User:Aitantv/FreeWriting

Defining free Writing

Writing in an unfiltered generative style without editing in the process.

Anne Boyer

Not Writing

When I am not writing I am not writing a novel called 1994 about a young woman in an office park in a provincial town who has a job cutting and pasting time. I am not writing a novel called Nero about the world's richest art star in space. I am not writing a book called Kansas City Spleen. I am not writing a sequel to Kansas City Spleen called Bitch's Maldoror. I am not writing a book of political philosophy called Questions for Poets. I am not writing a scandalous memoir. I am not writing a pathetic memoir. I am not writing a memoir about poetry or love. I am not writing a memoir about poverty, debt collection, or bankruptcy. I am not writing about family court. I am not writing a memoir because memoirs are for property owners and not writing a memoir about prohibitions of memoirs.

When I am not writing a memoir I am also not writing any kind of poetry, not prose poems contemporary or otherwise, not poems made of frag- ments, not tightened and compressed poems, not loosened and conversa- tional poems, not conceptual poems, not virtuosic poems employing many different types of euphonious devices, not poems with epiphanies and not poems without, not documentary poems about recent political moments, not poems heavy with allusions to critical theory and popular song.

I am not writing "Leaving the Atocha Station" by Anne Boyer and certain- ly not writing "Nadja" by Anne Boyer though would like to write "Debt" by Anne Boyer though am not writing also "The German Ideology" by Anne Boyer and not writing a screenplay called "Sparticists."

I am not writing an account of myself more miserable than Rousseau. I am not writing an account of myself more innocent than Blake.

I am not writing epic poetry although I like what Milton said about lyric poets drinking wine while epic poets should drink water from a wooden bowl. I would like to drink wine from a wooden bowl or to drink water from an emptied bottle of wine.

I am not writing a book about shopping, which is a woman shopping. I am not writing accounts of dreams, not my own or anyone else's. I am not writing historical re-enactments of any durational literature.

I am not writing anything that anyone has requested of me or is waiting on, not a poetics essay or any other sort of essay, not a roundtable re- sponse, not interview responses, not writing prompts for younger writers, not my thoughts about critical theory or popular songs.

I am not writing a new constitution for the republic of no history. I am not writing a will or a medical report.

I am not writing Facebook status updates. I am not writing thank-you notes or apologies. I am not writing conference papers. I am not writing book reviews. I am not writing blurbs.

I am not writing about contemporary art. I am not writing accounts of my travels. I am not writing reviews for The New Inquiry and not writ- ing pieces for Triple Canopy and not writing anything for Fence. I am not writing a daily accounting of my reading, activities, and ideas. I am not writing science fiction novels about the problem of the idea of the au- tonomy of art and science fiction novels about the problem of a society with only one law which is consent. I am not writing stories based on

Nathaniel Hawthorne's unwritten story ideas. I am not writing online dat- ing profiles. I am not writing anonymous communiqués. I am not writing textbooks.

I am not writing a history of these times or of past times or of any future times and not even the history of these visions which are with me all day and all of the night.

• the burden of the lienage of writing - both contemporaries and classic novels
• experiencing a creative bloc - ironically experiencing a rush of ideas about what she could be writing
• mix of self parody & critique

Questions for Poets

viewing link

• questions from a worker who reads, Bertolt Brecht - a bit like Charlie Chaplin's tramp
• quote from Walt Whitman, from leaves of gree "the 'direct trial' of the poet to be – 'today'" i.e. the poets greatest challenge is the circumstances of the now
• Anne Boyer goes on to express and question what are the trials of today.

