Ebook: On the existence of digital objects

Digital objects, in their simplest form, are data. They are also a new kind of industrial object that pervades every aspect of our life today - as online videos, images, text files, e-mails, blog posts, Facebook events. Yet the nature of digital objects remains unclear. This book conducts a philosophical examination of digital objects and their organizing schema by creating a dialogue between Martin Heidegger and Gilbert Simondon, which Yuk Hui contextualizes within the history of computing. How can digital objects be understood according to individualization and individuation? Hui pursues this question through the history of ontology and the study of markup languages and Web ontologies; he investigates the existential structure of digital objects within their systems and milieux.