Physical Space and Digital Space from Charlie Gere’s “Digital Culture” (2008)
[Presented at Jyoti Submit 2018 Jyoti Nivas College, Bangaloreon the 27th & 28th September 2018]
Introduction
In the wake of the Y2K or the new millennium, which is also known as the 21st century, digital entity had boomed us like a firework— marking the beginning of the Digital Age all over the globe. It is one of the cultural shifts which takes from handwritten texts to encrypted texts through computer engines and machines. This liberates texts to words into texts to binary numbers. The 21st century is the age where business entrepreneurial innovations, engineerings, researches and creativity changes the flow of inks, thoughts and concepts into digital content unlike the century that passes by, though they have laid the digital foundation. Digital Space— which is reciprocal with the vast space of the universe— the ocean, the skies and the landmass has held our trans-communication across the globe. Communication is the essence of human existence and its importance is inevitable as it envisages to sustaining our day to day activities, therefore, digital space remains as one of the most important space in our today’s world, despite the fact that it has it own limitations on representations, on netiquette, social media and moral ethics.Vulnerably or interestingly, humanity comes with digital technology now a days. Technology in many ways, even more than what we can imagine had helped and shaped human civilization in its functionality more than ever before in various fields. Yes, technology on the other hand may devalue human life since it is a fast-moving phenomena one after another. As long as we are stuck in the virtual world, societal ties might be getting better or even worst since internet is prone to be misused as it can even turn out to be an abusive platform; which probably could be the second fall of humanity and the first being Eden, if use inappropriately or otherwise. Implicitly, this may affect the soberness of social relations as much as it did well upon social relationships on humanitarian ground.However, the reality is, we cannot get rid of from techs, and even further technological devices will become smarter with new updates every now and then, more reliable; but more expensive for sure in the days to come. At the same time, our society, especially ours; have to realize that our society is a Consumer Society, rather than a vast chunk of innovations and productions.At the same time, ‘media’ as we know is the fourth estate after the executive, legislative and judiciary for its pivotal roles on meeting and fulfilling societal needs. The importance of media (which is a trans-communication) is as same as the other governing bodies especially in a democratic country where people’s voice is counted and have been the basic structure of the law makings.Life has been eased since the process of trans-communication been shorten, though, not the distance. Love and relationships are retained better or in the worst case bitter. Business firms have extended their empire since it become much and much easier through online access.
Trades and commercialization echoed from one region to another region throughout the whole world, despite geographical locations and barriers. Far flung distant lands are now connected in a single click and thus, the world become a global village, meaning globalization has begun, which is a symbol of peace and harmony, without which trade and commercial activities cannot exist and digital culture cannot be generated, thereby, power structures remain. Global mindset need to be cultivated and local barriers need to be reduced or eradicate for the furtherance of our world. Barriers are banal. it is seen in many cultural practices around the globe while we should embalm and uplift one another but not segregate or isolate since no man is an island.There was a huge technological advancement since the inception of Industrialization (c.1760), the time when Thomas Elva Edison began his Steam Engine (1698), Johannes Gutenberg and his Printing Press (1440-50), Bell started building his first Telephone (1876), and Marie Curie and her team initiates their first radio transmission (1898) and later Thomas Babbage with analytical engine (1837), and Alan Turing with his digitized computation machine (1936) and so on. Today, we are in the most advanced age than ever before where endless number of www dot coms emerges. Online platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp, YouTube, Quora, Google, Yahoo, etc. are overlapping each other from internet engines through the space and to your mind which may be wrapping your head especially ears, eyes and brain. It is operated to serve people regardless of race, sex or gender across the world for the better through internet, i.e. through digital space. It won’t be wrong to say that it motives is to make the world a better place to live, whilst it is now business centric and oriented with capitalistic ideology.Yes, this is the age of Information Technology but of vulnerable to pitfalling too, because a lot of information is a health hazards, some elements are brainstormings that can drain creativity and performances which is known as brainwashing. However this is the wave, movement or transition; which is a breakthrough from the 14th century until the 20th century.
