An event-based model for studying network time empirically in digital media systems

Abstract

In this article, I will attempt to engage critically with the concept of network time, which scholars have used to describe emergent, super-fast temporal experiences associated with digital media environments. I argue that critical reflection is necessary because, while network time has received significant attention as a time theory within the social sciences, there remains some uncertainty around its physical and phenomenological origins. I discuss some attempts to observe and ‘measure’ network time empirically, which I think raise a couple of important questions about its conceptual and material status. Through this discussion, I develop a reductionist model of time as interactive system assemblage and explain how the variable experiences of network time can be understood as a function of perspective. I then apply the principles of this model to a description of temporality on Twitter.