MULTIDISCIPLINARY | WRITING | AUDIO | VIDEO
MULTIDISCIPLINARY
Statio Numero: an interdisciplinary media experience.
Liminal Cycle Part III
This limited series is the third and final act of The Liminal Cycle, a meta-trilogy.
Knowledge of Liminal and Xen, which make up the first two parts of the trilogy, will be necessary for understanding this work.
Statio Numero A product plan left behind documents the creator’s descent into a parallel world or maybe simply madness. A story about persona, identity, liminality, and voice.
Xen: The Zen of the Other (as Ezra Buckley)
(Also presented as an audio drama and on Audible.com
The sequel to Liminal, an experiment in persona, identity liminality and voice.
The third and final part will be available in the future, titled Statio Numero. This trilogy is called The Liminal Cycle.
REVIEWS
Liminal (as Cameron Whiteside)
Part one of a trilogy, with Xen: The Zen of the Other being part two. The third and final part will appear later in the future, titled Statio Numero. This trilogy is called The Liminal Cycle.
REVIEWS
Ong’s Hat: The Begining Authorized Edition 2021
A newly updated and final edition of the Ong’s Hat companion book. I wanted to have a final version now that I am finshed with this project. Many people still want to review the material so here it is in all it’s infamy.
Who Authored the John Titor Legend?
In the year 2000, a man calling himself John Titor introduced himself to the Internet as a time traveler from the year 2036. He weaved a rich tale of being sent back to 1975 to retrieve an IBM 5100 computer. Those who interacted with John were impressed by the depth and apparent realism of his story. In the years that followed select details would emerge to help further legitimize John Titor. The question of whether or not John Titor was a real-time traveler remains a subject of contentious debate. This book sets that question aside to examine several figures who may be responsible for the posts. Among the principal suspects are entertainment lawyer Larry Haber and alternate reality gaming pioneer Joseph Matheny. Key players involved in the John Titor phenomenon who are not suspected of authoring the story are also profiled. These include a Ph.D. who filed a patent based on John Titor’s time machine schematics, an Internet sleuth called The Hoax Hunter who has worked to debunk the story, and even Art Bell, the legendary late night radio host who received several faxes from John Titor.
Funny thing, I don’t recall being interviewed or contacted about this. LOL. Because I WASN’T. Modern so-called “journalism” I guess.
The Gamecaller
Not written by me, but ebook created and distributed by me with the permission of Tobe Terrell.
The “Gamecaller”- a unique name for a unique occupation given by a unique character himself. M.D. Pettie was the gamecaller, “calling games” for a group of dropout professionals who roamed the world playing a series of consciousness-expanding games… Zen master… cult leader.. a CIA operative… con man… saint… [and] storyteller. He never claimed to be anything more than a student and a bemused observer of human folly… This is the personal story of some of the games that he invented, told by one of his players.
Third Realm (The Yellow King)
Written and executed by me, produced in conjunction with Foolish People
http://www.argn.com/2009/10/puzzles_for_the_apocalyp
A little birdie recently pointed me in the direction of a puzzle trail called Third Realm. The site has a labyrinth of puzzles and an apocalyptic countdown ending on November 2nd. The players’ goal is to free the Yellow King with the help of a self-proclaimed “Prophet in the Wild” through his twitter account, thirdrealm. The Prophet has been dropping cryptic clues, and there is a possible London deaddrop that has yet to be investigated.
