We Have Never Been Mediatized 301 fabricate non-communication – if one accepts the definition of communication as an exchange, as a reciprocal space for speech and response, and thus for responsibility. In other words, if one defines it as anything else than the simple emission/recep- tion of information. (Baudrillard, 1985, p. 577) Communication, then, is for Baudrillard dialogue on equal basis, leading to the establishment of a social relation be- tween two subjects. All other forms of dissemination of information, etc., is “simulation” (Baudrillard, 1976/1993). Historically, this means that he models communication on the most basic form of discursive exchange between humans, resulting in that all subsequent forms become deviations. His point is, however, that the symbolic cues used in human speech communication becomes altered in mediation since the technological means allow and restrict various aspects of communication. As he ex- presses it in Symbolic Exchange and Death: Every image, every media message and also ev- ery surrounding functional object is a test. That is to say, in all the rigour of the term, it triggers response mechanisms in accordance with stereo- types or analytic models. The object today is not ‘functional’ in the traditional sense of the term: it doesn’t serve you, it tests you. It no longer has anything to do with yesterday’s object, any more than ‘mediatized’ information has with the ‘reality’ of facts. Both object and information already result from a selection, an edited sequence of cam- era angles, they have already tested ‘reality’ and have only asked those questions to which it has re- sponded. Reality has been analysed into simple el- ements which have been recomposed into scenarios of stable oppositions, just as the photographer imposes his own contrasts, lighting and angles onto his object […]. Thus tested, reality tests you in return according to the same score-card, and you decode it following the same code, inscribed in every message and object like a miniature genetic code (Baudrillard, 1976/1993, p. 63).
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