OPEN CALL: Radio Creation Contest

The CDMC and Radio Clásica (RNE) are undertaking a collaboration to encourage the production of radio creations in order to promote this type of works. Within this line, a contest of ideas is called subject to the following
RULES
1
The works will necessarily be pieces of radiophonic creation, that is to say, whose most suitable means of production and diffusion is the radio. The works will not have been previously awarded nor emitted.
2
Words, noises, music, electronic or radiophonic editings and other similar elements may be the base of the work.
3
The project may be in Spanish only or in several languages but in this case Spanish should be the main language. The use of language or voice may also be omitted.
4
To enter the contest it will not be possible to send accomplished works, but mere projects: a written description of the work and of the elements that it will require, some excerpts as a model in cassette, CD or DAT, scores or fragments of these, acoustical materials, etc. Any form or presentation will be admitted, provided that it makes possible to the Jury to appreciate the interest of the projected idea.
5
There is no age nor citizenship limit.
6
The deliveries should be made on before April 15th, 2007 by any of the procedures allowed by the Administrative Procedure Act; such as registered mail, (postmark date will probe meeting the deadline), personal delivery, etc; and they should be addressed to:
"XIV Concurso de Obras de Creación Radiofónica"
Centro para la Difusión de la Música Contemporánea
c/ Santa Isabel 52, 5ª planta
28012 -Madrid (Spain).
7
There is no limit to the number of projects to be sent by each author.
8
The projects should arrive anonymously with an assumed name that will be reproduced on an enclosed closed envelope containing a photocopy of the DNI or passport and personal details of the author or authors. In the case of using texts by another author, his opportune permit must be accredited.
9
A Jury appointed by the CDMC and Radio Clásica will choose on the project considered the most suitable. The decisions of the Jury are without appeal.
10
The selected project will be the object of a commission by the CDMC, endowed with 6.000 euros gross. This Commission will be considered as the Prize of the Contest and it is independent of the production costs, which will be assumed by Radio Clásica.
11
Radio Clásica will produce the work with the means that the radio itself will determine. For that purpose, in addition to the human and technical means of the Radio, the facilities of the Laboratorio de Informática y Electrónica Musical del CDMC (LIEM-CDMC) can also be used. The radio broadcasting will take place during the last quarter of 2007, and we will try to give the work première at the Festival de Música de Alicante (end of September 2007). The project should be developed with enough time so that it may be produced and emitted on time.
12
By the simple act of participating, the competitors accept the terms of these Rules and the decision of the Jury.
13
The non-awarded projects will be available to their authors who can fetch them personally at the CDMC, previous identification of the assumed name, within the period of three months after the awarding is made public.
14
Once this period is over, the non-collected projects will be destroyed in order to preserve the anonymity of the Contest.

"Pirate" transmissions, then and now

By Tom Roe

The "pirate" radio stations picking up Howard Stern's satellite radio show and remicrocasting it on free airwaves, are back in the news again. Both The New York Times and Los Angeles Times are reporting Stern FM transmissions in those cities.

The New York Times Jacques Steinberg reports hearing Stern near 239th Street in the Bronx on 88.1-FM on a car radio. He quotes Russell Skadl, the faculty adviser of a Long Island radio station, WXBA, that operates on very low power on 88.1 out of a high school in Suffolk County, hearing Stern on that frequency on Long Island, quite a distance from the Bronx. The Daily News reported pirates in Brooklyn and New Jersey broadcasting Stern's signal last January, just as his show switched from FM to satellite.

In Los Angeles, the Times there has one person hearing Stern on 88.1 FM where jazz station KKJZ should be, and another on 88.3-FM. They say a local TV station is blaming "Pirate Cat Radio," which has always used 87.9-FM, not those higher frequencies. More likely, it is someone with less of an agenda then the Pirate Cat folk, and more likely some Stern fan with an electronic equipment fetish.

While some pirates pick up satellite feeds now, others have broken over top television feeds. Recently someone YouTubed the infamous November 22, 1987, interruption of Chicago's WGN-TV local newscast. WGN-TV's on-site technicians neutralized the "pirate" transmission of a Max Headroom-like figure spouting dada gibberish by switching to an alternate transmitter, but two hours later the Chicago PBS affiliate WTTW's "Doctor Who" transmission got a similar Headroom visit. Below is the clip from the WGN hijacking. Below that is the CBS News national reporton the incident, also YouTubed.

Slate's case for killing the FCC and selling off spectrum

Jack Shafer in Slate has a list persuasive reasons the U.S. should eliminate the Federal Communications Commission here.

Suppose Congress had established in the early 19th century a Federal Publications Commission to regulate the newspaper, magazine, and newsletter businesses. The supporters of the FPC would have argued that such regulation was necessary because paper-pulp-grade timber is a scarce resource, and this scarcity made it incumbent upon the government to determine not only who could enter the publications business but where. Hence, the FPC would issue publication licenses to the "best" applicants and deny the rest. Whenever an aspiring publisher pointed out that timber wasn't scarce, that huge groves of trees in Canada and the western territories made it plentiful, and that he wanted to start a new publication based on this abundance, an FPC commissioner would talk him down. He'd explain that just because somebody had discovered additional timber didn't mean that the scarcity problem was over, it only meant that timber was relatively less scarce than before. He'd go on to say that the FPC needed to study how best to exploit this new timber before issuing new licenses. Based on the notion of scarcity, the FPC would have evolved a power to prohibit licensees from using their paper for anything but publishing the kind of print product the FPC had authorized—no using that licensed paper to print party invitations or menus or handbills or facial tissue, the FPC would mandate. And so on.

