------------------------------------------------------------------------

Entropy8

Entropy8 was a  site Auriea started in 1995 or was it
1996, she can never remember. She can only admit that she
was into Illusion. All she wanted was to push her hand inside the
screen. She was on a mission to fool whoever came
around. Poke, provoke, paint. Someone from Sera Leone once wrote to
say once that she could feel Auriea's images in her liver... even
though it took Auriea awhile to really understand but was meant by
that but yeah... that's exactly what she was going for.

There is a fascination for quotations which she still hasn't quite lost. 
There was her own personal virus documented in The Disease Manifesto.
Hallucinations was more of a gallery where she wanted to show off all
her analog stuff. She did alot of photography and then there were all
of those curious things she felt the need to collect. Part of what
made her love the web from the first was that she could at last
collect things that didn't take up space. Digital collections,
Collections digitized. Other motifs seen with the early versions of
the site were digital decay, bit-rot, illusory mechanics and
diaristic fictions. She didn't make projects or pieces it was all a
seamless whole a space for her public/personal evolutions. It didn't
alter much in basic form from the time of its creation to the end in
1999 when she went and started entropy8zuper.org with Michaël Samyn.
Emotional reactions she was seeking in others and suddenly through
the web she found herself having a few. She started using a
webcamera. You could come to the site and then there she sat... a
fullscreen window into her room. Auriea was running a webserver on
her Powerbook called IO. She could see people come and go watch their
i.p addresses and their circulation to and from the pages served.
Sometimes someone would email to ask if thats her sitting there
watching them watching her. She would amuse herself by trying to put
a name with a number. All this communicating in a new way, people
becoming symbols and then people again.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Zuper!

Zuper! was the name Michaël used for his
professional design work. The name was derived of "Zupergraphyx!"
which was his pseudonym as a graphic designer. His motto at the time
was "If it's not Zuper!, it's not Graphyx." The name was chosen to
sound corny on purpose, making fun of the Belgian tradition of really
silly company names like Novatex and Supertran, etc.
When the time
was ripe to get his own internet domain, he realized that he was no
longer a graphic designer. So he shortened the name to Zuper!, under
the motto "If it's just Graphyx, it's not Zuper!"
Michaël's special
relationship with the letter Z started when he must have been about
16 and his brother asked him to sponsor a class charity activity. The
sponsoring required a name and since the school the brother was going
to, had expelled Michaël earlier, he decided to use a pseudonym:
Miga-El Zamien. This name reappeared later in art school in different
variations, according to the spelling rules Michaël tended to
re-invent regularly: Myga-El Zamien, Myga El Z! or El Z! Soon he
started signing his school work with just "Z!"

The largest part of
the zuper.com web site has always the Zuper! design portfolio. For
this portfolio, Michaël tended to design a completely new interface
every time a new technology was released, often a new version of the
Netscape browser. This way, the zuper.com interface became a place
for experimentation. There were eight different interfaces before the
completion of the merger with Entropy8. The first two were not much
more than single web pages exploiting the bug/features of Netscape
1.1 (1995). The third was made when Netscape 2 came out (1996) and
was a first experiment with frames. The fourth was made for Netscape
3 (1996) and made use of the novel feature of being able to change
the source of an image after the document was loaded. This site came
with 13 other versions for browsers that didn't have this feature,
some of which used the Shockwave for Director plug-in. The theme of
this site was fascism, which was what somebody who used new
technology at the time -and to this very day- was accused of by the
Information-Wants-To-Be-Free elite. Number five (1997) started with
the famous Windows 95 shutdown screen "It is now safe to turn off
your computer." and used Flash 2 (Futuresplash + sound!) technology.
It marks the start of the zuper.com domain. Sites before this one
were hosted on the server of local ISP ping.be and later in the
riv.be domain when Michaël was Riverland's art director. This version
also featured a first experiment with Dynamic HTML for Netscape 4
(Microsoft had not released a DHTML capable browser at that time).
The sixth interface was a parody on/tribute to the low tech net.art
style that was quickly becoming a genre in 1997. It combined this low
tech look with state-of-the-art Dynamic HTML. This version of the
interface also marks a major conceptual advancement in Zuper! design:
"Information does not equal content", illustrated by the ingenious
two-button interface: "Information" and "Portfolio". Sounds simple
and obvious but remains one of the most important pillars in
Michaël's design philosophy.
In 1998 the Zuper! portfolio was put in
a Javascript database. The interface to access this database was a
fairy-tale like environment with animals on a hills that functioned
as sliders. All done in Netscape-style Dynamic HTML. Internet
Explorer lacked seriously in performance for complicated DHTML
environments like this one. The graphics for the site were the result
of one full year of 3D modeling with Hash Animation Master
(preperations for a project that never came into being), with Johny
and Mathilda as crowning achievements. This was supposed to be the
last Zuper! interface (and was hence called "Interface"). It was to
become an ever growing narrative that would probably have abandonned
the idea of an interface to a portfolio at some time all together .
There were supposed to be four main characters, The Four Neo-Porn
Evangelists (Johny, Mathilda, Lucy and Marc), who had all sorts of
sexy adventures in some magical forest. Sadly there was only one
follow-up chapter, The Hills, after which the project died a silent
death because it required too much work for each installment and most
of all because Michaël had met Auriea and they were going to focus on
working together.

After the merger with Auriea, the Zuper! and the
Entropy8 site were still being developed. And before dropping them in
favor of doing only Entropy8Zuper! Michaël made a last interface,
number eight (1999), a Flash movie with a living/dying plant-like
structure in a Flash movie. All the sounds in this one are made by
Michaël's voice. The site contains hardly any written text in favor
an informal spoken words. Larger branches of the tree contain works
preferred by Michaël, smaller ones works that one shouldn't really
see, but the whole tree gives access to all Zuper! works made until
that day.

The size of the zuper.com site is 85 MB. May it rest in
peace.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Woman On Fire

http://www.womanonfire.com/proof.of.my.existence/documents/

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Group Z, Belgium

Group Z, Belgium is Michaël's
pseudonym as an artist. After his studies in graphic design, Michaël
seemlessly evolved through furniture design to fine art. Yet he
refused to adopt any single style or discipline for his art works,
following the graphic design concept he learned at school that style
is a bad thing because it limits your expressive potential. So he
made neo-constructivist paintings and pornography-inspired sculpures
of ready-made objects simultaneously.
In response to the lack of
comprehension of such diversity, Michaël started Group Z, Belgium, a
group of eleven artists who each had his or her own speciality. And
then he set up group shows in his studio, which each had a theme:
Circles, Pornography, Ergonomics, House.
When Michaël discovered the
internet in 1995 and dropped everything else, some of the first
things he did were Group Z, Belgium pieces: "Home" and
"Virgin/Sucker", both series made up from bits and pieces from
Michaël's extensive archive of media clippings. He found Adaweb
willing to host them and developed two more works on their server.
The interfaces of "LOVE" and "I confess" were both inspired by games.
"LOVE" was about many aspects of love. "I confess" was a critical
evaluation of where Michaël thought he was as an artist at the time.
As a result of the confession, Michaël stopped being an artist,
calling himself "ex-artist", next to "bad designer".

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Entropy8Zuper!

"Entropy8Zuper!" is the name of the merger between "Entropy8" and
"Zuper!". The URL of the home site of Entropy8Zuper! is
"http://entropy8zuper.org". We used to spell "Entropy8Zuper!" in all
lowercase ("entropy8zuper!") but we have changed that to
"Entropy8Zuper!". "Entropy8Zuper!" can be abbreviated to "E8Z!" or
"e8z!". There is an abbreviated URL as well: "http://e8z.org".
Never forget the exclamation mark in our name. It is part of the name
because the name "Entropy8Zuper!" is made from "Entropy8" and "Zuper!",
each part has it's own non-letter character: an "8" and an "!". On the
Belgian "AZERTY" keyboard, those two characters appear on the same key.
On that same keyboard, the letter keys "A" and "Z" are located next to
each other. "A" and "Z" are the initials Auriea and Michael use.
Obviously, using this means referring to Alpha and Omega, the Beginning
and the End, containing everything in between. We are not minimalists,
we are maximalists. The only reason why the URL does not have an
exclamation mark is that it is not allowed by the current Internet
standards.

how Entropy8Zuper! was conceived:


