Tech no longer ruptures cultural form because its aim is now invisibility

Evidence

What has happened, however, is that technology has been decalibrated from cultural form. The present moment might in fact be best characterised by a discrepancy between the onward march of technology and the stalling, stagnation and retardation of culture. We can’t hear technology any more. There has been a gradual disappearance of the sound of technological rupture — such as the irruption of Brian Eno’s analogue synth in the middle of Roxy Music’s “Virginia Plain”, or the cut-and-paste angular alienness of early rave — that pop music once taught us to expect. We still see technology, perhaps, in cinema CGI, but CGI’s role is somewhat paradoxical: its aim is precisely to make itself invisible, and it has been used to finesse an already established model of reality. High-definition television is another example of the same syndrome: we see the same old things, but brighter and glossier. — Mark Fisher (edited by Darren Ambrose), K-Punk, 1229

Categorization

• DEFINE: The decalibration thesis — decoupling of technological advance from cultural novelty, with CGI and HDTV as invisibility-making tech — is a definitional core of Fisher’s later ‘hauntological’ analysis.
• XREF: This precise claim migrates into Fisher’s essay ‘The Slow Cancellation of the Future’ and the notion of hauntology; connects to Zamyatin’s We and DeLillo’s White Noise on technological experience. — connects to: Technology has become decoupled from cultural form and no longer announces rupture
• DEEPTHINKING: Close to the top tier of Fisher’s whole corpus — the observation that the experience of technology itself has changed from rupture to invisible refinement is dense and generative.

Broader Connections

• Technology has become decoupled from cultural form and no longer announces rupture #corroborates (0.93)