The digital era promises, as did many other
technological developments before it, the transformation
of society: with the computer, we can transcend time,
space, and politics-as-usual. In The Digital Sublime,
Vincent Mosco goes beyond the usual stories of
technological breakthrough and economic meltdown to
explore the myths constructed around the new digital
technology and why we feel compelled to believe in them.
He tells us that what kept enthusiastic investors in the
dotcom era bidding up stocks even after the crash had
begun was not willful ignorance of the laws of economics
but belief in the myth that cyberspace was opening up a
new world.Myths are not just falsehoods that can be
disproved, Mosco points out, but stories that lift us
out of the banality of everyday life into the
possibility of the sublime. He argues that if we take
what we know about cyberspace and situate it within what
we know about culture -- specifically the central
post-Cold War myths of the end of history, geography,
and politics -- we will add to our knowledge about the
digital world; we need to see it "with both eyes" --
that is, to understand it both culturally and
materially.After examining the myths of cyberspace and
going back in history to look at the similar mythic
pronouncements prompted by past technological advances
-- the telephone, the radio, and television, among
others -- Mosco takes us to Ground Zero. In the final
chapter he considers the twin towers of the World Trade
Center -- our icons of communication, information, and
trade -- and their part in the politics, economics, and
myths of cyberspace.
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