpose of the KaosPilots is “positive social change through personal growth”.
The consultancy offers the same capabilities that are offered to the students to companies, NGO’s and public organizations, but adapted to suit their specific need. For examples of clients please click here.
The program is a three-year long education where the focus lies upon learning by doing through client assignments, from entrepreneurs, consultants, leaders and thought leaders.
The program consists of the disciplines Creative Enterprising Design, Creative Project Design, Creative Process Design and Creative Leadership Design and the education is designed around and operates according to the values Streetwise, Risk-taking, Balance, Compassion, Real World and Playful.
Our Purpose & Mission
Purpose
The purpose of the KaosPilot School is to create positive societal change through personal growth and enterprise
Mission
We strive to qualify the student vocationally as well as personally to thrive interdependently by developing their knowledge, skills and attitudes as pro-active learners, value-based leaders and sustainable entrepreneurs, for the benefit of themselves and society as a whole.
Everything starts with the individual and the individual passion and drive and then spreads with the knowledge of our interdependency. Students at the KaosPilots must explore what they consider to be positive societal change, and then adjust their actions to aid this development, while allowing and helping others to do the same.
It is our mission to create the frames for this process of learning and change to take place - to be a school, that focuses on helping the individual realize his potential, and use this to make a difference in the world.
Vision
It is the vision of the KaosPilots to be the best school for the world.
It is an ambitious vision, and can be interpreted in many ways, but first and foremost it means always considering what the world needs and has potential for at any given time, and balancing this with the needs and potential of the individual.
We envision a school that empowers its students to consider what kind of society they want to be part of, teaches them how to utilize their abilities to help create the change they wish to see, and gives them the skills to act on their dreams.
In time the ambition is for the organization to grow, making our value proposition and program accessible more people. We wish to create a global network of schools, a community of practitioners, fostering a new generation of change makers, value-based entrepreneurs and creative leaders.
KaosPilots wants to nurture and realize potentials and ideas about growth, meaning and sustainability for the benefit of people, communities, organizations and societies.
http://www.kaospilot.dk
General Info
The KaosPilots was founded in 1991 in Århus, Denmark. It grew out of a youth organization called the Front Runners, a truly novel initiative, who worked with cultural and social projects.
The KaosPilots is a self-governing institution comprised of two parts: the school and a consultancy. The purpose of the KaosPilots is “positive social change through personal growth”.
The consultancy offers the same capabilities that are offered to the students to companies, NGO’s and public organizations, but adapted to suit their specific need. For examples of clients please click here.
The program is a three-year long education where the focus lies upon learning by doing through client assignments, from entrepreneurs, consultants, leaders and thought leaders.
The program consists of the disciplines Creative Enterprising Design, Creative Project Design, Creative Process Design and Creative Leadership Design and the education is designed around and operates according to the values Streetwise, Risk-taking, Balance, Compassion, Real World and Playful.
Our Purpose & Mission
Purpose
The purpose of the KaosPilot School is to create positive societal change through personal growth and enterprise
Mission
We strive to qualify the student vocationally as well as personally to thrive interdependently by developing their knowledge, skills and attitudes as pro-active learners, value-based leaders and sustainable entrepreneurs, for the benefit of themselves and society as a whole.
Everything starts with the individual and the individual passion and drive and then spreads with the knowledge of our interdependency. Students at the KaosPilots must explore what they consider to be positive societal change, and then adjust their actions to aid this development, while allowing and helping others to do the same.
It is our mission to create the frames for this process of learning and change to take place - to be a school, that focuses on helping the individual realize his potential, and use this to make a difference in the world.
Vision
It is the vision of the KaosPilots to be the best school for the world.
It is an ambitious vision, and can be interpreted in many ways, but first and foremost it means always considering what the world needs and has potential for at any given time, and balancing this with the needs and potential of the individual.
We envision a school that empowers its students to consider what kind of society they want to be part of, teaches them how to utilize their abilities to help create the change they wish to see, and gives them the skills to act on their dreams.
In time the ambition is for the organization to grow, making our value proposition and program accessible more people. We wish to create a global network of schools, a community of practitioners, fostering a new generation of change makers, value-based entrepreneurs and creative leaders.
KaosPilots wants to nurture and realize potentials and ideas about growth, meaning and sustainability for the benefit of people, communities, organizations and societies.
Saturday 10 September 2011
Technologies
Minority Report
Apologies for the 3 mins you might have to sit though of Tom Cruise, but the technology is interesting and maybe not too far away.Ron Arad
Curtian Call Art Installation
Iron Man 2 - SFX montage by Prologue Film
Instructables
http://www.instructables.com/
Instructables is a web-based documentation platform where passionate people share what they do and how they do it, and learn from and collaborate with others. The seeds of Instructables germinated at the MIT Media Lab as the future founders of Squid Labs built places to share their projects and help others.
