hi rasa & raitis,  just today i showed three of those webcasting projects 
(relab, RIS, p-radio) to some young and not so young students of the
visual arts center in ny. the situation in those schools seems a bit
depressing, 10-12 Photosphop 13-15 Softimage 15-18 Macromind Director, 
no critical or better to say vivid view on the web, just 
preparation to work in silicon alley becoming a web worker. 

there is a problem in 'our scene' you can call it segregation, or
careerism or just the phase after the exstasy of beeing part
of an avantgarde movement. now the real work begins, we are
leaving the manifestoes and proclamations behind, everyone can
be a webdesigner and less and less people are afraid of unix or
talking tech-lingo with each other. that's how it seems.

i am also sad often that the old nearness or toghetherness without
any questions is not as is used to be. there are no 'virtual barrikades'
on the superhiway, it is more that we get more and more bored and confused
by empty slogans and buzzwords, role games, ego fights, strange
ideologies, conspiracy theories, disfunctional command chains, mutual
distrust etc.

if you see it in terms of a movement then something is over and it doesn't
come back so far. isea is inviting to send proposals for the 'revolution'
and ars electronica is declaring the 'info war', wired fired it's
chief ideologist and becomes serious east coast cyberliteracy. we, or
many of the dreams of what was making us to a we became true, even if
this isn't a mai 69 at all. 

but still many things are going on, many chances are opening just right
now, only the old paroles sound pretty shallow and go out into cyberland 
without any echo. if we were ever media squatters, we are sitting now
on our own servers or are leaving them (like berlin.icf.de) it is time
for the long breath, a far view, no short term hot exstasy of
overproduction, more a growing into depth, a differenciation and
the establishment of long term contacts or friendships.

\ formyself i am still unable to write any longer text, essay, article
trying to describe the new situation, criticising tendencies which scare
me, giving a broader picture in what i am still believing. instead we
assume all kinds of private politics, the rise of careermaking,
cyberstardom, but that's fake. 

i heard from interesting projects in budapest, beeing myself involved in a
fellowship in cologne, trying to refresh old networks here in new york and
defenitly not giving up only because a certain pathos seems to not work
anymore. there is no need to sell out or become part of the 'enemies'. in
fact there is a need to rethink 'who the enemies are' that was already
clearly said 1996 at a ZK around metaforum 2. some things take longer.


when i look at projects like the one above it is easy to imagine new kinds
of netprojects different from the old document-metaphor..  maybe less text
oriented, more like a party-interface or even an shared ambience tool, to
cheer up or mellow down your mood. it's also time to get a bit more
independent from the old slogans and leader figures which are maybe as
confused as you. 

especially now, there is some work to be done, some new aproaches to find. 
still i'd like to do the nettime book, work on a new software, and i am
sure the diversive channels will go toghether again in this or the other
form, which doesn't mean that we have to go back to the old times and old
formats! i know that you don't get all the feedback you deserve, but it's
really important to do the stuff even with more power especially then.
what about all the attention or boredom? who cares if the thing is
just right!

don't know if this makes sense or just sounds pathetic.. 

all best to riga!

/pit

(i swere you will be the first one getting any text..)