Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
capacity (Monmonier 2002). Perched high above the earth, satellites constitute
what Poster (1990:121) calls a superpanopticon, “a system of surveillance
without walls, windows, towers, or guards.” Throughout the cold war, satel-
lites were instrumental in the discursive scripting of geographic space (Ó
Tuathail 1996), its ideological construction within hegemonic modes of under-
standing shared by politicians, military planners, and the media that were
typically infused with the indiscriminate “othering” of the communist foe.
Gradually, civilian applications assumed an increasingly more important
role in the satellite industry's development. The major di
erence between
military and civilian purposes involved the shift in emphasis from surveil-
lance to communications; although the technology remains important in
both respects for military purposes, in the civilian domain communications
remains the dominant application. Large satellites capable of handling inter-
national tra
ff
c sit 35,700 km (22,300 miles) high in geostationary orbits,
which are by far the most valuable orbital slots because only in that narrow
sliver of space do satellites and the Earth travel at the same speed relative to
each other, making the satellite a stable target for signals transmitted upward
from earth stations (Frieden 1996). Because such orbital arcs are a scarce
resource, their distribution is strictly controlled through international organ-
izations (Hudson 1990; Hart 1991). From its vantage point, a broad-beam
geostationary satellite can transmit to (i.e., leave a “footprint” over) roughly
40 percent of the earth's surface, creating instantaneous time-space con-
vergence, so that only three or four are su
cient to provide global coverage
(Figure 5.1). Because the cost of satellite transmission is not related to dis-
tance, it is commercially competitive in rural or low-density areas (e.g.,
remote islands), where high marginal costs dissuade other types of providers
such as
firms (Giget 1994; Goldstein 1998; Warf 2006).
Postmodern capitalism, which relies on a series of telecommunications
systems to bind spaces together, has led the industry to undergo sustained
transformations as its economic and political prerogatives have shifted over
time. For example, satellites allowed television companies to initiate satellite
transmission of programs, ultimately leading to an explosion of satellite tele-
vision at home in the 1990s (Inglis 1991). Today, satellites are deployed by
telecommunications companies, multinational corporations,
fi
fiber optics
fi
fi
financial institu-
tions, and the global media to link far-
ung operations, including inter-
national data transmissions, telephone networks, teleconferencing, and sales
of television and radio programs. Because the producers of satellite technol-
ogy, and most of the industry's users, are concentrated in Europe and North
America, the production, transmission, and consumption of electronic dis-
courses are inescapably intertwined with the Western domination of the
global information infrastructure. For example, the world's largest media
companies rely heavily on communications satellites to provide a largely
homogeneous diet of television and video programs around the world. This
process of standardization has important repercussions for local and national
forms of consciousness and subjectivity, valorizing some forms of identity
fl
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