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monochrom featured in reader "Truth is Concrete"

Context Hacking: Some Examples of How to Mess with Art, the Media System, Law and the Market @ Shenkar Design School

Arse Elektronika on mako.co.il

Arse Elektronika: Sex, Tech and the Future of Screw-It-Yourself @ Ha-Midrasha, Tel Aviv

We may not forget that mankind is a sexual and tool-using species.
From the depiction of a vulva in a cave painting to the newest internet porno, technology and sexuality have always been closely linked. New technologies are quick to appeal to pornography consumers, and thus these customers represent a profitable market segment for the suppliers of new products and services.
Currently, all factors show that high-tech developments owe a great deal of their success to the need for further sexual stimulation. One could cite the example provided by the science-fiction concept of a full-body interface designed to produce sexual stimulation. But it isn't science fiction anymore. It's DIY.
As bio-hacking, sexually enhanced bodies, genetic utopias and plethora of gender have long been the focus of literature, science fiction and, increasingly, pornography, this year will see us explore the possibilities that fictional and authentic bodies have to offer. Our world is already way more bizarre than our ancestors could have ever imagined. But it may not be bizarre enough. "Bizarre enough for what?" -- you might ask. Bizarre enough to subvert the heterosexist matrix that is underlying our world and that we should hack and overcome for some quite pressing reasons within the next century. Don't you think, replicants?

monochrom features: "SAFECAST: Citizen Science after Fukushima Makes an Impact"

Safecast is a non-ideological, non-profit, volunteer-based organization created in the days immediately following the the Fukushima NPP disaster, which began three years ago on March 11, 2011. The release of radioactive material was accompanied by a disturbing lack of clear public information concerning radiation levels in the affected areas, and a series of missteps and misstatements by the Japanese government and by TEPCO damaged their credibility in the eyes of large segments of the population. Credible and independent data concerning the growing radiation risk was sought by many to fill the acute information vacuum.
SAFECAST quickly began to field mobile detectors of its own design, which leveraged open-source software and hardware and new-generation DIY tools such as laser cutters and custom PCB fabrication to dramatically accelerate development and deployment time. The group simultaneously developed an information management system that allows GPS-tagged radiation data points to be uploaded into a central database and displayed on an interactive web-based map. SAFECAST's radiation information system has seen the rapid deployment no fewer than seven increasingly refined GPS-enabled mobile radiation detector designs, called "bGeigies," the web-based "GeoSense" map, a free iOS-based map application, and other devices and software, all developed by volunteers and made freely available through Creative Commons licenses.

The radiation data gathered by SAFECAST volunteers in Japan and abroad currently exceeds 15 million data points, arguably the most extensive public data set of its kind. It was soon hailed as a technically competent, credible, and objective source of radiation information for Japan by specialists on both sides of the nuclear power debate. SAFECAST has been invited to present it's methodology and criticisms at the IAEA "International Experts’ Meeting on Radiation Protection after the Fukushima Daiichi Accident: Promoting Confidence and Understanding," being held in Vienna from Feb. 17-21.

At Raum D, SAFECAST Volunteers Joe Moross and Azby Brown will show the group's latest mobile radiation detector designs, talk about iterative design and the challenges of building a technically adept global volunteer organization, and discuss what the future holds in store.

monochrom's PROPOOL

monochrom press overview 2013

Johannes Grenzfurthner (monochrom) @ Cybersalon

Short interview with monochrom's Johannes Grenzfurthner at Cybersalon

Jeff Ricketts interview featuring monochrom

I’m Jeff Ricketts, and I’m very, very happy and honoured to be here answering your questions and interacting with you all! Before we get started, here’s a little information about myself for those of you that don’t know my work away from “Buffy The Vampire Slayer” and “Angel”...

I’m an American League-trained theatre, film, and television actor. I’ve performed in over 100 plays in New York, International theatre, Shakespeare festivals, and regional theatre. While in New York, I played the title role of Richard Schechner’s critically acclaimed production of FaustGastronome.

