action-virno.txt
Virno's example of this is in his discussion of 'virtuosity' to indicate the special capabilities of a performing artist. He is drawing upon Arendt's observation that the performing arts have a strong affinity to politics. A performance is characterised by its lack of an end product, or at least a product that is indistinguishable from the performance itself (2004: 52). Furthermore, it operates in real-time and has its own sense of purpose or fulfillment. In this context, it would appear that many of these attributes could be assigned to the virtuosity of programmers and programs.

action-virno.txt
The question for Virno is: ' what is the _score_ which the virtuosos-workers perform? What is the script of their linguistic-communicative _performances_?' (2004: 63). The score is 'general intellect' as the 'know-how on which social productivity relies', as a 'attribute of living labour' (2004: 64-5). General intellect in this virtuosic sense requires political action as it results from human living labour involving communication. The script is by no means determined and does not have an end product in sight, it is contrast: 'virtuosity without a script, or rather, based on the premise of a script that coincides with pure and simple _dynamis_, with pure and simple potential' (2004: 66).

autonomia-negri.txt
'set in motion by an automaton, a moving power that moves itself; this automaton consisting of numerous mechanical and intellectual organs, so that the workers themselves are cast merely as its conscious linkages. [...] Not as with the instrument, which the worker animates and makes into his organ with his skill and strength, and whose handling therefore depends on his virtuosity. Rather, it is the machine which possesses skill and strength in place of the worker, is itself the virtuoso, with a soul of its own in the mechanical laws acting through it; and it consumes coal, oil etc, just as the worker consumes food, to keep up its perpetual motion.' (1981: 692-4)

human-arendt.txt
'Every activity performed in public can attain an excellence never matched in privacy; for excellence, by definition, the presence of others is always required, and this presence needs the formality of the public, constituted by one's peers, it cannot be the casual, familiar presence of one's equals or inferiors.' (Arendt 1998: 49; excellence in this sense comes close to virtuosity, or _virtus_ in Latin, requiring a public to distinguish one over the other.)

networks-rossiter.txt
The book is split into three main sections, each with two chapters: the first, addressing the limits of democracy and organized networks; the second, tackling the creative industries, precarious labour and intellectual property; and the third, the virtuosity of 'general intellect' and 'processual democracy' to elaborate on the figure of 'organized networks'. Previous versions of many of the chapters have been published but together they make a powerful interlacing argument for criticism demonstrating a depth of research to highlight the key issues for political intervention in organized network culture (indeed, a companion volume might be Tiziana Terranova's _Network Culture_, Pluto 2004). Acknowledging the peer intellectual support of Nettime and Fiberculture mailing lists, it is perhaps not surprising that Rossiter demonstrates an impressive but familiar range of sources to subscribers (including immanent critique and negative dialectics of the Frankfurt School, the concepts of 'general intellect' and 'immaterial labour' in Autonomous Marxism, and the constitutive role of the outside and immanence in Deleuze's philosophy, amongst others) - taking a transdisciplinary approach that he likens to the collective ethos and protocols of the network itself. The sense of project is clear, passionate and hopeful:

tacticalmedia-raley.txt
What makes the book perhaps distinctive is its focus on ‘virtuosity’, drawing on Paolo Virno's work (such as in Grammar of the Multitude, 2004). Without this connection, the book would seem to operate more like a reference book for some of the most interesting media activist practices over recent years (including Critical Art Ensemble, Electronic Disturbance Theatre, Bureau of Inverse Technology, Carbon Defense League, The Yes Men, Etoy and Ubermorgen, amongst others). By no means a mere catalogue of works, it is a thoroughly researched, and there are examples of key players broadly associated with ‘activism, hacktivism, artivism’, but in general the analysis seems less sharp. For instance, despite the stated importance of the concept, the references to virtuosity are not entered into in depth. Although there is passing reference to how Virno draws on Hannah Arendt’s work to articulate virtuosity through performance – making the connection between performance and politics (p. 29) – there is scant detail here. Missing are the complex connections and prehistory, not least in Virno’s earlier work (such as his essay ‘Virtuosity and Revolution’, in Radical Thought in Italy, 1996) as well as that both Virno and Arendt are making explicit reference to Aristotle. Thus the closing statement – that ‘Tactical media contests the future terrain of the political, but it does so via virtuosic performances deployed and experienced in the present’ (p. 151) – remains rather unsubstantiated.