Richard Barbrook & Pit Schultz (1997), ÔThe Digital Artisans ManifestoÕ, The resistance to market forces and labour patterns is characterised by Ricard Barbrook and Pit Schultz in their 'Digital Artisans Manifesto' (1997). They reject the idea that the Internet is the final stage of alienating effects of machines, and instead, and alluding to autonomous Marxism, emphasise the centrality of autonomous and creative labour in this process as the force of historical change: 'We will transform the machines of domination into the technologies of liberation'. It is argued that this transformation can come about by rejecting neo-liberal work patterns of the free market, the 'californian ideology' and formation of a 'virtual class'. Instead they propose the digital artisan in which autonomous work is made possible in the manner of past craft workers': 'The revival of artisanship is not a return to a low-tech and impoverished past. Skilled workers are best able to assert their autonomy precisely within the most technologically advanced industries. The new artisans are better educated and can earn much more money. In earlier stages of modernity, factory labourers symbolised of the promise of industrialism. Today, as digital artisans, we now express the emancipatory potential of the information age. We are the promise of history.' This is written in polemical style as manifestos are, so accordingly perhaps lacks analytical depth. It seems to reinforce a 'virtual class' based on 'immaterial labour' but without the capacity to understand the ways in which relations of production are recast. Surely there is little point in following the invitation for 'Digital Artisans of Europe Unite!' without attaching this to other material antagonisms. There is more to autonomous Marxism than these ebullient declarations. This is perhaps unfair, it is written playfully and I have a poor sense of humour in this regard.