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[robotamerica]

The article I have provided in the link below essentially sums up my own critique of not only facebook, but of most "communication" sites on the internet; yes, this includes my skepticism of livejournal as an appropriate means of communication. I hope you all take a read of this article and take a few critical moments to think about it. What

Comments

[dubpulse]

but, is the answer disengagement and techno-luddism? or do we engage and force/demand user control of technology?

this is something i debate constantly. pronoia or paranoia in the age of commodified communication? i lean towards the former, but that is not to say i don't overwhelmingly agree with the critique in that article.

i'm more interested in what avenues of autonomy do exist in an online context, if any.

[robotamerica]

Yes, this is often something that I debate. Autonomous and non-commercial avenues/venues in internet communication technologies (ICT) are, to say the least, far superior to commercial avenues/venues. I am skeptical of the paranoid; however, this is a contentious debate, and it is true that big brother is ever more present in our postmodern condition. It is strange to see an overtly, and often unilateral, approach to the "rationalization" of ICT's without much room for debate - even us radicals see it as progressive and emancipatory. I must maintain, however, that it can be very disempowering and actually create a fragmented sense of community - as well as maintaining a very overly bourgeois sense of the world. Remember that literacy rates in the world are not 100% even in our cities; so, do ICT's actually come to the aid of the so called "marginalized"? Or do they further extend the digital divide