Subject: Re: gender: the internet is my bitch
From: Allucquere Rosanne Stone (sandy@muq.org)
Date: Fri Nov 05 1999 - 12:10:03 CST
> That isn't really what bothers me about this `personal assistant'
> scenario, though. The Internet is not a real realm of human interaction,
> at least not in the sense that is provided by actually going to your
> bank, or to the store, ect. Not that we're a really communal society
> anymore anyway
I'm inclined to agree, but then again, hoomins is highly adaptable critters,
and many don't like being put in noncommunal situations for long. Take, for
example, the emergent schooling behavior we're observing in teen groups in
Finland. The Finnish population has more cell phones than any other
country, and among teens cell phones have just about reached saturation.
They phone each other constantly, and information about what's happening on
the street spreads everywhere at once. As stuff happens here and there,
huge masses of teens converge, evaporate, and converge again somewhere
else. A satellite view of all those bodies forming those patterns would be
fascinating.
Now here's the thing: This is totally unhuman behavior. Humans are pack
animals, like apes and wolves, not schooling animals like fish. But the
presence of the new technology radically transforms that. Think of a group
of friends, geographically dispersed one minute and physically close the
next, modulating that distance at will, who are in continual contact via
electronically mediated voice. It may be that "communal" means something
different to them than it does to us. What does the fine structure of the
actual social dynamics of such a group look like (or can we even use those
terms)? What happens to the "alpha" person we observe in almost all
traditional human interaction (since that's a null term in schooling
behavior)? For me, stuff like that is what makes New Media fascinating...
Just my $.02,
-Sandy
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