nettime: reacting to 'What Kind of Libertarian'

[Jan De Pauw <Jan.DePauw@ping.be>]

following text, both in body and attachment, is a reaction to 'What Kind of
Libertarian', interview with Louis Rossetto. If you think it is relevant
enough to post, feel free. Just please let me know in reply.
Thanks.

Jan

__________________________
exact change only please
(considering the Rossetto interview)

HEADER

According to Louis Rossetto of Wired Ventures, constructive thinking about
the digital revolution is hard to come by. A majority of cybercritics tends
to rely upon classic left or right wing concepts - at a time when most all
progressive voices in the debate agree the old ideological systems have
broken down. Admittedly, the formulation of a new frame of thinking is a
first rate priority and a challenge one cannot forsake. Thus, St. Louis,
here we come !

BODY

Rossetto is not easy on his readers. Overall, his tone is defensive and
highpitched. He's the one to lay down the rules of the game. The most
important of them being we cannot fall back upon notions like 'state',
'massmarket' or 'morals' because those are 19th century and overtaken. He
wants to hear new metaphors. Furthermore, personal criticism is out of the
question and arguments have to be based on facts. Fully to the point, of
course. And finally, we have to appreciate his undertaking enthusiasm. The
man clearly knows how to hold his own. And he is adventurous. But then, so
am I ! 

Even if throughout his text Rossetto often confuses developments in
cyberculture per se with evolutions on a broader geo-political terrain, the
background of his ideas essentially looks like this : the economic,
political, social and ethical future world order is centerless.
Powerhierarchies will be replaced by horizontally spread, contextually
linked groups. National states, unions, monopoly-industries, schools and
churches are losing their privileged positions. From now on, society will be
regulated by a free market, consumption and democratic discussion that will
lead to exchange and consensus. Rossetto considers these developments to be
a revolution. He views the internet as both motor ˆnd metaphor of a
radically new world. 

The above being my brief synopsis of Rossetto's ideas, I will now base my
considerations on the notions of 'centerlessness', 'democracy' and
'emancipation'.  

Centerlessness

It's common knowledge that the grand discourses and ideological pillars of
our society have lost their significance. But even if the current world
order has crumbled, this does not mean that everything is now in free-flow.
Within the so-called centerlessness of the geo-political stage, new poles
are manifesting themselves :
* to an important degree, the 'global economy' is determined by the
socio-political relief of cities and nations : an estimated 70% of
'worldcapital' never leaves Manhattan; the stock markets of Wall Street,
London and Tokyo function as important indexes for world economy;
South-East-Asia represents a spectacular growing pole; multinationals,
international joint-ventures and (maffia)cartels conduct affairs along the
rationale of wage- and taxscales, national debts and corruption-resistence
of governments; the near entire African continent is a negative pole per se;
and the possible political futures of Hong Kong and Johannesburg are
frantically being mapped out.
* the falling apart of national states knows two movements : states regroup
into bigger blocks (e.g. the Schengen-group), or are shredded into smaller,
independent countries (e.g. former Soviet Block). Each of these tendencies
has its influence on 'worldeconomy' : either one draws new investments, or
relies on the international aid-economy of the military-financial complex.
Each of these tendencies is mapped out and controlled by several
institutions (IMF, Worldbank, United Nations), who in turn are being run by
the richest, most influential states.
* the disappearance of traditional industrial giants, under the pressure of
a deregulated market, gives rise to more flexible and delocalised molochs.
Media, software, cable and telecommunications offer ample examples thereof.
Furthermore, a growing automatisation enhances a lucrative leisure-culture
based on consumption. Entertainment and tourism industries, and the
(financial) service-sector gain importance throughout. 
Even if it's too early to call some of these new poles 'centers', they can
definitely be seen as radar-beacons, carefully scanned by the invisible
deciders of worldeconomy. The causal chains between the intelligence they
possess and, say, the price of bread are tight.

Also, the so-called centerlessness of the internet itself demands nuance.
The current debate about name.space is a fitting example. As you well know,
each computer in a network has a unique address (i.p. numbers and
domain-names). Up to 1995 those addresses were registered for free and
monitored by the InterNIC (Internet Network Information Center), under
supervision of the National Science Foundation. Since '95, the rights to
manage this database are in the hands of Network Solutions Inc, a privately
owned company charging $100 for each new registration, and $50 for each
annual renewal (from the third year on). Keeping the explosive growth of the
internet in mind, it is clear what massive income and control this virtual
monopoly has generated. Only since 1996, with the advent of new software, an
alternative is available. A new consortium of networks and
systemadministrators allows users to register under their own (brand)name
(what we call name.space) ˆnd to connect to both name.space and InterNIC
databases. Modest fees apply to name registration for websites and networks.
For those who just want to use it to browse, name.space is free.

At first sight, this development seems to confirm Rossetto's beliefs : the
internet is a many-to-many thing. Still, it is remarkable how an alternative
like name.space was conceived on the basis of 'parano•d subversion'.
Name.space was launched by Paul Garrin, an artist who manifested himself in
the eighties as an important exponent of video-activism (the use of
home-video to denounce power abuse). Garrin currently runs the cyberforum
MediaFilter, that functions as a webwatcher along with likeminded cells like
Covert Action Quarterly and Nettime. Not a critical optimism, but rather a
chronic allergy to various forms of powerconsolidation seems to be the
motivating factor behind their guerrilla-like penetrations. Significant in
this respect is the fact that Paul Garrin named his name.space e-zine 'The
Black Hole', which is much more grim sounding than the hip 'Wired'. Rather
than dissolving in the trip-like, caleidoscopic two-dimensionality of the
net, the subversive school tries to stimulate, through cyberspace, a
permanent watchfulness to the invisible pirates outside your screenframe.

