re: Lev Manovich's distance and aura essay ["<a href="/cgi-local/query.cgi?action=grab_object&kt=kt0528">Distance and
Aura</a>," RHIZOME CONTENTBASE, 3.29.97]

i liked it lots.
furthermore:

i agree that the differences between the human and the technological
have become blurred by the introduction of communication technologies.
i see this in the way that virilio articulates his observations
regarding the collapse of physical distances, and even social distances,
through telepresence.

i go further yet, and suggest that if one follows this line of
reasoning, there is no reason to think that ultimately knowledge also
might be annihilated with the same tools– since knowledge requires
distance in order for the transmutation of information into knowledge to
take place.

i think that this would be a most interesting road back into umberto
eco's new middle ages.