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[blast-agent <agent@blast.org>]

3 messages, from Stephen Linhart, Robbin Murphy, and Teo Spiller.


Matthew Slotover wrote:

> OK, well this is exactly where I disagree. I usually see the computer
> as a tool, not an art form. I use mine for writing, accounts, graphic
> design, image manipulation etc - so what? I could do any of these 
> things using different tools and the end result would be similar, if a 
> lot more time-consuming.

Stephen Linhart <Stephen123@aol.com> writes:

There are now a large number of artists creating digital works that
simply couldn't exist in traditional media.  These include works making
use of computer interactivity, continuous variation over time, computer
mediated networks of human participants, etc.  I'm surprised that there
can really be debate on the question of whether or not such works
exist.  Most of the best Web art is in this category.

Stephen Linhart


-----------------------------------------------


At 7:26 PM -0400 3/21/98, zonezero wrote:

>The problem with much of what is presented as web art today is that we
>have not yet been able to define in which part of the body does dignity
>or glory reside.

Robbin Murphy <murph@interport.net> writes:

"We are all sculptors and painters, and our material is our own flesh
and blood and bones. Any nobleness begins at once to refine a man's
features, any meanness or sensuality to imbrute them."

Henry David Thoreau
Walden

Robbin Murphy

murph@artnetweb.com
http://artnetweb.com/iola


--------------------------------------------


teo spiller <teo.spiller@rzs-hm.si> writes:

You are kindly invited to cooperate in a world wide project "Megatronix"
with your own web creations. Megatronix is an open online project, an
interactive, social critical theater, concept as an arcade game, where
the player becomes the actor. The "free choice" is just a fictive
solution, because the game is leaded by a random generator.

It is the continuation of the idea of a random leaded game, first used
in Esmeralda ( http://www.teo-spiller.org/esmerlda/ ) 
(Esmeralda was presented on the art festival OSTRANENIE 97 in the
Bauhaus school in Dessau, Germany)

The open structure of the game lets every user of the web to add his own
action scene into the MEGATRONIX game.

The main concepts, united in this project are:

1)The critical relation to the violent, senseless action movies, arcade
games, brutal comics and cartoons, intensifying the violent behavior of
the wide public, specially by youth. 
2) The concept of all different concepts, designing solutions, visual
presentations of web artist all over the world in one collective
project.
3) The confusion, that contemporary subject is throw in, specially
because of the intensive attack of too many TV channels, newspapers and
other commercial institutions, which goal is mostly their own profit.
4) The possibility that web tools gives: that one project can load
different scenes from the servers all over the world into one collective
project (I find it very fascinating, that you don't even need to write
the URL of the megatronic random generator, but you only have to name
the frame, where it is positioned).
5) The concept of an anarchic piece without any direction, loading in a
confused order different scenes one after another (just like sitting by
the TV with 35 channels and clicking on the remote control unit from one
channel to another, looking for "something interesting").
6) The second phase of megatronix is to fully automatise the submiting
of the scenes, so it will become an independent, self developing
organism, an artifical life form on the web.

How to add your own scene:
( http://www.teo-spiller.org/megatronix/add.htm )

The scene must be written in the HTML, it may include pictures and
sounds, but it may not include frames. If you are using any plug-in, you
must give a player choice to continue also without it. You may not link
from your scene anywhere but back to Megatronix random generator.

Every scene is concept as a fictive situation, where the player arrives.
It must be descriptive and it must harangue the player (like:"you just
arrived..", "you are in a trouble again", "great done! After a short
vacation, boss sent you to... where you...", etc.) There must be at
least two possible decisions (links) for a player to continue to the
next scene.

