CRD701: History and Theory of Communication Technology

In our first readings on new media, Manovich (2001) and Enzensberger (1970) both name a number of new media technologies, including the Internet, computer games, virtual reality, news satellites, electronic high-speed printing and microfiches with electronic access. With this week?s reading, Manovich asks us to include space on that list: ?Just as other media types ? audio, video, stills, and text ? [space] can now be instantly transmitted, stored, and retrieved; compressed, reformatted, streamed, filtered, computed, programmed, and interacted with. In other words, all operations that are possible with media as a result of its conversion to computer data can also now apply to representations of 3-D space? (pp. 251-252). The space Manovich envisions is not physical, which is naturally restricted, but a potentially infinite virtual space. For example, the physical boundaries of a game board limits action. Moving into a virtual realm, the restrictions dissipate. Myst co-designer Robyn Miller even felt the old media term ?game? was too limiting for his creation, instead defining it as a ?world? for players to explore (p. 248).

Castells (2000) considers the generation of knowledge and subsequent delivery and exchange (i.e. flow) of that knowledge. His new industrial space for high-technology manufacturing is ?characterized by the technological and organizational ability to separate the production process in different locations while reintegrating its unity through telecommunications linkages, and micro-electronics-based precision and flexibility in the fabrication of components? (p. 417). Essentially, what he?s talking about is an extreme form of the assembly line popularized by Henry Ford. Production is broken down into four discrete parts, beginning with research and development by highly skilled scientists and other professionals, then skilled fabrication of the product, following that semi-skilled assembly and testing, and finally after-sales maintenance and technical support (p. 418). There is no need for any of the four phases to occur in the same geographical region. In fact, Castells argues it is ?neither economically feasible nor socially suitable, in the prevailing social context? to mix the upper echelon who develop a technology with unskilled and semi-skilled workers who manufacture it (p. 418). Lest Castells be unique in his overt classism, my wiki post for this week (?Soulless Cities?) details the development of Ann Arbor, Michigan as a high-tech community, in part, by its displacement of the city?s black working class.

In Kellerman (2006), the concept of place moves beyond a geographic coordinate to encompass cultural-historical identity. With this in mind, I agree with Jacob in refuting Kellerman?s notion of a ?non-place.? Quoting Marc Augé, ?If a place can be defined as relational, historical and concerned with identity, then a space which cannot be defined as relational, or historical, or concerned with identity will be a non-place? (p. 137). What is such a place, or non-place as the case may be? I am by no means a world traveler, but typically fly a few times a year for conferences and family visits. I do not cease to exist once I pass the security checkpoint, nor do the people around me. If the underlying assumption is that everyone in an airport would rather be somewhere else, then I can list a number of non-places: hospitals, courtrooms, the DMV, etc. Each of these examples may also have minimal social interaction between those just ?passing through.?

Meyrowitz (2005) takes the sense of identity and defines it in terms of local and global experiences. He asserts our exposure to media functions as a global positioning system, allowing people from different physical locations and cultures to have shared experiences. Consider Meyrowitz?s claim that ?we more frequently intercept experiences and messages originally shaped for, and limited to, people in other places.? In Miller v. California (1973), the Supreme Court calls for the use of ?contemporary community standards? as a measurement tool in judging whether material is obscene. With the rise of glocality, it is almost impossible to consider the standards of an individual community. (See ?Orgies and Apple Pie,? discussing the use of Google search terms as a measure of community standards.)