[-empyre-] HYBRID BOOKWORK, Week Two - Paradoxical Publishing, Postmedia, Critical Aesthetics

[verlag at traumawien.at]

Hi Michael thanks for the reply.

I wasn't to put [3] as a kind of 'brain damage'. Was just an
[alter]na[t]ive (yy my first actual use of mezangelle, it s coming) input
without relying on hermetic academic backup too much. Also, i wouldn't want
to turn the discussion to Nick Carr etc, just wanted to throw in sth. But -
as the human factor is so much important to us, the question here would
rather (and much more interesting) be, at what extent we are giving treats
to the algorithms ourselves at what cost and return. Like in terms of how
it RECURSIVELY learns from us as we teach it our whole cultural sphere and
after that - what is happening there as a post-something on the other side.
As the 1 obvious example: while algorithms are about to learn our language
through form inputs etc, we are evolving a new written language ourselves.
Maybe for it not to understand us anymore? Or while algorithmic transcripts
of speech work almost perfect these days, we don't even listen to that
speech anymore (at least as we did), what for, if it is transcribed and
rolled out and backuped. Or we don't listen to the speech anymore but make
a book of it just to have to have the option of the real back? Alzheimers
def is the wrong word, but how does that kind of negative space (meant as
sth positive) look like and how do we act upon it?

The works collected by Silvio probably are a lot about what is is thrown
back here. The exemplary American Psycho by Huff/Cabell is what is left
after algorithms went through handling 'culture'. Why do we make a book out
of it and even party it and even exhibit it at the Jeu deu Paume in Paris?
Obviously, culture turns out to be something different and in that and many
other cases, culture becomes nothing but advertising, as Lanier once put
it. That kind of Number 1 SPAM, the whole pop-web works upon! At least it
is what i learn about it and i think those algorithmic examples are much
more defining and important than artists books of conceptual writing, which
became just too obvious (Push the 'make a book' button, out of that
breakfast plan).

L

Forgot the best thing happened in 2013 was the postartpoets as an
outstanding work of relational publishing performance. Starting here > >
http://www.postartpoets.com/


On Tue, Feb 18, 2014 at 8:26 PM, Michael Dieter <M.J.Dieter at uva.nl> wrote:

> ----------empyre- soft-skinned space----------------------
> Thanks for the post Lukas! I'm also a bit late responding so
> apologies, but I did want to just pick up on this point quickly...
>
>
> >
> "3 Post-Digital. After reading the mails from last week i asked my
> friend about 'post-digital' and he said 'Alzheimers'. I thought this
> was something, as it brought up the human connection, which i
> completely miss in your notes. Also, it could be turned in as the
> 'space left by the absence of the digital' - a generative amnesia,
> sort of. Unlearning learning, Tech drugs and the Kurzweil Cyborg, all
> the archives etc come in here. Just my thoughts without juggle-stretch
> terms too much."
>
> Post-digital brain damage - this is one of the more interesting
> definitions I've read! While I'm a bit skeptical of neurological
> explanations for what the web has done to us ala Carr's Is Google
> Making Us Stupid, continual partial awareness, overall cognitive
> fatigue and a sense of informationally-induced distraction is
> something I do recognize in myself. Sometimes I wonder if I'm just
> getting older and have more responsibilities.
>
> There is a real problem of our technologies being always on, too many
> browser tabs open, the smart phone buzzing an email update, the
> continual connection to social media streams - 24/7, real subsumption.
> Of course, there's the obvious pharmacological dimensions of the info
> attention economy as well, the rise of ADHD diagnoses, what Bifo
> theorizes as the pharmacological character of the 'schizo-economy' -
> including the need for 'panic' to be alleviated through the use of
> cocaine, ritalin, speed, modafinil and other nootropics. Maybe
> disciplinary software like Freedom and Anti-Social has something
> post-digital about it, or more accurately, Morozov's locked up router
> cable, smartphone and screwdrivers? That's the real neo-analogue
> response!
>
> In any case, this backdrop of attention is crucial I think in terms of
> how people deal with books today. It is something that Hayles, for
> instance, has explored in her book How We Think within the context of
> education and literary studies. Certainly, coping strategies have now
> also become a major topic in the mainstream press, even when it comes
> to ebooks as well -
>
> http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/05/books/review/how-do-e-books-change-the-reading-experience.html?_r=0
>
> - M.
>
> --
> Michael Dieter
> Lecturer
> Media Studies
> The University of Amsterdam
> Turfdraagsterpad 9
> 1012 XT Amsterdam
> http://home.medewerker.uva.nl/m.j.dieter/
> _______________________________________________
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> empyre at lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
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