Is The Net Revolution Breaking Faith?

The Net Revolution is facing changes that weren't predicted, changes not necessarily for the better. Lots of promises were made, countless expectations raised. Many haven't been met. Investors who fund much of the Net's technology are panicking. More significantly, there are signs that the public is losing faith in the digital revolution, and confused about it's goals. Sometimes, it's hard to blame them. Third in a series. (Read more)

It's sometimes hard to spot such consequences; Net culture is not known for carefully dissecting its own implications. In an essay called "The Shape of the Electronic Republic," part of a collecction called Composing Cyberspace, (Richard Holeton, editor), technological historian Langdon Winner wonders whether the computer revolution is committed to any particular set of social ideas. If so, he wonders, what are they? Where are they being proposed and argued?

It's a valid question, even if it assumes the computer revolution was shaped like other revolutions, by a handful of dogmatic leaders advocating specific principles.

There are powerful new political values developing online, and sooner or later, even politicians will begin speaking to them: the hacker ethic of creativity and exploration, which has brought joy back to work; the passion for freely exchanged information exemplified by Open Source and Free software; the individualism released by decentralized software programs and communications systems; and skepticism toward traditional ideas of intellectual property and ownership of culture, to name a few.

And yes, a new strain of rationalist political sensibility is emerging from this tech generation. But Winner is partly right: we have few forums where these ideas can be intelligently debated, and few understandings of common goals, if there even are any. Some of the best minds in cyberspace are setting their preferences so they can block out all that noise and confusion.

Many of the early Net philosophers gathered around the now-corporatized Wired magazine. But the explosion of a many-to-many, distributed information system, from Weblogs to P2P to IM, discourges common gathering spots. Both the volume of data and epidemic hostility have risen. As a result, data is filtered, moderated and refiltered. There are few places where people consider the kind of questions Winner legitimately asks, so the kind of discussion Winner wants poses a conundrum: either somebody has to assert control over public spaces online, or this revolution may become Balkanized, flaming and moderating itself to death.

"To mention revolution also brings to mind the relationships of different social classes," Winner writes. "Will the computer revolution bring about the victory of one class over another? Will it be the occasion for a realignment of class loyalties?" Such questions rarely intrude on the busy, pragmatic world of computer science, engineering and marketing, he cautions.

"Those actively engaged in promoting the transformation -- hardware and software engineers, managers of microelectronics firms, computer salesmen, and the like -- are busy pursuing their own ends ... But the sheer dynamism of technical and economic activity in the computer industry evidently leaves its members little time to ponder the historical significance of their own activity."

While they're not pondering, the consequences they create continue apace. In Virtual States: The Internet and the Boundaries of the Nation-State, Jerry Everard warns that too little thought has been given to the systematic inequalities that globalization engenders. In order to develop a telecommunications structure, for instance, developing countries like Vietnam, Cambodia, and India are forced to turn to multinational corporations to set up and manage their computer networks. This leads to the rapid establishment of infrastructure in profit-generating major urban areas, but it often leaves rural areas to fend for themselves. Thus in India, Everard writes, though there is a thriving software industry, the vast bulk of the subcontinent has yet to gain access even to telephones.

Such realities are almost unknown to this generation of tech workers and enthusiasts. As John Raulston Saul wrote, this is a brilliant, successful and creative culture, but an Unconscious Civilization in many ways, unaware of the political realities spawned by the very technology they are making and using, or by the daunting challenges the unchecked rise of corporatism poses. Sometimes the fallout can be serious. As a consequence, it created an Unconscious Revolution.

In his new book republic.com University of Chicago Law Professor Cass Sunstein warns that the emerging Net culture -- busy creating personalized "me" media -- threatens to undermine one of the basic tenets of democracy -- the willingness of people with diverse viewpoints to speak to and hear one another.

The Net is beginning to endanger a democratic society, Sunstein fears, with its fragmentation, advanced moderation and filtering systems. What makes free expression work, Sunstein asks? His answer: exposure to materials that people might not have chosen in advance. Unplanned, unprogrammed encounters are central to democracy. A culture that offers increasingly customized speech control preferences enables people to eliminate from their screens and minds anything they might not want to see or hear or might disagree with.