Nonetheless, this is the way how the world has been engineered by the endless effort of researches, commitment and labor weaving from the west which sway us like a tidal-wave deluded us while consuming our time as if time is like a flowing fountain sprinkling from heaven.Thus, Digital Culture is gaining momentum and it create a vast space more than ever before (social media, online gaming etc, which are just as addictive as drug). On the other hand, it shows how human civilization is a non-stop process which is rapidly moving towards or either slowly moving with time. However, history shows the slow foundational movement, with years gap behind one invention to another invention while the 21st century shows the rapid movement and utilization of technology not in terms of location but individually across the globe.So, due to its wide applications on different fields, “Digital Culture” will not simply vanish away, but rather, hopefully it will serve ahead for the betterment of the world and to save humanity from pure savage. At the same time, technological devices and apps are getting better day by day. The future holds great thing ahead with digitalization. We cannot give up, but we have to remember virtual life is incomplete with online life/feeds. One day, who knows the four walls within our home might be digitalized and the idea of avatar would probably take place. Perhaps, artificiality would rather seem to be the reality. The idea of computation machine of Alan Turing has further revitalized digitalization, from Typewriter to Printing Press has turn, now a days into online formats. Virtual reality is the product that we commonly used in our day to day life. The AI (Artificial Intelligence) would become our guide as in Yuval Noah Harari’s Sapiens’ (2011) has shown. It can be probably true that human existence and space might be equated with modern technology. Jack Ma, Mark Zuckerberg, Bill Gates, Steve Jobs etc, are tirelessly working on techs in order to cultivate the Digital Space while extending their capitalistic inks all over the world. While, computer and mobile phone or any digital products, online marketing companies are ceaselessly competing against one another. Hence, digital culture generates market competition. Here are some questions in relates to digitalization— what do you think:
- Is digitalization a new form of capitalism or socialism?
- Which one is bigger- digital space or physical space?
- Did humanity have lost its way?
2. Differences between Physical Space and Digital Space:In one way or another way, digital culture and physical space are different entities while the two moves parallel as a tie knitted together. So, it must have been a product of logical thinking, creativity and incessant work. It is a great achievement that human being can creates machine that can cultivates space which have never been existed before. We have the landmass, the vast seas and space, and now digital space, or technically termed as
Cloud. Human beings are enriched by mother nature, being a thinking social animal, who here for the sustenance of human civilizations. It isn’t a mistake to say that the
essence of God is in human being (we are the image of God), for the built-in apps are good enough to change the world, but only if we used it appropriately. It is a dangerous turn if love turns into lust, truth into rude, etc. Digital culture is a need-based invention so as to make life worth living, meaningful and colorful. To certain level, we need updates from the old traditional regime so as to cope with the emerging trend to the internet generation, because the emancipated ideas of youth needs to be addressed, neither skipped nor deny or invalidate the new outlooks that comes as a result of the rapid boom in information. There was a Comedian who say we need “Jesus Pro” out of the variant mobile updates so as to updates our solidified outlooks. Arguably, the world may not need changes but updates; like updates from the traditionally preconceived notions of the old odd conservative truth claim. Anything can become a truth; if we claim; because we believe it; driven by heaven’s merciful hands or of earthly retribution and vengeance.
Ontologically, digital culture and humanities goes hand in hand. The algebraic expressions, alphanumeric combinations and binary numbers are the short waves of humanities. It is more or less like existentialism and essentialism in modern Philosophy to which it is like the other side of the same coin. It is therefore, needless to say, culture is evolving and moving beyond human imagination and artificiality is very much a part of our life.artfulness is a new realityartificiality is a new antiquityartificiality is a new realityartfulness is a new creativity. This new space come into being as a result of innovations. “Stay Hungry Stay Foolish”
(the term is odd, but its depth is vast), of Steve Job’s seems to be serving as a new inspiration for many aspirants who clung to their dreams in the pursuit of technological innovations; which brought forth inspirations to the many dream hunters on various fields. Political regimes (capitalism, socialism or communism or marxism, democracy, theocracy, dictatorship) reigns through the structural power entailing in the new inventions.
