Blog 10

The first article in the reader, by Greet Lovink discusses how both nature and culture are slowly, by means of the ADD-generation media culture, becoming one and the same entity. The second article, by Lev Manovich, has a more positive take on the situation and says that the user-generated internet is popular because it is a new creative outlet. Both think that YouTube, and like user-generated online culture zones, have created a grounds for the expression of a stupefying amount of information. However, the main difference lies in that while one, Lovink, thinks that the amount of information streaming onto the web will become chaotic and lead to a tipping point, the other, Manovich, does not postulate on what it will lead to. He does, however, seem to generally view the entire ordeal as a positive process of advancing systems of culture and discourse we already have about today. For example, he points out the similarity between the conversation in YouTube video comments and the conversation that could potentially take place in a lecture hall. Lovink, on the other hand, focuses more on the fact that all of this advanced technology and the information overload of the web is, while currently balanced, going to soon result in a chaotic collapse of organization and lead to entropy.