Virtual Broadcasting

[Original German Blog-Post]

“What men share with all other forms of animal life was not considered to be human.”

“Action, the only activity that goes on directly between men without the intermediary of things or matter, corresponds to the human condition of plurality … this plurality is specifically the condition — not only the conditio sine qua non, but the conditio per quam — of all political life.”

“The distinctive trait of the household sphere was that in it men [sic] lived together because the were driven by their wants and needs.”

“Force and violence are justified in this [oiconomic] sphere because they are the only means to master necessity.”

“Society always demands that its members act as though they were members of one enormous family which has only one opinion and one interest”

Hannah Arendt, ‘The Human Condition’

The body – our Conditio Humana – ties us to the earth and sets natural boundaries to our longing for freedom. This common perception leads Hannah Arendt to the central thoughts of her philosophy of the ‘Human Condition’. In opposition to that is our ability to act, at least from time to time, to step outside the bodily confinement, to differentiate us as person, and jointly with others form the Polis, the public.

In this Aristotelian picture, labour, economy, lie in contrast to that, completely within the realm of the private-the Oikos. In modern societies, a restriction of work and production to the private household is no longer possible; the public is mixed with the private- a publication of the economy, and thus a privatisation of the public takes place -with grave consequences:
By this socialisation which was called “rise of the social” by Hannah Arendt, the freedom which had been integral to the public space is subordinated under the animalic satisfaction of economic needs. In an oikonomised Polis it is hardly possible, to set immaterial goals and to follow values outside the economy.
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The Internet has been often called a modern Agora – also the term Forum is used in the Net with a purpose. Indeed the Internet seemed to form the perfect public space in which a liberal society could unfold perfectly.

Economic enterprises like Google, Facebook, Twitter, etc. make an elementary part of today’s Internet infrastructure. To stay in Hannah Arendt’s metaphor -an inleakage of economy into the political sphere.

One example shall make clear the very tangible consequences of this – in my opinion necessary and hardly avoidable development

The ‘Collateral Murder’ video which Wikileaks had published had been known to the Washington Post for a longer time without being published. When Wikileaks at last put the Video on Youtube, it was removed at once- likely after invention of the US government. Only international pressure and the illustriousness of Wikileaks made Google restoring the Video online.

Here we see how basically the freedom of the press is touched by this topic. What use is in independent journalism when the publication does not reach out to anyone anymore because (private run) enterprises that have monopolistic control on access or even execute censorship? And not out of evilness but for economic reason.
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A Website not indexed by Google does de facto not exist; a book not offered by Amazon may just as well be pulped right away; music that is not listed on i-tunes will hardly be listened to. It is high time that we as the society become active again, take initiative, raise our voice. And not by trying to keep everything in the old tracks by regulations and laws (which is effectless anyway). No, it is thus important to take an active role and not just to react.

For decades there was no doubt that media are part of the Polis and not of the Oikos. For media as public there are minimum requirements

• Non-discriminatory access (all information is equally available for all users)
• Net neutrality (every publisher has the same right of distribution of their content)
• Plurality (of choice)
• Societal influence (transparent representation of ethic and cultural values)

In Western European and especially Federal German media tradition since WWII this becomes particularly visible with the broadcasting laws. Out of these rules of democratic/political media culture the large public service broadcasting institutions were shaped which took an important position in the public life of the European societies.

As the Internet does not just substitute broadcasting (then to adopt the existing regulations more or less unchanged would then be an easy task) but lead far beyond this classic media concept by displacing classic media in their relevance the influence of the classic media on our society fades away.

Therefore we need a discussion on ‘Virtual Broadcasting’, on public or public-law Internet.

Thereto we want to invite to virtueller-rundfunk.de and hope for active participation!