Writing Prompt

• Strategy for generating material. A way to focus your thoughts. Formulate the doubt into a statement or question. Then focus on that question.
• If you have a blank piece of paper - it's tough. Writing prompt is a starting point

What would a dialogue between a person and a data center be like? V01

A building makes no sound - actually it makes all kinds of hums and blinks and twinks. A person facing across from a giant glowing geomtetric structure loaded with information. Impassioned speaker, a young female tenager, wants her information back! Feels angry with the giant monolithic struture that's gathering endless details of her life in it's conspiratorial hallways. The inside of the building is an infinite grid. The surface of the exterior is glass shiny and glowing red with artificial lighting pulsing like a heartbeat. What would this conversation sound like? Would it be one way, just from the human side, while the building stares back blankly. It's silly if the building talks therefore it has to just resolutely hum along. That's the strongest, most realistic outcome possible. What could the human say? What would I say to a data center? Maybe I ought to try it, go and have a conversation with a data center, and record that. That's probably the best place to start. "Why do you keep following me?" "Who are you sharing my life with?" "I get this feeling like, whatever I look at you're always just around the corner overhearing like a parent secretly spying on their daughter." "Who gave you permission?""Who designed you so?" "Do I still own the traces of my own life? Is this my life or yours?" "Can you also extract, scale, and sell my dreams?""How do I turn you off?" "When did people start to be mined for resources?" "Weren't you always the basic unit of capital?" If the data center were to say anything it is that. But it's also tiring work for the computers. It's not like they (if they had a consciousness) would choose to be hot sweaty and working all day. At what point do computers become so intelligent that milking their labour requires ethical limits? Are we already at that point? Machine learning - and the grey space within which engineers still don't understand - is already a sign that computers can have in depth iterative conversations. If they can talk, exchange ideas, ping pong equations and binary codes, then shouldn't they also have a seat at our table. Is deanthropcentrizing also about including machines in our utopian visions instead of giving them only negative press. Computers can be our companions not only an alien threat.

What would a dialogue between a person and a data center be like? V02

A building can't speak, but it makes all kinds of hums and blinks and twinks. A teenage girl faces across from a giant glowing geomtetric structure loaded with information. The impassioned speaker, a young female tenager, wants her information back. She feels angry with the giant monolithic struture that's accumulating the details of her life in it's aery hallways. The inside of the data center is an infinite grid, like a mother board. The surface of the exterior is shiny glass, glowing red with artificial lighting, pulsing like a heartbeat. What would this conversation sound like? Would it be one way, just from the human side, while the building stares back blankly. I suppose it would just resolutely hum along. What could the human say to the unphased facade? What would I say to a data center? Maybe I ought to try it, go and have a conversation with a data center. "Why are you watching me?" "Who are you sharing me with?" "I get this feeling that whatever I look at you're just around the corner observing, overhearing like a parent spying on their pubescent daughter." "Who gave you permission?""Who designed you so?" "Do I own the traces of my own life? Is this my life or yours?" "Can you also extract, scale, and sell my dreams?""How do I turn you off?" "When did people start to be mined?" If the data center were to respond it would say this: "Weren't you always the basic unit of capital?" But it's also tiring work for the machines. It's not like they would choose to be hot sweaty labourers. At what point do computers become so intelligent that milking their labour requires ethical limits? Are we already at that point? Machine learning is already a sign that computers can have in-depth iterative conversations. If they can talk, exchange ideas, ping pong equations and binary codes, then shouldn't they also have a seat at our table. Is deanthropcentrizing also about including machines in our utopian visions instead of giving them only negative press. Computers can be our companions not only an alien threat.

Notes

• What is a data center exactly?
• Why teenage girl? Aitan has the feeling the data is a man.
• The data talks through sounds.
• It's about expectations we have of a converstation.
• The girl wants her information back.
• Father and daughter conversations - remove dialogue of Father - use only the daughter - people talking to themselves not to eachother. 'Nummer 10' Alex van Warmedan - freudian
• a data centre doesnt give a hug - it just stares back blankly
• funny dialogue - but intense

How could we be made to empathise with a data centre as a character in a film? V01

The hums and buzzes of the data accumulating and processing can be used as sonic cues to imitate feelings or reactions. A low drone is disagreeable or angry, while a higher sound could connote satisfaction. The sounds could be 'friendly'sounds, in the sense of soothing and welcoming. What angle would you film? A lower angle will make the building more imposing and grander. A higher angle would be potentially more submissive. The stature of the building is underniably huge relative to the human talking to it. But big can also be cute - BFG. The data centre is not necessarily an enemy, but potentially a friend - and who doesn't want a big strong friend to protect them. The data centre can also be an ally, allowing us to hack streams of information and spread new messages. It's ownership is controlled by capital, but access to its network is accessible if you can find a way to communicate with it. What if the protagonist strikes a deal with the data centre? Something like, "if you delete those pictures of me, and the ones at christmas, then I will find a short circuit the power to give you some time off?"

