history of computing – loriemerson

Flexible, Emergent, and Medium-Specific | Methodologies for Hands-On Experimentation

Below is the text of a talk I’m giving on September 8, 2022 for the Doing Experimental Media Archaeology research group at the University of Luxembourg. The text is written to be a talk, which means I haven’t been as thorough about citing outside sources as I would if it were to be published. *** […]

by Lori Emerson

The Importance of Getting the Weather on Your Atari 800, or, Slow Networks Experiment 7

Happily, libi striegl and I are slowly getting back to our Slow Networks experiments in the Media Archaeology Lab we began in 2020 as a way to, well, stay sane during the pandemic and have a little fun. To inaugurate our return, today’s experiment involves learning how to use our Fujinet network adapter. We first […]

by Lori Emerson

Six (Difficult and Inconvenient) Values to Reclaim the Future with Old Media

Below is the pre-print version of a book chapter I wrote for The Bloomsbury Handbook to the Digital Humanities, edited by James O’Sullivan and forthcoming in 2022. Gratitude to James for the opportunity to write this piece! * In the face of entrepreneurs’ and tech companies’ attempts to over determine the shape of what’s to […]

by Lori Emerson

The Net Has Never Been Neutral

Below is a piece, part of my larger Other Networks project, I originally posted on my blog some years ago but then took it down in the hopes that it would find a home in a journal. I’ve since realized that it would be better to share this piece on my website after all! *** […]

by Lori Emerson

Slow Networks Experiment 5: very short range over-air transmission

Continuing on from “Slow Networks Experiment 1: Over-Air Tranmission,” “Slow Networks Experiments 2 & 3: VHF Radio Transmission,” and “Slow Networks Experiment 4: Videotelephony,” this time we played with a strange and relatively recent entrant to the home security market: the X-10 Wireless video sender which we believe came out in about 1998. This is a puzzling […]

by Lori Emerson

Slow Networks Experiment 4: Videotelephony

Continuing on from “Slow Networks Experiment 1: Over-Air Tranmission” and “Slow Networks Experiments 2 & 3: VHF Radio Transmission,” this time we experimented with videotelephony or videophones – the ancestor of today’s Skype and Zoom. Details below. * Date: Dec. 18, 2020 Location:Media Archaeology Lab, 1320 Grandview Ave., Boulder, CO 80309 Participants:Lori Emerson, libi striegl Network […]

by Lori Emerson

Slow Networks Experiments 2 & 3: VHF Radio Transmission

Continuing on from “Slow Networks Experiment 1: Over-Air Tranmission,” this time we performed two different experiments with VHF Radio Transmission – details below. * Experiment 2 Date: Friday Dec. 14, 2020 Location:Media Archaeology Lab, 1320 Grandview Ave., Boulder, CO 80309 Participants:Lori Emerson and libi striegl Network Type: One-to-many broadcast networkOne-directionalOver-the-Air Audio Transmission using VHF Tools:Panasonic Bi-Sider TV/FM-AM […]

by Lori Emerson

“Did We Dream Enough?” THE THING BBS as an Experiment in Social-Cyber Sculpture

In 1990, artist Wolfgang Staehle and Blackhawk (the handle for Peter Von Brandenburg…), conceived of the idea of an online virtual community for artists. By 1991, Staehle, Blackhawk, and a group of about ten others launched The Thing Bulletin Board System into what was then exuberantly called “cyberspace.” The renowned early virtual community was at first for […]

by Lori Emerson

Towards a Variantology of Hands On Practice

Thanks to the hard work of co-editors Patrick Ellison and Collin Williamson, a special issue of Early Popular Visual Culture is now out – “Object Lessons, Old and New: Experimental Media Archaeology in the Classroom.” Below is the final draft of the Afterword I wrote, in which I outline six opportunities provided by hands-on practice, […]

by Lori Emerson

Interfaced

Thanks to the hard work of Matthew Rubery and Leah Price, Further Reading: Oxford Twenty-first Century Approaches to Literature (Oxford UP) has just been published with an incredible line-up of people. I revisited and expanded on some ideas I wrote about in Reading Writing Interfaces via my piece “Interfaced” – a draft version of which […]