If you’re in the mood to flex your puzzle solving muscles before the November 2nd apocalypse, head on over to the unfiction thread here
4P2
My first foray into the True Crime arena. Formula: Just put up a single, spooky web page, that purports to be a recruitment drive for an organization whose actual existence is speculative at best and at worst is fiction presented as fact or paranoid, hysterical hand-waving in the interest of selling books and you will get all kinds of reactions. In all fairness, I think the theories mentioned read as good fantasy crime fiction and this was a conceptual attempt at that very thing. Apparently, it succeeded. The unnerving side of this was the equal amount of applications I received asking to join (Really? Join a group of underground serial killers? Really?) or outright death threats by people who really believe in such things. (Someone summed it up pretty well in this article from The Fenris Wolf)
the-fenriswolf-iss-no-4-pp-87-116
El Centro & OMEGA
This was an ARG/Transmedia style story with occult/horror/conspiracy elements, started in 2004 and ended in 2006. It utilized Web, print (booklet), radio, phone trees, theater and newswire services. [A version of the doughnut shop scene from this story was used in Amsterdam production of Terra: Extremitas by Foolish People.] This project was done in collaboration my late friend Dave Szulborski. There’s a LOOOOOONG story about this project. So long in fact that it will take up at least three chapters in a future book.
The Incunabula: Ong’s Hat Project
[ Reviews | Interviews, etc. | Wikipedia | History] This was an ARG/Transmedia style story started in 1988 and ended in 2001. It utilized zines, BBS, early Internet, Web, CD ROM, CD Audio, DVD, print (book, graphic novel and magazine), radio, phone trees, fax, and news wire services. I gained and leveraged exposure in both the mainstream and alternative media to distribute over 2 million copies of CD ROM, ebook and print versions of the story combined. Story elements from Ong’s Hat were also included in the EA Game,Majestic which unfortunately ended prematurely due to 9/11. It was the subject of a full 4-hour show on Coast to Coast AM, been the subject of an article on the Weekly World News and been covered on many radio shows worldwide, books, newspapers, magazines, etc. Links to media here.
The Incunabula Papers CDROM was recently included in the BNF (Bibliothèque nationale de France) digital art collection.
Transmedia Litany (with Genesis P’Orridge)
My idea for an Exquisite Corpse jacket blurb using faxes. (WSB missed inclusion by a day). Used on Esoterrist
Banishing Ritual (cover) with Illusion of Safety (audio here)
WRITING
Statement: Much like Andy Kaufman considered himself a “Song and dance man” rather than a comedian, I do not consider myself a novelist. I create stories with multiple mediums mixed together. Books, video, audio, street art, phones, etc. I have from time to time, dabbled in the form of the book, which I consider to be a unit of measure now, rather than a literal object, but that’s a discussion for another day. Below are some of my “print” works, some digital, some dead tree editions. A few of them were objects in bigger, more sprawling object oriented works. I am currently thinking about a word to use instead of “transmedia” to describe what I do. My method precedes both Transmedia and ARG Back when I started doing this kind of work (1986’ish), I called it “Living Book Process”. That had a ring of purity to it, a resonance of artistic integrity and even a little touch of “magic. However, if I’m honest I also owe a lot to the Transrealism movement (PKD, Ballard, et al.) so it is almost ironic that Transmedia has been applied as a term to describe the art, although I really doubt it is a call back to Transrealism. For lack of a better set of ideas right now, let’s just say that I build experience matrices .
For a comprehensive list of most of my print work (not including maga/zine articles) see this list on Goodreads.
All my works dedicated to the memory of my dearly departed friends: The members of The Formless Ocean Group – Nina Graboi, Elizabeth Gips, Paddy Long, Betsy Herbert, and Robert Anton Wilson. Also to my “non-fog” departed friends: Mickey Hollenberg, Dave, DW Cooper, Dr. Hyatt (Alan), humdog and Diane DiPrima.
PAST WORK
Conversations with Diane Di Prima
A trilogy comprised of Liminal, Xen, and Statio Numero. All are written using different personas.
Beats In Time: A Literary Generation’s Legacy (Chapter 12 is my interview with Diane DiPrima)
Transmedia: Who Invited the Lobsters Anyway?
Legend-Tripping Online: Supernatural Folklore and the Search for Ong’s Hat by Michael Kinsell – While clearly this is a book about my transmedia project it also includes a lot of things that I wrote as examples, so I include it here. Metamodernism, anyone?
