List server busy. Full digest rescheduled - Hardcover

Gauthier, David

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0993248799 ISBN 13: 9780993248795

Publisher: Torque Editions, 2020

Synopsis

List Server Busy. Full Digest Rescheduled is a 1400-page artist book, which brings together a vast array of writing from the online archives of net and digital culture discussion forums and mailing lists from the mid-nineties until today, including: nettime, Crumb, -empyre-, Spectre, and the Syndicate. The content of the book was collated via the use of software which combed through Listserv archives and algorithmic operations extracting certain years' most discussed subject threads or replied to messages. The book also includes a visual analysis of quantitative data and discursive themes that move across the book.

Electronic mailing lists or Listservs were one of the main communication channels of 1990s Pan-European net cultures and “Net Critique/Netzkritik” that formed out of the post-1989 era as an ideology-aware alternative to the technolibertarian “Californian Ideology. By anthologising and bookifying the Listservs, Gauthier performs a kind of eulogy which affirms the Listserv’s  historic character, whilst questioning their continuing relevance. The book also functions as a celebration of the quality of writing and the exceptional and unique critical engagement found in these early electronic forums.

Originally presented at Transmediale Berlin in 2020 and limited to only 30 copies. Hardback bound in Balacron and blocked in gold on front, with red ribbon marker. Resembling a legal textbook or bible, this rare artist book is also accompanied by an online index which links back to the original content: www.full-digest-rescheduled.info. Designed by Mark Simmonds and Sam Skinner.

Edition details

• Publisher: Torque Editions
• Publication date: 2020
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0993248799
• ISBN 13: 9780993248795
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 1472