Hasta La Ideas

Tuesday Aug. 16th, Core77 welcomes Sheldon Renan for our bi-weekly creative speaker series: The Hand-Eye Supply Curiosity Club hosted at the Hand-Eye Supply store in Portland, OR. Come early and check out our shop or check in with us online for the live broadcast!

Sheldon Renan: Why Everything Wants to be Connected { and What That Means For Makers }

Tuesday, August 16th
6PM PST
Hand-Eye Supply
23 NW 4th Ave
Portland, OR, 97209
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Internet Map. Source: Wikimedia Commons

“Things are becoming more connected every day—connecting faster and in more ways than anybody realizes,” says Sheldon Renan. Renan’s Law states that “The more things are connected, the better things work… the smarter things are… the safer things are… and the more opportunity you have to succeed.” Conversely, emphasizes Renan, “If you limit connectivity, you decrease opportunity. You decrease safety”.

Renan’s “New Laws of Netness” explain how connectivity has begun to change in three ways as it becomes increasingly ubiquitous.

• Networks are converging towards becoming fabrics and fields. Access will increasingly be through more ubiquitous connectivity fields.
• Multi-threaded communications fabrics which connect users with both redundant and complimentary services are defining a new degree of connectivity—which Renan characterizes as entangled. Users are virtually “always on” and always connected. presence is continuous. User attention, perceived time and perceived distance are becoming elastic.
• Two separate worlds—the world of atoms and the world of bits—are becoming one. What we have begun to call “augmented reality” will be the new, converged normal.

Sheldon Renan was alerted to the growing importance of connectivity in the early 90s while working on special projects at Xerox PARC. Previously Renan had founded The Pacific Film Archive at U.C. Berkeley while writing the first history of experimental media. This led to producing interactive videodiscs and creating immersive interactive media spaces for theme parks and technology events. Currently Renan is writing a new book on the future of connectivity.

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Speaking of runaway successes spearheaded by Vogue editor-in-chief Anna Wintour, Fashion’s Night Out is back for its third year of worldwide retail boosterism that many have compared to a consumerist Halloween (with less candy and chicer costumes). Stateside shoppers can mark their calendars for Thursday, September 8, which is also the first of day of Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week in New York. The full Fashion’s Night Out schedule—including a full line-up of celebrity-studded events that are sure to bring back fond memories of the live pottery demonstration by Jonathan Adler at Barneys, Andrew Andrew DJ’ing amongst the Goyard satchels at Bergdorf Goodman, and other hijinks of FNOs past—will be announced on Monday, along with new ways to participate online. In the meantime, Fairhaven, Massachusetts-based Brahmin has debuted the official Fashion’s Night Out tote bags, which feature the new event identity. Available in three colorways, the $50 bags will be sold at participating FNO retailers with a portion of proceeds to benefit NYC AIDS in the Community Trust. Beat the maddening, tote bag-coveting crowds and order yours directly from Brahmin here. Trick or treat, indeed.

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

What’s the number one golden ticket that soon everyone in the upper echelons of New York will be trying to get their hands on? The presumably upcoming wedding between fashion designer turned TV personality Michael Kors and his long-haired, longtime partner (and occasional Jesus look-alike), Lance LePere. Now that gay marriage has become legal in New York, the pair are expected to tie the knot sometime soon, as the two were reportedly spotted at City Hall late last week requesting a marriage certificate. Thus far they’ve kept things quiet about the whens and wheres, but you can imagine that there is already an army of tabloid scribes and paparazzi digging for the details, given that the even is sure to have a few celebrities among its ranks. Here’s the only word from Kors thus far:

“Lance and I are very excited to finally be able to have the opportunity to marry in our home state after many years together,” Kors, a Long Island native, said in a statement.

“We have no plans for a major party, but we will be getting married privately,” Kors, 51, added.

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

How an experimental art collective turned a field into a puppy opera, lawnmower symphony and more

Chiefly interested in the “intersections between different fields of knowledge,” like all good art collectives, Machine Project’s objectives are sometimes frustratingly vague. Loose definitions on their site span “informal educational institution” to host of “scientific talks, poetry readings and group naps.” But if one thing is consistent about the L.A. nonprofit, it’s that every undertaking is steeped in radical creativity.

With seemingly unfiltered conceptual thinking, founder Mark Allen’s wide-reaching collaborations manage to translate the group’s raw ideas into crowd-pleasing installations. Most recently Machine Project took up a two-week residency at Minneapolis’ Walker Art Center during the museum’s Open Field series of outdoor art events, resulting in a collection of site-specific performance pieces.

Set to a live singing performance, Elizabeth Cline’s 10-minute operetta “Tragedy on the Sea Nymph” featured an all-dog cast acting as lovers shipwrecked at sea.

Another project involving animals, “The American Lawn, and Ways To Cut It” explored the sonic nature of the grass at Walker, using “sheep, choreographed gasoline-powered ride-on mowers with mounted oscillators tuned to the drone of their engines, and push mowers,” which were strung with tinkling bells.

Influenced by architecture, Machine Project’s Curator of Sound Chris Kallmyer was the driving force behind the lawn event and another experimental study in sound called “Music For Parking Garages.” The talented trumpeter and fellow musicians tested the limits of sound in a cavernous parking garage, playing to whoever pulled up a bean bag chair for a listen.

Sound artist Kamau Patton adapted solar panels and a light-to-frequency converter to measure the sun’s rays on the Open Field, turning them into a beautiful arrangement of tunes in his “Composition for Photoelectric Array and Ambient Light Open Field.”

Whether teaching kids to break into cars, amplifying melons, generating songs through algorithms, reading poetry over the phone or pickling through lacto-fermentation, there was no shortage of inventive activities on hand at the Walker in July thanks to Machine Project. Always testing new ideas, hosting events and teaching classes at their Echo Park storefront, subscribe to their newsletter to keep on top of this industrious group’s latest happenings.

The Walker’s “Open Field” events continue through 4 September 2011, check the site for listings.

All images from Walker Open Field

After a hiatus during the month of July the Hand-Eye Supply Curiosity Club is back. To kick things off with a fresh perspective, we’ve asked the Riverdale Highschool Robotics Team to talk about their activities in FIRST Robotics. Join us next Tuesday, August 2nd at the Hand-Eye Supply store in Portland at 6PM.

Do you have any advice to students that want to become involved in programs like FIRST robotics, or are just interested in learning about and building their own robots?

If you’re still in middle school or elementary school, but still want to get involved in robotics, the FIRST Lego League program is an excellent way to get involved. The competition is in many ways similar to FRC, but instead of raw materials, the robots are made of legos. Another program is the FIRST Tech challenge, which could be described as the intermediate level between FLL and FRC. Both are fun programs that can lead to FRC in high school. If your school doesn’t have an FLL, FTC, or FRC team, there are club teams that may allow students in the community to join. All of these teams are more then glad to have you no matter what you like to do.

Are there any specific tools that you consistently use when building your robots? Are there any rare, unique or otherwise specialized tools that you find indispensable?

Each team member probably has a tool they could not work without. Our electrician needs his multimeter, our programmers need their computers, and our fabrication team needs their drill press and welders. Perhaps the most important tools/supplies are the ones supplied by FIRST itself. Each year we get access to specialized design and programming software, as well as unique pieces of electronics. These are vital to building robots.

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