Squidlabs
http://www.squid-labs.com/
Squid Labs was founded in early 2004 by four passionate scientists & engineers. The vision of Squid Labs: Bring in consulting & contract work, and use the profits to grow internal projects & technologies. Keep many projects active, keep a small core technical team and outsource the rest, and build a high productivity workspace.
SQUID Labs is characterized by our multidisciplinary skill set and our ability to combine those diverse skills to create novel solutions.
"We're not a think tank, we're a do tank"
del.icio.us
http://del.icio.us/
Delicious is a social bookmarking web service for storing, sharing, and discovering web bookmarks. The site was founded by Joshua Schachter in 2003 and acquired by Yahoo! in 2005, and by the end of 2008, the service claimed more than 5.3 million users and 180 million unique bookmarked URLs.
Delicious uses a non-hierarchical classification system in which users can tag each of their bookmarks with freely chosen index terms (generating a kind of folksonomy). A combined view of everyone's bookmarks with a given tag is available; for instance, the URL delicious.com/tag/wiki displays all of the most recent links tagged "wiki". Its collective nature makes it possible to view bookmarks added by other users.
Delicious has a "hotlist" on its home page and "popular" and "recent" pages, which help to make the website a conveyor of Internet memes and trends.
Delicious is one of the most popular social bookmarking services. Many features have contributed to this, including the website's simple interface, human-readable URL scheme, a novel domain name, a simpleREST-like API, and RSS feeds for web syndication.
Use of Delicious is free. The source code of the site is not available, but a user can download his or her own data through the site's API in an XML or JSON format, or export it to a standard Netscape bookmarks format.
Digg
Digg is a social news website. Digg is a place for people to discover and share content from anywhere on the web. From the biggest online destinations to the most obscure blog, Digg surfaces the best stuff as voted on by our community. Prior to Digg v4, its cornerstone function consisted of letting people vote stories up or down, called digging and burying, respectively. Digg's popularity prompted the creation of copycat social networking sites with story submission and voting systems.How does it work?
Digg builds lists of popular stories being shared across the web. Every story has a digg button. Along with that button is a number that is the number of people from the Digg community who have said they like that like or digg that story.
The number of diggs a story collects over time can affect how that story spreads and gains more popularity as it spreads more.
In May 2009, Digg launched a new feature integrating Facebook Connect with Digg. The Digg integration with Facebook connect allows users of Digg and Facebook to connect their accounts. When a Facebook account is connected to a Digg account, Digg articles can then be shared on the user's Facebook page.
Thursday 8 September 2011
Smarter Governments
As state and federal governments work to infuse intelligence into their transport, energy, water, telecommunications and other systems in order to stimulate economies and benefit citizens, it begs the question: can the operations of government itself become smarter?
Smarter government will do more than simply regulate the outputs of our economic and societal systems. It will be a smoothly functioning system itself, interconnecting dynamically with citizens, communities and businesses in real time to spark growth, innovation and progress. The challenges are many – from departmental silos to process delays to lack of transparency and accountability. But governments around the world are showing real progress.
Smarter government means collaborating across departments and with communities.
Collaboration can help governments become more transparent and accountable; manage resources more effectively; and give citizens access to information about decisions that affect their lives. In the UK, Southwest One, an innovative joint venture, is providing shared services by integrating many functions of the Somerset County Council, the Taunton Deane Borough Council, and the Avon and Somerset Police.
Smarter government means helping to promote economic growth.
Governments can boost the economy by streamlining cumbersome processes and simplifying reporting requirements, which are especially burdensome to small agencies. The Belgian Crossroads Bank for Social Security has automated 42 services for employers, eliminating 50 social security declaration forms. As a result, 23 million declarations were made electronically in 2008 – a major productivity benefit for Belgian businesses, saving them an estimated $1.7 billion a year.
Smarter government means making operations and services truly citizen-centric.
Leading governments are integrating their service delivery, establishing offices that support multiple services and placing the most needed transactions on the Web. For example, herein Australia, Centrelink helps the government to provide appropriate service offerings based on citizens’ life events, such as marriage, the birth of children and the need for elder care. Kyoto, Japan, created a Web site that allows all people, regardless of their abilities or native language, to access city information.
And then there are those times when being citizen-centric with speed and accuracy may be a matter of life and death. During the recent wildfires in California, government agencies turned to Twitter to provide real-time updates on the status of the fires – directing people without power, but with mobile devices, to Google Maps for evacuation information.
Ideas
Smarter government will do more than simply regulate the outputs of our economic and societal systems. It will be a smoothly functioning system itself, interconnecting dynamically with citizens, communities and businesses in real time to spark growth, innovation and progress. The challenges are many – from departmental silos to process delays to lack of transparency and accountability. But governments around the world are showing real progress.
