References

Aarseth, E. (2001). Computer Game Studies, Year One. Game Studies, 1 (1). Retrieved from http://www.gamestudies.org/0101/editorial.html

Azuma, H. (2001). Dōbutsuka suru posutomodan: Otaku kara mita Nihon shakai. Tōkyō: Kōdansha.

Benjamin, W. (2002/1936). The Work of Art in the Age of its Technological Reproducibility. In M. Bullock and M. W. Jennings (Eds.). Walter Benjamin: Selected Writings Volume Three (pp. 101-133). Cambridge: Bellknap Press.

Bogost, I. (2006). Unit Operations. An Approach to Videogame Criticism. Cambridge, London: The MIT Press.

Bolter, J. D. (1991). Writing Space: The Computer, Hypertext, and the History of Writing. Hillsdale, N.J.: L. Erlbaum Associates.

Bush, V. (1945). As We May Think. The Atlantic, (July). Retrieved December 17^th 2009 from http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/194507/bush

Carr, N. (2008). Is Google Making Us Stupid? The Atlantic, July/August. Retrieved December 17^th 2009 from http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/print/200807/google

Consalvo, M. (2006). Console Videogames and Global Corporations: Creating a Hybrid Culture. New Media and Society 8(1), 117-137.

Derrida, J. (1976). Of Grammatology. Baltimore: John Hopkins University Press.

Derrida, J. (1996). Archive Fever: A Freudian Impression. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Frasca, G. (2003). Simulation versus narrative: Introduction to ludology. In M. J. P.Wolf and B. Perron (Eds.), The Video Game Theory Reader (pp. 221-236). New York: Routledge.

Galloway, A. R. (2006). Gaming. Essays on Algorithmic Culture. Minneapolis, London: University of Minnesota Press.

Grassmuck, V. (2000). Man, Nation & Machine: The Otaku Answer to Pressing Problems of the Media Society. Retrieved December 17^th 2009 from http://waste.informatik.hu-berlin.de/grassmuck/Texts/otaku00_e.htmlHall, S. (2007). Ethnicity: Identity and Difference. In E. K. Ching, C. Buckley, and A. Lozano-Alonso (Eds.). Reframing Latin America: A Cultural Theory Reading of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries (pp. 77-86). Austin: University of Texas Press.

Heidegger, M. (1993 [1927]). Being and Time: A Translation of Sein und Zeit. Oxford: Blackwell.

Jenkins, H. (2006a). Convergence Culture: Where New and Old Media Collide. New York: New York University Press.

Jenkins, H. (2006b). Fans, Bloggers, and Gamers: Exploring Participatory Culture. New York: New York University Press.

Jones, S. (2008). The Meaning of Computer Games: Gaming and Textual Strategies. New York: Routledge.

Kline, S., Dyer-Witheford, N. and G. de Peuter (2003). Digital Play: The Interaction of Technology, Culture, and Marketing. Montreal & Kingston: McGill-Queen’s University Press.

Kojève, A. (1969). Introduction to the Reading of Hegel: Lectures on the Phenomenology of Spirit. New York: Basic Books.

Kuhlen, R. (1991). Hypertext. Ein nicht-lineares Medium zwischen Buch und Wissensbank. Berlin: Springer.

Lowood, H. (2006). High Performance Play: The Making of Machinima. Journal of Media Practices 7(1), 25-42.

Nelson, T. (1960). Project Xanadu.

Okada, T. (1995). Otaku-gaku nyūmon (Introduction to Otakuology). Tōkyō: Ōta shuppan.

Okonogi, K. (1977). Moratorium ningen no jidai (The Age of Human Beings in a Moratorium; English translation published in Japan Echo 5(1) 1987). Chūō kōron(October).

Rowlands, I., and D. Nicholas (2008). Information Behaviour of the Researcher of the Future. Available December 17^th 2009 from http://www.ucl.ac.uk/slais/research/ciber/downloads/

Saitō, T. (2000). Sentō bishōjo no seishin bunseki (Psychoanalysis of Fighting Girls). Tōkyō: Chikuma bunkō.

Wark, M. (2007). Gamer Theory. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.

Biographical Statement

Fabian Schäfer is a research associate in Japanese Studies at the East-Asian Institute of the University of Leipzig. He received his Ph.D. from the University of Leipzig with a thesis on the beginnings of media and communication research in Prewar Japan. His current research interests include Japanese cultural studies, critical theory and transnational intellectual history.

Email: fschaefer@gmail.com

Abstract

Time, the irrevocability of choice and commitment as well as the finality of death are central premises in modern moral and political thinking. This irreversibility is understood to reflect something about the organism, and something about the world.  As culture comes to be mediated more and more by digital architectures in which time can be skipped, reversed, and begun again, it becomes important to revisit these premises. This paper seeks to bring together thinkers across nations and across disciplines to organize the question of time in the digital age. In particular the relationship between human beings and the virtual/digital world of knowledge databases and online video games.

Keywords

Animalization, Azuma Hiroki, Walter Benjamin, databases, di

Abstract

Time, the irrevocability of choice and commitment as well as the finality of death are central premises in modern moral and political thinking. This irreversibility is understood to reflect something about the organism, and something about the world.  As culture comes to be mediated more and more by digital architectures in which time can be skipped, reversed, and begun again, it becomes important to revisit these premises. This paper seeks to bring together thinkers across nations and across disciplines to organize the question of time in the digital age. In particular the relationship between human beings and the virtual/digital world of knowledge databases and online video games.

Keywords:

Animalization, Azuma Hiroki, Walter Benjamin, databases, digital games, digital media, Martin Heidegger, the Internet, otaku, subjectivity, video games

Introduction

To this day, philosophy still basically remains a Euro-American and logocentric project. It restricted itself geographically and culturally to thought by Western, male thinkers, stored in written language. Against the background of a widening of this philosophical canonization around the end of the Cold War (the collapse of the “Grande Narratives” proposed by postmodern thinkers), this article aims to frame an intervention into this formation of Western philosophy, through examining the simultaneous challenges of “non-European” thought, and thought that is presented by means of popular “non-linear” cultural forms, particularly the digital game.

There are two key stages in this intervention. First, “Western” philosophy is contextualized in relation to contemporary thought in Japan (primarily through a discussion of the work of Azuma Hiroki) in order to overcome the geopolitical dichotomy between a hegemonic (universalistic) Western philosophy and a marginalized non-Western philosophy. Second, digital games are acknowledged as a medium that contributes to philosophical discourse by refiguring given philosophical concepts based on its original materiality.¹ I suggest that this offers a possibility to overcome the logocentrism of philosophy already criticized by thinkers like French philosopher Jacques Derrida (1976). This article will discuss to what extent the philosophical concepts inherent of time and death can be experienced (or reflected upon) in a “playful” way through the act of playing these games. This article will not analyze the philosophical thought represented in the narration of games, rather it will focus on the actions of the player. It is the basic assumption of this article that playing digital games is an essentially different experience than watching a linear movie, because players actively participate (haptically and cognitively) in the shape that a game assumes. This mode of media use, which is based on the materiality of digital media, cannot be grasped simply by the idea of an “active audience” (see Galloway, 2006, p. 3). Digital game players both produce and consume their own experience; and many of the decisions and actions made by a player in a game touch upon ethical, moral, or philosophical issues. I will call this new form of philosophizing based on the interactions between players and digital games ludic philosophy.

This approach is necessary and important in order to align contemporary philosophy to the most recent technological developments in the field of digital media; not in the sense of a philosophy of digital games or media in general, but as a new form of philosophizing corresponding to these recent developments. To include digital games into the scope of philosophy acknowledges that it is necessary to rethink the meaning of academic philosophy in general. In order to prevent philosophy from loosing its contact to the contemporary mediated nature of the world, it is necessary for researchers and philosophers to accept that a new media literacy is required to understand the grammar and algorithmic logic underlying digital game (see Galloway, 2006). Moreover, it means to acknowledge that some of the most important cultural producers (philosophers?) of digital media are of the gamer generation (see also Wark, 2007).

This article works through this two stage intervention in the following manner: the first section, examines “interactivity”, from a Heideggerian perspective, using the example of the Internet and HTML; the second section introduces ludic philosophy by examining the possibilities of subjectivity in the use of digital games, and how play may allow users to experience and reflect on concepts such as  “control”/“freedom,” “time”/“space” and “existence”/“death’; while the third, and final, section describes modes of intervention and deconstruction into the structure of digital media in terms of another mode of user subjectivity from the perspective of Japanese cultural critic Azuma Hiroki’s approach to digital cultures and its users.

Internet: interactivity, choice, and fallenness

It is commonly agreed that the intellectual basis for the interactivity of the Internet was established by American scientist Vannevar Bush. In an article entitled “As We May Think” published in The Atlantic shortly after the end of WWII, Bush predicted that in the future ‘wholly new forms of encyclopedias will appear, ready made with a mesh of associative trails running through them’. The idea behind the Memex (short for memory extender) machine envisaged by Bush (1945) was that:

…[t]he human mind [...] operates by association. With one item in its grasp, it snaps instantly to the next that is suggested by the association of thoughts, in accordance with some intricate web of trails carried by the cells of the brain.

Even though the Memex was never realized, Bush’s article influenced the development of hypertext theory, such as that established by philosopher and sociologist Ted Nelson (who is also credited with first use of the term “hypertext”). Nelson’s (1960) project Xanadu, which was basically a universal knowledge management system, pre-empted the development of the World Wide Web by 25 years. The aim of Nelson’s project was to invent a word processor capable of storing multiple versions of documents and to facilitate non-sequential writing, in which the reader could choose his or her own path through an electronic document.

However, it remains questionable how the interactivity of hypertext impacts on its users and how they cope with the simultaneous existence and accessibility of documents or websites. According to German information scientist Rainer Kuhlen (1991, p.182): ‘…[h]ypertext seems to be cognitively reasonable on the supposition that the brain organizes knowledge […] in cross-linked, topological, and non-linear structures’; thus, ‘knowledge absorption based on comparable organizational patterns, as it is given with hypertext, might be more efficient than accumulation via the “detour” of linear forms of presentation’. However, Kuhlen (1991, p.56) insists that: ‘the integration of two networks, especially if they are polyhierarchically structured, is more difficult to integrate than a linear structure into an existing network’.²

The problems of the integration of linear and networked knowledge structures described by Kuhlen are also central to the most recent popular debates on the dangers and possibilities of the Internet. In August 2008, the German news magazine Der Spiegel and the American journal The Atlantic both published cover stories on the dangers of Internet-based communication and knowledge. The two magazines posed the question if ‘Google’ (The Atlantic) or, more generally, ‘the Internet’ (Der Spiegel) ‘is Making us Stupid?’ The tone of the stories is ambivalent: similar to the introduction of other new communication technologies such as radio broadcasting or television in the past, the discourse splits into two camps of Internet critics and Internet enthusiasts. The enthusiasts argue that the Internet is leading to the occurrence of new simultaneous modes of perception, a democratization of knowledge, and an unprecedented creativity of its users (see for example: Jenkins, 2006a). While the critics focus on: the loss of critical reason or the capacity for remembering, rising attention deficit, the loss of a common culture existing through the reading of books, and intellectual passivity. Furthermore, the critical camp often psychopathologizes the “effects” of the use of the Internet, arguing that spending “too much” time on the Internet – searching through a cornucopia of texts, videos or music or writing emails and instant messages – can “cause” social behavioral disorders such as an anti-social attitude or an unwillingness to communicate.

