Weekly Post 10
1: Putting aside the Turkle reading’s romanticism over communicative technologies (I honestly find the term “cyborg” a bit tiring in academia), I was very interested in the point raised via the man on the subway train. She claims that people seem to go out of their way “not to listen” to people on the phone in public, but I’ve observed the opposite effect, especially in situations where being on one’s phone is frowned upon. I think that her second notion, though – that the rest of the world becomes invisible to the individual using digital communication – is meritous and feeds back into ideas if disembodiment and digital technology, as well.
2: Ito’s article raised an interesting idea for me very early. In his “kit” notion, he raises the presence of credit and transit cards as “digital” technology. I just bought something earlier today, and going back over the process, I realized that if someone got my debit card they could use it for any number of things. Given how signatures work, they don’t even have to know my name. That goes double for my Metro card. This state of affairs raises a question for me. Are we directly connected to our identities anymore in day-to-day life? Certainly, many banks have measures in place such as demanding photo ID that would stop someone from walking into a bank and taking my money, nothing would stop someone with my metro card from spending it. Does this mean that they, in a sense, become me? Has my identity become separated from my actual body when someone possesses my digital device?
3: A question I believe is raided in the Fischer reading, particularly by the notion of “friends” in a digital age, is if we hold our online and offline friends to different standards. I know growing up, my parents were pretty clear that my online friends did not constitute “real” friends, and to a degree I wonder if a lack of physical proximity to someone does impact the ability to make friends with someone. On the other hand, some of my most enriching relationships at least began online, so even if there is a barrier I wonder if it’s a permanent one or one that will become thinner as the people born in the digital age grow older.
Definitions
Disembodiment: I consider this a major theme in this chapter, especially with the second question I’m posting. With the presence we’ve established in the digital world, do we maintain our identity when separated from our devices
Social Network: I think the use of the term in the Fischer reading perhaps calls for a comparison of how physical social network (inasmuch as they exist in the physical world) “look” compared to digital networks, and how the two have begun to intertwine.