Week 4: Creepin' on yo funkshins

I really liked Week 4’s readings and lecture. I’ve been thinking about this issue of ‘time-bleeding’ for a while, both on a personal level and in a wider social sense. I’ve been dealing lately with some issues involving unwanted contact via telecommunication. I was advised not to read the text messages this particular person was sending me, and I found my inner emotional battle not to read these text messages to be quite a strenuous one. Even though I knew I would most likely feel hurt and intimidated by what this person was saying, I still wanted to know, just to…know. I felt distressed and angry when I read them, but when I chose not to read them, I experienced the distress of wondering what new threats have been made by this person and what I would have to do to deal with them.  I felt out of control. What a curious sensation to experience: the tension between knowing and not knowing and the sense of a lack of control that rolls in with it. 1^st world issue, maybe?

It’s very possible, according to Gregg. In “Function Creep”, Gregg discusses a similar sensation operating among many professionals in the corporate world of the 21^st Century. Many talk about “anticipatory labour”, or work that they will have to do. Respondents shared that they would check their emails and text messages in order to ‘get their head around’ what was going on at that point in their working day and what they would have to do to “stay on top of work”. One person said they wouldn’t necessarily answer emails, or would answer that they would properly respond at a later point. Many reported this ‘checking’, or connectedness cutting in on family time or other important parts of their day such as exercise, but most seemed to consider work equally, if not more, important than these activities. Many reported that it gave them a sense of control over their lives and that the things that they traded off, such as time with family or time spent carrying out leisure activities were simply required sacrifices in an economic environment like that of the 21^st centure.

The idea that people would consider family time or exercise (or in my case, a blissful ignorance of unnecessary information) less important than the sense of control that comes with ‘knowing what’s going on,’ is indicative to me or an underlying sense that we, as a society, fear the unknown. This is indicated in our seeming unwillingness to allow whatever might happen, should we not read our emails or text messages, to just happen. Something catastrophic might happen; we might fall behind at work or a valid threat might be made, in my case. Then again, maybe life will keep happening, just like it should.

Maybe we should all experiment for a day by talking 24 hours longer to take action on a communication than we normally would. Hmmmm…

winding up the internet: winding back to week 2

I'm backtracking to week 2 to have a look at some of the readings and lectures from there. I was fascinated by the idea of how technology can lead to fundamental earthquakes in how we as a society approach the world and how changes can be made in reaction to fundamental though earthquakes, like the threat of a nuclear war. I left the lecture pondering that idea. I guess I'm also fascinated by how technology is also the thing we turn to for a sense of safety and permanence in the face of what looks like coming destruction. Although I would argue that even the most well-designed system is ultimately fallible, it seems like we as a society embrace and 'play' with technology and figure out what it can do for us, and seem to assume a sense of permanence or dependability in connection with that technology.

I thought Stalder had an interesting point when he commented that money, without the social connotations or existing systems determining what it can bring, is worthless except for its intrinsic material value, because money is a social construct of power. I guess what I got from Stalder's article is that culture is a constantly shifting and group-, not individually-determined stasis of things, and the internet is a constantly growing and shifting channel for information and production of culture.

hmmmm. so much to think about

Week 3 Blog post: The manifesto

I'm posting about a reading my class was given in DIGC202. The reading is called, 'A Declaration of the Independence of Cyberspace,'. This particular reading was authored by J.P. Barlow. It basically felt like a great big 'f**k you' letter to traditional authority holders who have sway over physical creativity and non-virtual 'life'. It seemed as if the authors were coming from a standpoint of having been restricted in some capacity by authority figures such as government, police or people with a stake in controlling information exchange, such as government intelligence agencies or record companies.

I found it to be an interesting read. I could definitely understand someone possessing a sense of disillusionment with current legal and social structures and wanting to implement positive change regarding these. I wonder, though, if creating the internet was a part of this person's effort to counteract this or create an alternative to traditional structures which improved upon current ones. If this is the case, i couldn't help but wonder if the person who conceptualised the internet had thought through the ramifications and potentially broad uses of the internet beyond the scope of what this manifesto is declaring to be appropriate. I don't doubt that the internet has allowed for aspects of information sharing in line with the manifesto and it's focus upon removing the restrictions of government. I think Wikileaks is a good example of the people acting in a manner which declares themselves " immune to [legal] sovereignty, even as [they] continue to consent to [their] rule over our bodies." Wikileaks continues to publish sensitive documents on the internet, even though physically this is not legal and the organisation seems only able to operate from countries with minimal laws against these actions. I also note that the internet seems to be used for distributing information which could be harmful to others such as child pornography.


I wonder if the internet nowadays is what Barlow envisioned when he wrote the manifesto.

DIGC202--Getting this action happening