Smarter government means collaborating across departments and with communities.
Collaboration can help governments become more transparent and accountable; manage resources more effectively; and give citizens access to information about decisions that affect their lives. In the UK, Southwest One, an innovative joint venture, is providing shared services by integrating many functions of the Somerset County Council, the Taunton Deane Borough Council, and the Avon and Somerset Police.
Smarter government means helping to promote economic growth.
Governments can boost the economy by streamlining cumbersome processes and simplifying reporting requirements, which are especially burdensome to small agencies. The Belgian Crossroads Bank for Social Security has automated 42 services for employers, eliminating 50 social security declaration forms. As a result, 23 million declarations were made electronically in 2008 – a major productivity benefit for Belgian businesses, saving them an estimated $1.7 billion a year.
Smarter government means making operations and services truly citizen-centric.
Leading governments are integrating their service delivery, establishing offices that support multiple services and placing the most needed transactions on the Web. For example, herein Australia, Centrelink helps the government to provide appropriate service offerings based on citizens’ life events, such as marriage, the birth of children and the need for elder care. Kyoto, Japan, created a Web site that allows all people, regardless of their abilities or native language, to access city information.
And then there are those times when being citizen-centric with speed and accuracy may be a matter of life and death. During the recent wildfires in California, government agencies turned to Twitter to provide real-time updates on the status of the fires – directing people without power, but with mobile devices, to Google Maps for evacuation information.
Ideas
As state and federal governments work to infuse intelligence into their transport, energy, water, telecommunications and other systems in order to stimulate economies and benefit citizens, it begs the question: can the operations of government itself become smarter?
"Citizen-centric"—the evolution continues
"Just as private enterprises have rediscovered their mission and business model by returning to a focus on customers, governments around the world are finding success in reorienting their structures, information technology and policies around the citizens they serve, to create a smart government."
This can range from "one-stop shopping" for previously discrete sets of services to information sharing and collaboration across regions and borders for the benefit of both citizens and government.
At a country level, for example in the United Kingdom and Singapore, governments are educating citizens about multiple ways to obtain services and encouraging them to use the most convenient and efficient channels. At the other end of the spectrum, across an entire continent, Europe has many examples of information shared across departments and programs to deliver service and benefits to citizens. To undergird this partnership, all European Union member states are required to have national legislation in line with the EU's directive on data protection.
"Citizen-centric"—the evolution continues
"Just as private enterprises have rediscovered their mission and business model by returning to a focus on customers, governments around the world are finding success in reorienting their structures, information technology and policies around the citizens they serve, to create a smart government."
This can range from "one-stop shopping" for previously discrete sets of services to information sharing and collaboration across regions and borders for the benefit of both citizens and government.
At a country level, for example in the United Kingdom and Singapore, governments are educating citizens about multiple ways to obtain services and encouraging them to use the most convenient and efficient channels. At the other end of the spectrum, across an entire continent, Europe has many examples of information shared across departments and programs to deliver service and benefits to citizens. To undergird this partnership, all European Union member states are required to have national legislation in line with the EU's directive on data protection.
6 ideas drivers of governmental change on a smarter planet
- changing demographics
- accelerating globalisation
- rising environmental concerns
- evolving societal relationships
- growing threats to stability and order
- expanding impact of technology
Crowdsourcing
Crowdsourcing is sometimes otherwise referred to as Mass Collaboration, Open Innovation, Community Production, Mass Solutions, Constituent Driven Innovation, Connected Intelligence, Collective Wisdom, Intelligent Networks and Human Networks.
Crowdsourcing is the act of outsourcing tasks, traditionally performed by an employee or contractor, to a large group of people or community (a crowd), through an open invite (call).
Crowdsourcing is typically enabled through online communities consisting of members with common skills or interests and is applied as a model that enables individuals and groups to innovate, create, produce, report, predict, collaborate, fund and to engage customers.
Crowdsourcing is being used to create, raise funds, engage customers, innovate, share knowledge, make predictions, promote social and environmental causes.
Crowdfunding (sometimes referred to as crowdfinancing, crowdinvesting or crowdsourced capital) is an approach to raising capital for new projects and businesses by soliciting micro donations from a large number of stakeholders. Charities and non-profits have long used this fundraising model in an offline context; however, with the advent of social media, and web 2.0 technologies, crowdfunding has become a viable fundraising mechanism for film, journalism and music in addition to nonprofit organizations.http://www.crowdsourcing.org
The World is Flat
 |
http://www.abc.net.au/tv/bigideas/stories/2011/08/16/3293658.htm |
In this brilliant new book, the award-winning New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman demystifies the brave new world for readers, allowing them to make sense of the often bewildering global scene unfolding before their eyes. With his inimitable ability to translate complex foreign policy and economic issues, Friedman explains how the flattening of the world happened at the dawn of the twenty-first century; what it means to countries, companies, communities, and individuals; and how governments and societies can, and must, adapt. The World Is Flat is the timely and essential update on globalization, its successes and discontents, powerfully illuminated by one of our most respected journalists.
