my simulacrum
only the allegory of the empire, perhaps, remains. because it is with this same imperialism that present-day simulators attempt to make the real, all of the real, coincide with their models of simulation. but it is no longer a question of either maps or territories. something has disappeared: the sovereign difference, between one and the other, that constituted the charm of the abstraction. because it is difference that constitutes the poetry of the map and the charm of the territory, the...
more »only the allegory of the empire, perhaps, remains. because it is with this same imperialism that present-day simulators attempt to make the real, all of the real, coincide with their models of simulation. but it is no longer a question of either maps or territories. something has disappeared: the sovereign difference, between one and the other, that constituted the charm of the abstraction. because it is difference that constitutes the poetry of the map and the charm of the territory, the magic of the concept and the charm of the real. -- jean baudrillard
new york and philadelphia, september 2007.
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