SOMETIMES NEWS JOURNALISM
NEEDS A GOOD AMG Software STRAINING...

 

"The antiwar movement cannot ignore the centrality of the corporate media to the war machine any longer. ...We will gather to demand that they act as watchdogs, not lapdogs, of the state and the military-industrial complex..."

-- text of 3.22.03 call for Action Against Corporate News Headquarters in NYC

 

"software art is in an unusual position to deconstruct war machines because software art is concerned with the creation and deconstruction of machines."

-- Jim Andrews (vispo.com), 3.20.03 [eu-gene] generative art discussion list

 

STRAINS OF 2003
(produced for Version>03 Festival, curated by criticalartware, 3/03 Chicago)

Exhibition of a selection of web-streamed news videos, collected with a slow modem, for the application of altered time-frame using AMG STRAIN software.

The way to sift through a mound of sand is to start at the bottom, moving the hands upward through it. The way to strain a flow of media is to move from the end of the flow to its beginning. AMG STRAIN is deconstructive software. Its sole function is to interactively play segmented Quicktime videos in reverse order as a way to disentangle (from) the intended messages of those videos. AMG STRAIN software is based on the 1992 video by Anne McGuire, "Strain Andromeda, The".

STRAINS of 2003 passes _MSNBC.com_ streaming media programming through a 56k modem in order to apply AMG STRAIN software to several weeks of its corporate-sponsored news cover(age). Each segment of each video can be played in dynamically variable durations, in reverse order.

_MSNBC.com_ does not make its media programming available as an open, long-term archive. After several weeks on the web these programs disappear. Only transcripts remain. Beyond what the commercial sponsors are willing to pay to prove the contrary, this deletion of media memory suggests that _MSNBC's product is valueless as cultural or historical record.

Sampling of the 2003 recordings of streaming news video clips selected by Barbara Lattanzi:

  • Americans in Baghdad at their own risk
  • Blair and U.S. Allies
  • Blix Report a blow to U.S.
  • Bush says time for UN members to show their cards
  • Bush accuses Iraq of charade
    Bush appeals to European Allies
  • Bush brushes off global protests
  • Bush gives Saddam Hussein 48 hours to leave Iraq
  • Duty, Honor and Country
  • Government-issued safety PSA
  • Ground forces wait in Kuwait
  • How to free yourself of over-thinking
  • In Northern Iraq
  • Inside the U.S. air base on the front lines with Iraq
  • Inspectors: Iraqi cooperation
  • Michael Buble performs "That's All"
  • MSNBC ad
  • News Conference At Azores
  • Patti LaBelle Space Shuttle Columbia tribute
  • Reaching out to troops
  • Saddam's refusal
  • Soldiers geared for high-tech war
  • Space Shuttle Columbia launch (from NASA website)
  • Steve Forbes discusses billionaires' club
  • Tom Ridge unveils terrorism readiness tips
  • Tom Ridge unveils readiness campaign
  • Tracking down Saddam Hussein
  • U.N. inspectors hunt for Iraqi missiles
  • U.N. move starts clock toward war
  • U.S. indicts 8 it says ran terrorist group
  • U.S. learns to live with heightened alert state