However, there is one part of your analysis I would like to address- when you state, “Bits are easy to copy while preserving their full organization, atoms are not…” and, “… that offline speech disappears after it is uttered; that, offline, we can usually see who is looking at us; offline walls, doors, locks and windows operate in a predictable manner,” I’m not sure that tells the full story.

As regards the first statement, I would add that while Bits are increasingly easy to copy, this ease of copying should not be confused or equated with ‘preserving their full organization’. Federico Giordano, and others engaged in digital preservation of old or antiquated digital technologies, worried in his essay, ‘Almost the Same Game’, that there is a real danger of losing the integrity of a digital artifact, the experience its use once contained, once we move its bits of data to another platform for which it was not originally designed. If I load up an emulation of the NES classic ‘Super Mario Brothers’ on my MacBook, am I experiencing the ‘full organization’ supposedly preserved with digital copying? Many would say no, and this example demonstrates that there is much volatility even in digital constructs.

On the second statement about how the offline is governed by the laws of physics, making offline speech ‘disappears after it is uttered’- I’m not sure this is accurate either. Take the Great Fear of 1789 in France, for example. That period’s well documented panics and fear-mongering was directly tied to rumors circulating among French villages. Rumors, once uttered, take on a life of their own, and much to the chagrin of ruling authorities these ‘willful interpretations’ (as Russian Imperial authorities took to calling Peasant use of rumor) do not fade away easily. (They may also lay dormant, like a virus or seed, waiting for the perfect moment to rise up and grow again) Because of this, one can never be sure how others are perceiving them. Perhaps inanimate objects can be relied upon to operate in a predictable manner, but the social discourse of analog speech is far from predictable in its operation. (This is something I try to address in my post looking at the debate surrounding the use of the term ‘cyberspace’ http://www.peasantmuse.com/2012/02/between-reality-cyberspace.html)

Again, great post!