Index

Contents

List of Illustrations   ix

The Body, the Screen, and Representations: An Introduction to Theories of 
Internet Spectatorship   1

1 | Making Internet and Computer Spectators   17
Introduction
Rendering Liveness, Materiality, and Space
Notions of the Empowered User
Addressing the Spectator
Stabilizing Identity
Erasing the Interface
Conclusion: Active Users by Design

2 | Visual Pleasure through Textual Passages: Gazing in Multi-user Object-oriented 
Settings (MOOs)   35
Multi-user Object-oriented Settings (MOOs)
Introduction
MOOs
The Look and the Gaze
Character Creation and Attributes in MOOs
The Look and the Gaze in MOOs
Gendered Gazing in MOOs
Graphical MOOs
Conclusion: Between Multiple and Coherent Identity

3 | Too Close to See, Too Intimate a Screen: Men, Women, and Webcams   57
Introduction
Feminism and Spectatorship
Critical and Journalistic Considerations of Webcams
Webcams
Women and Webcams
Regulating the Spectator
Women Webcam Operators and Authority
Visibility and Webcams
Making Texts Real
Some Problems with Webcam Viewing
Just a Guy
Conclusion: The Politics of Being Seen

4 | The Aesthetic of Failure: Confusing Spectators with Net Art Gone Wrong   85
Net Art Gone Wrong
Introduction
Aesthetics and Net Art
Net Art
An Aesthetic of Failure
Jodi
Peter Luining
Michael Samyn
Conclusion: The Limits of Failure and Repetition

5 | Can You Read Me? Setting-specific Meaning in Virtual Places (VP)   115
Virtual Places (VP)
Introduction
Virtual Places
Avatars
Painters and Avatar Galleries
Owning Texts
Criteria for Originality
Theories of Internet Authorship
Gender, Race, Sexuality, and the Avatar
Making Differences in Virtual Places
Conclusion: Authorship in Other Internet Settings

6 | This Is Not Photography, this Is Not a Cohesive View: Computer-facilitated 
Imaging and Fragmented Spectatorship   147
Introduction
Making the Digital Imaging Spectator
Photography
Digital or Post-photography
The Scanner as Camera
Carol Selter's Animalia and Punctum
Susan Silton's Self Portraits and Images of the
Partial Self
Ken Gonzales-Day's Skin Series and the Cut
The New Media Grid
Conclusion: The Morphed Spectator

Afterword: The Flat and the Fold: A Consideration of Embodied Spectatorship   177
Introduction
Carol Selter, Susan Silton, Ken Gonzales-Day, and the
Fold
The Body Folded and Evacuated
Hierarchy and Control
The Spectator in Pain
The Fat and the Fold
Men and the Weight Loss "Challenge"
Erotic Folding
Conclusion: A Technology of Waste

Acknowledgments   199
Notes   205
Selected Bibliography   273
Index   297