y must get tripod... just a sec
[fakeshop]: telephone books work also
life: Z's in snarg !
lia: mini, everythings mini in here...
life: yea, here 2
life: what's that pic ? a map ?
Au-: you can change the window sizes
lia: mindmaps ;)
Au-: oh my
Au-: snarg is naked
lia: how how how 
life: pale snarg
Au-: in the settings/preferences
signmonger: you have touched the perfect body of fun!
lia: just see the right eye :)
Au-: take of the check in windows as stamps
lia: not even the right one :(
Au-: then close all the windows
Au-:  and re open them
signmonger: krashed lost life and fake
[fakeshop]: the bride of frankenstein is approaching?
life: nope..still stamps...
life: hold on... brb...
signmonger: frank never married....'coz zey didne giv 'im ze job
signmonger: where is gate?
lia: leave, `ll be back -> more k to ivisit....
life: yup, rebooting did it... still buggy, this IVisit...
Au-: there she is tho im afraid ive been mean to her
life: bye lia
life: jef is decent again
signmonger: lia is ther and gone... ria is there 2 times
life: split personality
snarg: so how's my pic today.... am i moving?
life: good pic, shaky moves 
signmonger: u iz mo foto j'nic zen pik asso
life: stil lsays Gael... :)
[fakeshop]: is the bride of frankensatein in some sort of bondage situation
signmonger: {:+]
snarg: i found that light/high contrast helps. i think it has to do with the compression/codec maybe
signmonger: frank never got ze wife.....
Au-: all tied up and with clay in her poor, poor eyes
life: jef, you're right arm is missing !
snarg: i know it still says gael
snarg: u have some banner mode that i have'nt been able to find yet
life: Au - clay !? Some new BDSM scene thang ?
signmonger: uhav it all
Au-: yes... its a new york thing... :-)
life: thought so... mundo wacko...miss NY
[fakeshop]: so the bride has been sacrificed to art?
life: fake...funny... 100 AMPERSAND artificial ?
Au-: on the altar of conceptualizm
life: Hi there Gaelie ! Saw you !
signmonger: the bride is not the sacrifice ..... the bride is babylon....
[fakeshop]: i guess we're staring into each otheres eyes now
life: where the truth lies...
lia: which one?
life: sign...how do you get that banner scrolling ?
signmonger: to be or not is wot i got no mo no less this be bless
Au-: life... the triangle next to your window has a banner option
Au-: click in the space and start typing
life: yea, I know...can only switch it off/on
signmonger: so Ivisit sayz u is zere
life: gate is in ?
gate: hellooooo
life: we were just contemplating on the meaning of life...
life: sorry U missed it... :)
Au-: there you are gate
gate: ther is no meaning
life: gate has Art at his back !
life: yea...46
signmonger: just crashed but frankenstein has no wife just a mother
gate: crashing is part of this paradign
gate: who set up the room
signmonger: not me I'm a follower not a leader
snarg: did the server just go down?
gate: phil when i crashed--did the room come down
gate: hi jef
signmonger: I just went down so I dunny know
snarg: hi ken :)
gate: riea you should kill one of your feeds in case someone wants in
signmonger: OK so I've had a few drinks but for me this is kind of socialising
Au-: ok
gate: the capacity is 8
gate: sincen you deserve to be 2
signmonger: beyond my capacity...
gate: jef is that a cd looming over your head'
signmonger: eez zees a gud izee weez zo uglee
snarg: yeah it's reflecting gael
life: hugs to Gael
signmonger: guy has alreddy inz zee goa tropical zidewayzz zone
life: not quite
gate: ohh i see i see
signmonger: me neither...
gate: hi gael
gate: lia is that an ultrasound of your uterus
signmonger: kalif hz most lite
signmonger: hey let's not get personal
life: gate, U look older than I imagined...sorry ;-)
gate: i was just going to say--i think she's having twins
signmonger: shit I imagined something a lot worse considering...
gate: i AM older then u imagined
gate: older then i imagined
lia: no, has something to do with breast cancer.
life: tell
signmonger: in fact I can understAnd how he got the credit now
gate: actually its the camera
gate: i am 13 like antiorp
life: hehe
signmonger: from sweden...long digital nites
womanonfire -> [fakeshop]: fake can i come visit your shop sometime?
life: jef, avoid arm stiffness by all means !
gate: try chicago
[fakeshop]: yes
snarg: guy________what do you mean?
womanonfire: kewl
life: we still need you and your left arm...
signmonger: chicago chicago... it's a hell of a town
snarg: guy______________WHAT DO U MEAN?
lia: it`s ALL BETTER in black and white.
life: let that CD down !
signmonger: et kesskilyaodladesettekno?
life: B/W huh ? Ok... brb
gate: ok so what are we going to do with this
signmonger: sheet you don't pik up gud steuuff in zzee st. fer nowt
[fakeshop]: (private) private chat?
signmonger: tekno trouve
gate: ready for my closeup cb
lia: glad to have one more reason to not buy a TV 
snarg: has Z! been here?
life: yes
gate: oui
signmonger: sorry ken.....you jewish?
womanonfire -> [fakeshop]: public private
gate: till i crashed da room
life: no
gate: can yo see below my desk?
signmonger: kewel salomon my fave geez!
life: woman is in het softfocus cammode again
signmonger: don't wanna after last nite on ze Ivisit
life: spreekt er hier iemand Nederlands eigenlijk ?
signmonger: only hard liquor left....
lia: das klingt immer irgendwie wie ... wie....
signmonger: amsterdam.....why bother>?
snarg: ken______want  to see what Z! looks like?  :)
life: irgendwie ? love that word ! :)
gate: sure
signmonger: first we take manhattan then whatever's left....
lia: dat klengt imma igendwee ?
life: ouch ! Austrian ! ;-)
gate: guy do you always work on your back
snarg: is he coming through?  :)
lia: what cat (1-4?)
life: 4 - plush 
womanonfire: what a cute kitty
gate: where
womanonfire: lifecam
signmonger: the greek orthodox moslem....peace train
gate: hey i am allergic to cats
life: that's the one who leaves hair in my Campari's and vomits all over the place :)
lia: 3?
gate: lovely
life: there's her mother at the back...
signmonger: shit that's life
life: there was another one...
signmonger: mother doesn't get out much anymore I take care of the motel
life: hitch...
gate: im going to burn one...try to point the cam
life: cock...
life: ...norman...
life: bates...
life: zuper's back
snarg: Z!  :)
zuper: 't is ier vollen bak!
womanonfire: ZZZZZZ!
life: ja, gaat nogal ne gang, zenne !
signmonger: not much better than Z!'s front
signmonger: hey watch it gal he's married..
zuper: (private) My favorite woman on fire!
lia: z
signmonger: ze only revolution is zoo-ologique....
womanonfire -> zuper: hey there
womanonfire -> zuper: private mode
womanonfire -> zuper: weird
signmonger: gate lives in a mafia run pizzeria?
signmonger: r u still there fake?
zuper: (private) There seems to be more private talks than others...
womanonfire -> zuper: yes  so many people here tonight in the hell.lounge
zuper: (private) Has any sex taken place yet?
signmonger: hey I  don't mind talking to myself....u get used to it u know
life: ...
womanonfire -> zuper: unfortunately not yet ;_)
zuper: (private) Let's start some... :D
signmonger: ain't no sunshine now she's gone....
lia: yessss, each computer should have a folder called lia! that`s the main aim!  ::)))))))
zuper: Lia looks great tonight!
life: jef, your pic hasn't been moving since ages... ?
womanonfire -> zuper: but i cant see you and thats no fun
signmonger: that must be nice
zuper: (private) Touch me.
snarg: how about now?
womanonfire: go lia! go
life: zoum out Z
life: snarg..no moving snarg...
zuper: (private) I can feel you.
signmonger: life is like grass...all things pass
life: yea... i know ;=)
zuper: (private) Ypou have numbers on your fingers.
womanonfire -> zuper: and letters in my eyes
lia: go?
snarg: brb........
signmonger: someone out there has a concept of how to make this into ...."spectacle"
womanonfire: that was meant as encouragement
life: gate ?
lia: life?
lia: zuper?
lia: womanonfire?
life: we're here
zuper: (private) You're and open book, spelt backwards.
lia: sign 
lia: ?
lia: frz
life: frz ?
lia: :)
signmonger: HERE
womanonfire: we are receiving u
life: gate looks stoned
life: U C ? He's smiling !
life: and again !
womanonfire -> [fakeshop]: so where ru located?
womanonfire -> [fakeshop]: brooklyn right?
zuper: (private) ...
signmonger: so now if I want a drink i's the VSOP
lia: thanks for the canvas-advice.
womanonfire -> zuper: sorry i wuz having zex w/ someone else
[fakeshop]: (private) williamsburg,
zuper: (private) :)
gate: does the more people on this think slow it down
[fakeshop]: (private) and you?
life: lia - U C, I told you so ! ;-)
gate: thing
signmonger: say ton daystun
signmonger: death is a lot like life....
womanonfire -> [fakeshop]: manhattan/east vil
life: waddaymean ?
signmonger: where is petah, peter....jef?
[fakeshop]: (private) oldfashionedphonetypething=718.599.6565
womanonfire -> [fakeshop]: snailconferencing--->212 614 1676
lia: guy, are these people still around next month ? ;)
life: might be... but the cats f(u)r sure !
[fakeshop]: (private) which name do you prefer for yourself?
signmonger: time....
lia: pfhu! :)
womanonfire -> [fakeshop]: riea is my analog name
signmonger: no guarantees......
gate: jef did you put us on hold
life: woman is on the phone again...
signmonger: VSOP
life: tsjing !
snarg: i rebooted to see if my image would work
signmonger: tut a fay
life: works a bit better now...
signmonger: tao
zuper: Beware of too much happiness
life: Z!, what's your fps ?
signmonger: no danger...not here..
zuper: wof = 0.6, gate = 0.4, fake = 0.1
zuper: wof now 4.3
life: yours ?
[fakeshop]: (private) dont you think one of these computer experts is smart enough to intercept this private chat? I feel funny, another level into the domain behind the velvet rope.
life: wof 4.0,  gate=0,  snarg=.4  sign=7.8 U=0.0
signmonger: antiorp=aunty=elvis
signmonger: green is somehow fascist
[fakeshop]: oh my god 0.1 fps how embarrassing
signmonger: opinions
life: fake's alife ! :) 
womanonfire -> [fakeshop]: i hope no one can intercept would kinda negate the concept of private but sure someone could if they *really* wanted to.
life: well....almost
signmonger: nationalised dial up seems to be OK but....
[fakeshop]: (private) maybe theres some subject matter for a theme here, or were you one of those against a theme?
signmonger: good zat weez embarassayed by dif shit
lia: do the cats live?, they never move, you just move the camera....hmmmmmm
womanonfire -> [fakeshop]: no themez r ok
life: they always sleep... especially this one...emvy their lifes...
signmonger: hate seeing wot I look like
[fakeshop]: (private) that eye was cool can you do that again, i want to take a framegrab
life: but don't U love woman's eyelid !? :)
womanonfire -> [fakeshop]: your wish is my command
signmonger: her majesty her majesty her majesty her majesty her majesty her majesty her majesty 
life: gate's typing and it's private
signmonger: there is no life worth the green eyed beast
gate: how can you tell..its the one figure & the glance at the keyboard
life: again...your eyes give it away :)
signmonger: love of woman is not a straightforward thing
zuper: Love of a man is?
signmonger: what do you mean by on fire?
lia: greeneyed ---> beast ?
signmonger: damn your eyes...
womanonfire -> signmonger: on fire=
womanonfire -> signmonger: beyond control
lia: all or just green ones?
womanonfire: eyes are windows to the soul
zuper: on = about?
gate: trying to follow this conversation is a very zen thing
life: tao ! ;_)
life: I tching !
[fakeshop]: (private) thankyou
life: nebraska !
gate: thank god for riea for providing the images to look at
signmonger: by ze reeverz ov barbeelawn vayre I layz dow...rararaspooteen 
life: lips !!
zuper: (private) stop teasing
life: teeth !
life: pixels !
life: thumb !
life: sorry, index finger !
signmonger: don't invade russia or UK or stuff 'cos all conquest is limited
womanonfire -> zuper: you will appreciate it more this way
life: mouth !
signmonger: pronounced hoo givz a fuk......
life: camel !
life: red lights !
zuper: (private) your fire
signmonger: dependz where you want to look you old goat..
life: hahaaha
life: to the right of me
gate: this golfball ain't a bad macro
signmonger: wish I could keep mine but A life of poverty and bad diet and then I'd have to be a millionaire before..
life: face
life: hands
life: ..thinking...
womanonfire: thinking...
life: lia new still
womanonfire: reading...
life: what ?
womanonfire: you
life: I'm just a teddy bear
womanonfire: wish i could bum a cig from gate
lia: n, shit, forgot smoking til now and .....
signmonger: my toilet is the next waterfall to be featured in Pirelli..
life: what about a NYc cig ?
lia: have to leave for some minutes....
womanonfire: come on over
signmonger: talk about....BSkwoi...
lia: smoke at window only....
womanonfire: thanx gate :-)
signmonger: stop that life!!!  you know that it don't lead nowhere nice
life: lighter...smile
gate: my pleasure
signmonger: I wanna be your fashion accessory
life: satisfaction
gate: funny that so many of us smoke
womanonfire: pure pleasure
womanonfire: pure disease
life: I hate it that I smoke
gate: if we have a party in la they will kick me out of the state
signmonger: the victory of the consumer
life: it's my second worst vice
womanonfire: ok... whats the fist
womanonfire: first
gate: i love it that i smoke..everyone else hates me for it
gate: ok
life: being a jerk in general
gate: so
gate: whats
gate: the first
womanonfire: hes a jerk
zuper: you're not a jerk, guy, we all love you
womanonfire: :-)
gate: slight time delay
gate: being a jerk is a prerequiset
life: I'm a jerk, but  love my cats
gate: i won't even go there
life: count 'em...4 !
signmonger: the hypocritical attitude towards nicotine addiction is reflective of the general irresponsibility of govt....
gate: and
signmonger: so
gate: jef are there...or is that archived
zuper: summer
zuper: flower
zuper: easter
zuper: breeze
zuper: forever young
life: sex ?
zuper: no sex
life: ah ? ok.
gate: sex & violets
zuper: "you will appreciate it more this way"
womanonfire: ah yes
zuper: green
zuper: sweaters
gate: whats it
signmonger: hey maybe it's that sentimental phase of alcohol kcking in but....love you all...
zuper: pure wool
zuper: skin
gate: cash
life: Z! - I made a mix of your work....
womanonfire: Z!EX
signmonger: no body is VSOP U know thAt ria...
signmonger: just horses for courses
womanonfire: VSOP!
zuper: Life: you did what?
womanonfire: ????
life: see cam
signmonger: don't get fucky you guys...just had an evening wiv ze arties....
zuper: sneeze
zuper: rip
zuper: squeeze
zuper: hold
zuper: lick
gate: godbleee you
signmonger: opinion is the glorious domain of the reechan zee ...
life: ermmm..sex ?
signmonger: labia,,,,and then....
zuper: I miss 
J
zuper: Jef
snarg: yeah?
signmonger: L'amour eat l'enfant de salope...
[fakeshop]: translation of VSOP please?
womanonfire: yes yes yes 
womanonfire: VSOP?
life: <LURKING>jef</LURKING>
zuper: very sophisticated oral problem
signmonger: poese l'evolution de la demande de la teet///
zuper: TEETH
life: hahaha...
signmonger: girl wot u zink?
zuper: smoke
[fakeshop]: signmonger: no body is VSOP U know thAt ria...
signmonger: just horses for courses
womanonfire: VSOP!
zuper: VSNOB
zuper: blue pubic hair
signmonger: be cool be freeeeee!!!!!!!!
signmonger: loe freely
gate: fake are you here or is that your aura
signmonger: life is short
[fakeshop]: oh i see, a snob with blue pubid hair, thank you
signmonger: nothing is .........
signmonger: tell me..
signmonger: VSOP high alcohol content
[fakeshop]: im paracticing transparent lurking
life: hands !
signmonger: is adrug and I ain't commercant
zuper: more smoke
gate: we can almost lurkk thru you
life: 1 hand clapping
life: vsophand
zuper: (private) read
zuper: (private) want
gate: can you be transparent & move
womanonfire -> zuper: write
womanonfire -> zuper: have
zuper: (private) fingers stroke keyboard
[fakeshop]: im working on that 
signmonger: Fake is here there and everuwhere baby....
zuper: (private) hold
gate: i am lurking thru you
zuper: (private) heart
womanonfire -> zuper: press
zuper: bed
zuper: (private) close
womanonfire -> zuper: there
signmonger: in some kind of way it's normal that I take all the shit...I kinda got robust somewhere down the line
