The Truman Paradigm of The Internet’s Future
When we think about ourselves in the digital matrix, it can become difficult to remember that it’s not all made for us. The Truman Show is a fascinating project because we collectively have not caught up to an evitable reality in our own online existence that transcends in the film’s narrative.
Figure 1 – Truman Burbank retaining the rights as the master of his own fantasies
The efficacy of how we access information and come to accept the reality presented to us is palpable to each of us individually. Information is energy. Every time we assimilate ourselves into an online community, we apply ourselves while remaining undistinguishable. Our online interests are individually unique to each of us in the sense that our trajectories of curiosity can be both predictable and spontaneous simultaneously.
If we think about the birth and existence of the internet in the same way we think about the universe itself, we can see some clear parallels. The study of the birth of both entities is inconsequential of how they are perceived and accepted by the reality that is afforded to us. They are practically infinite voids that are constantly expanding through streams of calculated information. They also afford us an existential conundrum, as focus on ‘a subject’ can detract away elements that constitute a completely rationalised human experience in which we can understand exactly why things are the way they are.
If we think about the concept of creation in The Truman Show, we can see that primitive technology has evolved during the rapid growth of information phenomenon. This information cascade has sparked a perpetual desire for definite answers to the unanswerable questions we have about our realities. This leaves the isolated passenger, or the ‘individually isolated viewer’ dangling from the collective. Truman’s reality can be considered an allegory for Nick Bostrom's Simulation Argument since he exists in a “post-human” stage of civilization, where humankind has acquired most of the technological capabilities that one can currently show to be consistent with physical laws and with material and energy constraints. In the same way we see the evolution of an enterprise that starts with a single camera hanging over Truman, we are given a glimpse into the utero of the industry that seeks to covet Big Data and lead the world.
The medium in which the trajectory of the ‘exact’ life of Truman Burbank is recorded reflects exactly how each new person accesses the internet every day. They are born, as a single polarity, isolated with fundamental information, i.e. basic details, name, age, appearance. Their lives initially hold little to no meaning on the consumer ship. They have no fundamental propensity for profit. In the capitalistic space however, they can be profitable with investment. Viewer indulgence is an information waterfall. As a result, Truman’s life is conditioned to endure a series of begrudgingly demeaning constraints that keep him docile within his world.
The reality of Truman’s existence is paradoxical because his charade of a life must become increasingly interesting if it hopes to maintain (and gain) viewership - all the while he is kept in the same social stupor of his circumstantial cage. The circumstances of Truman’s home on Seahaven Island only invite so many possibilities for repeatedly spontaneous action. The maintenance of Truman’s reality executed in real-time perpetuates that meaning is found in material possessions, which can then be sold to the ‘actual’ consumer within the film’s universe. We can deduce that the creators of Truman’s reality work to service the same capitalistic entity that is regulated by the same expungements as our own. We know nothing about the economic reality of the fictional world, but Truman’s life is implied to be highly profitable for prospective marketing. Power always lies in the eye of the viewer; they are signalled by the event, and this is immediately followed by the signal images that are present during the event. Anticipation for change and development keeps the patina of viewership afloat. What is interesting about the Truman show is that it spotlights a duality between the entertainment world and our own; the now is the shortest moment of our life. Even the ‘now’ that took you through this sentence is over now. As a result, the significance of the event that is experienced will build a basis of contemporary knowledge that can be discussed in perpetuity amongst the masses, including those who shape the reality of the event itself. This process increases the prospect of a consumeristic response from the wider audience. This build-up will eventually lead to a break in the simulation - in which the information stream will fracture and allow either the consumer (Truman) or the proprietor (everyone else) to divert the narrative to a more stabilised position.
The timing where these cultural shifts happen are at semi-regular intervals in order to ensure everyone is ‘happy’ and submissive to the entertainment they are provided. Our capitalistic reality duplicates this. In a simple analogy, it works better for everyone if a runner wins a race wearing Nike shoes than if he succeeds unshod. This philosophy is an endurance during the internet age because signals have become increasingly saturated as the pinnacle of what can be called ‘grounded events’ become more impossible to break. Any human can only run so fast. Nike™ however can hypothetically sell shoes forever.
