A D V E N T U R E S   in   C Y B E R S O U N D

I often see the frenzy of interest in online communication technologies played out in the real world. On MTV, movie posters, and Wal-Mart circulars, I see URLs. In one car commercial, an actor says "I surf the Net... I'm on the Web.. I am cyberman!" And Digital Equipment has a television commercial in which business people navigate a huge machine of cogs turning in a dreamlike scene - Digital's metaphor for people considering business strategies on the Internet.

Perhaps I might be oversensitive to references to the Net in popular culture because I make my living describing online communication. But these references to me have an underlying subtext: this is what you need to do, this is your future. While the vast majority of the population has no clue about the Web - nor cares to - these references imply an attitude of how potent technology is in our lives.

A central theme of  technological determinism - the view that technology has a potency that shapes our lives - is fairly common. In fact, it is so common in much discussion about the Net, that it may seem very strange to think otherwise. The attitudes technological determinism implies are profound.

One school of thought says that "if you build it, they will come." ...(The American communications company) ...AT&T reflected this point of view in its long-running, "You will!" campaign. To me, that campaign reminded me again and again how AT&T seemed to overhype a potential technology (a variation on the picture phone, as telephone companies have been doing for decades), while at the same time ignore the reality of the Net. So instead of focusing on the real needs of people interested in online communication, their strategic plans were to try to create a market for products before they were created, all with the certainty that whatever products they would create, people would adopt and use them. This kind of technological determinism can lead not only to poor business planning, but it can also lead to narrow research agendas.

I'm not sure that the sharp dichotomy of views about the potency of technology tells the whole story. Technology and people are both too complex and quirky to precisely map their influences on each other.

December. J., 1996, exceprpts from the eZine, CMC

Back to the Top | Essays Index | Quit | eMail: Dr Russell Naughton