NewNQP

Another Circus Poster… for the upcoming garage sale style vide grenier in our village.

I got distracted by summer opportunities, and work. Peet chapeau Sneekes installed a tagging/keyword engine on the server (which we had to unplug after because it corrupted the server settings with my provider). Nevertheless I have to think here about content and what meta. Folksonomy, apart from its sociocultural and semantechnical opportunities, means what exactly to disparate content, to the global encyclopedia, to knowledge which is never value free but needs to be worked, reviewed and applied? At some point sooner or later we will see one or another and probably myriad value adding editorial re-clustering happening. After all it is one thing to have ‘all information available at any time to anyone’ — its de-institutionalizing, egalitarianizing effect being a noble general goal — any single bit of vernacular knowledge depending however on something slightly else than its global findability.

First information sung itself free from the real world. Remember that pathetic Cyberspace Independence Declaration? Today, with new technologies adding performance, we see enhanced information return to an everyday environment, becoming re-situated. The next thing will be new organizations, acting local, thinking, organizing and publishing informational. That’s when singularity could happen. It’s a couple of decades away, if some of us keep working on it. World media will need it.

Browsable 1: Center for Literary Computing at West Virginia University Projects
Browsable 2: Meaningful whereabouts/locative information while googleing your shoes (pasta&vinegar)

A weblog author ages post-by-post with his or her publication — reversely it comes of age with its author. As a ‘live’ format, a near real time, responsive voice, its progress at the level of self-awareness is slow. Since the phenomenon only dates from the late 1990s, mature weblogs we have not yet seen. Of course 15 years ago the web was equally inviting to any generation, but fresh nerds and experienced authors alike have only been underway with the new publishing format for the same short period of time. Even when Internet and media developments supposedly hurry along at a speed beyond Moore’s Law barrier, our understanding of those media is immature and our use of them puerile. Looking at raw numbers only impresses kids. Industry is there to remind us that technology develops fast and we should stay in pace. But industrial calculation is myopic, its outcome ever more.

The Internet’s development rather be calculated by the development of media literacy, and such is as tricky as calculating any other societal or cultural progress. A cultural footprint — one-by-one measuring pedestrian man’s progress — would, like any ecological footprint, have to be calculated by very small and very large effects combined, to see not only how fast we are going, but more importantly who is going where and which steps one likes to take and sites one likes to visit on the way. Who to walk with, who to pause with.

Early Information Age will anyway look as outdated in retrospect as the early years of the railways, radio and typewriter appear to us now. Machines, dress and architecture age, most habits die out while some return, existential doubt and most everyday routines, remain valid and are positively timeless: they make time and speed irrelevant to each other. Time can only be slowly recognized from lives being lived, and documented.

I would not mind (and be happy to perform whatever I’m good at in exchange for any interesting result) to have someone out there design NewNQP a custom WordPress theme that fits it like a glove, taking in consideration, and as an inspiration, the habits NQPaOFU dressed in over the past years… a worthy new garb? Before I start bricolaging myself.

After 7 years (since 22 March 1998) of almost daily personal posting on NQPaOFU, Notes, Quotes, Provocations and Other Fair Use, and after a long hiatus which I attempted to break several times, never getting back into the habit, with NewNQP I hope to pick up personal publishing in a new way. Leaving behind for the most part hand coded Pagespinner and FTP upload (the portal and archive at nqpaofu.com I maintain), adding WordPress enhancement, NewNQP kicks off as a nqpaofu.com subdomain: new.nqpaofu.com.

NQPaOFU was issue numbered, reaching #96 last year, almost #97 — some posts half-written, sleeping on my hard disk. NewNQP might follow a different organization, for a different way of publishing, writing, and being read. In the background another publishing project meanwhile has been going on since february 2005. It contains daily posts in Dutch on everyday subjects, household and family affairs, in the context of lifes being lived in Amsterdam and St. Germain des Bois. It is shared among three fellow readers-writers and one ’subscriber’. Its primary audience however is the authors’ kids, today aged 10-13, to be browsed one day in the future when they become curious to match their memories to what their parents have documented. It is a long ‘letter to the future’, posted by three families that have been playing together for years already.

What kind of content leaves this for NewNQP? I will try to keep the healthy mix of personal and professional interests which built NQPaOFU: art, media, life. I still ‘cherish my hesitation‘ with every upload. I still mark my life with publishing: graphing the bios. I still very much subscribe to the idea that publishing should be personal, distributed, individual, outside mainstream media, to be organized with the aim to connect people’s deep interests instead of selling them any industries’ profitable commodities.

