Digital fridges, analogue laundry

By Jelke de Boer on 21 February 2012

As my colleague Kees Winkel already pointed out we’ve recently started a fascinating course on new media theory at the University of Utrecht. While many interesting concepts, ideas and discussions have past in the first few weeks there is one specific topic that triggered me: technological determinism versus social constructionism. While it is a really academic discussion that stretches far beyond the domain of just these new media studies it somehow got me to think of my grandma’s washing machine?

tagged with: technology, digital fridges, determinism, innovation

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Freemote Treshold

By Jelke de Boer on 24 November 2011

I’m very excited about the upcoming Freemote festival, a gathering of electronic artists from all over Europe. Freemote is providing a stage for contemporary creative communities to share ideas and to collaborate. We will be participating in this creative event and our students will take part in the Freemote academy program. And as it’s all about audiovisual and electronic art here’s the festival trailer just to get you into the flow.

tagged with: freemote, motion design, video mapping, creative industry, art

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Keep on rocking in the free world

By Jelke de Boer on 20 September 2011

Now that the dust in the music industry seems to slowly settle and some interesting new business models take their first steps toward maturity it seems to be a good moment to have a closer look on recent developments in the exciting world of music. We've seen the success of services like last.FM and Spotify, mayor acts experimenting with free downloads and some exciting grassroots initiatives, but over all we see an industry that still hasn't found its way. Can a cross-media approach provide some answers to this confused industry?

tagged with: packages, music, events, business models

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The Archives in the age of cool

By Jelke de Boer on 16 February 2011

The city of Utrecht has, as many Dutch cities and regions, a rich and well-documented history. There is a huge mountain of data of all sorts of events taking place in or around the city. And by mountain of data you can take that quite literal. If you would make a stack of all the documents it would form a pile higher then the Mont Blanc, with its 4811 meters the highest mountain of Europe. The preservation of these huge collections is a complex task, and making it easily accessible is even harder. Making it all something that a non-professional audience can experience in a fun way seems like an almost impossible task.

tagged with: vrede van utrecht, experience, mobile, cultural heritage

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Attack of the cyborg zombies from augmented space

By Jelke de Boer on 21 April 2010

With the continues improvements on mobile devices and the growing acceptance of information technology there's a lot of exiting things to expect in our nearby future. Last weekend I attended the AR Dev Camp hosted by Mediamatic in Amsterdam and i got quite excited about some new applications currently in development. But it's not all hallelujah, there are also some major concerns that should not be swept away to lightly. Does this picture represent a bright new future or a techno-nightmare?

tagged with: open access, augmented reality, experience, mobile

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How big is your idea, and does size matter?

By Jelke de Boer on 4 January 2010

To be able to survive in a global market we need innovation. We need a creative industry, and most of all we need ideas. Preferably good ideas but just a whole bunch of ideas would do for now. Let’s start by having a look at the word "idea”. What is an idea? And what makes one idea a good one and another one bad? It's mostly circumstantial so there is no easy way to sepa-rate the good from the bad and the ugly. What we can do is look at the scale of an idea. I think we can divide the world of ideas and concepts into three different domains; there’s great inventions, big innovations and small improvements.

tagged with: creative industries, innovation, ideas, experience

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Audio branding: sensory or sensual branding?

By Jelke de Boer on 23 November 2009

Last weekend i attended the first international audio-branding conference held in Hamburg. It was exiting to meet the pioneers in this relatively new market. At the HU I have developed a new course in audio branding as a part of our minor digital audio design. It's one of the first courses fully focusing on this specific topic and I'm very pleased our program reflects the points of view I met there. As an eye opener (or ear opener) for all those who are unfamiliar with audio branding I'd like to point you to the TED talk by Julian Treasure:

tagged with: audio branding, branding, experience

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Another bit in the wall

By Jelke de Boer on 19 October 2009

With the vast growth of the internet the world is getting smaller. We all connect, share and contribute to this new glory of mankind, and if the guru's are right we're entering a new era. Life as we know it is changing so fast, look the other way a few seconds and you may have missed it. In this new world order new values are emphasised; openness, transparency, co-operation, sharing are key to be successful in a global economy. It's a wonderful development, too bad there is just one little thing wrong:

The internet is not growing, its shrinking.

tagged with: online censorship, accessibility, business models, geoblocking

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Crossmedial teaching: the university's interface

By Jelke de Boer on 7 July 2009

When looking at new developments in technology and the possibilities to apply new ideas the educational system seems to be a popular field for opinions and experiments. The introduction of the computer into schools not only had a big impact within the classroom it also opened a wide range of discussions on classic education versus newer ways of teaching. We should off-course keep looking at educational strategies and learning styles continuously and try to improve them where possible. Many influential thinkers have interesting and appealing new ideas on the impact of the internet on our lives, or even broader, on life, the universe and everything. I think its great to discuss those ideas at conferences, but we should not turn our school system into some lab setup using a generation of students as our lab rats. Many ideas seem plausible at first sight but actually only apply to a very small group of top students. Or to no students at all. In fact most of the world changing new ideas on education are driven by an ideology, in this case the ideology of technology. Is our youth fundamentally different from previous generations? Do we need to change the way students and teachers interact now we have this great interactive thing called internet? Here's a reality check from my teaching experience.

tagged with: crossmedial teaching, education

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Experience? Yes, with milk and sugar please

By Jelke de Boer on 28 May 2009

Product experience is hot. Experience is what makes the difference; nobody wants just another piece of soap when we can have an experience of a fresh sensation every morning instead. We’re moving from a product economy towards an experience economy. Take a look at this statement from Nivea when introducing new (European) products on the American market:

tagged with: starbucks, nivea, experience

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