4 ms·

As a demoscener, I think this cool (though maybe also a bit useless). But the thing this highlights to me now is how weird it is that UNESCO heritage lists are

As a demoscener, I think this cool (though maybe also a bit useless). But the thing this highlights to me now is how weird it is that UNESCO heritage lists are per country. The design seems wholly unsuited to any sort of culture that has emerged after the invention of global communication networks such as the internet. IIRC demoscene is already recognized as UNESCO heritage in Finland and Germany, what are we going to do, go down the list of every country that ever produced more than a few demos? I mean of course none of this matters, because there's not really any tangible benefit to one's hobby being on a list like this, but it's still kinda funky. As if culture stops at country borders.

w_TF 2y ago
also not very punk rock to crave validation from unesco
makeitdouble 2y ago
Would it help if you tried to have a demo class at a community center and could point at the UNESCO decision to get proper handling and shut down the "kids these days" arguments ?
DoingIsLearning 2y ago
The biggest benefit is in bringing legitimacy to preservation efforts and curation of historic records (photos, videos, data, binaries, sources) on the history of the Demoscene. There is a large chunk of software history prior to pre-cloud services that has died in someone's hard drive, floppy, CD. Maybe because it was tied to IP or maybe just because they didn't think much about its historic value or didn't see it as ground breaking or note worthy.
- skrebbel 2y ago
  > There is a large chunk of software history prior to pre-cloud services that has died in someone's hard drive, floppy, CD. Sure but I don't see how being on a UN list helps fix that. Seems to me like efforts from people behind eg scene.org, archive.org (hat tip to jscott) etc are substantially more valuable to preservation efforts than convincing some folk dance geeks who work at the UN that rotating nipple balls are also cool (which of course they are) EDIT: To be clear, I don't mean to dismiss the effort. The entire point of the demoscene is "because we can!", so obviously this also holds for getting our hobby listed by the UN.
  - robin_reala 2y ago
    UNESCO has funding available to use on heritage projects, which could support the existing archive efforts.
    - amszmidt 2y ago
      The IA is closing in on 30 years, has UNESCO done anything to help the IA during that time?
      - robin_reala 2y ago
        Have they ever applied?
        amszmidt 2y ago
        I don't know, but shouldn't UNESCO when marking something of significance do this kind of research, and reaching out to organizations that are trying (and have been trying) to do essentially what they want to protect? It is a great way of spreading the word ... many small organizations don't have the man power to do "other things" (like looking up how to apply for strange grants, let alone maybe know about them).
      - deater 2y ago
        the IA is great for hosting demos too, including running in in-browser emulation. For example see: https://archive.org/details/@deater78 https://archive.org/details/@deater78
        some_random 2y ago
        What has UNESCO done to assist with that?
  - squigz 2y ago
    GP answered why the UNESCO lists help, in their first sentence: > The biggest benefit is in bringing legitimacy to preservation efforts and curation of historic records (photos, videos, data, binaries, sources) on the history of the Demoscene. It's not necessarily about "effort" but perhaps more about "appearances" - it's easier to say "This history is important enough to be recognized by UNESCO: give us money to preserve it!"
- cinntaile 2y ago
  I think it's fine that some things just disappear with the sands of time. Not everything needs to be preserved.
  - CursedSilicon 2y ago
    Who gets to define what's preserve and what is lost? And why?
  - DoingIsLearning 2y ago
    > it's fine that some things just disappear The thing about History in general is that we as present time people have a poor intuition of what is valuable historic data for people in a future (long time from now) time. Today we draw conclusions from graffiti on Roman walls or Babylonian complaint records. Arguably at the time nobody would consider vandalism or customer service records worth preserving for posterity.
dmbche 2y ago
If I'm trying to see how it's useful, attaching your country's identity to a cultural practice is a good first step to then fund and prop up/support said practice - while the list itself doesn't change much, you can refer to it to show the demoscene is worthwile and argue for funding/support.
- kilpikaarna 2y ago
  > fund and prop up/support said practice I wonder how this would look in practice in the case of the demoscene. I feel like there was a moment in the earöy 2010s-ish when there was an interest in the demoscene as one aspect of "digital art", along with games, animation etc. Seems to have faded a bit, maybe because the focus of the demoscene shifted towards size limits where the aesthetic accomplishments can be less immidiately obvious to the uninitiated.
eCa 2y ago
> how weird it is that UNESCO heritage lists are per country. Most things on the list are geographic (in some sense) so for those it kind of makes sense that they are country based. There are some that spans multiple countries, the largest of which that I’m aware of is Struve Geodetic Arc stretching from the Arctic to the Black Sea. But I agree that some cultural evolutions are quite far removed from the physical space in which they happened.
ForHackernews 2y ago
It's also unsuited to cultural heritage that predates the nation state or spans modern semi-arbitrary borders.
amyjess 2y ago
> IIRC demoscene is already recognized as UNESCO heritage in Finland and Germany, what are we going to do, go down the list of every country that ever produced more than a few demos? Potentially, yes. Take a look at the following list and you'll see, for example, that 24 countries are listed for falconry. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UNESCO_Intangible_Cultural_Heritage_Lists https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UNESCO_Intangible_Cultural_Her...

w_TF 2y ago

also not very punk rock to crave validation from unesco

makeitdouble 2y ago

Would it help if you tried to have a demo class at a community center and could point at the UNESCO decision to get proper handling and shut down the "kids these days" arguments ?

