I should quickly introduce myself - Francis McKee, researcher
examining open source movement at Glasgow School of Art and Head of New
Media at CCA in Glasgow.
I'd like to second Martijn Stevens point - i've been averse to joining
this discussion so far as i have felt the conservation projects to be
far from my own interests or experience. I understand rationally all
of the good reasons to conserve and preserve net art or digital works.
My gut instinct though is to let many of them go - the net for instance
is essentially such an unstable medium with extinction built into so
many sites and many of the artists i've enjoyed most seem to thrive on
that or produce works that are in process and cannot be saved as they
change from moment to moment, feeding off the web's current activity.
The first generation of net artists also seemed to have invested
heavily in an anti-materialist/anti-object sentiment that seems
inimical to some aspects of preservation though i feel i should go back
and read Josephine Berry's 'Information as Muse' essay again
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