Why are people content to have their inputs so restricted? In part, because free speech online has nearly buckled under the onslaught of flamers, fanatics, spammers, and other e-vandals. The Digital Citizen, driven underground, has taken to lurking. (Not Jefferson's idea either. If the Continental Congress had used moderating programs, it's hard to believe they would ever have agreed on a Constitution).

So the Net revolution, as revolutions will, has veered off, slowed down, and confounded expectations.

Next: Is Open Source the New Jerusalem?

Comments

I'm not so sure..

[Malachi]

I think this is a viewpoint, but one that should be analysed beside other views. To some degree we are still sleepers, a mundane nation living day by day in ones self and others problems. On the other point you've got those who are crossing bounderies helping others in ways we had never thought possible. Look at europe and the growing span of kiosks for web access, or Tokyo with the amazing cellular/data networks.

On the front of a poor country, what are we doing about it and how different is it from what we were doing before technology? During the 20's we thought we were kings, but reality hit us. Maybe the media could do a more justified approach to the problems of the world rather than create tantamount upheaveals which don't really exist. (case in point being watch the media talk about our current economic clime. Everyone from Fidelities ex pres to Greenspun himself are saying this is within normal bounds. Market correction, 15, 7, 2 year cycles of possible slows and gains, etc.)

We've got a long road to go, and due to technology it has the ability to shift much more readily, and much more apparently now. 5 years ago I thought I knew what was going to happen. Minor things like browser wars and such are easy to forcast, but where Internet2 begins and FTL communication come in, who knows. I follow a general Libertarian view, but are we ready for that much freedom? I feel I am, but by looking at all the worried day traders, they obviously have too much control.

Where are we going to be in 50 years. Severly poor countries ignored or snubbed by their neighbors? Will a global war for some resource take hold? Will space travel offer us anything but experiments, or can we use the moon as a resource? Will we find a better energy source, a more valid government, or shall we be relegated to a preindustrial age due to terrorism?

I don't know anymore, and you know what, I don't care. I'm living my life the best and most constructive way possible gaining whatever experiences I can along the way. That is what works for me. What I really wish is that we could legally cull the herd from time to time.

Sunstein is wrong

[briancarnell]

It is the traditional media, such as newspapers and television which have a relatively monolithic, inbred viewpoint.

Take something like the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Before the net, for the most part you'd have to rely on the relatively bland reporting from traditional newspapers and maybe a quick 2 minute clip on the news if something big happens.

On the Internet it takes just a few minutes to get not only very detailed coverage, but coverage from any number of political points of view, from far right Israeli supporters to far left Palestinian supporters.

If some people still choose only to get one narrow view, it's because they've been trained so well by traditional media outlets.

Re:Sunstein is wrong

[cowscows]

The problem with the internet is that the detailed coverage can be overwhelming, and the different points of view can conflict and confuse. A lot of people like their information in easily digestible, bite size chunks. And while it's sad that that often results in watered down biased commentary instead of intelligent and concise articles, it's ingrained into many people's attention spans.

The internet was founded on the exchange of information, but for a number of reasons, wasn't established with any real way to verify said info. And while the stories and opinions given by more traditional media aren't always complete or accurate, they still carry more validity in the minds of the public just due to tradition.

The information overload that the internet can so easily press on us seems to me to be an almost impossible challenge to reliably and fairly overcome. As people begin to realize that like the real world, the internet is full of people who want to take your money, not make the world a better place, of course their faith in it as a revolution will falter.

It's not that the internet isn't living up to its possibilities, it's that it's falling short of greatly accelerated and overstated expectations.

Re:Sunstein is wrong

[StoryMan]

Well, yes and no.

I'll agree with the idea of "monolithic" coverage. Yes, old-school press and news outlets have been monolithic in their coverage for years and years.

But I disagree with your essential assertion that the internet engenders a more "polylithic" (or, I suppose, "polyphonic") view -- and is (ergo) better.