The absurd regulatory agency that I imagine here is only slightly more absurd than the Federal Communications Commission, which has exercised even greater control over the radio spectrum. Until the mid-1980s, broadcasters had to obey the "fairness doctrine," which required them to air opposing views whenever they aired a viewpoint on a controversial issue. Rather than tempt an FCC inquiry, most broadcasters simply avoided airing any controversial views. Aside from bottling up debate, what the FCC really excelled at was postponing the creation of new technologies. It stalled the emergence of such feasible technologies as FM radio, pay TV, cell phones, satellite radio, and satellite TV, just to name a few. As Declan McCullagh wrote in 2004, if the FCC had been in charge of the Web, we'd still be waiting for its standards engineers to approve of the first Web browser.

OPEN CALL: International Media Art Biennale WRO 07

Call for Works: Deadline for submissions 15.02.2007. WRO Center for Media Art Foundation in Wroclaw/Poland, announces an international competition open to any work created using electronic media techniques, exploring innovative forms of artistic communication. The competition welcomes creators of artistic projects of diverse forms such as screenings (video art, computer animation), installations, objects, performances, multimedia concerts and network projects from all over the world. The main prize is 5000 euro and the total prize money awarded is 8000 euro.

Biennale: the new strategies and territories of digital artistic communication; Artists in the face of high culture's permeation with popular culture; global with local culture; commercial with independent culture; the role of individual artistic attitudes in the midst of global tendencies; the metamorphosis of an artistic experiment in the light of a spectacle society culture. Media arts that de-interpret the cultural context stemming from civilization as well as interferences into the code that steers behaviors within the social space. The creation and record of a changing picture of culture. The deadline date for entry submission is 15.02.2007.

Presentation of works selected to the very final along with the international jury's announcement of competition results will take place during public screening at the WRO 07 Biennale. Agenda:
16 - 20 May 2007 competition, special events, symposium;
16 May - 17 June 2007 exhibition
Places:
National Museum in Wroclaw;
WRO Art Center
The competition regulations and entry form are available in downloadable format at http://wro07.wrocenter.pl. Requests to receive the regulations and entry form by post can be made at print@wrocenter.pl. Contact: WRO Art Center, ul. Kuznicza 29a, 54-137 Wroclaw 16, P.O. Box 1385, Poland, tel.: + 48 71 344 83 69, tel./fax: + 48 71 342 26 91,
http://wrocenter.pl, info@wrocenter.pl

Eutelsat investigates source of mystery jamming

From Media Network weblog:

Satellite operator Eutelsat said today it was investigating the source of a mystery signal which temporarily jammed broadcasts by several television channels and AFP’s news services. Eutelsat, one of the world’s three main operators, would not say whether it believed the “unidentified interference” was deliberate or accidental. “We have noticed interference” to the signal since Tuesday afternoon, said a spokesman for the Paris-based company. Eutelsat said that the difficulties were not caused by the company, nor by Globecast, which provides the bandwidth signal. Globecast, a subsidiary of France Telecom, also refused to comment on the origin of the disturbance. Agence France-Presse and several European, Middle East and northeast African radio and television stations had their services blocked by the interference. All transferred their satellite transmissions to another frequency to resume operations. AFP said its operations were virtually back to normal late Wednesday. (Source: AFP)

Sununu introduces 'White Spaces Act of 2007'

Recognizing an untapped resource for technological innovation, United States Senator John Sununu (R-NH) today introduced the “White Spaces Act of 2007,” which would provide access to unassigned or unused portions of the broadcast spectrum. Sununu, who helped author a similar bill last year, believes that opening access to so-called “white spaces” can lead to the creation of new products – many of which cannot be imagined today. “Broadcast spectrum that is otherwise unused represents a new frontier for product development. By removing barriers that prohibit access to white spaces, there is enormous potential for entrepreneurs to bring products to market that are now beyond imagination,” said Sununu, a member of the Senate Commerce Committee.

Sununu elaborated on specific provisions of the legislation: “My bill differs from others in this area, first, by imposing a shorter timeline to complete FCC rulemaking. The sooner consumers have access to this spectrum the better. Second, I retain the option that licensing may be the best way to allocate some white space spectrum. This ensures the maximum flexibility for dealing with future applications or commercial ventures. Finally, the bill would prohibit the FCC from imposing its marketing ban on white space technologies.” Sununu’s bill requires the FCC to finish its rules to permit use of unused broadcast spectrum between 54 MHz and 698 MHz within 90 days of enactment or October 1, 2007, whichever is earlier. Additionally, the legislation holds the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) accountable for recent action taken on white spaces, and addresses any uncertainty or legal proceedings that may occur regarding authority over the use of white spaces.

