[Nettime-bold] So Far So Good

["Lachlan brown" <editors@london.com>]

Almost seven years ago, in December 1994

 Digital Revolutionaries

met in the Committee Room of 

The Baths on Laurie Grove 

at Goldsmiths College

University of London

to discuss the subject of

the World Wide Web 

and the question:


‘What’s to be Done? and how to go about doing it?”


It was agreed unanimously, without dissent, 

to agitate, to be ‘playfully serious’ in curation, 

editing, and arts and design practise as well as in

 criticism of the coming digital revolution. It was 

further agreed to radicalise under 'playfully 

serious' principles everyone each of us came across

in our respective fields.


The group agreed to reconvene in seven 

years time, and to bring along all those they 

had radicalized in the interim to discuss

progress and to implement the next ‘seven year plan’.


It was felt that a seven years intervention 

being ‘playfully serious’ (Bruckman+Resnick)

in several fields ought to be followed 

up with a further seven years being ‘seriously 

playful’.


Those in attendance included:

Rachel Baker – design/artist discussed strategies 
for getting ‘street theatre people’ and ‘small 
press poets’ involved as well as the ‘design community’ in general.

Lachlan Brown – cultural studies publishing and research who discussed the forthcoming ‘difference 
engine’ intervention and the academic/publishing 
community in Canada and the UK.

Lisa Haskel – new media curation and policy who discussed the ‘labelling’ properties of object-
oriented language, as well as getting the Arts Council of England and some Europeans involved.

Simon, Pauline and Tina, founders of Mute 
discussed plans for the magazine Mute and its digitalartcritique.

a representative of HRC Westminster (Jeremy Quinn) 
didn’t really get any of it at all.

Alessio Qartzo-Cerena – marketing and advertising 
sector discussed ‘cynical reason in advertising’.

John Wood, chairperson and host, waffled on about 
‘the web, ecology, crop-circles’ and 
helped make the tea.


Sean Cubitt agreed earlier in 1994 (Sept) to help 
further the aims of the group by developing The Digital Cultures course (96) and writing Digital Aesthetics (97) a seminal work confusing to abstraction the real terms of the digital 
revolution, and to insinuate himself in 
International bodies concerned with scholarship 
and policy on Internet therein to create havoc.

Rachel focused in ‘new media arts practice’ 
bringing in Heath Bunting, James Stevens, 
Matt Fuller, 
The Old Boys Network, and many others.

Lisa focused in ‘administration and policy of 
new media’ in a determined, ambitious and single-minded way.

Alessio radicalized new media marketers ultimately 
confusing and deflecting the ‘dot.com’ boom in London.

Simon and Pauline developed the peerless Magazine Mute.

A full transcript of the debate of December 1994 will be made available via Difference Engine.

The proposed title for the forthcoming meeting of December 2001 is

‘So far, so good.’

All interested parties are invited to attend.



Lachlan Brown

http://  ...


d i f f e r e n c e  e n g i n e  - m e m o r i e s . h i s t o r i e s . f o r e s i g h t

it makes common sense, but it hasn't been commonsense for very long


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