“Analogue longing” - In the Corona Update on April 15, Bruckner Orchestra chief conductor Markus Poschner, Rector Gerald Bast (Applied) and robot psychologist Martina Mara discuss the forced new virtuality. Rector Meinhard Lukas discusses with his guests the digitization push forced by Corona and the analogous longing it causes.

If the media artist Peter Weibel has his way, the Corona crisis will turn a new era. In a comment in the NZZ he speaks of the end of the local society: “So you can say that one of the lessons of the virus is to push us into the digital age with violence and power. No forms of production or reception will remain unaffected. The constant call, Don't touch! ‘Means nothing less than that all social forms are touched by the virus. The constant call, Don't come closer! ‘Adorns the entrance portal to the long-distance society in a prognostic way."

The study by the Institute for Trade, Sales and Marketing discussed yesterday in the JKU Corona Update points in the opposite direction. A significant trend towards closeness is attested here. And the analogous longing is also growing in culture and science. Operas in video-on-demand format. Online visits to museums and lectures exclusively via video conferencing cannot really replace the quality of analogue presence.

Rector Meinhard Lukas discusses this phenomenon with the following experts:

• Dr. Gerald Bast, Rector of the University of Applied Arts in Vienna
• Univ.-Prof. Martina Mara, head of the Robopsychology Lab at the Linz Institute of Technology at the JKU
• Prof. Markus Poschner, chief conductor of the Bruckner Orchestra Linz and honorary professor at the University of Bremen