3. The History of Digital Culture.It is no doubts that science and progress are very much clung to the digital age or information age. The immensity of progress is contributed by sciences in various fields of computation such as physics, mathematics, etc. There are tens and thousands of geeks responsible for digitizing our world which is why history has witnessed such a captivating, yet a cosmic level digital development that has taken place. Technology is one of those that are the most celebrated, gigantic machine which is shaping and moulding of our world into various forms and genres.History is not always about wars, (Holocaust, the two great wars, etc.) though, sadly it has a devastating impact upon humanity, (in one way or another way technology initiates or ignites many historical impacts). but on the other hand, there’s tremendous progress taking place right from the beginning of inventions until then. As a consequence, culture, our perceptions, and viewpoints changes or turns into different forms from generation to generation, which means culture is not constants and it is not fixed, it is rather like a fluid, though there is a mental concept of centrality exist which is known as norms. Since technology has enhanced our ideas from time to time, giving us a broaden outlooks, transform our approaches as it felicitates platforms to access audio-visual, online library, etc. and thus humanity is paddling forward so as to sustain better society, from an agrarian society into industrial society. Industrialization enhance Capitalism, Socialism and Materialism which directly hinges human society and materialism is an element that beats us like anything. Materialism is a social apparatus and fashion is highly valued. It is all about transformation on different dimensions while mental outlooks and physical outlooks are coincided. The idea of digitalization is derived from power of natural laws that are mutually endowing the earth. Geometry and algorithm are diametrically followed in weaving machine, spinning machine. Sound waves and frequencies, heat and energy in Edison’s Steams Engine, Thermodynamics. Johannes Gutenberg’s Printing Press, Bell’s Telephone, Alan Turing and Babbage’s Computation Machines.In Radio and Trans-communication, Samuel Morse, Bell, Marie Curie, Alan Turing, would be associated with digitalization. Morse Code—light and sound, ciphers, secret writing, and cryptography. Codes and Coding began; which signifies the natural process of life has been squeezed or digitalized. This now could reflects almost any systems from scanning alpha-numerical data like the interception, Morse Code and QR codes, and in linguistic or semantic/semiotic contexts as well. So, technology is meant to heal the world while technologically generated nuclear plants are planted in every nooks and corner of the world, which is probably for peace to abolish heinous evil.
4. Political and Economic System with Digitalization:Everything that moveshave certain pattern.some moveto and fro;some dings:some chimes.Some motions are pulled by the gravitational force, and some repels and defy the law of gravitational forces. At the same time, anything that moves produce a to-and-fro motion, which comes back and forth while some motions are oscillatory in nature. Likewise, even media have the same motions. It is immensely arguable or agreeable that, media is political in nature since there could be biases in representation. The answer would be yes or no, but it also comes with business and other such institutionally initiatives which is expected to bring forth social needs. Political ideologies like democracy are the very idea of globalization. Media brings business possible, the hegemonic structure of our capitalistic approaches began which is known as power. In other words, this is the way of living whether we consciously or subconsciously believe it (or not), but our subconscious mind is responding it daily. Digitalization is humanly oriented, and commercialization sprung and, it is political in nature. As mentioned earlier, media is known as the fourth estates, its roles and importance especially in democracy is inevitable. It checks the democratic principles and serve as a safeguard to the constitution. Through media, the voice of the people is heard and it reach more number of people. It also serves as an agent in the
Decentralization of Power.Again, power is political in nature, although, social structure are arranged in accordance with the natural process of capability over uniformity. Power, thereby distributed amongst the hierarchy and the social functionary has been governed much better than before.
5. CommunicationThe twenty-first century’s generations were hugely the product of the so-called Digital Media because it has become one of the most common platforms throughout the world, since it dominates human minds, creates new values and outlooks crossing barriers such as lands and oceans, gender and races, regions and religions, languages and ethnicity, as it creates stages and enables youths, despite it buried morality and question what morality is. There are lots of Digital Stage where new generation are venting and investing their time and life through online platform. Some of which are educational, fun, socio-interactions, and so on and so forth. For example, Vlogger, Blogger, Youtuber, and other related means of digitalization. Each and every individual mind turn out to be a Digital Colony colonized by communication and information that sprung up after every seconds.The current century witnessed a social exposure through digital media since social media of various types has come by. It is also a full-fledged digital age and it is a digital aid for each and every individual— youngs, adults, and toddlers alike. On the contrary. It is also the beginning of digital divide from place to place and it is unfortunately the beginning of Generation Gap. Which is the difference in perceptions, derived from the preconceived notions to the new ways of perceiving things, or moving from a primary stage to secondary stage. (Pop Culture) It is nothing but, a line segment where older generation and newer generation are simulated apart, by the rapid changes airing in the clouds with the lapse of time and technology serve as one of the major leading factors and human dignity remained a question especially in a developed country who pursue freedom as their spirit and soul.