Democracy

The internet allows users to communicate and exchange ideas. Software
permits the consumption and production of documents. Digital worlds invite
reaction and participation. Such forms of (pre-programmed) interactivity,
Rossetto understands as fullgrown alternatives to the vertical system of
electoral democracy. To him, democracy is an interactive and contextual
process of creation and exchange. A process that finds its most radical
dimension in the internet.
Paul Virilio thinks differently about it. In 1977 already, he published
'Vitesse et Politique', a study of speed in relation to democracy. Up into
his latest book 'La Vitesse de LibŽration' (1995), the theme of
velocity/speed has kept him occupied. In his considerations he equates the
increasing compression of data and speed of transmission - basic
characteristics of the internet backbone technology - with the reduction of
time and space. According to him, compression and digital transmission lead
to the Nothing, to inertia and sollipsism. Absolute speed,
instant-communication, are the opposite of democracy, which in fact requires
distance and reflexion time. The breakdown of parlementary democracy is a
consequence of the absolute speed of digital traffic (speed of light). Not
the other way around. In contrast to Rossetto, Virilio does not believe in
the emancipating power of telecommunication. In his study of the Gulf War he
tested his theories (see 'L'Žcran du dŽsert, analyse des technologies mises
en oeuvre dans la guerre du Golfe et de sa 'couverture mŽdiatique', 1991).
He concluded that the so-called 'real-time' reporting technologies managed
to disengage the public opinion from what was going on and inforce the power
of the military-informational complex, run by the Pentagon and CNN. 
Not only then does the much lauded horizontality of the net seem to be
inadequate, the globality of instant-communication further reveals itself to
be harmful. Virilio does not detect a new flowering democracy, but a falling
back onto oneself. And in that, he finds a new form of feodalism, wherein
the individual is the world and wages private wars. In the Lebanon of the
eighties, the former Yugoslavia and also in the metropolitan ghettoes,
Virilio detects examples of such private wars. Might Rossetto, the
rags-to-righteous-riches enterpreneur, himself be involved in such a conflict ?
Rossetto refers the ethical discussion about the future to the backrooms of
history. Left, right, the state and massmarket are dismissed as empty
shells. This is the era of privatised welfare (pensionsavings, insurances in
abundance, private education...). Everybody now has a choice and only needs
to work hard and pay the bills. In the future products will be made and sold
to measure. Much like the question about universal access to the net,
Rossetto neither addresses the matter of universal participation in the
future. Yet, a recent United Nations study revealed that the gap between
rich and poor has doubled in the past thirty years. About one fifth of the
world population controls 85% of total income. Furthermore, the study
predicts that the total worldproduction will have doubled by the year 2030,
but the African part therein will have shrunk from 1,2% to 0,4%. And the
most important news of all : the classic model of unequal economic growth
(Western Europe, U.S. Latin-America) has revealed itself to be less
efficient than the model applied in e.g. South-Korea or Taiwan, where
economic growth is linked to equal redistribution of wealth. Those last
countries make for the strongest overall growth of the past year ! 

Emancipation

Radical thinking about the future, as Rossetto invites us to deliver, offers
two possibilities. Either we erase the majority of the world's population
from our tentative notes, or we try to realise a thorough redistribution of
means. Given painful 20th century examples of the former option, it seems
more appropriate to choose the latter. When talking about redistribution of
means, we should not limit our perspective to financial matters of income
and debt. The distribution of cognitive means is equally important.
Education and training are important weapons. Especially in the war against
growing computer illiteracy. Wired calls itself a journalistic forum,
reporting on our possible future. But the magazine itself is neologistic on
the brink of total loss of meaning. The call for new metaphors is misplaced,
because such figurative language will vary according to the degree of
complexity mastered by the user. We do not need fit concept packaging, but
grammatical navigationsystems that allow the development of non-linear
semantics. Classic educational systems, relying on canon, tradition and
history, are insufficient in that respect. The simultaneity of information
on the net confronts us with problems such as 'version', 'context',
'association' and 'verification'. Those have to be investigated. Not with
the intention to end the monologue with a formal 'you are right', but to
start the dialogue with a tentative 'I see'. It is naive to want to be a
poet in the present crisis of meaning.

END

Many of the elements Rossetto incorporates in his drawing of the future, are
manifest today. But we have to be careful not to take the present for
absolute. It is not because old economic monopolies are being eroded, or
political centerparties have lost the voter's trust, that no reorganisations
or reconsolidations of 'power' are taking place. To put it differently : it
is not because current organisational structures are crumbling, that the
future is unconditionally open. Wired itself is very busy claiming big
pieces of the cake, by reproducing an ever more diversified internet
discours wherein Wired itself is occupying center stage (website, magazine,
books, tv). Wired is a commercial succes we have to acknowledge. But I want
value for my money.

Jan De Pauw
Wolfstraat 16
9000 Gent
09/233 02 80
rek. : 703-0327227-27
Jan.Depauw@ping.be 

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Jan De Pauw
32 9 233 02 80
DE VERBEELDING
32 9 225 14 40