Homo Cypiens. Herlander Elias
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not need the smartphone, and then the smartwatch because you do not need anything that you already have. And so we get to the network screens. The younger generations deal with digital without wishing to know an office, a library or to write on paper. The world of network screens is their own screen, space and file. In this world the computer has been simplified. The sophisticated, cutting-edge technology is disappearing from everyday use. So, a person starts as a computer owner but soon becomes a user of the cloud service. In the current time, to use a computer, i.e., a network screen, is to use a service and, therefore, what matters most is the user’s experience.
The network society is a functional one in digital, in which the most important is to collaborate and to be with friends, to meet a lot of people and join social events. The user of the post-computer generation is a smart user, therefore a savvy one when it comes to work with digital technologies. And he does not refer to “digital” but only and only to "technology." In the era of network screens the big concern is to be productive, social and to be known. Everyone, regardless of age, has a web site, YouTube channels and other predefined online addresses. Being in this digital society is for the younger generations, as for the older generations, the same as when in the past one used to go to a library or to write on a typewriter or lived in a literary club with friends. The post-computer generation of network screens is always online and is bubbly, is tense and superficial in what concerns socializing. And stranger still is that it does not read books. All there is to read is online. Young people and their network screens are concerned about being on the Internet and using apps for everything, small pieces of software that simplify the computing experience. In this scenario what counts is to be connected, to be seen and to constitute an audience. All young people are online producers of contents and at the same time they are audiences, but it remains to be checked what value and practical relevance has what they produce. From this ecosystem emerges a new form of cybernetic consciousness and a form of social and psychological being before the world. Another factor to take into account is that in the same way that the space between new and advanced generations has been shortened, so has the space between national and international. Everyone has friends abroad or foreign friends. Now it is literally in the age of the network, everything happens online and at a click. Now it is possible, but difficult, to be alone. There is always social noise, and post-computer generations use the network screens and need that noise. There is a dense landscape of information always at your mercy. Today a young user does not read books or set up machines. He is a passive agent who collaborates, seeks, buys, adheres, uses and produces contents or services. In the post-computer generation, nobody owns anything. Everything is just a use, a permanent beta state as Rushkoff and Kelly point out.
There is no physical space to accumulate things, so everyone files all the information online because later it may be useful. A negative feature of the cloud era and the fact that everything is a service is that for the digital experience to improve, something is usually taken away from users to make the system less dense. Older users notice that features are being removed, but the post-computer generation does not complain because it does not read, it only uses what is available. Their issues are different. The generation of network screens is more concerned with living new experiences. And what experiences? Things like everyday objects, books, art pieces and other items do not interest them at all as they did for the petty-bourgeoisie or the middle classes in the past, which had a great attachment and affection for products that were reproduced on an industrial level whether produced manually. The new generations have come to the conclusion that life is too short to know most of the things one can pre-know online. So, as nothing lasts forever there is no money better to spent than traveling. That is why the post-computer generation uses network screens as portals for future experiences. While the TV generation was passive and dreamed, bought a car, a home and had children and a professional career, the generation of network screens does not drive, does not buy houses, does not buy car, instead does renting, does not have children, does not care about careers and does not make future plans because it is overwhelmed by the volatile present.
Another important issue in this society, in which looking young and cool is a must, is that there are too many options: a lot of people to know (superficially, of course), many places to go, lots to read and see, but in digital format, and there is still the common perception that life is short because you can not see or access everything in a timely manner. That is why reality is, as Marshall McLuhan suggests, in the rearview mirror. There is a future fixed on the horizon, a gift that flows by our side like when we drive a car, but in the rearview mirror we contemplate what seems more still ― the past. In the era of network screens there is a whole new relationship with the past. There is too homogeneous past, but one lives in a present full of heterogeneities, and it increases our curiosity. Yet, no one wants to get out of their comfort zone ― it feels so good when you have a network screen in your hand, like an iPad! This is the new “TV” of the digital masses. The problem with post-computer generations is that they are becoming passive as well. The world comes to you. There is a tension because the Internet knows the world without knowing the world. There are those who feel challenged to meet you and there are those who think that you have seen them without having to go anywhere. We reached a dead-lock; on the one hand there is more world to see, but at the same time we do not feel like facing the inconvenience of airports. The web-screen becomes that portal to see the world and work with friends and socialize at a non-stop pace. We are so immersed in this “everything” that we do not even notice that the computer is disappearing and transforming itself into an experience ― it is no longer an object, it is a use. Also, after the international investment made with the free Internet for three decades something would have to change. And what has changed is that the information society has merged with the society of capital. Young people today use digital without being aware of the social changes brought about by all of this. And that is what is serious and worrying.
1.The Three Eras
There are several ways of dividing our historical line; however the development of digital media reveals a demarcation of what lies behind. We can thus explain that there is a pre-media era, one of media and one of post-media. The latter will not necessarily have to do with the end of the media, but instead with a period when it is impossible for us to return to the pre-media period. In this way, it is impossible to return to the moment without mediation, without mass media (Press, Radio and TV) or digital media (smartphones, cloud, web, tablets, blogs, social media, etc).
The pre-media era was one in which individuals lived integrated into a natural ecosystem. There were "means", but there was no media, for instance: there were engravings on the cave walls, people communicated through the ornamentation of their bodies, meaning, there was an aesthetic sensibility towards the body and face, and the trophies were displayed to communicate a social status. Out of the caves, that is, out of the prisons of ancestral images, the human beings had to deal with the cities and nothing else was the same as before. Moreover, cities symbolize gigantic machines of human beings and machines of machines — cities are the symbol of the second era. If in the pre-media era there is no sedentary life, in the middle one also called second era, we are confronted with the phenomenon of sedentary life through the arising of cities, commerce and new migratory flows. Thus, big urban centers turned into mega-machines for people who work with machines and in places where money and medium-scale trade abound, while suburban areas are useful as logistics support for the center of the polis. But where were the media? The media consisted of scrolls, documents in the libraries, ceramic engravings or stone tablets with inscriptions and reliefs. In the streets and forums the heralds used to announce the news aloud in front of a crowd eager for them. In this remote epoch, the media consisted of oral accounts, written inscriptions on soft supports and stone. Any material with plasticity able to be handled, baked, or painted, was used. For example, the army banner system was a good and useful support (or "medium") from the point of view of warfare communication.
Yet, how did we reach a time when the city became a media machine, "offering" publicity posters, newspaper distribution, radio and TV programs broadcasting celebrities’ life, books on sale, and the "pass the word around” advertisement strategy, to the new bourgeoisie? The answer is simple: it was done through capitalism and information. In today's city, which is typical of the post-media phase, there has already been a merger between the sphere of information and that of capital. Even