User:Sebastians/rwrw/annotation/111012

(currently reading this, therefore this "random" position in the book)

In the chapter Digital Cameras and the Will of Technology, part of his book Web Aesthetics. How Digital Media Affect Culture and Society, Vito Campanelli (VC) writes about the possible reasons and consequences associated with the widespread use of mobile digital devices.

He describes how we more and more consider only that to be real and authentic, which is mediated, thus being compelled to re-represent our experiences. Whereas the media industry tries to offer an authentic experience by concealing the mediation, we as individuals need to be able to look at a moment that we have experienced again and again in order for it to become real.

This need, however, isn't necessarily a human desire only, but is just as well driven by what VC calls the will of technology. Initially man would have a goal and the machine or tool (for example an individual and discrete one as the hammer) would provide the means to achieve it. Referring to italian philosopher Emanuele Severino, VC describes the reversal of this relationship. According to Severino, the contemporary subject approaches technology in the same way as s/he previously approached god (→ "save me", "be the means through which my will is made"), to then more realistically realize that the s/he needs to take a step back in order not to interfere (→ "may your will be done").

VC calls the act of sharing (e.g. photos) a "simulacrum of purpose" that gives us the illusion that we act deliberately instead of fulfilling the will of technology. As technology provides both aim and means at the same time, humans lack a real "telos" and are reduced to the operation of machines.