ISEA 2004: New Media Artist Timothy Jaeger Uses P2P Networks to Mix Music Collections for Broadcast

8.30.04 -- For one week in August this year, the Baltic Sea was the center of electronic music, new media research, art, and design by virtue of hosting ISEA2004, the 12th annual symposium on electronic arts. This year it was organized for the first time in two cities, Helsinki, Finland, and Tallinn, Estonia - and the ferry that runs between them. I participated in this conference (http://www.isea2004.net) as a representative of UCSD's Center for Research in Computing and the Arts and UC DARNET (Digital Arts Research Network), both of which helped fund my trip.

A year ago I had submitted a proposal to present a project I worked on in conjunction with WKCR Radio of Columbia University in New York City. The project, entitled The Peers Are Alright!, dealt with ways of harnessing the users of various decentralized peer-to-peer (p2p) file-sharing networks to contribute and mix parts of their music collections for broadcast over radio and the Web.

What ensued was a rapid proliferation of mixes and samples from users across the globe. For the live broadcast, which took place on June 27th, 2003, I made three live mixes of the samples collected for WKCR Radio's Live Constructions program, which in the past has featured the works of prominent avant-garde musicians such as John Zorn and Farmers Manual.

London BBC Resident VJ Kriel demonstrates the latest techniques in image manipulation.

Scanner, aka Robin Rimbaud, mixes cell phone sounds into his live set in front of a multiscreen visual backrop

At ISEA, my presentation dealt with a synopsis (and snippets) of the radio/Web broadcast and further research on the ways decentralized p2p file-sharing networks are turning into different kinds of entities altogether. Tapio Mäkelä, the program chair for ISEA 2004, led the panel "Networked Experience" in which this took place. Other participants included artists and programmers from Sweden and Sofia, Bulgaria, who dealt with such topics as Linux-servers for artists.

I went into some depth on aspects of telematic art production and new phenomena, such as records labels for users of p2p file-sharing networks that are developing in the digital domain. For instance, when a critical mass of users decides that the flexibility of a network allows for different kinds of positive production, they will "hijack the net" and facilitate its use towards that end, as in the case of Soulseek, one of the p2p networks. One of the conclusions I drew was that users will continuously (re)define the networks -- not the other way around.

Other events that took place on the "Networked Experience" cruise were various presentations from artist/new media groups from Africa, India, and New Zealand, all dealing with various methodologies for working/writing grants/developing self-sustaining practices. There was a wide variety of all-night concerts and multimedia events, and a predominance of collaborations between electronic musicians and VJs (Visual Jockeys) using some of the most advanced tools to create engrossing environments of music and visuals.

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ISEA 2004: New Media Artist Timothy Jaeger Uses P2P Networks to Mix Music Collections for Broadcast