Communications and Cyberspace: Chapter 22

In Chapter 22, Professor Strate proposes the concept of cybertime and virtual time. His main argument goes, "the computer functions both as a clock- keeping, measuring, and producing time both for the outside world and its own internal microworld-and as a medium- generating "virtual time" through stories, games and audiovisual presentation". I find this statement interesting because I find that while the computer keeps track of time, I also find myself losing track of time easily when I'm on the Internet. The creation of terms cybertime and "virtual time" exhibit the immense impact the digital world has on our reality. It was even able to infiltrate one of the most objective parts of the real world. The chapter is introduced by paralleling the computer with the clock and their similar functions. Both technologies manufacture pure information. While the computer also serves as clock, it is unlike any other timepiece because "the central processor generates time for the computer's internal world". This is a fascinating idea because time is often thought as an element that cannot be created nor molded. Another interesting point made was that the computer functions as a medium of time but not in the traditional sense. The computer and communicate a sense of time that is not exactly the time but rather "virtual time". Virtual time refers to the sense of time propagated in the virtual reality and computer generated worlds. VR has become so involved and powerful that it even has its own separate sense of time. (that's kind of scary)

6/27 Cybertime

One of the aspects of the cybertime phenomena is that computers are able to tell time in the outside world. It is fascinating to think that computers and clocks produce nothing material but instead deliver information (363). Another comparison that Professor Strate makes that’s interesting is that the clock coordinates and synchronizes activities, and as a consequent of their ability to self-operate they become a metaphor for the body and universe. Furthermore, Professor Strate makes a good point that even if we are wearing the best watches, the times will always vary as much as 10 to 15 minutes. It is important to realize this because as our society continues to be more fast paced, these differences in time will eventually be “intolerable.” Moreover, he explains that computers also "communicate a sense of time that is not necessarily the time." Instead it’s a virtual time by which human perception agrees. Another important thing brought up in the chapter is e-mails.  There is such a sense of immediacy with e-mail, that even when an e-mail is written in an earlier period we conceive it to be communicated to us in the present. As a result, “our sense of time passage becomes distorted.” Moreover, cybertime and cyberspace within computers is the only medium where we have the ability to experiment different versions of ourselves. While reading this chapter this idea particularly stood out to me. It amazes me that we have this ability to try out our “dream selves.” Even though this possibility can provide many positive experiments, I believe it is also important that we remember that it is just a virtual reality.

Communication and Cyberspace Chapter 22

Chapter 22, Professor Strate's chapter, is titled "Cybertime." He states that the invention of the computer can be traced back to the invention of the clock; it was one of the first automated machines, and it produced information. He writes that, "Cybertime is absolute time, digital time, and it is quicktime." Today, people mark time down to the second, and even the nanosecond, changing the way people relate to time. Not only do computers display time, they also "communicate a sense of time that is not necessarily the time." He refers to this sense of time as "virtual time." As he said in class, no other medium allows users to lose track of real time so easily.

Chapter 22

Professor Strate has written chapter 22 in the last homework assignment for this class, titled “Cybertime.”  Strate stresses the importance to consider the concept of cybertime.  It represents the intersection of the computer’s time-telling function, the computer’s representational function, and our own subjective experience of time with interactions with the computer.  Strate mentions how the computer can be traced back to many inventions way back when, but he was the one to compare it to the mechanical clock developed in the middle ages.  He does this because both the computer and the clock produce information only.  I do remember talking about this a few classes ago, but Strate mentions in his piece how digital displays of time have many objections.  With the traditional clock face people can see all the possibilities of time by looking at all of the numbers, while a digital clock is decontextualized time (the present time).  “Cybertime is based on a series of separate and distinct electronic pulses.”  An important distinction that Strate mentions is that digital time is a quantitative concept of time, not just a quantitative measurement of time.  He defines cybertime as absolute, digital, and quick time.  I like how professor Strate compared cybertime with real time.  Real time is formed by physical change, continuous, divisible, tied to the rhythms of nature, and monochronic, while cybertime is independent of its microworld, digital, atomistic, quicktime, and polychronic.  Virtual time is defined as “virtual reality’s internally generated sense of time and may be used in reference to both computer-generated virtual worlds and the illusion of reality created by all forms of media.”  The key is that cybertime is digital.  The term dimension is also associated with cybertime, for time and space.  It is multidimensional, not one-dimensional.  On a different topic, one fear for cybertime is the loss of privacy and that every move could be electronically recorded for later use.  Computers are smart in that they can predict the future—“they lock future events into a predetermined course in a way schedules cannot.”  Interaction with computer media includes our use of time or cyberchronemics.  Sacred time is a form of cybertime.  One sentence in Strate’s piece that jumped out at me was that we need to remember that time is a network of relations among different events.

Cybertime and Mad Men

            The concept of cybertime is such an integral part of our thoroughly computerized world and it’s amazing that the concept is not paid more attention. While one might have been able to find respite from the digital world 10 or 15 years ago, the digital “frontier” has absorbed our current world like a tidal wave. With this intensified wave of digital technology, the issues about cybertime become increasingly relevant.

            The tribalism and breakdown in meaning that follows increased digitization can be seen in the fandom of AMC hit show Mad Men. With a guise of authenticity (people drank and cheated a lot in the 60s), the show is entry point for many people into the increasingly distant world of the early 60s and it’s tumults. The adventures of the show’s banal lead man Don Draper, with a few references to the cultural changes of the era, become the organizing people around which people discuss the 60s on the Internet. This trend of otherwise disposable entertainment being dressed up in facsimile history is quite popular, with shows such as The Tudors, The Borgias, Spartacus, and arguably Game of Thrones dominating the On Demand/Netflix medium. While we may try to strike a balance on the positives and negatives of cybertime, certain material realities and social trends push us ever close to Frederic Jameson's idea that our modern world is one characterized by meaningless schizophrenic digital consumption.