jared

An exciting new theory, one that again shows that it is collaboration, not competition that is responsible for success of human development and prosperity. Even more so, it shows the role women and especially grandmothers play in making us being successful.

https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2018/06/07/617097908/why-grandmothers-may-hold-the-key-to-human-evolution

Important reading and highly relevant to us at Memefest. I still remember talking to a large audience of activists and critical and engaged creatives and asking them why are almost all using Facebook instead of this social network we have established at Memefest and it made me a bit sad to see how powerful FB is to interrelate even this fantastic folks. But the story has not ended yet and we are ready to make the next step and will let you know more about it soon. In this process, this new book by Geert Lovink and Ned Rositer is an important and useful guide.

Organization after Social Media by Geert Lovink and Ned Rossiter

Here the blurb:" Exploring the politics of networks through and beyond social media

Organized networks are an alternative to the social media logic of weak links and their secretive economy of data mining. They put an end to freestyle friends, seeking forms of empowerment beyond the brief moment of joyful networking. This speculative manual calls for nothing less than social technologies based on enduring time. Analyzing contemporary practices of organization through networks as new institutional forms, organized networks provide an alternative to political parties, trade unions, NGOs, and traditional social movements. Dominant social media deliver remarkably little to advance decision-making within digital communication infrastructures. The world cries for action, not likes.

Organization after Social Media explores a range of social settings from arts and design, cultural politics, visual culture and creative industries, disorientated education and the crisis of pedagogy to media theory and activism. Lovink and Rossiter devise strategies of commitment to help claw ourselves out of the toxic morass of platform suffocation."

PDF available freely online: http://www.minorcompositions.info/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/organizationaftersocialmedia-web.pdf.

Five years ago we printed this beautiful Food Democracy posters for Memefest 2013. Now the Food democracy book shows the process of the festival on the topic with additional research. Published a few months ago the book is getting more and more interest, and we truly love the work we have done.
If you haven't yet, check it out here:
http://www.memefest.org/en/fooddemocracy/

More than two years ago i saw the first ASMR video. The somehow creepy videos where someone whispers, and touches objects and this is recorded by very good microphones causing a sensation of special pleasure. It is pretty fascinating as a marketing strategy as well as brands use it to sell their products.

http://www.bbc.com/capital/story/20180605-the-weird-whispering-videos-that-brands-want-to-cash-in-on

I met David Giles last week. He is an academic at Deakin Uni here in Melbourne. What brought us together was the book Food Democracy:

http://memefest.org/en/fooddemocracy/

David, has done some super interesting work on Dumpster Diving and on the link bellow you can listen to a really cool interview he has given on the subject- great stuff!

http://www.abc.net.au/radio/programs/conversations/conversations-david-giles/8512342

The beautiful power or words: A Priest and His Political Billboards in Australia

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-43985084

David Harvey, a Marxist critique of higher Education

https://soundcloud.com/freshed-podcast/freshed-100-a-marxist-critique-of-higher-education-david-harvey

This is a very important read. John Jordan on the Revenge against the commons, writes about the recent attempts by the French Government to evict The ZAD, the largest autonomous zone in Europe.

https://zadforever.blog/2018/04/24/the-revenge-against-the-commons/

Vida
2 months, 4 weeks ago

Thanks Oli! Important happenings in the Zad.

A review of our Food Democracy book by Mapping Edges:

http://www.mappingedges.org/readings/food-democracy-critical-lessons-in-food-communication-design-and-art/

An urgent message from our friend John Jordan!!

A CALL FOR INTERGALACTIC SOLIDARITY ACTIONS EVERYWHERE TO END THE DESTRUCTION OF THE ZAD OF NOTRE DAME DES LANDES

We are writing with the smell of tear gas rising from our fingers. The springtime symphony of birdsong is punctuated by the explosive echo of concussion grenades. Our eyes are watering, less from the gas than the sadness; because our friends’ homes, barns and organic farms are being destroyed. Bulldozers, supported by 2500 riot police, armored vehicles, helicopters and drones, are rampaging through these forests, pastures and wetlands to crush the future we are building here on the to the zad (The zone à defendre).

See and read more here:
https://zadforever.blog/2018/04/11/a-call-for-intergalactic-solidarity-actions-everywhere-to-end-the-destruction-of-the-zad-of-notre-dame-des-landes/

This is very interesting and at the same time a bit bizarre. Who wants to see on the smart phone live stream of what is in our fridge?

