The future generations of nanotechnology will rely on being able to effectively arrange atoms. Molecular manufacturing, and the use of molecular assemblers to hold and position molecules, will be key to the future, controlling how molecules react and allowing scientists to build complex structures with atomically precise control. In this essay, K. Eric Drexler discusses [...]
Archive | Technoculture
RSS feed for this sectionMooks for Everyone
BBC News reports that Canadian researchers have designed a computer that pays attention to the person using it. The picture of the device is ridiculous and could be a bit overwhelming for the paranoiac, but the computer can sense when its user can and should be disturbed by using an eye-contact sensor. This device should [...]
/. and Sterling
Check out Slashdot’s 1999 interview with Bruce Sterling. Here are some tidbits: Question: Do you believe that conscientious consumerism is going to be sufficient to avert continued environmental destruction? Sterling: No, no, you’re not getting it yet — you’ve got to go deeper than that. If you have to be “conscientious” about it, that means [...]
Persistent Place
In his article “Replacing Place,” William Mitchell suggest three criteria for constructing successful virtual communities: access, visibility, and persistence. The latter, Mitchell explains, is like your house: a place in which you have some personal investment of time and, yes, money.
Liminal
Having thought about Murray for a couple of weeks now and trying to position it within the context of my current reading in new media, I’m left with the word liminal to describe not how it integrates into the discussion at large, but how I conceive of the larger conversation in general.
Haraway Summary
I thought that summarizing Haraway’s main points in each section of her “A Manifesto for Cyborgs” would be helpful for many in my New Media course. Of course, these are how I interpret these sections at this time. My view of this piece has changed over time, but here’s how I currently see this important [...]
Media and the Material
Recent reading has made me think more about the seriation between the medium and the message — i.e., the cybernetic matrix of ideas about the physical and metaphysical that merge and precipitate new and unexpected ideas. In fact, these two notions — the medium and the message — upon further consideration, don’t seem separate ideas [...]
