I think tech-space articulates it for me. I'm reading a Communications text
which describes such space as embodying two fundamental changes:
"...the increased separation of information about a phenomenon from the
phenomenon itself;
and the reorganization of space and power that results from that separation."
(if anyone wants details of the source, let me know - it's called (1996)
"Mass Communications in
Canada")
>
>I've thought a bit about these matters from two perspectives: the
>architecture of movements in space and organizational relationships, and
>successors to the idea of computer labs and smart classrooms.
>
<snip>
>The actual future
...which u distinguish from a 'virtual' future?...
>seems more likely to
>belong (for many reasons) to distributed computing: lots of individually
>powerful chips and boxes, fast-wired to one another, so that whatever
>capacity is available anywhere in the network is used for a current task
>and users don't know or care where their process is being run. Users see a
>customized interface to a virtual machine, as if their computer was local,
>when actually it's not. Users access the network capacity in two ways:
>personal screen units (maybe foldups? and eventually replaced by eyeglasses
>or contact lenses that let you both see the ordinary environment and
>superimpose the virtual 3D interface on part of your field of vision when
>and where you want it) that you can carry around with you (on/in you), and
>standard terminals located all over the place (like phones are now) that
>once you log in displays your own customized interface with default access
>to your own files, just as if it were a clone of your 'personal' machine.
so u assume a highly visualized culture; which I cannot disagree with, but
which I
do find, ironically so, rather myopic and leading to a further erosion
of literacy and aural communications... the ultimate 'visual' culture will
be Western-capitalisms final journey to the "end of the world as we know
it"...
<snip>
>
>Regarding the space itself, I think we have to plan in terms of an eventual
>'double-space': physical space and a navigable 3D cyberspace. A lot of the
>semiotic materials of the future: texts, images, sounds, videos,
>animations, simulations, etc. will not be materially present in the
>physical space, but will be 'virtual images' (in the technical sense in
>optics): you and others will 'see' them in some place(s), but someone who
>is not tuned in to your computer channel will see nothing there (or see
>something else there appropriate to their own project or task at the
>moment). So I imagine a lot more 'bare space' physically, as if the whole
>environment was a sort of 'blue screen'.
the absence of a tactile environment? can this be healthy? the dimishing
of an accoustically-sophisticated aural environment- where silence =(death)?
or such versions of tech supremacy which promote kinds of sterility...?
more whiteness. Can't say I find this at all encouraging...
I think ur right about the infrared access: but the double-space you describe
is utterly chilling and fantastically white... the sterile future rings of a
masculine-dream...
surely the future holds something more ecclectic in store?
<snip>
>
>In these assistive environments, people will work alone at times, in
>face-to-face groups at times (co-viewing virtual texts and images), and in
>virtual groups at times. Even without the next-step projective imaging
>technologies, people with laptops will do all this, and such a model is
>more flexible than fixed workstations. It would even be possible to just
>'rent' people laptops, o have them 'signed out' for in-building use only.
>They could be configured to the building's network of servers, and only
>work with them, but become automatically customized to the user after login
>(including the capacity to retrieve user home files by internet ftp). I
>think of a billiards parlor (pool hall) where most people rent a cue stick
>and some bring their own. There are a lot of interesting psychological and
>cultural questions raised by this model about how personally attached
>people will be to the machines themselves, vs. to the files or the
>customized interface, and what possible 'tragedies of the commons' need to
>be attended to with public facilities.
yes, issues of access become even more pronounced... tech-sharing
seems plausible only amongst the elite. Ownership, too, is
an elitist concern (again pale, masculine...)
>
>So if we think of a building as a 'machine for living' (FL Wright) and
>these as buildings for collaborative learning/meaning-making, then most of
>the assistive technology will be invisible (in walls, under floors, above
>ceilings, etc.) and the space will be bare and space, the better to make
>the 'place' more flexible and customizable. Obviously there will also have
>to be some contrasting spaces which have fixed 'place' character and a lot
>of rich physical texture to facilitate face-to-face relaxation (like a
>Faculty Common Room, or a cafe, etc.). So I imagine three types of
>space/place: public spaces which are physically bare but can become various
>sorts of workgroup 'places', non-work gathering places with rich visual and
>furnishing character (including vistas or open decks to outside
>landscaping, and maybe some interior landscaping as well), and private
>spaces of two kinds: permanent offices that are physically richly
>customized but with at least one 'bare wall', and temporary offices that
>are more like the public workspaces.
a key policy in Canadian standards regarding communications is access:
that innovations include the practical applications which make it accessible
to all classes, all rural and urban-based populations...
What models do you think Westernized cultures will draw from
to determine accessibility standards?
>Why have public buildings at all?
... What is, "To serve the public"?
>we really need serious, specific, and
>convincing answers to this question. Why should there be physical library
>buildings? university teaching buildings?
these are two very different beasts: public libraries make information available
to, for example, the "poor":
university teaching buildings are ideological and material
limbs of the education institution - if anything, universities might
benefit from
following the public-library model, where literacy and media and technology
access
are housed in community-centred buildings to service the 'public' ...
universities, ideally, ought to be thinking about decentralization and
access: but, I live in a country which heavily subsidizes education
and so, these issues are inevitably entwined with funding criteria.
>If people prefer to work from
>home (do they?),
As someone who works at home, I can say I like it, I don't
feel isolated, but I also perceive it as specific middle-class white babe
kind of
privilege...so advocating it as a practice becomes difficult.
Alvin Toffler's "The Third Wave" advocated as much, and was soundly
critiqued for being an elitist assumption...
how to talk about the future in a way which surpasses our ideological
limitations???
<snip>
>
>One of the modernist dichotomies built into my vision of a possible future
>above is the separation of work space from relaxation place even within the
>same building. An alternative model is the 'internet cafe' where people can
>socialize, eat, drink, and also 'work' on terminals. I like breaking down
>the work/leisure dichotomy, but I'm not sure how much work I could get done
>in such an environment. I'd like to have places like this as alternative
>spaces to pure-work and pure-leisure places, but I'm not sure they
>represent a general solution.
It would depend on what you do, Jay. Santitation workers don't have this as
an option.
Construction workers, health care workers, any public service occupation; any
civil service job; good grief I dare say there is a teeny portion of
the population who are in a position to choose their work/leisure
locations. Again, this smacks of elitism,w hich i don't call as irresponsible:
so much as, _given_ the relations between technology and the elite,
how are we to imagine a spatially organized future which offers some kind
of *post-structural* spatial organization?
diane
"Every tool is a weapon if you hold it right."
Ani Difranco
*********************************
diane celia hodges
faculty of education
university of british columbia
vancouver, bc canada
tel: (604)-253-4807
email: dchodges who-is-at interchange.ubc.ca