Rebels and Devils: The Psychology of Liberation edited by Christopher S. Hyatt, Ph.D. introduced by S. Jason Black foreword by Nicholas Tharcher contributions by William S. Burroughs Joseph C. Lisiewski, Ph.D. Timothy Leary Ph.D., Robert Anton Wilson, Austin Osman Spare, Genesis P-Orridge, Aleister Crowley, Joseph Matheny, Peter J. Carroll, Israel Regardie, Jack Parsons, Phil Hine, Osho, and many others
Black Book Omega: CIRQUE APOKLYPSIS by Christopher S. Hyatt, Ph.D. Joseph Matheny, Nick Pell, Calvin Iwema, Wes Unruh, Antero Alli (more info here)
Contributor YouTube: An Insider’s Guide to Climbing the Charts (more info here)
Introduction to The Art of Memetics Aside: When I posted about this book on Greylodge, Seth Godin references the post as a good example of “How to write like a blogger“ This made me happy. 😉
Contributor/Editor:This is Not a Game: A Guide to Alternate Reality Gaming with Dave Szulborski (Excerpt here )I edited and contributed to : “This Is Not a Game” which was included in the annual Tween market report that went to marketing executives worldwide in the toy, gaming and youth market industries. Also, I appeared as myself/in character, in person, in the “Catching the Wish” ARG by Dave.
Third Realm (The Yellow King)
Written and executed by me, produced in conjunction with Foolish People
http://www.argn.com/2009/10/puzzles_for_the_apocalyps
4P2
My first foray into the True Crime arena. Formula: Just put up a single, spooky web page, that purports to be a recruitment drive for an organization whose actual existence is speculative at best and at worst is fiction presented as fact or paranoid, hysterical hand-waving in the interest of selling books and you will get all kinds of reactions. In all fairness, I think the theories mentioned read as good fantasy crime fiction and this was a conceptual attempt at that very thing. Apparently, it succeeded. The unnerving side of this was the equal amount of applications I received asking to join (Really? Join a group of underground serial killers? Really?) or outright death threats by people who really believe in such things. (Someone summed it up pretty well in this article from The Fenris Wolf)
the-fenriswolf-iss-no-4-pp-87-116
El Centro & OMEGA
This was a ARG/Transmedia style story with occult/horror/conspiracy elements, started in 2004 and ended in 2006. It utilized Web, print (booklet), radio, phone trees, theater and news wire services. [A version of the doughnut shop scene from this story was used in Amsterdam production of Terra: Extremitas by Foolish People.] This project was done in collaboration my late friend Dave Szulborski. There’s a LOOOOOONG story about this project. So long in fact that it will take up at least three chapters in an future book.
Contributor: What Would Bill Hicks Say with Ben Mack, Amelia the Great and Soft Skull Press (along with Jeff Danziger and Martyn Turner; writers Neal Pollack, Robert Newman, and A.L. Kennedy; and Thom Yorke of Radiohead and others…)
Contributor: 2004-2005 Exquisite Language project
Introduction, afterward and editing for Poker Without Cards– First Edition. I orchestrated the first release campaign for this book, with the main character becoming “real”on the Internet for a while. After the first few months I turned it over to the author. (statement regarding this work here)
GALT’S ARK: The Black Symphony, First and Second Movements
Produced by Cthulhu
The Players: Joseph Matheny, Christopher S. Hyatt, Ph.D.,
Father Daniel Suders & Nicholas Tharcher
Illustrated by S. Jason Black, Jonathan Sellers, Weirdpixie & MobiusFrame
THE BLACK BOOK Volume III, Part I
THE BLACK BOOK Volume III, Part II
(The Black Books are considered the workbooks for The Psychopath’s Bible, which I wrote an infamous jacket blurb for.)
