Abstract

The beginning of the 1990s saw the rise of critical interest in examining the promises and risks posed by newly built network technologies in Europe. A key role within these discussions was played by the newly founded "Digital Cities", whose stated goal was to provide the necessary infrastructure for self-governed communities. Not only was the shared use of technological infrastructure crucial to the invention of new forms of organization, interaction and participation, but also the active sharing of common goals and interests. For this reason the idea of the digital city with its virtual communities helped to implement new technologies by providing the necessary metaphors in order to translate technological developments into social practices. Hence, many of the technologies that make up Web 2.0 emerged in the 1990s, and with them also emerged the idea of social media, user-generated content or participatory platforms. By retracing the threads of current practices of sharing back into the early days of network building, the aim of this article is to critically examine new forms of network-based subjectivation which produce specific concepts of subjectivity within the digital environment