Stories in Digital Media (SIDM) was a blog run by a few students and the professor Frieder Nake, part of the former Digital Media programme in the state of Bremen, Germany. By the end of the first decade of the millennium, the web and digital technology were advancing at an unprecedented pace in the social and artistic sphere. Developments were exciting, and we kept a log of some events and took time to reflect.

What you see here is a rendition of the content as it was back then, in a different, static archival representation. Enjoy this glimpse into a hopeful and exciting past.

Stuff that may be relevant for the Digital Media programme in Bremen.

A Vision of Students Today

· Katja Langeland · in Rant
Some ambitious thoughts at the beginning of the new Year: While I was sorting my old mails and mailinglists, I happened to come across an older post of the German Thesis E.V. Mailinglist recommending this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dGCJ46vyR9o
Here is the Link for follow up discussions they mention at the end: Revisiting “A Vision of Students Today”   I think, even though American conditions are shown in the video, a lot of the mentioned facts are probably directly transferable to German or International circumstances. At the moment, I am reassessing what I did during my studies (since I am now so close to finish it), what I could have done better, what I might have helped change. It occurs to me, that I of course could have tried harder, especially when it comes to collaborations with the students' union executive committee (ASTA, StugA) and alike organisations. I always avoided those for the strangest and most simple reasons. Sometimes, I get angry about myself, because there are people like me who want to change things in their course of study for the better. Every time I tried (alone or in a small group), somehow the efforts got lost at some point. I learned one thing in all these years at very different universities: If you do not ask rock-solidly, self-confidently and patiently (plus politely but firmly) over and over again for certain things from your professors as well as from their and our (!!!) administration, nothing will happen or change for the better. Then, the shown implications of the video will get worse, we, the students will drag ourselves down by our own behavior, mediocrity will prevail and extraordinary events that could probably inspire our whole future and becoming will not happen anymore. It was the striving for (positive) distinctiveness and several unique events, created by the exceptional efforts of some professors (and alike) as well as the students, that inspired me along the way. This is the reason why I enjoyed my education so much. This is the reason why we all should aim higher and try harder to save our little paradise of being a student. And we should counteract distractions and obstacles in order to create a good learning environment instead of constructing just a place where we somehow get by in order to gain some stupid degree to earn (possibly more) money with some (brainless) activity. Studying should be more than that. Tough stuff.

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