ubik

2006

As we busy ourselves with the task of "designing" ubiquitous computing environments suitable for human habitation, we find ourselves within an interzone, inbetween that which is, and that which is rendered as present. The experiences we design proclaim you are here now, yet no where.

We are in a maze, here, which we built and then fell into and can't get out. In essence, VALIS selectively fires information to us which aids us in escaping from the maze, in finding the way out. It started back about two thousand years before christ, in Mycenaean times or perhaps early Helladic. That's why myths place the maze at Minos, on Crete. That's why you saw ancient Crete through the 1.618034 door way. We were great builders, but one day we decided to play a game.

We did it voluntarily; were we such good builders that we could build a maze with a way out but which constantly changed so that, despite the way out, in effect there was no way out for us because the maze - this world - was alive ?

To make the game into something real, into something more than an intellectual exercise, we elected to lose our exceptional faculties, to reduce us an entire level. This, unfortunately, included loss of memory - loss of knowledge of our true origins. But worse than that - and here is where we in a sense managed to defeat ourselves, to turn victory over to our servant, over to the maze we had built.

The third eye closed, Fat said.

From Valis, by Phillip K Dick.

ubik - ubiquitous - computing : the environments from which we draw meaning - the lense through which we see both self and world.

ubik has been erased - to be replaced, rewritten as only electronic texts can, the rest of uber.tv will follow - to become something else. the question remains as to what. suggested answers ?

Posted by Gavin on August 14, 2006 | edit