Wave Bubble

Two Wavebubbles. Left is an earlier revision with the top removed and with external antennas. Right is v1.0 with internal antennas, fit into a pack of cigarettes. The Wave Bubble is a self-tuning, wide-bandwidth portable RF jammer. The device is lightweight and small for easy camoflauging: it is the size of a pack of cigarettes. An internal lithium-ion battery provides up to 2 hours of jamming (two bands, such as cell) or 4 hours (single band, such as cordless phone, GPS, WiFi, bluetooth, etc). The battery is rechargeable via a mini-USB connector or 4mm DC jack (a common size). Alternately, 3 AAA batteries may also be used. Output power is .1W (high bands) and .3W (low bands). Effective range is approximately 20' radius with well-tuned antennas. Less so with the internal antennas or poorly matched antennas. Self-tuning is provided via dual PLL, therefore, no spectrum analyzer is necessary to build this jammer and a single Wave Bubble can jam many different frequency bands - unlike any other design currently available! To reconfigure the RF bands, simply plug it into the USB port of your PC and type in the new frequencies when prompted. Multiple frequency ranges can be programmed in, each time the device is power cycled it will advance to the next program in memory. While the documentation here is both accurate and complete (as much as possible), the construction of such a device is still an advanced project. I would not suggest this as even an 'intermediate' skill project, considering the large amount of difficult SMT soldering (multiple TSSOP and SOT chips, 0603 RC's), obscure parts, and equiptment necessary to properly construct and debug. This design is not for sale or available as a kit and never will be due to FCC regulations. Please do not ask me to assist you in such matters. All original content for this project is distributed open source under Creative Commons 2.5 Attribution / Share-Alike.

OPEN CALL: Meet the Composer Commissioning Music/USA 2007

Meet The Composer is a national organization founded in 1974 that has revolutionized the environment for composers in this country. Its mission is to increase opportunities for composers of every style of music by fostering the creation, performance, dissemination, and appreciation of their work. Commissioning Music/USA is a landmark commissioning program developed by Meet The Composer in response to a critical need on the part of the music community. Commissioning Music/USA provides national support for the commissioning and multiple performances of new works representing all styles of music. The program provides support for emerging and established composers, promotes wider knowledge and appreciation of contemporary works, and encourages organizations to work together to build the repertoire for new music. Deadline: January 26, 2007 for the following categories: small ensembles, orchestra, chorus, concert band, jazz band, and solo works.

OPEN CALL: Bent Festival

The Tank is currently accepting proposals for:
Bent 2007 : The Fourth Annual Circuit Bending Festival
Proposal Deadline: January 26, 2007. Participant Notification: February 5, 2007
The Tank is pleased to announce the fourth annual Bent Festival. In celebration of our fourth year, we will be holding three back-to-back festivals across the USA. The schedule for the 2007 festival is as follows: Bent Los Angeles, April 12-14, Bent Minneapolis, April 19-21, Bent New York City, April 26-28.

In response to the growing interests of the community, this year we are interested in opening up the Bent Festival to performers and artists that create their own electronics as well as to those who hack, bend, modify and destroy them. We are currently seeking performers and artists to participate at each of the above locations and are specifically looking for submissions in these categories:

Performers: Bands or solo artists who incorporate home built or circuit bent instruments or ideas in their performance. Please email a short description of your act, along with a link to mp3s and photos if you have them (no attachments larger than 1mb!). Also let us know which of the above locations you would like to be considered for. if you don't know what circuit bending is, please research it a bit before you apply.

Installation Artists: We are looking for artists who can commit to spending at least 15 hours in our space over the course of the festival creating site-specific pieces of art that somehow incorporate circuit bending. Each of the three venues will be quite different, but we are looking for artwork for each of them. We will provide space and as much materials and electronic equipment and tools as we are able. Please send a one-page proposal of what you would like to do and examples of your past work. Also, please be able to commit to spending time in the space during the festival and be prepared for a shared and at times hectic work environment - no white walls here's.

Artwork: In addition to installation artists we are also interested in having artwork up on the walls that fit into the spirit of the festival from people who might not be able to join us in person or who can¹t commit to working in the space during the festival. Please submit digital images or links of your work and a brief description.

Workshop Instructors: Anyone who is able to lead a workshop or give a presentation! Topics in previous years have included general circuit bending workshops for beginners and extremely technical, hands on workshops on a particular aspect or niche of the genre. If you feel you have a subject you would like to lead a workshop on, please provide us with a one-page description of that workshop, as well as links or examples of your current and past work in the field.

Bending Recipe Book: This year we are going to be putting together a very home-grown book of circuit bending instructions for beginners. The format will be a large collection of instructions submitted by circuit benders from around the world. If you have a favorite bend that you would like to share with the world this is your chance! We will collect as many of these as we can collect and bind them into an inexpensive book that we then sell at the festival. To submit, please provide a step-by-step list of instructions (including photos if you can, and details of what toy and parts are used). We will credit you in the book and send you a free copy.

