The THINGS that came in from the cold – poem by Matt Harvey
There have always been Things, and the Things there have been
– the simplest tool, the most complex machine –
Did their own private thing, and they did it quite well
But each lived alone in a separate cell
Things were solitary all on their tod, set apart
Until wonder of wonders, one day Things became ‘Smart’
An uppity interweb chappie equipped
Each Thing with its very own Thingummy Chip
And now they’re awake, though they’re not quite sure how
They’ve evolved from ‘just-sat-there’ to ‘smarter-than-thou’
Since each Chip is imbued with an embedded sensor
Their immense potential’s exponentially immenser
It’s almost like sci-fi, they’re au fait with wifi
Can act as a gopher while you loaf on your sofa
Gossiping gadgets and whispering widgets
And all within reach of our fidgeting digits
There’s a linking that’s almost like thinking – but far less confused
There’s a digging for data – though phishing’s politely refused
For if and when mischievous hackery threatens
Things can all be restored to their factory settings
They’re wearably share-ably bridging the gaps
Wirelessly tirelessly – not needing naps
They’re awake on the line between Always and Never
They may not be conscious, but my word they’re clever
You enter a building, it knows who you are
And next to whose Audi you’ve just parked your car
It knows what you’re wearing, it knows where you went
To buy it, what else you bought, how much you spent
Without being untoward or indiscreet,
It knows who’s around that you might like to meet
And it might engineer a chance meeting or two
It’s ever so keen to arrange things for you…
Because Things can now, with due diligent deference
Anticipate your every want, need and preference
Things are sharing our track-able, digital traces
On a need-to-know and a need-not-to-know basis
This audited, ordered, inaudible chorus
Is doing our knowing and not-knowing for us!
BUT, you ask, is this good for my health? – A no-brainer:
Your fridge is in touch with your personal trainer
Your GP’s in the loop with your heart’s smart pace-maker
Which has access – trust me – to all relevant data
From your own un-despicable, biddable minions
Long on loyalty and, thankfully, short on opinions
Who’ll do as they’re told and they’re told SO MUCH MORE
Who – unlike their creators – know what to ignore
Even when sitting there not doing much
They are quietly, busily, keeping in touch
Thing one with Thing two, with Things three, four, five, six
Things seven through ninety-nine join in the mix
In clumps and in clusters, in clubs and in cliques
Each listening in when another Thing speaks
And though it seems slightly numerically gimmicky
Things a hundred to ninety-nine shy of infinity
Yes a Million. Billion, Trillion Things
Join hands – or whatever – and light up and SING!
Your smart whole’s connected to your smart part
Your smart head’s connected to your smart heart
Your smart work’s connected to your smart home
You got the whole world in your phone…
If the signal should weaken an IPv6 booster
Will keep Smart Things speaking – like Jeeves to our Wooster
I’ve heard this Jeeves speak and here’s what he said:
“Don’t trouble your sweet homo sapiens head
If Things get on top of you, don’t fret or fuss
For Ours is the Thingdom – leave it with Us”
The Internet of Things – Matt Harvey
First published in Resurgence Magazine
The Internet of Things by Matt Harvey
There are definite perks to being a poet. You are entitled to gaze at the moon with authoritative longing, to peek into the dark chambers of the world’s most secret heart and read the graffiti stencilled there. You can talk nonsense to your kids. Another is getting to attend conferences where in between singing for one’s supper there are privileged glimpses to be savoured of others’ worlds.
And this is how I came to be commissioned to write about the Internet of Things for a conference on the future of the work place, and find myself high up on level 39 at No. 1 Canary Wharf. It’s so high I accidentally lost touch with everything and everyone I thought I knew. Easy to do.
There have always been Things, and the Things there have been
– the simplest tool, the most complex machine –
Were solitary, all on their tod, set apart
Until wonder of wonders, these Things became ‘Smart’
An uppity interweb chappie equipped
Each Thing with its very own Thingummy Chip
Since each Chip is imbued with an embedded sensor
Their immense potential’s exponentially immenser
The potential I’m referring to here is the loads and loads of info transmitted and absorbed by these Things – what’s called Big Data. And delegates are encouraged to ‘leverage’ this. I hear the word ‘leverage’ used more times in one day than in the previous decade. It is used instead of ‘utilised’ which is utilised instead of ‘used’.
