One on One: Ondi Timoner and Nasty Nets
Internet artists Joel Holberg and Ondi Timoner meet offline to chat about online privacy, the power and price of up-to-the-minute connectivity, and the latest equipment and technologies.
“Open your life and you’ll get all sorts of attention. We as human beings crave that attention, so we jump on it.”
– We Live in Public>/em>director Ondi Timoner
– We Live in Public>/em>director Ondi Timoner
The Festival is host this year to two unique insights into the Internet. Ondi Timoner returns to the Festival with We Live in Public, a documentary about the life of the early Internet guru Josh Harris, an instant millionaire in the Net boom who then explored artificial societies by creating a bunker where people lived for a year, while being filmed and watched online 24 hours a day. Nasty Nets is an online art collective that curates, promotes, and trades virtual culture – making art in variable forms, and finding an art in sharing it and other found “footage.” Two Nasty Nets members Joel Holmberg (from Berlin) and Chris Coy (from Salt Lake City) met each other for the first time here at the Festival, and met with Ondi Timoner to talk about something they’re all invested in: virtual worlds and how they affect people in the real one.
Insider: How would you describe Nasty Nets in your own words, and what do you get out of it personally?
Joel Holmberg: We don’t know what to get out of it, what these interactions are. We were sharing links and files; it doesn’t come out of a tradition of exhibitionism, like what’s explored in Ondi’s film. More like a bulletin board. It’s more like a formal language that develops with imagery and MIMEs. Things that become popularized through doing it.
Ondi Timoner: So you are coining things, burning culture.
JH: Yes.
OT: Nice. … The virtual world is even with, if not over and above, the physical world now, don’t you think?
JH: I think in this instance it’s really democratic and super-generous with all the users.
OT: Yes, not a negative thing. Just a way of being. You know each other and are involved and doing work together. Ten years ago it would have been impossible and now it’s standard operating procedure. There are all sorts of people I’m friends with that I don’t really know. It’s pretty wild. Do you feel like the Internet is old enough that there have been two generations using it different ways?
JH: Absolutely two generations in that the first generation had more development on the user end. It wasn’t just corporations and the web services deciding what feature they would let you work with. I guess now there is more conscious agreement between web creators and the users. You have to give up this privacy when you open up a Facebook account. For us, our practice is centering on these services giving you tools in order to have impromptu moments of creativity. Was there a wave that happened that these tools became available for everyone? When We Live in Public starts, it’s this main guy who has incredible resources.
OT: It wasn’t democratized yet. At that point access to that type of technology – you could do it, if you were really, really dedicated to it. [Now] the option of ceding your privacy for connection, recognition, fame, all these things that the Internet provides on a daily basis gives you that free opportunity to go for it. Open your life and you’ll get all sorts of attention. We as human beings crave that attention, so we jump on it. We create that connection – even if it’s not attention, it’s that feeling of not being alone. Like moths to a flame. Now people don’t think you exist if you aren’t online.
JH: There is a level of consciousness that happens, especially when you are working in a group. Even with updating statuses. We arrived at this point three years ago when I felt like my consciousness was really tied into this community. People that don’t have as much experience with the Internet have gone through this in the last six months. All I can think of is what am I doing now – I can put that on Facebook. And in your film the people have totally different intentions.
OT: I was worried and concerned that people would think I was down on the web. I’m actually twittering from Sundance. We should live in public. It’s fun; why not? It’s fun to feel connected, and you learn so much minute by minute. I just did a thing about kids in Ethiopia. These schools get online and it’s completely altering their worlds. The Internet is the best and most amazing invention of our lifetime.
JH: Part of what I do [as a form of art] is ask questions on Yahoo Answers. I asked the question, “Are you comfortable with other people seeing the files on your computer?” I was surprised that no one really cared. “I don’t have very much.”
OT: One thing that didn’t make it into my film was people talking about their children. And how their kids are living in public and would never conceive of anything else. “No problem, Mom and Dad, you can see everything I did last night.” It’s a completely different mentality from, say, Gabriel Snyder from Variety, who feels like a dinosaur, wanting to close his door and have privacy at night. I think it’s fading for me. At the end of the day it’s a need for love.