Stipends for all festival performers, artists, and workshop leaders will be provided. We have a limited number of travel grants available as well. Please get in touch for more info. Submit all proposals and questions to contact@bentfestival.org http://www.thetanknyc.org, http://www.bentfestival.org.

Take action: defend your right to record off the radio!

From Electronic Frontier Foundation:

The new Congress has barely begun, but the major record labels are already up to their old tricks. [Democratic] Sen. Dianne Feinstein has re-introduced the PERFORM Act, a backdoor assault on your right to record off the radio. Satellite and digital radio stations as well as Internet webcasters would have to adopt digital rights management (DRM) restrictions or lose the statutory license for broadcasting music. Letters from constituents like you helped beat this dangerous proposal last year -- take action now to block it again. This bill aims to hobble TiVo-like devices for satellite and digital radio. Such devices would be able to include "reasonable recording" features, but that excludes choosing and playing back selections based on song title, artist, or genre. Want to freely move recordings around your home network or copy them to the portable player of your choice? You'll be out of luck if PERFORM passes. This bill would also mess with Internet radio. Today, Live365, Shoutcast, streaming radio stations included in iTunes, and myriad other smaller webcasters rely on MP3 streaming. PERFORM would in effect force them to use DRM-laden, proprietary formats, so you can say goodbye to software tools like Streamripper that let you record programming to listen to it later.

OPEN CALL: Repressed II works on paper

There exists a class system within the confines of most societies where a small percentage of the ruling class dictates the dreams and realities of a larger percentage of those who happen to be economically or socially challenged. Within the same system, there exists a economically and socially sanctioned creative culture known as the artists’ class who disguise themselves as painters, graphic designers, musicians, writers and other creative individuals. When in reality they are nothing but a homogenized version of what they emulate.

The intent of this year’s 804noise exhibition is to focus more, but not be limited to, philosophically progressive and/or socially provocative works. We have far surpassed a cultural level of basic image making and find great importance in creating social programs helping to sustain a visual dialogue. As artists, we present new ideas or criticisms to the general public, helping perpetuate social evolution. With that in mind, this year's March show will be prompted with the intent to give back to our neighborhood.

We are searching for artists who seek a language that speaks to the people who experience an unfathomable amount of strife in their lives -- those who wish to provide their community with new dreams that have yet to show up on a t-shirt. We want people who strive to push the envelope and join the ranks of the socially aware avant-garde. For more information and submission form, please download this .pdf file [http://www.bizhy.com/repressedpacket.pdf ]

Entry Requirements:
1.) All works must be submitted by February 19 and upon acceptance,
delivered and present by February 26.
2.)We would like works intended to contribute socially or
philosophically to cultural evolution. (Historical propaganda artifacts also accepted)
3.) Work must use paper as its canvas, basis, etc.
4.) Artists must supply their own transportation of the work
5.) Both 2D and 3D works will be accepted. Live footage is also acceptable, however, must be sent to us in an editable format (for the possibility of a video collage).
6.) All work must be properly labeled with name, date, and medium.
7.) Work must be framed and/or mounted.

Radio station attempts to stop blog from posting audio clips

From Electronic Frontier Foundation:

Over the past year, a self-described "fifth-tier blogger" who publishes under the pseudonym Spocko (www.spockosbrain.com) posted audio clips of what he deemed to be offensive and violent talk radio rhetoric from ABC-owned and San Francisco-based KSFO-AM and apparently succeeded in encouraging several advertisers to pull their ads from the station. ABC-corporate struck back, sending a vague, threatening letter to his hosting company, 1&1 Internet, who promptly shut him down instead of standing up for his rights. (Spocko, now back online, subsequently moved his business to Computer Tyme, a host with more backbone.)

EFF has agreed to defend Spocko if he is sued by ABC and/or KSFO over their allegations of copyright infringement, but it more than likely won't come to that. As ABC's lawyers know, the brief audio clips posted on Spocko’s blog are classic examples of protected fair use, the right to use copyrighted materials for purposes of commentary, parody, education, or artistic expression. That important detail -- and the fact that KSFO's corporate counsel misrepresented Spocko's legal position in a briefly successful attempt to snuff out his blog -- are conspicuously absent from KSFO's discourse these days, at least so far.

A far better response than the embarrassing legal posturing we've see thus far is what KSFO apparently has on tap for later today (Friday, January 12th). Melanie Morgan, co-host of KSFO's Morning Show, one of the targets of Spocko's criticism, yesterday announced that at least three hours of special programming will be dedicated to addressing the Spocko controversy, beginning at 12:00 pm PT today. Responding to critical speech with more speech is almost always the right response. Better late than never in this case.

Unfortunately, the station has begun arguing (ironically enough) that criticism of their content amounts to censorship. Morgan yesterday blasted Spocko and his "stalker friends on the Internet" who, according to Morgan, are trying to "take away our free speech rights."

Sorry, KSFO. Not quite.

