[from the previous episodes: in May 2008, a gang of people, enticed by the idea of tasting marinated anchovy sandwiches early in the morning, meets in a location which is not too remote nor too renown, in the Northern part of the Grosseto province, Italy. The term “BuioMetria Partecipativa” is shared, and at the bar in Torniella we hear one of the best ever jokes on the use of the press – read ep. 1]

The Buiometria Partecipativa project was presented for the first time in a conference, organized by the author of this blog. The title of the conference was just too long, like some Italian movie titles from the late Sixties and early Seventies (the film director Lina Wertmuller was good at this):

Culture, environment, free information technology: which opportunities for our territory from then integration of diverse subjects ?

Back then, it would not have been possible to think of a more concise title.

The event arose from a personal need: I was getting a sore throat by answering to people who, after following stories like the epic palla 21 in chicago, m(‘)appare Milano, or initially The revenge of the Killer Chihuahua and of the Zombies, were posing some questions. The most frequent were:

1. who are you?
2. why do you do this?
3. what drugs to you take?

I proposed to three folks, among a group of close colleagues (and with the possibility of taking a Monday off: Francesco Giubbilini, Stefano Costa and Luca Delucchi) to come and tell their experience and the collaborations which we had been activating between October 2006 and May 2008. On top of this, I proposed a sort of “preface” concerning episodes which took place in 2004-2005.

I had the chance of reading the press release for this conference about a month ago, together with others. To be honest, I found hard to understand it, even though I drafted it myself!

The producer of a RAI Radio Due show, following our stories since 2007, wrote me (or called…I can’t recall) and made three statements which I carry with me since then

1. you guys are crazy
2. if you will find somebody who can relate to what you are trying to explain with this press release, we (RAI Radio Due) will interview this person, because he/she must have a very peculiar mind
3. …however, we would like to talk to this engineer, Francesco Giubbilini: this buiometria partecipativa thing sounds cool

So the conference took place:

Francesco was interviewed by L’Altro Lato, the RAI Radio Due show (we have a recording, but I can’t locate it right now), we had some 20 people attending (which is not bad for a Monday morning in Ribolla), and it was sunny in the afternoon.

We actually have a video of the morning. All of the conference was recorded, including some comments and questions which were made. But it would be very strange to watch it now…it’s a bit too soon.

Less than 24 hours after the closing of the conference, it might have been around 6AM in Bologna, I found something like…

[let’s plant some fruit trees
let’s produce our own stuff
let’s talk of reality and cultur

let’s use the formula of balance, like the multinationals]

But why, having at 4PM of June 9 2008 a train ticket from Cecina (Leghorn) to Milano, I was standing the day after at dawn in a Bologna alley on the wrong way to the train station ?

– 2 – to be continued…