Re: <nettime> .another internet is possible!_

[Richard Barbrook <richard@imaginaryfutures.net>]

Hiya,

> the internet which used to be a "beach" until the 2000s, where
> another world was not only possible bu also in practice. that was what
> richard barbrook described as "cyber-communism" at the end of the 90's on
> this list. 

Much as I would like to take credit for this concept, I realised when researching my
'Imaginary Futures' book that all I did was propose a satirical updating of the utopian 
hi-tech visions of Russian scientists in the 1950s and American hackers in the 1960s...

> the internet is not a "beach", not a place to escape to, not a place
> to take a breath, not a place to be free, anymore...

For those of a less pessimistic disposition, here is a nice irony: Facebook provides free 
software and free servers for its users to share information with each other. In other words,
dotcom capitalism in the service of cybernetic communism!

Richard

=======================

Dr. Richard Barbrook
Dept of Politics and IR,
University of Westminster
32-38 Wells Street
LONDON W1T 3UW
England

+44 (0)7879 441873

http://www.classwargames.net
http://www.imaginaryfutures.net
http://www.theclassofthenew.net
http://www.imaginaryfutures.net/other-works

âThe proletarian revolution is that critique of
human geography through which individuals 
and communities will begin constructing places
and events suitable for the re-appropriation not
only of their labour, but also of their total 
history. By virtue of the resulting mobile 
spaces of play, and by virtue of freely chosen
variations in the rules of the game, the 
autonomy of place and the authenticity of life 
will be discovered.â

Guy Debord, The Society of the Spectacle.






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