-empyre- is an online community of over 1000 artists, writers, theorists, curators and others, maintained by a changing team who choose guests and topics and moderate discussions to retain the thematic integrity of the list. -empyre- is not a chat space, nor an announcement or self promotion list, nor online performance space.

-empyre- facilitates critical perspectives on contemporary cross-disciplinary issues, practices and events in networked media by inviting guests -key new media artists, curators, theorists, producers and others to participate in thematic discussions.

-empyre- is an Australian based global community which preserves its autonomy as a non-hierarchical collaborative entity by engaging with new content on a monthly basis. The list was instigated by Melinda Rackham (AU) in 2002. The community grew exponentially and within the first year Adrian Miles (AU) and Rebecca Cannon (AU) joined briefly as facilitators. Long-term facilitators Christina McPhee (USA) and Michael Arnold Mages (USA) were invited to the -empyre- curatorium soon after, and during the next years they were joined by Jim Andrews (CA)and Felix Sattler (AU/GER). In 2005 Tracey Meziane (AU) and Marcus Bastos (BR) joined the team, and in 2006 and 2007 it was extended with Sérgio Basbaum (BR), Nicholas Ruiz III (USA), Renate Ferro (USA) and Tim Murray (USA).

-empyre- global community conducted three moderated conversations in 2006 and 2007 on the three leitmotifs of documenta 12, as part of the documenta 12 Magazine Project. The list discussions: Is Modernity our Antiquity?; Bare Life; and What is to be done (education)? are produced and edited by Christina McPhee. Links to the discussions and edited essays are available for download on -empyre-'s website.

-empyre- often collaborates with institutions and festivals to produce dynamic online forums for physically located events. One such collaboration with Cornerhouse in Manchester, has produced a freeware Reader on 3d art and games which can be downloaded here. In addition -empyre- participates in other projects: here is Marcos Weskamp's Social Circles visualization time slice of the list dynamics.

-empyre- is currently archived by Pandora, a project of the National Library of Australia, dedicated to preserving online publications of national significance for future generations, and by the Rose Goldsen Archive of New Media at Cornell University, as a repository of emergent ideas amongst those working at the leading edge of contemporary practice.