As far as I’m aware, I’m one of only six actors to appear in “Buffy The Vampire Slayer”, “Angel”, and “Firefly”. I played Weatherby of the Watcher’s Council in Buffy’s “This Year’s Girl” and “Who Are You?”, as well as playing the same character in Angel’s “Sanctuary”. I also played the Spider Demon in Angel’s “Sacrifice”, and played one of the two ‘Hands of Blue’ in Firefly’s “The Train Job” and “Ariel”. In addition to my roles on Joss Whedon’s shows, I’ve also appeared in CSI, 24, Charmed, Star Trek: Enterprise, Without A Trace, The Guardian, Philly, The Drew Carey Show, and NYPD Blue.

These days I live in Austria. My work in Austria includes playing the Captain of the International Space Station in Monochrom’s ISS. It’s an improvised sitcom that was filmed in front of a live audience. You can watch most of it for free here - http://www.monochrom.at/iss/ . My film credits include The Strange Case Of Wilhelm Reich, Holes, Clockstoppers, and Amber Benson’s “Chance” (along with Whedonverse alumni Amber Benson, James Marsters, and Andy Hallett). I’ve recently wrapped shooting on “Good Morning Kabul”, directed by Barbara Eder. Finally, I am about to appear in Monochrom’s film “Die Gstettensaga: The Rise Of Echsenfriedl”, where I will play the leader of the Barbarians. The film will premiere on ORF III in March of this year.

monochrom @ "The Cyborg's New Clothes - Wearable Computing, Iteractive Fashion and Skin 2.0"

The wearable revolution is at the gates: Sensors and chip sets, the "peace dividend of the smartphone wars" as former WIRED editor in chief Chris Anderson puts it, are cheaper now than ever, making it easy for companies to incorporate sophisticated hardware into wearable devices. Many of the big names in consumer electronics have already released products at the International CES in Las Vegas. Like it or not, 2014 will be the year of the wearable. January's Cybersalon will touch of the following topics: Is Google Glass the continuation of CCTV by other means? How will the commodification and intrusion of our bodies by wearables change our perception and understanding of subjectivity? Is self-logging a trendy self-management strategy or does it create an El Dorado for personal data dealers? In which ways can critical artists respond to the challenges raised by the rapid human-machine integration? How can we tap the subversive potential of wearable technology? How can interactive fashion explore subjectivity as a nexus between inside, outside and in-between spaces? How can artificial pneumatic computer-controlled skin help us outsmart surveillance? Over the last two decades, the dialectic of political economy and technological progress has turned the vintage utopias of the 90s on their dystopian feet: 20 years ago, media art pioneer Nam June Paik had imagined the future Internet user as a Deleuzian prototype nomad warrior, cycling the Electronic Superhighway on a bike, dressed in a fancy data suit, wearing a neat surrealist Dali-style VR helmet. In 1995, MIT Media Lab founder Nicolas Negroponte had dreamt of the Body Net as the digital road warrior's kit upgrade, connecting your shoe computer to a wrist keyboard and head-up display: "Activating your body means that everything you touch is potentially digital. A handshake becomes an exchange of digital business cards, a friendly arm on the shoulder provides helpful data, touching a doorknob verifies your identity, and picking up a phone downloads your numbers and voice signature for faithful speech recognition." In 2014, however, the reality principle has gained the upper hand. We see supermarket workers in the UK wearing body-borne computers for performance monitoring and location tracking, a technology formerly employed in sports or pet-keeping. Shops in London are secretly snooping on customers by targeting their mobile phones through Wi-fi. In that fashion, the 'cyborg's new clothes' are capable of leaking our personal data to dark global data markets in real-time. Without a retailored Esprit de Costumes, we may all unwillingly become participants in a virtual World Naked Bike Ride.

TV premiere of "monochrom's ISS" on Austrian station OKTO

In post-production! "Die Gstettensaga: The Rise of Echsenfriedl"

Die Gstettensaga: The Rise of Echsenfriedl

WTF: "Heute" tabloid reports a third time about "Six Feet Under Club"

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