The Tech of Communication

Though the readings this week covered a wide range of topics, they all had arguments to make about how we communicate in technology and data driven contexts. It is clear that technology as a method of communication has meaning imposed upon it as we incorporate it into our norms of sociality. Boellstorff discussed the construction of relationships in virtual worlds, arguing that they are distinctly different than those made in the actual world. In her analysis of Patients Like Me, Olivia Banner noted the rise of biosociality as a defining identity for many people, exemplified by the rise of online platforms for sharing about one’s health. Gershon introduced us to the ide of media ideology, a concept used to define beliefs about how a medium communicates and structures communication.

Boellstorff works very hard to make clear the idea that relationships developed in Second Life do not have to rely at all on either individual’s actual life. I was surprised by his claim that many sl residents prioritize making friends, as we were generally afraid of speaking to anybody on first joining the community. The relationships that people seek out are described as being much deeper and occurring much more quickly than those in actual life. In a community such as Second Life, friendships are built on the basis of the other’s mind and not their appearance, as there is no way to tell what they actually look like. All connection comes from whom they are as a person and who they create themselves to be in sl. Residents are given the space to share about their actual lives but very few members choose to provide such information. In this section of his analysis I was surprised by Boellstorff’s claim that sex in sl is really sex, not a representation of the act as a murder in sl would be. I am also intrigued by the relative prevalence of sl residents that have relationships both in sl and the actual world. Though it doesn’t seem like many consider this a form of infidelity, I struggle with the contrast between the emotional power of these sl relationships and the idea that giving one’s mind to another outside of their actual world relationship is acceptable.

Contrary to how the residents of Second Life choose to keep their actual world identities relatively private, users of Patients Like Me use their only given space for personal expression to share often extensive stories about personal experience and their desire to find support in those that understand their condition. Outside of this space, the website is focused mainly on biomediation, where subjects become their data by analyzing their illness in terms of statistics. This type of interaction with their illness is driven by their desire to find a biomedically supported diagnosis or cure of some sort. Many of the illness that have online support groups have contested diagnoses and realities, indicating a conflict between biomedicine, cultural, and patient construction of the illness that often leaves the patient feeling unsupported. I find it especially interesting that users are so willing to provide their personal medical information to be sold to corporate clients such as pharmaceutical companies. In a world where privacy seems to be a primary concern, this might indicate the level of desperation these individuals have for some sort of support.

Gershon spends most of her analysis discussing the role of media ideology in our lives and how it impacts how we navigate our relationships with one another. Getting to know someone now requires understanding their media ideology and being somewhat compatible with that because different methods of communication have different innate meanings to different people. Her most surprising discovery to me was how much attention we pay to the media outlets we encounter in different stages of our relationships with other people. When telling others of our communication with somebody we often include what form this communication took.