While such radio personalities certainly have a right to air their views, the First Amendment says nothing about a right to advertiser-subsidized speech. Even if advertisers choose to pull their ads because Spocko has a more convincing argument -- even if advertiser revenue dries up completely and shows are cancelled -- it doesn't necessarily follow that anyone's free speech rights have being violated. Rough and tumble speech is often protected speech nonetheless, as KSFO well knows, and the "marketplace of ideas" promoted and protected by the First Amendment frequently results in definite winners and losers. KSFO, quick to call out the attack lawyers yet slow to respond to the concerns of advertisers, is rapidly embracing that loser mantle.

Harvesting RF energy

From Erica Ogg on c|net:

A Pennsylvania start-up says it has the answer to one of the biggest problems in mobile phones: battery life. After three years of keeping its technology under close guard, Powercast has come to CES 2007 to get consumer and manufacturer attention. Powercast is a radio frequency that is transmitted over a small area, and its energy is "harvested"--wirelessly--to give power to small devices like cell phones.

While it's presented as wireless power, Powercast isn't just a replacement for a universal charger. Instead, it's meant to either continuously charge a battery or replace the need for them altogether. It works like this: a transmitter can be placed anywhere--in a lamp, for example, that is plugged into the wall and sits on a table. The transmitter in the lamp sends out a continuous, low RF signal. Anything with either AA or AAA batteries set within its range--and equipped with a Powercast receiver, which is the size of your fingernail--will be continuously charged.

"Our solution is, if talk time (on a cell phone) is 5 1/2 hours, by trickle-charging (it) at work, now talk time is 10 hours because the battery never gets to dead," John Shearer, CEO of Powercast, said in an interview. There are many applications for Powercast, said Shearer, but the company is making the PC peripherals market a priority. Think a wireless keyboard or mouse with no battery, or a hermetically sealed battery that the customer never need access again. Major CE and IT manufacturers will have to agree to build Powercast capability into their products, and thus far Powercast is revealing only Philips as a future partner. The first Powercast product will come to market by the end of 2007, the company says.

OPEN CALL: iEAR Residencies

New York State composers, musicians, sound and multimedia artists are invited to submit project proposals to produce innovative new sound work at iEAR Studios located at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, New York. New sound work may include, but is not limited to, the creation of:
* live interactive music performance system
* sound sculpture
* web art
* production of a CD-ROM or DVD
* audio and video post production
* music for film or video

When: Residencies will be scheduled between July 1, 2007 and June 30, 2008. Deadline: Postmarked no later than March 1, 2007. Details & Application: http://www.arts. rpi.edu/files/ 441

The residency will take place at iEAR Studios located at Rensselear Polytechnic Institute in Troy, New York. Resident artists will receive up to 80 hours of iEAR Studio time, a technical assistant, a public presentation of the work (as part of the iEAR Presents! 2007-2008 public performance series) and a stipend. Travel and lodging are the responsibility of the artist. For more information about residency and visiting artist programs, contact Laura W. Andruski via email at andrul@rpi.edu pr call 518-276-4829.

OPEN CALL: Giant Ear))) "hybrid sounds"

The New York Society for Acoustic Ecology's weekly, two-hour radio show "Giant Ear)))" airs every Sunday at 7-9 p.m. on free103point9 Online Radio. Next month's show's theme is "hybrid sounds." You can send yours to lemurz66@yahoo.com (.aif, .wav, or MP3 files
only-sorries, not accepting snail mail art at this time) via dropload.com or yousendit.com or any other free file-holding program. Deadline February 9, 2007.

OPEN CALL: Remix Radio Anacapri

In July 2006, AAIR, the independent radio station of the Architectural Association School of Architecture, listened to Capri. Invited by Diego Cortez (lostobject.org), nine AA students recorded natural and man-made sounds to create an extensive sonic map of the island. Capri holds our curiousity. An enormous, jagged slab of limestone in the sea, the intangible setting for iconic gestures of artists and lovers, and a home to people living their local lives, Capri is a fantastical island.

International Remix Competition A

We would like to invite you to create your own sonic story of Capri. Participation is open to everyone, and submission is free and desired. All original recordings are available for listening and free download at radioanacapri.com. Remixes must not exceed six minutes. Multiple submissions are welcome. There are no other rules, but it is important to remember that we cannot publish copyrighted material for which you don't own the rights or have permission from the owner.

Awards
For 3 best remixes we promise fame, fortune and a place on the upcoming Radio Anacapri record produced by the AAIR along with respectable sound artists and musicians.

Jury
Brian Eno, Arto Lindsay and Ryuichi Sakamoto.

Deadline
31 January, 2007 postmarked if posted

Send your remix to:
International Remix Competition A
c/o AA Independent Radio
Student Forum Pigeonhole
Architectural Association School of Architecture
36 Bedford Square, London, WC1B 3ES, United Kingdom

OPEN CALL: In the Public Realm

Now in its twelfth year, "In the Public Realm" is an opportunity for emerging artists living or working in New York state to create a temporary work in a public space. Up to ten emerging artists will be selected by a distinguished panel of artists, curators and critics, and will be commissioned by the Public Art Fund to develop formal proposals for public art projects. From these proposals, the Public Art Fund will select three artists to realize a work in the coming year. In the Public Realm is a program of the Public Art Fund designed to encourage innovative public art projects by emerging artists living and/or working in New York State. Artists selected through the program will make proposals, develop their work in relation to urban conditions, and ultimately present an artwork in the complex arena of public life in New York City. Artists are encouraged to investigate the physical, social, and psychological nature of the urban environment throughout the diverse neighborhoods of New York City. Previous experience of working in public spaces is not necessary for selection in this program.