Besides this panic mongering and exaggerated psychopathologization of Internet users, it is the “effects” of the Internet on cognitive abilities and reading capability that Internet critics find particularly unsettling. In his editorial at the The Atlantic, American writer Nicholas Carr complains that the persistent use of the Internet is already having an influence on his capacity for concentration and contemplation. According to Carr, he was ‘once (…) a scuba diver in the sea of words. Now [he] zip[s] along the surface like a guy on a Jet Ski’ (Carr, 2008). Commonly it is “interactivity” it self that is deemed to have this ‘Jet Ski’ effect on our cognition.

The concern that Carr indicates stems from the inner restlessness that users feel when they are faced with the decision between two or more possibilities. This restlessness complicates the seamless absorption of knowledge by means of interactive digital media. Hyper-links might be compared to junctions or options, or possibilities on which Dasein can project itself. In this sense, the networked structure of the Internet might thus be described as a miniature of the possibilities-for-Being (Seinkönnen) of Dasein. As in “real” life, deciding in favor of one possibility necessarily means to negate others. According to Heidegger (1993 /1927):

Dasein is its basis existently (existierend) – that is, in such a manner that it understands (verstehen) itself in terms of possibilities (Möglichkeiten) (…). But this implies that in having a potentiality-for-Being (seinkönnend) it always stands in one possibility or another: it constantly is not other possibilities, and it has waived these in its existential projection (existentieller Entwurf). Not only is the projection, as one that has been thrown, determined by the nullity of Being-a-basis (Nichtigkeit des Grundseins); as projection it is itself essentially null(nichtig) (p. 285).

Nevertheless, it is only in what Heidegger (1993/1927) called the ‘authentic’ (eigentlich) mode of Being (Seinsweise) (p. 42) that Dasein can “choose” [or] win itself’ and thereby ‘be’ itself (Selbstsein, Being-one’s-Self) through an existential projection in the choice of ‘its ownmost possibilities’ (p. 68). Most of the times, Heidegger admits, the Dasein is determined by the given possibilities and is thus not situated in the mode of authenticity (Eigentlichkeit) but in one of “fallenness” (Verfallenheit).

The possibility of ‘falling’ seems to be relatively high in the case of the interlinked structure of the Internet – or other databases – if compared to the reading of a linear structured book. This ‘fallenness’ can assume two forms – ‘distraction’ and ‘procrastination’ in the case of the Internet. Regarding the former, re-reading Walter Benjamin’s well-known essay The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproducibility (2002/1936) as an ontological inquiry of new modes of media reception appears to be valuable. Benjamin (2002/1936), who anticipated McLuhan’s perception that media are not just passive channels of information but also influence the ways we perceive things transmitted through the media, observes that:

Just as the entire mode of existence of human collectives changes over long historical periods, so too does their mode of perception. The way in which human perception is organized – the medium in which it occurs – is conditioned not only by nature but by history (p. 104, original emphasis).

I suggest that this observation is particularly appropriate for contemporary use of the Internet.

“Surfing” the Internet can be described as what Benjamin termed ‘reception in distraction’ (Rezeption in der Zerstreuung) (Benjamin, 2002/1936, p. 120). This mode of perception, according to Benjamin, is based on the ‘tactile [taktisch] quality’ of the object of perception––which was, in Benjamin’s case, movies and photographs (Benjamin 2002/1936: 119). The tactility of digital media is emphasized by the interactivity of the Internet or databases. As Nicholas Carr (2008), asserted in his cover story of The Atlantic, hyperlinks, ‘[u]nlike footnotes… …don’t merely point to related works; they propel you toward them’ (Carr, 2008). The perception of the Internet is, to use the words of Benjamin, one of ‘tactile reception’ (taktile Rezeption) that is based on ‘habit’ rather than on ‘attention’ (Benjamin 2002/1936: 120). To Heidegger, who used the term ‘distraction’ (Zerstreuung) in a comparable way, distraction is based on ‘curiosity’ (Neugier), a mode of fallenness. Other than Verstehen (understanding) as the self-projection of the being on its ownmost possibilities, curiosity is merely based on ‘seeing’ (Sehen). In this mode of being, ‘Dasein seeks what is far away simply in order to bring it close to itself in the way it looks. Dasein lets itself to be taken along [mitnehmen] solely by the looks of the world’ (Heidegger 1993 [1927], p. 216).

The dangers of ‘fallen’ or ‘distracted’ ways of Internet use can be substantialized by Rowlands and Nicholas’ (2008) study of online research habits. Over the course of five years they analyzed the behavior of visitors to two popular research sites – one operated by the British Library and one by a U.K. educational consortium – that provide access to journal articles, e-books, and other sources of written information. The results of their research showed that people using the sites exhibited a kind of skimming activity, hopping from one source to another and rarely returning to any source they had already visited (Rowlands and Nicholas 2008). Users typically read only one or two pages of an article or book before they would jump to another site. Sometimes they saved a long article, but there’s no evidence that they ever went back and actually read it. Despite users potentially having the possibility to jump back to an earlier link and choose a different alternative, they only rarely make use of that possibility. The annihilation of the linear and non-contemporaneous time-space continuum established by the non-determined structure of the Internet does not overcome the restricted cognitive abilities of human beings.

The reversibility and choice associated with digital media appears to sit rather ambiguously in relation to human cognition. Apparently, while many Internet users react to links as “possibilities” in Heidegger’s sense, there is also a tendency towards ‘Squirreling’, a process of coping with the flood of information provided by the Internet by the creation of personalized individual databases of the information retrieved from larger databases (Rowlands and Nicholas, 2008). In medical terms, this fetishization of knowledge may be described as procrastination. Procrastination, a condition that some psychologists advocate therapy for, is characterized by deferment of actions or tasks to a later time, may result in stress, a sense of guilt, the loss of personal productivity, the creation of crisis and the disapproval of others for not fulfilling one’s responsibilities or commitments. Not only that this undone work seems to leave traces in our subconsciousness, it also does harm to our computers because we clutter up our hard disks – often in a very unorganized way – with downloaded and yet unread texts.

However, it is important to add here that even Heidegger’s or Benjamin’s perspective on distracted or habitualized perception is not totally pessimistic. In fact, they agree that curiosity and tactile apperception aren’t necessarily something that should be condemned from the outset. According to Heidegger, the temporality (Zeitlichkeit) of curiosity, which is non-‘anticipatory’ (namely ‘non-self-projecting’) and thus merely ‘awaiting’ (gewärtigend), ‘has its natural justification [...][and] belongs to the everyday kind of being of Da-Sein and to the understanding of being initially prevalent’ (Heidegger, 1993/1927, p. 478). Similarly, Benjamin (2002/1936, p. 120) asserts that perception in a state of distraction ‘under certain circumstances… …acquires canonical value’. Since:

the tasks which face the human apparatus of perception at historical turning points cannot be performed solely by optical means – that is, by way of contemplation. They are mastered gradually – taking their cue from tactile reception – through habit (Benjamin 2002/1936, p. 120, original emphasis).

Obviously, if applied to the cognition of the interactive structure of the Internet, Heidegger’s and Benjamin’s perspective refers to two ways of dealing with digital and interlinked texts. The first is the “authentic” Seinsweise of understanding and contemplation. This is a mode of reception that – in Bolter’s (1991, p. 167) words, looks ‘through the text’ and thus grasps and understands the meaning of the narration “behind” the text. the second is a “fallen” mode, in which the user has to ‘look at the text, as a series of possibilities [or links, F.S.] that he or she (…) can activate’ (Bolter 1991: 167). This division establishes two modes of usage––one being active and “authentic” and one being passive and “in-authentic”––rather than two strategies of dealing with digital, networked information.

It is important to acknowledge that the distinct strategies of explorative browsing and the purposeful search both contain possibilities for ‘authentic’ and ‘in-authentic’ modes of use. While the users’, in Heidegger’s words, ‘ownmost projection’ may guide the purposeful search; it is also necessary to be open to the possibilities provided by the structures of interactive digital media. This is because the versatility and complexity of the Internet also has its positive side, sometimes called the serendipity effect. In general, serendipity refers to an unintended, fortunate, but accidental discovery. The Internet, with its many possibilities and multifold layers emphasizes the emergent possibilities of this form of information retrieval. This form of ‘browsing” large amounts of data is only possible through the haptic and tactile perception described by Walter Benjamin and is one important aspect of digital media literacy.

“Ludic philosophy”: subjectivity, irreversibility of choice and virtual death in digital games

Just like hypertext has to be read by activating links, digital games must be played in order to “function” as a medium.³ Alexander R. Galloway (2006, p. 2), asserts that: ‘[w]ithout the active participation of players and machines, digital games exist only as static computer code. Digital games come into being when the machine is powered up and the software is executed; they exist when enacted’. Digital games are an ‘action-based’ media (Galloway 2006, p. 2). To Galloway (2006, p. 3), it is impossible to grasp the materiality of digital games through concepts like ‘interactivity’ or ‘active audiences’. Unlike traditional media such as books, television, or radio, digital games are distinct as they have a: ‘materiality [that] moves and restructures itself’ (Galloway, 2006, p. 3). Playing a game, to Galloway, is a combination of mutual diegetic and non-diegetic actions executed either by the machine (video game) or the operator (player) (Galloway, 2006, pp. 6-8). This differentiation by Galloway not only constructivly approaches the schism between narratology and ludology, it also allows for a reconsideration of the philosophical nature of digital games.⁴

Ian Bogost (2006) argues that digital games:

require critical interpretation to mediate our experience of the simulation, to ground it in a set of coherent and expressive values, responses, or understandings that constitute effects of the work. […] This is the place where rules can be grasped, where instantiated code enters the material world via human player’s faculty of reason’ (p. 99).