zuper: fog in 
he
womanonfire -> zuper: bare
zuper: (private) buttocks
zuper: (private) |)
signmonger: I seem to have crashed without crashing..
womanonfire: no crashing allowed
signmonger: I've lost all control over Ivisit except its still there
gate: is this program buggy or is it my lack of horsepower
zuper: horse
zuper: hot horse
gate: i can type faster then this little fucking box can take it and i type one word a minute
signmonger: I think it must be time to say goodnight
zuper: REBOOT
womanonfire -> zuper: addiction
zuper: (private) no
[fakeshop]: yeah that sounds fishy
zuper: (private) not addiction
zuper: (private) no satisfaction
signmonger: thats the thing with allowance
zuper: (private) no extasy
zuper: (private) just urge
lia: have to phone .....
signmonger: think about what we got to do...this program is amazing
life: with Riea ?
[fakeshop]: i need to go soon, also
signmonger: nobody is giving any consideration to content.....because the content market is dull
lia: anotherone
zuper: bed time
womanonfire: life?
signmonger: I loved the alcohol myth but in the end i t was a myth
life: i *SHOULD* so some work...
signmonger: in the end you can only go so far in life....
gate: nite euro brethern
signmonger: 
signmonger: the rest is BS
life: hehe..
snarg: i gotta run downtown now
life: the nite is still young 
life: 1:48 AM
signmonger: goodnight.... or good afetrnoon
gate: time to burn one.....in windy LA
zuper: I'm still young too, but...
womanonfire: bye snarg
[fakeshop]: so was it good for you too?
signmonger: sorry bad spelling
signmonger: is jef still ther?
life: we touch a lot our faces...
snarg: cu
life: cu
zuper: bye jef
[fakeshop]: bye
life: bye
signmonger: life in the fast lane....
life: nice loft with antlers, gate ! :)
zuper: (private) why do all people in front of a computer hold their finger to their heads?
signmonger: all mod cons...
womanonfire -> zuper: good question
signmonger: who is there now?
womanonfire: still here
zuper: (private) one more cigarette...
life: holding strong here
womanonfire -> zuper: just one more...
zuper: (private) and then sleep
womanonfire -> zuper: ssssssslleeeeeeeeep
womanonfire -> zuper: no sleep 4 me
zuper: (private) deep
zuper: (private) soft
zuper: (private) away
womanonfire -> zuper: bad
signmonger: according to Ivisit gate is still here
life: which color is best for an iMac ?
signmonger: grey
womanonfire: tangerine
zuper: grey!
life: nobeige
womanonfire: black!!
signmonger: beige/grey
life: yes !!! :)
life: someone is doing black new G3's...
signmonger: and square....compartmentalised.
womanonfire: excellent
signmonger: russians were the only peole who got a chance at design....and they're mad
lia: still here but phoning
womanonfire -> zuper: fantaZ!
zuper: (private) my favorite drink
womanonfire -> zuper: crush
womanonfire -> zuper: orange
signmonger: chi kung.....if ever u feel ze nid
womanonfire: kung chi
lia: 2:01
zuper: (private) my favorite color
womanonfire: king chu
zuper: (private) crush
signmonger: ich gnik
womanonfire -> zuper: crutch
lia: ack
lia: b
signmonger: breath well think well feel well be well - sorry but it don't change the rest
zuper: (private) crotch
signmonger: is it just us gals?
womanonfire -> zuper: clutch
womanonfire: yea
zuper: (private) now!
life: how do you get a still pic in the video window ?
lia: copy,paste, 160x120,
signmonger: than yiou should considering...
lia: or if you don`t have video?
life: i dit c/p, but not 160x120
lia: think it must work also 320x240 ;)
lia: proportions!
zuper: (private) proportions
lia: sale me the cam ? ;)
life: nope...doesn't work...
womanonfire -> zuper: dispropotionate
signmonger: nothing to copy nothing to paste
life: err...no... but U can use it in March
signmonger: alisrelatif
womanonfire -> zuper: not a word oops
signmonger: onewayorzeuvver
womanonfire -> zuper: try again
womanonfire -> zuper: again
womanonfire -> zuper: again
womanonfire -> zuper: again
zuper: (private) i love you
womanonfire -> zuper: again
zuper: (private) sleep with me in the network
lia: was das z?
signmonger: in march gAte will tAke allhis children and hide in my country place bacause deals wiv MOMA never work however optimistic you R
womanonfire -> zuper: kiss and tell
lia: you got it!
zuper: (private) just kiss
womanonfire -> zuper: kisZ! and tell
life: there U are...best of all worlds !
zuper: (private) talk with air
gate: ok so does that mean you don't want your truckload of sony goodies to play with
life: talking to me, are U talking to me !?
womanonfire -> zuper: byte and eat
signmonger: if Z!is there he does zownds
life: or are U talking to me ?
zuper: (private) yes byte
gate: phil
gate: killer sunset but my cord to short& the sun is too brite
signmonger: best of all world's
womanonfire -> zuper: simulate stimulate
zuper: (private) simulation is real
gate: big brite sun reflecting on pacific ocean--thru eucaliptus trees blowing in the wind
signmonger: I believe in vot I see...
signmonger: and ze rest belongs to someone else
signmonger: we ain't touched on politik yet???
signmonger: somewhere down the line...
life: nice kitten, Lia ! :)
signmonger: kind of trust you guys though
signmonger: the koala stinking of eucalyptus gets pArted from his love
signmonger: to entertain and educate someplace weird..
zuper: (private) the cigarette didn't help me
womanonfire: lia must get a cam
life: jef'n'gael
womanonfire -> zuper: breathe deep
lia: it always sleeps ;)
zuper: (private) i'm breathing
womanonfire -> zuper: deeper...
zuper: (private) can you feel it
womanonfire -> zuper: yes
zuper: (private) can you hear it
lia: nonono, don?t wanna cam....nono`.
womanonfire -> zuper: yessssssssssssssssssss
life: Veerle (pregnant) and Jef
zuper: (private) never leave me
lia: flowers :)
lia: tnx z!
womanonfire -> zuper: never
signmonger: she can have one of mine....orpheus(2cams)
womanonfire -> zuper: say
zuper: you're welcome
womanonfire -> zuper: never
zuper: (private) but is feels so good when you whisper it at night
lia: o.k.
womanonfire -> zuper: good when you scream
zuper: (private) don't scream please, I only like soft and silent things
lia: look exactly like mine ?
womanonfire -> zuper: expect the unexpected
life: yea, there eurotwins...
zuper: (private) all my senses are open
zuper: (private) like flowers
life: Z! in his younger days ! ;-)
lia: by the way, i HAVE a cam, how do you think i could have pictured my cats?
life: :)
womanonfire -> zuper: evey poor pore
womanonfire -> zuper: every poor pore
womanonfire -> zuper: pure
womanonfire -> zuper: vein vain vane
zuper: (private) receiving fingers
zuper: (private) receiving tongue
lia: z!s garden?
zuper: (private) lips
zuper: (private) breath
signmonger: I've seen sun and I've seen rain I've seen sunny days that I thought would never end
womanonfire -> zuper: saliva
womanonfire -> zuper: tounge
womanonfire -> zuper: skin
signmonger: tak  ... fascist conglomerate....
womanonfire -> zuper: sensation
zuper: (private) i want to be wet by you
life: mommy cat when she was young
lia: ey!!!!!!
signmonger: samaytonpar
signmonger: austria judaism und ze udder esoteric europe.....
womanonfire -> zuper: feel it
womanonfire -> zuper: i
signmonger: kellshar?
womanonfire -> zuper: eye
zuper: (private) lick your eye
signmonger: even in hell there seems to be a complete fear of .....
lia: waldheim.
signmonger: dans mon jardin extraordinaire...
womanonfire -> zuper: take
womanonfire -> zuper: hold
signmonger: what have you all got that you are so afraid of losing?
zuper: (private) i take and i hold
zuper: (private) i'm going to fly
womanonfire -> zuper: fly away
zuper: (private) hold me tight
lia:  I've seen sun and I've seen rain I've seen sunny days that I thought would never end---> lucky you. here in vienna we did`nt see the sun for the last 9-10 weeks.
womanonfire -> zuper: i hold and i take
womanonfire -> zuper: and i.....
zuper: (private) we're off!
signmonger: goethe?
womanonfire -> zuper: climax
womanonfire -> zuper: again
womanonfire -> zuper: again
womanonfire -> zuper: again
zuper: (private) no no
womanonfire -> zuper: again
zuper: (private) no climax
womanonfire -> zuper: never
zuper: (private) postpone
zuper: (private) slow down
zuper: (private) float
womanonfire -> zuper: i cant slow down
zuper: (private) your breath is the air
womanonfire -> zuper:  i lack control
lia: eh....
zuper: (private) ok
zuper: (private) then I will follow you
womanonfire -> zuper: the air around you
zuper: (private) where are you taking me?
signmonger: is a rose of another colour.....
lia: light
signmonger: austria...germany...croatia...the europe....that I live in?
womanonfire -> zuper: burn
womanonfire -> zuper: i burn
zuper: (private) yes
zuper: (private) consume
signmonger: where are you going?
life: sign...more VSOP !
lia: log-book: the speed of light is 1.6 fps
zuper: (private) open
womanonfire -> zuper: warm me more
womanonfire -> zuper: warm you
signmonger: you never heard of....
zuper: (private) your hands feel so big
signmonger: the things that happened????
zuper: (private) your mouth is all around me
gate: eucalypyus tree swaying in wind
womanonfire -> zuper: tasting
life: gate - do you have koala's too ?
zuper: (private) i'm your fruit
signmonger: or you just don't care?
womanonfire -> zuper: sweetness within
signmonger: somewhere else??
gate: if you look on patio to left of tree you can see koala drinking a fosters
signmonger: not me.
lia: humanz are stupid.
signmonger: not us.
zuper: (private) sweet sweat
lia: i can`t change it.
signmonger: not now.
lia: thanks for that, guy.
signmonger: living loving just like a woman....
signmonger: j'y suis
life: this one's for Riea... :)
gate: sky is orange & magenta..ocean is purple
signmonger: my only friend.....
womanonfire: um... thanx
womanonfire -> zuper: ripe rip
zuper: (private) peel me
signmonger: lafff i grew up in europe.....
womanonfire -> zuper: restrain
womanonfire -> zuper: surge forward
zuper: (private) it will be worth it
life: for phil...
zuper: (private) come in now!
lia: watchin sign: i have to smoke again.
womanonfire -> zuper: play with me
womanonfire -> zuper: toy with me
zuper: (private) here is my hand
life: for gate...
womanonfire -> zuper: i control you
zuper: (private) yes
zuper: (private) i can feel it
life: for Z!
womanonfire -> zuper: intensity
zuper: (private) your hands on my head my hands in your hair
signmonger: and arayanya left with the favoured tribe....to collect the weapons...
zuper: (private) your air
signmonger: but the fight was fixed
zuper: (private) electricity
womanonfire -> zuper: you burn me i burn
womanonfire -> zuper: softly
zuper: (private) we become sparks
signmonger: and all things are knowable except ...
zuper: (private) thousands of sparks
womanonfire -> zuper: a sensuous smoke
life: for all of you ! peace & love....
zuper: (private) touch smoke
life: gotta do some work now...
life: bye
womanonfire -> zuper: slips through your fingers
womanonfire: good night life
zuper: (private) your fingers are smoke my fingers are smoke
womanonfire: luv 2 u
zuper: by life
zuper: bye life?
zuper: hello death!
life: buy life !? ;-)
zuper: (private) sweet small death
womanonfire -> zuper: your fingers 
zuper: (private) my fingers
womanonfire -> zuper: touch so much
womanonfire -> zuper: my body
gate: z your up prettlate
womanonfire -> zuper: feels....
zuper: (private) I'm smoke I go everywhere
gate: that is gatespeak for late
zuper: yes gate, I'm addicted to a woman on fire
zuper: (private) feels
womanonfire -> zuper: rythm
zuper: (private) yesss
womanonfire -> zuper: writhing
womanonfire -> zuper: turning
womanonfire -> zuper: spinning
womanonfire -> zuper: seething
zuper: (private) around me
zuper: (private) around you
womanonfire -> zuper: all over you
womanonfire -> zuper: on you
womanonfire -> zuper: in me
zuper: (private) i'm opening up
zuper: (private) on me
womanonfire -> zuper: in you
zuper: (private) ine me
zuper: (private) i can feel you
zuper: (private) you're inside of me
womanonfire -> zuper: yes
zuper: (private) my heart beats so fast...
gate: think my attemps at the sunset..fried my camera
gate: tsk tsk
womanonfire -> zuper: need
womanonfire -> zuper: to
womanonfire -> zuper: catch
gate: it was borrowed
womanonfire -> zuper: your 
womanonfire -> zuper: breath
zuper: (private) I'm breathing as slow as I can
zuper: (private) breathe me
lia:  tomorrowStopSmoking.
zuper: (private) and can't hold it much longer
gate: one has to go to dinner.....
womanonfire -> zuper: i go deeper 
zuper: (private) yesssss....
womanonfire -> zuper: find the place 
womanonfire -> zuper: just right there
womanonfire -> zuper: right
zuper: (private) i never realized you could go so deep in me
womanonfire -> zuper: there
lia: hey wof, when all guyz leaved i`ll connect my cam ;)
zuper: (private) yes
zuper: (private) i am here
womanonfire -> zuper: i will live there
zuper: (private) within me
zuper: (private) touching you
zuper: (private) live here
womanonfire -> zuper: staying there
zuper: (private) always
womanonfire -> zuper: moving only slightly
zuper: (private) only slightly
womanonfire -> zuper: just enough to make you feel it
womanonfire -> zuper: then
zuper: (private) so sensitive deep inside
womanonfire -> zuper: then
womanonfire -> zuper: give you more
womanonfire -> zuper: gradually
womanonfire -> zuper: filling you
zuper: (private) almost pain
lia: 
womanonfire -> zuper: pleasure pain
lia: 
lia: 
lia: 
lia: 
lia: 
lia: 
lia: 
lia: 
lia: 
lia: 
lia: 
lia: 
zuper: (private) so good
lia: :)
womanonfire -> zuper: weakness=strength
womanonfire -> zuper: let go completely
zuper: (private) I'm liquid
womanonfire -> zuper: i smear you all over me all over you
womanonfire -> zuper: drinking deep
womanonfire -> zuper: sinking
zuper: (private) I almost disappear
zuper: (private) in you
zuper: (private) I can't see the difference between outside and inside anymore
womanonfire -> zuper: there is none
zuper: (private) I'm exploding softly
zuper: (private) eternally
womanonfire -> zuper: imploding
zuper: (private) disappearing
zuper: (private) i want to smell you
womanonfire -> zuper: existance is darkness
womanonfire -> zuper: emitting
zuper: (private) darkness is endlesness
zuper: yes, sign, we're still here
lia: yes, but you won`t hear anything, because there`s no microphone connected ;)
lia: ah, heard something....
lia: again?
lia: ;)
lia: how can i see who speaks/sings....?
zuper: (private) one more cigarette
womanonfire -> zuper: just one more
womanonfire -> zuper: i just want a drag
lia: what do you want to know?
zuper: (private) smoke with me
lia: that i think it`s o.k.????
lia: don`t wanna talk about politics.
zuper: (private) i'll hold it to your lips
lia: can`t change HUMANZ
lia: can change myself.
womanonfire -> zuper: i inhale
womanonfire -> zuper: i hold it in
zuper: (private) i hear
zuper: (private) i see
lia: should i scream everyday?
zuper: (private) i open my mouth
lia: what to do?
womanonfire -> zuper: i hear
womanonfire -> zuper: i feel your motion
lia: nice words.
womanonfire -> zuper: your breath
lia: it doesn`t HAPPEN
zuper: (private) you're on my chest
lia: not even with the people next to you.
lia: wing a flag.
lia: won`t help.
lia: 
womanonfire -> zuper: skin on skin on skin
womanonfire -> zuper: on
zuper: (private) the smoke circles around your face and fingers
lia: i like pictures, not words.
zuper: (private) skin on skin on skin
zuper: (private) I have never been this naked before
womanonfire -> zuper: so bare
zuper: (private) hard and soft
zuper: (private) translucent
womanonfire -> zuper: glowing
zuper: (private) from the inside
lia: yes.
zuper: (private) I'm going away now, my dear
zuper: (private) I will connect to you in Dreamland
zuper: (private) hope I will find you there
womanonfire -> zuper: ok 
womanonfire -> zuper: i will search for you
zuper: (private) You will always be inside me
womanonfire -> zuper: ...
zuper: (private) I will never forget you
zuper: (private) i can still feel your fingers on my skin
womanonfire -> zuper: i left a trace?
zuper: (private) yes
womanonfire -> zuper: goodnight
zuper: (private) goodnight
zuper: (private) it was nice
zuper: (private) talking
zuper: (private) to you
womanonfire -> zuper: you too
zuper: (private) close eyes
zuper: bye!
womanonfire -> zuper: !