Submit your materials in a 10" x 13" envelope. Do not use staples on any application materials. All submissions must include the following:
1) Brief cover sheet, including your name and contact information, stating the format of your submission. Use one of the following descriptions: 35mm slides, CD, DVD, or VHS. We will only review one format per artist. Submit one of the following formats:
a) Six 35mm slides of recent and/or current work in a clear plastic slide sheet. Each slide must be clearly numbered and labeled with your name, title, date, media, dimensions, and the TOP indicated. Please include a slide description sheet with corresponding numbers. Larger format transparencies, photographs, and drawings will not be considered.
OR
b) Six digital images saved to one CD. We will only accept JPG file formats. All JPGs must be sized at 250 dpi, 5" x 7". Number and title each JPG, and include a description sheet with corresponding numbers. The sheet should list your name and the titles, dates, media, and dimensions of your work. Please include a labeled print-out of each JPG, printed on regular paper.
OR
c) One 3/4" VHS videotape, or one DVD that will play on a stand-alone DVD player. We will not view QuickTime files. Clearly mark the outside of the tape or DVD with your name and title(s) of the work(s). Do not submit original work.

2) Current resume, including name, address, telephone number, and email address.

3) A brief statement of interest (no more than 300 typewritten words). This should generally describe your work and will be used by the panel when viewing slides or digital images. This statement will be considered by the Advisory Committee as an indication of the direction your work might take should you be selected.

4) A self-addressed stamped envelope large enough to return submitted materials containing the correct amount of postage (stamps only, no postage meter strips). Submissions without S.A.S.E. will not be returned and pick-ups are not permitted.

Materials must be received at the Public Art Fund's office by 5:00 p.m. on Friday, February 9, 2007 (postmarks are not acceptable). Hand deliveries will be accepted. Artists will be notified by letter in May 2007. Please do not call before this date.
Please mail application materials to:
Public Art Fund
In the Public Realm
One East 53rd Street, 11th Floor
New York, New York 10022

U.S. frequency jamming in Iraq

From Defensetech.org:

Every once in a while around Baghdad, American bomb squads stop what they're doing, and retire to their bunks. The reason why: "Compass Call," a modified C-130 turboprop plane which serves as the "only US wide-area offensive information warfare platform," according to GlobalSecurity.org. The Compass Call and the Navy's EA-6B Prowler can jam radio and cell phone traffic for miles around, disrupting insurgent communications. But the aircraft also can disrupt the jammers that bomb squads use to stop improvised explosives, Aviation Week notes. There's even a fear that all those crossed signals could accidentally detonate guerilla bombs.

"We have a smart system that jams IEDs [improvised explosive devices] in Iraq, that found itself fighting with another smart electronic system," Lt. Gen. Walter Buchanan, chief of the 9th Air Force and Central Command Air Forces, says. "They got locked on [to each other] because of the lack of coordination..."

Another concern is accidentally triggering IEDs with jamming signals. "We deconflict our jamming activities when we know we have people near IEDs... so that we don't unintentionally set them off," he says.

The problems also extend to surveillance and communications systems. "When you take a look at data links and the number of jammers in place and all the radios we have out there, [deconflicting] becomes a very difficult problem," Buchanan says.

Because all of the communication systems are in similar bands and create interference, a Predator UAV at Balad, the main U.S. air base in Iraq, is in danger of losing its ground control link once it is 35 mi. from base, he says. In the less congested airways of Afghanistan, that range is 120 mi.

"The problem is bad enough that Central Command is putting more urgency into developing an EW [Electronic Warfare] Coordination Cell," the magazine observes. "The task is critical because new users of the electromagnetic spectrum come into theater almost daily."

Like the next wave of Prowler planes, for example. They'll come equipped with an ALQ-218 electronic attack system designed to "turn those enemy wireless communications into a weapon against the insurgents who use them," Aviation Week says.

Before the end of the decade, information warfare specialists are expected to use these and other electronic warfare aircraft, both manned and unmanned, to find enemy communications networks and plot with precision their location on the ground. Those networks would then be seeded with false information as well as viruses, worms, zombies, Trojan Horses and other computer attack tools that would leave them communicating with U.S. analysts as often as they do with other insurgents.

OPEN CALL: New Interfaces for Musical Expression

On behalf of the NIME07 Committee, we would like to invite you to be
part of the 7th International Conference on New Interfaces for Musical
Expression (NIME), organized by Harvestworks and New York University's
(NYU) Music Technology Program in partnership with LEMUR and the NYU
Interactive Telecommunications Program (ITP).

We encourage contributions of the following kinds:
* Papers (full-length, short-length, posters)
* Demos
* Live Performances
* Installations

Complete submission guidelines are now available at
http://www.nime.org/2007.