"Before 9/11, New York Times columnist Friedman was best known as the author of The Lexus and the Olive Tree, one of the major popular accounts of globalization and its discontents. For Friedman, cheap, ubiquitous telecommunications have finally obliterated all impediments to international competition, and the dawning 'flat world' is a jungle pitting 'lions' and 'gazelles,' where 'economic stability is not going to be a feature' and 'the weak will fall farther behind.' Rugged, adaptable entrepreneurs, by contrast, will be empowered. The service sector (telemarketing, accounting, computer programming, engineering and scientific research, etc.), will be further outsourced to the English-spoken abroad; manufacturing, meanwhile, will continue to be off-shored to China." –Publishers Weekly
Howard Rheingold on collaboration
TED Talk
Fascinating talk from Howard Rheingold about the coming world of collaboration, participatory media and collective action.
http://www.ted.com/talks/howard_rheingold_on_collaboration.html
Fascinating talk from Howard Rheingold about the coming world of collaboration, participatory media and collective action.
http://www.ted.com/talks/howard_rheingold_on_collaboration.html
Fictitious futures, virtual development and visual language
Podcast from ABC Radio National article on virtual construction and design.
http://www.abc.net.au/rn/futuretense/stories/2011/3302237.htm
Guests
Rob Walker
Co-founder of the Hypothetical Development Organisation. Author & freelance journalist.
Edward Boatman
Founder of The Noun Project.
Julian Bleecker
Designer, technologist and researcher at the Design Strategic Projects studio at Nokia Design. Co-founder of the Near Future Laboratory.
David Hollywood
Virtual Architect.
Cameron Tonkinwise
Associate Dean of Sustainability at Parsons, The New School for Design in New York.
Tuesday 6 September 2011
Burning Wastelands
The way to get wonderfully lifelike behaviour is not to try to make a really complex creature, but to make a wonderfully rich environment for a simple creature. – David Ackley
Designed by Charikleia Kalamari the above-mentioned project is one of thirteen design responses to this year’s Inter 3 brief about energy as relationships. Moving away from heavy mainstream infrastructures students explored platforming technologies, unconventional laboratories and guerrilla compounds, partly commentary, partly speculative, partly culturally injected. We critically reviewed India’s sacred and scientific as well as high-tech and low-tech sides in order to understand and discuss via design the high-contrast scene and processes involved in energy extraction, exchange/transfer, manufacturing, final use/consumption and renewal/feedback loop.
Numerous time based prototypes were built throughout the year to test and explore energy relationships, effects and performatic behaviours. Design, build, test, simulate, fail, re-build, design again… solve by iteration. Digital and analogue, fabricating and DIY techniques were used in order to hack and tinker daily live objects from electronic toys, antique mobile phones, vintage computers and musical instruments. From these experimentations some strange-behaving creatures emerged which later on turned into fine tuned wonderful designs that dream, dance, live/die, grow and sing, forming peculiar ecologies of novel energy-beings.
Articulating the ordinary Alexey Marfin (above) designed an interactive threshold controlled by the use of mobile phones on the site of Mumbai’s notorious Chor Bazaar (‘thieves market’) based on the concept of DIY and a disassemble/re-assemble strategy. Basmah Kaki reinterpreted sound and wind energy on the site of a vast and bleak granite quarry in Bangalore where a delicate instrumental apparatus nests on a gargantuan carved-out mountain contrasting with the harsh mine environment and the exploitation of women and children.
Among the tales of biological exuberance, death and life energy cycles were re-assembled in fragile bacteria lagoon laboratories and blossoming uranium landscapes scripted in an altered flora. Digital dreams of augmented reality discussing the concept of virtual religious rituals; a sonic Hindu temple in the marshlands of a slum controlled by the flow and tuned by the purity of water; global energy hunters gathered around the fires of e-wasted Microsoft hills and Intel mountains in Mumbai’s biggest landfills… students unveiled stories of horror and hope.
Inhale. Take in as much air as you can. This story should last about as long as you can hold your breath and then just a bit longer… – Haunted, Chuck Palahniuk
INTER 3 students 2010-11: Alexey . Basmah . Enrique . Harikleia . Hessa . Ilina . Lee . Maria . Min . Nara . Nathalie . Sergej . Vasu
Saturday 3 September 2011
John Frazer - The Architectural Relevance of Cyberspace
A new consciousness - a new mode of thinking - is emerging with profound implications for architecture.