An then, the tragedy unfolds:

She was the sun and he was the moon. She was Medusa, the octopus
girl, and he was the pigling, a flowerboy. She was furious fire, he
was the solemn sea. Her heart ruled over the deep, dark and hidden.
Hismind was lighter than the air. An invincible ocean seperated these
two young deities. The chances theywould ever meet were minimal. If
it wasn't for that mythical world of wires and servers...

[NY
scene here?]

Working late, Z. hears a noise coming from the
kitchen, next to his office. He logs off and goes to take alook. It's
dark in the kitchen. The sound is still there, behind him. He turns
around and sees what appearsto be some clothes lying on the floor in
the corner. It's E. and she's sobbing hysterically. "What aboutyour
children?" she cries, "It's hard enough for me to understand why you
are leaving me after thesenine years, but how can you be so cruel, so
selfish as to leave our two children behind? For god's sake,they're
only two and three years old. How could you allow this to happen? Why
did you let it come thisfar? How long have you known that girl? A
month? How many times have you actually spoken to her?Once? Twice?
How can you leave everything we've built up together, our home, our
relationship, ourfamily, for this? For god's sake, Z., think about
it! Think about what you're doing! Use your head. You'rein love with
her. So what? That'll end soon enough. It always does. I know why you
have fallen out oflove with me. It's the children. You lost interest
in me when I became a mother. I have sacrificed mywhole life for
them. And for you. So you could go and follow your ambitions. I was
happy that you foundsomebody whom you could work with. I truly was...
How could I have been so stupid? And how couldyou?"Z. didn't say a
word. He ran out of the room, eyes filled with tears and feeling
choked. "She's right. She'sso fucking right. Why am I doing this? I'm
a monster. Even worse. I'm an asshole. A pathetic egocentricmale
chavenist pig. Like everybody else."

A. looked around at the
tangles of wires and piles of paper in the afternoon light filtering
in from thewindow - the one window in the entire overpriced manhattan
cell which recieves light and air from theoutside. The scattered
remains of four years on the floor and M. threatening to toss her Mac
out thewindow. He puts the box down and seems to crumple from the
inside. A. has never seen him this waybefore twisted with emotion and
desperation. "You would leave me? This guy is offering you
thingsexotic locations and a new life things I cannot compete with."
"I just have to get out of here" his facewas transofrmed into a mask
likeness of someone i did not recognize. "You just dont get it do
you? Iwant to go too. I want to get out of here too, I just always
thought we could do it together. Together,why cant you belive that we
can change that we can make our live different" get out of this
shittyapartment, travel..." I just don't know what I am doing and I
do love you I just need time... ok I wontleave I will sit here and we
will try to make it work.

A cold winter's night on one side and
evening on the other side of the ocean. Some of the world's finestweb
designers and artists are gathering in an on line video application
to see if they can use it for anartistic project. Their group is
known as Hell after their web site hell.com. Z. is there, aka Z! And
A.,Womanonfire. They had hardly ever communicated with each other
except for the odd hell mailing listmessage. She had known and
admired his work for a long time and he thought her work was too
beautifulto be true. Everybody was there: Gate, Lia, Signmongers,
Snarg, Fakeshop... Z. did not have a camerayet and was posting stills
while A. was the Webcam Mistress. Her blurry image was mysterious
andseducing. And she could play the game so well. She was on a T1 and
Z. on a slow modem connection.Nobody knows who ended up seducing
whom. Not even the log files can give a clear answer to that. Butfor
both A. and Z., it had been one of the most significant nights of
their lives. And one of the mostecstatic ones too. As digital artists
they focus on sensuality and how to use the seemingly coldtechnology
of their medium to communicate on a deep emotional level. A. used
mainly pixels for this,while Z. played games with the cursor. Little
did they know that plain old ASCII chat could lead to anoverwhelming
experience like this. They were both virgins. Lifting each other up
into digital clouds.Burning each other. Typing was caressing. Words
were wet and hot. There was smoke everywhere.Smoke, mist, steam,
clouds. The sun and the moon met. The copper wires had never been
this hot before.It was dazzling, hallucinating. And it felt so real.
More real than anything they had ever felt before.These two
strangers, virgins. Innocent. Hearts beating frantically. Sweating
behind the keyboard.Floating, flying, raging. Kiss me.

The next
morning Z. could not get last night's transparent lover out of his
head. He made the first screenof what was going to become their most
important communication tool for the next month,Skinonskinonskin. A.
responded promptly. Skinonskinonskin in Hell's heavily secured
Seaside Motelbecame the last resort for when the frustration caused
by the physical distance became unbearable. Forwhen the ASCII chat
and staring at each other's webcam images became too painful.

It was the beginning of the end. And the beginning of forever. They
couldn't help themselves. Everythingfit so well. Both their creative
paths had come to some kind of a dead end and suddenly they met the
onewho could solve it all. Merging was what they wanted. And they
wanted to tell the world about theirlove, their union, their strenth.
Entropy8zuper! was born. Entropy8 was her site and on line avatar.
AndZuper! was his. Now they were one and started spreading their
mysterious motto written in a languagethey shared, Javascript: if ( 1
+ 1 == 1 ) { e8z = true; }, when one and one become one,
Entropy8zuper!is born.

To their surprise and nervous delight, they
discovered that their jobs were going to take them to thesame city at
the same time in the near future. The Webby Awards in San Francisco.
So the date of theofficial launch of entropy8zuper.org was set: they
day when they would meet in the flesh for the firsttime.Of course
they could see the curse coming the awful irony of the lives they had
lived before then. Z.never wanted children but gave them to E. as a
christmas present. A never wanted to be the slave of S.but went along
because she thought that was what love was all about. And now...
rebellion... and the priceto paid comes at the end.

Making Genesis, the first part of entropy8zuper.org was an exhilarating
experience. Everything went sosmoothly. Never before in their
workaholic lives had working together with someone been so
perfect.DHTMLove. The process was so natural. They complemented each
other perfectly. If this is not a loveaffair, maybe it is even better
than that. Having two brains instead of one. Two hearts. Four hands.
Nomore 'you' and 'me', only 'us'.Doubts made them feel lighter. With
ever protest with every doubt came the certainty that a decision,
afinal solution was to be made and she knew what that decision was
but not wanting to admit that shecould go against everythign she knew
was right.

She wanted a cigarette and wanted it bad.

On the
plane back to him... on yet another flight... she knew the
signifigance of his airplane takeoffanimation in EXODUS and WIREFIRE.
So this is her life that she lives so eagerly. .. forever
withoutregret... To fly from here to there singing his praises....
This was one flight which passed by quickly...too quickly for the
wine drunk to wear off... meanwhile....

It was clear to both of
them that this was a strictly on line adventure. No way where they
ever going toleave their stable relationships just to be with each
other physically. That clearly was not an option.

Not satisfied
with their means of communication yet, they set up an on line office
together, with videofeeds from both their offices, a chat application
and of course the two clocks: New York time and Belgiantime. It was a
place to centralize their work together and to talk to and stare at
each other for hours andhours while the modem clock in Belgium was
ticking. A. would stay up late working so she could catch aglimpse of
Z. when he started his day. And Z. organised his life in Ronse
according to New York time.

And the clock moves too swiftly as it
always does in New York City. Could she make enough this night.could
she be worthy of the love of such a beauty. 

So we met in San
Francisco and got over our initial nervousness quite quickly, the
strong memory ofcountless hours making love to a keyboard, that
plastic emotion made flesh, we spent the mostwonderful time together.
The ecstasy we experienced in each other's on line company was
multipliedwhen our skins touched and our voices were felt in each
other's ears. Step two was taken. Step two toheaven, step two to
hell. 

A. and Z. had to agree to the simple fact that they just
had to be together. This was not about a man inlove with a woman or
vice versa anymore. This was about fate. About things written in the
palm of Godshand. Suddenly their lives had taken on mythical
proportions. They were meant to be one. However sillyit may sound, it
was the most natural thing in the world to them. The sun and the moon
had finally met.

In the living room of her small apartment.. very
late at night she sat with her best friend B. He didn'twant to know
the details and he didn't know it was an affair but A. was spilling
something anyway. "Ifinally feel I know my destiny" she said. I've
been working with someone who has shown me what I wasmeant to do.
With 

Back on earth, hell started. They both had very stable and
comfortable relationships but the stormbetween them was going to
obliterate all of that. Nobody had seen it coming. Nobody
understood.Everybody was looking for reasons, for explanations. We
consulted astrology hand books for clues.Needless to say, very few
people supported their love. They were crazy. As good as
married.Comfortable. Happy. Children. Good lives that they were
destined to destroy. Because they suddenlyturned religious and
believed in fairy tales... Yes, they sure deserved each other.
Dreamers! Totallyunpractical human beings. Incapable of taking care
of themselves, let alone each other. Withoutcompassion and no sense
of responsability.