IMPORTANT DATES

Submission deadlines
Installations and Performances
- January 31st 2007: Papers/posters, Demos, Live Performances,
Installations

Notification of acceptance
- March 9th 2007: Papers/posters, Demos, Live Performances,
Installations

Registration deadlines
- April 16th 2007: Early Registration (reduced fee)

Final text submission deadline
- April 16th 2007: Complete Camera-ready Papers and Abstracts

PAPERS/POSTERS

We invite the submission of papers on topics related to new interfaces
for music performance including, but not restricted to
* Novel controllers and interfaces for musical expression
* Novel controllers for collaborative performance
* Novel musical instruments
* Augmented/hyper instruments
* Interfaces for dance and physical expression
* Interactive sound and multimedia installations
* Interactive sonification
* Sensor and actuator technologies
* Haptic and force feedback devices
* Interface protocols and data formats
* Gesture and music
* Robotics and music
* Perceptual & cognitive issues
* Interactivity design and software tools
* Musical mapping strategies
* Performance analysis and machine learning
* Performance rendering and generative algorithms
* Experiences with novel interfaces in education and entertainment
* Experiences with novel interfaces in live performance and composition
* Surveys of past work and stimulating ideas for future research
* Historical studies in twentieth-century instrument design
* Reports on students projects in the framework of NIME related courses
* Artistic, cultural, and social impact of NIME technology

Accepted presentation types are:
- Full Paper (6 pages in proceedings, longer oral presentation)
- Short Paper (4 pages in proceedings, shorter oral presentation)
- Poster (2 or 4 pages in proceedings, poster presentation)

DEMOS
Demo Sessions are an opportunity to support and discuss realized or
partially realized work with conference attendees, in an informal,
discursive way. Demos of technologies and applications that address
the topics listed above will be considered for selection.
Demonstrations are designed to give exhibitors an opportunity to show
material that benefits from having a physical presence at the
conference. It is important that there be a realized, demonstrable,
working component to all submissions to this category. This is not to
say that Demos cannot be sketches or further ideas or future plans for
the project - but an activity, process, action or actionable form of
the concept must exist as part of the Demo proposed.

Demos must include a 2 page poster to be displayed at the Demo
Sessions and included in the printed proceedings. The poster should
address the scientific/technical aspects of the project, acquired
experiences and/or the context of the development.

For those submitting papers, we will provide the possibility of
scheduling demo presentations within the dedicated Demo Sessions. The
submission
procedure will allow that a Demo option be chosen for any Paper
submission. An accepted paper will not guarantee an accepted demo.

Accepted presentation types are:
- Demo (Demonstration space plus 2 pages in proceedings)


LIVE PERFORMANCES
A series of three evening concerts as well as 'NIME-at-night' events
at clubs will be organized during the conference to highlight creative
use of interactive instrument technology and performance systems. One
of the evening concerts will feature commissioned performers playing
work from their repertoire as well as pieces submitted through the
Live Performances call.

We welcome proposals for performances to be featured in the NIME 07
concerts.

Accepted presentation types are:
- Concert Performance (Performance slot plus program note in
proceedings)
- Club Performance (Performance slot plus program note in proceedings)
- New Work for Commissioned Performer (Performance by commissioned
performer plus program note in proceedings)

INSTALLATIONS
The NIME Installations category is intended to address submissions
that deal with the subjects listed above, but are intended for
public-space or art gallery contexts. Accepted Installations will be
shown for the full 3 days of the conference, beginning on the morning
on Thursday, June 7th and ending in the evening on Saturday June 9th.
The Installations venue for NIME 2007 will also be open to the general
public. Installation submissions will be judge by artistic merit,
interactivity, relevance to NIME, innovation, exhibition history
experience and practicality criteria. A one-paragraph description of
the Installation project must be submitted with other required
materials, and will be included in the conference proceedings.

Accepted submissions to the Installation category will be exhibited in
an environment appropriate to a public-space and gallery context. NIME
2007 is obtaining special facilities in New York City, near other
conference events for exhibition of accepted Installation projects.
Please check the NIME site in November for floor plan details and
photos of the space. The number of accepted submission will be
partially subject to available space.

Accepted presentation types are:
- Installations (Installation space plus brief description in
proceedings)


SPECIAL FOCUS ON ROBOTICS AND MUSIC
NIME07 will include a number of events specially focused on robotics
and music. These will include a keynote speaker from the field of
robotics and music, a special workshop on the subject and a concert
series the weekend before NIME07.

Therefore, we are especially inviting submissions in all categories in
the area of Robotics and Music. Special consideration will be given to
competent submissions in this area.

VENDOR BOOTHS
For presentations of commercial products and companies not associated
with a conference submission, there will be exhibit booths. Please
contact Jennifer Stock at vendors@nime2007.org.

WORKSHOPS, SPECIAL SESSION AND ASSOCIATED EVENTS

June 6, morning:
* Workshop on Music and Robotics
Details on how to participate in the Music and Robotics workshop to
come.

