Dictionary of Operations

Dictionary of Operations is the third in a series of new lexica. After defining the field of "Tactical Reality" (2002) and "Strategic Reality" (2009), this concise manual to the contemporary cognitive environment analyzes 72 terms to access the operative logics of social and anti- social media.

Dictionary of Operations highlights the subtext of the politics of information and the underlying framework of media reality in digital networks. Global conflicts over resources accelerate the social crises of mediated representation. Cognitive algorithms question the autonomy of the individual and its freedom of action. Looking into the intimate relation between knowledge and control it identifies the financial crisis as a crisis of rationality and claims "Economy as fate is the swindle of the century".

Dictionary of Operations focuses on the subjective dimension of information technology related to potential political action. The text follows ancient connections between conjuring and the dark art of truth projection and asks: If every communication is an oracle, who owns meaning which authorizes legitimate knowledge?

Dictionary of Operations reflects illusory mirror worlds and excavates media-archaeological ghost stories that continue to haunt the world. Tracing the omnipresent trails of monsters, zombies and ghosts in the infosphere it declares "To be human is to be haunted, bound in chains to a past dominating the present."

Dictionary of Operations defines transversal practices between theory and activism, digital media and street culture. It covers terms ranging from A-T, from "Absolute Mammon" to "Truth Production". Drawing on anomalies as allies against enforced normalization it builds on an insight from an ancient Babylonian text: "one cannot escape misery without revolting against the established powers."