DoingIsLearning 2y ago

The biggest benefit is in bringing legitimacy to preservation efforts and curation of historic records (photos, videos, data, binaries, sources) on the history of the Demoscene. There is a large chunk of software history prior to pre-cloud services that has died in someone's hard drive, floppy, CD. Maybe because it was tied to IP or maybe just because they didn't think much about its historic value or didn't see it as ground breaking or note worthy.

skrebbel 2y ago
> There is a large chunk of software history prior to pre-cloud services that has died in someone's hard drive, floppy, CD. Sure but I don't see how being on a UN list helps fix that. Seems to me like efforts from people behind eg scene.org, archive.org (hat tip to jscott) etc are substantially more valuable to preservation efforts than convincing some folk dance geeks who work at the UN that rotating nipple balls are also cool (which of course they are) EDIT: To be clear, I don't mean to dismiss the effort. The entire point of the demoscene is "because we can!", so obviously this also holds for getting our hobby listed by the UN.
- robin_reala 2y ago
  UNESCO has funding available to use on heritage projects, which could support the existing archive efforts.
  - amszmidt 2y ago
    The IA is closing in on 30 years, has UNESCO done anything to help the IA during that time?
    - robin_reala 2y ago
      Have they ever applied?
      - amszmidt 2y ago
        I don't know, but shouldn't UNESCO when marking something of significance do this kind of research, and reaching out to organizations that are trying (and have been trying) to do essentially what they want to protect? It is a great way of spreading the word ... many small organizations don't have the man power to do "other things" (like looking up how to apply for strange grants, let alone maybe know about them).
    - deater 2y ago
      the IA is great for hosting demos too, including running in in-browser emulation. For example see: https://archive.org/details/@deater78 https://archive.org/details/@deater78
      - some_random 2y ago
        What has UNESCO done to assist with that?
- squigz 2y ago
  GP answered why the UNESCO lists help, in their first sentence: > The biggest benefit is in bringing legitimacy to preservation efforts and curation of historic records (photos, videos, data, binaries, sources) on the history of the Demoscene. It's not necessarily about "effort" but perhaps more about "appearances" - it's easier to say "This history is important enough to be recognized by UNESCO: give us money to preserve it!"
cinntaile 2y ago
I think it's fine that some things just disappear with the sands of time. Not everything needs to be preserved.
- CursedSilicon 2y ago
  Who gets to define what's preserve and what is lost? And why?
- DoingIsLearning 2y ago
  > it's fine that some things just disappear The thing about History in general is that we as present time people have a poor intuition of what is valuable historic data for people in a future (long time from now) time. Today we draw conclusions from graffiti on Roman walls or Babylonian complaint records. Arguably at the time nobody would consider vandalism or customer service records worth preserving for posterity.

dmbche 2y ago

If I'm trying to see how it's useful, attaching your country's identity to a cultural practice is a good first step to then fund and prop up/support said practice - while the list itself doesn't change much, you can refer to it to show the demoscene is worthwile and argue for funding/support.

kilpikaarna 2y ago
> fund and prop up/support said practice I wonder how this would look in practice in the case of the demoscene. I feel like there was a moment in the earöy 2010s-ish when there was an interest in the demoscene as one aspect of "digital art", along with games, animation etc. Seems to have faded a bit, maybe because the focus of the demoscene shifted towards size limits where the aesthetic accomplishments can be less immidiately obvious to the uninitiated.

eCa 2y ago

> how weird it is that UNESCO heritage lists are per country. Most things on the list are geographic (in some sense) so for those it kind of makes sense that they are country based. There are some that spans multiple countries, the largest of which that I’m aware of is Struve Geodetic Arc stretching from the Arctic to the Black Sea. But I agree that some cultural evolutions are quite far removed from the physical space in which they happened.

ForHackernews 2y ago

It's also unsuited to cultural heritage that predates the nation state or spans modern semi-arbitrary borders.

amyjess 2y ago

> IIRC demoscene is already recognized as UNESCO heritage in Finland and Germany, what are we going to do, go down the list of every country that ever produced more than a few demos? Potentially, yes. Take a look at the following list and you'll see, for example, that 24 countries are listed for falconry. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UNESCO_Intangible_Cultural_Heritage_Lists https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UNESCO_Intangible_Cultural_Her...