>From fowler@mindvox.phantom.com Wed Aug 25 17:25:56 1993

      GGGGGG
   GGGGGGGGG
 GGGGGGGGGGGG
GGGGG     GGGGGGGG
GGGG
GGGG
GGGG
GGGG
GGGGG    GGGRIST
GGGGG      GGGRIST
 GGGGGG     GGGGRIST
  GGGGGGGGGGGGGGRIST
    GGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGRISTGRISTGRIST
        GGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGRISTGRISTGRISTGRISTGRISTGRIST
           ONLINEONLINEONLINEONLINEONLINEONLINEONLINEONLINEONLINE






                            S k y




                           B l u e




                            I r i s







                            E y e


                        B l o s s o m



GRIST On-Line #1, a new journal of electronic network poetry, art and culture
will be up October 1, 1993 at anonymous ftp etext.archive.umich.edu
/pub/Poetry.

GRIST will be eclectic.  GRIST will be open to all the language and visual art
forms that develop on the net.  Personally, I am a poet but I think we're all
rapidly becoming multimedia artists--the old borderlines are virtually gone.

I see the net as an extension of all the alternative forms of communication and
interaction that were initiated with the break from traditional academic and
culturally controlled forums of the period prior to the mid 60s.

I will spend a lot of time getting the mag out
to other networks--Compuserve, BBSs, Fidonet and others.
For instance, it will immediately be available to gopher.cic.net/ftp.cic.net, a
private non-profit concern that provides networked information resources to Big
10 university libraries.  Announcements, e-review copies, direct mail off-line,
and press releases will be issued to make people aware of its existence.  A
very limited hardcopy edition, containing some material unique to the hardcopy
edition, will be DTP.

Insofar as resources, time and energy allow, GRIST will support and facilitate
the network dissemination and archiving of e-mail art appearing in the pages of
GRIST On-Line as well as the results of congresses, shows and other programs
that may arise in the network context.

GRIST On-Line will provide a place where all the forms of expression that are
coming together
on the net will be presented, developed, discussed and exhibited.  I
want to bring the thoughtful people of my generation into the net, who may not
be aware of
it, and I want to include all those who are growing up with the net.  I think
there are
going to be significant impacts on the forms and contents that we call poetry
and graphic and visual art on the net and I want GRIST to be a place where all
that is visible and viable.

(All of this will not happen at once, or from the beginning.  There will be a
lot of poetry and other writing that does not reflect these concepts, primarily
because not a lot of poets, just as not a lot of e-mail artists, have engaged. 
A primary goal of GRIST will be to facilitate that engagement.  What actually
appears, month to month, will be a function of what contributors are doing, not
what I wish they were doing.  But I hope we can all encourage each other to
think seriously and deeply about what we are doing and to develop the medium
toward the expression of real human values.)

GRIST On-Line totally supports a philosophy of the net that is visionary, free,
open, and democratic.  However, there will be nodes, gathering points within
that vast freedom, where people will naturally congregate to share ideas,
techniques, and creations.  GRIST intends to be one of those nodes.

#1 will be on-line October 1st and will include a proposal from Crackerjack for
NETWORKER TELENETLINK 1995.

Subscriptions available now from fowler@phantom.com.

Articles, announcements, essays, art work, and correspondence welcome and
solicited at all times.