I can still wake up with a post itching. I feel ready to again deplete my attention.

A dear promise: ‘to be continued’… Though it seems like a communication to its readers, it is firstly a ‘note to self’, an excuse not to continue there and then, a disclaimer, testifying that an argument runs dry and will not be elaborated upon any time soon. Searching NQPaOFU for that disclaimer find me 12 instances, sorted here by score. 12 unfulfilled promises over 7 years. Might I allow myself…?:

1. Jouke Kleerebezem’s NQPaOFU 56, 30 June-27 July 2002 ••
NQPAOFU 2001, Notes Quotes Provocations And Other Fair Use
…for an overthrow of the powers that introduce and exploit them? Definitely to be continued. 18 July 2002 A network does not do anything….
http://www.nqpaofu.com/2002/nqpaofu56.html

2. NQPaOFU: 2000/1998-2003 ••
NQPAOFU 2001, Notes Quotes Provocations And Other Fair Use
…to be continued writing between the links NYOD the simple life; re:clientage give me the/one/a break, for the better just one break the leaving song…
http://www.nqpaofu.com/nqpaofusince1998_2000.html

3. NQPaOFU: 2003/1998-2003 ••
NQPAOFU 2001, Notes Quotes Provocations And Other Fair Use
…Bangalore-Kovalam, India ‹ to be continued, working my way back in time, adding at the bottom, including URLs for your convenience, so check again,…
http://www.nqpaofu.com/nqpaofusince1998_2003.html

4. Jouke Kleerebezem’s NQPaOFU 58, 30 August-25 September 2002 ••
NQPAOFU 2001, Notes Quotes Provocations And Other Fair Use
…information, real content, is forwarded and replied. Irreducable abundance (to be continued) Banking. Anselmo’s infinito. 10 September 2002…
…imagined it to become in early times, like August 1994, 8 web years away. (to be continued) Moreover, how to imagine such production to offer enough…
…of radio is in fact your noise being my signal and the other way around. (to be continued) (…) this all works only if each person makes links as…
http://www.nqpaofu.com/2002/nqpaofu58.html

5. notes quotes provocations and other fair use anchors 2 ••
NQPAOFU 2001, Notes Quotes Provocations And Other Fair Use
…Bangalore-Kovalam, India — to be continued, working my way back in time, adding at the bottom, including URLs for your convenience, so check again,…
…to be continued recluse elastik complexity was: dazzle shops wares, media, information was: splendid isolation thegoodnews title follow…
…to be continued nqp don’t follow leaders we want more mediatization/informatization yesterblog personal publishing conservancy] solid…
http://www.nqpaofu.com/nqpaofu-anchorlonglist2.html

6. Jouke Kleerebezem’s NQPaOFU 91, 2-28 November 2004 ••
NQPAOFU 2001, Notes Quotes Provocations And Other Fair Use
…the spur of the moment, relativizing the value of the conclusive. To be continued. Networked media spread the news infinite in all directions, in real…
…be everywhere at once. You can only tap so many sources at the same time. To be continued. Besides: you are your own platform, pretty much. Your…
http://www.nqpaofu.com/2004/nqpaofu91.html

7. Jouke Kleerebezem’s NQPaOFU 27, 24 March-21 April 2000 ••
NQPAOFU 2000, Notes Quotes Provocations And Other Fair Use
…to be continued (1) Last Saturday over post-narrative diner I sat with Paul, and Jan van Grunsven, and some students. At one point for the first time…
http://www.nqpaofu.com/2000/nqpaofu27.html

8. Jouke Kleerebezem’s NQPaOFU 34, 19 September-3 October 2000 ••
NQPAOFU 2000, Notes Quotes Provocations And Other Fair Use
…(to be continued: ‘context built the cat’) 26 September 2000 re-action towards new standards in life activities artist attention: Friedrich…
http://www.nqpaofu.com/2000/nqpaofu34.html

9. Jouke Kleerebezem’s NQPaOFU 86, 16 May-8 June 2004 ••
NQPAOFU 2001, Notes Quotes Provocations And Other Fair Use
…TO BE CONTINUED Narcoleptic attack knocks around 10pm. I drag myself to the lite studio to sip one J , a nightcap. Sit back, toggle. Hope to fall…
http://www.nqpaofu.com/2004/nqpaofu86.html