Despite their strong love, making decisions
wasn't easy. Seperated by the ocean, it became hard torealize how
desperately fatal their love was. They tried to reconcile with their
partners one day whilepromising each other eternal togetherness the
other. Hysterical laughter and desperate crying. A. boughta plane
ticket to Belgium and burned it. A. called Z. to tell him she hated
him. Z. called A. pathetic. And"the yo-yo from over the ocean"...Sick
of being in doubt and feeling too much, Z. turned into a machine,
destined to go to New York and sortthings out once and for all. In
fact he thought that meeting her for a second time would make him see
thatit was all a delusion and that his true home was with his family.
He could not have been more wrong. It isfrightening to see two
creatures who hardly know each other be so close together, so much
one unit.Godlike.Even more determined to live together they went back
to the warzones that used to be their homes. Ifyou fall out of love
with one person and fall in love with another person next, things are
simple. In thiscase, they both had a perfectly nice human
relationship.

But their union was godlike and god is cruel.

It
had not ended then. It was awful. What they experienced in these
months would make anyone wish theywould never feel again. From the
highest ecstasy to the deepest agony. Rusted meat hooks in raw
flesh.Tearing everything apart.

A. fled her home, put her stuff in
storage and asked Z. to buy her a plane ticket. The queen of the
webwas broke. Their love had been so expensive. Z. left and found
them an apartment not to far from wherehis family lived. He could not
live too far from his children.

[end here?]

She came and they
lived like gods. Tasting the world's forbidden fruits. Getting drunk
on old cheese andsalmon. She took a James Bond movie title as her
motto: "You only live twice". They made Exodus, thestrangely fitting
next chapter in their on line Bible at Entropy8zuper!A. was going to
stay for a month, after which she had to be in New York again for a
while. Their brainstried to tell their hearts that this was a test.
During that month the mother of Z's children demanded thathe put A.
on a plane and came back or go away and stay away. She was going to
keep the children and hewas going to become some uncle to them. Z.
died. He left. Blind love. At the station. On the train.

This is a beautiful story of eternal love. Beauty is evil. Love is
banal. Kiss me.

Don't you realize you have given me everything i have ever
wanted. Wrapped up and presented on asilver platter. Fame, Artistic
fulfillment, The opportunity to learn, Enjoyment of life, Travel,
Family,Everything. I cannot bear it, It is only some sort of cosmic
joke that you cannot enjoy it. I WANT THISPLANE TO LAND RIGHT NOW.
You. Dammit. You are the catalyst... all i have ... all i want... i
cannot lie...lcannot try to save face... i must admit it... you are
the one... i want 

No matter what. 

If we can just get past
this... maybe it is a test... but wwe will get past this. I want to
feel your freespirit... damn i wish you could still see what i saw in
you from the beginning. HYou are special... you areunique, perfecgt,
better than the rest...

beautiful...you are the most talented web
person i have ever met. technology, reasoning, artistry, i know
nothingof these.

you can make anything happen... if this is your
propaganda then i have fallen for it. please come to me.let me hold
youjust let me hold you,

Put yourself inside me and be as when we
first met and knew no0thing but desire and hope.feel yourself
dissolve into me.Assimilate our deisres into one. Search for the
feelings.Doubt them not a momentResist, postpone but ultimately
relent......\\to trust

Why cant you trust me.I can do so much for
us.I am learning to trust myself... to bring ideas to fruition to
take the lead to comfort you in your time ofneed.,

i am your
pu;ppet your doll.i wiould do anything you want anything you told me
to do.

and that is a big issue in magazine design./././../

how
to bridge the gaps betweeen these types and the more socially
acceptable formats.

i knw that i love you i just know it.,.l.

i
need to feel you to remember what we;ve had and that is myt
fault,.



i love you but now i must sleeep\

kiss me.Auriea.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Skinonskinonskin

The first page of
Skinonskinonskin was made by Michaël the day after we had our first
sexual encounter in a chat application. Parts of this chat session
can be found in the Words page of Skinonskinonskin. The next day,
Auriea responded with Smoke. Skinonskinsonskin became our refuge in
the period when we were falling in love through the network. When
chat and email proved too restrictive, we resorted to Dynamic HTML to
express our feelings and desires, in an attempt to touch the
other.

Skinonskinonskin I was published on the hell.com server.
After we stepped down as active members of this artists' community,
we released Skinonskinonskin II on our own server. Since the release
of the first version, the site had kept developing. We still needed
to communicate to each other. So these later developments were added
to the first when we re-released the site. We haven't added much to
Skinonskinonskin since we have been living together, but the
possibility of future additions is not excluded.

Skinonskinonskin
tells the story of our love. From the first lusty feelings through
the doubt and the pain, the anger and the disappointments. Through
the longing and desire, the memories of beautiful hours spent
together and the betrayal of love. The clash of responsibilities and
duties and promises with the power of passion, love and destiny.
Skinonskinonskin testifies to our happiest moments and also to our
deepest pain. It is very hard to browse through it indifferently.
Even for us.

Skinonskinonskin was at first developed in secret in
a protected folder on the hell.com server, called SeaSideMotel. Later
we decided that some people might enjoy seeing these pages. But as
they were so personal, we had not desire to make it too easy to see
them. First we made a questionnaire that the user needed to go
through before being able to access the site. Ultimately we released
the site as a pay per view event on the hell.com server. This was a
good way to "keep the riff raff out" while also an experiment with
e-commerce. Would people be willing to pay to see a web site? Just
like they pay for the cinema, renting a video or seeing a concert?
The answer was no. It was only because hell.com had such a massive
amount of hits, that we made any money. When we released
Skinonskinonskin II on our own server, hardly anyone visited it. It
was an interesting experiment, offering our visitors the opportunity
to support the artists directly rather than letting them compromise
the quality of their work by having to find other sources of income.
Interestingly, the experiment has failed. Of the 500 or so visitors
that visit our web site daily, about 100 people have signed up in the
year that Skinonskinonskin II has been on line. People are simply not
willing to pay for access to artists' web sites.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Whispering Windows

womanonfire: hello there
womanonfire: i was just about to send you another email
womanonfire: wondering if that is you that i see in the distance
zuper: by the way: hello auriea it is SO NICE TO SEE YOU I almost have tears in my eyes
womanonfire: between the green lines of the grid
zuper: yes it is me
womanonfire: i wonder wht your voice is like
zuper: my voice?
zuper: let's try
zuper: it's weird to talk in a silent office at night
womanonfire: yes
womanonfire: i can just barely make you out
womanonfire: how fitting
womanonfire: it sounds so far away but you feel so close
zuper: yes
zuper: i am close
zuper: i don't understand myself
womanonfire: i will write you a very long letter tonight
zuper: I'm falling in love with a 160x120 pixel video...
zuper: Yes please write me a long letter
womanonfire: it is dificult for me here right now
zuper: why is it difficult?
womanonfire: i was just about to write one about this
womanonfire: because i love you
zuper: ...
womanonfire: seems so 
womanonfire: strange
womanonfire: maybe it is lust
womanonfire: i cant tell anymore
zuper: pixellust?
womanonfire: right
zuper: I my case only ASCIIlust...
womanonfire: but i want to make a home for us
womanonfire: in the network
zuper: Have you read Sterlings 'Holy Fire'?
womanonfire: no
zuper: They have places called 'Memory Palaces' on the net
zuper: where they keep all their souvenirs and where people can meet
womanonfire: i just heard you that time
womanonfire: !
zuper: in dutch!
womanonfire: yes!
zuper: (private) I realised today that I have never been in love with somebody who doesn't speak Dutch before.
womanonfire -> zuper: i have never been in love with someone in another country before
zuper: (private) I have never been in love with someone with green dreadlocks before
zuper: (private) let alone black skin
womanonfire -> zuper: yes i hope you wiwll like my skin
zuper: (private) I already do.
womanonfire -> zuper: :)
zuper: (private) Your voice sounded higher than I had imagined...
zuper: (private) (What did I imagine then??)
womanonfire: i long to hear your voice in my ear
zuper: (private) 
zuper: (private) 
zuper: (private) 
womanonfire: the sound is a bit distorted with these things
zuper: (private) yes
womanonfire: if no one was around me here
zuper: (private) the image is distorted too
womanonfire: i would speak to you
zuper: (private) but that's ok
womanonfire: yes!
womanonfire: these are all part of our relationship
womanonfire: these limitations
womanonfire: we must
zuper: (private) 26 letters, no sound, no image
womanonfire: learn new ways
zuper: (private) make DHTMLove to me...
womanonfire: i plan to
womanonfire: its all i want to do
womanonfire: tell eveyone i can no longer work for them
womanonfire: and spend all my time
womanonfire: DHTMLove
womanonfire: image!
zuper: image
zuper: (private) my favorite on fire
zuper: (private) i see
zuper: (private) I'm touching my monitor but it just doesn't feel like you...
zuper: (private) our eyes met
zuper: (private) youdidn't see that of course
womanonfire: i could feel it
zuper: (private) i wish i could type blindly
womanonfire: you are there
zuper: (private) yes
zuper: I'll make you a keyboard with a cast of my body
womanonfire: i am fondleing my keyboard
womanonfire: but it dosent feel like you
womanonfire: oh well the fragments we have are beautiful
zuper: why is a computer screen only 2D?
womanonfire: lack of foresight by the industry
zuper: your eyes
womanonfire: your words...............
womanonfire: your images.........
womanonfire -> zuper: i can hear your heartbeat
zuper: (private) you can?
womanonfire -> zuper: you should go get some sleep
womanonfire -> zuper: it must be late there
zuper: (private) yes it's almost 2 AM
zuper: (private) I can't bare the thought of going to bed without you
zuper: (private) I didn't want to become addicted
womanonfire -> zuper: now i am trembling
womanonfire -> zuper: no addiction 
zuper: (private) I can feel it
womanonfire -> zuper: i have to go
zuper: (private) ok
zuper: (private) you go
zuper: (private) i stay
zuper: (private) just one more cigarette
womanonfire -> zuper: just one more
womanonfire -> zuper: i will write you a long letter
zuper: (private) Yes write me a long letter
zuper: (private) We're here for each other
womanonfire -> zuper: yes
zuper: (private) goodnight, my dear
zuper: (private) kiss
womanonfire: (private) yes
womanonfire: (private) hold
zuper: (private) yes
womanonfire: disconnect only the software
zuper8: disconnect
zuper8: only
zuper8: the software
womanonfire: fade...
zuper8: fade...

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Godlove

"/godlove" is the name of the directory where entropy8zuper.org started.
It contains "The Godlove Museum" and "Closer"

The term finds it roots in this chat between us dated 02-15-99:

womanonfire: i am just not able to believe in forver
womanonfire: its a sad thing for me
zuper8: forever is a metaphor
womanonfire: to have sucha flaw
womanonfire: a metaphor
zuper8: there are more than 4 dimensions
zuper8: in at least one of those 'forever' or 'endlessness' exists
zuper8: in one of those dimensions
zuper8: i love you forver
zuper8: +e
womanonfire: that sounds like a better definition than the others ive heard
zuper8: definition of what?
womanonfire: i love you
zuper8: forever
womanonfire: description of forever
womanonfire: forever is now
zuper8: it's not like a dogma
zuper8: it's just an idea, a feeling
womanonfire: i have so many feelings, forever must be one of them
zuper8: yes forever is now
womanonfire: i love you
womanonfire: forever
zuper8: but time doesn't matter in the dimension of forever
zuper8: forever yours
womanonfire: you are gonna make me cry 
zuper8: you make me cry all the time
zuper8: tears of sorrow
zuper8: tears of joy
zuper8: it becomes hard to distinguish
womanonfire: yes
zuper8: we might be transgressing a point
zuper8: the point where opposites cease to be opposites
womanonfire -> zuper8: i dreamed, i dream <----- my favorite sonicyouth song
womanonfire: and become the same?
zuper8: (private) sing to me
zuper8: not the same
zuper8: i think
womanonfire: or fit together
zuper8: but all part of one big experience
zuper8: one state of being
zuper8: maybe love?
womanonfire: maybe that is what god is
zuper8: yes
womanonfire: i ve often thought that 
zuper8: maybe we have found god :)
zuper8: godlove
womanonfire: godlove
womanonfire: !
zuper8: !
zuper8: so genesis wasn't such a bad idea after all... ;)

......

womanonfire: no really i want to meet you and never leave
zuper8: yes really
zuper8: i know
zuper8: 
zuper8: we will
zuper8: some day
zuper8: 
womanonfire: yes 
womanonfire: someday forever
womanonfire: forever now
zuper8: i do
zuper8: :)
womanonfire: :)
womanonfire: i do too
zuper8: you break all your own rules
zuper8: :)
zuper8: i do too
zuper8: :)
womanonfire: its part of the mystique of our relationship
zuper8: it is
womanonfire: it feels good to break the rules
zuper8: beyond our selves
womanonfire: and we can be everything to each other
zuper8: yes
zuper8: no rules
zuper8: only one constraint
womanonfire: yes
zuper8: some kind of magnetism
zuper8: keeping us together
zuper8: moving as one
womanonfire: love
zuper8: love
zuper8: 
womanonfire: lovers
zuper8: deeplove
zuper8: widelove
zuper8: eternallove
womanonfire: godlove
zuper8: godlove
zuper8: let's call our /web directory /godlove
womanonfire: yes
womanonfire: lets
zuper8: consider it done :)
womanonfire: dancing
zuper8: i will never be able to follow your dance

Going to this directory one is initiated into our habit of pasting bits
of story in places where they wouldn't normally show. Also here if one
views the source is the entire latin text of Dante's Paradiso placed on
the page by Auriea to mark the 2nd anniversary of her meeting Michael.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Closer

Closer is our old information section. It still contains
some unique
bits of information, like the credits pertaining to
different projects.