The Incunabula: Ong’s Hat Project
[ Reviews | Interviews, etc. | Wikipedia | History] This was a ARG/Transmedia style story started in 1988 and ended in 2001. It utilized zines, BBS, early Internet, Web, CD ROM, CD Audio, DVD, print (book, graphic novel and magazine), radio, phone trees, fax, and news wire services. I gained and leveraged exposure in both the mainstream and alternative media to distribute over 2 million copies of CD ROM, ebook and print versions of the story combined. Story elements from Ong’s Hat were also included in the EA Game, Majestic which unfortunately ended prematurely due to 9/11. It was the subject of a full 4 hour show on Coast to Coast AM, been the subject of an article on the Weekly World News and been covered on many radio shows world wide, books, newspapers, magazines, etc. Links to media here.
Description: “…a bizarre Internet phenomenon: an “immersive” online experience—part mystery, part game, part who knows what—known as both the Incunabula Papers and Ong’s Hat. The Incunabula Papers/Ong’s Hat was, or is, a “many-threaded, open-ended interactive narrative” that ”weds an alternate history of chaos science and consciousness studies to conspiracy theories, parallel dimensions, and claims that computer-mediated environments can serve as magical tools…. the documents provoked a widespread “immersive legend-trip” in the late 1990s. Via Web forums, participants investigated the documents—manifestos—which spun up descriptions of brilliant but suppressed discoveries relating to paths that certain scientists had forged into alternate realities. Soon, those haunted dimensions existed in the minds and fantasies of Ong’s Hat’s many participants. That was evident as they responded to the original postings by uploading their own—all manner of reflections and artifacts: personal anecdotes, audio recordings, and videos—to augment what became “a really immersive world, and it was vast”. – The Chronicle of Higher Education—-
“Ong’s Hat was more of an experiment in transmedia storytelling than what we would now consider to be an ARG but its DNA – the concept of telling a story across various platforms and new media- is evident in every alternate reality game that came after.” – Games Magazine 2013
Though Ong’s Hat may not have set out to be an ARG, the methods by which the author interacted with participants and used different platforms to build and spread its legend has been reflected in later games. –Know Your Meme
The Incunabula Papers are arguably the first immersive online legend complex that introduced readers to a host of content, including what religious historian Robert Ellwood has called the “alternative reality tradition. – Legend-Tripping Online: Supernatural Folklore and the Search for Ong’s Hat
As a companion piece to understanding some of the history of the transmedia work that centered around Ong”s Hat you may also want to read Legend-Tripping Online: Supernatural Folklore and the Search for Ong’s Hat, reviewed here.
The Incunabula Papers CDROM was recently included in the BNF (Bibliothèque nationale de France) digital art collection.
Game Over? (currently re-vamping this for re-release)…but if you just HAVE to have it now, someone is selling one for $900 over here. 😛
What Really Happened at Ong’s Hat?
The Incunabula Papers (CD ROM) Free ebook versions here
Incunabula: The Graphic Novel Free ebook version here
Why DVD? (B and N Digital Bestseller)
Convergence 2000 (B and N Digital Bestseller) Free ebook version here
Earth Dance 2000 (Video and DVD)
The Millennium Whole Earth Catalog
Transmedia Litany (with Genesis P’Orridge)
My idea for an Exquisite Corpse jacket blurb using faxes. (WSB missed inclusion by a day). Used on Esoterrist
Banishing Ritual (cover) with Illusion of Safety (audio here)
The Last Book
Also contributed a few articles to Bob and Arlen Wilson’s Trajectories.
A write up I did about my old friend Rob Brezsny for disinfo.com
Interview that I did with with Beat poet and author Diane DiPrima
Nina Graboi Interview, bOING bOING, Number 8 (written under my nom de plume: Michael Kelly)
I’ve contributed articles to AlwaysOn and Adotas. I’ve contributed book, music, and movie reviews to Gnosis and Magical Blend in the past as well as the old Boing-Boing print magazine and Fringeware Review. Note, in the interest of full disclosure, I’d sometimes contribute more than one article or review to a single publication and to avoid the appearance of saturation, I’d use the pen name: Michael Kelly for some of the articles.
(more added as I dig it up and dust it off)
AUDIO
I have dome some audio works over the years and here is some of it.
