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\title{}

\author{Florian Cramer}

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\maketitle

I am going to talk about three (rather trashy)  pop songs and their
relation to electronic media.  This lecture has been announced has
``cork-dry'', 


France Gall, Der Computer Nummer Drei (1968)

%% \begin{quote}
%% The computer number three\\
%% looks for the right boy for me\\
%% and love for us both \\
%% is guaranteed
%% 
%% The computer exactly can\\
%% find a woman for every man,\\
%% and happiness instantly flies\\
%% out of its files.
%% 
%% One of many millions\\
%% is waiting somewhere for me
%% 
%% (Size: 182 -- collar: 39 -- feet: 46 -- stop!)
%% 
%% The computer number three\\
%% looks for the right boy for me\\
%% and love for us both is guaranteed
%% 
%% For a long time, I was lonely\\
%% now just love remains\\
%% thanks to our technology, and science, \\
%% and electronic brains
%% 
%% The computer number three\\
%% looks for the right boy for me\\
%% and love for us both \\
%% is guaranteed
%% 
%% The computer exactly can\\
%% find a woman for every man,\\
%% and happiness instantly flies\\
%% out of its files.
%% 
%% One of many millions\\
%% is waiting somewhere for me
%% 
%% (Age: 22 -- black hair -- profession salesman -- characteristics: piles of cash)
%% 
%% The computer number three\\
%% looks for the right boy for me\\
%% and love for us both \\
%% is guaranteed
%% \end{quote}
%% 
%% 
%% \begin{quote}
%% Der Computer Nr. 3\\
%% sucht für mich den richtigen Boy,\\
%% und die Liebe ist garantiert für beide dabei.\\
%% Der Computer weiß genau\\
%% für jeden Mann die richtige Frau,\\
%% und das Glück fällt im Augenblick\\
%% aus seiner Kartei.
%% 
%% Denn einer von vielen Millionen,\\
%% der wartet auf mich irgendwo.
%% 
%% (Gross: einszwoundachtzig, Kragen: 39, Schuhgröße: 46, stop!)
%% 
%% Der Computer Nr. 3\\
%% sucht für mich den richtigen Boy,\\
%% und die Liebe ist garantiert für beide dabei.
%% 
%% Lange war ich einsam, heut' bin ich verliebt,\\
%% und nur darum ist das so,\\
%% weil es die Technik und die Wissenschaft\\
%% und Elektronengehirne gibt.
%% 
%% Der Computer Nr. 3\\
%% sucht für mich den richtigen Boy,\\
%% und die Liebe ist garantiert für beide dabei.\\
%% Der Computer weiß genau,\\
%% für jeden Mann die richtige Frau,\\
%% und das Glück fällt im Augenblick\\
%% aus seiner Kartei.
%% 
%% Denn einer von vielen Millionen,\\
%% der wartet auf mich irgendwo
%% 
%% (Alt: 22 Jahre, schwarze Haare, von Beruf Vertreter, Kennzeichen: Geld wie\\
%% Heu)
%% 
%% Der Computer Nr. 3\\
%% sucht für mich den richtigen Boy,\\
%% und die Liebe ist garantiert für beide dabei.\\
%% \end{quote}

Online dating:

Match-making, scientific objectivity: database logic, cybernetic
feedback: Man-machine feedback loop.

Norbert Wiener: Cybernetics as study of ``Cybernetics, or Control and
Communication in the Animal and Machine'' (1948)

Feedback loop: discomfort -- adjustment 

``The Psycho-Structural Cybernetic Model, Feedback, and Problem Gambling:
A New Theoretical Approach'', Canada, 2004

Parallel of human functioning and machine feedback loop, ``regel lijn''.
Behaviorist ideology: human behavior can be modelled after formalisms, machine
logic.

Negative media theory, and criticism: information technology and
computers as control systems. (Kittler, Foucault.)

Cybernetic art, 1960s/70s: control systems.

End of cybernetics.

Jump into 1983:
Trans-X, Living on Video (1983)


%% 
%% \begin{quote}
%% Give me light\\
%% give me action\\
%% at the touch of a button.\\
%% Flying through hyper-space\\
%% in a computer interface.\\
%% Stop -- living on video\\
%% stop -- integrated circuits.\\
%% Stop -- sur un faisceau de lumieres\\
%% stop -- is this reality?
%% 
%% Traveling in a light beam\\
%% laser rays and purple skies.\\
%% In a computer fairyland\\
%% it is a dream you bring to life.\\
%% Stop -- living on video\\
%% stop -- integrated circuits. . . .\\
%% Living on video -- sur un faisceau de lumieres
%% 
%% I see your glittering blue eyes\\
%% you look at me with a smile.\\
%% It's a computer fantasy\\
%% it is waiting for you and me.\\
%% Living -- living on video\\
%% living -- living on video
%% 
%% Living -- living on video\\
%% living -- living on video -- stop. 
%% \end{quote}

Anticipates cyberspace utopias by ten years, and second Life by 22
years.  Trans-X: project by  Pascal Languirand, degree in communication
studies. 

Both songs are far ahead of media theory in imagining the possibilities
of computer media. The Trans-X vision is less technocratic and
cybernetic, but more psychedelic: technology as a means to freedom, as
in cyberspace and early Internet utopias. The computer is no longer
outside the love relation, but part of it, shaping/filtering perception
(``I see your glittering blue eyes -- you look at me with a smile''):
Turn from cybernetics to media, and more precisely: ``interactive''
media. 

Typical for computer art in total: cybernetic art of the
1960s/70s gets replaced with ``new media'' art of the 1980s/90s,
although they both boil down to the same, as made obvious in the Italo
disco song ``Future Brain'' by Den Harrow in 1985:


%% \begin{quote}
%% 
%% Stockin' away all the details you want to know\\
%% Day after day all your memories get to grow\\
%% Putting all that you've stolen\\
%% In a prison that you've locked forever\\
%% Taking the place of our imagination\\
%% But you won't erase my heart
%% 
%% There is no way you can understand what I feel\\
%% You never pray 'cause your soul isn't even real\\
%% You might know lots of things now\\
%% But you can never be a lover\\
%% Winning the race with your information\\
%% But you can't replace my soul
%% 
%% Future brain you make me wonder\\
%% Is it sane to make a sample of my love\\
%% Future brain you're getting stronger\\
%% It's a shame you'll never know how to find love
%% 
%% Living today but tomorrow will be the same\\
%% I know I can say that you will never win this game\\
%% No matter how much you know now\\
%% You will never get to know us never\\
%% Taking the place of an institution\\
%% But you can't replace my love
%% 
%% Future brain you great computer\\
%% It's insane to program everybody's love\\
%% Future brain your list is longer\\
%% But you're to blame 'cause you don't know\\
%% How stupid you are
%% 
%% There is no way you can understand what I feel\\
%% You never pray 'cause your soul isn't even real\\
%% You might know lots of things now\\
%% But you can never be a lover\\
%% Winning the race with your information\\
%% But you can't replace my soul
%% 
%% \end{quote}

Critique of both cybernetic and media utopian dating, with a catholic
tint: ``you can't replace my soul'', ``you never pray 'cause your soul
isn't even real''.

But there is truth in it: ``Interaction'' mixes up cybernetic feedback,
``touch of a button'', with social interaction. Media and computers are
not interactive in a social sense. Frustration with interactive art,
that it reduces communication and interaction to push-buttons: The
computer make your online dating match, it can provide computer
fantasies, but it can't be a lover. Both the cybernetic control fantasy
and the utopia of interactive media fail, the machine is a machine.


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