Bogost defines digital game simulations as ‘the gap between the rule-based representation of a source system and a user’s subjectivity’ (Bogost, 2006, p. 107). It is the “subjective” achievement of the user to create mental models (in the case of abstract simulations such as economic simulations) or cognitive maps (in the case of spatial and concrete games such as first-person shooters), ‘that converge on an interpretation based on what the simulation includes and what it excludes’ (Bogost, 2006, p. 104; original emphasis). Bogost concludes that it is the ‘gap’, the things left out by the simulation based on the reduction of complexity that provides leeway for the users’ individual subjectivities. It is exactly this leeway that is of interest here with regard to what I have tentatively called ludic philosophy.⁵

Subjectivity, freedom, control, and agency are central concepts of philosophy and critical theory. Against the background of the leeway given by digital games described above, it is necessary to ask that if in addition to offering subject positions, the experience of subjectivity in digital games is also reflected philosophically by the players during the course of play. Galloway explains the particular relation of subjectivity and digital games by comparing the first-person perspective in games with the first-person perspective in cinema. He argues that:

while the mass media of film, literature, television, and so on continue to engage in various debates around representation, textuality, and subjectivity, there has emerged in recent years a whole new medium, computers and in particular video games, whose foundation is not in looking and reading but in the instigation of material change through action (Galloway, 2006, p 4; original emphasis).

If one understands subjectivity or identity as the ‘a game that ought to be played against difference’ (Hall, 2007, p. 82; original emphasis), the potential of digital games in relation to questions of subjectivity and its philosophical reflection becomes more clear. Similar to the perspective of Jacques Derrida (1996), who argues that because the perceiving subject’s mental state is constantly in a state of flux, and differs from one re-reading of texts to the next, the meaning of language is thus not essential but constantly temporally deferred, the simulation of a digital game creates a “gap” between virtual reality and reality, leaving a leeway for subjectivity (see also Bogost, 2006).

This becomes particularly obvious in the case of first-person shooters. In cinema first-person perspectives are aesthetically marginalized, used mainly ‘to effect a sense of alienation, otherness, detachment, or fear’ (Galloway, 2006, p. 56). However:

with the advent of video games, a new set of possibilities were opened up for the subjective shot. In games the first-person perspective is not marginalized but instead is commonly used to achieve an intuitive sense of affective motion. […] Where film uses the subjective shot to represent a problem with identification, games use the subjective shot to create identification. While film has thus far used the subjective shot as a corrective to break through and destroy certain stabilizing elements in the film apparatus, games use the subjective shot to facilitate an active subject position that enables and facilitates the gamic apparatus (Galloway, 2006, pp. 68-69)

Similar to the experience of subjectivity of first-person shooters which is rather based on motion and a ‘gamic vision [that] requires fully rendered, actionable space’ (Galloway, 2006:,p. 63; original emphasis) generating a haptic and tactile experience of this space, the experience and reflection of the philosophical experience of control (lack of freedom) is based more on the non-diegetic than the diegetic elements of game play.

In his subsequent discussion of Civilization III (Firaxis Games 2001), Galloway (2006: 85-106), illustrates how these non-diegetic elements of digial games are experienced. Instead of focusing on the hidden ideologies of digital games, Galloway analyzes the manipulation of parameters in construction and management simulations (CMS) in Civilization or the command of hot keys of the controller in martial arts games such as the Tekken series (Namco 1994-) as an allegory (not mere representation) of the idea of control in modern control societies. Similarly, Bogost (2006: 154) describes the Grand Theft Auto (GTA) series (DMA Design/Rockstar North 1997-), as a game that: ‘does not just provide several different styles of gameplay, it also allows free-form transitions between those play styles’ and allows ‘the player [to] make[s] a conscious and rational decision to follow one path instead of another’, as the experience of freedom. Thus, Bogost (2006: 169) concludes, ‘we should be less inclined to condemn works like GTA for their brutality than to try to evolve the core problem at present: how to understand and refine […] our possible action so we can interrogate and improve the system of human experience’.

Similar to the experience of freedom and control in video games, it is also the experience of irreversible choice (and it’s relationship to time) that has been totally disregarded as an important factor for the creation of simulations. Counter-Strike (Valve Software 2000), a popular online and multiplayer LAN tactical first-person shooter, can explain another philosophical moment inherent to digital games. Unlike the undetermined structure of webpages that created a non-linear and reversible experience of time, decisions in online-videogames are necessarily real-time decisions. Contrary to the traditional linear structure of written language that allows the reader to jump back to earlier points of the text, creating a repetition of the past, decisions made on the Internet are necessarily real-time decisions. Whereas one is able to pause or save a game in regular digital games, in online-games or even chat forums this is impossible. Once a game has started or a message is posted, it is impossible to jump back to an earlier point on the linear time axis since all information is send instantly to all other participants of a game or a chat forum.

On a narrative level, Counter-Strike attempts to realistically simulate the combat between a group of terrorists and counter-terrorist team. Similar to other first-person shooter games, each team attempts to complete their mission objective and/or eliminate the opposing team. However, one important feature distinguishes this game from other games of this genre, namely that killed players are not able to “respawn” (come alive again), but turn into “spectators” for the remaining time of the round. Originally, it was the aim of the developers to encourage strategic gaming among the players of each of the two groups. This feature is however, a common point of criticism from among the games’ players, because it causes long waiting periods for eliminated players. However, I suggest that this is also one of the most important reasons behind the popularity of Counter-Strike, because in this case virtual death takes on a higher stakes than is usually found in digital games on the first-person shooter genre. Death is much more real because it is irreversible (at least for the duration of a single round).

Heidegger described this anticipation of death as the authentic temporality of Dasein. On opposition to the ordinary representation of time – which is characterized as ‘an endless, irreversible sequence of “nows” which passes away’ (Heidegger 1993/1927, p. 478) – he proposed a dimensional conception of time. This conception encapsulates the existential and basic structure of temporality as a double movement. The first movement is the anticipation (Vorlaufen) into its future (Zu-kunft). The second movement consists of a ‘coming back understandingly to one’s ownmost ‘being’ [“Gewesen”]’ (Heidegger 1993/1927,p. 373). Dasein exists through the authentic projection on its ownmost possibilities. According to Heidegger, it is anxiety (Angst), not of something that is in the world, but of the being-in-the-world of Dasein. It is only in this state of anxiety that Dasein is projected upon itself and is liberated from domination, being free to be itself. This however, presents Dasein to its own finitude and nullity by experiencing itself as a “being-toward-death” (Sein zum Tode) (Heidegger 1993/1927, pp. 304-312). Put differently, being-toward-death is not an orientation that brings Dasein closer to its physical end, in terms of clinical death, but is rather a way of being. It is the anticipation of one’s death that brings one into its authentic mode of being. If applied to the particular character of online-games, what makes the experience of online digital games so “real” or “authentic”, is no so much the technical perfection of the simulation of three-dimensional space, sound, or haptic sensation, but rather the anticipation (and in some instances irreversibility) of one’s death and thus the experience of a dimensional structure of time. Based on this Heideggerian interpretation, I suggest that online-games are in fact more than just “games”. Unlike typical games, commonly conceptualized as non-productive entertainment, that are primarily played for escapist purposes, online-games like Counter-Strike simulate the most feared, and at the same time existential, feature of human life: mortality.

Media literacy, deconstruction, and otaku

With regard to “fallenness” of Dasein to a tactile and habitualized information seeking behavior in the digital era or the behavior exhibited when playing digital games, it is valuable to take into account the contemporary philosophical discourse on the phenomenon of otaku culture in Japan, since much of the public debate on the positive and negative sides of the Internet or digital games parallels the discourse on otaku culture in Japan. Previous discourses on otaku––a Japanese term that refers to people with obsessive interests in various Japanese subcultures, particularly manga, anime, science fiction, or digital games—usually psychopathologized the otaku as people being anti-social, uncommunicative, self-absorbed and even perverted, or tried to understand the phenomenon psychoanalytically.⁶ However, this article will focus on the work of Azuma Hiroki (2001), an important Japanese cultural critic who analyzed the otaku from the perspective of their pioneering role in the so-called “information society”.⁷

In his book Dōbutsuka suru posutomodan: Otaku kara mita Nihon shakai (2001, Animalizing Postmodern: Japanese Society as Seen from the Perspective of Otaku), Azuma Hiroki considers the otaku phenomenon a new peculiarly Japanese inflection ‘of the global trend of postmodernization’ (Azuma 2001,p. 19).⁸ With reference to Kojève’s (1969) neo-Hegelian distinction between two forms of ‘post-historical existence’––the ‘animalization’ of American society based on consumerism and the highly formalized and aestheticized ‘snobbism’ of the Japanese—Azuma asserts that otaku culture consists of a ‘two-tiered’ (nijū-ka) mode of consumption that reflects the two-layered structure of the postmodern itself (Azuma 2001, pp. 76-78).⁹ In addition to the two layers of the modern world-image—the ‘depth’ of ‘grand narratives’ (namely ideals, ideology) and a ‘surface’ of many ‘small narratives’—Azuma claims that the latter were replaced by a ‘grand database’ in the postmodern world-image (sekaizō). Whereas the modern era formed a structure in which a single grand narrative/ideal controlled the diverse small narratives and cultural and social criticism consisted in analyzing grand narratives as reflected within various small narratives, in the postmodern, people may grasp any number of small world-images (Azuma 2001, pp 50-54).

Azuma claims that one can identify two ways of how the otaku deal with this new world-image. He calls one the “animalesque” (dōbutsuteki) side of database consumption; that is the solitude and passive consumption of the many small narratives of digital games, anime, or manga that are merely based on “combinations” (kumiawase) of self-referential elements from the grand database. Moreover, database consumption also has a second, an active or “humanesque” (ningen-teki) side, because otaku actively intervene in received commodities by breaking down the narratives into their compounds (as for digital games these are screenplay, character, background or for manga it is the single “sensitive elements” (moe yōso) that characters are composed of), and thereby get access to the database that lies in the “depth” behind the small narrations and “recreate” (niji sōsaku) It is this “double structure” (nisō kōzō) of deconstruction and reconstruction that prompts Azuma to interpret the otaku culture as a deconstructivist and, thus, subversive form of cultural reception that brings it close to a deconstructivist method in contemporary literary theory that offers a subject position to intervene in existing cultural forms or the discourse.¹⁰ Azuma bases this assertion also on the fact that to the otaku it doesn’t matter any longer if the “author” of the small narratives they consume is a professional––“authorized” by one of the big manga or anime publishers––or an amateur who publishes his self-made anime or manga in one of the many fanzines (dōjinshi) or the Internet. from it their own narrations or pictures.

