Date: Mon, 05 May 1997 23:10:22 +0100
From: Joćo Paulo Monteiro
To: marxism-international@jefferson.village.Virginia.EDU
Subject: M-I: POF-1
I wish to salute Ben Seattle's coming to this list. For the next months
he will be sending weekly installments of a series he has prepared on
the party or the proletariat in the age of the revolution in
communications. This is good news and, if discussions develop
productively, could take us into a new level of development of our
self-conscience as a marxist list on internet's infacy. The future could
be happening right now. M-I - after overcoming some unfortunate
incidents - has developed into a interesting group for debate, not yet
qualitatively different from any of the myriad lists and newsgroups on
the net. The point should be, in the next 5-10 years, to actually create
something new here, organizationally as well as in the realm of a
renewed political thinking. A new synthesis. Unfortunately, as of now,
the most qualified people to undertake such tasks are not here on-line.
But I have few doubts that this is the place to be. This is where it
will all happen.
I must say I'm something of an insider in this thread since I know Ben's
ideas and have been discussing them with him for some time. I don't
share all his optimism on the predicted pace for the expansion of the
net nor on its political meaning for proletarian revolution. I
occasionaly have qualms over his style of prose. But I'm otherwise
generally in close agreement over much of his thinking (so far anyway)
and I'm looking forward with great interest for sharp exchanges over
these matters.
Ben has a site on the Web that I have already had the opportunity to
recommend here. It's in http://www.pix.org/cyberLeninism/ . Some texts
there - particularly the 'S.O.M.E. hipothesis' series and 'Digital Fire'
- are certainly among the most interesting and exciting stuff one can
read on the web these days.
Welcome to M-I Ben,
Joćo Paulo Monteiro
Porto
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