An Online Utopia

A Reflection on “The Myth of Cyberspace” by Nancy Baym and “When Old Myths Were New: The Never-Ending Story” by Vincent Mosco

Utopia holds the promise of a better tomorrow. A better tomorrow holds the key to many a myth. Does this analysis mean that Utopia is, in fact, a myth? This argument appears to be valid which encourages one to think of how many times Utopia has been promised by the media and technology industries.

In the conclusion of her 2010 book, Personal Connections in a Digital Age, Nancy Baym writes of cyberspace as a technological innovation that has been taken for granted through everyday use and misuse. Similarly, Vincent Mosco discusses the history of technologies that have been the hype of the time period, but have quickly become a natural, everyday item or service that modern and previous generations have taken for granted including the telegraph, electricity, the telephone, radio and television.

Both writers address these previous media successes at “radical transformation(s)” (Baym 153) in societies throughout history; however, Baym’s writing, though aware of the unintended consequences, is much more open to the idea of an online Utopia. Mosco has a much more pessimistic look at the myths constantly in use to trick the minds of the consumer.

Baym makes several points that support Web 2.0 and its promise of a Utopian paradise, however, one particular points stands out to me, for I feel it is the main reason that I have jumped feet-first into cyberspace. I say “feet-first” because I was hesitant to join social networks and reveal so much information, but once I approved of Baym’s point that “we stay in touch with more people for longer and across greater distances” (Baym 153), I was not so cautious. Web 2.0 “enables us to connect with people who are not physically with us” (Baym 154). For example, I have cousins in Sheffield, England who I would never have contacted as a result of shared interests if social networking did not exist and operate in its current manner. For this and other long-distance connections, I am not only impressed but grateful as well.

However, these feelings are not constantly on my mind when I use the technology at my fingertips. It is only when I truly think about why I am continuing to use services such as Facebook that I feel any emotion toward something so “bodiless, unreal, and seductive” (Baym 152). It is in this way that “mediated interaction is treated as a hallucination” (Baym 152) that we take for granted.

Mosco’s perspective on taking new technologies for granted deals with the media businesses tricking consumers into believing in the “magic” of technological advancements and letting the consumers obsess and grow bored until a newer technology promises a better Utopia. This vicious cycle is, as Mosco points out, “is certainly not new” (Mosco 140). He writes: “history is filled with mythmaking about technology,” showing his lack of faith toward the possibility of an eventual, ideal Utopia.

Personally, I believe that Utopia is what an individual ultimately expects from the idea or item in question. When one questions the quality of a product or service, that person has higher expectations for technology, and to imagine that Internet was once unavailable is nearly unthinkable. One can gather a great deal of optimism when Baym writes: “it is not a question of either/or, of one versus the other. It’s a question of who’s communicating, for what purposes, in what contexts and what their expectations are” (Baym 153).

In conclusion, for those who have high expectations, Utopia will always be a myth, but to those who are consistently satisfied with what is presented to them, then Utopia is constantly being revisited. It is all a matter of perspective.