C-Level View :: April 12, 2006

Executive View

'Art Imitates Network' at Ball State University

By Mary Grush

AVP for IT Phil Repp Sees the Wireless Network in a New Way

At Ball State University (IN), an interactive digital sculpture project will bring the university’s wireless network infrastructure to life for all to see and hear on April 18 th and 19 th – offering IT managers, the general university community, and campus or virtual visitors a new view of Ball State’s wireless network.

Ball State’s Associate Vice President for Information Technology Phil Repp explains, "This project is an effort to provide personalization of the network. A network is like a huge 'noun' out there – just a thing – and our idea was to find out how we could make our network a 'verb' and get people to interact with it. We thought, 'Wouldn’t it be cool to actually visualize a person’s location and sense on the network?' That would give the network more meaning and value to the individual. They could relate to it on a personal level and say, ‘I’m over here! I’m involved!'"...

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