SWITCH
Requested amount from Knight News Challenge:
$40,000Total cost of project including all sources of funding:
$50,000Expected amount of time to complete project:
9-12 monthsSWITCH is the new media art journal of the Computers in Art, Design, Research, and Education (CADRE) Laboratory for New Media of the School of Art and Design at San Jose State University. Published since 1995, SWITCH is one of the earliest online journals focusing on art and technology. The mission of SWITCH aims to critically evaluate developments in art and technology with community, research and openness. SWITCH is interested in fostering a critical viewpoint on issues and developments in the complex crossovers between art and technology through practice, research, outreach, and participation.
We agree on two points. First, technology is a continuum of change; the foundation for the journal will adapt to the technology but be founded conceptually. Technologies shift; what is popular and functional today will likely not be so in 10 years. Our goals include creating a sustainable, accessible, open journal that is capable of being used and archived for the far future. Second, we aspire to grow to a global level while maintaining our roots in Silicon Valley.
Our short terms goals focus on open format and on new information. Using an open format to create that is portable, accessible, well understood and that will provide semantic information relevant to it's content. Our second goal is to implement a news source on parallel levels. The first level will be based on pertinent research to the fields of art and technology. We will connect emerging CADRE innovations with relevant practitioners in the field connecting theory and application. Second, being in the Silicon Valley, we wish to provide timely reporting on emerging topics related to art and technology locally.
1 commentHow will your project improve the way news and information are delivered to geographic communities?
Connecting San Jose State University, City of San Jose and the Silicon Valley.
How does SWITCH can improve the connection between the technological innovations of Silicon Valley to the academic research at San Jose State University?
By involving key players throughout our geographic target we will be able to accomplish the following benchmarks:
A. Involve practitioners, artists, and public working in pertinent arenas such as polar identity, green technologies, social ability of machines, etc. These practitioners will be invited to serve in various capacities such as advisory, curatorial, column formats and any other capacity relevant to the betterment of SWITCH.
B. Invite research contributors to involve students at the university connecting issues such as bioengineering, robotics, and system technologies with the art community. The will do this by collaborating their research with work developing out of the University by either submitting a paper or project or working directly with students and faculty. We will identify this group through a series of open calls, symposiums and collaborative processes to identify these individuals.
C. Connect the university with projects showcased in the San Jose Zero One (01SJ) Biennial Global Festival of Art on the Edge.
D. Work closely with the City of San Jose Public Arts Program to showcase, report on and develop art practices involving art, science and technology. We will accomplish this through regular interaction at events and meetings.
0 commentsHow is your idea innovative? (New or different from what already exists.)
Anew
We are changing our thirteen years of providing read-only information into a participatory format. We are setting ourselves up to provide the necessary research and innovation in realm of art and technology.
Our use of technology will include: Hand held applications on devices such as cell phones using a meta-database to access SWITCH, but it will also provide a community and social framework from which ideas can be exchanged. The site would make use of open source Android phone technology in order to fully utilize the democratic nature of the system, allowing any community to access the site and contribute to the site.
In providing an open source database/community with a cohesive structure around relatively inexpensive technologies, wisdom, not just knowledge, becomes democratic.
We will also create an open research forum that allows for peer review and open comment. It will also allow for accessible research, which would otherwise be only available to institutions with financial means.
In addition to these technologies it is in our interest to connect with the global community while maintaining our roots to the educational institution by which we are founded. While we will utilize a familiar format of the web, we will also provide information accessible by mobile devices, pod casts, and web applications in social networks which will not only speak to a demographic born into a culture of handheld technology, but will also be accessible on a smaller modular device more affordable and utilized by those in developing countries.
0 commentsWhat experience do you or your organization have to successfully develop this project?
Our Team
Provided Resources: The San Jose State University School of Art and Design provides us space, server capacity, symposium venues and creative support. One of our partners, San Jose Zero One (SJ01) Biennial provides access to events, artists and other practitioners. The City of San Jose's Public Arts Program works along side SJ01 as well at project stemming out of CADRE. Our relationship to the city’s public art program is strong and can provide valuable facilitates and access to public figures.
Our volunteered talent includes writers, programmers, engineers, designers, artists, and art historians. With over 20 years of alumni, we receive support and contributions from academic institutions throughout the country.
The current volunteer staff at Switch includes the following profiles:
Danielle Siembieda is the Managing Editor with a B.A. from University of Missouri, worked on projects for Albuquerque Journal, MTV, VH1 and several other news sources. In addition Siembieda is a graduate student at the CADRE New Media lab at SJSU and works on issues involving Green Technology and Energy.
Ali Sajjadi, associate editor. His work has been published in the papers of the Daily News Group as well as in the Chronicle and Mercury News. Also a competent coder, his current projects include building a php and mysql based ajax.
Thomas Asmuth, MFA Candidate at CADRE, artist and theorist; he works in themes of DIY, pedagogy, hardware, and science and technology. His work has been exhibited at the 01SJ Festival, San Jose Museum of Art, and the Tang Museum, Saratoga Springs, NY.
James Morgan, founder of Ars Virtua Gallery in Second Life and professor at San Jose State University.
Joel Slayton is the director of the San Jose Zero One (SJ01) Biennial 2010, Founder of SWITCH and CADRE New Media Lab at San Jose State University.
Hasan Elahi is an interdisciplinary media artist with an emphasis on technology and media and their social implications. He is also an assistant professor at San Jose State University.
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