[spectre] WE THE USERS - DIGITAL FOLKLORE Reader.

[marc garrett]

Sorry for any cross posting...

WE THE USERS - DIGITAL FOLKLORE Reader.

DIGITAL FOLKLORE Reader, reviewed by Pau Waelder.
http://www.furtherfield.org/displayreview.php?review_id=375

DIGITAL FOLKLORE Reader. Edited by Olia Lialina & Dragan Espenschied. 
Designed by Manuel Buerger. Contains essays and projects investigating 
many different facets of Digital Folklore: online amateur culture, DIY 
electronics, dirtstyle, typo-nihilism, memes, teapots, penis enlargement...

"Although we are being constantly told that this is the era of the user 
(or youser), as the TIME magazine Person of the Year cover in 2006 so 
triumphantly expressed and social networks try to remind us every day, 
the role of users is still underestimated, while their contributions are 
both labeled as "amateur" and absorbed into the structures provided by 
web 2.0 companies. In front of this, Olia Lialina and Dragan Espenschied 
advocate the importance of the contribution of user-generated content to 
contemporary culture by coining the term Digital Folklore: "Digital 
Folklore encompasses the customs, traditions and elements of visual, 
textual and audio culture that emerged from user's engagement with 
personal computer applications during the last decade of the 20th and 
the first decade of the 21st century". The term stems from the artistic 
work of Lialina and Espenschied over the last years, as well as their 
research in Interface Design at the Merz Akademie in Stuttgart, which 
has derived into an unorthodox and very interesting publication, halfway 
between the scholarly reader and the artist's book."

Pau Waelder Graduated in Art History at the University of Barcelona, has 
a Masters Diploma in Advanced Studies in History Science and Art Theory 
at the University of the Balearic Islands and is currently writing his 
PhD thesis in the field of art, science and technology. He has 
participated in international simposia such as the I International 
Conference on Arthur Danto and the End of Art, (CENDEAC, Murcia, 2003) 
and Gaming Realities, (Fournos, Atenas, 2006). He has written chapters 
for the books Gaming Realities. A challenge for digital culture (Athens: 
Fournos, 2006) and Extending Experiences. Structure, Analysis and Design 
of Game Player Experience (Rovaniemi: Lapland University Press, 2008), 
as well as the text Games of Pain: Pain as Haptic Stimulation in 
Computer-Game's Based Media Art, published in Leonardo Vol. 40, Issue 3 
(MIT Press, 2007).

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