network materiality and temporality: things flow 'non-continuously' in network culture

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NETWORK MATERIALITY AND TEMPORALITY:THINGS FLOW “NON-CONTINUOUSLY” INNETWORK CULTURE5 NOV, 2015 @ THE UNIVERSITY OF HONG KONG

Winnie SOON | Ph.D Fellow | www.siusoon.netSchool of Communication and Culture

The Center for Participatory IT

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www.siusoon.net



http://www.siusoon.net/

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What is material?

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Computing as Material Practice

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[materialist approaches] embrace both the material substrates andabstract of programming languages required for data storage,processing and exchange: code, hardware devices, operatingsystems, software, applications, platforms, interfaces, documents,file formats as well as networking protocols and infrastructure.

(Casemajor, 2015, p. 5)



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ABOUT ME

www.siusoon.net/nonsense/



Nonsense (2015)

http://www.siusoon.net/nonsense/

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MATERIALIST FRAMEWORK

Actor Network Theory (Latour, 1987, 1992, 1999, 2005; Callon, 1991; Law, 1992)”Things-in-phenomena” (Barad, 2007)



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If we limit critical discussions of digital culture to the notions of“open access”, “cyber”, “digital”, “Internet,” “networks,” “newmedia”, or “social media,” we will never be able to get to what isbehind new representational and communication media and tounderstand what it really is and what it does. If we don’t addresssoftware itself, we are in danger of always dealing only with itseffects rather than the causes: the output that appears on acomputer screen rather than the programs and social cultures thatproduce these outputs.

(Manovich, 2011)



AARHUSUNIVERSITETAU Winnie SOON | Ph.D Fellow | www.siusoon.net

School of Communication and CultureThe Center for Participatory IT

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CONTINUITY / FLOW / STREAM



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Raymond Williams invokes the concept of 'flow' as a way ofexplaining the effect of immediacy and presence the experience oftelevision gives. The defining characteristic of broadcasting, both astechnology and as cultural form, Williams argues, is one of sequenceor flow.

(Feuer, p. 15, 1983)



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I want to suggest that in social media, as it developed until now(2004-2012), database no longer rules. Instead, social media bringsforward a new form: a data stream. Instead of browsing or searchinga collection of objects, a user experiences the continuous flow ofevents.

(Manovich, n.p, 2012)



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In network time, things flow non-continuously. The NOW constantlypunctures time, as the new quickly becomes old, and the oldbecomes forwarded once more as new(ish).

(Chun, forthcoming)



http://siusoon.net/home/?p=1155

How to get the Mao experience through Internet… (2014)



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THROBBER



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PROGRESS BAR



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DATA PACKET



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TEMPORAL THINGS



temporal things (2015)http://networkedthing.orgfree.com/

http://networkedthing.orgfree.com/

http://networkedthing.orgfree.com/

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The network structure of today’s communication channels and oftheir information stream is often understood as providing a directconnection between users and services or between twocommunication partners, even though there cannot be any directconnections on digital networks. The metaphor of the flow concealsthe fact that, technically, what is taking place is quite the opposite.There is no stream in digital networks.

(Sprenger, 2015, pp. 88-89, my emphasis)



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DISCONTINUOUS TEMPORALITY



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The Pirate Cinema by Nicolas Maigrethttp://thepiratecinema.com/

http://thepiratecinema.com/

http://thepiratecinema.com/

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Thank You

network materiality and temporality: things flow 'non-continuously' in network culture

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