I mean, yeah, many viewpoints are better than one viewpoint -- you can argue this successfully -- but many viewpoints don't necessarily get us any closer to the "truth" -- or, more realistically, don't *necessarily* approach a heightened or a more critical understanding of the specific events in which we hope to *approach truth*.

It is here -- that many voices aren't necessarily better than one voice -- where I differ with many of the critics (Katz included) that call this sort of thing a "revolution."

The polyphony engendered by the internet is (I suppose) a necessary condition of heightened critical awareness but it's not a sufficient condition. It doesn't (by itself) guarantee we're getting "better" or "clearer" or more "critical" information on -- to use your example -- the Israeli/Palestinian conflict.

What many critics fail to mention, I think, is that the *people who utilize the net* must develop a "critical awareness" above and beyond the information gathering abilities that the net allows We must be able to sort through the polyphony of voices and determine our own version of "truth" or at least determine the actions that we must take to lead us closer to "truth."

This is why I think that, yes, the net is nifty and all that -- but the burden still rests on the individual. Perhaps it partly rests upon the state or the nation to support the individual in his or her "mission to glean the truth." I don't know. I suspect that is dangerous.

But to imply that just because the net offers many voices we should embrace the net is, IMHO, a wrong headed reading of the "net revolution."

I think Katz's series, moreover, is flawed from the get-go. I don't understand his notion of "revolution." What, exactly, is the net "revolting" against? How do we differentiate revolution from evolution? And what if the net is actually a "counterrevolution?"

What if the revolution actually exists *outside* of the "internet" and is in fact the triumph of capitalism and the triumph of corporations to control the state?

What if the "net" is actually some sort of "socialist" counter-revolution that threatens to undermine the fundamental tenets of global capitalization? (It threatens, for example, to make extinct the notion of "intellectual property." I mean, really: just what is "intellectual property?" It's not a natural right. Where does our notion of "intellectual property" actually come from?)

Re:Sunstein is wrong

[Moofie]

Did those 94,800 pages somehow leap off the screen and force their way into your consciousness? There are a hell of a lot more books at my university's library (or, for that matter, at Barnes and Noble) than I have any desire, or even ability, to read in my lifetime. Somehow, though, I manage to get in and out having obtained only the information I'm interested in.

Information overload is a luddite buzzword, and nothing else. Maybe when I have a direct neural connection to the 'Net that force-fills my consciousness with useless data, information overload will be a problem....but that's why I'm not going to have a direct neural connection to the 'Net...

Ok Katz, that's it

[Kasreyn]

I'm bored of this. You are now the first /. editor to have the amazing honor (nyuk nyuk) of being placed on my "please don't plague me with articles by this editor" list. In case you care why, it has something to do with a neverending string of pompous, self-important articles about this sort of thing, whose only apparent purpose is to inflate the average slashdotter's sense of superiority. Not only are you a huge Karma Whore (though you're an editor and don't need it), you are also in Dogbert's words "an elitist technology bigot", and I'm tired of it.

If I want to talk to self-important assholes with rampant ego problems, there's always alt.religion.kibology. I read /. for real news.

Sorry to post offtopic here, but I thought you deserved to know.

-Kasreyn

Moderation Necessary for Healthy Exchange

[JAVAC THE GREAT]

Without moderation, it would not be possible to have a sensible exchange of ideas on the internet. As the number of people online grows and the number of places on the internet to exchange ideas shrinks, conversation will become more and more convoluted until there is nothing left but noise.

What can we do? The best thing to do IMHO is to apply a sort of "darwinistic" moderation system. Comments and ideas that are inherently inferior are filtered from view. For example, on slashdot, if one idea is bad, it can be moderated so low that most people cannot see it. Then, any replies (i.e., descendants) of that message are also rendered invisible.

This sort of system makes it easier to concentrate on the more important (or better), and thus, more highly moderated comments. Slashdot has created a system that is IMHO ahead of its time. I think we will see and more and more of this kind of darwinistic content control over the internet as the signal to noise ratio rises, and I think that it will lead to a better exchange of ideas, and in the end, everyone will benefit. Censorship will not be necessary because the system will inherently censor unwanted material. Thus inappropriate material will not be visible to thus who should not be viewing it. Since moderation is established by community standards, this actually fits the legal definition of obscenity, so any negatively moderated ideas are automatically, legally, obscene. This frees the admins of such a medium from legal obligation to monitor content.

