Items related to Digitopia: The Look of the New Digital You
Synopsis
The year is 2001. The internet has us swimming in information. New digital media like DVDs, MP3s, PlayStations, and DTVs are revolutionizing the entertainment industry. The e-economy has redefined the marketplace. E-books are now available at the click of a button. And life is... what? Faster? Better? Richer? Healthier? Happier?
Well if you're not exactly sure, don't be surprised. As Richard DeGrandpre spells out in this panoramic guide to the new electronic culture, all is not necessarily well in our emerging digital dreamworld. First and foremost, he explains, we are becoming digitally mastered. New digital portals are leading us into an ever more virtual reality, such that the images,rhythms, and moods of the digital environment are rapidly become the dominant images, rhythms, and moods of the mental environment. Digital technology is conditioning in us a growing desire for plugged-in worlds, he says, leaving us increasingly unsatisfied and frustrated in what's left of the unplugged world.
In twenty-five original and provocative essays, DeGrandpre questions whether we as individuals or as a society have adequately considered the implications of a fully-wired world, and finds considerable historical evidence that our digital culture will lead us to a time that has, literally, no place. The name of this placeless place is of course Digitopia.
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Review
Standing athwart post-history yelling "Stop," psychologist Richard DeGrandpre looks askance at the cultural impact of our technology in Digitopia: The Look of the New Digital You. Embracing McLuhan's analysis of media's transforming influence on our lives, he is suspicious of, if not exactly hostile towards, digital culture. It's a fairly conservative message coming from a lefty, but many of his arguments will hit home with all but the most libertarian reader. DeGrandpre's 25 essays are clever, well-informed, and concise, though he's generally more concerned with scoring rhetorical points than illuminating his topics more broadly.
Still, it's important to hear all sides of any argument, even arguments that, like this one, are largely waged implicitly. The pro-tech case is simply the status quo, making collections like Digitopia vital for readers who prefer conscious and thoughtful analysis to careless acceptance. The broad scope DeGrandpre brings is refreshing--including information about teenage girls' body image, pre-literate cultures, and the developing world's health care puts his rhetoric in context and may help convince a few readers that some effects of technology ought to be curbed before post-history leads to post-humanity. --Rob Lightner
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