The spectacle 2.0 : reading Debord in the context of digital capitalism

The Spectacle 2.0 recasts Debord's theory of spectacle within the frame of 21st century digital capitalism. It offers a reassessment of Debords original notion of Spectacle from the late 1960s, of its posterior revisitation in the 1990s, and it presents a reinterpretation of the concept within the scenario of contemporary informational capitalism and more specifically of digital and media labour. It is argued that the Spectacle 2.0 form operates as the interactive network that links through one singular (but contradictory) language and various imaginaries, uniting diverse productive contexts such as logistics, finance, new media and urbanism. Spectacle 2.0 thus colonizes most spheres of social life by processes of commodification, exploitation and reification. Diverse contributors consider the topic within the books two main sections: Part I conceptualizes and historicizes the Spectacle in the context of informational capitalism; contributions in Part II offer empirical cases that historicise the Spectacle in relation to the present (and recent past) showing how a Spectacle 2.0 approach can illuminate and deconstruct specific aspects of contemporary social reality. All contributions included in this book rework the category of the Spectacle to present a stimulating compendium of theoretical critical literature in the fields of media and labour studies. In the era of the gig-economy, highly mediated content and President Trump, Debords concept is arguably more relevant than ever. Chapter 1. Preface: Guy Debord, Donald Trump, and the Politics of the Spectacle by Douglas Kellner 1. Donald Trump: Master of Media Spectacle 2. The Apprentice, Twitter and the Summer of Trump 3. The Spectacle of Election 2016 Chapter 2. Introduction: From the Notion of Spectacle to Spectacle 2.0: The Dialectic of Capitalist Mediations by Marco Briziarelli and Emiliana Armano 1. Context and Purpose 2. Genealogy of the Spectacle 3. Foundational Elements of the Debordian Spectacle 4. Beyond the Integrated Spectacle: From Integration to Subsuming Digitalization 5. The Emergence of the Spectacle 2.0 6. Book Structure and Content PART I: CONCEPTUALIZING THE SPECTACLE Chapter 3. The Integrated Spectacle: Towards Aesthetic Capitalism by Vanni Codeluppi 1. Introduction 2. Alien and Blade Runner: A New Social Model Emerges 3. The 1970s: From Conflicts to the Network 4. From Information to Sensation 5. Aesthetics and the Metropolis: The Case of Birmingham 6. Conclusions Chapter 4. Guy Debord, a Critique of Modernism and Fordism: What Lessons for Today? by Olivier Frayssé 1. Introduction 2. Debord’s Theories as Countercultural Productions 3. The Genesis of Debord’s Theories 4. The Society of the Spectacle, a Critique of High Modernism 5. High Modernism and High Fordism 6. What Use is Debord in Understanding Digital Work and Labour in the Age of the Internet? 7. Conclusion Chapter 5. The Spectacle of New Media: Addressing the Conceptual Nexus Between User Content and Valorization by Raffaele Sciortino and Steve Wright 1. Introduction 2. Some Preliminary Thoughts on Debord 3. The Debate Around Value Production in Social Media and its Implications 4. Notes Towards a Conclusion. Against Impotence: Promises and Limits Chapter 6. Spectacle and the Singularity: Debord and the ‘Autonomous Movement of Non-Life’ in Digital Capitalism by Clayton Rosati 1. Digital Capitalism and Apocalypse 2. Spectacular Theory and the ‘Autonomous Image’ 3. Pseudonature, or the Autonomous Image in Digital Capitalism 4. Malthus and the Cylon: AI, Obsolescence and Digital Capitalism 5. Cylon Troll in the Revolutionary Council PART II: PHENOMENOLOGY AND HISTORICISATION OF THE SPECTACLE: FROM DEBORD TO THE SPECTACLE 2.0 Chapter 7. Rio de Janeiro: Spectacularization and Subjectivities in Globo’s City by Barbara Szaniecki 1. Introduction 2. From the New Museums to the New Cultural Urban Scenario 3. The Creative Territory: Real Estate Speculation and the Spectacle of ‘Free Labour’ 4. Final Considerations Chapter 8. Data Derives: Confronting Digital Geographic Information as Spectacle by Jim Thatcher and Craig M. Dalton 1. Introduction – The Spectacle of Data 2. The Double Role of Data Within the Spectacle 3. Drifting Towards Data 4. Drifting Through Data Chapter 9. Branding, Selfbranding, Making: The Neototalitarian Relation Between Spectacle and Prosumers in the Age of Cognitive Capitalism by Nello Barile 1. Introduction 2. One Step Back: The Actuality of Debord’s Definitions of Spectacle, Consumption and Commodities 3. The Second Model Explaining Cognitive Consumption: The Double Bind 4. The Third Model Explaining the Evolution of Cognitive Consumption: The Ritual of Confession 5. The Integration Between Bit and Atoms: From the Automation of Everything to the Destiny of Makers Chapter 10. Tin Hat Games – Producing, Funding, and Consuming an Independent Role-Playing Game in the Age of the Interactive Spectacle by Chiara Bassetti, Maurizio Teli, Annalisa Murgia 1. Premise: The Age of the Interactive Spectacle 2. Producing Counternarratives Today: A Theoretical Reading of Tin Hat Games 3. The Case Study 4. Collectively Constructing a Critical Product 5. Digitally Setting Up an Interactive Spectacle 6. Discussion and Conclusion Chapter 11. ‘Freelancing’ as Spectacular Free Labour: A Case Study on Independent Digital Journalists in Romania by Romina Surugiu 1. Introduction 2. Several Notes on Contemporary Romanian Journalism 3. A New Space, in a ‘Post-Apocalyptic’ Landscape 4. Crowdfunding and Financing the Old ‘New’ Journalism 5. What Does Freelancing Stand For? A Debordian Interpretation of Free Labour in Journalism 6. Conclusions Chapter 12. Immaterial Labour and Reality TV: The Affective Surplus of Excess by Jacob Johanssen 1. Introduction 2. Neoliberalism, Reality Television and Labour 3. Spectacular Labour 4. Affect as Excess 5. Shame and Sign Value 6. Conclusion: Disciplining Bodies Chapter 13. Disrupting the Spectacle: The Case of Capul TV During and After Turkey’s Gezi Uprising by Ergin Bulut and Haluk Mert Bal 1. Introduction 2. Spectacle, Strategy and Digital Capitalism 3. Gezi and Capul TV: Resistance and the Aesthetics of the Mediatized 4. ‘With Our Own Words, With Our Own Media’: Voluntary Labour and the Sustainability of the ‘Guerilla Media’ as Counter-Spectacle 5. The ‘Hive’ Disrupts the Spectacle: Leadership, Strategy and Politics 6. Conclusion