The X rules I never break on I-Land

I. I always (try to) write in correct (academic ?) french, including the use of punctuation.

II. I erase my history each time I use someone else‘s computer.

III. I post an answer on forums I signed on only if necessary.

IV. I bookmark every article, page or book page that seems interesting to me.

V. I try not to download too much.

VI. I ALWAYS keep my “Répliques” podcast updated.

VII. I never post any photo of myself.

VIII. I NEVER drink  my “webshake” (podcasts of political philosophy conferences/Aqua Teen Hunger Force episodes/mediology articles/ South Park episodes) before going to bed (it would make anyone sick).

IX. I never chat with more than two people  in the same time.

X. I never use twice the same password for my web activities.

A little story about this guy…

E-learning, Schme-learning !

– Did you like last week’s e-learning class, Chad ?

– … *wakes up suddenly* Uh, what ? You mean, that thing about the geopolitical context of our business ?

– Yeah, you know, with this little bearded teacher who wouldn’t stop barking at you !

– You gotta admit this e-learning c**p is all about fun, right ?

– … What do you mean ? I was stressed to death the whole time !

– Howard, my boy, it’s time to take your slice of the big modernity pie ! See, my son is having some e-learning lessons too, and he tells me that his teacher is so busy trying to make his webcam work that he doesn’t control anything happening in the room ! One of the kids even hit my son’s neighbor with a keyboard during the course, for Christ’s sake !

– … What’s your point ?

– Simple, Howard: I just decided to follow my son’s advice. Keep pretending you’re attentive to the lesson, nod when you’re asked to, and do everything else you want at the first little technical problem ! And I don’t have to remind you that these problems often occur, especially when you give’em a hand, right ?

– I guess you’re right, Chad… Tricky, but right.

Babel’s back !

As the XXIst century ends its first decade, we see reappear a strange ghost of the cyber-punk era. Remember, back in the late nineties/millenium year, when Stephen King sold his book Riding The Bullet through digital release only, many were thinking that weird names like CybookGen would be soon part of our daily conversations. Though the technology was ready for many years, and the ideals of a reading democratisation strongly defended since the early seventies, what we call today “e-books” just comes back now on the table.

Upgraded, lightened, fashioned to fit into the iPhone age, Amazon’s Kindle, Sony’s Reader or Barnes & Noble’s Nook were launched during 2009. Even if the devices are still quite expensive (at least 280 $, damn it !), it seems that everything is done to tempt the readers to buy one of these thin screens.

I can’t help but think there’s a part of mythology in this “e-reading comeback”. We live in a promethean world, where any single scientific or technologic innovation awakes pagan impulses. The e-book, such as Gutenberg Project or Google’s attempts to create the absolute online library clearly shows how wide the Alexandria’s Library wound remains.

But I’m wondering if there isn’t some tight link with this Babel tower we human once tried to wave in the face of God. It’s like Amazon tech guys, assisted by their mythology consultants, had said in a think tank full of sweaty shirts and coffee-stained neckties : “The old guy up there may have divided our tongues so we can’t understand each other anymore, but we can at least build this illusion of human knowledge in the pocket of everyone, so we could be connected and powerful again !”

And indeed, who wouldn’t like to read the entire Divine and Human Comedy on a tiny screen, sometime between lunch and subway ?

The thing is, when you read something on a screen, everything is an information. E-reading put the architext (a term created by Emmanuël Souchier, CELSA teacher) at the same level than the text. So if you read Dostoyevsky’s The Possessed on the Kindle, your reading will depend on the cultural injonction brought by Amazon’s settings. It also multiplies the interactions you can have with a text. With a book, you open it, read it, mark it, underline it or close it. But with an e-book, you can download, see images, read books and magazines. The ancient levels of sacrality are erased, and new ones are emerging.

I’m not sure I’d like to read Stendhal or Canetti on an e-book. The matter and the text himself doesn’t apply to those electronic rules. But I’d be curious to see how David Foster Wallace’s Infinite Jest (a 1000 pages novel filled with endnotes), an anticipation/world literature book tackling communications and art analysis issues, would look on a Kindle ! If I’d have to buy an e-book, I surely try the Amazon model with DFW’s masterpiece… It’s probably the closest way to enter synesthesia !