Post Digital edges towards the mainstream

Yesterday’s post was a little on the esoteric side, diving into the use of Post Digital in the art. If you’re seeking evidence that the term is rapidly evolving away from that into the mainstream, can I point you towards an article published last month in the UK’s Guardian newspaper?

Yesterday’s post was a little on the esoteric side, diving into the use of Post Digital in the art. If you’re seeking evidence that the term is rapidly evolving away from that into the mainstream, can I point you towards an article published last month in the UK’s Guardian newspaper?

Simon Jenkins – a respected political and cultural commentator – wrote a piece called Welcome to the post-digital world, an exhilarating return to civility – via Facebook and Lady Gaga. Here’s an extract:

Post-digital is not anti-digital. It extends digital into the beyond. The web becomes not a destination in itself but a route map to somewhere real. In Marshall McLuhan’s terminology, it is cold where live is hot. This is why concerts did not die with the invention of records, but thrived on the difference. The screen relieves loneliness, as once did letters and phones, but it remains a window on the world, not a door. You cannot download the thunderous beat and sweaty presence of thousands at a Lady Gaga concert, any more than you can make love on Facebook, much as some try. You have to go somewhere for it to happen.

While I agree heartily with the first sentence of that paragraph, I find myself uneasy with the rest of it. His attitude seems to suggest that digital is an addendum to the real world, a useful addition, but one that inevitably brings us back to the physical and the analogue. I’m not sure that’s what I understand by the term. To me, post digital is the state where the analogue or digital nature of an experience or product in irrelevant, and not worthy of note. Jenkins seems to be yearning for an unwinding of the importance of digital back to a lower-key state, rather than looking forwards to a new era, where the two blend seamlessly.

Based on this piece of journalism, I think we can assume that Post Digital is a term that’s approaching the mainstream – but isn’t there yet.

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Illustration: Otto, The Guardian