One can find similarly deconstructive and reconstructive behavior among the members of the global subcultures gathering around digital games. First-person shooters like Counter-Strike are often used to produce machinima. Machinima is a coinage of the words machine, cinema and animation and refers to 3D-animations created in a real-time virtual environment. Digital games with a powerful 3D-engine are the most inexpensive programs to create machinima. Basically, the easiest way to create machinima is to let several persons play after a screenplay in a networked multi-player-game. By recording the screen of one player, her or she acts as cameraman. The other players move their characters within the virtual environment like movie actors. Afterwards, the movie is cut and sometimes even dubbed. Accordingly, the technological requirements to produce machinima are very low because one basically only needs a computer and a game. However, many of the machinima movie productions are much more sophisticated because they make use of modified commercial digital games. These modifications range from mapping and modeling, namely the creation of own virtual environments and characters, to the manipulations of the game software itself, such as lip synchronization, the direct recording of the graphic output as a movie file, or the programming of complete production frameworks (see Lowood 2006, for an expanded discussion of machinima).

Azuma’s argument for the new media literacies of the otaku vis-à-vis the initial negative definition of digital media as “fallenness” suggests the necessity of reformulating the question asked by The Atlantic and Der Spiegel. The appropriate question should not be: Is Google, the Internet, electronic databases, digital games, or the new flood of information in general, making us stupid? As we have seen, besides the “fallen” or “animalized” mode of media use, there is also space for a productive and “humanesque” or subjective way of dealing with digitized information. In terms of education, pedagogies, or media literacies, however, it is necessary to teach the users of these new media the sharp distinction between these two modes. Particularly with regard to the use of digitalized knowledge and the Internet, it will be of particular importance to teach contemplative and analytic reading to a generation of otaku and Google users that possesses a highly developed digital literacy but is beginning to lack basic reading and writing skills.

Even more important than teaching the differences between different ways of handling knowledge in the digital age, however, is how we can incorporate Azuma’s positive appraisal of the “double structure” of deconstructive and reconstructive elements of otaku culture or machinima into existing frameworks of teaching and pedagogy. Let’s take for instance the case of Japan Studies. I think that it has already become a global phenomenon that an increasing number of students enrolling in Japan Studies do so because of an interest in Japanese popular culture and anime or manga in particular (see Jenkins, 2006b). To some of them, calling themselves otaku is part of their lifestyle and offers them a subject position and, thus, a self-identity. Many of them, similar to the otaku in Japan, spend much of their time on homepages such as fanfiction.net, animexx.de or quizilla.com, reading, commenting and writing stories or uploading pictures that are based on existing anime or manga. In other words, one has to pose the question if it is possible to integrate the existing competences of the new type of students of Japan Studies that are comparable to those attributed to the otaku––namely digital literacy, electronic reading skills, active participation in the reconstruction or “bricolage” of media contents published at the Internet or of manga and anime––to the deconstructivist project in the humanities in general.

Conclusion: ludic philosophy, qualitative research and pedagogy

In this article, I have outlined my idea of a “ludic philosophy.” The aim of this new type of philosophy is to overcome the logocentrism and Euro/American-centrism in traditional philosophy. I have tried to show that philosophical concepts inherent to certain games can be experienced and reflected in a “playful” way through the act of playing these games. However, it still has to be proved if the possibility of subjectivity provided by digital games (as action-based media) and deconstructive behaviour described above actually evokes the experience and/or philosophical reflection of the idea of agency or subjectivity on the side of the player/user. It is necessary to substantiate this assumption on an empirical level, since it remains questionable if the leeway or simulation gap given by a digital game is actually “used” in the way proposed in this article. Therefore, it is necessary to study the behavior exhibited by the players during play, which relates to the philosophical concepts mentioned above. Moreover, it might produce even more insights if one compares the behavior of players in Japan with players in Europe or the USA, because the Japanese game market is different from Europe or the USA. In Japan, for instance, first-person shooters like Counter-Strike are far less popular than among European and American gamers. Instead, there is a number of genres that do not even exist abroad, such as the many love games (ren’ai gēmu), novel games (noberu gēmu), and development games (ikusei gēmu), many of them having explicit pornographic content.

The findings of these empirical studies will have an impact on the pedagogical discourse as well. The reactions of politicians and the mass media to the rampages at schools in Erfurt (2002), Emsdetten (2006), and Winnenden (2009) in Germany hint at the importance of these topics. Most of the reporting and conservative politicians tried to explain these acts of unintelligible adolescent violence with the consumption of “violent” movies and digital games. Counter-Strike was among one of the games frequently mentioned in this respect. If the findings of the empirical analysis of philosophical gaming will show that there is no significant philosophical reflection taking place among players of commercial digital games, these findings may reveal possible frameworks for pedagogical approaches to digital gaming and game design.

Notes

¹ Japan has an unique status in the global game market, as both a major producer of games and also as a particularly strong local market (see Consalvo 2006; Kline, Dyer-Witheford and de Peuter 2003).

² All quotes from Kuhlen are translated from the original German by the author.

³ Aarseth (2001) argues that digital games ‘are both object and process’.

⁴ This schism is described thoroughly by Frasca (2003), and more recently by Bogost (2006) and Jones (2008).

⁵ In German the terms “leeway” or “room for manoeuvre” are commonly translated as Spielraum (lit. “room for play”), similar to the technical term “play” in English. Against this etymological background, the relationship between digital games and what I have called ludic philosophy becomes even more obvious.

⁶ Other than the general public discourse, Saitō (2000) attributes a rather ‘conservative sexuality’ to the otaku despite their preference for homoerotic or violent and pornographic manga in his book. See also Azuma (2001: 129-130).

⁷ According to Grassmuck (2000), it was Okada’s concern was ‘to establish otaku as a new type of expert who focuses on the style, special effects and signature of individual comic artists. Where Gutenberg-schooled readers detect a story, writes Okada (1995), the otaku first of all refer to the syntactic levels. Their judgment is based on an extensive knowledge of the particular genre allowing them to decode quotations, grasp references, and appreciate nuances’. He describes otaku as ‘people possessing an advanced visual sensation’ and a ‘new type’ of adaptation to the cultural condition of advanced consumer and information society. To Azuma (2001: 8), otaku can thus not be described merely as ‘youths enjoying a moratorium’ based on of their juvenile and passionate collecting. For the idea of a generation in a moratorium see also Okonogi (1977).

⁸ Azuma’s work was published as an English translation in 2009 as Otaku: Japan’s Database Animals on the University of Minnesota Press, all the quotes in this article are translated from the original Japanese by the author.

⁹ Kojève argues that Japan is a society of ‘formalized values’, values that have no meaningful content anymore but are solely gratuitous (playful, but neither work nor fight for prestige). Examples – snobbery, the Noh Theater, the ceremony of tea, the art of flower bouquet – only formal detail, it does not really matter one way or the other. Kojève says that since animals cannot be snobs, there is hope for some kind of human existence to persist even into the post-history. Man would not really be capable anymore of transforming content, but would only be able to confront one form by another. As Kojève says, man would ‘opposed himself as a pure “form” to himself and to others taken as “content” of any sort’ (Kojève, 1969: 162, ft 6).

¹⁰ It was Bolter (1991: 163) who emphasized the relationship between Derridarian poststructuralism and hypertext as well. Bolter argues, based on the rhizomatic structure of the internet or databases, that electronic texts do not have a centre or margins because of their ‘deconstructive reading’: ‘The reader can follow paths through the space in any direction, limited only by constraints established by the author. No path through the space need be stigmatized as marginal’.

References

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Azuma, H. (2001). Dōbutsuka suru posutomodan: Otaku kara mita Nihon shakai. Tōkyō: Kōdansha.

Benjamin, W. (2002/1936). The Work of Art in the Age of its Technological Reproducibility. In M. Bullock and M. W. Jennings (Eds.). Walter Benjamin: Selected Writings Volume Three (pp. 101-133). Cambridge: Bellknap Press.

Bogost, I. (2006). Unit Operations. An Approach to Videogame Criticism. Cambridge, London: The MIT Press.

Bolter, J. D. (1991). Writing Space: The Computer, Hypertext, and the History of Writing. Hillsdale, N.J.: L. Erlbaum Associates.

Bush, V. (1945). As We May Think. The Atlantic, (July). Retrieved December 17^th 2009 from http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/194507/bush

Carr, N. (2008). Is Google Making Us Stupid? The Atlantic, July/August. Retrieved December 17^th 2009 from http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/print/200807/google

Consalvo, M. (2006). Console Videogames and Global Corporations: Creating a Hybrid Culture. New Media and Society 8(1), 117-137.

Derrida, J. (1976). Of Grammatology. Baltimore: John Hopkins University Press.

Derrida, J. (1996). Archive Fever: A Freudian Impression. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Frasca, G. (2003). Simulation versus narrative: Introduction to ludology. In M. J. P.Wolf and B. Perron (Eds.), The Video Game Theory Reader (pp. 221-236). New York: Routledge.

Galloway, A. R. (2006). Gaming. Essays on Algorithmic Culture. Minneapolis, London: University of Minnesota Press.

Grassmuck, V. (2000). Man, Nation & Machine: The Otaku Answer to Pressing Problems of the Media Society. Retrieved December 17^th 2009 from http://waste.informatik.hu-berlin.de/grassmuck/Texts/otaku00_e.htmlHall, S. (2007). Ethnicity: Identity and Difference. In E. K. Ching, C. Buckley, and A. Lozano-Alonso (Eds.). Reframing Latin America: A Cultural Theory Reading of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries (pp. 77-86). Austin: University of Texas Press.

Heidegger, M. (1993 [1927]). Being and Time: A Translation of Sein und Zeit. Oxford: Blackwell.

Jenkins, H. (2006a). Convergence Culture: Where New and Old Media Collide. New York: New York University Press.

Jenkins, H. (2006b). Fans, Bloggers, and Gamers: Exploring Participatory Culture. New York: New York University Press.

Jones, S. (2008). The Meaning of Computer Games: Gaming and Textual Strategies. New York: Routledge.

Kline, S., Dyer-Witheford, N. and G. de Peuter (2003). Digital Play: The Interaction of Technology, Culture, and Marketing. Montreal & Kingston: McGill-Queen’s University Press.

Kojève, A. (1969). Introduction to the Reading of Hegel: Lectures on the Phenomenology of Spirit. New York: Basic Books.

Kuhlen, R. (1991). Hypertext. Ein nicht-lineares Medium zwischen Buch und Wissensbank. Berlin: Springer.

Lowood, H. (2006). High Performance Play: The Making of Machinima. Journal of Media Practices 7(1), 25-42.

Nelson, T. (1960). Project Xanadu.

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Biographical Statement

Fabian Schäfer is a research associate in Japanese Studies at the East-Asian Institute of the University of Leipzig. He received his Ph.D. from the University of Leipzig with a thesis on the beginnings of media and communication research in Prewar Japan. His current research interests include Japanese cultural studies, critical theory and transnational intellectual history.

