Assessment prep joca

Assessment prep

  Version 1. A rough outline in the form of a list. Text
  Next steps: Connecting to visual material, make text less 'grocery list' 
  
   

What have I done?

• doing interviews
• transcribing interviews
• communication with interviewees
• thinking about concept of publication
• editing interviews, making a collective narrative
• selecting content for the publication using various methods
• archive research (city archive, Lexis Nexis)
• translation
• scanning documents and adding them to the wiki using the GUI and a script
• making scripts in shell (prototyping)
• research on squatting law
• being part of group discussions
• Making a dualboot Linux / Windows on my laptop

In short for publication: Research, interviewing, editing

The research in the city archive was 'my thing', for the practical reason that I am a native speaker in Dutch and the material was in Dutch. The other activities were collaborative, and quite varied. I did some interviews, some communication with interviewees, lots of editing. Quite all round.

What have I learned?

ASK

Attitude

• The importance of archiving outside of an institutional context. Grass roots archiving to build an archive to start a debate, use as a weapon
• why, what, who, why, where and how much in the context of publishing
• Defining methods and ethics for interviewing
• Ways to organize wiki archives
• being more critical towards my software tools.

Skills

• basics of Shell
• basics of working with a raspberry pi
• Steps involved in planning and producing a book
• Working with MediaWiki

Knowledge

• history of free software / open source culture
• history of open licences. First steps in strategic use of licenses in publishing
• History of Rotterdam concerning squatting culture, urban planning, connection to Dutch history on this point

Doing the interviews, thinking about the concept of the publication and working with the group went well. Of course some things went wrong as well. I lost a recording of an interview due to a technical failure, and I had no backup. But I think that I solved it in the best way possible for that moment by transcribing the interview from memory right after discovering the issue. This was right after the interview, so everything was still fresh. Next to that contact with the interviewee, to check that statements are right. Implement these things. And checking how to avoid this issue in the future.

The group process worked in most cases. For the next time it might help to set some things up in advance: communication channel, file storage and method to keep everybody updated. Now we did a lot on the go, which has value in the sense of learning and applying. But at some peak moments of workload (editing, finishing up before printing) it didn't fully work. Files and information were lost, I missed some things etc.

Some things can fail, but then it matters how you deal with it.

Where do I want to go?

• do more writing myself. Doing the interviews and editing them was a good exercise in listening, and reading. Now more actively involved in posing a certain statement, or question in text.
• integrate more things of the prototyping course into the special issue. (needed time to build skills. Context of next trimester is more applicable. I can move to a task where coding/building etc. has a bigger part)
• See if I can be more involved in the design aspect. Either within the special issue, or in a self-directed project.

Timewise and energywise this was a challenging trimester. Starting at XPUB and managing two exhibitions for my bachelor graduation project, of which one was abroad. It was good that I kept the number of missed days to a minimum and everything worked out, without going over my physical and mental boundaries (which has been an issue multiple times in the past). On the other hand, I wished that I could have some more focus in times for the course to go the extra mile. In some extra reading, doing self-directed research, trying some more things out at the publication station. Now that the aftermath of the exhibitions is over, I'd like to reserve some more time for that.