Marcel Reichart Blog

Social Internet

„He doesn’t know to email.“ Dieser Wahlspot traf McCain persönlich. Der 72-Jährige gehört zur Vergangenheit. Obama ist der erste Internet-Präsident wie JFK der erste TV-Präsident war. Barack Obama hat in seinem Wahlkampf nur selten seinen Kontrahenten persönlich angegriffen. Einer der vielen Werbespots zielte jedoch auf John McCain. Der Spot stellte die Welt vor über zwanzig Jahren dar. Es war eine Welt ohne Personal Computer, ohne Handy, ohne Internet. „Doesn’t know to use a computer“, erklärt die Stimme und zeigt den heute 72-jährigen McCain. Obama dagegen trägt nicht nur einen Blackberry am Gürtel und ist damit jederzeit vernetzt.....

weiter auf Cicero.de 

Diesen Artikel habe ich dem Dezember-Heft in gekürzter Fassung unter dem Titel Gewinner Social Internet und online beigesteuert.

David Bowie: Helden

Nicholas Carr on Nietzsche, Google and Gutenberg

Again I read this profound and provocative Atlantic-article by Nicholas Carr how the internet affects our thinking and would like to post it to your attention.

SEED sets science and design to talk

The last issues of Adam Bly's science magazine SEED featured some of our dear DLD friends, including the senior curator of Architecture and Design at the Museum of Modern Art, Paola Antonelli and biology pioneer Craig Venter. In a frank interview, Venter who sequenced the human genome explains what’s holding science back and how he intends to fix it. The design issue presented seven different themes – from visualization to algorithm – that underlie the emerging science-design movement. I like it a lot, especially the conversation of Will Wright and Jill Tarter of the SETI center on science and game design. Wright created not Sims as well as Spore. And the influence game design has on science but also business is far reaching "Can we model reality?”

The debate between the highly esteemed “father of fractal geometry” Benoit Mandelbrot and MoMA’s Paola Antonelli embraces among other things, fractals, self-similarity in architecture, algorithms that could specify the creation of entire cities, visual mathematics, and “the death of Euclid”. And what is interesting, Nassim Thaleb dedicated his book "The Black Swan" to Mandelbrot. Small worlds indeed.

   

 

Change, Clouds and Chanel

Three articles that I picked of the two current Economist editions I'd like to comment on. The fact that young voters in the US really brought the change and rallied for Obama in a way which has not been seen so far. And the knew to use the internet and social networking. It is the real first internet election like it was the first television election in 1960 (the famous Kennedy-Nixon TV debate). 1960 it brought the iconic turn of politics. Like the 1960 Olympics made the sports competitions a global political event. The 2008 elections are the digital turn of politics.

The other 16-pages dossier is on cloud computing. A very good read to better understand the scope of this paradigm shift in computing and data storage. There are many dimensions to it, the environmental issue of energy consumption which makes server farms go under water, the political question of privacy rights and law enforcement when data is not stored at a place to localise, and the business impact. Who will benefit when information commoditizes further? Nicholas Carr sees Google as the benefitor and driver of this process like Microsoft emerged as monopolists by commoditizing products like the browser that were "complementary to its cash cows, such as Windows".

And I liked the face value on Maureen Chiquet, newly named CEO of the epinomious Chanel, a brand that stands for the luxury and inspiration for nine decades now. How to renew such as legacy? The notion of luxury is changing so much. Often people tell you that personal time and independence is true luxury, less buying expensive products that can be bought on Ebay or whose exclusivity may be undermined by fakes. Global brand need to aspire buyers in different cultures. Celebrities endorse such brands and vice versa, like Nicole Kidman or Keira Knigthly with Chanel. But even so, luxury has been a growth market over decades, and just now feels the impact of the credit crunch. I visited the Chanel Mobile Art Pavillion in New York and can say that this staging of the brand is a most modern expression of inspiration and brand mystique.

Taryn's view

Last week, Taryn Simon gave a talk at Christiane zu Salm's About Change Collection. I was happy to go there, since Taryn spoke at DLD08 and it was good seeing her again. She showed two series of her work: American Index and The Innocents (Taryn is a highly relevant new photoartists introduced to us by Hans-Ulrich Obrist look her bio and profile here).

The image above belongs to the American Indes series. It shows the only legal canabis lab in the US. On her website you see more of these examples of unknown and hidden places of reality we don't know. To me this is very strong. Even more so, the prior series on convicted innocent people who she portraited at the crime scenes the never have been. The stories of these people make you think a lot. Often it is, as she explained, due to false photo identification they are sent to prison for years. Then DNA tests brought them back to life. So the unvisual overcomes the visual. It is part of the change of our times. I would like to keep tuned on her future projects.

Jazz wonders: Waltz for Debby

Bill Evans's Waltz for Debby is one of my favorite jazz pieces. Just enjoy the fine and serene thema, the off-beat ryhtmics and harmonies:

Artsy and establishing Berlin

This week's Berlin Art Forum again was a frenzy week of numerous openings, dinners and parties. The city has become an Euriopean art hub, nothing new, but you feel it. When I lived in Berlin Mitte eight years ago, the city was fun, but lacked a clear profile, a loaden history, Plattenbauten Osten, a patchwork, cozy West Berlin, Mitte was yet more a construction site, some big hotels, few restaurants and most clubs were temporary. We were the New Economy generation, experimenting a new media. So was the arts, yet leading figures of today's art world worked in Berlin since the nineties. Olafur Eliarsson or Klaus Biesenbach.

2008, Berlin is an artsy, young and vibrant metropole. New galleries emerge and leading galleries are coming to Berlin. Sprüth Magers or Capitain Petzel (picture at Karl-Marx-Allee), both with impressive places in Berlin Mitte. Private collections are built and temporary Kunsthallen (see below). Grill Royal is the place to go, Cookies has arrived on Friedrichstrasse and art magazines like Monopol or 032c set the talklines. Actually rents went up a lot in Mitte, too.

On a typical evening, you move around from place to place (see Monopol Party in picture). With some luck you see Quentin Tarantino, Diane Kruger or Malcom McLearan. Hollywood likes Berlin, too. Next Monday James Bond is premiered. The city has created momentum. It becomes a political hub, has good universities and a bunch of internet companies and creative minds. Actually, we just put a small team to Berlin to build some websites. Nevertheless, there is high unemployment, no industry nor capital, actually the city is almost bankrupt, less elegance than Munich or Hamburg and now has an airport less. And it is shining. But keep going Berlin, you are changing a lot and give coolness to Germany.