This thesis examines site-specific art on the Internet from the popularisation of the World Wide Web in 1994 until 2001. The artists studied here are those primarily associated with the term 'net.art', although other artists not associated with this term have also been considered wherever relevant. The generic term I use to designate all these artists is thus 'net art'. The central aim of this thesis is to understand how Internet technology has been used by artists to extend certain avant-garde tendencies in the context of a globalised and networked society.

Whatever happened to tactical media? David Garcia, one of the genre’s early formulators, takes C6’s recent publication DIY Survival as an opportunity to reflect on the general state of cultural politics after its net propelled reinvention in the `90s. Concerned with the commercial cannibalisation of tactical media, he identifies a need to connect its ‘hit and run’ ephemerality with more permanent stuctures of resistance

A new zone of media theory, netporn, revealed itself at this October’s The Art and Politics of Netporn conference in Amsterdam. Willing voyeur Sebastian Olma remained largely unaroused – except by the Italians, who were quite affecting

Net.artist Jess Loseby celebrates the greener pastures of the thriving net.art, net.sound and net.criticism aggregator Furtherfield

Net artists are using data corruption to create work from chaos. But is it really chaos, asks Peter Carty

> NEST: Example of corrupted data

Net art just wants to be free, or at least that's what we were led to believe. But recently the shine has been wearing off its image as the rebel art form which no 'dirty capitalist' would touch with a barge pole. Frederic Madre takes a look at net art in the post-edenic era.

After the heady days of the dot com boom and the online corporate critique that followed in its wake, net artists’ and activists’ preoccupations are shifting towards the state. Raimundas Malasauskas reports on one New York example

BLURTING IN A & L ONLINE

EMAIL ART

At the Tate Modern's Border Crossing seminar, the artist/activist approaches of panelists Heath Bunting and Florian Schneider threw divergent light on the politics of migration.

Today’s ‘self-managed’ or sociological type has been shaped overwhelmingly by the impact of ‘60s counter-culture. Jettisoning the disciplinary schemas of modernity, capitalist production models – of goods and subjects – have taken on board the anti-authoritarian demands of the flower power generation.

What now for ‘access’ and ‘autonomy’ after the dot.bomb? Daniel Berchenko reports on current thinking in New York