Designed as part of my response to Newcastle City Council’s ‘Interpretive Signage’ brief, which aimed at taking heritage information into the digital realm, the ‘Information Free Zone’ raises the questions “How much information do we need?” & “Where exactly can we go to get away from it?”
An ‘Information Free Zone’ would restrict “the use of the electromagnetic spectrum for wireless telegraphy (to include WIFI, SMS, Bluetooth etc)” and I proposed that the zone be applied to an already peaceful space next to the City’s Cathedral – Amen Corner – and went ahead and notified the public of this ominous change:
If the ‘Information Free Zone’ were to be applied in the UK public sphere, an important question would need to be addressed:
Does the zone impose an ‘information embargo’ through the use of electromagnetic signal jamming technology?
Or is the zone subscribed to by citizens (in a similar way to the quiet coach on a train.)
(A technologically imposed ‘Infromation Free Zone’ would likely be in contravention of the 2006 Wireless Telegraphy Act.)
Early responses from the public were mixed – here are some examples:
The Mobile Media and Media Ecologies module (MMME) requires our consideration of ways in which ‘cutting edge’ interactive and mobile technologies might play a role alongside traditional interpretive signage in disseminating context-specific information and media for tourists and ‘the general public’ in and around the area of the Castle Keep, Black Gate, and St. Nicholas Cathedral in Newcastle.
I have to admit – I’m no great fan of ‘History.’ The word ‘History’ evokes for me period-drama images of kings and queens, castles and peasants, heavy stone engravings, cosy explanations and linear timelines of ‘important’ dates.
I am however interested in contemporary notions of our collective heritage: ‘Where we are coming from?’ and ‘Where we are going?’
The historic ‘Old Town’ comprising the Castle Keep, Black Gate and Cathedral is in many senses birthplace of the City of Newcastle so I decided to visit the city’s local history library and try to get some sense of how a city is ‘born’.
Rather than turn this blogpost into my own phony-historic sketch of Newcastle I’d like simply to share, in a scrapbook fashion, various clippings and notes:
In 1168 the burgesses of Newcastle were fined 100 marks for compelling a knight to swear, which was an infringement of the then laws of honour; but the sum was remitted for their services in the king’s Castle.
King Henry I. granted laws, customs and privileges to this infant community.*
*An ancient parchment register, in Northumberland House, contains an article entitled, “These are the laws and customs which King Henry granted to his burgesses of Newcastle.”
“In the borough there ought neither to be given merchet, heriot, blood-wit or stengedwit.”
“No foreigner be allowed to cut fish to sell.”
“Whosoever shall hold land in the borough a year and a day justly, and without claim, if the claimant be within the kingdom, he is not bound to answer such claimant.”
“Every burgess may have a furness and mill.”
“No foreigner ought to buy cloth to buy, unless he be of the custom of the borough.”
“A burgess may carry his corn out of the country whithersoever he pleases without licence.”
1. Hue and Cry to be raised against obstinate offenders against the peace of the town, who are to be punished by the extremity of law; one half of the fines imposed on such persons by the Mayor and twenty-four of the town to go to the King, and the other half to the Corporation.
Series of photographs and videos made whilst walking between Newcastle train station and Culture Lab to document every occasion where I saw ‘evidence’ of ‘law’ (prep for our Theoretical Foundations ‘Media Theory’ seminar.)
At an extremely simplistic level, I wanted to formally begin explicitly investigating ‘law’ as a ‘medium’ within my Digital Media studies at Culture Lab.
Used my laptop to play back the images and videos in sequence as a slideshow presentation. A kind of monotonous (and humourous) rhythm was established – pressing the spacebar and instinctively speaking words and phrases to accompany the photos – kind of spontaneous performance.
Uploaded the photos as an .MOV file to YouTube and then added a ’subtitle track’ to reproduce/share the experience of the presentation.
Subtitling – Why would I do this?
Demonstrate a NEW, ABSOLUTE INTRINSIC reading of the signage and architecture of the city? No.
But, street signage (for example) demonstrates very well, one of many levels of conceptual ‘encoding’ and ‘decoding’ taking place in people’s heads, unconsciously, all of the time. And if we are in any doubt regarding how signage should be interpreted, we have a text – The Highway Code – to ensure that signage is interpreted (decoded) with consistency. Interpretation is as important as the embedded message itself.
(Below – amusing comedy sketch on subtext…)
A fascinating aspect of Youtube (and the web2.0 phenomena as a whole) is the commenting function, which allows a kind of subjective subtitling to develop – people are enabled to share own perspective – interpretation democratised?
Subtext – add your thoughts to video
The subtitles in evidences_of_law.mov are a kind of subjective ‘sub-text‘ which, inevitably, intrudes and influences – imposing a kind of narrative on the viewer’s ‘reading’ of the images.
Whilst looking for a suitable YouTube subtitling tool I stumbled across Overstream – an application which is designed specifically so that individuals can impose their own reading over an online video. Now, not only can we have foreign language subtitles (making a film accessible to broader audiences) and directors commentaries (sharing insight into a creative process) but also subjective commentaries and alternative readings – all within ‘mainstream media.’
I was emboldened to attempt to develop my own subtitle file following a presentation given by Pete Hindle at the Datarama event in October. You can read all about that here.
Adding subtitles was a surprisingly technical affair – I found out that it is possible to embed a subtitle or caption track into a YouTube video by making an *.srt file. This is basically a piece of code which is read in three components:
(1) number in the sequence
(2) timecode in/out
(3) text to be displayed
Typing this ‘code’ by hand (even with copy and paste) was laborious , tedious and frustrating . It took forever. If I did something wrong then the *srt. file wouldn’t load to YouTube. And if I needed to add something in then the number of all the subsequent entries had to be changed. It was painful going back and forth lining up the times with the appropriate frames.
Through this exercise it is much clearer to me why we might use tools (software, interfaces…) to automate this kind of laborious coding task. I would have given up if I had not been really determined to share the file.
Only a minority of individuals with a certain level of technical knowledge would put this amount of effort into subtitling a YouTube video so, the absence of a higher level interfacing tool (subtitling software) creates a barrier to participation.
Below: notes from Jamie Allen Media Theory session (4-11-2009) on MRes. research WIKI.
Sergio Muñoz Sarmiento is an artist who practices art law. He is interested in the relationship between contemporary art and law, with a focus on copyright, free speech, deaccessioning, and nonprofit organizations.
Manufacturers of riot and personal defence shields since 1977, when Arnolds made for the Metropolitan Police the first shields ever to be used in the UK.
Coincidence Engine One consists of a precisely fabricated expanded polystyrene foam construction whose form evokes an amphitheatre. Within this structure, twelve hundred clocks of identical design are arrayed in concentric arcs.
As an interactive artist Rozin creates installations and sculptures that have the unique ability to change and respond to the presence and point of view of the viewer.
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