Author: Dirk von Gehlen
Dirk von Gehlen
Reading time: 19 minutes
Synopsis
A New Version Is Available (2013) looks at how art and culture are made in the digital age. These summaries show how digital changes affect things. They look at both ideas and real examples from the world of art and culture.
What you will learn: How to understand tomorrow’s changing world.
We surf, navigate, and explore online. Because of the internet, these words and what they mean are normal for us. We use them without thinking. But they tell us a lot about the digital world.
This is what the summaries for A New Version Is Available are about. They show how digitalization and the internet change our daily lives. They also change how art and culture are made. In the digital age, art and culture do not just move to new storage places. They change in a big way. They become ‘liquid’ and can always change shape. So, creators and users must learn new ways to think about them and use them.
In these summaries, you will learn about the new features of art and culture in a digital world. You will find out about the good things this change brings. You will see new forms and ways to sell art and culture. You will also learn how it affects creating and enjoying art.
The next summaries also explain:
- what art and culture have in common with software,
- what Pumuckl can teach us about changing our way of thinking, and
- why artists and cultural workers should stop working alone.
Blink 1 – Update needed: Our ideas about art and culture are old.
What do we think of when we hear ‘art’ and ‘culture’? Most of us imagine books, paintings, statues, and records. These things are indeed art and culture. But they are ‘analog’ versions. They were created before the digital age and the internet.
In the analog world we know, culture is stored somewhere. Art and culture were put on a data carrier. This could be a CD, a canvas, or a manuscript. There was always a real, finished product.
Think of an old encyclopedia like the Brockhaus. It has 30 thick books that fill a shelf. You can touch and flip through them. We did not help create it. We also do not know who made it. We only see the final books. The rest is a black box.
In the analog world, art and cultural items came out of these black boxes as finished products. This made us believe in the idea of the genius artist. We thought this artist created their work alone. It was often a hard process. Once their painting, sculpture, or novel was finished, they stepped aside. The art business then took over and sold it.
But digitalization has changed these creative processes. They are now a thing of the past. Instead of the Brockhaus, we now have group cultural works like Wikipedia. This new encyclopedia does not sit on a bookshelf at home. It is online for everyone to use. We can all help it grow. You can even see how it was made.
So, Wikipedia is not tied to a physical data carrier. It is also not a product of a black box. Other art and culture items have also become free from their carriers. Music is no longer only on a CD or record. A text is no longer only on paper.
Blink 2 – In the digital age, art and culture never have a final form.
Because of digitalization, art and cultural products are becoming free from their carriers. They are no longer tied to CDs, video cassettes, or books. This means they can be copied, changed, and edited many times.
In the analog world, the word ‘data carrier’ meant data had weight. Moving it from one place to another took effort. But in the digital world, data is almost weightless. It does not need a carrier. It moves around the world in seconds, as if by itself.
But not everyone in the art and culture world seems to understand what this means. Many people only see the digital world as another way to sell old formats. For example, a paper book becomes an e-book and is sold online. Newspaper articles are just put on a publisher’s blog. But these creators miss the most important thing: Digitalization changes how art and cultural items exist.
Before, a published newspaper article was fixed and could not change, like a block of ice in Antarctica. But digitalization has warmed the climate a lot. Now, a newspaper article stays liquid, soft, and movable. Its ink never dries. It can be changed, commented on, and updated again and again.
Digitalization has the same effect on all other art and cultural products. There is no longer a fixed, final form. Everything stays changeable. This idea might seem strange for traditional forms of culture. But it is normal for things we know from the digital world. For example, we update our computer software all the time.
The idea of constant change is now not just for computer programs. It is spreading to all parts of the digital world. Everything is liquid.
Blink 3 – Software now means more than just computer programs.
Art and cultural items that become ‘liquid’ in the digital age share three things with computer programs.
First, they exist in many versions at the same time. These versions are always changing and can be worked on further. On Wikipedia, users can see older versions of an article. They can also see every single change. An article is never finished. If a politician dies, this is updated in their Wikipedia entry in seconds. Years later, if one of their speeches becomes important, someone will add a paragraph about it.
Music pieces can also develop in different ways at the same time. This happens through mashups, remixes, or cover versions. This creates many versions that exist side-by-side. Sometimes, it also creates completely new songs and styles.
Also, with software, you cannot tell the difference between the original and a copy. Or, the difference does not matter much: In the analog age, a painting had one original. Every copy was either clearly marked as a copy or it was a fake, which was not allowed. In the digital world, every copy is just another version. You can make it and work on it further without losing quality.
Software only works as a complex system made of many parts. Before, people thought a writer wrote a novel from start to finish. A painter painted one line after another. But today, art and culture can be made like a software product. The system is split into parts, and many people work on them at the same time.
Together, these parts make a whole. But they can also be taken out, changed, and improved separately. This makes it easy to add new features. It also creates space for group work. For Wikipedia, this means changes and updates happen every second. No single person watches over the whole work.
Blink 4 – The journey is the reward: The process is now a key part of art and culture.
In football, it is not just about the final score, like 2-1 after the game ends. It is also about what happens during the 90 minutes. Who scored the goal? Who missed by a little? Who did we watch the game with?
What happens before the final product is also becoming more important in art and culture. Digitalization means that interested people can follow how a work is made. They can experience it and even help shape it. The user, who was once passive, now becomes active. The old ‘black box’ becomes an open playground where many people can join in making a work.
