Simon Ings writes:
Before we knuckle down and write some proper promo copy for our next Arc, Forever alone drone, I thought it might be fun to give you the back-room story about how this edition came about.
Due out next week, Forever alone drone emerged out of a couple of interests. Sumit (editor of New Scientist and my boss) has been wanting to play with drones for a while and has been gnawing his leg off, watching all the world get into print about this before he does.
This gave us a connection to drone-wielding part-time terror suspect Liam Young, who’s been playing recently with Bruce Sterling, Warren Ellis et al on a model city of the future to rival the famous New York World’s Fair Democracity exhibit.
We’re interested in how a surveillance city has a playful, as well as a repressive side. (Maureen McHugh’s style of pervasive gaming uses satellite shadows in its gameplay sometimes.) And how surveillance may, after all, become ‘sousveillance’ (to use David Brin’s word) – a watching of those in power by the many.
So, while according due weight to the terrifying possibilities of drone culture we’ve used Arc’s winter issue, Forever alone drone, to reveal some of the other possibilities too, and we’ve used the idea of remote action to explore a dizzying array of strange landscapes: the tunnels under the world, the white-light corridors of near-death, ice-clad digital fortresses, outer space – even Canada.
Follow this blog for further news and visit arcfinity.org to buy the first three Arcs, formatted for tablets, e-readers, phones and computer screens, and in a collectible print edition. All three issues are now also available in DRM free e-Pub format from Google Play.
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