surveillance and the digital archive

in a conversation / presentation today in college regarding the construction of a free source digital archive of random unused footage from a variety of sources, the problems i had were many. it seemed like it emerged from the rather archaic idea that everything can be fully described by words through the act of naming, i.e. - a comprehensive tagging system. like an image, object, event can be fully and completely realized through comprehensively describing it in minute detail in words. and for what purpose? but we shall get to that later. and why should one contribute? in a time when server space is easily available for me to broadcast myself to whoever may choose to find me why do i subject myself and my subjects to a tagging system.

did not the problematic of the act of naming and thus defining for persecution or pleasure make orientals all of us? this leftover of the outmoded and unfashionable urge of the enlightenment project was disturbing, the new technology or the leftspeak freeware spiel notwithstanding.

but that might not be the only difficulty. what can one say when the act of indexing allows and enables the complete destruction, not merely a deconstruction, of a subject’s self by juxtaposing superficial similarities through a process of cross indexing that negates broader contextual differences.

“and for what purpose?” i asked earlier. is information knowledge? a glut of images culled from a variety of sources flooding the net clubbed together by a few words. does this constitute an archive? if all archives have an area of interest, what is the interest of this one? what are its politics besides its freeware argument which conflates private space with private property, and in turn misunderstands both?

to say that if something is on record in a digital format somewhere in the world it should be immediately part of the public domain is simplistic in my understanding of things. what happens when what’s on camera is invasive and something that the subject is uncomfortable to share with the world? does the act of wielding a camera immediately entitle you to the right to broadcast what happens in a particular relationship across the world? to say that if something is done in public space and is recorded it can be broadcast is surveillance of the most frightening kind. and if these were to be locatable on a map it can form a tool of oppression and repression even more easily than it can be something that can serve to free.

there is a freedom in darkness, in hidden corners. a place where what is considered illegitimate survives and thrives. these are necessary spaces that can only survive out of the mega-information networks of such new media initiatives. those who believe in the redemptive power of an all revealing light can only be those who already occupy a priviledged position in society and therefore are not prone to be attacked.

in other words, i think the project misunderstands not merely the notion of privacy, but that of the role of technology as a liberator, that of the gaze and accessibility, that of language and freedom. the project misunderstands and misuses power.