Figure 2 - A contained Seahaven Island as viewed by its’ creators
A great irony for Truman is that he sells life insurance since his whole life is caged. Caged by the same system that cages Truman, the creators of the televised show, have a vast but limited quantity of income to upkeep the fantastical reality that cages Truman. The financial situation of the viewers who watch the fictional show can only put in so much of their own money to help keep the show on air. This means that the sporadic narrative of the televised reality is an allegory for a capitalist economy because as viewership goes up, so does the profit of the sponsored signals that perpetuate real change in their lives. As such, Seahaven Island is an allegory for the capitalist world because it restricts each participant in a financially sustainable way and controls interest to maintain passivity. Irony is rife throughout the narrative and serves to reflect a repetitive conditioning that stimulates anxiety and works to keep both Truman and the viewer aware of the spontaneous dangers that can occur if they wish to incur change (although these are mathematically unlikely, of course.) This imparted limitation is further reflected in the walls that surround Truman, as they represent the containment of information in the internet age. Every channel and increment of Truman’s cell are monitored for the preservation of an illusion. As such, the intertwined networks of energy and surveillance build to accumulate a body of knowledge that upholds an imagined reality for one outward observer in an inwardly focused world.
When we consider the increased time and effort that has been put into the internet since its inception, we can deduce that the scale of the Seahaven set is an allegory for interest and expectancy. The structure is an emblematic reflection of how interested the globe has become with polarised fantasy. Had the same amount of time that has been spent exchanging information online been put into building a physical structure, the ‘claim’ that it would be seen from space would likely be a gross understatement. The walls that cage this array of information are an allegory for the separation between moral and economical law in the simulated reality. The walls of the cage are reached by Truman, as he continually breaks the domestic circumstantial coding that keeps him on Seahaven ad infinitum.
Chastened by what his life has become, Truman succumbs to his impermeable desire to venture beyond what is known to him. The journey for Truman is significant because he circumnavigates surveillance via the artificial sea and by extension, his coerced fear. By taking advantage of their underestimation, Truman proves that he exists beyond personal reservations for suppositions and hindrances for safety. In the face of personal gain, Truman reflects the invaluable nature of transparent data. Not unlike everyone who exists within the film, Truman is set on the path to freedom by breaking through his own victimisation mentality as fights against the dynamics of immorality that constitute his suspended animation. Truman experiences this anguish alone. However, by doing so, Truman unites the world in two sections by serving as the guise of an archetype for serenity and conservation on one hand, and empathy for a life powered by relentless ambition and liberation on the other. Truman side-lines the conditioning of his own perspective by acting on his internalised wisdom and opportunity to strive beyond the transgressive events that construct his routine every day. Unsurprisingly, the act of escape is the ultimate draw for viewers because they understand his anguish, even if they personally wish to keep him enclosed. The act of hunting Truman mirrors the act of hunting humans for sport. The escape is ironic because his entire life has been sponsored until the moment where Truman proves his own aptitude at responding to personal anguish during turmoil. The fact that the censored screen has garnered the highest number of viewer ratings in the show’s history speaks to the total ambiguity of the internet speculation phenomenon. The viewers are plainly aware of Truman’s desire for reconciliation. While they would likely assume escape would be the ultimate end-goal for Truman, the film itself provides no context for which this would be achieved until they manage to find Truman and broadcast him on a boat.
Figure 3 – Truman’s boat reaching the boundary or control
The widespread viewership comes from the ambiguity that anything could have transpired in the simulated world. The intensity of the ambiguity mirrors the standardised fashion in which we receive and follow news narratives online. The repetitive rules have been outlined for the typical viewers so they must apply their own theories as to why and how Truman could be cut for public viewing. The intimate moments of performed sexual gratification that transpire in Truman’s world not only blur the lines between coerced prostitution but they also highlight the immorality of the information machine. Everything is watched, it is only a matter of what is ‘morally accessible’ to the public that amounts to any sort of sensation. As outsiders looking in, it is similarly interesting that the murder of Truman is not out of the question, yet any sort of nudity or sexual proclivities (which would certainly be scandalous and therefore profitable) are kept secret under the pretext that personal exposure exists, but remains shunned under pretext of social commonality. This capitalistic mentality is cleverly implemented to maintain and broaden viewership amongst ‘conservative’ viewers and those with young children.
