Tech Stream

Tech Stream 032

25 September 2009

Listen and download: MP3

The Screen Worlds exhibition at the Australian Centre for the Moving Image, ACMI.  You can see the giant, white Lara Croft mentioned in this week’s program.

In the Tech Stream this week we’re looking at the use of social media and internet communications technology to connect virtual and physical spaces: from art galleries to government forums. We’ll also meet Yiying Lu, creator of the iconic Twitter “Fail Whale”, whose first solo exhibition also includes augmented reality technology. And come for a guided tour of a new exhibit at ACMI, the Australian Centre for the Moving Image, which has videogames as a major focus. Download or stream the program via the MP3 link above or find out more after the jump.

Our first guest is Yiying Lu, creator of the Twitter “Fail Whale” illustration, which you can see above.  The image appears when the micro-blogging service is overloaded. Yiying’s solo exhibition, a collaboration with Augmented Reality pioneers MOB, is part of Australian Web Week and opens on October 2nd at the Pyrmont Bridge Hotel in Sydney.

Matthew Gingold is the brains behind the Circuit art installations which form part of the 2009 Melbourne Fringe Festival which starts this weekend.

Next we meet the Labour Senator for the Australian Capital Territory Kate Lundy. Senator Lundy and her team have been organising “public sphere” events around issues to do with government 2.0, the opening up of public data and other issues facing the ICT industry.  She talks to us today about the technology used to allow participation in these forums, both online and off.

I also participated in the recent Public Sphere #3 event which was focusing on ICT and creative industry development in Australia. People from a variety of disciplines took part and some of their presentations are available here. A summary of the event is also on the Senator’s blog here.

Some of the audio I collected at this forum ended up on our Future Tense program, which is also broadcast domestically on ABC Radio National.  They devoted an entire program this week to issues around web 2.0 and participatory democracy.  It featured an extended interview with Dr Nicholas Gruen, chair of the Australian government’s Government 2.0 Taskforce.  More details and audio downloads are on  the Future Tense website.

Finally this week we get a guided tour of the new Screen Worlds exhibition at ACMI, the Australian Centre for the Moving Image. Conrad Bodman, head of exhibitions at ACMI, introduces us to the key sections and explains why video games are such an important part of the exhibit.