Syndicate: Mute 9 is out !

[Andreas Broeckmann <abroeck@v2.nl>]

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            ******----Mute9----OUT!----******
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Mute is a UK based quarterly about culture and
technology. Issue 9 is out now. The contents of
issue 9 will go online next week. In the meantime,
issue 8 (September 97) is already available, as are
select back issues and articles.

Mute online will remain an archive site for all Mute
content while Metamute, Mute's internet site will be
relaunched (edited by JJ King) on 12th March as
part of London Electronic Arts' "Eyes of March"

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Metamute: www.metamute.com
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====MUTE 9====

In chronological order:

====*Short/Cuts*====

*NEWMEDIACENTRE.COY:
The Institute of Conemporary Art and creative
sponsor Sun Microsystems have just joined forces.
But who's wearing the trousers...
--> see also Cyber.Salon 3 <nettime> announcer 021a 1/2

*LITTLE AND LARGE:
_P2P_ and the Amsterdam Agenda...

*THE PLUG 'N' PLAY CLUB:
The Hyperjam, tele-clubbing and Digital Diaspora...

*SWOOSH - YOU ARE NOW ENTERING AIRSPACE:
Do airports challenge us to 'imagine new synthetic
worlds'? - AA design project for Heathrow, Terminal 5...

*THE 77TH ELEMENT:
Motorola's Iridium ring of satellites' unacknowledged
parent project: Jean Marc Philippe's _Celestial Wheel_...

*CUTS LIKE A LASER:
Fashion company Suture use photomicrography and
laser cutting to new ends...

*BABELFISH/LOUDMOUTHS/WEBSTALKER
The Shortest/Cuts...

*THE TWO HACKS:
Carey Young's _Base Matter_ @ HIP97
The Tacit Hack - "Inserts" - art in academic journals...


====**MAIN**====

**Eric Kluitenberg interviews Huge Harry:
HUMAN ART IS DEAD, Long Live the Algorithmic Art
of the Machine...

---"People are not machines. Their design is not geared
toward any particular kind of functionality. People
don't have a purpose in life. That's why they have
existential problems, and they don't like to do useful
work for more than a few hours a day, and they like to
have holidays and vacations. Machines have a sense
of purpose."

**A Toolbox of Everyday Media In Eastern Europe,
Andreas Broeckmann and Inke Arns:

---"One fortunate consequence of the Party's propaganda was
that the media on the Eastern side of the Iron Curtain
was never perceived as the source of reality production,
whereas in the West, this illusion was clung to fiercely.
Eastern bloc techniques for dealing with the media -
hesitancy, scepticism and irony - are a useful legacy."


====***Special Section:TECHNOSCIENCE***====

---"It is becoming an all too common revelation to hear
of 'independent' government advisors, even critics, also
holding down jobs on the boards of biotech corporations.
This ambidextrous career strategy can only deepen the
existing discrepancy between the industry's hi-finance PR
and lobbying campaign and the absence of a powerful,
independent critical force." (Intro)

***Technology Consensus Census
Mute interviews Richard Sclove of the Loka Institute
about corporate accountability and the state of technological
democracies...

---"The consensus conference [...] is a little bit like a
jury in court. If the Danish government is going to debate a
complicated, controversial question like biotechnology policy
or how we should make use of the knowledge from the Human
Genome Project, their Board of Technology assemble a jury
(asit were) of about 15 quasi-randomly selected Danish
citizens. The panel excludes anybody with expertise on the
topic and it excludes anybody from an organised interest
group that is active.

***Technocrative Dreamtime in Malaysia: Cybercolonialism
John Hutnyk on the MSC, Malaysia's economic crisis and
Science Cities...

---"Who will be the hi-tech workers? A layer of
technocrats and experts will need to be recruited, from
in part the expat Malaysian elites schooled in the salons
of Stanford, MIT, London and Manchester, but in large part,
at least in the first phases, the already existing personnel
of the multinational infocorps that are invited to 'relocate'
will provide staff for the most important posts. The imported
workers will have expat lives and an expat status which is
not far from the old 'colonial career' that has always been
the hallmark of business empires under imperialism."

***DIRECT BIOCRACY QUESTIONNAIRE - Mute @Hybrid WorkSpace

---"If you want to develop blisters try walking around in
someone else's shoes. At this summer's Hybrid WorkSpace we
managed just that when, together with net.journalis Josephine
Bosma, we lip-synched the talk and limped the walk of
empirical science. With roughly 600 people a day dropping
into the Hybrid WorkSpace, we were in the perfect environment
for carrying out a questionnaire on the subject of Technoscience.
We wanted to find out what people think about the ethics of
certain technological and scientific developments and whether
they would like to have a greater say in their social
implementation."


====****REVIEWS****====

****GAMING (Games & Multimedia)
+ Blade Runner + Dark Forces + Jedi Knights II + Final
Fantasy II + Tomb Raider II + G Police + Nuclear Strike +
Hexen II + Nude Raider
/Ed: John Paul Bichard <johnny@ultralux.demon.co.uk>
****DEE BLUE (Soft Science)
Mathematicians are from Mars: Hari Kunzru interviews
Mark Atkinson
+ Science News
/Ed: James Flint <jim@metamute.com>
****README (Print)
Rage Against the Machine - but do it in machine code:
Tom McCarthy on the Systems Novel
+ The Dark Knight Returns + Come + The Way the Wind Blew +
La Carte Postale + Computer One + Cybertrends + The Closed
World + Browser
/Ed: JJ King & Tom McCarthy
<jamie@metamute.com> and <tom@metamute.com>
****AUDIOPHILE (Music)
Emit do Time:
Hari Kunzru interviews Emit's David Thompson.
+ Mindvirus + Eleven Phases + Ultimate Sushi + Radical Beauty
/Ed: Hari Kunzru <hari@metamute.com>
****ART TM (Art)
Pretty Good Piracy: Lisa Haskel on Mikrolab
+ Martin + I Won't Promise you the Earth + rootLESS97
/Ed: <mute@metamute.com>
****SHELF LIFE (Fashion)
/Ed: <mute@metamute.com>

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    *-----------THANKS TO ALL CONTRIBUTORS-----------*
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(that means independent newsagents) as of issue 10. We are
still eagerly looking for distribution in individual
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Any helpful tips welcome at: pauline@metamute.com
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GENERAL CONTACT:
Mute, 2nd floor, 135-139 Curtain Road, LONDON EC2A 3BX, UK
T: +44 (0)171 613 4743 / F: +44 (0)171 613 4052 /
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Editors:
-Pauline van Mourik Broekman (pauline@metamute.com)
-Simon Worthington (simon@metamute.com)
Assistant Editor:
-Josephine Berry (josie@metamute.com)

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