To Invade Homes, Tech Is Trying to Get in Your Kitchen

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/25/technology/smart-homes-tech-kitchen.html

Check out this link as it gives very helpful insight on what is all the data Facebook and Google have on you

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/mar/28/all-the-data-facebook-google-has-on-you-privacy

renfah
3 months, 2 weeks ago

facebook stole my account 6 years ago - coz i got nearly 5000 followers - and they wanted my REAL NAME, not with me...cheers

oliver
3 months, 2 weeks ago

What do you mean, they "stole your account"?

This has been around for a while now, but media seems to be slowly reporting on this. It is one of the more fascinating social developments in our current world, one that - I think- will radically alter peoples autonomy. I have asked my Chinese students about this, - they did not know anything about this development.

http://mobile.abc.net.au/news/2018-03-31/chinas-social-credit-system-punishes-untrustworthy-citizens/9596204?pfmredir=sm

The newest of the arguments that make the case we should be using independent and autonomous social networks like the one on memefest.org!


Revealed: 50 million Facebook profiles harvested for Cambridge Analytica in major data breach

Whistleblower describes how firm linked to former Trump adviser Steve Bannon compiled user data to target American voters

https://www.theguardian.com/news/2018/mar/17/cambridge-analytica-facebook-influence-us-election

I remember Memefest 2014, here in Melbourne.
Our theme was Dialogue, more precisely "Radical Intimacies: Dialogue in our Times". Giving my lecture at the symposium I was explaining how much effort we were putting into programming and designing an autonomous online social network on memefest.org and how funny and sad it is that so many artists, activists etc. actually use pretty much exclusively Facebook to network and self promote. What we could observe back than was a strong indicator or what is happening now. Facebook is not a place for non profits, activists, artists groups, because our outreach is dictated by how much we are willing to pay. Not paying for our posts on FB simply means our reach will be super small, like 3 % of our following on a FB page. It is very important to understand this. Memefest is a free for all social network, no surveillance, no data mining, no advertising, no payment, and a community that is actually reading the posts, not just scanning and linking them. So lets keep on being active here and nurture this space, and make use of it!

s2art
4 months, 1 week ago

Hi Oliver, it was great meeting you yesterday at the book fair, the coincidence is too strong to ignore.

We are inviting you to the book launch of Food Democracy by Oliver Vodeb, Saturday March 17h @ 2pm!

Called by the publisher Intellect books UK “A new type of academic book”, and by reviewers “a seminal text”, “urgent” and “extraordinary”, Food Democracy asks how to make socially responsive communication, design and art that counters the role of the food industry as a machine of consumption. More than four years in making and more than 200 people involved in this extradisciplinary research, Food Democracy by Oliver Vodeb is out now.


The beautifully designed full color book also includes for the first time a unique and delicious compilation of socially engaged cooking recipes by the academic, design, artist and activist community. Aiming not just to advance scholarship, but to push ahead real change in the world, Food Democracy is essential reading for scholars and citizens alike.


Melbourne Design Week 2018 is brought to you by the National Gallery of Victoria in partnership with Creative Victoria.


The book presentation will be followed by a discussion with Daryl Taylor and the audience


Link to NGV website: https://www.ngv.vic.gov.au/program/food-democracy-book-launch/

Link to book: http://memefest.org/en/fooddemocracy/


Book launch at:

Saturday March 17th
2pm–3pm
Testing Grounds
Booking is not required.
1-23 City Rd, Southbank, Melbourne

This is a fantastic text on the state of today's universities:

https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/whose-university-is-it-anyway/#!

Community Harvest Project
Hello all! I find this super meaningful and I am seeking your support. I have been participating in ...

Read about the ZAD, the largest squat on Europe, in the Guardian article bellow. After years of successfully defending the ZAD from the French authorities a new wave of threatening eviction is under way.

"The story of “la ZAD” in western France began more than half a century ago, when the French government earmarked the site for a new airport as part of a plan to create a transatlantic “Great West” gateway to France and Europe.

Years of consultations, arguments and indecision supposedly ended in 2008, when the €580 million project was given official approval. The squatters began arriving the same year, claiming they were responding to an appeal from farmers fighting compulsory purchase orders. No airport-related construction has since taken place on the 1,650-hectare site."

Full article here: https://www.theguardian.com/inequality/2017/dec/28/end-of-la-zad-frances-utopian-anti-airport-community-faces-bitter-last-stand?CMP=share_btn_fb

Sttwn
5 months, 3 weeks ago

this is great stuff Oliver-