Dot, Poster

When Mark Poster wrote his piece on Postmodern Virtualities in 1995, I doubt that he ever thought technology would expand as greatly as it has today. He stated that by the mid-1900s about 30 million people used the internet, I am sure that number has grown in mass quantities since then and that it will only continue to grow in years to come. He also proposed that the "transmission capacity" of the internet would increase so much that it would "be possible to transmit any type of information (audio, video or text) from any point in the network to any other point or points, and to do so in 'real time'" (535).

This idea of "real time" transference of technology over the internet has become a part of daily lives in our culture, one that if taken away would radically alter the lifestyles of millions. Take Rollins for example, everything that we do somehow revolves around the technology that the internet provides. When we wake up in the morning, we turn on our computers or I Phones to check the weather outside. The weather sources that we rely on are updated numerous times per hour to accurately portray the conditions around us, if they were not we would not be able to get an accurate idea of how to dress. Before the internet or I Phones, one would have to turn on their television and wait until the weather channel displayed their area's weather or walk outside and test the elements on their own. After dressing appropriately, one will probably check their email or blackboard to see if teachers have sent any type of notification for class that day. If a class is canceled or an assignment is due, one is able to instantly find out rather than having to wait to actually talk to the teacher to find out. I believe that the best example of this real time transference in our lives today is definitely SKYPE, the computer program which works as a video telephone of sorts, through a direct feed those you are talking to can also see exactly what you are doing. Numerous instances of "real time" transference aid us all the time and we have become so accustomed to them that we hardly recognize their presence and definitely not their significance.

Later in his piece, Poster presents the idea of narrative in cyberspace, something that has also increased since 1995. He states that "individuals appear to enjoy relating narratives to those they have never met and probably never will meet" and in our culture, especially today this is undoubtedly true (543). There are many examples of this in our culture and it would be hard to find a person who has not participated in the creation of one such cyber narrative. Facebook and MySpace are two examples of such places where people publicize stories about their lives and even post pictures to show events in their lives. On these two websites, one most communicates with ones they know, but there are sites, such as the one we are using blogger.com where people can anonymously post stories about their lives and others can anonymously read them. The implications of such narratives are also discussed by Poster, but it can easily be seen that with the ability to publicize such narratives, people are taking advantage of the growing technology around them.

Very much has changed in the ten years since Poster wrote this piece. It will be amazing to see the technological changes that take place in the next ten years in our world and how they shape the lives of those who are introduced to them.