Email: fschaefer@gmail.com

Abstract |References| Full Text: HTML, PDF (912 KB)

Abstract

It is often argued that young people growing up in the presence of the Internet and new media are ‘techno savvy’. They are often distinguished as a new generation because of their relationship with new media, which is assumed to be considerably different, in comparison, to older generations. This new generation has also been characterized as the ‘Net generation’ (Tapscott, 1998). However the stereotypical images of ‘net geners’—being technologically savvy—have rarely been questioned. This article aims at nuancing these images with the objective of exploring the stereotypical images, rather than proving if the images are true or false. By using a statistical representative study of Swedish people’s Internet behaviour and linking the results to an analytical frame of Internet skills, the question, “what is it young people know when it comes to the Internet use and how is it related to the stereotypical image of the ´Net generation’?” is explored. The main findings suggest that various Internet activities differ by age and few activities could be ascribed solely to the so-called ‘Net generation’.

Keywords:

Net generation, stereotypical images, Internet skills, self-efficacy, techno-savvy

Introduction

It is often argued that young people growing up in the presence of Internet and new media are ‘techno savvy’. They are assumed to possess new media skills and attitudes which older generations do not. This is assumed to be the main reason for the perceived technological generation gap between the young people and their parents, teachers and other adults. This new generation has been positively characterized as the ‘Net generation’ (Tapscott, 1998) or ‘Digital natives’ (Prensky, 2001) or even ‘Millennials’ (Howe and Strauss, 2000) due to their often-unquestioned proficiency in accessing and using technology and new media. However these positive images of young people being technologically savvy have rarely been questioned (Bennett et. al. 2008). To a certain extent, they have been taken for granted.

This article aims at nuancing these overly optimistic images. The objective is not to prove if the stereotypical images are true or false, but to explore stereotypes prevalent in the literature. This is achieved by drawing on a statistical representative study of Swedish people’s Internet behaviour and linking the results to an analytical frame of Internet skills (Hargittai, 2005; Potosky, 2007; van Dijk & Hacker, 2003; Livingstone et. al., 2005) to explore the question, “what is it young people know and how is it related to the stereotypical images of the ´Net generation’?”

The stereotypical images the article nuances are perceptions pertaining to whether or not all ‘net geners’ are Internet users and generally accepted understandings that they tend to use the Internet in similar ways or in similar locations.  The article also explores the extent to which generational differences between the ‘net Generation’ and older generations affect Internet behaviours.  Additional stereotypical images explored include the extent to which ‘net geners’ rely on the internet over more traditional media forms, whether they really are ‘techno-savvy’ or meeting the criteria of what is sometimes referred to as the “MySpace generation” (Rosen, 2007) due to their use of web 2.0 related activities such as social networking.

Review of the literature

In the EU Kids Online report from 2007, twenty-five European countries are compared regarding children’s and young people’s Internet use (Hasebrink, Livingstone & Haddon, 2007). The results are based on Eurobarometer’s data regarding children less than 18 years of age. The report shows Internet adoption among children varies from about 30 percent up to 70 percent across European countries. Sweden is one of the countries where Internet adoption is largest (among children 66% and among their parents 97%). Internet access at home is also high, with 61 percent of Swedish children accessing the Internet from home. According to the 2008 World Internet Institute’s study used in this article, Internet usage among Swedish children 3-18 year olds is 73%, where 1 of 5 of the youngest ones (3 year olds) use the Internet occasionally and almost all (92-99%) teens and ‘tweens’ (11-18 year olds) use the Internet on a more regular basis (weekly or daily). Other Swedish studies on (young) people’s Internet use also show high Internet adoption and Internet use (Medierådet: Ungar och Medier 2008; Nordicom: Internetbarometer 2007; Statistics Sweden: Use of computers and the Internet by private persons in 2008).

A complementary study by Livingstone & Helsper (2007) show that in the UK, like in other developed countries, there are few children who are not using the Internet and that the previous conception of digital divide between haves and have-nots is no longer applicable to young people. However, they discovered inequalities by age, gender and socioeconomic status in relation to children’s Internet use. The main findings are that older children use the Internet more when compared to younger children. It is also reported that girls use the Internet more at a younger age (9-15) while boys use the Internet more frequently at an older age (16-19). The report also found that expertise in using the Internet is crucial for opportunity take-up. Those who are more skilled at using the Internet use it more often. Furthermore, the report highlights how expertise has a greater impact than age (Livingstone & Helsper, 2007).  There are few studies that have addressed the issue of digital inequalities among children and young people. Additionally, few reports have been critical of stereotypical images of the ‘Net generation’ (Livingstone & Helsper, 2007; Cheong, 2008; Bennett et. al. 2008; Sherry and Fielden, 2005; Facer and Furlong, 2001).

Bennett, Maton and Kervin (2008) emphasise that there are studies indicating that youngsters are highly familiarized with technology and use it for various activities. They also emphasise that there are large percentages of youth who do not have access to technology or the digital skills often ascribed to ‘digital natives’ (Bennett et. al. 2008). This, according to Bennett, Maton and Kervin (2008), could lead to a neglect of those who are less interested or less able to use new technology, especially when socio-economic and cultural factors are overlooked. Sherry and Fielden (2005) suggest that  ‘millennials’ (born after 1983) are more confident with technology compared to older generations, most likely because they were more likely to have studied computer technologies in school. They also found millennials more confident in teaching themselves to use computers. However, Microsoft Word was the only application on which millennials scored significantly better than their older cohorts. Sherry and Fielden’s (2005) findings emphasize that the millennial cohort is not as competent with computers as they are confident in their perceived abilities.

Cheong (2008) critically examined the techno-savvy image of young adults in Singapore where the majority of youth have access to the Internet.  Cheong found that young people’s Internet skills and problem-solving behaviour varied. A significant proportion were unfamiliar with solving computer related problems, while others said that they were able to diagnose and solve computer problems on their own, or with some help from technical support staff. Based on the results, Cheong states that there are secondary digital divides among young adults when it comes to Internet skills, problem-solving behaviour and Internet usage patterns. This all challenges the often unproblematised image of techno-savvy youth (Cheong, 2008). Facer and Furlong (2001) also found that there are children who are ‘low’ computer users. The ‘low users’ were interviewed and some themes regarding their position in the margins of the digital society were identified. Firstly they identified that their access to computers at home are not only dependent on their socioeconomic status, but also the family’s value towards purchasing and using a computer (Facer & Furlong, 2001). Secondly, it seems as if the lack of access at home does not increase computer use in other places. Those who have computer access at home, are more likely to take opportunities to use computers in other places such as school or at friends’ homes. Thirdly, the children who are low computer users, referred to the ones having a computer at home as the ‘brainy ones,’ meaning that they most likely achieve higher academic success. This points out the fact  that social and cultural resources have a big impact on their access (Facer & Furlong, 2001).

In accordance to Bennett et. al. (2008), Cheong (2008), Sherry and Fielden (2005), Livingstone and Helsper (2007) and Facer and Furlong (2001), this article aims to problematise and question some of the stereotypes about the ‘Net generation’.

Conceptualisations of the ‘Net generation’

Tapscott (1998) was one of the first to identify the new generation growing up surrounded by digital media. He calls this new generation the ‘Net generation.’ He explains further that being surrounded by digital media has made the ‘net geners’ so used to it, that “digital technology is no more intimidating to them than a bread toaster” (Tapscott, 1998, p.1). He argues that the ‘Net generation’ is the first generation to be more comfortable, knowledgeable and literate than their parents, teachers and other adults. According to Tapscott, this is because it is easier for children to learn how to use new technology since they are more familiar with from birth. Children assimilate technology while adults must accommodate to technology, which is often a more difficult learning process (Tapscott, 1998, pp.36-42). Prensky (2001) presents a similar argument about the learning process of what he terms ‘digital natives’ and ‘digital immigrants’. In accordance with Tapscott, Prensky labels the ones born with the new technology as ‘digital natives’. They are seen as being fluent with the digital language of technology. The digital immigrants must, on the other hand, learn to adapt to the new technology in a similar way an immigrant learns a new language (Prensky, 2001). Rosen (2007) calls this generation the ‘My Space generation’ defining them as being immersed with technology, and social networking sites.

According to Tapscott the oldest ones of the ‘net geners’ are today in their early thirty’s (2009). The eldest of the generation turned 31 in 2008 and the youngest turned 11. Tapscott talks about a generation instead of life-stages because he claims that ‘net geners’ are different from older generations not only in using technology, but because their brains have developed differently (2009). Their brains process fast-moving images differently. To sum it up, the conceptualization of the ‘Net generation’ is mainly positive and highlights the generation gap by posing young people as technologically savvy, using the Internet for everything, for extended periods of time and from various places. Being techno-savvy for this group also means not being intimidated by technology (Tapscott, 1998; Prensky, 2001). The ‘net geners’ are said to be using Internet to communicate with people all around the world. This includes contributing online content, finding information online and checking facts, while simultaneously being critical to the found information—because they understand online content can be manipulated.  Entertainment, play and immediacy are also assumed to be very important to everything ‘net geners’ do online (Tapscott, 1998).

Analytical frames to discuss stereotypical techno-savvy images

To be able to nuance and discuss the rather stereotypical images emerging from the conceptualisations of the ‘Net Generation’ above, the concept of Internet skills is introduced. These include several contiguous concepts – ‘Internet skills’ (Hargittai, 2005; Potosky, 2007) “digital skills” (van Dijk & Hacker, 2003), “Internet literacy” (Livingstone, Bober & Helsper, 2005) and “digital literacy” (Erstad; Eshet-Alkali & Amichai-Hamburger, 2004). Later the choice of the concept ‘Internet skills’ is explained, but first a brief review is provided to explain how these concepts are defined in the literature.

Digital skills

van Dijk and Hacker (2003) propose three different levels of digital skills; instrumental skills, informational skills and strategic skills. The instrumental skills refer to being able to operate hardware and software. Informational skills refer to a slightly more advanced type of Internet use, such as being able to search, select, process, and apply information using the hardware and software. The strategic skills, being part of highest skill level, refer to individuals being able to use the found information to improve one’s own social position in society (van Dijk & Hacker, 2003).

Internet literacy

Livingstone, Bober and Helsper (2005) provide a similar way of thinking about Internet literacy. They emphasize three skill levels for Internet literacy. These include knowing how to access the Internet, being able to understand and/or evaluate information and opportunities online and being able to create content by being an active producer and receiver of online content (Livingstone et. al. 2005). Some attempts have been made to measure what people can or can’t do on the Internet (Potosky, 2007; Hargittai, 2005). Usually these measurements are referred to as Internet skills. Potosky (2007) constructed an Internet knowledge measure (iKnow) containing questions about different Internet knowledge items. These included being able to construct a webpage, update virus programmes, designing a background and changing preferences on the computer.

