online: 16 june 2003

12 june 2003 a parkbench tv network

This is the historical precedent for the imaginary parkbench tv in London2 on the second earth j-921.




18:34 I join about 20 people (some with laptops) taking part in Pete Gomes's* parkbench wireless event - in which a parkbench is marked with the address of a wireless computer network - through which anyone sitting on the bench with a laptop has free access to a local tv programme centered on the bench.

inscribed on bench:

a parkbench tv network
www.parkbenchtv.org
GPS N 51*31.093' / W 00*07.810'
you are in a wireless connection area
face the antenna with your laptop
localised media / community network access / regeneration

with incised pictures of the antenna on the AA roof etc.

several sketches (to follow when I've found how to send them from my handheld to this page)

from the leaflet:

a parkbench tv network
You can watch the content from the internet anywhere in the world - and if you want you can contribute to the channel - the only rule is that the content has to be about the area local to the bench and it's immediate surroundings.

from parkbenchtv:

a parkbench tv network interviews with local people sitting on the bench, tour of the garden, etc...

The above details tell me that this is indeed a timely project, embodying as it does a hopeful and trustful belief in the power of everyone to use the power of new communication channels constructively without need for direction from a centre... The centre is everywhere!

...Though the interviews with the gardeners, and their complaints at the activities of the drug users who misuse the garden, show how far we have to go before self-organising works for everyone.

Thank you Pete.



*Pete Gomes is an experimental film maker who teaches communication at the Architectural Association, Bedford Square, London WC1B 3ES.

Parkbench tv was his idea and it was realised with the participation of Panos Hadjichristophis, Marc Fornes, Viviana Muscettola, Maria Gonopolskaya, Mathew Murphy, Michele Pasca di Magiano (members of the AA) and members of the local community.




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