’To be done is to be‘

       or

’To do is to make be‘

The internet is not a medium. It is a matrix in which other media are stored. This is not without precedent, but it is realized to an unprecedented degree. For instance, text in film is not considered a separate medium to film; the medium of text is reduced to content passed through the medium of film. In a way, film has become the matrix for older media such as text, sound and image. However, in that film shares more with other media than with a true database, I would still consider film a medium in its own right.

But while there are media aspects to multimedia or new media (if we consider them to be the amalgam of older media with Interactivity), the Internet itself lacks some vital aspects of a definition of media. Considering the assembly of motion-graphics, text and sound on the Internet to be a conglomeration of many separate media into ‘multi-media’ is a backwards approach to understanding the Internet. Earlier media are merely content within the matrix of the Internet, crystallized into instances of existence through the medium of human interaction. The Internet is not a medium. We are the medium.

Now, this could be said to a degree about any medium. Is an unread newspaper a medium? Since it conveys nothing, it is missing an aspect necessary to the definition of a medium. Only by reading the newspaper does it convey anything, and in that sense, we serve as the medium for the content of the newspaper. If we see ourselves as the medium for the newspaper, then each particular instance of existence of this newspaper is different, as we each select and digest different parts in different ways.

This is the precedent I speak of, and we see it in everything around us. Reality is a construct of perception. But never before has the need for human interaction as a precursor to an instance of existence been true to such a degree. With interactive media, the act of perception is externalized, so that without our interaction it is imperceptible. Without human intervention, a site is mere potential, requiring the interaction of a human to crystallize parts of that potential into concrete, observable existence.

So, what does this tell us as creators of the content that flows through the veins of this matrix? A definition of the user as the medium through which the matrix is enabled embraces both user and developer together, and forces us to reconsider our view of the user. We are all — content-creators and viewers — users of the Internet. Considering the user as merely a viewer of end content deprives them of a very important role. When we consider the user in the role of a developer, as someone assembling other’s efforts with their own into an experience, we get closer to approaching the Internet in a fashion more appropriate to its nature as matrix. And we get closer to approaching our role as the medium more appropriately.

Email, blogger, wiki and some sites by Hi-res are examples of aspects of the Internet that make this role more apparent, and I believe that if we consider our users along these lines when we create, we will be creating much more interesting and developing experiences.