We are seen split in two. Because this was one
of the first meta-sites we made for Entropy8Zuper.org, and it was
made while we were still living far apart the symbolism of the aplit
screen was meant as a way to describe us as two things which online
are one. And when we wrote our Philosophy out for the first time it
was like putting our foot down to not make those same compromises in
our vision that we've made in the past. Together we at last had the
strength to scratch away the myopic vision of those who would hire
us. They will hire us and they will pay and they will see that it is
good.

Entropy8zuper! is committed to delivering fullblown
interactive multimedia to the web. We are not compromising on
anything. Our work is not compatible with any old browser. The
network is a social place. A place where people live and love and cry
and play. Entropy8zuper! makes digital environments for people:
emotional, engaging, entertaining. 
Information technology is not
the future. We are.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Contact

EMAIL
To contact Entropy8Zuper!, please send email to "two@entropy8zuper.org".
To contact Auriea Harvey, please send email to "a@entropy8zuper.org". To
contact Michël Samyn, please send email to "z@entropy8zuper.org".

FAX
We do not have a fax machine because we think it is inefficient
technology.

TELEPHONE
We do not have mobile phones because we object to the telephone as a
means of communication. A mobile phone only doubles the annoying aspects
of the telephone. We think the telephone is intrusive and disrespectful
and should be reserved for matters of extreme urgence.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Checklist

The checklist is our old home page. We used it during
the first two years of our existence as "Entropy8Zuper!". It changed
regularly. We have archived some of its itereations and all of its
backgrounds in The CheckList Museum.

The page consisted of an HTML
form. This means that we used standard HTML form elements like
buttons and input boxes whose appaerance depends largely on the
user's system configuration. This was a design decision, not one
motivated by laziness. Don't forget the Michaël won Alexei Shulgin's
Form Art Competition in 1997!
We liked the contrast of the
rudimentary form aesthetic with the elaborate treatment of the rest
of the site. But both are the results of the same attitude towards
design. An attitude that aims at maximizing the desired impact of the
design by all means available.
Checklist was meant as a filter. We
thought that one could only enjoy our site if one took the time for
it. Checklist worked like a brake in ones surfing routine because it
made you stop and figure out what to do next. You needed to check a
few boxes and press the button -aptly labeled "Button"- in order to
continue. The checkboxes referred to the requirements for viewing the
site: a fast computer, the right browser, the right plugin and "a
physical need for wonder and poetry". The first three were checked
for you after running some background tests in Javascript but the
fourth required manual checking. Trying to enter the site without
checking it, presented you with an error box saying "You need to feel
emotionally unstable, hysteric or very patient.", which was an
accurate description of how we felt when we started the site (except
maybe for the patient part... but we considered that one as a back up
solution anyway in case the former two were missing).

We felt we
needed to replace checklist with something new when our site became
too complex and too big for an interface made out of form elements.
Looked at in a sentimental way this was the end of an era. Admitting
that it was time to let go of the past. It was a difficult thing for
us.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Blazon

The layout and structure of our current homepage is based on heraldry.
We have a general fascination for symbolic ornaments. Heraldry is one of
those systems that combine beauty, mythology and information. We like
imagery to have meaning. We are not very fond of the trend in modern art
to obliterate or discredit the meaing of imagery. Instead we prefer to
add meaning to already very pregnant symbols. There is no defence
against the baroque.
The similarity between the shield and motto combination of blazons and
icons and their name on a computer desktop was quite striking to us.
The Blazon homepage is a place where a lot of things are happening. We
a fantasy about putting our whole site into the Blazon movie up to the
point where a browser would not be required anymore to view our work.
Just a Flash player or an executable provided by us would do, while the
site would remain accessible through a web browser.
We have built Wirefire into Blazon. There is a way to access our
portfolio database built into The Close Corporation. Our live webcam
images are there when you roll over the Entropy8 and Zuper! shields.
There is even a real time chat application in the Contact section
(click on Talk), where you can also subscribe to our mailing list
(Dust) and send us an email message.
Blazon contains an XML sockets client which connects all users
currently on our home page to each other in real time. This
architecture is used for the chat, representing the present visitors
and representing their clicks. All of these things are visible to all
users who are looking at the home page at the same time. In a way,
the visitors create the home page, the spectators create the spectacle.
The live clicks on the shields from any user are represented by white
pulsating dots. We also log these clicks and represent the results on
the shields. At the time of writing, hexagons represent the average
number of clicks per day on every shield. This is a way for everyone
to monitor acces to our server (or at least to the home page).
Furthermore we keep track of the number of people who are looking at
this page. Each user has been represented by a bee and later, after the
WTC bombing, as the Arab word for Peace. The number of bees/peace equals
the number of people looking at this page. Note that at this time the
movement of the bees is completely random and has nothing to do with
the activity of the users. Later we will want to represent each user by
a bee and maybe allow for regular visitors to have there own avatar.
Combining this with the already present chat, would turn our modest
home page into a full blown graphic chat application. But would you
notice that without flashy advertising for vaporware?

Blazon is set up in a very modular way. There are seperate layers for
foreground, background, click history and visitor count. All of these
can be easily replaced by other movies. As a result our home page
changes often.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Godlove Museum

The name given to our interpretation of the Bible. Currently it contains
"Exodus", "Genesis" and "Leviticus". We are working on "Numbers", which
should be finished by the end of 2001.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Genesis

Genesis was made before we met physically. It was
intended as a presentation of us joining forces. It tells about the
godlike meeting of souls that we experienced during those days. We
did not know at the time that this was going to be the start of a
series. We just picked the name Genesis because it was about the
start of Entropy8Zuper! and left the rest of that part of the Bible
for what it was. Later we came back to Genesis with Eden.Garden 1.0
and we have discussed doing something with the idea of the flood as
well.
The music in the beginnning is from the Messe in B Minor by
J.S. Bach conducted by the splendid Nikolaus Harnoncourt and
featuring an almost orgasmic Kyrie duet. We found this coinciding of
divine and carnal ecstasy very appealing. Maybe we mistook cyberspace
for heaven.
In any case, it was by making Genesis that we realize
how well our skills and talents complimented each other. We trusted
each other perfectly and thought as one brain.
The second scene of
Genesis is a tribute to the place where we met, an artists group
called Hell, again not without religious connotations.
Then there is
the storm with Auriea and Michael as saints and a sample from a band
we had bonded over: Sonic Youth.
In the ocean, we start playing with
your cursor, a ting we are very fond of doing. The cursor represents
your hand. Playing with it is like touching. When you get caught by
the upper hand (a scan of Michaels hand holding an actual 'real-size'
cardboard version of the famous Netscape pointing finger cursor
-later this cardboard was sent to New York as a present; during the
making of it, Michael cut a hole in his favorite pants and once again
curs the analogue) you end up on the beach, which is like a
mini-portfolio, where things developed in the ocean have stranded and
are available for your amusement. To get to the Ecstasy scene, you
need to go down into the dark depths of the Ocean. Up until this very
day, not many computers can handle the Dynamic HTML in this scene
very well, especially not when you heighten the ecstasy by typing
madly on the keyboard -a thing Auriea and Michael ended up doing
quite frequently during those days...
The orchid was a symbol of our
shameless embrace of the banality of our divine
lust.
Entropy8zuper.org was launched with Genesis and Closer on the
day we first met in the flesh. In room 222 in the San Francisco
Triton hotel. On Auriea's cute and rare tiny Japanese Apple Powerbook
2400.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Exodus

THE END
An Entropy8Zuper! production.

After
Auriea moved to Belgium, we thought it was appropriate to make a
piece called Exodus. About leaving the places that held us down and
arriving in each others Milk and Honey.
Obviously it starts with the
end, the end of our previous lives. And a quote from James Bond, "You
only live twice", since we both had left the life that we thought we
were going to have for the rest of our lives, since we had both
betrayed the person we had promised eternal loyalty to.
The empty
chair in scene two, the Waiting Room scene, is Auriea's chair in her
apartment in New York as seen through her web cam. The little images
surrounding it are from webcams too.
Airplanes had become part of
the network of technology that connected Auriea and Michael. So the
site has a tribute to them. The soundtrack is a sample from Bjork's
The Hunter, a song Michael played over and over again when he was
preparing things for Auriea's arrival, in the car commuting between
his ex-home and family where he still lived and the apartment in Gent
that he and Auriea were going to share. "If travel is searching and
home has been found, I'm not stopping. I'm going hunting. I'm the
hunter. I'll bring back the goods. But I don't know when." I'm going
hunting, I'm the hunter, I'm the hunter, I'm the hunter.


Like
all books in The Godlove Museum, Exodus ends with a red(dish)
"Ecstasy" scene. This one features five cursors, one for every
finger. When you hold the mouse button down, the fingers close. When
you release it, they open. It is one of our many attempts of having a
physical contact with the pixels, of touching the digital skin. The
cursors represent your hand as it has been teleported into the
virtual space on the screen. A space that is made up of love and lust
and sex and honey dripping dripping. Bees bees bees like the
molecules of your body. Touching touching everything. Indecent
behavior. Melting.

Having had a love/hate relationship with James
Bond all her life, You Only Live Twice is Auriea's favorite Bond
film. 

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Leviticus

After Genesis, about the birth, and Exodus,
about leaving one life to start another, Leviticus is about the rules
and customs, and the conflicts with them, and the sacrifices one has
to make if one wants to make a new life for oneself. It is the piece
that sticks most closely to the Bible text of the three. We actually
read the Bible before working on it. And the Book still had a lot to
say about our own lives. Or we could make it say a lot about our own
lives.
Leviticus starts with a quote from Genesis: the "biting"
frame borders. And though these make the existence of the lambs
difficult, it is ultimately the users who needs to sacrifice them in
order to proceed. After which Genesis is quoted again. But when the
meeting of hands was glorious in Genesis, it becomes a much less
stable thing in Leviticus. Many factors are trying to prevent this
meeting, which I guess is the general theme of our Leviticus. Many of
those factors are not external but have become part of our being. We
are both products of our environments and as such represent its views
and morals. It took us a while to discover that a lot of the
conflicts we had amongst ourselves, were simply cultural differences
that were caused by the programming of our minds by the
socio-political environment we had lived in up until that day. On top
of that came the practical difficulties like trying to get Auriea to
stay in Belgium legally, which caused us a great deal of frustration.
Not in the least because we were internet beings: we had already
abondonned the concept of country borders altogether and now we were
beamed back down to earth where all sorts of old rules still applied.
The text on this scene is from one of the many documents involved in
Auriea's residency. The spoken quotes from Leviticus were borrowed
from the Audio Bible web site. The drum sound is from Jarboe.
After
making the hands touch three times, a long non-interactive sequence
starts. The Sun and the Moon  meet as throbbing hearts. The Sun and
the Moon represent Auriea and Michaël. Auriea has always felt this
personal association with fire and the sun and Michaël has always
consider himself related to the moon. This was one of many
"coincidences" that came to the surface when we met. After that you
get the recipe for preparing a heart. The heart in the movie is
actually a pig's heart that we had bought in the local supermarket
and sown bock together, a bloody affair. We did not eat this one. We
only managed to swallow some chicken hearts in our research, I'm
afraid to say. The love incantation is a sample from Lamb(!).
The
next scene is expanded from a eufimism that is used in Leviticus for
menstruation: her flowers were upon her. As you can imagine, in
Leviticus, there are some rules involved with this frightening aspect
of the female body. "And if any man lie with her at all, and her
flowers be upon him, he shall be unclean seven days; and all the bed
whereon he lieth shall be unclean." (15:24) We tought this was very
romantic and sexy. So we chose orchids to represent blood flowers.
The text tells the tragic story of us leaving our previous lives and
really shouldn't be read by sensitive souls. Again, the music is
based on a Jarboe sample. I guess we felt Jarboe's music was very
Leviticus...
Next scene is the chewing of the heart (We covered our
faces with oil to record this footage). The background for this is a
towel with flowers upon it. The pump machine and memory clouds with
Diamanda Galas screaming Leviticus: "Unclean!" Click the machine and
now it is your turn to bring the Sun and the Moon together. A nuclear
explosion -fascinatingly beautiful- leads to the Ecstasy.
Scans of
parts of our body, feathers and whithered Tiger Lilly leaves. And our
cover of the infamous Serge Gainsbourg hit, "Je t'aime, moi non plus"
(previously covered by Nick Cave and Anity Lane as "I love you, nor
do I"). A song about l'amour physique that contains lines about
coming in between a woman's kidneys and other Leviticus related
subject matter.
In the end, Leviticus is probably most of all about
the conflicts Auriea and Michaël have within themselves, having both
commited such a horrible crime and the guilt that is caused by the
joy this crime brings us.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Numbers