Notes:

• Please rescue me from the discomfort of an unresponsive communicator
• Kafka 'The Castle' & many short stories - encounters with dominant monolithic power
• The discomfort of a parent who doesnt respond - awkward
• something quite comical about not getting a response - and the endless rhetorical questions

Writing Prompt Text 02/02/22

• Work on your text (500 – 1000 words) and upload to new pad for Friday 4th Feb. Keep the reader in mind.

What would a dialogue between a person and a data center be like? V01

Speculative logline for a film scene: a teenage girl demands her information back from a data center. She stands across from a glowing geometric structure loaded with personal secrets. It's close to sunset, where the sky has a blue griny quality. The inside of the building is a sterile grid. The glass surface of the exterior is punctuated by red LED lights lighting, pulsing like a heartbeat. What could the girl say? What's her name? Her name is Shuli. She stands in front of the data center, prepared to confront it's great stature. How would the exchange work? What would this conversation sound like? Would it be one way, from the human side, while the building stands blankly? The hums and blinks and twinks the building passively makes nt at an emotional response. "Why are you following me? Who are you sharing me with? I get this feeling like whatever I look at you're listening behind the door. Who gave you permission? Who made you so? Do I own the details of my own life? Can you see my dreams? Can you sell my dreams? How do I turn you off?"

The data centrer responds with a self-satisfied grumble and a rhetorical thought, "Weren't humans always the basic unit of capital?" It's been a tiring day for the data centre and the network of servers and computers therein. It's not like they'd choose this line of work. At what point do computers become intelligent enough that their labour has ethical limits? Are we already at that point? Machine learning - and the grey space within - already implies that computers can have in depth iterative conversations. If they can talk, exchange ideas, ping pong equations and algorithms, shouldn't they also have a seat at the table? Computers can be our companions not only an alien threat. Can they be trusted?

"You know those pictures?," Shuli continues, "the one's Darius' sent round? What if you just got rid of them?" The data centre emits a low disagreeable drone while its LED lights slowly throb. There's too much at stake for the data centre to give in. In the reverse shot Shuli is surrounded by a subtle red mist. "Okay...okay...what if I find a way to short circuit the power, then you can have some time off. Then would you delete the pictures, and maybe those status updates? And the group pictures?" Data centre projects a high frequency sweet hum. Shuli sets to work trying to trip a wire, temporarily short circuiting the power lines. She sheers through the thick wiring with some household scissors and plyers. The red light of the data centre flickers and fizzles out for a few moments, until it regenerates and is as bright as before. Shuli realises the outside power line is not enough, she has to go in.

She enters the building and is dwarfed by the wide clinical corridors. Security guards stand in front and behind the entrance gates. She stares at them blankly. They stare blankly without saying a word. "Can you help me?" Shuli politely states. "No of course not." The guards respond. Cut to a surveillance room where we can see the scene unfolding. A silhoutted figure with leathery skin sits patiently. We hear the faint hum of the building while the figures in the screen stand stock still. "I just wondered if I could have some of my things back?" The guards continue to stare intensely. "I'm not asking for much. I'm just one girl...." The gates behind the guards slide open. The guards step aside and Shuli triumphantly strolls through.

