From Network Society to Digital Labyrinth: Algorithms, Bubbles, and Attention Markets

#Soul tech

Those of us who were young in the 1990s still remember the enthusiasm with which the arrival of the internet was received. Suddenly, a new space of freedom opened before our eyes, a digital territory where information would flow horizontally and globally, bypassing the mediation and censorship of the powerful groups that at the time controlled the media shaping the public sphere. It was as if, overnight, a crack had appeared in the wall of one-way communication: forums like The Well, homemade pages like Geocities, or collaborative projects like Wikipedia embodied the promise of a “network society,” where knowledge and public discussion could circulate freely and without hierarchy, weaving collaborative networks that would challenge the vertical structures of the past.

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