Contact: Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Coy, Volker Grassmuck, Prof. Dr. Jörg Pflüger
Funded by: DFG

(Follo-up to the project "Technically Induced Global Subcultures" in cooperation with the projet "Theory and History of Media")

Keywords
Computer science and society; open global computer networks; computer as medium; knowledge order; technization of knowledge

Abstract
With global digital electronic networking new forms of communication, of information, of acting and of entertainment have emerged that are based on using computer-networks as digital media. The historically grown order of knowledge that unfolded mainly along the lines of text and print now comes under the influence of open global computer-networks. The nationally determined knowledge orders (a term of Helmut Spinner), situated alongside the legal and the economic orders, are being replaced by a new global knowledge order. The "future of knowledge" is being decisively determined by its accelerated digital technization. From within the context of computer science the task is to analyze the technical elements of this new global knowledge order and to condense them into a concept of "medium" that appropriately describes computer-networks as medium. The conncetion and distinction of computer science aspects with current concepts of media in the cultural and social sciences is the subject of the project. For the discipline of computer science, conclusions for its education and research will be drawn.