In his article, Debord talks about the idea of a “constructed situation” and explains what is necessary to to purposefully orchestrate interactions between people, places and events. Those who intentionally express experimental awareness are called presituationists, and are opposites to the passive spectators who are “forced into action” simply by unintentionally reacting to the environment that the directors have created for them. In these instances, the presituationists are acting as the butlers/textual computers that McCullough describes, which “anticipate some of our needs before we do, and must carry out some of our business without our needing to know about it…” Debord however, wants us to be aware of what is necessary for technological advancement and what is catering to playful tendencies. I found it funny that both Debord and McCullough mentioned refrigerators in their texts. Debord writes that “We obviously have no intent in encouraging the continuous artistic renovation of refrigerator designs,” but that is exactly what we are seeing today. Not only are the layouts of fridges changing to become more stylish (and arguably functional), but they are now fitted with ice and water dispensers, digital temperature and humidity gages, and interactive touch screens which allow us to watch a cooking show or read a recipe right from the refrigerator screen. We no longer see the fridge as a “cold, dark places to store your food” as McCullough describes it. Now, even it can bring about some ridiculous delight. In the “Neo-Jetson” “try it and see” age of rapidly advancing technology, we are now seeing just how far we can push technology into as many things as possible, whether or not they should be there.
10.09.2014