“The Multi-Temporal Experience of Plate Spinning” presented by Speed
Symposium:
Session Title:
- Creativity and the Web
Presentation Title:
- The Multi-Temporal Experience of Plate Spinning
Presenter(s):
Abstract:
Increasingly our experience of the internet is transforming from a diet of digital books and choice making from grey embossed buttons, to a dynamic experience of multiple times and spaces as we open more browser windows and a paper based culture begins to embrace network technologies. As we inhabit so many web pages simultaneously, ‘smarter’ sites are beginning to tell us that we are not alone in cyberspace.
Beyond the chat sites where we direct our communication, network software is beginning to extract information about ourselves and distribute it to others as we are online. Software such as Meta-Spy (meta-spy.com) and Raindance (http://caiia-star.net/speed/raindance) both acknowledge the presence of others in a passive manner. As a new culture emerges away from the domination of the broadcast model adopted from traditional media, our awareness of the community around us grows as our vista on cyberspace takes on a new seat that offers an ability to see further and see more. A position where social navigation can once again be observed as though the internet was becoming an inhabited environment beyond the one to one relationship we have with our desktop monitor.
In highlighting the value of this emerging point of view the author presents his paper alongside the performance of a ‘plate spinner’, as a model for the potential of this technology and the multi-temporal nature of our experience of it. In observing the skilled performance of a ‘classic’ circus act, and reflecting upon the audience’s consciousness of multiple times that each embody a beginning and end, the author draws our attention to our faith in multiple narratives and the possibility for a transformation of the western understanding of the teleological frameworks that underpin so many of our cultural processes and artifacts.