Digital literacy

The concept ‘digital literacy’ is a wider concept that includes not only Internet skills (what people can or can’t do with the Internet). According to Erstad ‘digital literacy’ contains skills, knowledge and attitudes in using digital media to be able to master challenges in the learning society (Erstad, 2005). By this Erstad argues that digital literacy relates both to technological skills, how to operate the technology per se and to possessing skills regarding technology use to achieve personal or collective goals. The latter can also be compared to van Dijk and Hackers concept of strategic skills (2003).

It is not simple to define what is meant by the broader concept of ‘digital literacy’ and it is even harder to find a good way to measure it.

Measuring Internet skills and self-efficacy

As mentioned before, one way is to measure the ‘Internet skills’, another way is to measure self-efficacy by asking people how confident they are in using digital media. The individual’s belief in her own ability to perform, or self-efficacy (Bandura, 1997) is equally important for the use of Internet. LaRose, Mastro and Eastin (2001) found that positive outcome expectations, Internet self-efficacy, and perceived Internet addiction were directly related to Internet usage. Negative outcome expectations, self-disparagement, and self-slighting were negatively related to Internet use. Torkzadeh et. al. (2002, 2006) also found that an individual’s belief in her ability to perform, also affects her performance. Torkzadeh and van Dyke (2002) followed 189 students before and after computer training. They found that both male and female respondents benefited from training and improved their self-efficacy scores for all factors.

In this article the focus will be on Internet skills and self-efficacy in order to explore the relation to the concept of the techno-savvy ‘Net generation’. A lot of the concepts of ‘Net generation’ are about the Internet use and this paper deals with Internet use as well.

Method

This study is based on data collected in an annual Swedish national survey about Swedish peoples’ Internet use.  It is a component of the international World Internet Project (www.worldinternetproject.net). The survey was conducted between February and April 2008. A representative random sample of 2,266 people from around Sweden from the age 12 years old answered a wide range of questions about their Internet use. Two different surveys were conducted, one with respondents 16 years and older and one with young people from 12 to 16 years old. The main reasons for conducting two different surveys were that people younger than 16 needed their parents’ permission to participate, hence the methods performing the telephone interviews were a little bit different for the two groups. Since we had to speak with parents to respondents younger than 16 years old, we asked the parents a few questions about the access to the Internet in their home, about their own Internet use and about their children’s Internet use. We also asked respondents older than 16 if they have children. For the ones that had children, we asked what their children mostly do when using the Internet and how often their children used the Internet. Most of the results in this article are based on respondents from 12-30 years old. In Table 1 we can see the sample sizes for four age groups which 12-30 year olds were divided in.

Table 1: Sample sizes for different age groups

The group of 12-30 year olds are referred to as the ‘Net generation’. In an attempt to explore generational differences, the group of 12-30 year olds where compared to 32-50 year olds (N=672). Non-parametrical tests were used to analyse the generational differences, but also the effect on Internet skills and self-efficacy by age and gender.

In order to explore the stereotypical images of the techno-savvy ‘Net generation’ the following questions were used about Internet skills:

• Do you know how to use the following things on the Internet?  Send an email? Attach documents to your email? Download music? Make a voice-call online? Set up a server?

The question about self-efficacy was:

• How competent are you when it comes to using the computer? Not competent at all, not that competent, fairly competent or very competent?

The five Internet related items regarding Internet skills where then summarized into an index to represent the Internet skills scale. Low values on the scale indicated poor Internet skills, while high values indicated good skills. When it came to internet use, some of the questions asked were about using the Internet for communication (instant messaging, chat rooms, make voice calls and send emails), information (look up the meaning of a word, searching facts, search information to school related work) and entertainment (listening to /downloading music, playing games, watching /downloading videos, watching TV online and listening to online radio). The answers were measured through a six-grade scale (never; occasionally; sometimes per month; sometimes per week; once a day; several times per day). In order to measure regular activity, the weekly and daily users were coded as 1 and occasional users and non-users were coded as 0. All the activities belonging to the different themes such as communication, information, and entertainment were made into indexes on the same theme. Further an index on web 2.0 activities was conducted based on two questions, “Do you have a weblog?” and “Are you a member of a social networking site online?” This index had only three values, 0, 1, 2. The lowest value (0) indicated non-activity in web 2.0 related activities while the highest value (2), indicated high-engagement in web 2.0 related activities since both weblogs and social networking sites were used.

Results

The results in this paper focus on what 12-30 year olds do online and their knowledge when it comes to using the Internet. This included how they perceived their competence in using computers. The aim was to analyse the data from a Swedish national representative survey regarding peoples’ Internet use and compare the results to the stereotypical images of techno-savvy ‘net geners’, in order to nuance the images. Interpreting the conceptions of ‘Net generation’ within the dataset used in this article, the following stereotypical images were questioned:

• Are all ‘net geners’ Internet users?
• Do all ‘net geners’ use the Internet in a similar way?
• Are there any generational differences between the ‘Net Generation’ and an older generation when it comes to Internet behaviour?
• Are the ‘net geners’ relying more on the Internet and abandoning traditional media?
• Do ‘net geners’ use the Internet from various places?
• Is the ‘Net generation’ techno-savvy?
• Is the ‘Net generation’ also the ‘MySpace generation’?

Are all ‘net geners’ Internet users?

The basic assumption for the stereotypical images of ‘net geners’ is that they are Internet users (Livingstone & Helsper, 2007; Lenhart, 2005). In Sweden, the proportion of non-users 12-30 years old is 2.5 percent (n=18). 3.5 percent don’t have Internet access at home (n=25), 2.7 percent (n=12) don’t have access in school and 19.6 percent (n=42) don’t have access at work. Overall only 1.5 percent (n=11) lack access at home, in school or at work (depending on the occupation). Among Internet users there are few low users. Among those who have Internet access at home there are 7 percent (n=47) low users, meaning they use the internet only a few times per month or even less. 24 percent (n=102) of the students and 16 percent (n=27) of the working people are low users. However, when taking all three places for Internet use into consideration, the non-users and low users make up for 8 percent altogether (n=58). When comparing this to Livingstone and Helsper’s (2007) study in the UK, the low-users in the UK correspond to 13 percent of the children aged 9-19. However it is also shown that Internet use increases with age and that might be the explanation to the lower proportion of occasional users in Sweden, in comparison to the UK (the youngest ones in the Swedish sample are 12 years old). In accordance to other studies (Livingstone & Helsper, 2007; Lenhart, 2005) the proportion of non-users is about 3 percent.

A lack of interest seems to be the main reason not to use the Internet. However, many respondents, when asked about their lack of usage, have answered ‘don’t know’. It is hard to say if there might be some other reasons for non-use. The ‘no interest’ answer might have been interpreted as a socially undesirable answer and the ‘don’t now’ answer was therefore chosen. Facer and Furlong (2001) identified a group of young people that constructed their own values regarding technology/computer use that diverges from the dominant image of the ‘Cyberkid’. These children argued that the computers were not important for them in their daily activities. Some argued that computer use is not healthy, that they rather be outside engaging in physical activities. However this construction was not unproblematic. Some of the children were concerned that they should not have felt the way they did about computer use and some of them expressed the idea that their own children won’t have to face the digital inequalities because they are going to be born into the digital society (Facer & Furlong, 2001).

Table 2: Non-users answers regarding the reasons to not use the internet (16-30 year olds)

Do all ‘net geners’ use the Internet in a similar way?

According to Tapscott (2009) young people aged 11-31 are the ‘Net generation’. That statement suggests that all 11-31 year olds are using the Internet in a similar way because they belong to the same generation. In an attempt to explore this stereotypical image of the ‘Net generation,’ the Internet use for communication, information and entertainment were compared between four age groups (12-16; 17-20; 21-25; & 26-30 year olds). The younger age groups (12-16 and 17-20 year olds) are frequent users of instant messaging (61% – 72% daily users). However the older age groups (21-30 year olds) are more active when it comes to using email (26% of 12-16 year olds and 47% of 17-20 year olds are daily users compared to 74% of 21-25 year olds; 77% of 26-30 year olds are daily users). Communicating through chat rooms and making voice-calls is rather unusual for all age groups (Chat room ≥ 53% non-users and voice-calls ≥ 70% non-users). When it comes to using the Internet for information searching it seems that using the Internet for school related work increases by age (12-16 year olds = 6% daily users; 17-20 year olds =14%), when examining young people that attend school. The entertainment oriented Internet use also differs in some respects between age groups. The youngest (12-16 year olds) are the most frequent game players (26% daily users), 17-20 year olds are the most frequent users when it comes to downloading music and listening to music (32% daily users) while the older age groups 21-25 and 26-30 are the most frequent listeners to online radio (21-25 year olds = 29% daily or weekly users; 26-30 year olds = 19% daily or weekly users).

Are there any generational differences between the ‘Net generation’ and an older generation when it comes to Internet behaviour?

As stated before,  ‘net geners’ are expected to have a different relationship with information and communication technology in comparison to older generations (Tapscott, 1998; Prensky, 2001). To be able to say something more detailed about these perceived differences, non-parametric Mann-Whitney tests were performed.  The activities were categorized by communication, information and entertainment. Using these themes, indexes were constructed.  The communication-index consisted of activities such as instant messaging, chat rooms, voice calls and email. The information index was about searching for facts and looking up a meaning of a word, and finally the activities regarding the entertainment online such as listening to music and watching TV online were summarized into an entertainment index. Further, an index of web 2.0 activities was also conducted. These included the use of weblogs and social networking sites online. Each activity was coded as 0 for not using the activity at all or using it occasionally and 1 for using it regularly which is weekly or daily. The activities regarding web 2.0 were dummy variables from the beginning (0=No; 1=Yes) and should be interpreted as use/non-use. The values in each index could vary between 0 for not using any of the activities regularly to the maximum amount of activities that were included in the index. The ‘Net generation’, here in accordance to Tapscott defined as 12-30 year olds, was compared to an older generation, which include both ‘baby boomers’ and ‘gen Xers’ (32-50 year olds). The two groups were compared regarding the regular use of communication, information and entertainment online.

