North-Western Europe could be in for some sudden climatic surprises in the future.

North-Western Europe is kept warm by an ocean current known as the North Atlantic Current, an extension of the Gulf Stream which brings warm water from the tropics to the north. This current is sensitive to global warming and could slow down, or even break down as a result of increasing global temperatures. Studies of Earth's ancient climate show that the North Atlantic Current has changed repeatedly and dramatically in the past, resulting in massive and sudden regional climate changes [ice ages]. >from *Future climate change in North-Western Europe may come as a shock*. January 15, 2004.

"The rate and extent of change, especially since the 1950s is unprecedented," says Dr Will Steffen, Executive Director of the International Geosphere-Biosphere Programme and lead author of the book "Global Change and the Earth System: A planet under pressure", a view of a rapidly changing planet presented by hundreds of scientists from around the world. "We are changing the very life support system on which we depend and its future is highly unpredictable."

One of the concerns raised by the book is that many of the changes occurring to the Earth remain 'invisible' for long periods until critical thresholds are crossed and large changes follow. "Some changes may be irreversible on any time scale meaningful to humans", says Steffen." >from *New policies needed to combat Global Change*. January 20, 2004

related context
> new study reports large-scale salinity changes in the oceans. saltier tropical oceans and fresher ocean waters near the poles are further signs of global warming's impacts on the planet... continue to freshen northern north atlantic ocean waters -- to a point that could disrupt ocean circulation and trigger further climate changes. december 17, 2003
> electrokinetic cells: new source of energy. november 17, 2003
> earth 'will expire by 2050': living planet report. july 12, 2002
> global warming: u.s. climate action report 2002. june 12, 2002

imago
> ice age coming?

"Promenade in nanoland propose an imaginative one-hour tour through nanoparticles self-assemblies, the forms and structures which inhabit the extremely small (from our macroscopic world).

Songs and texts accompanies a collection of transmission electron microscopy obtained from the evaporation of colloidal nanoparticles solutions (like coffee into water) onto transparent substrates (carbon ultra thin films).

In nine chapters the submicrometric world is extensively observed.

Together with the images there are pieces of a relate which it turns to be part of it. A relate which narrates a journey, which more than a journey is a childbirth.

An indefinite trip, indeterminate, introspective, which should lead to the world through a metaphoric uterus. (vivo sin vivir en mi).

With characters which could be anyone at any moment in any place. The music accompanying the images has been capriciously extracted from my personal collection of records of the last 4 years, during which the scientific Project was carried out.

I hope that the promenade will be pleasant and widens the chest and caress the spirit and frees the imagination to understand that other worlds constantly exist and co-exist.

Let you be moved, thanks" Victor F. Puntes. >Extracted from lab notes: "Project: Metronom 04. After meeting each other, Science becomes Art." Exhibition at Metrònom in Barcelona from January 27 to March 6, 2004.

related context
> artificial landscapes: an aerial tour to the nanoland. october 24, 2002
> paisatges artificials, un viatge aéri a nanolandia per victor f puntes. openfriday@straddle3, october, 25, 2002
> metrònom

imago
> make your own path

Snow White and The Madness of Truth is a work of art by Israeli-born Swedish composer/musician Dror Feiler and his Swedish wife Gunilla Sköld-Feiler, which made a brief splash of international news after the Israeli ambassador vandalized it January 16, 2004 by tipping one of the lights into the water and causing a short circuit. >from *Snow White and The Madness of Truth*. From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

The installation Snow White and The Madness of Truth had three parts: bright photographers' lights aimed at a long rectangular pool of blood-like red water on which a little boat floated with a cardboard sail made from a much-published photograph of Hanadi Jaradat -the woman who blew up a restaurant in Haifa during the weekend of the last Jewish New Year; music performed by Feiler playing in the background; and the text on the accompanying wall.

The installation was a part of the Making Differences exhibition, in conjunction with Stockholm International Forum 2004: Preventing Genocide. The title attempts to pose the question: Does it make a difference? Do we make a difference?, and Can art, photography etc make any difference?, in order to engage people in a dialogue about these matters. Many of the shows also illustrate individual people's work who we believe do make a difference when it comes to open people's eyes toward a larger understanding, and a broader view of the issues. Art, journalism and documentary has a saying in forming opinions amongst people.

Done in a responsible way, art can actually have a value and a meaning beyond being just art itself - it can make people reflect on, and better be prepared, for a discussion and understandning of the events of the world." >from *Making Differences*. January 17 - February 7, 2004

related context
> dror feiler. "i want always to deal with the grim problems in life: shrapnel (war) ; beat the white the red wedge (revolution) ; schlafbrand (second world war) ; let the millionaires go naked (revenge of the poor); intifada (israeli-palestinian conflict). aesthetics per se do not interest me... when i compose or play i do not look for beauty, but for truth."
> art attack under press spotlight. bbc news, january 19, 2004
> banksy: graffiti art. the banksy manifesto is talking about how the application of paint can make a difference. december 3, 2003
> guess who died: on arafat in israeli art. october 6, 2003
> mirroring evil: nazi imagery/recent art . one recent of many art exhibitions at the jewish museum that have addressed the period of the holocaust. march 18, 2002

imago
> release yourself

An open exchange [ presentations + debate + performances + party ] around the real-time use of sensors controlled through PureData will be held on January 30, 2004 in the openfriday@straddle3.

