The Container a means of technological repatriation

 

The container a unit of transportation, distributing large quantities of collective and individual Gross Domestic Products. A dogma in the industrial revolution.

 

The Container Project is a non-profit mobile access space to new technology for marginalise urban and rural communities linking them to their heritage and cultural backbone. It has a simple basis - it gives artists / marginalise groups open access to computer equipment also acting as an un-intimidating point of contact for new users.

 

The project is about helping people to explore and create with computers, and express themselves on the world wide web. The project will create a completely new kind of socially interactive space - a virtual meeting place, a net access centre and technology workshop linking migrant communities to their roots.

 

We are seeking donations and sponsorship (computers and accessories) for this project. The container will be offering advice technical support and solutions, training preparation for further education or DIY- media. The project, will be launched in September 1999.

 

The Container is the term used to describe a mobile work station that exists primarily to provide simplified access to information technology about topics that are distributed over a number of different applications. The Container project is aiming to put some 15+ computers, an internet server, portable power generators and other equipment in a specially converted container unit this will form the core of a roving multimedia centre. The Container will work with local and international collaborators and artists to produce a series of multimedia workshops. At the most basic level the Container will function as a link to new media resources, at a more advanced level it will provide considerable added value and training to source information. Giving access to underprivileged people will be one of its primary initiative. The majority of the workshops that will be done will centres on developing and implementing community projects, either on its own initiative or in partnership with others.

 

The project is about giving people a taster of the newer technologies. It's about fostering the creative abilities of people and continuing to distribute their values into the millennium, to help sustain this contemporary culture clash, of which Jamaica is one of the loudest cultural producers of the last fifty years, and have been chosen as the first country to embark on.

 

The overall idea is to set up a series of multimedia workshops in several locations across Jamaica and have simultaneous lineups with workshops in the UK. The main objective of these workshops are to facilitate the idea of alternative networking between the Caribbean islands and Europe. Creating a Do-It-Yourself medium through the use of computers and new technology.

 

The metaphor the Container leads us to consider two main functions. The Container can be used as a unit through which we exports new initiatives into regions that would otherwise be inaccessible and introduce people to the means of new technology. It can also function as a carrier that import not just banana but the wealth of cultural diversity that exist in these otherwise inaccessible communities.

 

There is an economic benefit to making it easier for people to buy locally but of course there is also an economic benefit in promoting Marketing to the wider world. The Container is aiming to support both these functions. Conventions within the Container will try to make life easier and more productive for users.

 

The Container will provide all services and information on whatever resources we manage to secure for use by local people to develop their own home pages, clubs, on-line business and shops. It will provide services that are free at the point of use.

 

Interactive Collaboration on the Container project will foster the creation of exciting and innovative work. The project's aim is to address an implication of the new technology: The need for understanding its principles and day-to-day practice, and the development of a sensitivity to its visual language and cultural implications. This implies an exposure to a range of representative systems and theoretical underpinning, a development of the individual's artistic and creative abilities within and extended by the technology.

 

Giving people the means to turn their situation around, by working productively with computers. It's about fostering the creative abilities of people and redistributing their values as it affects global culturalization and Empowerment. To give access to people in the many inner city / rural isolated communities and facilitating the need for them to show that they can contribute to the future, that they will have a place in the millennium.

 

The other aspect of the project is a web site that will both precede the physical aspect of the work and provide its platform on the internet. The Container Web Site is the first stage of the project being launched in April, this will put in place a comprehensive, internet access point to provide a focus through which the material, procedural, technical and cultural dynamics of Diaspora and of globalisation can be investigated.

 

The Container Web site will become the main on-line point of entry to the margins and as such its image and style is important to everyone. Given that it caters for no particular market segment it should probably aim to be as neutral as possible but provide for easy user customisation.

 

The Immediate task is to find Sponsorship and Voluntary contributions from European/UK - based companies, organisations and groups, to support and supply computer hardware and software and resources for the project.

 

The Container project is supported by IANI media, Mongrel, Escape, Computer Access and The Arts Council of England.

 

For more information on how you can help or participate please contact - mervin@mongrel.or.uk or 0181 552 2698 or visit the website at http://www.container.access-it.or.uk

Timetable

Task	Dates
Web site Launch stage 1 Project Fund raising and promotions Project set-up stage Participatory Project work Project Launch stage 2 Artist Collaboration Programme	April 1999 April - August 1999 June - August 1999 July - August 1999 September 1999 September 1999 - ..........

 

 

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