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The Shadow of the Nets |
Boulevard Connection
For some time I have been roaming the net - theorically, during lenghty meetings, workshops, discussions; methaforically, amidst continuous, endless efforts to focus the subject of our research; practically when banging on the keyboard to gain access to its multiple, evergrowing, restless resources: now it seems that time has come to lean on the staff and draw a long nurturing breath.
It cannot be a very long break though, for the ceaseless motion of the net does not allow any distraction: on the very moment you think to have had a grip on it, something new comes about, and the whole game starts all over again.
You prick up your neck stiffly, for relaxation does not belong here.
Up again, running after the sudden, impromptu glitter of bits dashing from one point to another; bouncing from modem to modem - invisible and silent pin-ball of our time. Here I sit, fascinated, thoughtful, dubious in front of the screen, not daring to press another key: the magic might disappear.
Thoughts go to the multitude of people who crowd the intangibile, immaterial digital "grande place", just like sunday morning gatherings of a new aeon to come: words, images, sounds - ideas - whirl in a vacuum that keeps on expanding along the impredictable paths of machine-like dreams. New forms drift in the vastity of a yet unexplored, uncountable sea.
There I stand in a would be Hopper, acquarium like, corner café, staring at the city-lights, exchanging mute glances with possible inhabitants of the connective world, temporarely returned to the realm of atoms. Far away eyes; quick, soft steps of those who dare not to infringe the magic stillness of the barely perceptive creeeping of zeros-ones.
Offs-ons permeate our environment; they mingle with our inner-self, change our perception of reality, make Burroughs' interzone closer to everyday life. We may pretend not to care about bits carrying around weightless billions of valuable information as well as rubbish and a lot of nonsense: useless effort! The motion is set, and was conceived not to stop under any circumstance. You may hinder the flow here, but it spurts elsewhere.
I let my memory flash back to a lonely graffiti on a peeled-off Lisbon wall: "surf or die", and off I go again catching the long wave that will carry me to the core of the net.
March 30, 1997
DP
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