1. Too much fighting !!!

------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Close Corporation

PORTFOLIO
We have huge portfolio stored in a MySQL database that contains
commercial and personal projects and drafts by Entropy8, Zuper!,
Group Z Belgium and of course Entropy8Zuper! Currently, though, the
only way to access this database is through the random access in The
Close Corporation on our homepage. But we have plans for more
efficient systems.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Art Collection

Currently our corporate art collection contains one piece: Olia Lialina's
"If You Want to Clean Your Screen". Purchased in the Alps, 05 June 1999
for $2000USD.

he hand of the virgin awaits your action.
the holy virgin says: "if you want me to clean your screen scoll up and down"

------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Heavenly Airport

This is a place for take-offs and landings.
In other words: this is where
everything goes that does not fit in
with any of the other groups in the
Blazon hierarchy.

More importantly however, this is our "live" folder, where things are
in constant flux. Very much like the way the areas surrounding
airports are always under construction. You can find general
silliness here, links to other sites but also links to E8Z!
projects. The small things the gizmoes made for others to host. The
things that we want to keep in front of our eyes as a reminder to
keep them going. Some of these ideas in incubation may become one of
our big ideas one day but that day is not today.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Dust

Dust is our mailing list. You can subscribe to it in the Contact
section of the home page (click on Spam me!). It is after the specks of
dust that we use in Wirefire to represent the participants.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Eden.Garden

SFMOMA commissioned us to do a piece for their 2001 "010101: Art in
Technological Times" exhibition. The budget was 12,000 US Dollars and
after much deliberation we decided to use it research a technology that
we had known very little of up until then: interactive 3D.

We wanted to use this technology to make simulated action figures of
ourselves, something we had wanted to do for a long time but never found
the time for. At first we thought about making an interactive sex
application where the user could manipulate our action figures and move
them into poses of the Kama Sutra. But then there was the desire to do
something with the Garden of Eden, an aspect of Genesis that we had
forgotten when we were doing ours.

After many many many hours, days and months of research we discovered
a technology that would allow us to use the principles developed earlier
for Michaël's Websinger application, to a 3D world. The Websinger analyzes
HTML documents and represents them as experimental music. This analyzing
of the code of the web was of particular interest to us because it was a
time when time was starting to chew away parts of the web. New browsers
appeared than were incompatible with old ones, effectlively making part
of the web disappear. We were suddenly confronted with death and decay
in a space that was supposed to be endless. So as an experiment, we
decided to make a whole new kind of browser that wasn't backwards
compatible with anything but that still used the same code as its source
of inspiration. Yes, visualizing this code is an act of creation, turning
the browser into a God.

Here's some of the blurb we wrote at the time:

As a sequel to the 'Genesis' chapter on our site, we went back and visited
the Garden of Eden. "Eden.Garden 1.0" is another way to look at the data
one can find on the Internet. Just like a web browser, Eden.Garden
analyzes the code of a document and renders it visible (and audible).
Unlike a traditional standards-compliant browser, Eden.Garden renders
those documents as scenes in the idyllic (or not so idyllic) setting of
the Garden of Eden, as a 3d environment through which the user can navigate.
We are there as Adam and Eve, dancing to the rhythm of the code. When a
visitor types in a URL and presses the button they set the hand of God
(the browser) in motion. Every location becomes a new environment full
of life. 

This project started as an idea to 'teleport' ourselves into the networked
space. We expanded the idea to show how this new place might look like to
our digital selves.

It is not unthinkable for visitors to feed the machine their own HTML
as building blocks to create their ideal environment... bringing us
all one step closer to Bruce Sterling's "Memory Palaces" (from the
book "Holy Fire"... we highly reccommend it :D) That among other
things: The Web Singer (by Zuper! inspired by the Web Stalker by IOD),
Quake, Tekken, the KamaSutra, online gaming and skinning communities,
and miscellaneous operatic and painterly sources were endless inspiration
for this project.

Eden.Garden is Javascript for 'Garden of Eden' (Javascript is a
browser-based programming language used heavily in this project for
text parsing).
This is the start of a huge project, hence the version number in the
name. Future versions will take advantage of advances in technology
and our growing knowledge in the fields of 3d and real time environment
programming.

[text from the site] 
The Garden of Eden works like a browser. You feed it a URL and it
interprets the data. The text becomes the engine that drives the dance
of the main characters. And the code defines the world. HEAD defines
the sky: SCRIPT is sunny, META is gloomy, STYLE is rainy. Javascript
elements define the things in the sky: var is a parrot, function is a pigeon,
if is an eagle, and window.open is a dragon. TITLE is the sun and /TITLE the
moon. A frameset page will render as a desert, while a page with a BODY tag
will have a grassy floor. In the desert, a NOFRAMES is rendered as a
building and a FRAME SRC as a clickable Belly Dancer. FONT tags show up
as rabbits, varying in size according to FONT SIZE specification in the HTML
document. An EMBED tag is an orange elephant, an OBJECT tag a yellow one. A
FORM becomes a building. !DOCTYPE is a Mountain. A DIV is a metal robot,
while a LAYER is a golden robot. A HR is a very long electric line. Tables
are forests, TD a wide tree, TR a thin one and TH a short one. BRs are
bushes in random sizes. An A HREF is a clickable Buffalo. A P tag is a
flower and an IMG tag a butterfly. These two vary according to alignment
settings. The dreaded BLINK tag is rendered as a vulcano, a BLOCKQUOTE as
a tiger and a CENTER as a replica of a fountain found here in Gent, Belgium.
A Java APPLET shows up as a monkey, A NAME tags as peacocks and every LI
(list item) as a flamingo. Comments are zebras.

The moves Adam and Eve make are based on the traditional moves of
characters in 3D games, like Quake3Arena: death1, death2, death3, taunt,
weapon attack, melee attack, change weapon, weapon idle, melee idle,
crouched walk, walk, run, backpedal, swim, jump forward, jump forward-land,
jump backward, jump backward-land, standing idle, crouched idle, turn in
place. Only we have replaced the traditionally violent attack gestures
from the games by gestures of pillow fights and tickling.
Each letter of the alphabet represents a move. The letters on the left
side of a computer keyboard are Eve's moves, the letters on the right
side those of Adam.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Groorg Groorg

A secret project by Michaël initially
developed to become his hidden alter ego. Or his Portrait of Dorian
Gray. A living organism that would be manipulated and transformed by
the visitors of the site and Michaël's darkest secrets. Now, as it
has stopped evolving, Groorg Groorg has become a living fossile. A
memory of a less glorious life. Maybe it should be killed. But we're
not sure if it can be killed. Maybe if we stop paying the Network
Solutions bills?

This site has not been publicized for a long time
and as a result it did not get any visitors. After a year or so, the
site was submitted anonimously to the Rhizome artbase as a test, a
secret response to Alex Galloway's request to submit some of our
Entropy8Zuper! work. But Groorg Groorg still hasn't appeared in the
Rhizome link list and as a result none of our other work has either.
The only link to Groorg Groorg on the net remains the one in our
Airport section. The reason why it is there is because Michaël is not
working on the site anymore and has no intention to do so, really. It
was started before completion of the merger between Michaël and
Auriea. And has become a relic to that time.
In the bubble that
appears when you open one of the creature's shields, you can see the
last 10 shots Michaël's web cam took at any given time. That part of
the site is still live. The sounds were all made by Michaël's mouth.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Her Boyfriend Came Back From The War

This piece was commissioned
by Olia Lialina for het Last Real Net art Museum. She asked many
artists and designers to create a version of her famous "My Boyfriend
cam back from the War" web site, in another medium. She chose us to
do a Flash version.
The movie consists of the the images from the
original website and its text read out loud by Auriea and Michaël. It
is also available as a screensaver.
The background music loop is
made with a sample from a piece by Jean Sibelius.

Like so many
projects we've worked on elements from this haunt us and end up
remixed in Wirefire and in our daily ways of speaking. 

Oh, how
many times has Auriea asked Michael to marry her and he always says
"No, better next month after holidays and the weather must be better.
Yes next month. I'm happy now..." ?
How often does Michael reach for
Auriea and whisper teasingly "Kiss Me ... tomorrow!" ?

On mouse over:
Imagine yourself floating.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Kiss

Project commissioned for the Snowblossom exhibition.

This was the valentine sent from A to Z in 2001
This was his reply
This was their reply

Subject:  Re: kiss <- forever
Date: Wed, 14 Feb 2001 20:31:04 +0100
From:  Z! <z@entropy8zuper.org>
To: A! <a@entropy8zuper.org>

>ROXANE:
>   Hush! hush!
>
>CYRANO:
>   A kiss, when all is said,--what is it?
>   An oath that's ratified,--a sealed promise,
>   A heart's avowal claiming confirmation,--
>   A rose-dot on the 'i' of 'adoration,'--
>   A secret that to mouth, not ear, is whispered,--
>   Brush of a bee's wing, that makes time eternal,--
>   Communion perfumed like the spring's wild flowers,--
>   The heart's relieving in the heart's outbreathing,
>   When to the lips the soul's flood rises, brimming!
>
>ROXANE:
>   Hush! hush!
>
>http://www.netcolony.com/members/ant/plays/cyrano3.html
http://e8z.org/404kiss
>
MICHAEL:
     Hush! hush!


Bodyscans were made in England, the operator said that he had never
scanned more than one person at a time. Auriea and Michael become one
body. Locked in 1 digital embrace. 


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------------------------------------------------------------------------

Sixteen Pages

Sixteenpages.net was made as a
response to a question from Andreas Broegger, asking us to create a
project for Hvedekorn, a not-for-profit Danish quarterly magazine and
web site for art and poetry. This project would consist of anywhere
between 1 and 16 pages in the magazine as well as any number of
megabytes on line.So we challenged Andreas: "Ok, we'll take the 16
pages out of your magazine and teleport them to the net because The
truth is in here." To which he responded: "Ok, and you get the money
we save by not having to print those 16 pages."Sixteenpages.net is a
search engine interface and www portal. It covers the complete
universe, since it has sections for all four elements and their
corresponding directions of the wind, human organs and gods. Each
leading to four portals from where you can start your journey,
sixteen in total. Technically, the interface is by no means perfect.
It will not work without your cooperation.Michaël Samyn & Auriea
Harvey, Entropy8Zuper!

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Venus Trap

For us interactive media have always been about the body. Experiencing a
web site is a sensual experience. We are not bodiless entities when we
roam the internet. All of our actions and thoughts are based on having
bodies. The way we respond to mental stimuli is motivated by our
physicality.
When Mr. Hello asked us to submit a piece for his on line show about the
hand shaped cursor that signifies moving the cursor over a link or 'hot
spot' in web browsers, we responded with this piece. The 'hand shaped
cursor' turns the computer cursor into an extension of your body. It
testifies to the inherent sensual nature of interactive computer
environments.
Venus Trap was loosely based on an earlier interface for the Zuper! site
in which one would 'touch' little hand icons to gain access to the
different elements of the site.
When experiencing a web site is a sensual event, making and publishing
one because a very intimate thing. In a way developing a web site, is
like developing a sense organ, a tentacle or antenna. Our web sites are
ways for us to bare some skin in order for users to touch us. And in
turn they allow us to touch the user. We tell the prosthetic sense organ
how to respond to certain touches. The response is ours. The experience
of those sites becomes a sensual game of teasing and pleasing.
In Venus Trap, touching the pictures of our hands will open them into a
risky openness. You can stroke our hands gently but you cannot click.
Doing so will make our hands snap close and eat up your hand cursor,
effectively taking away your sense organ.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Wirefire

Auriea Harvey & Michael Samyn  
to be read aloud by Auriea @ wwvf.nl
11 October 2001




A SECRET HISTORY OF WIREFIRE




I. Interactive Porn

	A. The secret history of Wirefire is sex in a virtual world.
The loss of physicality -- but let me not call it a loss -- because of
what is gained... What one can gain through Wirefire is a new sense of
touch, an enhanced fantasy, a glimpse of a personal utopia... What
afterall is Sex but communication, and Love one of the messages one
hopes to get across.


	go to -
	http://google.com
	search keyword: jetaime machine
	scroll down
	link into:
http://www.entropy8zuper.org/godlove/it's_not_about_comfort_baby/movies/ 



	B. The genre of Virtual Sex games is something which has
permeated the market, type Virtual Sex into any search engine and you
can readily see that there is a world out there for whom sex in the mind
is 'real' sex.

