[NetBehaviour] Where the Rhizome went..

[Alan Sondheim]

Rhizome isn't the real issue here of course as Lichty points out. There 
are a _lot_ of people - I'm thinking of wryting for example - who are not 
academically-oriented and haven't settled in. I do agree with Lichty's 
points in general; even 'text' seems backwater at this point, and 
certainly there's a furious leap to the gallery system. Within the aegis 
of the artworld, that's not unusual; it's been that way ever since I've 
been associated with artschools (I'm not teaching at one at the moment but 
have floated in and out at times) - I remember the enormous 'impact' 
Sonnabend had in the early 70s for example.

I think it's worth taking a closer look at SL - I get tired of the 
critiques of power / corporate structures there (which are self-evident in 
practice) and find very little discussion of the very real friendships and 
group collaborations / discussions which grow out of it - in other words 
the exhuberance. I'm loosely associated with Odyssey which has spilled out 
into Ning (through Sugar Seville) and Facebook and who knows where else, 
and this is healthy I think. Discussions and collaborative features have 
spread across applications, not resided within them - this has been 
happening for a while now. Private email has become more important (at 
least for me) as a way of extending discussion; email lists like Cybermind 
have become literally aging communities which is of interest in itself. I 
wonder if there's not a lot more real-life street discussion as well; at 
least in NY I hear it everywhere at this point.

Blogs _are_ booths and in a way it's sad, I've stumbled across incredible 
writing that pretty much no one is accessing. It's a kind of privatization 
that's understandable, particularly given the degree of spam today (which 
is still rising almost exponentially), but it cuts into community in a big 
way of course.

Then there's gaming which is still increasing in popularity - there were 
new stats on this today -

For me I don't miss the early 90s; I'm finally getting a modicum of 
recognition, as are others I know - whereas we felt excluded by the money 
and power talk/strategies of the dot.com stuff.

- Alan