DESIGN AND DEVELOPMENT OF NETZSPANNUNG.ORG

The first phase of the project: October 1999 to September 2002

The MARS Exploratory media lab discussed in workshops and numerous conversations with experts from the various areas of digital culture how a network for communicating art, culture and new media should be realised in practice.
As a result, a concept for an Internet-based information, communication and production platform was developed. This platform was to be designed as a modular distributed system, geared to collaboration, participation and expandability, which could cater for the different interests and skills of a very heterogeneous user group. In 2001 the platform went online under the name of netzspannung.org. It had some remarkable technical features, including public input interfaces and special tools for knowledge visualisation - its knowledge discovery tools.
› Platform Technology
› Knowledge Discovery Tool Timeline, Version 1

Besides setting up a suitable technical infrastructure, the MARS Exploratory Media Lab also developed various content-oriented concepts to encourage an exchange between artists and computer scientists, and to showcase topical projects, issues and developments in media art and research.
In 2001 the MARS Exploratory Media Lab addressed current questions such as digital archives, copyright, awareness, and distributed systems in an online journal. The team organised the "cast01/Living in Mixed Realities conference" and since 2001 has held the annual "digital sparks" competition for university and college students. In 2002 the knowledge pool at netzspannung.org was substantially enriched especially by numerous lectures on media-related themes.
› cast01//Living in Mixed Realities
› Journal#0
› digital sparks
› Lectures