Hyper-reality and the digital Renaissance – Stephen Hill, MM30
December 2009
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Web is not a world of ‘Hyper-real Utopia’ but
one still plagued by “less pleasant characteristics: vanity, insularity and
petty prejudice”. Harassment is “routinised and naturalised”.
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“networks and friendship groups [on social media
sites] are increasingly confined to parochial factions of college and workmates”
So not a utopia after all – we take our prejudices with us.
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He argues body image is also a problem on the
web. Now users of social media are under the same kind of pressure (being in
the public gaze) as previously only experienced by soap stars and such like.
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Overall
argument suggests generally a force for good – “it is the message not the
medium that triumphs” and gives good examples of SKYPE.
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