that is not functional to the network it is highly responsive to challenges from without and dysfunction from within the
network it distributes power, decision-making, function and profit throughout the network,
rather than concentrating them at the centre. the key features of the network are flexibility, fluidity, and responsiveness
b. the culture of the network society: “timeless time” and the “space of flows”
The culture of the network society is characterized by “virtuality,” a highly synthetic, multi-
media, high resolution “virtual culture.” The virtual culture of the network society can be
more specifically defined in terms of two aspects: time and space. The “timeless time” of our
technological culture is created by the elimination of time as a variable in a culture of instant
communication. We experience this new dimension of time in the 24/7 quality of life in North
American society. The “space of flows,” the generic and global space that is created in a
deterritorialized world culture, is the dynamic and mercurial domain that emerges in a
network society changed by technologies that make the real virtual. The Internet is the
purest form of the “space of flows”: liquid, infinite, informational. But the “real” world of the
network society is also taking on this character as we layer on that world information
networks, as well as the rapid movement of capital, goods, and people, all accelerated by
the network model.
英语论文网 【http://www.51lunwen.org】
Castells defines the “space of flows” concept in his famous 1996 book, The Rise of the
Network Society, as follows:
Our societies are constructed around flows: flows of capital, flows of information,
flows of technology, flows of organizational interactions, flows of images, sounds and
symbols. Flows are not just one element of social organization: they are the
expression of the processes dominating our economic, political, and symbolic life. ...
Thus, I propose the idea that there is a new spatial form characteristic of social
practices that dominate and shape the network society: the space of flows. The
space of flows is the material organization of time-sharing social practices that work
through flows. By flows I understand purposeful, repetitive, programmable sequences
of exchange and interaction between physically disjointed positions held by social
actors. (p. 412)
The network society makes policy and regulation, both built on the idea that the state is the
primary source of media governance, more difficult to achieve. The major regulatory
agencies for media and telecommunications in Canada and the U.S., the Canadian Radio-
Telecommunication Commission (CRTC) and the Federal Communication Commission
(FCC), have acknowledged their limits with respect to policing activity on the Internet. Hate
speech, child pornography, and Internet casino gambling are just several of the issues that
elude the regulatory powers of the agencies
本文来自：英语论文网 【http://www.51lunwen.org】 |
论文编号：
lw200707250855363549 