A New Version Is Available used these new chances. It was a crowdfunding book experiment. 300 supporters followed how it was made. They regularly saw new text versions. Dirk von Gehlen kept them updated on the book’s progress.
We should not think this way of working is unimportant. In the past, it was not good to add extra information about how an artwork was made. A ‘leaflet’ was not wanted. The artwork should speak for itself.
But today, being part of the creation process is not just a part of a work. It is a sign of good quality. Just as a 2-1 score is not complete without the 90 minutes before, art and culture in the digital age need more than just finished works.
On Wikipedia, for example, users have endless extra information. The whole process of creation is written down. We can see details about older versions. Different writers have added sources. They have also kept notes on discussions and comments.
This extra information shows clearly how the current version of an article was made. This allows a group of people to improve it well. Without this extra information, Wikipedia and similar projects would not work.
Blink 5 – In a liquid world, we all become active participants.
Digitalization does not only change how art and culture are made. It also changes the old roles of creators and users.
First, digitalization and the idea of culture as software change the role of cultural creators. An author who publishes texts digitally in an online magazine works differently. They are not like someone writing for a printed magazine. They publish a first version. Then they update and revise it. They also talk with their readers. They answer comments and use them in new versions. They develop ideas from the article further and use them in other works.
The writer’s ‘black box’ where they worked alone becomes a meeting place. The author talks with their readers. They include readers in making the text. This makes readers active participants.
The work itself is never finished. You can download, save, and print it at any time. But this is always just a snapshot. Every new user comment creates a new version.
In the digital world, art and culture become a shared project. One example is the Bundesgit experiment. Software developer Stefan Wehrmeyer started it. It explores how software tools can be used for making laws. For example, it asks: ‘How can we make changes to laws clear and easy to follow using version control systems?’ and ‘How can we let citizens take part in this process?’
Some thinkers believe that this development will go even further. The author Douglas Rushkoff talks about ‘Shared Thinking’. This is a way of expanding awareness. It could develop in the future because of digital networks. We cannot yet know what its effects will be.
Blink 6 – In a liquid world, we need new ways of thinking and acting.
Especially in older groups, digitalization is often seen as a danger. They think it will destroy what has worked for decades. But this change can also be a chance. It can open up new possibilities.
Old art and culture places, like publishers and galleries, are used to selling an artwork. They see it as the product of a genius artist. For them, it is a special, valuable, one-of-a-kind item. They do not like transparency, copying, or further editing. These things challenge their old ways of thinking and doing business.
We urgently need to change how we think. The new rules are already here. If you do not adapt, you will lose importance over time. You might need help or money to survive.
But we all need to learn this new way of thinking. We are in the digital world. But our minds still follow old patterns. For example, a Word document acts like a digital piece of paper. It still follows the idea of a typewriter. It does not fully use the chances of the digital world.
Our ‘liquid’ culture needs people to edit texts at the same time. They also need to see how texts change over time. This new way of thinking must become real for us.
But if we adopt these new ways of thinking, new possibilities open up. Wikipedia shows this. What works well there would fail in the analog world. For example, unfinished texts, ‘under construction’ signs, or no official person to approve changes. What would cause chaos in the analog world works in the digital world. It is time to greatly change how we think and act. This will help us use the good chances of digitalization.
Blink 7 – In a liquid world, experience and dialogue are key.
What successful new thinking in the ‘liquid’ world means can be seen in the story ‘Pumuckl and the First Snow’. The little goblin carries loads of snow into his master’s warm workshop. Each time he comes back from outside with a new cart, he is sad to find no snow left.
What he does not see: The snow is not gone. It has turned into water while he was away. Just like Pumuckl, we must learn to see this process and deal with it.
Here are five ideas to help us:
First, think of the product as a process. This means the journey becomes the goal. For example, a band can livestream the first parts of a new, unfinished song to their fans. This way, they can get feedback.
Second, this creates experiences. Like in a football game, the journey to the goal can be the most exciting part of a work. The final result is no longer the most important thing.
Third, artists and cultural workers must stop working alone. They need to talk and keep their audience updated. Like Dirk von Gehlen, who regularly told his supporters about his project’s progress, this conversation can inspire everyone.
This kind of talk is also the first step to create a network. In this network, like-minded people can talk through chat or comments. The creator finds their new role here as a go-between.
Finally, a meeting place should be opened. All interested people can enter this place while a work is being made. The doors of an art studio or music studio should not just open when a work is finished. They should be open to everyone from the start.
Summary
The main message of this book is:
Digitalization changes art and culture in big ways. Art and cultural works become liquid. They can always change shape. The process of making them becomes a key part of the whole work. So, the ways of thinking that are needed to be active in art and culture will also change.
What you can do:
Share your work.
If you let others freely change, copy, remix, and mash up your work, you are already part of tomorrow’s art and culture world.
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To read more: Network Thinking by Ulrich Weinberg
Network Thinking describes a new way of thinking. It moves from linear thinking to connected thinking. This is because connected ideas are needed to solve the challenges of our digital world. This new way of thinking breaks down old limits. It brings different fields together. This creates space for new ideas and chances.
Source: https://www.blinkist.com/https://www.blinkist.com/de/books/eine-neue-version-ist-verfugbar-de