PRESS RELEASE 09/10/98
Lottery Award for Street-Level Net AccessTwo years ago Sheffield's skips and dumpsters started to receive uninvited attention. The scavengers responsible called themselves "Redundant Technology Initiative" - a group of artists interested in technology, but who couldn't afford even the cheapest high street computer deals. Knowing that high-tech businesses in the UK scrap more than a million computers every year, they looked in the trash - and found fully functional machines! Redundant Technology Initiative have gone on to receive national attention for their innovative art installations made with hundreds of junk computers. Now the Lottery's Art 4 Everyone scheme has agreed to fund a two-year project to get their trailing-edge technology on line so that other people can use it too. The project, called Access Space, will open in Sheffield's growing Cultural Industries Quarter in the Spring of 1999. It's all about helping people to explore and create with computers, and express themselves on the world wide web. Access Space will be a completely new kind of social space for the city - a meeting place, a net access centre, a technology workshop and an art studio all rolled into one. The project is modelled on backspace, a unique, informal technology centre that's been running in London for the last couple of years. backspace has attracted over two thousand users - artists, activists, hackers, slackers, DJs, downshifters, musicians, writers, campaigners, punks, poets, pensioners and many more - just about anyone with something to say. Now Redundant Technology Initiative aims to attract a similarly wide range of people to Sheffield's own low-tech net access centre. With all of the high-tech hype surrounding the internet it's easy to forget that the system was designed back in the 1970's - so you can connect with almost any computer, given a little ingenuity. And ingenuity is just what Redundant Technology Initiative have to offer. Redundant Technology Initiative are delighted by the Lottery's support for their low cost, "banger racing" approach to computer use. All too often projects involving technology are like the Grand Prix - great to watch, but so expensive that only an elite few ever get to do the driving. Access Space on the other hand, will concentrate on the Ford Escorts, not the Formula Ones of the computer world, helping many more people to get behind the wheel. The project relies on the generosity and good sense of businesses that are upgrading their computer systems. Right now thousands of machines are languishing in corridors and storerooms, too good to throw away, but no good for the latest programs. Access Space is the perfect opportunity to put them to really good use. So if there's an old computer cluttering up your office, then call James at Redundant Technology Initiative on (0114) 2495522 - the project will take it off your hands and give it a new lease of life.
Contact: James Wallbank <- lowtech |