The parallel world of cyberspace, created and sustained by the world's computers and communication lines is just one manifestation of deep cultural and technical changes which are reshaping our understanding of our world. This shift of perception from a universe of objects to one of relationships is the characteristic paradigm shift of the century. With this goes a shift from specialisation to generalisation, from the self-conscious to the unselfconscious, from linear relationships to complex webs. Our emerging new world view is characterised as decentralised, desynchronised, diverse, simultaneous, anarchic, customerised...
The term cyberspace is used loosely to describe the invisible spatial interconnection of computers on the Internet and it is also applied to almost any virtual spatial experience created in a computer. But tangible space and physical structure have already taken on a new significance as a result of the growth of cyberspace.
The term cyberspace is used loosely to describe the invisible spatial interconnection of computers on the Internet and it is also applied to almost any virtual spatial experience created in a computer. But tangible space and physical structure have already taken on a new significance as a result of the growth of cyberspace.
Virtual reality has caused us to reassess reality.
Old world architecture has achieved a new physicality just as the new architecture of process starts to transcend physicality and achieve ephemeralisation.
Ephemeralisation: the ability of technological advancement to do "more and more with less and less until eventually you can do everything with nothing" Buckminster Fuller.
Virtual worlds should not be seen as an alternative to the real world or a substitute, but as an extra dimension which allows us a new freedom of movement in the natural world.
Old world architecture has achieved a new physicality just as the new architecture of process starts to transcend physicality and achieve ephemeralisation.
Ephemeralisation: the ability of technological advancement to do "more and more with less and less until eventually you can do everything with nothing" Buckminster Fuller.
Virtual worlds should not be seen as an alternative to the real world or a substitute, but as an extra dimension which allows us a new freedom of movement in the natural world.
Contemporary science fiction concentrates on the coexistence of the real world and the metaworld of cyber-space. The realisation gradually dawns that we have been living in a virtual world all along.
The argument rested on the idea that architects were 'first and foremost system designers who had been forced to take an increasing interest in the organisational system properties of development, communication and control', Pask identified a significant vacuum in architectural theory and claimed cybernetics as 'a discipline that fills the bill in so far as the abstract concepts of cybernetics can be interpreted in architectural terms (and, where appropriate, identified with real architectural systems) to form a theory (architectural cybernetics, the cybernetic theory of architecture). Thus cybernetics in architecture was advanced as a new theoretical basis and as a metalanguage for critical discussion.
The argument rested on the idea that architects were 'first and foremost system designers who had been forced to take an increasing interest in the organisational system properties of development, communication and control', Pask identified a significant vacuum in architectural theory and claimed cybernetics as 'a discipline that fills the bill in so far as the abstract concepts of cybernetics can be interpreted in architectural terms (and, where appropriate, identified with real architectural systems) to form a theory (architectural cybernetics, the cybernetic theory of architecture). Thus cybernetics in architecture was advanced as a new theoretical basis and as a metalanguage for critical discussion.
Frazer, J. The Architectural Relevance of Cyberspace in Architectural Design 1995, Academy Group, London, UK.
Social Enter Prise
In line with the CAPITheticAL design competition and also linking with the design brief for this unit, we have been asked to reconfigure or adapt an existing government agency, or to create a new agency to suit our chosen strategy theme. Through a study of various agencies carried out in weekly workshops, we investigated:
Basically, it refers to an organisation that uses a business model of buying and selling goods or services but, unlike a traditional business, its prime motivation is to fund or support social causes.
Some existing examples of social enterprise:
The Big Issue http://www.bigissue.org.au/
The Big Issue Australia is one of Australia’s leading social enterprises providing creative solutions to the issue of homelessness.
We achieve this by using different mechanisms to connect people with the community, such asThe Big Issue Street Magazine Enterprise (a fortnightly independent current affairs magazine sold on the street by our authorised vendors), the Community Street Soccer Program (a national initiative using the positive power of sport to change lives), and The Big Issue Classroom (that challenges primary and secondary students to break down stereotypes surrounding homelessness and encourage tolerance and empathy towards all people).
McSence
http://mcsence.co.uk/
The McSence Group is an award winning Social Enterprise comprising five operating companies providing a wide range of professional services to businesses and individuals including Managed Workspace, Property Maintenance and Cleaning Services, Conference Centre Facilities, Training Services and Home Help services.
McSence is owned by the Community in which it is based and is governed by an unpaid board of volunteer Directors.
http://www.socialenterpriselive.com/section/news/management/20101122/google-supports-social-enterprise-start-ups
Internet giant Google has entered the world of social enterprise to provide a package of support to young social entrepreneurs.
A partnership between Google's Getting British Business Online campaign; UnLtd, the foundation for social entrepreneurs; and the UK's largest network of business leaders, the Institute of Directors (IoD), launched the package last week during Global Entrepreneurship Week.
