… this is the so-called blog of Arie Altena. I write about new media, art, internet-culture, media-theory, literature &c. for various magazines and publications. I work as editor/researcher for V2_ in Rotterdam: http://www.v2.nl; I am part of the team that organizes the Sonic Acts festival: http://www.sonicacts.com. Occasionally I teach at an arts academy or university. A few times a year I am invited to give a lecture on subject related to new media, literature, contemporary art, media theory &c. I serve as chairman of the board of Foundation 2 which is in charge of the concert series DNK-Amsterdam: http://www.dnk-amsterdam.com, and I was a member of the committee for the Fonds BKVB: http://www.fondsbkvb.nl. Sometimes I do a translation job (GB-NL and GE-NL).

A sort of archive of my published writing can be found at http://www.xs4all.nl/~ariealt.

I studied Literary Theory at the University of Amsterdam and spent 4 years there as a PhD-student, working on American postmodernist literature. I never finished my PhD because at the time (1994) the WWW and HTML were far more exciting, and I became involved with new media and the internet.

I worked for Mediamatic, http://www.mediamatic.net for a long time — still feel a strong connection to them.

I also work/worked for Metropolis M, the Dutch magazine for contemporary art, http://www.metropolism.org.

I co-organized Sonic Acts X, XI, XII, XIII and XIV http://www.sonicacts.com, and the Kontraste festival 2011 and 2012. I also edited five books for Sonic Acts, as well as two for Kontraste.

And much more, of course.

In 2006 I was a researcher at the Jan van Eyck Academy in Maastricht, http://www.janvaneyck.nl, where my research on the transformation of writing amongst serious bloggers is part of the Ubiscribe-research: http://www.ubiscribe.net. I am continuing this research.

I live in Amsterdam. I play guitar & banjo in Oorbeek, http://www.oorbeek.net.

It goes without saying that on this blog I write about anything that catches my attention. Including blogging.

And cycling.

Actually, mostly cycling at the moment.

In 2006 I decided to write in (international) English; before that I used my native language, Dutch. Although I feel more at home in Dutch, I continue blogging in English; being under the impression (delusion?) I have a small international audience…

In 2011 I decided to use Dutch as the main language, for the simple reason that I enjoy writing in Dutch better than writing in English, and also because in my professional & private life I’m using English so much, that also blogging in English tips the balance off too much.

Please note that although I have accounts at Facebook, Twitter and the like, I hardly use those services, if at all.

E-mails to ariealt[at]xs4all.nl please.