Thursday, September 03, 2009

Geert Lovink and the web

Geert Lovink talks about the web and social networking here.

Social networks are technologies of entertainment and diffusion. The social reality they create is real, but as a technology of immediacy you can’t get no satisfaction. We initially love them for their distraction from the torture of now-time. Networking sites are social drugs for those in need of the Human that is located elsewhere in time or space. It is the pseudo Other that we are connecting to. Not the radical Other or some real Other. We systematically explore weakness and vagueness and are pressed to further enhance the exhibition of the Self. ‘I might know you (but I don’t). Do you mind knowing me?’.

Overall, I think he had some very good points in this article. ‘Free as in free beer’ is not like ‘free as in freedom’. Open does not equal free. These days ‘free’ is just another word for service economies.

Finally he gets there:
Soon the Web 2.0 business model will be obsolete. It is based on the endless growth principle, pushed by the endless growth of consumerism.


and what can one else do than just love this expression:
Anxiety over masturbation meets digital narcissism

Tuesday, September 01, 2009

Meanwhile the president is taking a bath...


...och får en halvsida i HBL.
En svagt kylig vind drar genom vikens träd denna sista sommarkväll. /.../ om ett tag får hon också dra av sig T-tröjan och glida ner i vattnet som speglar marschallerna på bryggan.


How poetic! You would have wished this was some kind of bad joke, but it isn´t. This is how the news are nowadays.