The ‘Ultimate Myth-Busting Package of Support’ includes funding from UnLtd’s £500-£15,000 award programme, the £205 joining fee of the IoD, which offers access to meeting rooms and networking events, although the annual membership fee of £313 still needs to be paid, and a free website and domain name from Google with free indexing on its search engine.
The complete package aims to support young entrepreneurs and social entrepreneurs develop their ideas into businesses.
Features of a social enterprise:
Social Enterprise Models
1. Employment model
If you're looking to provide employment for marginalised people in your community, this model is for you. Your potential employees could be individuals who are elderly, suffer from a disability, have cultural or language barriers or have been isolated from the mainstream job market. In this model, the good or service being sold is less important than providing employment to its target group.
Examples include leaflet drop and newspaper delivery services provided by people with a mental illness, or culturally specific food catering supplied by refugee communities.
2. Goods/services model
Maybe you're not happy with some of the products currently on the market or the harmful methods used to produce them. This model attempts to minimise or remove any social or environmental harm in the creation of a product or the provision of the service. SEOs that offer fair prices to their makers by selling free-trade goods use the goods/services model. These SEOs avoid inequitable tariffs and promote better conditions by refusing to sell products made in sweatshops. Similarly, organisations that provide environmentally responsible goods, such as organic food or products that do not include petrochemicals, also often embrace this approach.
3. Social investment model
If you have a good business idea unrelated to your cause, the social investment model might be the way to go. This model most closely resembles a traditional business. However, unlike a business, this model invests all 'profit' into a charitable cause. This means that whatever you choose to do, you can raise money for the cause that's most important to you.
4. Hybrid model
A hybrid model combining more than one of the above structures is also a possibility. For example, a waste recycling business that hires long-term unemployed people and directs its 'profit' to a variety of charities combines all three models.
http://www.abc.net.au/catapult/basics/s2554740.htm
Creative Commons
Share, Remix, Reuse — Legally
Creative Commons works to increase sharing, collaboration and innovation worldwide.
http://creativecommons.org.au
Creative Commons is an international non-profit organisation that provides free licences and tools that copyright owners can use to allow others to share, reuse and remix their material, legally.
Creative Commons Australia is the affiliate that supports Creative Commons in Australia and administers the Australian Creative Commons licences.
Creative Commons is a world wide project that encourages copyright owners to allow others to share, reuse and remix their material, legally. We offer a range of free licences that creators can use to manage their copyright in the online environment, each providing its own specific protections and freedoms. We have built upon the “all rights reserved” of traditional copyright to create a voluntary “some rights reserved” system.
Social Traders
http://www.socialtraders.com.au/
Social Traders is a social enterprise development agency that was launched in June 2009. Based in Victoria, it came about in response to the need for systemic change required to support the development of social enterprise in Australia. Whilst much of Social Traders’ direct work with social enterprises will occur in Victoria we will be undertaking research and advocacy at a national level.
Social Traders
• is developing a social enterprise development fund which will provide training, support and investment to a number of Victorian social enterprises every year;
• will be investing in measuring the social impact of social enterprises;
• organises events and opportunities for social enterprises to network;
• undertakes research and policy development to further the interests of social enterprise;
• is leveraging funding into the social enterprise arena;
• is undertaking projects that will open up markets and business to social enterprise.
Why do people develop social enterprises?
There are 3 principle motivations for developing a social enterprise:
1. Income generation - Many nonprofit organizations see social enterprise as a way to reduce their dependence on charitable donations and grants through commercial activity
2. Employment – Many people see employment or engagement of marginalised groups as the principle motivation for social enterprise.
3. Service delivery – Social enterprise has the capacity to create or retain services needed in communities.
Like any other business, setting up a social enterprise requires substantial advice, investment, and support. The Social Traders web site provides links to a range of tools and resources that will help people to develop a social enterprise. Much of the support available to mainstream business may be relevant to social enterprises starting up, as they often face many of the same barriers.
Urban Infomatics
http://www.urbaninformatics.net/
The increasing ubiquity of digital technology, internet services and location-aware applications in our everyday lives allows for a seamless transitioning between the visible and the invisible infrastructure of cities: road systems, building complexes, information and communication technology and people networks create a buzzing environment that is alive and exciting.
Driven by curiosity, initiative and interdisciplinary exchange, the Urban Informatics Research Lab at Queensland University of Technology (QUT) is a transdisciplinary cluster of people working on research and development at the intersection of people, place and technology with a focus on cities, locative media and mobile technology.
Urban informatics is the study, design, and practice of urban experiences across different urban contexts that are created by new opportunities of real-time, ubiquitous technology and the augmentation that mediates the physical and digital layers of people networks and urban infrastructures. (Foth, Choi, & Satchell, 2011)
Our team comprises and collaborates with architects with degrees in media studies, software engineers with expertise in urban sociology, human-computer interaction designers with a grounding in cultural studies, and urban planners with an interest in digital media and social networking. Being hosted by the Institute for Creative Industries and Innovation at QUT enables our projects to embrace the creative energy of a range of disciplines across design, performance, production and writing.
