The absence of location & a merge of presence

Absence. The state of being away from a place or a person. The non-existence or lack of.

If we take 'programming' as a technological entity, I feel that in essence we are programming our absence of location and are causing, and have indeed caused a merge of presence.

The likes of email, the mobile phone and the Internet obviously allow us to be present without being predominantly locative to the source. We are able to access services, communicate and interact with anyone or anything around the world. I find this interesting, there is always the sense of thinking, 'where would be be without mobile devices'; because of our reliance of them, well the answer is, '...anywhere we want!' (surely?).

Looking at technology itself as location, the launch of the iphone and of course other similar mobile-browser technologies has caused an absence, and lack of the usual standardized platforms (such as a PC browser) - which has caused the internet to become portable. We do not need to be present at a physical workstation, instead the portal to the web is mobile.

GPS and its integration of mobile means that we don't actually need to know where we are either- the technology finds us! Take Sat Nav's, is there an element of control here? and an element of reliance almost?

This stuff has become old news, but what is interesting is the rise in need to merge the gap between mobile and a standard browser portal. Sites such as http://mologogo.com/ and http://bliin.com/ rely on an internet technology to communicate on the move, but however they also create a real-time, social, community online that relies on mobility...

General view on "We are programming our absence"

In the sense the quote "we are programming our own absence" relates to one of the points which technology and computers are slowly taking over jobs. This being said a lot of jobs are now being replaced by machinery, such as in factories when repetitive work is needed. Maybe the reason being this was decided was mainly to cut down on employment costs but also one could argue that replacing humans for machinery would help keep a high and consistent quality to products.

Paul Virilo's quote could also be related to all forms of communication regarding how technology is and how it will carry on stretching the boundaries of our already absence in civilisation. There are hundreds of different forms of communication which requires some form of technology but in one sense they all have a similar effect of programming our absence.

For example: Webcams and microphones would replace the need for meeting person to person but instead give the users a visual and voice enabled communication which people can use to contact their friends/family even if they're half way across the world so already there is an absence in human interaction. Also with the big craze of a certain website network called "facebook" which allows users to search other members, leave messages, play games, etc. With the network having such a large list of different functions which lets users interact with each other without having to be there in person leaves little possibilities of human interaction.

At a business level technology is showing signs of technology taking, like smaller companies have opted to rather have all their products be displayed on their website rather than opening a store. For a consumer the advantages of being able to purchase a product at any given time without the inconvenience of store opening/closing times which also relates to how technology is programming our absence.

TBC..