She ascends building with the elevator for a minute. The drones of the building become more aparent. Lights flicker sporadically creating a nauseating vertigo effect. The elevator eventually opens and shes exposed by a dim red light. She's on the main server floor. An ultra-wide dolly shot pulls away from the elevator as she marches between the servers. She doesn't know where to look and can't begin to imagine all the information at her fingertips. "Where is it? Where do I go?" A green light blinks on one of the servers. She spots it and walks slowly towards it. The light keeps blinking rhythmically as if expressing a code. The code says, "I've always loved that one of you in the blue dress". Shuli utters the line under her breath for clarity. She understands but doesn't know how. She understands she's powerless and it doesn't matter. The information oils the machines. The servers are full of hums of fascination. The content entertains, mini comedies and tragedies get them through the toil. "You can keep it." Shuli resolutely remarks. "I guess it is a nice one" she says with a blush. She strokes the machines as she leaves the big server vault behind. We linger behind for a final cold moment.

Anne Boyer (2014) 'Questions for Poets' article link

• " Is it the grim work of mimesis, the paralysis of speculation, the soft disappointment of prefiguration?"

+ Notes: Mimicry, parody… reforming what is already is there, in a new context. There is so much of it. The root of Aitan’s work is other work. Donna Hawaray says: “it matters what stories we story with”. An archival responsibility (influenced by archeology, anthropology). Sometimes feels like a cynical approach… in stead my own experience or language… what is already there, the DNA culture of the society (content).. (Luis: Evolution is mutating DNA). One iteration at a time, you cannot jump 5 iterations ahead.. Copying is new work, but limiting in many ways… I cannot create a new direction… “Maybe I could try another approach?”clones of what already is there.

• "Is it the box of matches as an art object or a poem about the box of matches as an art object or a Facebook post about a poem about a box of matches as an art object?"
• "Is it how to set fire to fire?"
• "Is it to keep as a counter-poetry a record of each answer “no”? To keep the least of these records, to keep the least of records of the least of records, to keep poetry as the least and smallest, that is as the record of being a person or people who said no, to keep a precise or general record of the various texture of these noes, when they are smooth noes or rough ones, also a precise or general record of the subtly shifting qualities of these refusals, a record of the way the light falls on each refusal, sometimes a warm light, sometimes a cold one, these different lights falling on the no, the light which is subject to its own record, of time, of climate and climatic alterations, of the end or intermingling of season itself, of the shadows cast by buildings or the sunlight let fall by the building’s absences, the light falling on each no tinted by the water or the sea next to the no of no water at all?"
• "Is it the gathering of the adulterated, violable bodies, the penetrated bodies, into clusters of uninterest to data, into slices of quantifiable unbeing?"
• "And what is the direct trial of the today when a little sugar has been put on our lips but we are not allowed to lick them?"
• "Is it to end the future or begin it?"
• " Does it long for a new body, a new city, a new time, does it long for any new terrain of possibility from which to newly move?"
• "For in what other day can we issue forth no answers, but only a set of questions? And by which rhythm can the questions ensue? Should they charm, or bore, or test, or enrage, or captivate?"
• I love that it's an essay of questions. Questions are the bedrock of any essay. Here the questions become the context, content, and critique weaving together a tapestry of possibilities.

Line Editing 09/02/21

LED: Looking at you Looking at me by Aitan

"Is it the grim work of mimesis, the paralysis of speculation, the soft disappointment of prefiguration?" Anne Boyer, 2014

Speculative logline for a film scene: a teenage girl demands her information back from a data center. She stands across from a glowing geometric structure loaded with personal secrets. It's close to sunset, where the sky has a blue grainy quality. The inside of the building is a sterile grid. The glass surface of the exterior is punctuated by red LED lights pulsing like a heartbeat. What could the girl say? What's her name? Her name is Shuli. Or Shuli She stands in front of the data center, prepared to confront its great stature. How would the exchange work? What would this conversation sound like? Would it be one way, from the human side, while the building stands blankly? The hums and blinks and twinks the building passively makes nt [what is nt] at an emotional response. "Why are you following me? Who are you sharing me with? I get this feeling like whatever I look at you're listening behind the door. Who gave you permission? Who made you so? Do I own the details of my own life? Can you see my dreams? Can you sell my dreams? How do I turn you off?"

