The exercise of subjectivity in the assessment of any publication is one of the more satisfying — and risky — activities of the art librarian (and, one suspects, of other specialists librarians). — Clive Phillpot

Submissions of works and/or articles are welcome. Drop a line to s [at] silviolorusso [dot] com. As materiality matters, donations of physical artifacts are very appreciated. Here’s a form including all the necessary information.

At the moment P—DPA is a side project, so a reply might take some time. Please be patient.

Criteria

Works should inherently address or anticipate one or more aspects of publishing and one or more aspects of digital technology according to the following categories.

• Tools, modes of production, design (e.g. DTP, crowdsourcing, Print on demand)
• Digital features (e.g. DRM, Internet, database)
• Devices (e.g. computer, e-reader)
• Distribution, dissemination, appropriation, intervention (e.g. remix, plagiarism, download)
• Categorization, archiviation, organization, structure (e.g. ISBN, tags, metadata, index)
• Bookness, bookform, book as object (e.g. skeuomorphism, binding, book as prop)
• Spaces and rituals related to books and publishing (e.g. online store, bookshop, library)
• Book typologies (encyclopedia, catalog, magazine)

Inherence

In order to be included in the archive, a work, through its own nature, should actively question, highlight or reframe constitutive aspects of publishing in the post-digital age. Of course, this perspective on the works holds a level of ambiguity that is the result of the unique identity of the archive, which point of view is ultimately subjective. Inherence is a fluid criterion in a dialectic relationship with the digital environment.

Anticipation

An experimental project that predates the universal spread of digital technology shouldn’t be excluded from the archive a priori. P-DPA applies a “post-digital gaze” to experiences that, more or less consciously, anticipate modalities of the digital age. As an example, several “network-enabling”counterculture magazines could be considered as tangible expressions of what would later become known as the blogosphere. It is no coincidence that Steve Jobs described the Whole Earth Catalog as a sort of «Google in paperback form, 35 years before Google came along».