At a spring conference on ad design here in Toronto, advice from keynote experts was unanimous:

This is a multimedia piece. For full effect please have this song playing while you read the article. - Annie.

During the afternoon of July 25th, the Design Exchange and the organizers of DigiFest 2008 ran their first charrette of a series that will spur innovative thinking around our treatment of water. The challenge of the day, admittedly rather misnamed í¢â‚¬Å“Adapting to Water Disastersí¢â‚¬  gathered 30 or so of Torontoí¢â‚¬â„¢s most creative thinkers to focus on imagining possible solutions to major catastrophic anomalies that the world could not have anticipated. I was happy to have been fortunate enough to participate.

Annie Spencer

Whenever I voice my attention to some new obscure thing, it surprises me when whoever is listening scrubs it off by saying, í¢â‚¬Å“oh, well thatí¢â‚¬â„¢s normalí¢â‚¬ . Their retort has a way of padding my newly perceived anomaly as an already-realized standard that somehow I had missed. Equally parsed and relieved by their statement, my own wonderment soon drowns in that personí¢â‚¬â„¢s perception of í¢â‚¬Ëœstandardí¢â‚¬â„¢. If this thing seems to be so anomalous to me, then just what is normal to you?

Annie Spencer is a new media poet and experience designer living life beyond its margins and writing postcards home about it. Her current artistic practice is dedicated to an expansive game-story approach to trans-media, narrating and curating powerful questions with a unique sense of possibility.

Please find the articles for our rewind issue below with guest curator Jesse Scott, and articles for our new issue Anomalies above.

Ok, so here I am. at a particular place at a particular time. situated. and we are talking about, exploring this idea of rewind. where to begin?... where I am now. Where to go?.. well, backwards.

Eg.: I remember the 1st time I heard about Capital Magazine: [still think it's the best afro i ever actually saw in person [wow, how's that for a provincial attitude..!?] ] Is that a rewind? A displacement? Where does memory fit into this? We must seek [how's that for bridging themes, eh?], scan, toggle, journey towards a deciphering of this concept... but it is confused. as with any large meme, there are evocations, multiplicities of meaning...

In a recent interview on Roots People , dubstep pioneer and sonic theorist Kode9, in the midst of speaking about the architectures of proliferation in regards to dubstep and its international growth, mentions three cities: London, and the infamous FWD Nightclub where Kode 9 performs and hosts as a resident DJ, New York, where Joe Fresh - Kode9 calls him "the president of dubstep!" - acts as America's ambassador to the sound, and Vancouver, where he played the Konspiracy Group's FWD001 (and yes, they named the concert series separately from the London Club) show back in 2003.

Some points of contention (you thought we would have answers by now? but we are traveling backwards - how can we?!?!):

Introducing the REWIND Curator Jesse Scott - aka metre, aka CineCitta. Jesse is a media artist, curator, promoter, and theorist working from Vancouver, BC. He regularly curates and programs with the memelab, New Forms Festival, NTSC, and the Balcone Arts Society.

Jesse works within many stylistic domains, in the context of live performance, recorded, and installation-based art. His work is preoccupied with the crossover of sound and listening practice with radical political gesture, with the autonomy of the image and sovereignty from recuperation, and the political role of the artist. As a writer, Jesse Scott has had text appear on soundsimple.ca, WOO magazine and VJTheory.net among others.

Everything below here is from the SEEK issue of Mash. Check out REWIND with Mash Curator Jesse Scott.