[Nettime-bold] Re: <nettime> Water-shedding

[Jonathan <jd.conroy {AT} student.qut.edu.au>]

> Perhaps because you don't need anything else to read a 
book, except a
> knowledge of the language it is written in. A cdrom 
needs a cdrom
> drive, computer and software, all of which must be 
compatible with the
> cdrom. It also needs electricity and the technology 
that produces it.
> In short its usefulness requires an *entire* 
infrastructure which is
> itself changing rapidly. I'll go with the book.
>
> Roberto Verzola

Nice point, a CDROM is a product of the systems, 
organisation and technology of idustrialised society, 
and as such, work produced on CDROM can never be 
considered craft.

Books, on the other hand, can go either way, and so even 
books produced by industrialised means (as most are) 
retain some of the cultural and aesthetic attachments we 
have for craft, and the idea of a unique work.

Finally, books age in a visible, tactile and olifactory 
way.  An important part of the attachment and intimacy 
we develop with artifacts is that they embody some 
notion of having a soul.  Age and wear give character 
and soul to what are otherwise tools.


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