May 98
After a hard night debating about infowar, 
I have the following dream:

The Data Dandy

The data dandy is wearing his finest embroidered coat 
and his favourite wig. We sit at the lunch table in a 
famous café of the day. We are by the river and but it 
might as well be Venice. 

The data dandy is wining and dining, charming to your 
demure. He says many fine words, and you cannot help 
but pick up your glass and drink with him, flush at 
his remarks. It is as if the sun has come in through 
the window  to caress your skin and the light is 
so pure and so soft.

He points to his sleeve, a fine cotton underneath 
a linen brocade. The linen brocade is pulled up 
slightly to reveal the tender white which has little 
pillows sewn onto it. He pulls one off with a silky 
ribbon and shows its dreamy underbelly into which 
embroidered sentances have been inscribed. "You are 
as beautiful as your heart" Tugging another, it reads 
"I am yours forever" whilst on the next is written 
"In time we will be together for all time."

You wander the stone streets of this regal city until 
next you meet. The stench of the river is masked by 
perfume carriers and your heady flushing heart leads 
you back to the café. You are surprised to be dinning 
with the dandy and his mother. A buxom stern woman, 
from whose left side you can barely feel the glow of 
your proposing lover. 

As the formal conversation draws to its end the mother 
leaves the table to call for a coach. The data dandy 
smiles at you and sits momentarily by your side. He 
buries his head in your heaving busom and gives it 
a deep kiss. You cannot help but hold his head there 
a moment whilst you try not to drown. The suffocation 
is tremendous, for such a kiss is so exquisite and yet
so untrue. He sits opposite you again smiling and begins 
to roll up his sleeve, unveiling the pillows hidden 
beneath. Tugging the ribbons and letting his wonderful 
words fall free you are struck by how they could be 
written to any other. Your name is not inscribed, 
rather it implied by structure. The data dandy is a 
trope, a generic gentleman of words inviting you with 
romantic rhetoric. You let yourself speak  and you say 
"speak my name".

"Lower your voice" the data dandy snarls. You look at 
this man, shaking free of your desire and continue to 
question "where are we going?" The dandy is looking 
embarassed "be quiet" he says. He turns and looks after 
his mother, "wait here" he says and turns away. You see 
the bus that has entered the back of the café. You 
realise that you are to be lost. 

You see the crystal glass of the window and listen to 
the water lapping below. Unsure by which compulsion, 
you jump out of the window and into the cold water. 
Your skirts pull you  below the surface and so 
weighed you look up to the canal's edge. 

A group of people are looking back at you, holding 
linen purses on long bamboo poles. They are the 
saviours for the river jumpers: the linen purses so 
designed to be thrust into your throat and draw poison. 
You keep looking up, watching how peacefully the 
figures are dispersed, dismembered by the waves.

Meanwhile…four years ago……

An extract from the essay 
"Mark Pauline and the SRL experience."
Oct 1994
Zina Kaye


It is interesting that (SRL) could, with such timing 
and equipment at hand, uncover the fears of their 
contemporaries, yet what place really does all this 
technological vaudaville take in the grand scheme 
of things? Is such skill based in the structure of our
time or does SRL have a critical plan?

Mark Pauline is part data dandy, part saint, and 
part little boy. On one hand he uses SRL to promote 
the example of a system that has no financial 
motivation, that is not co-opted into the social 
contract and that can survive on its own terms. The 
performances, then, keep the circle going by 
attracting more people, equipment and motivation.  
This is a practical example of the form of 
Autonomous Zone discussed by Hakim Bey. On the 
other hand one could argue that he is self-absorbed 
with his own collection of information and without 
true critical standpoint, "the data dandy proves 
what everybody already knows: that information is 
omnipresent, but not freely available. Certain facts 
are very decorative, and you have to develop a 
good nose for that."* 

* Geert Lovink, "Sovereign Media and the Data Dandy. Two Fragments of ADILKNO's Media Theory", The 5th International Symposium on Electronic Art, University of Art and Design Helsinki UIAH, Helsinki 1994, pp142.