<h2 style="font-weight: normal;"><font size="2">The following is my recent <i>Sociology Lens</i> post. The original text is available <a href="http://sociologycompass.wordpress.com/2009/11/15/conference-summary-part-i-the-internet-as-playground-and-factory/">here</a>.</font></h2>
<br>Best,<br><br>PJ Rey<br>University of Maryland<br><a href="http://www.pjrey.info">www.pjrey.info</a><br><h2><br></h2><h2>Conference Summary Part I: The Internet as Playground and Factory</h2>
<h4>November 15, 2009</h4>
<p><a href="http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Geodynamo_After_Reversal.gif"><img class="alignleft" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/89/Geodynamo_After_Reversal.gif" alt="" height="296" width="269"></a>by <a href="http://www.pjrey.info/">pj.rey</a></p>
<p>The New School held a <a href="http://digitallabor.org/" target="_blank">conference</a>
last week that may be of interest to many Sociology Lens readers, so I
have decided to devote this week’s entry to sharing some notes from the
conference.</p>
<p>The implosion of work and play was the most recurrent theme in the
panels that I attended. The term “playbor” was frequently used to
describe the product of this implosion. Panelists generally seemed to
assume that playbor was a relatively new and increasingly prevalent
phenomenon. However, one dissenter, an artist named Stephanie
Rothenberg, argued that play and productivity have coincided from the
earliest days of capitalism. She explained that hobbies (e.g.,
collecting, handicraft, parlor room singsong, gardening, and animal
raising) are voluntary forms of play that produce objects with no
intent to exchange them on the market. These activities often have
significant social aspects and some hobbies, like music or quilting,
are even done collaboratively. Given the resemblance to hobbies,
Rothenberg urges that we view playbor as the latest instantiation of a
historical trend, rather than newly emerging paradigm. In fact she
claims that online environments like Second Life mimic the world so
hyperbolically that they offer an unprecedented opportunity for us to
turn a critical eye on ourselves. In our distanced view of these
“simulacrums,” we find our own distanced reflections.</p>
<p><span id="more-4921"></span>This emphasis on the supposed distance
between our online and offline presence in the world, however, strikes
at the heart of my major criticism of the conference: Panelists again
and again betrayed the assumption that the online world was somehow
distinct from the “real” world. However, this assumption was never
substantiated—and I am dubious as to whether it can be. We know, for
example, that most online interactions occur between people who know
one another from “real-life” contexts. Moreover, I believe users often
perceive their online interactions in a different manner than we do as
sociologists.</p>
<p>Sociologists tend to view the variable which distinguishes online
and offline interaction (i.e., technology) as salient. In contrast, I
think it is likely that users focus on the areas of continuity (i.e.,
the interactions themselves). This difference in emphasis, I think, is
behind the tendency to over-exaggerate the dichotomy between “virtual”
and “real.”<strong> </strong>Clearly, the Internet facilitates new
forms of communication that are instantaneous, spatially-compressed,
asyncratic, and highly reproducible. These communications may be
different, but they are no less <em>real</em>. It is no less absurd
to say that online interactions constitute and occur in a separate
world than it is to say that telephone calls do. Internet theorists
appear to be making the same conflation between form and properties
that Aristotle worked to dispel over two millenia ago.</p>
<p>Returning to playbor, Martin Roberts argued that fun occupies a
seemingly unassailable position in our culture, whereby criticism meets
almost immediate dismissal and is largely non-existent. He extends the
theory of the Frankfurt School by arguing that the capitalist system
not only profits from a cultural obsession with fun that is a driving
force in the sphere of consumption but now increasingly benefits from
the notion that “productivity is fun” (and it’s implicit inversion:
being unproductive is not fun). A culture driven to seek productivity
in its leisure time presents greater opportunity for exploitation.</p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0pt; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">Interestingly,
the cultural identification of fun with productivity perfectly
contradicts the technical definition of play in Johan Huzinga’s <em>Homo Ludens.</em>
Huzinga was one of several theorists including Tiziana Terranova and
Marshall McLuhan, who were repeatedly cited at the conference but
receive limited attention in sociology.</p>
<p><a href="http://digitallabor.org/discussion/">Discussion</a> of the topics covered in the conference is ongoing. <a href="http://vimeo.com/user2103510/videos/sort:date">Interviews, panels, and other video</a> are also available.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/pressRelease/idUS220749+30-Sep-2009+PRN20090930"><img title="Square-eye" src="http://sociologycompass.files.wordpress.com/2009/09/square-eye10.png?w=30&h=30" alt="Square-eye" height="30" width="30"></a>
“Common Threads and Stephanie Rothenberg Present ‘Retailing 14th
Street’, An Artistic Exploration Into the Experiences of Retail
Workers,” by Reuters</p>
<p><a href="http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/journal/119570943/abstract"><img title="Square-eye" src="http://sociologycompass.files.wordpress.com/2009/09/square-eye10.png?w=30&h=30" alt="Square-eye" height="30" width="30"></a> “Ma Bell Minus the Nantucket Gam: Or the Impact of High-speed Data Transmission,” Marshall McLuhan and Bruce Powers</p>
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