The New York Times reported yesterday on a nifty net art project called AddArt. The concept is simple: replace annoying online ads with works of art. Here’s a sample of the article:
Steve Lambert, a conceptual artist, plans to add his own twist to one type of software that blots out commercial messages. His add-on will replace the display ads — which are usually papered over with blank windows — with curator-picked artwork from contemporary artists.
On a recent afternoon, Mr. Lambert demonstrated a test version of AddArt at the Chelsea studios of Eyebeam, a nonprofit arts and technology center where he has a fellowship. Mr. Lambert opened the Fox News Web site on his computer, and both the banner ad at the top of the page and a rectangular ad on the bottom were replaced with a bald eagle illustration. (He is using stock art rather than original work at this point, which can be downloaded from www.addart.eyebeam.org.)
Mr. Lambert, 30, said he and Evan Harper, an artist, are not starting from scratch, but rather were modifying the program Adblock Plus. “ Why reinvent the wheel when you can insert a gear and make it run backwards?” said Mr. Lambert.
There are a couple things that strike me about this project. Obviously, this isn’t an optimal platform for showing “work”, but it does create an amazing opportunity for satire in places where an opportunity might not otherwise exist. So it isn’t going to compete with the traditional gallery, but like most net art, that isn’t the goal. I think the real power of this is the ability to change the way ads show up on particular sites. The stars and stripes demo is a good example of this, turning the Fox News home page into a Colbert-esqe satire. It reminds me a bit of the Evil Google Logo greasemonkey script.
The biggest hurdle with this type of project is not getting artists to create work for it, because a handful of people can do a lot. The tough part is building an audience to actually use and enjoy it. While viewing more art on the web is a great idea, there might need to be more to it than just a few replaced banner ads here and there. What incentive do users have to use it? For practical purposes, this should really become an option within AdBlock Plus, since that software has an established userbase that is already hostile to ads and may be receptive to something else.
I’m also a skeptical because in some ways the Aat is just as distracting, if not more, than the advertising it is replacing. It is just a different take on what spyware is already doing… replacing ads with those of competitors. This software is just a bit more up front, and the competitors have more of an altruistic intent.
Finally, it is just a little laugh worthy that the NYT reported on a piece of software that could potentially deprive them of ad revenue. That is the name of the game on the web, though, and maybe someone in the NYT gets it.
Also, check out The Anti-Advertising Agency. They’ve done some pretty interesting projects, AddArt is just one getting press treatment right now.
There’s something a little… I dunno… not quite right about the eagle on teh Fox News page. It’s like there couldn’t have been a more appropriate image selection for a page already as hyper-Americanized as it could be.
Comment by taylor — May 15, 2007 @ 3:02 pm
Just wanted to drop a note that I am thinking similarly about these issues and planning with them in mind. Adblocking extensions are the #1 most popular extensions for Firefox. AdBlockPlus has been downloaded millions of times. The potential audience from just a fraction of those users is huge, not to mention that new users in the art community. You are right, getting those users to choose to look at art instead of blank space is one of the challenges. Also, for what it’s worth, right now it looks like AddArt will work in conjunction with AdBlockPlus. A good sign…
If you want any more info, let me know.
Steve Lambert
Comment by Steve Lambert — May 15, 2007 @ 11:15 pm
@Steve - I read about your project on the Make blog (probably as Justin was writing) and immediately wondered how customizable the “artwork repository” would be? The Walker helps run a site for Minnesota artists, mnartists.org, which is full of new work from photos to painting to sculpture — and I’ve got code written that could provide custom sizes of the images. That is, banners, etc… The only downside is I’m not sure the server is up for the load that would be put on it from thousands and thousands of image hits– are you imagining hosting the artwork somewhere? Or do you have something else in mind entirely for seeding the artwork?
Cool project!
Comment by Nate Schroeder — May 16, 2007 @ 6:03 am
The extension should simply point to some images on a server hosted at Eyebeam. The artwork respository should be very customizeable, because it will be on the server (not seeded). If you wanted to do something with the artists from mnartists.org, you could propose a show or modify the extension and make your own. As far as server load, small images shouldn’t be too hard on it. We thought about ways the images could be downloaded once and held locally, but at this point I don’t think that will work. We’re also looking at ways the images could be cached by the browser so they will be downloaded less often.
Comment by Steve Lambert — May 17, 2007 @ 6:54 am
@Steve - We’ve got the same interest as the Walker. We’d love to make a Brooklyn Museum modified extension perhaps to show the work in the Feminist Art Base or our Collection images.
Comment by Shelley Bernstein — May 21, 2007 @ 10:02 am
@Shelly - Email me and when things get rolling we’ll work it out. In fact, anyone with anything that could be called a “curatorial concept” should get in touch. We should be assembling a calendar later this year.
Comment by Steve Lambert — May 24, 2007 @ 10:36 pm
[...] caught up with Steve about a year ago in the comments on the Walker’s post about the application and mentioned the Museum would be interested in contributing images to the [...]
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