Home is where my archive is

Sigthorsson, Gauti (2008) Home is where my archive is. In: Screen Studies Conference, 2008, University of Glasgow, Scotland. (Unpublished)

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Abstract

The miniaturization and dissemination of audiovisual media into small, mobile assemblages of cameras,
screens and microphones has brought "database cinema" (Manovich) into pockets and handbags. In turn,
this micro-portability of video production calls for a reconsideration of database cinema, not as an aesthetic
but rather as a media ecology that makes certain experiences and forms of interaction possible. In this
context the clip and the fragment become a social currency (showing, trading online, etc.), and the
enjoyment of a moment or "occasion" becomes an opportunity for recording, extending, preserving and
displaying. If we are now the documentarists of our lives (as so many mobile phone adverts imply), it
follows that we are also our own archivists as well. From the folksonomies of Flickr and YouTube to the
slick "media centres" of Sony, Apple and Microsoft, the audiovisual home archive is a prized territory of
struggle among platforms and brands. The database is emerging as the dominant (screen) medium of
popular creativity and distribution – but it also brings the categories of "home" and "person" closer to that
of the archive.

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