VY2K asks: can we see following the postmodern condition the emergence of a "virtual condition"? If so, what are the technical, political, and ethical implications? Definitions of the virtual are not easy to come by. Before microchips were invented philosophers were debating the elusive power of the virtual. Yet now, thanks to the viral spread of networked computers, the virtual is not so much elusive as it is pervasive. Even so, like the puzzle of the philosophers, this contemporary virtual produces effects and results which blur our usual ways of seeing things. We find new worlds emerge, which though real, are less than physical. We find spaces emerge, which though extensive, are immediate and not at all distant. In short, as the virtual becomes ever more actualized in our daily lives, many of the famliar ways in which we've looked at the world are being reversed, if not turned upside down.
Is virtualization the continuation of war by other means? Is it the harbinger of a new world order, or a brave new world?
Global Media Project
VY2K is a Udris, Der Derian, Udris film produced by the IntoTechWarPeace Project at the Watson Institute for International Studies. The film was made possible by grants from the Carnegie Corporation of New York and the Ford Foundation.