Civic Media
http://civic.mit.edu
The MIT Center for Civic Media creates and deploys technical and social tools that fill the information needs of communities.
We are inventors of new technologies that support and foster civic media and political action; we are a hub for the study of these technologies; and we coordinate community-based test beds both in the United States and internationally.
Civic media is any form of communication that strengthens the social bonds within a community or creates a strong sense of civic engagement among its residents. Civic media goes beyond news gathering and reporting. MIT researchers and students are experimenting with a variety of new civic media techniques, from technologies for protests and civil disobedience to phone-texting systems that allow instant, sophisticated votes on everyday activities. The Center amplifies the development of these technologies for community empowerment, while also serving to generate curricula and open-source frameworks for civic action.
Transforming civic knowledge into civic action is an essential part of democracy. As with investigative journalism, the most delicate and important information can often focus on leaders and institutions that abuse the trust of the communities they serve. By helping to provide people with the necessary skills to process, evaluate, and act upon the knowledge in circulation, civic media ensures the diversity of inputs and mutual respect necessary for democratic deliberation.
- Virtual
- Flexible
- Mobile
- Distributed
Basically, it refers to an organisation that uses a business model of buying and selling goods or services but, unlike a traditional business, its prime motivation is to fund or support social causes.
Some existing examples of social enterprise:
The Big Issue http://www.bigissue.org.au/
We achieve this by using different mechanisms to connect people with the community, such asThe Big Issue Street Magazine Enterprise (a fortnightly independent current affairs magazine sold on the street by our authorised vendors), the Community Street Soccer Program (a national initiative using the positive power of sport to change lives), and The Big Issue Classroom (that challenges primary and secondary students to break down stereotypes surrounding homelessness and encourage tolerance and empathy towards all people).
McSence
http://mcsence.co.uk/
The McSence Group is an award winning Social Enterprise comprising five operating companies providing a wide range of professional services to businesses and individuals including Managed Workspace, Property Maintenance and Cleaning Services, Conference Centre Facilities, Training Services and Home Help services.
McSence is owned by the Community in which it is based and is governed by an unpaid board of volunteer Directors.
Each of the five trading companies is a stand-alone organisation with it’s own professional management that is tasked with returning profits for the Group. At the end of each financial year, the profits accrued are gifted to the parent company McSence Ltd which is a registered charity. McSence Ltd then uses these profits to reinvested in new business ventures or alternatively to distribute back to the community in the form of community grants. Many voluntary groups in the community have received support in this way including all the local schools and many individuals and families.
Although McSence is focused on the delivery of professional services to our clients, it continues to be a business run by the community, for the community. The Board of Directors form a cross section of the entire community and work on a voluntary basis without remuneration. Since the creation of the business no fees or expenses have ever been claimed by any of the Directors.
Googlehttp://www.socialenterpriselive.com/section/news/management/20101122/google-supports-social-enterprise-start-ups
Internet giant Google has entered the world of social enterprise to provide a package of support to young social entrepreneurs.
The ‘Ultimate Myth-Busting Package of Support’ includes funding from UnLtd’s £500-£15,000 award programme, the £205 joining fee of the IoD, which offers access to meeting rooms and networking events, although the annual membership fee of £313 still needs to be paid, and a free website and domain name from Google with free indexing on its search engine.
The complete package aims to support young entrepreneurs and social entrepreneurs develop their ideas into businesses.
Features of a social enterprise:
- a continuous activity, producing or selling goods
- a high degree of autonomy
- a minimum amout of paid work
- an explicit aim to benefit the community
- an initiative launched by a group of citizens
- decision making power not based on capital ownership
- a participatory nature, which involves various parties
- limited profit distribution
- training
- job creation
- provision of local services
- Intermediate Labour Market Companies – businesses that undertake commercial work in order to train, support and employ disadvantaged job seekers and then help them into mainstream jobs.
- Social Firms – businesses that undertake commercial work to create employment for people with a disability
- Cooperatives, Associations and Mutuals – member-benefit businesses, formed to meet defined social needs of members, e.g. childcare, housing
 |
| Mind map of Social Enterprise, by author |
Social Enterprise Models
1. Employment model
If you're looking to provide employment for marginalised people in your community, this model is for you. Your potential employees could be individuals who are elderly, suffer from a disability, have cultural or language barriers or have been isolated from the mainstream job market. In this model, the good or service being sold is less important than providing employment to its target group.
Examples include leaflet drop and newspaper delivery services provided by people with a mental illness, or culturally specific food catering supplied by refugee communities.