PD is a real-time graphical programming environment for audio and graphical processing, developed by Miller Smith Puckette. PD is a multiplatform and open source software (runs on Win32, IRIX, LINUX and Mac-OSX). It is easy to extend PD with plug-ins (so-called 'externals'). Many collections of externals (so-called 'libraries') are already available. It is used as a rapid prototype-software for DSP(Digital Signal Processing)-algorithmn, and also as a music instrument and universal multimedia software. Also it is used in the academic field for teaching and exploring computer music and new media art." >from *About Pure Data*. The Pure Data Portal.

Presentations and performances by:

> (((universomente))) (carlos botto aka caen). Caen is an intermedia artist, composer and researcher that created Universomente, independent laboratory of production and research in audiovisual experimental techniques and interactive communication. Nowadays working in the presentation of interactive installations, performances and researching in the field of the real time control of audiovisual media (see butterflystorm, ictuscopyk, jardineria fractal y cultivos tecnorgánicos).

> nice-noise (alejandro posada aka alex). NICE-NOISE are a formation entered in the musical work production, image and experimental sound,installations and in the design and manufacture of devices applied to the audio-visual art. This fusion reflects the sintesis of an alliance that from the childhood is fed by music, science and the art. members: Carlos M. Franco, Alejandro Posada Entrecanales

> onnirik.org (xavi manzanares aka moe) its a net node, that experience and research subversive and hybrid territories in culture,sound, technologies, and political actions. Is figuring out the connection among multisensoriality inside individual perception and communication fluxes inside collective experience. onnirikteam >>xavi manzanares + leo sanchis

> puredata from riereta.net (ramiro cosentino aka rama + jaume nualart aka jaume). Riereta.net, a human trusted network that owes very much to the model of free software communities, both for the software used, and for the internal organisation, based on spontaneity, curiosity and cooperation.

> r3 :: rebel.refuse.resist aka skeezo. our collective is born as audio-visual creation platform tied to the social movements and the 'alternative' information. this takes us to introduce in the free software community of and to contemplate the true "social movement" to level of communication in networks, between the endless source of ideas and resources that contributes to us, arrive to us new creation concepts (real-time, memetics, cyborg, recycling va), ideas (pd/linux in a xbox, net-collaborative audio/video) and tools (PS pdp-pidip gem) that now we used for almost all our creative processes.

openfriday@straddle3
·······························
pd open dev
friday january 30, 2004. 20 h
straddle3. c/ riereta, 32 1-3
barcelona

related context
> openfridays
> theory and techniques of electronic music by miller s. puckette
> pure data webring
> the construction of experience: interface as content by david rokeby

imago
> pd_open_dev

Like the martial arts, displacement can become idea, action and art.

Parkour is a process allowing to extend human qualities while moving while using the medium. It is a question of overcoming all the adversities. This art can be practised independently, to two or in group. The partners advance according to a route called 'tracé'... They apprehend it thanks to a method tested by the initiator of known as Parkour: David Belle and Sebastien Foucan. >from *Parkour.net. Le site des pratiquants de parkour*.

draw a straight line on a map of your home town. start from point a, and go to the point b. don't consider the elements which are in your way (barriers, walls, wire fences, trees, houses, buildings) as obstacles. hug them: climb, get over, jump: let your imagination flow: you're now doing parkour.

"the day when all will be flat, we'll be dead." the people who practice parkour apply this principle on a physical level, and offers to transpose this attitude on a moral level. all depends actually on the way which the obstacle is taken. an obstacle in normal circumstances prevents us from going further, it paralyses. in parkour however, everything is viewed as an obstacle that can be used to create movement. >from *Art in motion*.

related context
> urbanfreeflow, the global parkour network.
> urban space and representation by iain borden. in the movement of the body across urban space, and in its direct interaction with the modern architecture of the city, lies the central critique of skateboarding - a rejection both of the values and of the spatio-temporal modes of living in the contemporary capitalist city.
> theory of the dérive by guy-ernest debord. dérive [literally: drifting], a technique of rapid passage through varied ambiances. Dérives involve playful-constructive behavior and awareness of psychogeographical effects.
> civic tv: alternative visions of the urban experience. november 21, 2003
> psy-geo-conflux: the meaning of living in a city. may 14, 2003

imago
> ferumm le parkour

It was twenty years ago today that I quit my job at MIT to begin developing a free software operating system, GNU. While we have never released a complete GNU system suitable for production use, a variant of the GNU system is now used by tens of millions of people who mostly are not aware it is such.

Free software does not mean "gratis"; it means that users are free to run the program, study the source code, change it, and redistribute it either with or
without changes, either gratis or for a fee.

My hope was that a free operating system would open a path to escape forever from the system of subjugation which is proprietary software. I had experienced the ugliness of the way of life that non-free software imposes on its users, and I was determined to escape and give others a way to escape.

Non-free software carries with it an antisocial system that prohibits cooperation and community. You are typically unable to see the source code; you cannot tell
what nasty tricks, or what foolish bugs, it might contain. If you don't like it, you are helpless to change it. Worst of all, you are forbidden to share it with anyone else. To prohibit sharing software is to cut the bonds of society. >full article *The Free Software Community After 20 Years: With great but incomplete success, what now? by Richard Stallman*. January 5, 2004

related context
> about the gnu project.
> free software and richard stallman. from wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
> open-source practices in software engineering.december 12, 2003
> a fan of freedom: thoughts on the biography of rms by eric s. raymond. november 11, 2003
> free as in freedom: the life story of richard stallman. june 25, 2002

imago
> cook the code book - free reflections and recipies