Medialab Prado

In this essay we would like to embed the possibilities for citizen science within a theoretical framework. By reviewing the notion of space, we would like to bring up a pattern of key questions that deal with a scale enlargement in a globalized world. With the help of Heidegger, Tygstryp, Deleuze and Guattari we suggest a functional interaction between places and networks. Citizen science, within the context of local culture, as a result of movement and locality.

Although places are fixed wholes, they are not self-sufficient. In order to reach a place one needs to travel, physically or digitally. Roads and fibers construct networks that maintain the accessibility of places. Networks do not exist by themselves: a network structure cannot exist without places where you can enter or leave. Places are therefore inherent to any network system. Together, and in continuous interaction, places and networks form the spaces that we encounter, through which we move around, and with the help of which we learn.

The modern age has changed the way we think about spatial relationships. This brings up questions about how to conceive the notion of space as generator of (social) interaction. We live in a network-based society. Knowledge is continuously being moved and distributed. Distant relations form a clear (network) structure, while locality appears to have moved to the back. New localities have emerged on the web where it seems easier to communicate with a sympathizing Korean than with a stubborn neighbor.

We can ask ourselves if we still can use the strict dichotomy between place and network or if the border between the two has been blurred. Does the notion of space constituted by places and networks still fit our highly digitized world that exists by means of global interaction? How is modern space being produced? How can a local network be established in order to exchange and distribute information on a small scale?