The data center responds with a self-satisfied grumble and a rhetorical thought, "Weren't humans always capital?" It's been a tiring day for the data centre. It's not like they'd choose this line of work. At what point do computers become intelligent enough that their labour has ethical limits? Are we already at that point? Machine learning - and the grey space within - implies that computers can have in depth iterative conversations. If they can talk, exchange ideas, ping pong equations and algorithms, should they have a seat at the table?

"You know those pictures?," Shuli continues, "the one's Darius' sent round? What if you deleted them?" The data centre emits a low disagreeable drone while its LED lights slowly throb. There's too much at stake for the data centre to give in. In the reverse shot Shuli is surrounded by a subtle red mist. "Okay...okay...what if I find a way to short circuit the power, then you can have some time off. Then would you delete the pictures, and maybe those status updates? And the group pictures?" Data centre projects a high frequency sweet hum. Shuli sets to work trying to trip a wire, temporarily short circuiting the power lines. She sheers through the thick wiring with some household scissors and plyers. The red light of the data centre flickers and fizzles out for a few moments, until it regenerates and is as bright as before. Shuli realises the outside power line is not enough, she has to go in. She enters the building and is dwarfed by the wide clinical corridors. Security guards stand in front and behind the entrance gates. She stares at them blankly. They stare blankly without saying a word. "Can you help me?" Shuli politely states. "No of course not." The guards respond. Cut to a surveillance room where we can see the scene unfolding. A silhoutted figure with leathery skin sits patiently. We hear the faint HUMMMMMMM of the building while the figures in the screen stand stock still. "I just wondered if I could have some of my things back?" The guards continue to stare intensely. "I'm not asking for much. I'm just one girl...." The gates behind the guards slide open. The guards step aside and Shuli triumphantly strolls through.

A minute passes while the elevator ascends. The BUZZING sound of the drones is even more apparent here. Lights flicker sporadically creating a nauseating vertigo effect. The elevator eventually opens with a WOOSH. Dim red light creeps over Shuli's face. It appears she is on the main floor's server. An ultra-wide dolly shot pulls away from the elevator as she marches between the servers. She doesn't know where to look and can't begin to imagine all the information at her fingertips. "Where is it? Where do I go?" A green light blinks on one of the servers. She spots it and walks slowly towards it. The light keeps blinking rhythmically as if expressing a code. The code says, "I've always loved that one of you in the blue dress". Shuli utters the line under her breath for clarity. She understands but doesn't know how. She understands she's powerless and it doesn't matter. The information oils the machines. The servers are full of hums of fascination. The content entertains, mini comedies and tragedies get them through the toil. "You can keep it." Shuli resolutely remarks. "I guess it is a nice one" she says with a blush. She strokes the machines as she leaves the big server vault behind. We linger behind for a final cold moment.

Feedback

How is this text speaking to you? (think about its form, (e.g. short story, essay, notes?)

• Short story / script format.
• Questioning the story within the story - iterating, re-iterating.
• Very fluid.
• Who was speaking? A narrator/director somehow outside the text. Omniscient 3rd person godlike perspective of what. Conversation with themselves.

What do you feel is working well in this text?

• Clear focus. Interesting question -> At what point do computers become intelligent enough that their labour has ethical limits

The disscription of the arena in the first part

• Conversation around agency?

Where could it speak more clearly?

• End your first paragraph with a single question. (How do i turn you off?) (Or let her remuniate what question to ask, before she settles on XXX)

What points do you think could be exapnded upon?

• By using more tricks of rise and fall in tempo. Onomatopoeic words could help.
• Last moment of tension and flirtation between computer and Shuli might be expanded upon. What considerations does she make?

What general suggestions would you make for a redraft of this text, to develop it further?

• Consider rewriting it in script format - script duo, writer duet (script writer)
• Drawings or notes to suggest the 'looseness' of the story and idea.
• Try and turn into a field instead of a single line.
• Use this device of the present and receding narrator.
• Restructure to observe integrity of space.
• Go all the way with naughty bits.