10. Jouke Kleerebezem’s NQPaOFU 93, 3-31 January 2005 ••
Notes Quotes Provocations & Other Fair Use 93 nuthatch between hatches outside the Moulin studio note the background deformation through the b…
…to be continued nqp Weißt du, schwanzt du? Convictions at any price. Plenty concerns. I’m in the process of finishing the Open text. Only…
http://www.nqpaofu.com/2005/nqpaofu93.html

11. Jouke Kleerebezem’s NQPaOFU 1, 22 March-8 April 1998 ••
NQPAOFU, Notes Quotes Provocations And Other Fair Use
…thought: let’s assume with John Doerr that the Internet is under-hyped. (to be continued) Departure for Pittsburgh to present at the VisionPlus 4…
http://www.nqpaofu.com/nqp/ciw_nqp.html

12. notes quotes provocations and other fair use anchors 1 ••
NQPAOFU 2001, Notes Quotes Provocations And Other Fair Use
…to be continued writing between the links NYOD the simple life; re:clientage give me the/one/a break, for the better just one break the leaving song…
http://www.nqpaofu.com/nqpaofu-anchorlonglist.html

15 July 2006; 18:30-
my poster design for the 2006 edition of the village’s méchoui
Saint Germain des Bois
vernacular style: melt with a twist

For posting in la France profonde (’deep France’) the poster and door-to-door leaflet remain the medium of choice. Yet we put up a site, for those unlucky to not be able to live here permanently, sentenced to Paris, Amsterdam, London… and we do email notification of upcoming events (typically 6/yr: spring walk, church concert, Feu de St. Jean, méchoui (lamb from the spit), flee market, Xmas) and other news. Subscribe at ‘germaniens’ at the above domain and we’ll keep you posted.

A is for Attention, my economy of choice, bankrupted when
B, for Bandwidth, brings in the noise…
C is for Computation, which gives you the spleens, while
D is for you, Dummy, to compete with machines!
E is for Eyeballs, windows to the soul, blinded by bits, as
F is for Feed, which inhibits your wits, so quick call in
G for a Grid, a Guideline or Google… or hit Q for Quits.

H is for Hard disks, spinning your daily dose
I is for Infinite, 0’s and 1’s, come down the hose.
J is for Juggernauts, aiming the best of your surf,
K is for the Key, you supply to your turf, lest
L is for Lagging, you want none of that, since
M is for Momentum, where real time is at…
N is the Narrowcast, Native to the Net,
O is for Offline, where media customization will never be met, since
P is for Preferences, individually, electronically set.

Q are the Questions, we frequently ask
R is Redundance: all answers that mask, ignoring the
Smart S’s, for Sovereignty, Soul, Sex — Sweet and Subtle, which take
T for Trivia, but none for rebuttal…
U is for the savviest User, this boundless center fraction, whose
V is for Virtual: the quality of his satisfaction, while
W W W Waiting, for intimate, intelligent interaction…

X is for Xerox and Xanadu: as ideal worlds can be planned but never made,
Y is for Yearning, for otherwise it is never too late, to — with
Z for Zest — reach that altered state!

After Have(Not) Alphabetical Candygrammar Koup, originally published in NQPaOFU 14, 9 July 1999: “As a little aide de mémoire, I supply you with my Have(Not) Alphabetical Candygrammar Koup (or HACK), since songs help me through times with no bandwidth better than bandwidth helps me through times with no content.

Like the later NQPaOFU, also NewNQP has no date pride.

The everyday strings its routines along the calendar and the hour. Rather than timestamping such moments, the routines themselves build a timeless chain of repeated events which in their intimate detail are never the same, while their urgency and purpose can be identical. They maintain, feed, clean, harvest, discuss, reflect the vital activities behind the life and times and production of any author.

30 June 2006; 10:53
clean stable at Le Moulin du Merle
ready to be refurbished
front doors for sale

2 July 2006; 13:04
JK in line for the eco festival lunch
Ecodomaine des Gilats

Whether or not they’d be part of his or her core interest, everyday routines behind even the most artificial ‘text’ can be queried — without ever mistaking the author for his or her personas, Mickey…

For an artist and designer like myself, the separation of content and design is an interesting challenge. All WordPress ‘Themes’ that I looked at so far seem equally ready-made to me and do not fit my content. The possibility to skin ones content is however fascinating. I bet some designers out there designed good skins for WordPress driven content. Yet it is not the medium which is the message and WordPress is not its author, but you and me. Any experienced and skilled designer can design a better, truer interface for any individual piece of content, add more value to it, than any template can accommodate.

