Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
NAMAland on one level exists as a mobile app which over-layered the city
with a contextual data layer re-presenting the city as a network of property and
interconnected financial transactions which have bankrupt a nation. The ambition
for the project was that it move beyond a purely oppositional stance. Generalised
protest had at this stage been normalised and was easily countered by a narrative
which invoked the need to move forward and rebuild, for change to come from the
crisis it seemed necessary to set the agenda and shape that change. This is the benefit
of a data-led approach, because of the specificity of the data-informed critique the
alternative narrative is immanent to the critique itself.
Through data and the locational immediacy of AR NAMAland sought to recount
a narrative of the city which ran counter to the official version, through revealing,
contextualising and crucially locating the NAMA data in the space of the city and
letting the users' perform their own interpretation and form their own analysis. In
this data-built account the data established the foundation and the narrative was
constructed, not by the artist, but through this act of participation. Themes which
emerged from the project were the question of data transparency in particular
the need for NAMA data be made available for public scrutiny, and the demand
for vacant NAMA properties to be made available for community use. These
themes, which were central to the project's public events, were widely taken up
at a community, activist, academic and ultimately at a political level resulting in
substantive changes to the situation.
4.6
Open Data
NAMAland was built on open data which was augmented with location information,
in turn this data inspired further projects demonstrating the power of data to
enable a myriad of approaches and interventions from mobile apps to occupations
(Fig. 4.5 ). In late 2011 I came into contact with groups associated with the Dublin
Occupy movement who were at the time interested in extending their campaign
into occupation of NAMA buildings. This was a research-based project which
stressed the accuracy of their data. The focus of their campaign was to call for
the unlocking of a public resource for community and social usage so it was vital
that their targets were correctly identified. The campaign was built on NAMAland
data augmented with additional research. Their campaign resulting in a series of
short lived occupations beginning in January 2012 which highlighting the fact that
many NAMA properties were vacant and decaying due to neglect while there was a
shortage of affordable space for community groups. A secondary guerilla program
of identifying NAMA properties through affixing banners to their exterior was
begun which once more drew attention to the neglect of these properties calling
for them to be made available to social and community groups. These became
part of the general conversation on NAMA and have achieved results, both through
foregrounding the issues of NAMA properties and their usage and in opening access
to properties.
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