Virtual objects and their application: about the industrial production of object relationships

We live in an epoch that could be designated as the post-Gutenberg-era. Writing is no longer the dominant sign system. It is replaced by electronic signs. We consider approximately the year 1950 as the turning-point between these two epochs, because by then, in the years after the 2nd World War the American households were saturated with televisions. Thereby, the new sign system asserted itself. The topic of this article is the transformation of our sign system and thereby of our worlds of symbols, the leap from the world of written signs into the world of electronic signs, and the possibility born out of it to create electronic objects, which I prefer to call virtual objects. The manipulation of object-choice and object-relationships accompanying this change and the role assigned to analysts in this new world will be considered as well. These electronic signs developed quickly a life of their own. A totally new class of objects came into being, the class of virtual objects. These are electronically transformed, completed or wholly electronically produced objects. This procedure is accompanied by an industrialization of object-choice and object-relationships. The manipulated object-choice and object-relationship is born and, moreover, a displacement of natural objects through virtual ones. A change of the socio-cultural understanding is also a consequence of this process. New patterns of socio-cultural understanding develop, that could be described as industrial feudalism. The goal of this article is to describe the transformation of our world of signs and the connected industrialization of object relationships, and to interprete them according to our present possibilities.