2. Goods/services model
Maybe you're not happy with some of the products currently on the market or the harmful methods used to produce them. This model attempts to minimise or remove any social or environmental harm in the creation of a product or the provision of the service. SEOs that offer fair prices to their makers by selling free-trade goods use the goods/services model. These SEOs avoid inequitable tariffs and promote better conditions by refusing to sell products made in sweatshops. Similarly, organisations that provide environmentally responsible goods, such as organic food or products that do not include petrochemicals, also often embrace this approach.
3. Social investment model
If you have a good business idea unrelated to your cause, the social investment model might be the way to go. This model most closely resembles a traditional business. However, unlike a business, this model invests all 'profit' into a charitable cause. This means that whatever you choose to do, you can raise money for the cause that's most important to you.
4. Hybrid model
A hybrid model combining more than one of the above structures is also a possibility. For example, a waste recycling business that hires long-term unemployed people and directs its 'profit' to a variety of charities combines all three models.
http://www.abc.net.au/catapult/basics/s2554740.htm
Creative Commons
Share, Remix, Reuse — Legally
Creative Commons works to increase sharing, collaboration and innovation worldwide.
http://creativecommons.org.au
Creative Commons is an international non-profit organisation that provides free licences and tools that copyright owners can use to allow others to share, reuse and remix their material, legally.
Creative Commons Australia is the affiliate that supports Creative Commons in Australia and administers the Australian Creative Commons licences.
Social Traders
http://www.socialtraders.com.au/
Social Traders is a social enterprise development agency that was launched in June 2009. Based in Victoria, it came about in response to the need for systemic change required to support the development of social enterprise in Australia. Whilst much of Social Traders’ direct work with social enterprises will occur in Victoria we will be undertaking research and advocacy at a national level.
Social Traders
• is developing a social enterprise development fund which will provide training, support and investment to a number of Victorian social enterprises every year;
• will be investing in measuring the social impact of social enterprises;
• organises events and opportunities for social enterprises to network;
• undertakes research and policy development to further the interests of social enterprise;
• is leveraging funding into the social enterprise arena;
• is undertaking projects that will open up markets and business to social enterprise.
Examples
The social enterprises that are most visible in Australia are the opportunity shops that are located in every suburb and town. Some of the more well known social enterprises include the Bendigo Bank Community Branches, The Big Issueand Fifteen Restaurant. Behind these well known identities are thousands of other social enterprises that operate in most communities across the country.There are 3 principle motivations for developing a social enterprise:
1. Income generation - Many nonprofit organizations see social enterprise as a way to reduce their dependence on charitable donations and grants through commercial activity
2. Employment – Many people see employment or engagement of marginalised groups as the principle motivation for social enterprise.
3. Service delivery – Social enterprise has the capacity to create or retain services needed in communities.
Like any other business, setting up a social enterprise requires substantial advice, investment, and support. The Social Traders web site provides links to a range of tools and resources that will help people to develop a social enterprise. Much of the support available to mainstream business may be relevant to social enterprises starting up, as they often face many of the same barriers.
Urban Infomatics
http://www.urbaninformatics.net/
The increasing ubiquity of digital technology, internet services and location-aware applications in our everyday lives allows for a seamless transitioning between the visible and the invisible infrastructure of cities: road systems, building complexes, information and communication technology and people networks create a buzzing environment that is alive and exciting.
Driven by curiosity, initiative and interdisciplinary exchange, the Urban Informatics Research Lab at Queensland University of Technology (QUT) is a transdisciplinary cluster of people working on research and development at the intersection of people, place and technology with a focus on cities, locative media and mobile technology.
Urban informatics is the study, design, and practice of urban experiences across different urban contexts that are created by new opportunities of real-time, ubiquitous technology and the augmentation that mediates the physical and digital layers of people networks and urban infrastructures. (Foth, Choi, & Satchell, 2011)
Our team comprises and collaborates with architects with degrees in media studies, software engineers with expertise in urban sociology, human-computer interaction designers with a grounding in cultural studies, and urban planners with an interest in digital media and social networking. Being hosted by the Institute for Creative Industries and Innovation at QUT enables our projects to embrace the creative energy of a range of disciplines across design, performance, production and writing.
Civic Media
http://civic.mit.edu
The MIT Center for Civic Media creates and deploys technical and social tools that fill the information needs of communities.
We are inventors of new technologies that support and foster civic media and political action; we are a hub for the study of these technologies; and we coordinate community-based test beds both in the United States and internationally.
Transforming civic knowledge into civic action is an essential part of democracy. As with investigative journalism, the most delicate and important information can often focus on leaders and institutions that abuse the trust of the communities they serve. By helping to provide people with the necessary skills to process, evaluate, and act upon the knowledge in circulation, civic media ensures the diversity of inputs and mutual respect necessary for democratic deliberation.
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