NOTE: I am currently moving all my past podcasts to Archive.org . The archives will include all the episodes of my past podcasts like: Coincidence Control Network, The GSpot, Cup of TNB, Fear and Loathing on the Internet, G-Pod Radio Archives, Los Angeles Film Festival Series or LA Times Lunch Talk.
If you’d like to keep up with the archive as it is built, just check this URL on a regular basis.
I directed and produced the 2009 Los Angeles Film Festival podcast, The Santa Barbara International Film Festival Podcast and produced the LA Times interview series with John Horn. I have also produced the list of audio works below.
- Xen: The Zen of the Other
- The Incunabula Papers: Ong’s Hat and Other Gateways to New Dimensions- Audiobook (Amazon, Audible and iTunes)
- Robert Anton Wilson Remembered
- TAZ: Original Falcon [Liner notes at Realitysandwich] – TAZ Poster
- Robert Anton Wilson: The Lost Studio Sessions: Original Falcon [Liner notes at Realitysandwich]
- The Incunabula Papers- Platinum 20 Year Anniversary Audio Book Edition Radio Play
- Old GPod Radio Archives (Podcast series)
- The GSpot (Podcast series)
- Fear and Loathing on the Internet (Podcast series)
- Cup of TNB (Podcast series)
- CCN (Podcast series)
- IMDB (partial list of movies)
- Amazon
- Radio collection
- Disc of All Trades (appearance)
- Televison appearances (still negotiating rights to display here)
- UFO Crash at Rosewell (co-produced, in acknowledgements, very rare now. Can be found on some torrent netwokrs as we did give it away on Greylodge for a while)
- Google Video (adding)
- YouTube
- Greylodge (MSNBC says: “Check out their whole podcasting section, there’s some really good stuff there.“),also mentioned on WSJ and Boing-Boing.
- Transmedia Litany (with Genesis P’Orridge)
- The Banishing Ritual with Illusion of Safety– Banishing Ritual Cover
Note- I have a ton of yet to be digitized print, video and audio that I could put here, but I have decided instead to take my time and release a batch every so often.
VIDEO
Various theater and video works. Will add more here later. Was being lazy and hoping someone else would upload some of the stuff I have but I guess it’s up to me to encode and upload. Oh well. Admittedly, this page needs some work. I’ll get to it, eventually.
Theater-Video
I created and executive produced the Los Angeles Film Festival Podcast and the Santa Barbara International Film Festival Podcast. Archives :Youtube of SBIFF and LAFF. Also archives over at Alterati.
Produced The “I” in the Triangle with Robert Anton Wilson– Original Falcon [Sample 5 minutes of “I” in the Triangle at RealitySandwich] Free version now on Archive.org
Appeared in person, in character, at live events for my late friend Dave’s works, Art of the Heist and Catching the Wish.
Contributor to Terra: Extremitas and sponsored Dead Language with Foolish People
Contributor The Abattoir Pages: Foolishpeople- Executive Producer of Online Strategic Development also wrote a piece for the performance.
Visions of Heaven and Hell: I appeared as one of the “hackers” interviewed about technology and it’s social impact. Ran on iTV (UK) and PBS nationally in the states.
A Weekend with the Illuminati: A LARP I co-designed and ran with Robert Anton Wilson over a weekend at the Esalen Institute, in 1991.
Digital audio, etc.
- Incunabula audiobook radioplay now available (done radio theater style)
- Art Bell, etc.
Film
Still dusting off and encoding a bunch of TV and radio appearances from the 80s and 90s, LIKE CNET TV, MTV AND CBS
Joseph Matheny 
One’s story has an alpha and omega with temperance being the mediator of one’s center point that produces one’s art of abrahadabra that bridges one’s dreams with one’s creating hands.
The middle mediator knows what the alpha and omega has forgotten. In this the alpha and omega are just the margins for creation of beingness . ALL is alive within the margins whether it is realized or not but it is always personal and never tribal. The tribe will never benefit from another’s understanding but there is hope for more individual understanding. There are no 100th monkey principle until there are 100 magick # 1’s.