Quality of MOOspace

Angela Hunter, of Northwestern Univ., wrote:

There is a mixed media a-representation of points
as cyberspatial cords throttle the newborn's throat
crossing over and under precarious lines a breach birth
when aliases no longer hide the ascii consciousness sliding
down the legs of afterwards the word assimilates but now
typing fills the simulacrum with pulpy reality suckle it gently
drink its curdled taste all letters are shaped the same here
it is you who must make them speak or pour wine choking on the bones
of uncanny connections bringing forth the beat of seven veils ripped
hiding seven morphed genders representing the first glimpse of each
sense as it is awakened in the bloody eyes of a primary infantile desire
no secondary melancholy the word does not lose its abject tense all
tenses here are one and the hypertrophied lag sets the cadence
which fills our lungs with that first screeching breath in the field 
     we desire. 

...to which Alan Sondheim replied:

There's a huge difference between talk and moos and I feel naive about the latter having, as you know (Angela), been on them very little. But I've been on PMC MOO before and others elsewhere as a visitor, and still feel that the apparatus is always already present, that gender for example, is enumerated, that proper nouns are utilized, that texts are stored, that objects are constructed, that bodies are present by virtual presencing. It reminds me of early cinema, with the projection speed varied by hand literally for affect/effect. Unixtalk on the other hand, for me is a textual body as well as a body of text; the dividing line alone underscores the differentiation or membrane of communication. It lacks complete surprise which the MOO has. It lacks constancy which the MOO has and lacks storage and possession/possessivity. But the body also lacks these things, and the reason net.sex has been so overwhelming at times on talk is precisely because (not only of ascii cs/ucs, that argu- ment could continue forever) of the body-imaginary which floats there within it.


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Last modified: Wednesday, 18-Jul-2007 16:28:13 EDT