In an ideal situation, design comes with the content. In the work of some artists ‘themes’ might come before individual works. Design which comes before content is like roads which come before traffic or buildings before occupants. From inner city malls to highway sprawl to social housing we all know where uniformity can lead. Yet it is also considered a sign of equality, like in the school uniform. Beyond the limits of uniformity, individual expression takes shape.

As in traffic, so in screen based information media, reliable, accessible navigation is a design factor. Interface clarity, readability, color and shape to enhance the text/illustration relationship are design factors. Editorial priority, accentuation, macro and micro view are design factors. But readability is linked to literacy. People read different messages and meanings from like designs. Interpretation is infinite. Many expressions allow multiple interpretations — even gain from them, depend on them, thrive on them. Readability allows more elasticity of interpretation than usability, when the success of an action is at stake. Then again I even might consider user preferences overruling design decisions, like in case a user enlarges the font size rendering.

What’s in a page? Coming from a history of print publication I can’t get used to calling the units which constitute a web ’site’ ‘pages’. It hurts everytime I read it. But we can’t call them ’screens’ either. Otherwise ‘pages’ would have to be called ‘papers’, or ’sheets’.

Printed sheets of paper are called pages in the context of their organization into ‘books’. If you rip one out, you still hold a page — you might tell from a page number, or page header. HTML-files are called pages in the context of their organization into hypertext stacks(…) for web publication. If you rip out a web page, you have an HTML-file which lacks some elements, like linked-in images. If you screendump a web page, however, you still have a web page, but if you then print it, you don’t. Hm.

NewNQP will be written in ‘categories’ as much as chronologically. Categories are meta-information, in much the same way titles are meta-information to a work of art. They are both content and meta, or parallel information. The ‘title’ is a long debated item in contemporary art, e.g. in Die List der Unschuld; Das Wahrnehmen einer Skulptur (1982; original title ‘Le sens de la transparence ou La perception d’une sculpture’) by Remy Zaugg, whose last paragraph on page 298 ends:

“Letstes Element der Inszenierung: der Titel, oder konkreter ausgedrückt, die beschreibende Etikette, welche die im Museum ausgestellten Werke begleitet. Jeder wie auch immer geartete Titel inszeniert einen bestimmten semantischen Bereich. Er ist ein Wort, welches versucht, das Werk auszusagen. Er spricht in Namen des Werks, als ob dieses sozusagen nicht volljährig wäre oder als ob es unfähig wäre, sich allein zu behaupten. Aber der Titel bevormundet auch das wahrnehmende Subjekt, da er ihm befiehlt, worauf es seine Wahrnehmungsabsicht zu richten habe. Jeder Titel setzt also dem Werk, welches ein aufgeschobenes Wort ist und das Subjekt verantwortlich zu machen weiss, ein Ende. Jeder Title usurpiert die Funktion, die das Werk dem Subjekt zugedacht hat. Er muss verbannt werden, inbegriffen «Ohne Titel».’

My first categories are:

Abecedarium
Correspondency
F
Molenkraam
NL
Omnia Mea in Media
Read/write
(Uncategorized)
Vintage NQPaOFU

Category creation is a great tool in the ‘folksonomy’ vein of organizing content, though individually focused, more like an ‘idionomy’ (which both piles neology upon neology becoming meaningless, and is a recognized term in a different context, I find, and will have to look into). Better would be something like ‘idiotaxonomy’, the taxis signifying the categorizing element in taxonomy, nomos the law creating element.

Creating meta-information early on struck me as a basic necessity for large scale personal networked publishing, as some posts in NQPaOFU prove. I will search for them and see how much today’s content is better enhanced than yesterday’s.

Categories that haven’t made it (yet) to the list would include:

(Getting my) feed back
Poetry
Rocket or any other science
Spam canvas
Turf

I am not back yet into productional mode with NewNQP. As long as I do not link it from the NQPortal however, I remain free from a larger readership. I created this post mainly to be able to attach the Vintage NQPaOFU category to it, for it to appear in the Categories list. Of course I should create a Post named ‘Categories’ and list all the ones created so far in it — or find out how to permanently show the list even while there have not been written any posts in some categories.

So in Vintage NQPaOFU I hope to republish some meanwhile forgotten gems from the years 1998-2005…

Hee man! Superbedankt en nu wil ik nog wel een paar extra uurtjes in mijn leven om hier eens lekker doorheen te jassen.