While Truman is human, he is coerced to act in a single polarity within the same four sides of a screen in the same way we watch the film transpire. Truman is an abnormal leper of the moral world, since he has experienced little to no spontaneously genuine contact with the impulsive outside world. The attempted murder of Truman on his boat journey is emblematic of Charon and the River Styx as he travels across a plain of circumstantial limbo that delivers him to a judgement before an entity larger than himself. Without question we can consider the moment Truman hits the painting to be the pinnacle of emancipation. No longer unable to question his own certainty, Truman can finally touch the edge of his prison after a lifetime of toil. Within this moment, we can understand his own rectitude and empathise with our own acknowledged desires to escape manipulation under peer pressure. Truman speaks to his creator and assures him of his own power relative to his own. The void of vacant space that exists beyond the single, crammed door of the cage represents the future of information technology. In this void, information accumulation is fluid and is no longer controlled by secularisation of fascination. Truman exists as he always has, however he is now guaranteed by the certification of his basic identification and spontaneity of reality. While this hypothetical reality is impossible to realise without the capitalist world, it replicates the reality of the individual online. The ‘crowd’ mentality that unites the internet hive is suspended within this fluid space by the gratification of new information.
In this sense, the reality of online information generation differentiates the individual in a manner that replicates to follow the climax of The Truman Show. We will inevitably reach a point in which the individual no longer exists as a voice, or representation - but as an amalgamation of streamed content that cascades itself in perpetuity in an unwinnable void. The inversion of capitalistic sustainment is emblematic of limbo in which no amount of information can be shared that will balance the equilibrium of economic stability and morality in our society. We will each become the image of the brand we represent.
The interconnected convergences that tie split-second interest online will eventually collapse in on itself as the accounted ‘truth’ about how a singular event transpired will become a unit of information that cannot possibly differentiate or discount the information tied to it. The moral balance of concrete laws that uphold every sort of sustainable society will be vehemently vanquished in favour of collective interest. While the process of information generation continues to increase over time thanks to developments in consumer technology, surveillance, and consumption, so will the apathy each individual feels for the events that shape the world. ‘News-worthy’ events will only become more and more polarising and interesting if they have a critical bearing on our own personal dynamics and interests. This will spark a chain reaction in which no one soul will be able to save themselves from the inevitable that will come. This division will be vicious and generate a desire to hold onto the simulated hypothesis of ambiguity that keeps interest alive. In this sense, the trajectory of our presence online can be said to be catching up to the reality broadcast on The Truman Show. We will structure our own personal worlds and transverse the plains of data to eventually reach a point where nothing can be bought or sold. This future will only be operated within a collective void that permits fluid existence in a simulated past.
We become our own virtual ancestors with each passing transmission of data and no sense of personal identity will exist beyond our own individual self-perception. In this plane, we will be allowed to share our resources as we scramble to ensure the survival of our own self-perceptions. The morality of this inevitable reality is uncertain because it has not come to pass and is mathematically impossible to predict. An axiom in algebra states that one shift must follow another. We, like Truman, will certainly come to abide by this rule as humanity will continue to share information and reach a point in which we will understand the conditioning of our capitalistic reality online and work to serve a higher purpose in which the minutia of social hindrance is absolved.
Illustrations list
Figure 1: The Truman Show, dir. by Peter Weir (Paramount Pictures, 1998)
Figure 2: The Truman Show, dir. by Peter Weir (Paramount Pictures, 1998)
Figure 3: The Truman Show, dir. by Peter Weir (Paramount Pictures, 1998)
Bibliography
Nick Bostrom, ‘ARE YOU LIVING IN A COMPUTER SIMULATION?’, Philosophical Quarterly, (2003) Vol. 53, pp. 243‐255
