Paper short abstract:

This paper explores the political and technical dimensions of users’ temporal experience online, which sets the metronome for contemporary life. I highlight the findings mixed methods study to uncover how time is considered in history of the development of Name Data Networking (NDN).

Paper long abstract:

In the popular imagination, virtual environs made possible by contemporary networked information and communication technologies (ICTs) save time by freeing us from the physical realm with its impossible commutes, risky associations and bulky objects. However, STS' interrogation of informational and computational infrastructure reveals that information is thoroughly material. As contemporary life is increasingly synchronized with ICTs, it is important to dissect the relation between the materiality of information and how ICT infrastructures are designed to process this information efficiently and seamlessly. These design practices produce particular temporal experiences for users, resulting, for example, in the common impulse for instantaneous fulfilment of desire, as well as the urge to be continuously available. I draw from information studies, philosophy, media studies and computer science to uncover how the values in network design and conceptions of temporal experience are built into ICTs.

I look to the ICT infrastructure to understand how the design and implementation of these technologies make assumptions about time and users' attention as resources to be managed and, in some cases, exploited. I highlight findings of a qualitative study of design document analysis and interviews with designers to uncover how latency is managed in the design of Name Data Networking (NDN), a new protocol for file and data transfer over the internet. These study results show how time is used as a resource in networked computation, highlighting the political, epistemological and technical dimensions of temporal experience online, which sets the metronome for contemporary life.