About This Site

Derivative Works is a weblog about content on the internet.

Content? What do you mean?

Published things. Everything on

Flickr , pushed through

weblogs , appropriated from

newspapers . Our instant message

conversations . The stuff we post on Ebay. Everything on craigslist. The stuff that starts offline and wends its way online. Everything.

Isn't that a little broad?

Yes, and that's the point. I think that the millions of people who publish content on the internet are really just artists. And the amazing emerging tools that are being launched to serve them are art implements. And that there are precious few people calling this out.

There are lots of sites that do a great job of informing us about the business of technology, sites that meme us on the new applications and widgets, and sites that show us how to use the stuff.

There's also a robust press centered on the art world covering art created by artists. What I'm interested in is documenting what's happening with the rest of us, the ones just making stuff without naming it or naming it inadaquently. Blogs are really collage, and when we quote other blogs and newspaper clippings and mix them with our thoughts we're creating new art. When we collect images and mix them together with images from people all over the world, we're making art. Wireless communities are salons. et cetera.

Me, too.

This site is also personal. I want to name this stuff, and document it, in part so that I can make sense of what I've been doing for the past four years with my own art. Here's more.