There’s a linking that’s almost like thinking – but far less confused
There’s a digging for data – though phishing’s politely refused
Awake on the line between Always and Never –
Things may not be conscious, but my God they’re clever
You enter a building, it knows who you are
And next to whose Audi you’ve just parked your car
We hear of a building with 10,000 sensors – a Smart Building, that knows how many people are in it, can calibrate heating, lighting and acoustics, and measures both gender balance and the collective mood of the people within, based on biometric facial profiling.
Presenters say things like: ‘You can leverage your existing investment in the network to access this valuable data.’ ‘There are real business outcomes we can leverage. Let’s reach out, engage and drive these business outcomes.’ And even, ‘people are your most important metric’.
At the end of the day we hear from a ‘vibe manager’ who draws a Venn diagram showing the space where Emotional Intelligence, Neuroscience and Mindfulness overlap. The old IQ ‘metric’ is balanced with Emotional Intelligence: EQ and Spiritual Intelligence: SQ. One day, trust me, they’ll merge into one integrated Practical Intelligence: B’n’Q.
If the signal should weaken an IPv6 booster
Will keep Smart Things speaking – like Jeeves to our Wooster
I’ve heard this Jeeves speak and here’s what he said:
“Don’t trouble your sweet homo sapiens head
If Things get on top of you, don’t fret or fuss
For Ours is the Thingdom – leave it with Us”
So my message to you is: don’t worry – or, if you must, worry efficiently with the new iWorry app which itemises your worries and organises them according to their capacity for cortisol leverage. And remember: There’s still no ‘I’ in team, but there’s definitely one in anxiety. And it’s stressed.
Matt Harvey is Regen SW’s poet in Residence – You can read his book The Element in the Room – Poems inspired by renewable energy here
Or you can purchase it online
Composing for Energy Engagement – studies in sm/art infrastructures – PhD Dissertation by Lea Schick
For more information about Lea Schick at Copenhagen University
Abstract
Rising energy consumption, access to fossil fuels, and not least climate issues have put energy infrastructures on the agenda in many parts of the world. How to redesign electricity infrastructures in ways that ensure stable, affordable and ‘clean’ energy production? Denmark has set the ambitious goal to show the world that it is possible to replace all fossil fuels (including for transport and heating) with renewable energy, primarily wind, and thus become CO2–neutral before 2050. An integral part of a ‘green transition’ in Demark, and in many other countries, is a so-called smart grid, which can handle distributed energy production and ensure ‘flexible electricity consumption’. The smart energy infrastructure should ensure that electricity is consumed as the wind blows and it thus designates new forms of involvement of end users. Whereas the current electricity infrastructure has been carefully designed to be invisible, unnoticed, and un-engaging, a green transition will most likely make energy more visible and one of the major challenges proves to be how to re-design for more and for ‘the right’ kinds of energy engagement. This challenge is not only taken up by engineers and policy planers, but also by artists and designers.
This thesis investigates different experimental cases within Danish smart grid planning and within art and design. Each case raises the issue of engagement differently. Grounded in science and technology studies (STS) energy engagement is here taken to be a dynamic and changeable ‘thing’ emerging through socio-technical relations and infrastructural environments. As the different cases ‘compose’ relations between people, energy, infrastructures, and environmental issues differently, they make possible specific kinds of engagement and not others. It is the specific compositions of energy engagement and their potentiality that is central to this dissertation.
In concert with a growing body of literature within social science and humanities the dissertation seeks to expand approaches to energy that mainly focus on its technological and economic aspects. Instead, passing through the notion of engagement the dissertation is concerned with broadening our analytical and practical understanding of energy. Taking seriously the urgent need for radical energy transitions the main contribution of the dissertation is to describe and analyze and to move between various attempts to ‘speed up’ and ‘slow down’ reasoning in cases of composing energy infrastructures. The dissertation highlights how energy can engage both engineers and artists, and illustrates the importance of keeping very different actors in the picture if the goal is to stay open and experimental with regards to which kinds of future energy engagements and sm/art infrastructures are possible and desirable.
https://pure.itu.dk/portal/files/80690822/PhD_Dissertation_by_Lea_Schick_final_version_.pdf
Thank you to Patrick Devine-Wright Professor of Human geography at University of Exeter for this link.