June 7-9:
* NIME 2007

May 31st to June 10th:
* New York Electronic Arts Festival

NIME 07 organized site visits, additional workshops and off-concerts
including jam sessions are planned.

free103point9 Online Radio January 2007 Top 40

1. Phantom Limb & Tetuzi Akiyama, Hot Ginger (Archive)
Recorded June, 2006 at free103point9 Project Space in Brooklyn.
2. The Dust Dive Flash, Tens of Thousands (free103point9 Audio Dispatch 029)
3. Mouthus, For the Great Slave Lakes (Threelobed)
4. Eugene Chadbourne + Dave Fox, The Foxbourne Chronicle (Umbrella/Assembled)
5. Various artists, The Art of the Virtual Rhythmicon (Innova)
With Jeff Feddersen, Matthew Burtner, Janek Schaefer, Annie Gosfield, and others.
6. chefkirk, Giant Squid (804noise 006)
7. Pauline Oliveros, Lion's Eye/Lion's Tale (Deep Listening)
8. mirror/dash, "i can't be bought" (Threelobed)
9. Eloe Omoe, marauders (Animal Disguise)
10. Caustic Castle, Caustic Castle mini-CD (804noise)
11. North Guinea Hills, North Guinea Hills et. al. (self)
With Patrick McCarthy, Michael Garafalo, Laura Harrison, Sean Smith, and others.
12. Viki, compilation (Animal Disguise)
13. Edmund Mooney, Happy Trails (self)
14. Compiled by TJ Norris, triMIX: TribrydInstallation Soundtracks Deconstructed (Innova)
With Scanner, Beequeen, Humectant Interruption, M. Behrens, Asmus Tietchens, Nobukazu Takemura, Illusion of Safety, and others.
15. Jonny Farrow, Suite for Broken Rhodes/Sketches of a Cleaning Building (self)
16. Dave Burrell, Momentum (High Two)
17. Sic Alps, Pleasures and Treasures (Animal Disguise)
18. Sonic Liberation Front, Change Overtime (High Two)
19. Charter Oak, three song CD (self)
With Tianna Kennedy, Brendon Anderegg, Chris Millstein, Lucas Jansen, and Rob Hatch-Miller.
20. Gratkowski + Fox + Menestres + Davis, ORM (Umbrella Recordings)
21. FFFFs, I Can Hear Summer Coming (Sockets)
22. The Caution Curves, a little hungry (Sockets)
23. DJ Slip, She's a Time Traveller (Broklyn Beats)
24. Fortner Anderson + tape/head, he sings (Wired on Words)
25. Tor Lundvall, Empty City (Strange Fortune)
26. Vertonen, Stations (CIP)
27. Sybarite, Cut Out Shape (Temporary Residence)
28. Scanner with MCs from the New Horizon Youth Centre, Night Jam (Bette)
29. ben owen, radio in (Winds Measure Recordings)
30. Brian Groder, Torque (Latham Records)
31. Goat/Sixes/Xome, Deluxe Incinerator, a 3" Collection Featuring... (CIP)
32. Juan Matos Capote, the subway aural recordings (self)
33. Todd Merrell, Neptune (Dreamland Recordings)
34. Giancarlo Bracchi, Universal Soul Adaptor (self)
35. Fluorescent Grey, Lying on the floor mingling with god in a tijuana motel room next door to a veterinary supply store (Isolate Records)
36. Mammal, "No Hope/In the Mood" 7" (Chondritic Sound)
37. Prana Trio, After Dark (Circavision)
38. Eric Gafney, uncharted waters (Old Gold Records)
39. Sabir Mateen's Shapes, Textures, and Sound Ensemble, Prophecies Comes to Pass (577)
40. Andrey Kiritchenko, Stuffed With/Out (self)

To submit a CD, LP, CS, etc. for airplay and inclusion on the Wave Farm Study Center archive, send it to:
free103point9 Wave Farm
5662 Route 23
Acra, NY, 12405

OPEN CALL: Polar Radio

r a d i o q u a l i a have just began broadcasting a new FM radio
station in Antarctica. 'Polar Radio' is Antarctica's first ever artist-run radio station. It transmitted its first programme on FM on 29 December 2006. Polar Radio is part of a series of projects run by I-TASC - the Interpolar Transnational Art Science Constellation.

Do you have a song, a message, or a sound that you want broadcast in
Antarctica? We are looking for your music, sound art, radio plays, radio
documentaries, and any phonically interesting artefacts you have to
broadcast on Antarctica first artist-run radio station. There is a
supply plane leaving for Antarctica from Cape Town on 11 January. We
plan to have a shipment of CDs sent on that supply plane. We are now
looking for CDs of:
- music of all different kinds
- radio art
- radio plays
- audio documentaries
- audio books
- archived news reports
- investigative journalism
- podcasts
- any other audio material you would like to have broadcast in Antarctica
If you have sonic material you want broadcast, please make a CD and send it to:
Siphiwe Ngwenya / I-TASC
c/- Pitch Black Productions, 7 Prince Street Gardens, Cape Town 8001, South Africa
Deadline: Jan. 10, 2007
The best formats to send are:
- audio CDs
- MP3 CDs