On the Internet, We’re Always Famous

home than elsewhere, increasing efficiency of communication and of controlling human behavior can, instead of liberating us into the air like birds, fix us to the ground like toadstools. All information will come in by super-realistic television and other electronic devices as yet in the planning stage or barely imagined. In one way this will enabl

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As the internet evolves, especially for us “very online people,” there’s a deepening sense that we are, together, becoming something beyond the scope of our original intentions. We are rapidly approaching a sum far greater and more mysterious than what we often perceive as its cold, mechanistic parts.

While we conventionally think of ourselves as “u... See more

To receive no one’s attention would be a kind of death. There are, of course, disordered ways of seeking attention, but we need the attention of the other even if only to know who we are. This is why I recently wrote that “the problem of distraction can just as well be framed as a problem of loneliness.” Digital media environments hijack our desire... See more

To understand the networked self, we must first understand the self, which is a ceaseless endeavor. The ultimate problem of the Internet might stem not from the discrete technology but from the Frankensteinian way in which humanity’s invention has exceeded our own capacities.