Category: Winter/Spring 2007

By Barbara Crow and Kim Sawchuk

Welcome to the second edition of Wi: the journal of the mobile digital commons network.

The articles included in this issue address the theme of collaboration in the context of research-creation. Many large research networks involve inter-disciplinary collaborations between researchers trained in different fields: computer science, engineering, fine arts, design, humanities, and the social sciences. In the context of the MDCN, these fields bring practitioners with different forms of expertise to the production process. Too often, the setting up of an inter-disciplinary research team is seen as the assembly of a grocery-list of knowledge. It is not. The process of meaningful collaboration for the purposes of research-creation is an always complex – sometimes frustrating – potentially rewarding experience.

Read more →

By Yasmin Jiwani

Collaborative research can often be an exciting venture if conducted with honest intentions, respect for the collaborators and accountability to the project. Having experienced both the benefits and disadvantages of collaborative research, here are some of the rules that I have finally come up with!

Read more →

By Alison Powell

Fredericton, New Brunswick. February, 2007
Montreal, Friday night, end of October, 2006

In a café on St-Laurent I cup a mug of tea and wind my scarf against the cold. Michael from Île Sans Fil (or ISF) and I are meeting to discuss a writing project for this journal, and I am trying to find a new angle on a story I’ve lived in for two years. The last thing I want to do is to write another case study of “Canada’s most successful community wireless network.” I’m no longer inspired to write about innovative business models that encourage local businesses to share their internet bandwidth. I have already written about the sociology of volunteer groups that define their political engagement through technology. While I feel that ISF’s use of Wi-Fi hotspots to create new media distribution sites, and their work with artists to create sites of cultural exchange is interesting, I don’t only want to tell that story. I have piles of field notes that tell the story of the relationships at the heart of my research. I haven’t written about them, but I want to begin to tell those stories, as difficult and confusing as they may be.

Read more →

By Andrea Zeffiro and Daviid Gauthier

Daviid Gauthier is one of the lead engineers in the Mobile Digital Commons Network,1 a collaborative research project involving Concordia University, the Banff New Media Institute, the Ontario College of Art and Design, and York University. As a researcher in the network, I have had the privilege and pleasure of working closely with Gauthier in numerous circumstances, from technology tutorials to in situ testing. Gauthier has defied my ideas of the stereotypical computer engineer, which I have come to identify as a socially inept 20-something male, who sits in front of a computer terminal screen in a darkened room for fourteen hours a day.

Read more →

By Kim Sawchuk and Barbara Crow

In the summer of 2006, Marit-Saskia Wahrendorf was commissioned to develop a series of ’skins’ for the cell phone as a part of the MDCN. Skinning is a term used in industrial design to discuss the surfaces that overlay a given form. In answer to this request from MDCN, Wahrendorf crafted a series of hand-made, customized covers out of colourful scraps of old fabric to re-skin the cell phone. This audio piece by Barbara Crow discusses Wahrendorf’s work, and is accompanied by a photo gallery displaying the skins she developed.

Read more →

By Michael Longford

The Mobile Digital Commons Network (MDCN) is a national collaborative research network launched in 2004 by the Banff New Media Institute and Concordia University. Situated in Banff, Toronto and Montreal the network is made up of designers, engineers, and communications scholars from a number of institutions that also includes the Ontario College of Art & Design and York University. The MDCN explores the connections between human beings, urban and wilderness settings, and mobile technologies. By developing interactive mobile experiences and observing the dynamics inherent in wireless immersive environments, each of the MDCN projects that make up the network moves us closer to understanding how these technologies augment, enhance and transform our culturally situated experiences of urban and outdoor spaces.

Read more →

By Janice Leung

Despite the wet and dreary weather, the inaugural Scotiabank Nuit Blanche (September 30 to October 1, 2006) attracted more than 425,000 visitors bustling on the streets of downtown Toronto. At what is promised to be “the sunset-to-sunrise celebration of contemporary art,” the event offered Torontonians everything from provocative bedtime stories (Bedtime Tales: Fables and Fantasies, 2006), “ballroom” dancing (Ballroom Dancing by Darren O’Donnell, 2006) to an all-night swimming party (Night Swim by Christie Pearson, 2006). Modeled after the highly successful event launched in the city of Paris in 2002,1 Toronto’s Nuit Blanche is divided into three zones (Zone A: Bloor/Yorkville; Zone B: McCaul/University; and Zone C: Queen Street West), in turn providing more than 100 access points to showcase a wide selection of contemporary artworks by both Canadian and international talents.

Read more →