Question:

Does the internet’s physical global infrastructure directly (or at least indirectly) benefit from any ecosystem services? Can it? How?

Inspiration:

1. Evan Roth, “Internet Landscapes“
2. Trevor Paglen, “Deep Web Dive“
3. Gustavo Romano’s “Madonna, Water Maps, & Botannical Gardens” essay (from Net Art Latino Database)
   • Building off the idea of “technological determinism” (the internet attention economy as the market which decides what content survives and what disappears forever)…
   • “The digital medium makes no allowance for marking the passage of time… either it’s here or it’s gone.” … Can these digital cultural assets be sustained by making sure the internet itself is built on a sustainable infrastructure?
4. Niklas Roy, “Pneumatic Computing – Flop or Future?“

Approaches:

1. Mapping
   • Map the major cables/hubs of internet infrastructure across the world
   • Map the ecosystems in these areas and the accompanying local services in use
   • Identify matching supplies and demands among these two global systems
   • Present maps/diagrams visualizing how the services would interact at a local level
     • For an audience of internet users most-likely oblivious to its physical infrastructure and to the concept and complexity of ecosystem services
2. Research
   • Learn what comprises the internet’s physical infrastructure
     • What natural resources does it demand?
       • How are these resources sustained through ecosystem services in other systems?
     • How does it connect to the power grid / other infrastructures?
     • How does one come up with / discover new ecosystem services that can be taken advantage of?
     • Present this research as raw documentation
       • For an audience of internet users most-likely oblivious to its physical infrastructure and to the concept and complexity of ecosystem services
3. “Design fiction”
   • Inspired by Niklas Roy’s project above, the proposed question can be: how can the internet infrastructure be restructured to incorporate existing ecosystem services?
   • Learn what comprises the internet’s physical infrastructure and identify alternatives involving existing ecosystem services
   • Presentation can be in the form of a video, a series of images (photoshopped, CG, illustrations)
     • For an audience of internet users most-likely oblivious to its physical infrastructure and to the concept and complexity of ecosystem services