<nettime> The Church of Internet Salvation

[Morlock Elloi <morlockelloi@gmail.com>]

There was an event at the Internet Archive earlier this year: "John 
Perry Barlow Symposium". The stage was streamed, the whole thing is 
available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oaci9vlg_Sc .
TL;DR: Barlow enabled Snowden; the Internet is as revolutionary as LSD 
(a lot); it's not about information but about experience.
---

The event was held at the Internet Archive auditorium, which looks a lot 
like a church ... the building used to be the Christian Science church;
The side benches are occupied by about hundred half-life-size statues. 
The small people enhance the creepy scenery ( 
https://s3-media4.fl.yelpcdn.com/bphoto/umWznynp6-GHqGJtYyuM9g/o.jpg , 
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c0/The_main_hall_at_Internet_Archive_%282013%29.jpg 
) and evoke so many associations that I'll abstain from any. Maybe 
that's the intent, the association overload.
The rest of the benches were full or real people, which did a lot of 
hugging among themselves;
Cory Doctorow was a perfect MC with a 3.5-hour uninterrupted smile.

E. Snowden gave the usual talk, with a twist around redefining meaning 
of "national security" meme.
During E. Snowden talk women cried (at least the three observed.) His 
sermon style of talking was a perfect match for the venue and the audience.
The talking head from the Freedom of the Press Foundation [which was 
founded by J Assange and JP Barlow for the principal purpose of funding 
Wikileaks, and which cut off funding channel to Wikileaks few months 
earlier, the same Wikileaks that saved E. Snowden's ass and ushered him 
to Moscow] brazenly lied about 2013 E. Snowden events, implying that FPF 
was somehow involved in E. Snowden's escape, and declared that P. Barlow 
enabled E. Snowden.
---

The fascinating part was the transformation of technological deployment 
into consistent mythology. Everything is perfectly explained: how 
Internet came to be (because of freedom and such), with heroes, 
villains, officials, priests, unmentionables and saints.
Can't wait for the Islam-like version.

.



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