Podcast 325: Thorsten Sideboard

Art + Music + Technology

There are lots of conferences that come along - and move along - without making a dent on anyone's attention. Thorsten Sideboard's Algorithmic Art Assembly is *not* one of those; it's first outing, last year, was one of the buzziest conferences I'd heard about. Now with the pandemic, conferences are a little out-of-bounds, but talking with Thorsten not only revealed a lot about the development of a conference and the community surrounding it, but also about how you can expand your personal passions into something powerful.

In our chat, we learn about how Thorsten ran across the live-coding scene, how San Francisco transformed him and led him to create the Algorithmic Art Assembly, and how he came to create his own live-coding environment (called SBShell, or Sideb0ard). We also learn about the power of knowing people, and how small the world sometimes can seem. It's a fascinating tale, and it's fun to imagine being in the places that Thorsten found himself.

You can check out Thorsten's work at The B0ardside website, track the current state of the AAA at https://aaassembly.org/, and hear/see more of his work at his Bandcamp site and YouTube channel. And keep your eyes out for the next Algorithmic Art Assembly conference - it's sure to be worth the visit to SF!

Transcription: http://www.darwingrosse.com/AMT/transcript-0325.html