Customer Reviews

Data Trash: The Theory of Virtual Class (Culturetexts)

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

I bought this book because there was a good plug on the back from Bruce Sterling, and he's usually interesting. But I don't know what he was thinking; maybe he was stoned. In fact, I am at a loss to explain any detail of this book's existence without supposing that everyone involved was seriously impared in one way or another.

Here's a sample paragraph, from page 83:

"As for the technocrats? They have long ago blasted off into hyperspace, filled with sad, but no less ecstatic, dreams of a telematic history that will never be theirs to code. An evangelical class, schooled in the combinatorial logic of virtual reality and motivated by missionary consciousness, the technological class is already descending into the spiralling depths of the sub-human. It wills itself to the will to virtuality. In return for this act of monumental hubris, it will be ejected as surplus matter by the gods of virtuality, once its servofunction has been digitally reproduced. In Dante's new version of the circling rings of virtual reality, this class operates under the sign of an ancient curse: it is wrong, just because it is so right. For not understanding the virtual hubris, it is condemned to eternal repetition of the same data byte."

And that's one of the clearer paragraphs.

The endless stream of sentences that parse, without actually saying anything, eventually put me in the mind of "travesty generators" -- computer programs that, given a set of phrases, and a passably complex grammar for combining them randomly, can spew out infinite amounts of blather, just like the above. For example:

"If one examines social realism, one is faced with a choice: either reject the neoconstructivist paradigm of narrative or conclude that the collective is capable of significance. Therefore, the subject is interpolated into a postcapitalist sublimation that includes art as a reality. Any number of narratives concerning textual objectivism exist. 'Class is intrinsically dead,' says Sontag; however, according to Scuglia[1] , it is not so much class that is intrinsically dead, but rather the failure of class. In a sense, Lyotard promotes the use of postcapitalist sublimation to deconstruct society. The subject is contextualised into a predialectic capitalism that includes language as a totality."

That paragraph was generated by a computer program.

And that program didn't even need a grant from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, as /Data Trash/ says that it did.

Whatever ideas (as opposed to mere themes, which is all I can find in most of the book) of worth that there might be in this book are buried under prose too turgid to imagine.

It's rare that I come across a book I can't understand. When I say "can't understand", I mean it's rare that I can't make out a full sentence anywhere in the book, even though it's written in English. Maybe I'm just an idiot. Or, maybe this is the most ludicrous, overblown, over hyped, full-of-itself kind of books that's written for people who describe artwork and music with metaphorical sayings like "cyberdeath" and other drivel. Here's an example:

"But the wireless body could be, and already is, something very different. Not the body as an organic grid for passively sampling all the drifting bytes of recombinant culture, but the wireless body as a highly-charged theoretical and political site: a moving field of aesthetic contestation for remapping the galactic empire of technotopia." (p. 17)

You thought I was kidding, didn't you. Whenever I see the words "galactic", it better refer to Carl Sagan or Star Trek. This book is called Data Trash for allll the wrong reasons. You can't help but get the distinct feeling that the authors are trying to hide their ignorance of what goes on on the Internet with artistic techno-babble. But here, let me give it a try:

This book could be, and already is, something very different. Not the text as an intelligible body of knowledge for inquisitive academics or jaded cyberhacks, but a useless mound of mile-high overdramatic cybercrap, highly-charged with nonsensical terminology and technobabble: a failed attempt at high-minded snobbery of galactic proportions.

contrary to the prior reviewers, and despite my heavy training in university level (hons) british-style analytic philosophy, i found their book incredibly interesting, particularly their concept of the virtual class, a concept i've already written (crystal clear) papers on, one prior to kroker et al., and one in response. i believe they have much to say, but like most postmodern writers, get swamped in "blather" as the other reviewer called it, and spew out lots of characterisations of internet culture while disregarding clarity. but this is nothing new for postmodernists. it's quite conventional, in fact. they substitute philosophic rigour for flair. IMHO, if you're interested in internet as a cultural phenomenon, you MUST read this book. even if it displays some technological ignorance and a lot of lack of rigour. i found it fascinating, but turgid....

I don't have time this instant to go into the depth that this book deserves, as I just was going by and saw the not-so-hot reviews. I be remised if I did not pipe in. This is one of the finest books I have read (No, I am not holding it next to Heideggar, for depth, per se, or Dostoevsky for wit, though it has both in droves). That said, I have read it about 10 times. I don't know why I stuck with it, I think it was because of all the web stuff that was enveloping the world in the late 90s (as cliché as that may sound).

If you do stick with it you will be rewarded with an interesting and with, most likely, one of the only genuine discussions of the connections between virtual reality, monetary value (World Bank, IMF, though I am not sure they are named directly), advertising, the Image (in the Boorstein sense) reality television (years ahead of its times) and the creep of reverse nihilism, nihilism turned on the self.

If you aren't into the philosophical aspects, it also makes a great sci-fi read.

The questions need to be asked, true. Our society's fetishization of technological progress and free markets need to be challenged, and that is the best role for the Krokers and similar critics: poking the hornets nest and seeing who gets stung.

But there is bigger question when studying Data Trash, Hacking the Future and the Krokers' other techno-dystopian tomes: does all this jargon and rhetoric actually add up to anything? The Krokers are great at stirring the pot, but seem to have some fundamental misconceptions about the nature of technology and how, in a practical sense, it is accepted or rejected by people.