Internet for Everyone

The internet, once a tangible presence, has now become a blur, a cloud, a friend, a deadline, a redirect, or a 404. If it ever truly existed, we could not perceive it, for it has no shape, no face, only a name that describes everything and nothing simultaneously. Yet, we persist in our efforts to climb aboard, to get inside, to be part of the network, to participate in the language game, to appear in search results, to assert our existence.

However, we will never truly enter something that is not there. All this time, we have lamented the demise of any critical outside position, when we should have taken a closer look at information networks. Attempting to gain access is futile, for networks are all edges, as Bruno Latour has pointed out. We thought there were windows, but instead, we find only mirrors.

In the meantime, we are confronted with an ever-growing presence – not just information, but the world itself. A particular world that has already become a part of our consciousness, and it demands something from us. It seeks not only to harvest our eyeballs, our attention, our responses, and our emotions, but also to condition our minds and bodies to absorb the wealth of the planet's knowledge.

This profound transformation of our relationship with the digital realm is explored in a collection of texts edited by Julieta Aranda, Brian Kuan Wood, and Anton Vidokle. Contributors include Hito Steyerl, Keller Easterling, Bruno Latour, Ursula K. Heise, Gean Moreno, Franco "Bifo" Berardi, Diedrich Diederichsen, Rasmus Fleischer, Jon Rich, Geert Lovink, Brian Kuan Wood, Joana Hadjithomas, Khalil Joreige, Hans Ulrich Obrist, Julian Assange, Metahaven, Benjamin Bratton, and Patricia MacCormack.

These authors grapple with the evolving nature of the internet and its impact on our perceptions, our identities, and our understanding of the world around us. They question the very existence of the internet, challenging us to confront the illusion of its tangibility and the ways in which it has become intertwined with our lived experiences.

Through their insightful and thought-provoking analyses, these writers invite us to reconsider our relationship with technology, to examine the power structures that shape our digital landscapes, and to imagine new possibilities for navigating this ever-shifting terrain. In doing so, they encourage us to move beyond the simplistic narratives of progress and disruption, and to engage with the complex, nuanced, and often unsettling realities of our digital age.

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