For example: You are arrested in the evil wizard's castle, the eagle
peck your liver every afternoon. What will you do? 
a) make a liver spread
b) get cirrhosis
c) peck eagle's liver

Every link must be like this:

<A HREF="Javascript:newscene()" TARGET="MEGATRONIX">
a text or a picture...
</A>

The "newscene" is a function, running the random generator. It is
positioned in the frame called "MEGATRONIX".
.
As a user clicks that link, the random generator will choose another
scene. You can also use "sub scenes". It means, the player's decision is
followed by a logical continuation of the scene, but than the sub scene
must end with the upper link

for example:

Is player chooses "a) make a liver spread", it may be linked to a new
HTML file, where he is asked for the name of the spread:
1) Gavrilovic
2) Bucco
3) Microsoft

but every of possible answers must than end with the upper link

The pages (scenes or sub scenes) may not content any other links !

OPTIONAL:

You can also add your own text in the lower frame, instead of
"MEGATRONIX" by adding into the BODY of your document the following
code:

<BODY onLoad="parent.MEGATRONIX.document.nekaj.ime.value='your text';
 return true;"
      onUnLoad="parent.MEGATRONIX.document.nekaj.ime.value='M E G A T R
O N I X';
 return true;"
BGCOLOR="#ffffff" TEXT="#ff0000" LINK="#000000" VLINK="#000000"
ALINK="#000000">

where is "your text" a string, you want to appear in the lower frame
(author's name, a comment or anything else)

                                           EXAMPLES:

The best examples you find on http://www.teo-spiller.org/esmerlda/   but
there are few samples from it described here:

AN EXAMPLE:

there is a text in Esmeralda:

You're great! (this is a comment on the previous scene, user came from)

As you walk behind the blonde, she lost a coin (or throw it).

A policeman saw it... Not to gave yourself, you must give it her back.

How will you call her?

There are three possible answers:

a) Hey babe (it links to a page, where it says "don't call me babe!" and
it automatically loads another one with the text "BUM! BUM! BUM!" and
this one loads the "GAME OVER" frame, that ends the game.
b) You fucking bitch! (it links to a page, where she answers "Put it
into your ass, you silly clown", where is "ass" a link, that runs the
random generator, that chooses a new scene.
c) Very respected lady (it links to a sub scene, where you "make love
with her", but she is a nymphomaniac, and when you want to live, you
click "EXIT" and it runs the random generator, that chooses a new scene)

ANOTHER EXAMPLE

there is a text :

Not only tits and beer gives you trouble;  Because of too many
intellectual efforts, you became a letter in a medieval book. What now? 
Will you try to make love with a border, prove you are not a letter with
eating a carrot or pay the dragon to burn the book?

There are pictures of  a) Visa Card, b) a carrot and c) a young girls
backside (with the text "what a border"). A link from every of three
pictures runs a random generator, that chooses a new scene.

THE THIRD EXAMPLE:

there is a text:

"A BIG CAR IS A SIGN OF A SMALL PENIS..."

Remember "The Specialist"? Stallone used a Bus and sleep with Sharon
anyway! You, Macho, are using a Bus too: An empty Bus arrives and seven
passengers enter. On the next stop eleven person exit. How many people
are still in the Bus?

the possible answers are

a) 0
b) -1
c) 4

Every answer opens the same page, where it says "You are very BAD in
mathematics", where "BAD" is a link, that runs the random generator
again

HOW TO SUBMIT:

after you have created your scene (or even more scenes), please send a
mail to
teo.spiller@rzs-hm.si
and tell the full URL (the internet address - for example
"http://www.yourserver.com/yourdirectory/yoursubdirectory/yourscene.html")
of your scene, so I
will add your URL to the random generator.

One scene is also "GAME OVER" and a random generator can load it
anytime. Whenever it loads it, it ends the game.

So is the user jumping from one scene to another in a random order until
the "GAME OVER" scene appears, having a feeling, he plays a game, but in
fact, the random generator runs it.

for any questions, please contact
teo.spiller@rzs-hm.si

best

Teo Spiller

Megatronix
http://www.teo-spiller.org/megatronix/



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