An autoethnography of using new technologies

Abstract

The aim of this study is to identify the difficuties facing any study of new technologies. In my approach to the study of the internet, I am faced with taking it to be, according to the oppostion suggested by Hine (2000), either "culture" or "cultural artefact". I would also add the further complicating distinction between "emotion" and "consumption". I use the qualitative method of autoethnography - for Lewin, this variety of ethnography mixes fieldwork and literary expression as part and parcel of the same enterprise.