Humans Striving to be Computers

In Jeffrey Sconce's article Tulip Theory he examines the current situation regarding the rising fame of new media and digital culture. He applies a parable, the tulipomania parable, to the conditions in Universities and academic institutions across the globe regarding new media programs and their new relationship with digital media. The parable outlines a relationship between economics and new impressive discoveries or developments in culture. It is no doubt that digital media is taking the world by storm as more and more people find themselves immersed in a digital culture. In his article Sconce writes that "It's all about 'digital culture' now" (Sconce, pp. 180).



Sconce accepts this new growing fad and touches in on the impacts of new digital technologies on educational institutions. For most schools, new media studies have branched off into the study of the digital media, a media that is putting all other mediums into a state of transition.

Sconce discusses in his article how this new desire for schools to be "involved" in the digital culture has led institutions to aggressively promote classes that incorporate digital technologies so that they appeal to funding boards. "The place of digital media in both the political and cultural economies of the future is certain" (Sconce, pp. 180) and Universities are playing on this notion to try to jump on board as soon as possible. Sconce expresses a concern that too much tampering and implication of digital media may lead to a loss of the original course load itself. Not too mention "the idea that new technologies are a 'growth field' - a place where money, opportunity, and prestige await all willing to forge ahead and stake their claim" (Sconce, pp. 183) encourages older media's to be labelled exactly that; "old media".



It is strange to see such a course load and media like film being swept aside to make room for the next economic and cultural hit which is digital. Unlike many other art forms as well as fields of study, our generation has been around to witness most of this mediums break through, and is only a few generations shy of its birth, and we are now witnessing it, along with other popular mediums, being replaced. "The fact that many, many more people still read books, go to movies, and watch television than explore the frontiers of cyberspace matters little. Digital media are the future" (Sconce, pp. 183).



It can't be denied that digital will definitely be one of the forerunners (if it isn't already the one) of future technologies, and in this world of hyperaccerleration of work digital technology, along with others, is making life for man a lot easier. Sconce makes reference to William Faulkner writing "As I Lay Dying on a typewriter in six months while he was working forty hours a week in a General electric plant" (Sconce, pp. 185), and commenting on how most people today would strive for such concentration and channeled focus. Now life has become facilitated by all of the technology that surrounds each individual in society. Research is now available at the tip of a finger, one click of the mouse and a student, almost any student, can have access to hundreds of thousands of online articles. Not only that but web sites like Wikipedia also make information searches all the more easy. Spell check is probably the number one aid in not only researching papers, but writing them as well. The 21rst century is one that is running on triple time, speeding along. Sconce touches in his article the competitive drive technologies have instilled in us. Now it does not matter whether or not we have the technology, its whether we have THE BEST technology out there. Digital technology is the 21rst centuries cultural capitalism.



Technology today is developed to facilitate life, and make many mundane tasks easier. As Aronowitz claims, "not only practical but also intellectual luddism seems irreversibly weakened" (Aronowitz, pp.133), and man has now become a cyborg of sorts. Digital culture is speeding up our world, like so many mediums in the past have, and society exists in a fast paced realm. The other day I went for job testing, a simple data entry test that was not terribly difficult, but the tricky part was time. I had to be able to complete the data entry in a limited amount of time, which was set at four minutes. 200 names in four minutes. With all of the new available softwares our lives have rapidly increased in pace. on a general whole society is motivated and endorsed by speed. Work deadlines have been pushed forward. Technology has had a permanent effect on work for it has radically raised and enhanced the bar for man, enabling while simultaneously forcing us to work faster, as though we ourselves were an upgraded computer or software.

In the past, Gods, demi-gods and foreign worlds or dimensions were anthropomorphic, but in today's society it appears that man, like work has been made to resemble a computer and its software. We constantly strive to be faster, obtain more knowledge in shorter periods and retain it for longer. The technology we have invented to facilitate our lives is now the model we use to "improve" them. Society justifies the replacement of work forces with softwares because it is "efficient", "faster", "cheaper". "If any employer's profits are squeezed by skyrocketing costs, install a computer: watch heads roll and the bottom line soar" (Aronowitz, pp. 133). Society is striving to reach cyberspace, through both technology and out own personal aspirations.