The parallel world of cyberspace will take on a liquid architecture. But the inhabitants will be as liquid as their environment. They will therefore be occupied with both the design of shape and surroundings … What the street used to be to historical dandies like Brummell, Baudelaire and Wilde, the Net is to the electronical one. Cruising along the data boulevards cannot be prohibited and clogs the entire bandwidth in the end. The all-too-civilized conversation during the rendezvous stirs up some misplaced and inconvenient information, but never leads to dissidence. Willfully wrong navigation and elegant joy riding in somebody else’s electro-environment is targeted to trigger admiration, jealousy and confusion, and self-assuredly heads toward a stylized incomprehension. One fathoms the beauty of one’s virtual appearance.
Predictor: Lovink, Geert
Prediction, in context:In a 1993 article for CTheory.net, excerpted from a larger work titled “The Art of Being Informed,” Geert Lovink, the European media theorist behind Amsterdam’s cybermagazine Mediamatic, writes: ”The parallel world of cyberspace will take on a liquid architecture (Michael Benedikt). But the inhabitants will be as liquid as their environment. They will therefore be occupied with both the design of shape and surroundings … One of the potential shapes is the digidandy … The digidandy only collects information to flaunt it, not to transfer it. He is informed all too well, even excessively so … He mocks measured consumption and intake of current news and amusement in dosages and doesn’t worry about excess or overload of specialistic knowledge. His carefully composed information portfolio shows no constructive motivation. His zapping is not prompted by boredom, but by a superior unwillingness to stay in touch with current events and the latest trivia. The screen is the mirror in front of which he does his toilet … He jeers at actuality, hype and fashion: for a moment, an I emerges, which is his own anchorman … In contrast to the data collector, the ditto dandy is not concerned with the obsession of the complete file, but the accumulation of as many immaterial ornaments as possible. While the otaku is an introvert and never crosses the boundaries of his lone cultivations, the digidandy searches out the most extroverted news groups in order to launch his unproductive contributions. Whatever the digidandy snatches to present elsewhere would be latently of interest, if it were not that his presentation were so indiscreet. His whimsical wit distracts from everyday items. The genius of his bon mots lasts 30 seconds, after which they disappear from the screen. Our dandy is a broker in gigo-ware. Your garbage is his make-up and his substance your fluidum. What the street used to be to historical dandies like Brummell, Baudelaire and Wilde, the Net is to the electronical one. Cruising along the data boulevards cannot be prohibited and clogs the entire bandwidth in the end. The all-too-civilized conversation during the rendezvous stirs up some misplaced and inconvenient information, but never leads to dissidence. Willfully wrong navigation and elegant joy riding in somebody else’s electro-environment is targeted to trigger admiration, jealousy and confusion, and self-assuredly heads toward a stylized incomprehension. One fathoms the beauty of one’s virtual appearance … Only, the scented water and the red stockings have been replaced with the prestigious ‘Intel’, delicate datagloves, and butterfly goggles laid in with rubies, and there are sensors in his eyebrows and nostrils.”
Biography:Geert Lovink was the editor of the media/art magazine Mediamatic from 1989 to1994. He has lectured about media theory in Eastern Europe and participated there in conferences on independent media, the arts and new technologies since 1991. He helped organize Interface 3 (Hamburg,1995) on the culture of computer networks. In 1995, together with Pit Schultz, he founded the International “nettime” circle, which promoted Internet criticism (www.desk.nl/nettime). (Research Scientist/Illuminator.)
Date of prediction: January 1, 1993
Topic of prediction: General, Overarching Remarks
Subtopic: General
Name of publication: CTheory
Title, headline, chapter name: The Media Gesture of Data Dandyism
Quote Type: Direct quote
Page number or URL of document at time of study:
http://www.ctheory.net/text_file.asp?pick=136
This data was logged into the Elon/Pew Predictions Database by: Anderson, Janna Quitney