The results show that the communication activities vary between the two generations (Z= -13.382) as well as within the ‘Net generation’ (Z=-2.338) though the differences within the ‘Net generation’ are not as distinct as between the two generations. The differences within the ‘Net generation’ are significant on a 95% confidence level while the differences between 12-30 year olds and 32-50 year olds are significant on a 99% confidence level. The reason for this could be explained by the high adoption of email in all age groups, while instant messaging and chat rooms usages were mostly used among the younger people. However, instant messaging also varies within the ‘Net generation’ because the younger group (12-20 year olds) is using it to a higher extent than the older group (21-30 year olds). The information- and entertainment-activities don’t seem to be specific for the ‘Net generation’ because the differences within the ‘Net generation’ are considerable as well as between the generations (see table 3). Some of the activities in the ‘entertainment index’, like games for example, were mostly used among the youngest (12-16 year olds) and some of the activities such as watching TV online were hardly ever used, which could explain the variation within the ‘Net generation’. The web 2.0 activities described here are defined as using weblogs and social networking sites, by the ‘Net generation’ in a higher extent than the comparing age group (32-50 year olds) (Sig=0.209 within ‘Net generation’).

Table 3: Comparisons in regular use of Internet activities between the ‘Net Generation’ and an older     generation (32-50 year olds) as well as within the ‘Net Generation’

Are the ‘net geners’ relying more on the Internet and abandoning traditional media?

Table 4 shows the average time per week spent using the Internet, watching television, listening to music and radio (not through the Internet) and reading newspapers and magazines. According to the stereotypical images of ‘Net generation’, young people are turning to Internet for everything, meaning that they are abandoning more traditional media. The time 17-30 year olds were spending with Internet in an average week was perceptually higher than the time they spent consuming traditional media. They spent almost twice as much time using the Internet as watching TV. On the other hand, the Internet is not a medium specifically limited to one age group. Since even the oldest in this analysis (36-45 year olds) are spending the most hours using the Internet when compared to other media. The youngest age group, 12-16 year olds, was spending less than 15 hours per week with the Internet which is 2 to 8 hours less than the other age groups. According to Tapscott (2009), the youngest ones should be immersed with technology and using the Internet in a much greater extent than the previous generations. This doesn’t seem to be the case for the 12-16 year olds. They are also reading books and magazines, watching television and listening to music approximately the same amount of time as other age groups, which means that they are not abandoning traditional media.

Table 4: Average time per week spent with different media

The majority of 12-30 year olds are daily users (12-16 year olds =78%; 17-20 year olds =84%; 21-25 year olds =85%; 26-30 year olds = 81%) but the time spent online varies within age groups. 12-30 year olds are using the Internet approximately 3 hours daily at home. Between 29 and 41 percent of 12-30 year olds are spending one hour or less with the Internet daily in their homes (See Table 5). The heavy Internet users (those spending five hours or more online daily in their homes) are generally from the 17-20 and 21-25 year olds.

Table 5: Time per week spent online

Do ‘net geners’ use the Internet from various places?

Using the Internet at other places than the home, such as relatives or friends houses, and public places, such as libraries and internet cafés, is not very common and the time spent online in these places is very low. Average time spent with Internet at friends’ and relatives’ houses is up to 30 minutes per week (for 12-16 year olds). At public places the weekly Internet use is almost nonexistent. 12-16 year olds and 21-25 year olds spend approximately 3 minutes per week using the Internet at public places. 26-30 year olds spend 4 minutes and 17-20 year olds spend approximately 12 minutes per week online at public places. In accordance to other studies, the home and school are the primary places they access the Internet (Hasebrink, Livingstone & Haddon, 2007).

When it comes to using the Internet in school we could only compare the two youngest age groups 12-16 and 17-20 year olds. The proportions of students in the older age groups were too small to be used in a statistical analysis. The average time spent online in school is 68 minutes per week for 12-16 year olds and 253 minutes or approximately 4 hours per week for 17-20 year olds. The reason is that a much larger proportion of 17-20 year old students are using the Internet daily (45%) in comparison to the 12-16 year olds (7%). One explanation could be that 93 percent of 12-16 year olds who have Internet access in school say that there are rules about what they can and can’t do online when they are in school and 61 percent of the same cohort report that they are not allowed to use the Internet during breaks. However the proportion of non-users are small (12-16=9%; 17-20=4%), including those who do not have access to the Internet in school. Even though the proportion of non-users is small, the school doesn’t seem to be the arena for 12-16 year olds to take up opportunities online. It doesn’t seem to be an opportunity for low Internet users at home to be using the Internet more in school. The relationship between time spent online at home and time spent online in school is positive both for 12-16 year olds (R=0,321**) and 17-20 year olds (R=0,233**). The more time they spend online in their homes, the more time they spend online in school. This is similar to Facer and Furlongs (2001) findings about those who have computer access at home; they report these individuals are more likely to take opportunities to use computers in other places such as the school or friends’ houses.

Is the ‘Net Generation’ techno-savvy?

In order to explore the extent of how techno-savvy the ‘Net generation’ is in regards to their usage, the aspect of self-efficacy on computer use and the aspect of Internet skills were used. For self-efficacy in computer use the question, “How competent are you when it comes to using the computer?” was examined. The majority saw themselves as fairly or very competent when it comes to using the computer (12-16 year olds = 88%; 17-25 year olds = 86%; 26-30 year olds = 83 %). Few said that they were not competent at all (1% -2%). But a rather large proportion thought that their competence in using computers was not that good (11% – 17%). When looking at the low- and non-users separately, we could see that the proportions of those perceiving their competence as low is higher comparing to the total sample (12-30 year olds). 12.5 percent of the low- and non users said that they are not competent at all when it comes to using computers.

Table 6: Self-efficacy among non-users and low-users (12-30 year olds)

In previous studies it is shown that Internet skills and self-efficacy vary both by gender and age (Livingstone et. al. 2005). A Kruskal-Wallis test was performed both on Internet skills and self-efficacy. The age was tested for four different age groups (12-20; 21-30; 32-40; 41-50). The results show that gender (Chi2=131.055) and age (Chi2=37.012) are both significant on 99 % confidence level for the differences in internet skills as well as in self-efficacy (gender Chi2=53.863 and age Chi2=57.786). However, within the ‘Net generation’, the differences are not so big (for internet skills within ‘Net-generation’ sig=0.057 and self-efficacy sig=0.249), which means that the age could not explain the variation in Internet skills and self-efficacy within the group of 12-30 year olds. The youngest in this group, 12-16 year olds, stand out because there was no gender differences found concerning self-efficacy or Internet skills. For the 17-30 year olds the self-efficacy tends to decrease for females (R=-0,269**). 12-16 year olds stand out for one more reason. When examining the Internet skills it is shown that they score lowest on the Internet skills-scale containing five Internet use items (email, attach documents to email, download music, make voice-calls and set up a server). The Internet skills seem to increase by age (R=0,143**) within the group 12-30 year olds. 13 percent of 12-16 year olds scored 1 or lower and only 2 percent of 17-30 year olds scored 1 or lower on Internet skills. This is similar to the findings in a study by Sherry and Fielden (2005) where they found that the Millennial cohort is not as competent with computers as they are confident. The basic Internet skill seems to be using the email since almost all of the respondents scoring 1 answered that this is the one thing they know how to use. There were no statistical significant differences found when it comes to socioeconomic factors. It would have been expected to find differences among young people who are still living at home, however the socioeconomic differences in Sweden might be smaller comparing to for example the UK or the USA where other statistical surveys on young people’s Internet use were performed (UK Children Go Online, PEW Internet and American life project). The notion of ‘Net generation’ doesn’t focus on social differences among young people, though it is shown in several studies, as in this, that gender and age have impact on the confidence in using computers and the Internet (Lee, 2008, Torkzadeh et. al. 2006, Livingstone et. al.2007).

Is the ‘Net generation’ also the ‘MySpace generation’?

Another stereotypical statement or image is that the ‘Net generation’ also is the ‘MySpace generation’ (Rosen, 2007). As shown before the web 2.0 activities such as use of weblogs and communities seem to characterize the so-called ‘Net generation’. In Figure 1 we can see the proportion of community users and weblog users among different age groups. As pointed out before, the use of social-networking sites and weblogs decreases with age. However, it is important to notice that writing weblogs isn’t that usual (11-17% users) even among the ‘net geners’ and when it comes to the social networking sites there are a lot of non-users in the younger age groups (33-50% non users) even though the proportions of users are significantly higher comparing to older age groups. This would mean that even though the image of the ‘net geners’ as web 2.0 users appears to be true when comparing to an older generation, there still are a lot of non-users. In fact, when it comes to weblogs there are more non-users. This, I would argue, is a way of exaggerating the proportion of use in social networking sites and weblogs, and ascribing the ‘Net generation’ such characteristic.

Figure 1: Use of social networking sites and weblogs (12-50 year olds)

Conclusion

Using a representative study about Swedish people’s Internet behaviour some of the stereotypes of ‘Net generation’ were explored by framing them as questions and analysing each question through the data. The main conclusions drawn from the results presented are that it is too simplified to talk about a ‘Net generation’. This article implies that several of the stereotypical images about the ‘Net generation’ can be nuanced. In the sense of using the Internet it could be argued that a ‘Net generation’ exists since almost all of the 12-30 year olds are using the Internet. However, the Internet adoption is generally high in Sweden and the majority of non-users are older than 60 years. It is therefore not enough to state that there is a ‘Net generation’ just because the age group defined as the ‘Net generation’ is using the Internet. There is an assumption about the similarity of Internet use as unifying factor for the ‘net geners’. In accordance to previous research findings (Livingstone et. al., 2005, 2007) it is found that Internet usage differs between age groups. Livingstone et. al. (2005, 2007) has shown that older children spend more time online and become more skilled at using the Internet. They also show that the youngest age group (12-16 year olds) do not spend as much time with the Internet as their older cohorts in the ‘Net generation’. Gender differences were also found in accordance to previous studies (Livingstone et. al., 2007). This means that social factors such as age and gender can’t be excluded from the discourse about young people’s Internet use. They are important for explanation in variance of young people’s Internet use.

Another important issue emerges in relation to the fact that some young people perceive their competence in using computers or technology as low. An uncritical assumption is that all ‘net geners’ are equally competent in using the information and communication technologies. Although the vast majority of ‘net geners’ are Internet users and think of themselves as fairly or very competent in using computers, it doesn’t mean that they all use the Internet in the same way and are equally competent. This was found to be the case for the youngest age group (12-16 year olds) in comparison with older cohorts. 12-16 year olds scored rather high on self-efficacy-measure and not so high on Internet skills. The most likely explanation is that the Internet skills-scale did not succeed to measure the youngest age group’s skills (it is possible they would have scored higher on the Internet skills if they were asked about activities they frequently engage in). This finding questions the stereotypical image of ‘techno-savvy’ ‘net geners’ because it could be interpreted that the youngest ones do not necessarily know more when it comes to using the Internet. It could be that they just know different things. It is also interesting that no gender differences were found among 12-16 year olds concerning self-efficacy and Internet skills. Further research needs to be done in order to explore when and why men and women start to feel differently about their competence in using computers and the Internet.

