FROM STUDYING SOCIAL MEDIA TO EXPERIMENTAL ART INSTALLATIONS, THE BERKELEY CENTER FOR NEW MEDIA EXPLORES THE EVER-CHANGING INTERSECTION OF TECHNOLOGY, CREATIVITY, AND COMMUNICATION.
Launched in 2004, the research center brings together scholars from 37 departments across campus — philosophy, engineering, and journalism among them — to investigate new media’s powerful effect on culture and our daily lives. Last year, the center established its first endowed faculty chair through the Hewlett Challenge with a gift from craigslist, one of the world's most popular web sites.
“Our mission,” says Professor KEN GOLDBERG, director of the center, “is to critically analyze and help shape developments in new media from cross-disciplinary and global perspectives that emphasize humanities and the public interest.”
The following three ongoing projects illustrate the innovative research and explorations taking place at the center.
BLACK CLOUD SPREADS URBAN ENVIRONMENTAL AWARENESS
Developed by art practice associate professor GREG NIEMEYER and other researchers, Black Cloud is an environmental studies game for high-school students that mixes the physical with the virtual. In the game, students play either real estate developers or environmentalists, using actual air-quality sensors to monitor neighborhood pollution. Their goal: identifying good sites for either additional development or conservation. Students in Los Angeles and Cairo, Egypt, currently use the game-based learning curriculum. || studio.berkeley.edu/bc
OPINION SPACE’S CONSTELLATION OF VIEWPOINTS AND CONNECTIVITY
Launched in April, Opinion Space is an experimental group discussion system that ventures beyond one-dimensional polarities such as left/right or blue/red to promote dialogue between people with differing viewpoints. Participants use sliders to indicate their opinions on five short propositions and enter responses to a “discussion question” that changes every few weeks. In the visual display of Opinion Space, each user appears as a glowing point placed in relation to other points representing people with similar opinions. The system encourages participants to then explore the comments of other users — and to modify their opinions based on what they learn from others. || opinion.berkeley.edu
COLLOQUIUM BRINGS IN THE HEAVY HITTERS
For more than a decade, Berkeley’s Art, Technology, and Culture lecture series has challenged conventional wisdom about technology and culture. This series of campus lectures, free of charge and open to the public, has presented more than 120 artists, writers, composers, curators, and scholars who discuss the overlapping worlds of artistic expression and emerging technologies, taking into account critical and cultural perspectives. Guests have ranged from performance artist Laurie Anderson (at right in conversation with Ken Goldberg) and musician David Byrne (above) to the late scientist/artist/author BILLY KLÜVER ’57, a Berkeley alum who has been called the father of electronic art. || atc.berkeley.edu
next section: Class Acts — The Class of 2009: Strength in numbers
