Cyber Typologies and Societal Spectacles

The Internet is a very inviting place, that some would note as 'too inviting', to all the freaks and geeks among us. There is a little something for everyone at the Web's digital doorstep; it will take you as you are. In "Technologies and Utopias: The Cyberflaneur and the Experience of 'Being Online'", Mauren Hartmann approaches two interfaces of technology: the machine, (i.e. digital), and the space, (physical). In this approach she wonders if there even is a line to cross between these two, once very separate thoughts, anymore. After all, man did make machine and be he the most objective being in the world, there are bound to be some emotional imprints on that hard drive somewhere.

One most obvious hint that man made machine is the experience of being online itself. Chat rooms and avatars mix and meld and morph into notions beyond both time and space. In many respects, these things deemed both infinite and finite are like the greatest dreamscape ever imagined in ancient fairy tales. Cyberspace is all of these things and none of them in one whole. It is like a mind never ceasing to sleep. Links are the branches of one thought racing to connect to another and memes are those brief moments when our R.E.M cycle has been interrupted and we are half-awake, caught between the reality outside and the fantasy within.

Although the similarities between cyberspace and dreaming is clear and present, the dream still serves a client on an individual basis whereas cyberspace has a bigger following. For example, in this new world one would eventually start to notice others around him as actual figures and not just as screen names who respond to his questions on a whim. One could ponder other existences like his own and want to know more about them, (i.e. if their aspirations were mutual, etc.), and wonder why they posted particular things rather than just how or when they did so. Hartmann describes there being seven types of internet users: the cyberflaneur, cyberflaneuse, webgrrl, cyberpunk, netizen, cybernaut, and the surfer. All have their own reasoning for doing what they do, whether it is to inform, destroy, build, scandalize, discover or express themselves. As one interacts or counteracts another, communities are created and a new issue arises, surveillance, (where one watches many, ex. the government bugging phones), verses sousveillance, (where everyone watches each other, ex. forums online).

Following this theme of surveillance verses sousveillance, is Guy Debord's Society of the Spectacle, a black and white French film that features oddly juxtaposed images and a formal voiceover. Here, the imagery which represents a person, a nation or an event is a spectacle. "This spectacle is the guardian of sleep..." he notes as an army invasion on the beach follows still footage of topless women frolicking in the ocean. Magazine imagery, celebrity and politicized news all come together as the intangible and often decadent, (the fantasy), and cast spells on their spectators. This theory can be applied to avatars and profile pictures, where the spectacle has the power, people can show what they want to be shown to others and hide what they do not. However, the spectator can also have the upper-hand. As a consumer of this spectacle, he or she can manipulate the spectacle however they want to and choose to idolize or dissemble the spectacle's pedestal, (ex. the relationship between public figures and the public). In conclusion, the Internet is a shared dream full of differing personalities, all of which have their own reasoning for being here in the first place.