In what ways can the Net be thought of as an ‘open architecture?’
In terms of the growth of the Net, it has been described as a ‘truly remarkable cultural achievement’ (Lister, M. page 164). This growth is certainly remarkable and cultural, but it is interesting to think of it as an ‘open architecture’ as this reminds me of buildings and cities. But this makes sense here because in this case, the Net could be metaphorically described as a city. Where buildings could be the areas the internet has, e.g. games, social sites, shopping, research, emails, etc, and rooms in these buildings are individual websites, forums and pages. This way, it is easy to imagine the Net as being an ‘Open Architecture’ because, metaphorically, a user can walk into this city, and easily enter any building, any room and interact or become involved somehow with the people within it. This cultural and metaphorical city (the ‘architecture’) which is, here, the Net, is very open because everything is simply so accessible to anyone and everyone.
Does this not a cause for concern when you think that anyone can walk into these 'buildings'? And false identities? When i read this, I thought of the buildings as being open for room for net culture to grow and expand. Is it a good or bad thing that the net is so open? Do the positives outweigh the negatives?
ReplyDeleteThe net being so open is a good thing in terms of communication, socializing with friends, reuniting with family, business, food and movie industries (for example) being on demand. The users being able to metaphorically walk straight into these buildings is certainly going to have negatives as well as positives but surely the fact that people can easily explore and wander the 'buildings' is for more positive purposes otherwise wouldn't it have been noticed and changed/stopped by now?
ReplyDeleteI think the analogy of a city is a very appropriate one - we can go a bit philosophical and think in terms of the different districts and streets that one can encounter, the major routes through the city and then the little back alleys that are less popular - soemtimes with hidden gems of shops or clubs within them, sometimes a bit scary and we pass through quickly.
ReplyDeleteBut while we wander off, there are soem things we can consider too. Is this imaginary city really so open in its architecture? Is it really open to anyone and everyone? When we wander around the city, go in its shops, its offices, its leisure centres, do we get access to every bit of them? Adn can we just wander into any site and be welcome - or are there some places, as if we accidetally wandered into a symposium on the study of quantum physiscs, that we a) wouldn't be welcome, and b) wouldn't understand if we were?