Simulacra

\sim-yə-ˈla-krə\

Function : noun.

1: May be classified into three categories according to the technology used to create images and symbols: counterfeit —when “technologies” were intended to create an illusion that would pass for reality—; replica —the photography and the video created new possibilities for the development of replicas of the reality—; and simulation —the advent of computers has made possible a new breed of image… Reality ceased to be imitated or replicated, and began to be simulated.—[1]

2: Simulacra may be used to describe the relation between the real and the meta-real products of the digital age. This is the globalization of information because of the media-technologies. Nevertheless the information can be understood as a cumulus of messages, —Paraphrasing Mc Luhan— the messages given by TV & News-papers has not the same content as the message given by a light-bulb, because of the social effect. Then, the container of the message [the medium] itself is the one that is communicating, more than the content, then… the medium is the message: "THE MEDIUM IS THE MASSAGE[2]". Also "SIMULACRA[3] IS THE MASSAGE."

3: The digital Scale may be understood inside the simulacra, because the possibility of scale-changing gives the most potent tool of the simulation: work in one scale. For the next generation of architects a dramatic-change in the approach to the working-scale may be expected.[3]

[4]

Associated words + links
simsociety
simpolitics
avatar
netcast
simpolitics
virtuability

Bibliography

1. De Landa M., “War in the Age of Intelligent Machines”, p. 179, 188.

2. Marshall McLuhan & Quentin Fiore, from the book "The Medium is the Massage: An Inventory of Effects" refered to McLuhan's slogan "The Medium is the Message"

3. Simulacra, coined term by Jean Baudrillard, "Simulacra and Simulation" ,1980

4. Image by LFOdiaga, 2007

(luis fernando odiaga, 26/11/07)
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