When it comes to the generational differences for the Internet activities analysed in this paper it is shown that very few Internet activities can be ascribed to the ‘Net generation’. Only for web 2.0 activities a generational difference was found between the ‘Net generation’ (12-30 year olds) and the older generation (32-50 year olds), implying that the ‘Net generation’ could be characterized as a ‘MySpace generation’. However, writing weblogs is not that common even among the ‘net geners’ and the use of social networking sites is not as great as it could be expected, which means that such a characterisation would exaggerate the importance of web 2.0 related activities for the ‘net geners’. This is why it is important to explore and try to nuance the stereotypical images of ‘Net generation’ in an attempt to try to avoid ascribing certain qualities to the so-called ‘Net generation’.

The diversity of Internet use among ‘net geners’ on one hand and the consistency of self-efficacy in computer use on the other, indicates the complexity of the concept ‘techno-savvy’. Since the Internet skills were not exhaustively measured it is not possible to say how techno-savvy the ‘net geners’ really are. However, as mentioned before we can not exclude the ones who do not find themselves as competent computer users, and we can’t ignore the actual differences in Internet usage both when it comes to amount of time spent online and the usage patterns. This could result in many young people being left out of important and increasingly necessary educational opportunities to explore and become familiar with certain technologies in schools, especially if they do not have access at home. It is proposed that further analyses on measuring Internet skills are very important mainly for two different reasons; (1) in order to explore the stereotypical images and learn more about what people know when it comes to using the Internet and (2) to further explore who are the ones gaining advantage in the information society and who are those at risk of becoming excluded?

References

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Bennett, S., Maton, K., & Kervin, L., (2007). The ‘digital natives’ debate: A critical review of the evidence. British Journal of Educational Technology, 39(5), 775-786.

Buckingham, D. (2000) After the death of childhood. Growing up in the age of electronic media. USA: Malden: Blackwell Publishers Inc.

Cheong, P. H. (2008). The young and techless? Investigating internet use and problem-solving behaviours of young adults in Singapore. New Media Society, 10(5), 771-791.

Erstad, O. (2007). Conceiving digital literacies in schools – Norwegian experiences.        Paper presented at the 3rd International workshop on Digital Literacy, Crete, Greece.

Erstad, O. (2005). Digital kompetanse i skolen. University Press, Oslo, Norway.

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Hasebrink, U., Livingstone, S., & Haddon, L. (2008). Comparing children’s online opportunities and risks across Europe: Cross-national comparisons for EU Kids Online. Retrieved from http://www.lse.ac.uk/collections/EUKidsOnline/Reports/D3.2_ISBN.pdf

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LaRose, R., Mastro, D., & Eastin, M. S. (2002). Understanding Internet usage: A social-cognitive approach to uses and gratifications. Social Science Computer Review, 19(4), 395-413.

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Metzger, M., Flanagin, A. J., & Zwarun, L. (2003). College student Web use, perceptions of information credibility, and verification behavior. Computers and Education, 41(3), 271-290.

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Potosky, D., (2007). The Internet knowledge (iKnow) measure. Computers in Human Behavior, 23(6), 2760–2777.

Prensky, M. (2001). Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants On the Horizon. NCB University Press, 9(5), 1-6.

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Biographical statement

Sheila Zimic is a Ph. D. Student in Informatics at Mid Sweden University. Sheila is using the national representative study conducted by World Internet Institute in her research on young people’s Internet use. The World Internet Institute is an independent research institute, representing Sweden in the international World Internet Project since year 2000. Sheila is also a member of the CITIZYS research group. The focus of the research group is Information technology and Sustainable society.

Email: sheila.zimic@miun.se

References

Bandura, A. (1997). Self-efficacy: The exercise of control. Basingstoke: W. H. Freeman.

Bennett, S., Maton, K., & Kervin, L., (2007). The ‘digital natives’ debate: A critical review of the evidence. British Journal of Educational Technology, 39(5), 775-786.

Buckingham, D. (2000) After the death of childhood. Growing up in the age of electronic media. USA: Malden: Blackwell Publishers Inc.

Cheong, P. H. (2008). The young and techless? Investigating internet use and problem-solving behaviours of young adults in Singapore. New Media Society, 10(5), 771-791.

Erstad, O. (2007). Conceiving digital literacies in schools – Norwegian experiences.        Paper presented at the 3rd International workshop on Digital Literacy, Crete, Greece.

Erstad, O. (2005). Digital kompetanse i skolen. University Press, Oslo, Norway.

Eshet-Alkali, Y., Amichai-Hamburger, Y., (2004) Experiments in digital literacy. Cyber Psychology  & Behavior, 7(4), 421-429.

Facer, K., & Furlong, R. (2001). Beyond the myth of the ‘cyberkid’: Young people at the margins of the information revolution. Journal of Youth Studies, 4(4), 451–469.

Findahl, O. (2008). Svenskarna och Internet 2008. World        Internet Institute.Retrieved from http://www.wii.se/publicerat/rapporter/doc_download/6-svenskarna-och-internet-2008.html.

Hargittai, E., (2005). Survey measures of web-oriented digital literacy. Social Science Computer Review, 23(3), 371-379.

Hasebrink, U., Livingstone, S., & Haddon, L. (2008). Comparing children’s online opportunities and risks across Europe: Cross-national comparisons for EU Kids Online. Retrieved from http://www.lse.ac.uk/collections/EUKidsOnline/Reports/D3.2_ISBN.pdf

Howe, N., Strauss, B. (2000). Millennials rising: The next great generation. Vintage Books, New York, USA.

LaRose, R., Mastro, D., & Eastin, M. S. (2002). Understanding Internet usage: A social-cognitive approach to uses and gratifications. Social Science Computer Review, 19(4), 395-413.

Lee, L. (2008). The impact of young people’s Internet use on class boundaries and life trajectories. Sociology 42(1), 137–153.

Lenhart, A. (2005) Protecting Teens Online. Pew Internet and American Life Project. Washington, DC.

Livingstone, S. (2002) Young People and New Media: Childhood and the Changing Media Environment. London: SAGE.

Livingstone, S., Bober, M. and Helsper, E., (2005) Internet literacy among children and young people: findings from the UK Children Go Online project. Retrieved from http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/archive/00000397.

Livingstone, S., & Helsper, E. (2007). Gradations in digital inclusion: children, young people and the digital divide. New Media & Society, 9(4), 671–696.

Media Council (Medierådet). (2008) Ungar och medier. Fakta om barns och ungas användning och upplevelser av medier. Retrieved from http://www.medieradet.se/upload/Rapporter_pdf/Ungar_&_Medier_2008.pdf

Metzger, M., Flanagin, A. J., & Zwarun, L. (2003). College student Web use, perceptions of information credibility, and verification behavior. Computers and Education, 41(3), 271-290.

Nordicom- Sverige (2008) Internetbarometer 2007. Retrieved from: http://www.nordicom.gu.se/common/publ_pdf/266_internetbarometer_2007.pdf.

Potosky, D., (2007). The Internet knowledge (iKnow) measure. Computers in Human Behavior, 23(6), 2760–2777.

Prensky, M. (2001). Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants On the Horizon. NCB University Press, 9(5), 1-6.

Rosen, L. D. (2007). Me, MySpace, and I. Parenting the Net Generation. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

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Tapscott, D. (2009). Grown up Digital: How the net generation is changing your world. McGraw- Hill Companies, New York, USA.

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Abstract

It is often argued that young people growing up in the presence of the Internet and new media are ‘techno savvy’. They are often distinguished as a new generation because of their relationship with new media, which is assumed to be considerably different, in comparison, to older generations. This new generation has also been characterized as the ‘Net generation’ (Tapscott, 1998). However the stereotypical images of ‘net geners’—being technologically savvy—have rarely been questioned. This article aims at nuancing these images with the objective of exploring the stereotypical images, rather than proving if the images are true or false. By using a statistical representative study of Swedish people’s Internet behaviour and linking the results to an analytical frame of Internet skills, the question, “what is it young people know when it comes to the Internet use and how is it related to the stereotypical image of the ´Net generation’?” is explored. The main findings suggest that various Internet activities differ by age and few activities could be ascribed solely to the so-called ‘Net generation’.

Keywords:

Net generation, stereotypical images, Internet skills, self-efficacy, techno-savvy

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Biographical statement

Gurmit Singh, M.Ed, is the Professional Development and Education
Programmes Coordinator at the International AIDS Society, Geneva,
Switzerland. His research on online mentoring for scientific writing
won the Best Paper Award at the IADIS e-learning conference 2009.

Email: Gurmit.sidhu@gmail.com

References

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Biographical statement

Tanner Higgin is a Ph.D. candidate at the University of California,
Riverside. His research focuses on race, gender, and power in digital media
and culture. He has published an article on race and videogames in Games and Culture and also has chapters in Joystick Soldiers: The Politics of Play in Military Video Games and The Meaning and Culture of Grand Theft Auto.

For more information visit his blog: http://www.tannerhiggin.com.

Abstract

Empirical evidence underlines the importance of ICT-based innovations in education for at least two reasons: They prepare for a future workplace in a knowledge society increasingly dependent on ICT and furthermore, they support student-centred learning processes. However, adoption of ICT in educational organizations in general as well as of specific ICT-based innovations varies broadly across nations as there are many different influencing factors with strong interdependencies. In order to better understand the dynamics of innovations in education, in this article we expose to discussion an integrative model based on a combination of models of individual and organizational adoption processes and their interplay with a socio-economic environment. The authors propose this concept of an “educational innovation system” to analyse differences in the diffusion of ICT-based innovations across countries and to better understand educational policies and their impact on classroom practice.

Keywords:

Education policy, innovation research, educational technology

Biographical statement

Andreas Breiter is Professor in Information Management and Educational Technologies in the Department of Mathematics and Computer Science at the University of Bremen, Germany. He has published widely on educational technologies as socio-technical systems and the role of ICT in educational reform.

Email: abreiter@ifib.de

Castulus Kolo holds the chair in Media Management at the Macromedia University of Applied Sciences in Munich, Germany. His research is focused on the dynamics of media innovations in households and organizations, their preconditions as well as their effects. Besides his academic activities he is consultant to public and private institutions.

Email: ck@future-directions.com

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Biographical statement

Andreas Breiter is Professor in Information Management and Educational Technologies in the Department of Mathematics and Computer Science at the University of Bremen, Germany. He has published widely on educational technologies as socio-technical systems and the role of ICT in educational reform.

Email: abreiter@ifib.de

Castulus Kolo holds the chair in Media Management at the Macromedia University of Applied Sciences in Munich, Germany. His research is focused on the dynamics of media innovations in households and organizations, their preconditions as well as their effects. Besides his academic activities he is consultant to public and private institutions.

Email: ck@future-directions.com