6. Digital Ideology and Pop Culture.What is Youth Culture? Is youth culture a Sub-culture, or a Counter-culture? Is pop-culture a high culture? Probably yes, probably not, since it is new and hence it is young, it comes to the mass only in the 1980s or a little earlier. Therefore, pop culture is ofcourse not a mainstream culture. In which a pedantic speaker Ben Shapiro and Professor Jordan B. Peterson argued the ideas encrypted in Pop-culture especially in terms of pronouns. The he—she; him—her namings on gender fluidity, culture fixity with the idea of political correctness allowing gender shift, even though it is not biologically impossible since it is in incongruence— and due to which debates were heated up (of course intellectually and academically) between laymen, intellectuals and conservatives. Youth culture and Popular culture coheres in one way or another way. Popular Culture is considered as a Commodity to be consumed or utilized; music and fashion— sadism and hedonism are the soul of youth culture.Morality remain as a victim under pop-genre/culture, since freedom is sought as a material (hedonism, sadism). The new free-floating concepts of individuals were no longer subjected to the old regimes, phrases like “what is freedom, it’s my life, I can do whatever I want”, etc, are now a common parlance in most societies. Socialization takes a different turn from the past experiences; social exposures are becoming a new habits since new ethics and perspectives are brought in by media with the post-war experiences. Online feeds and notifications are new waves that swing the way we think, though not the way we live in the reality. Living and thinking is like a distant land that charms the eyes.Why there is a cultural change, the so-called paradigm shift? The process of shifting to a digital culture is nuanced, also creative, and incremental. Anything viral is a hit in our day to day life. Movies such as The Social Network (2010) and The Imitation Game (2014) are some movies that change the world based on true story. Software and apps are developed for all sorts of modern acces or connection all over the world. GIS Mapping, Data Networking, Alexa, Bixby, Siri, etc are some of those. Once the network is created, life gets better, despite the Digital divide. The development in printing technology, photography and audio-visual has standardized the production of language, communication and connection are enlarged to written, oral and other forms. Communication is a representation of message and it is a respiration. As Marshall McLuhan stated, ‘medium is the message’, since our message is the passage. The passage now is our digital machines. Therefore, digital culture directly or indirectly deals with interpretation, translation, on semantics and semiological, sign, symbol, signified, sounds and meanings because it is the essence of human beings.
7. Some of the digital culture are as follows“The twenty-first-century business enabled by high technology, operates on a global level and sometimes appears to yield more power than nation states”. (Charlie Gere’s Digital Culture, page 17) Cyber Culture, Gaming, Software, Trolling, Hacking Viral, Internet based Company, High tech Companies have reshaped and redefined our culture. Therefore, digital technology serves as an avant-garde, relocating our morale value.
Conclusion:“Societies have always been shaped and nurtured by the nature of the media by which men communicate than by the content of the communication”. (Marshall McLuhan, Medium is the Message, 1967, page 09). As much as progress and development are made, human beings are always in it. Broadly speaking, progress, growth and development has certain ideologies. It is true that it can be a democratic principle, communism or socialism or secularism.
In the age of Post Modernism and in the 21st century, technology and ideas move very fast, but culture still stand on the ground and culture stands as an apparatus to measure the changes taking place. As much as digital space is huge, safety and privacy is a common concern. Also, we internet users are vulnerable and prone to be attacked by hackers. Due to the advancement in technology, it overruns human capability and thus old and new ideas are overlapping one another and sadly coercion and force has often been taken place due to the difference in concepts which actually is a very odd old practice to eliminate something vivid, lively and agile. Ideas need space and live needs to be lived. Difference needs to be conglomerated so as to get to one more similitude. Therefore, truth claim needs to redefine, refine and re-interpret on various tenets and dogma to accumulate higher ground. Truth claim may not be truth; but the only thing is we believed in it on the influence of religious view and of politics.Finally, digitization goes hand in hand with popular culture. In Posthumanism, as a result of technological advancement, cybernetics and robotic research have lead to Artificial Intelligence (AI) and hopefully it will serve ahead for the betterment of the world. This is a transitional age where Generation X, Y and Z are in the crossroads where digital media has tinged and hinged our outlooks more than what it is supposed to be; which may even lead to digital anxiety. Virtual life is the wave that sway away the reality of real life of young minds with loads of information.
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thanks for readingReferences/Bibliography:
Medium is the Message, Marshall McLuhan, 1967, Gingko Press.
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Digital Culture by Charlie Gere, 2nd Edition, Reaktion Books, London 2008.
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