These are roots of our Wirefire application, from the mouth of our river
flowed just such an idea. After buying Virtual Valerie as a birthday
present for his father, Michael thought to make a virtual sex game, for
fun and profit. For one reason or another the project did not come out
but we are left with this artifact which shows the beginnings of the
Wirefire system: 



	load in browser:
	text04.dcr 
	
	
	
	
	The idea of it was to insert 2 players into a story via a
modem connection, in this artifact what we have left over is text. A
hand touching a thigh in the mind - but had he taken it further the
scenes would have been played out in some graphical way. 

You chose to be man or woman. You as a participant show up in the game
and your virtual partner sits next to you at the other end of the line.
As you select the action you wish to take the other Virtual Sex
participant gets two choices of what they will do next. based on thier
choice you get two choices of what to do next, and so on, and so forth
until the game is done (sigh... if these things are ever finished) the
thought was also to accomodate virtual voyeurs as some people like to
play and others they like to watch.





II. /underyourdesk


	that which senses you touchless and touches you senseless
	

( read aloud together: )


	zuper: (private) sleep with me 
	zuper: (private) close your eyes 
	womanonfire -> zuper: eyes are closed 
	zuper: (private) mine too 
	womanonfire -> zuper: i am 
	womanonfire -> zuper: with you 
	zuper: (private) yes 
	zuper: (private) bones 
	womanonfire -> zuper: i can hear your heartbeat 
	zuper: (private) muscles 
	zuper: (private) I can hear yours 
	zuper: (private) I can feel it 
	womanonfire -> zuper: sleep 
	womanonfire -> zuper: dream 
	zuper: (private) I think I'll stay awake just a little bit 
	zuper: (private) and watch you 
	zuper: (private) breathe 
	zuper: (private) memories 
	womanonfire -> zuper: feel the memories 
	zuper: you're making exactly the same gestures as I am:
holding your head, stroking your hair,... 
	womanonfire -> zuper: : 
	womanonfire -> zuper: it is you stroking my hair 
	zuper: (private) my hand follows the shape of the side of your
body without touching it




	load in browser:
	http://entropy8zuper.org/underyourdesk/ 
	an evacuated building. 



	B. Chatting was very important for a time to both of us. this
text communication was the heigth of intimacy to the point where before
we met when we had opportunity to hear one anothers voices it was too
strong a gesture i felt blown away by the power of just this one added
dimension to our affair. The sad truth was that we wanted to hide in our
fairy tale and not have the delicate bubble in which we floated burst by
reality. It sounds evil but the real things in our lives were not any
more important for being real.  Our Virtual Work was and still is the
most real thing which has ever happened. Perhaps as he said at the time
"it takes believing in magic..." it takes desire to create ones own
paradise.

The office was where we first had a glimpse of what Wirefire could be.
Communicating live from 1 to 1. In this the last version of
/underyourdesk before Wirefire was completed our so called "interoffice
stereo system" which consisted of us buying the same albums and playing
them at the same time while we chatted had evolved into the ability to
play audio clips for one another to add emphasis or just to get each
others attention. we made it a comfortable office and met there everyday
to work, to play...


	
	C. skinonskinonskin, a series of digital letters to one
another, was begun the day after we first came together in text when
Michael sent me breath.html. We set up a small room in
http://www.hell.com/NO/SUCH/PLACE/EXISTS/seasideMOTEL/. We, both being
web designers, wanted to share that coded intimacy with one another
building our own world. DHTMLove.




	D. Genesis was the first chapter of our website which we made
together, here, online. 


All of these elements are present in what is today Wirefire the chat,
the webcameras, the sampling of elements from our work the pieces
forming a dream for us. But next private/public place was our goal.
After all we are exhibitionists. I've had a webcamera beaming me onto
the net since 1998... i was ready for what we were to create next...





III. Wirefire beta
	
We were now living together. but... we were apart...
I was overseas. Michael sends me email. I go to /underyourdesk, we talk.
I leave the office open on dialup in my hotel room, i sleep and he plays
music to wake me up. I was overseas. We take screen-grabs at one
another. ..  ...
Michael sends me email. I go to http://entropy8zuper.org/wirefire for
the first time and this is what i find there. 


	load:
	Wirefire beta
	

The basic concept is that we make tools such as this one which is an
interface to the movies on the server. Another movie acts as browser
client and allows "voyeurs" to tune in.
needless to say this initial content of Wirefire evolved...




IV. *W*I*R*E*F*I*R*E* 

this is what Wirefire became:


	load:
	Wirefire 1 interface
	
	

Technically, it is animations, sound files, and jpegs pushed into motion
with an engine of scripts and layer built upon layer littered with specs
of dust. A thin wire strung between two camera images, fingers on
keyboards like figertips on each others skin, letters on a monitor
screen, whispers. Beneath that, there is a fairy tale for those who like
to watch, a realtime communication with its messages built into the
content.

Though now that we are together and we've morphed our daily chat
obsession into weekly group sex. The currents which run through Wirefire
are still the same... what does it mean to interact with another human
using digital media.  what does one do when you fall in love with a
160x120 pixel image? How is it to be a digital being in love? What is
ecstacy like in the network? 




	load:
	Wirefire 2 interface




V. *WIREFIRE PERFORMANCE*

Wirefire is an online performance, a communications tool and a really
good story.  
 This project utilizes technology we have developed to touch through the
wires. It combines chat, sounds, images, animations and live camera
streams to form an interactive, improvisational expression which goes
beyond words.  

Performers create simple files which are mixed in real time. Built in is
a sytem for the performers to see the presence of viewers and also a way
for the audience to communicate with the performers. The system exists
entirely on the Internet meaning that performers can be in any location
and the performance can be viewed by anyone with a current web browser
and the Flash plug-in. This is the only online performance/tool of its
kind which we have been operating  since July 1999 and in its present
format since April 2001.

Wirefire is our personal remixer of emotions and graphics, it provides
an opportunity to free-associate the themes and materials in our work
and  an opportunity to infect our collaboration with  Autopo‘zie.

Wirefire may be viewed in three distinctly different  modes. Random,
Live and Replay:
Random mode: is the default mode of this site. When you first arrived
you no doubt noticed that movies began streaming to your browser.. In
this mode just sit back and let the computers do the work mixing files
at random from our library of Wirefire material. When we start a
performance Random automatically switches into Live mode.
Live mode:  when the humans take control. This mode allows for real time
image blend effects and sound mixing . During the perfomances one can
see how many are Òin the audienceÓ  as the presence of each viewer
connected is shown as a small spec of dust on your screen. You can be
aware of who is at the controls by live webcamera images and text chats
between performers and between audience members. All of these elements
make for quite a different experience of the Wirefire environment than
the Replay or Random versions.
Replay mode: if you have missed one of our live performances you can
come to the site and view it in Replay mode. After every performance a
data file is saved and the entire show can be replayed from the server.
While the files are shown in the same order  the timing is random, and
it is archived without chat, live images and none of the realtime
effects produced during the Live show.

Wirefire is a meeting of two minds. Michael had an idea of how to make a
theatrical entertainment environment where people could connect remotely
and act out their fantasies. Auriea, an exhibitionist and performance
artist wanted to make an online event which could serve as communication
and creative excercise. Both of us with a strong desire to get out of
the box and say... show... what we really mean.

This project evolved, most importantly, however, from our earliest forms
of communication through the internet. We met each other online and that
was for a long time the only way we could talk to each other.   We used
commercially available video chat software but quickly felt its
limitations. It had live images and some audio capabilities but left us
feeling as if a barrier were between us. A gulf of space and time
clouding our feelings. It lacked a way for us to collaborate on our
various projects and it lacked feeling.

We graduated to creating our own online "office" which afforded us a
place to meet online. Javascript clocks were set up which told us the
time in our respective locations: New York City, USA, and Ronse,
Belgium. We put in a cgi based chat and organized html pages linked to
our current work and important links. We became chat addicts and
addicted to each other. Meeting in secret in our private place. Joining
forces to make magic online. During our time in that interface we
noticed how HTML could be input into the text chat to change things like
colors and  font sizes. As time went on the interface developed into a
way to play music for each other and leave love notes. 

The sea of frustration which engulfed us during this time raised many
issues about what it means to interact with another human using digital
media. We created another project titled skinonskinonskin which dealt
with our everyday lives and the complications of this new relationship
between us in contrast to the intensity of our online correspondance.
This is the main current which runs through Wirefire... what does one do
when you fall in love with a 160x120 pixel image? How is it to be a
digital being in love? 
What is ecstacy like in the network?

Once we came together in the same location we decided to take what we
had learned from our office and the emotional lessons of
skinonskinonskin and develop it into something which would be an
effective system for our communications while on the road and for public
entertainments.

Firengin: the new Wirefire engine
Now the engine behind the Wirefire performance has been completely
rewritten, amongst other things to take advantage of the XML sockets
interface that version 5 of Macromedia Flash offers. The engine has been
streamlined completely and allows for much more flexible employment.
The core of the new engine consists of only four files: a client and
tool application (both Flash movies) and two CGI scripts written in
Perl. Optionally one can add the free Swift-generator (also a CGI
script) to this combo, which allows for the direct loading of images and
sounds into the Flash environment. The fuel for the engine consists of
Flash movies made by the user(s) and pictures and sounds (from any web
site, as long as you know the URL). 
Note that the new Firengin can be used entirely without the aid of web
browsers. And that that would not exclude access through web browsers.
The choice is up to the user: to attend a session through a web browser
equipped with the Flash plugin, or to use an application that can be
downloaded from our server. The same goes for the performers.
The relative simplicity of this system would allow for making it
available to the public in one of the following formats:
1. Shrinkwrapped: downloadable software and instructions to set up on
the user's own server
2. Motel: users come to a dedicated server and set up a Firengin session
(private or public), optionally acquiring accounts which would allow
them to set up their own version of Wirefire.
We are considering one or both of these strategies, if there is a demand
for them, so if you are interested in utilizing the Wirefire environment
for yourself contact us.

Mainflame: multi-user Firengin
The Firengin system could also be adapted so it would allow for more
than two performers. This brings a whole new dimension to the Wirefire
idea. It would be possible to set up a massively-multiplayer network.
Initiators could download the multi-user Firengin and install it on
their servers. On their servers they would set up one or more Firengin
sessions. The initiators decide how many performers are allowed to
participate in a session and whether or not the session can be attended
by the public.
A live Firengin session reports back to the Mainflame server that keeps
track of all available multi-user sessions.
Users would go to the Mainflame server with their web browser or with a
client application that they can download. They would choose to either
participate as a performer in sessions or attend a performance as a
viewer.
Any web server can run any number of Firengin sessions, provided the
necessary resources are available (memory, bandwidth, CPU processes,
TCP/IP port numbers.)
The multi-user Firengin could be used for many different purposes:
-multimedia chat sessions (intimate private meetings and/or chat orgies)
-artistic performances (Firengin also works very well when projected in
large format)
-visual multi-dj-ing 
-presentation of graphics and sounds (designers to clients, help desks,
etc)
Firengin is just software. The content of a session depends on the
content the performers make for it. This can range from still images to
online games, from private one on one text based chat to a multi-user
multi-viewer multi-media interactive real-time performance. Plus, with
canned and replay mode, it can also be used as a non real-time
application. 
More information will be made available about Mainflame as we develop
the idea.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Text

The purpose of this file is to be an encyclopedia of
everything we know and can write down about our work. As such it will
grow continuously as we remember things, or as new interpretations
develop, as we feel like writing, etcetera.
It was first published
as part of our response to a commission for the BORDER=0 LOCATION=YES
"Artist as an Expert" exhibition curated by Olia Lialina.