Alan Sondheim’s Internet Text: An Effective Example of a New Media Database

Alan Sondheim’s Internet Text has been posted online since 1994 and is both an aggregate of Sondheim’s writings and a “continuous meditation on cyberspace.” Internet Text is an ongoing project of written, generated, and posted texts online. The pieces reflect on the nature of computer-mediated consciousness, digital textuality, and online communication and culture. The author description provides some context for the reader: “The Internet Text is a continuous meditation on “cyberspace,” emphasizing language, body, avatar issues, philosophy, poetics, and code-work.”  As I began to browse through the text files, reading snippets from a few, I expected to find a sequential narrative from the first file to the next and so on. I soon realized that there is no connection from one file to the next, and that these files are pieces of data for the reader to experience in any way that he/she chooses.

Therefore, I began to understand Internet Text as a database per Lev Manovich’s “The Database.” Manovich states that “Multimedia works that have “cultural” content appear to particularly favor the database form” (219).  Internet Text is a collection of text files that share common cultural themes surrounding cyberspace and the files are an extended analysis of the environment of Internet communication, as well as an extended meditation on the psychology and philosophy of Net exchange. Also, Internet Text further supports the concept of the database because the text files do not relate in an obvious way, and have no apparent beginning and end, or premeditated story. It appears that there is no organization or logical presentation for the data, which is quite overwhelming and confusing if the reader tries to construct a narrative from the material. Perhaps this is why there is no trajectory for navigation and no instruction dictating that the reader move sequentially through the text files; the reader must decide how he/she would like to experience the content.

In addition, because this is a living project, with additional files being added to the database, the entries appear arbitrary, but do not modify the logic and intent behind this work—which is for the reader to read the text files in any order that he/she desires. Thus, new files provide additional information and content that does not alter the reader’s navigational or viewing experience; they provide supplementary material for the reader to view if the reader chooses to enhance his/her knowledge.

Based on the text files that I viewed, some contained stories that had a coherent narrative, and some seemed like a jumble of data. For instance, mk.text has no apparent coherent story, and the sections within that file do not appear to have any relevance to each other. However, the sections within “Internet Futures” have a coherent discussion about the potential futures of the internet on society and culture. Towards the end of my exploration, I came across net0.text, which was the first text file created for Internet Text. Interestingly, Sondheim’s discussion in this file lends itself to the “database complex” that Manovich describes in “The Database.” The “database complex” is a psychological condition that accompanies a user’s experience with new media. As a user navigates through a new media object, he/she experiences a reflection of his/her image and actions. Sondheim states that he envisions “the reader as self-generating, as if the text were a form of inner voice.” Therefore, the texts that the readers decide to experience will have some resonance with them, and will reflect an image of humanity and culture surrounding cyberspace. The user’s personality plays a major role in his/her interaction with the content, which will determine the his/her overall experience.

Internet Text does not have a conclusion, and none of the individual files have conclusions. There are multiple experiences for every user, and multiple themes to be drawn upon for each piece of data. These unlimited possibilities, the changing nature of the text files, and the unstructured presentation of data make Internet Text an effective example for understanding new media databases.

One thought on “Alan Sondheim’s Internet Text: An Effective Example of a New Media Database

  1. I definitely think you’re right to consider Internet Text as a database. I wonder, how does that shift the kind of questions or expectations we might have about the work (as opposed to thinking about it as a narrative)?

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