Network Notebooks nr.1
Technobohemians or the new Cybertariat?
New media work in Amsterdam a decade after the web
by Rosalind Gill
http://www.networkcultures.org/networknotebooks/ (pdf download)
First publication in the series ‘Network Notebooks’, published by the Institute of Network Cultures, Hogeschool van Amsterdam. Order printed copies by sending an email to info (at) networkcultures.org. A pdf is also freely available.
About the publication
Accounts of new media working draw heavily on two polarised stereotypes, veering between techno-utopianism on the one hand, and a vision of web-workers as the new ‘precariat’, victims of neoliberal economic policies and moves to flexibilisation and insecurity on the other. Heralded from both perspectives as representing the brave new world of work what is striking is the absence of research on new media workers own experiences, particularly in a European context. 
booksThis report goes beyond the contemporary myths of new media work, to explore how people working in the field experience the pleasures, pressures and challenges of working on the web. Illustrated throughout with quotations from interviews, this research examines the different career biographies emerging for content-producers in web-based industries, questions the relevance of existing education and training, and highlights the different ways in which people manage and negotiate freelancing, job insecurity, and keeping up to date in a fast-moving field where software and expectations change rapidly.
The research is based on 35 interviews carried out in Amsterdam in 2005, and contextually draws upon a further 60 interviews with web designers in London and Brighton. The interviews were carried out by Danielle van Diemen and Rosalind Gill.