Thus, it is clear that such a sytem is both necessary and beneficial, rather than restrictive. Given the current environment of net culture, with its pervasise goatsecx links and rampant flamage and trollage, such a system will unquestionably do more good than harm.

internet virtual community == myth

[nate1138]

Every time someone mentions virtual community on the internet my stomach turns. It really is just that, virtually a community, but not quite. Sure people will ramble on about the WELL and other successful ventures like slashdot. However these are merely the exceptions that prove the rule. The only kind of online community that really had any credence was the old BBS scene. This was due to the fact that these people generally lived in the same geographic region, had similar environments, and had common threads, the very things that define community. They tended to have face-to-face get togethers (anyone remember board parties??) and were generally more intimate than anyone in the vastness of the corporatized internet is capable of.

Katz gets it wrong, again.

[Sodium Attack]

"Flamers, fanatics, spammers, and other e-vandals" are only a small part of the problem. Yes, they exist, and yes, they make it more difficult to communicate, but the "problem" (if it really is one) exists even without them.

Even if you read /. at -1, the majority of comments posted to an article are on topic. Yet, I browse most articles at 3, and set my threshold lower only for those articles I'm especially interested in. It's not that the posts at 2 and 1 and often even 0 don't have interesting things to say, it's just that I don't have time to read all those comments.

Katz's identification of the problem can be summed up in two sentences:

1. It would be wonderful if everyone listened to all the wonderful things everyone else had to say.
2. But people don't have time to do that.

And as we've come to expect from Katz, no suggested solution is proffered.

Why are people content to have their input filtered this way, Katz asks? Because most of us accept the reality that this volume of communication imposes upon us, and don't take it personally if other people choose not to read our comments.

"The Net is beginning to endanger a democratic socieety, Sunstein fears, with its fragmentation, advanced moderation and filtering systems."

Oh, please. Before the net, Jon, you and I had no way to communicate at all. Now you can talk, and if I choose to, I can listen to you; and if I choose to, I can ignore you. How is this less free than the situation before the net, when you and I had no effective means of communication at all, regardless of whether we wanted to communicate or not?

Freedom of speech includes more than its mere name would suggest: freedom of speech includes the freedom not to speak, the freedom to listen, and the freedom not to listen. If people choose to exercise their freedom not to listen, that is democracy in action, and not a mortal threat to democracy, as Katz would have us believe.

Hogwash

[Artagel]

Various people, Professor Sunstein at times among them, have always feared systems that are not designed to promote the messages they like, and supress the messages they dislike. They don't like political systems that seem to let the wrong kind of people 'win' and do not like systems that let the 'right' kind of message get filtered.

Democracy in a fundamental way requires a desire among a people for a common destiny. The idea of community can be an inclusive or exclusive thing. For example, the 'melting pot' theory of America is an inclusive model. The communities of the Amish are fundamentally exclusive. An Amish community does not desire a common destiny with the non-Amish community that surrounds it, it is designed to promote a separate, perhaps compatible destiny.

Democracy should be inclusive through reciprocity. That is to say, I include you and you include me. It should not be designed to be controlling. Slavery systems 'include' slaves in the society, but not in a democratic way.

The content regulation of media is primarily based on the concept of the right to not hear something. That is why there are certain words that can't be used during prime time television. One solution would be to tell people that if they don't like the media, TURN IT OFF. Then listening is not forced. The alternative, is to determine what is ok to say or not ok to say to avoid forced listening. This is Sunstein's preferred mode -- after all, he is afraid of people turning other people off, or having the freedom to do so. [Ok, maybe they aren't against the FREEDOM to do it, merely the EXERCISE of that freedom. That seems to be a distinction without a difference to me.]

Online communities are not exclusive by design. One can certainly be a member of multiple ones, and use that to cross-pollinate. SLASHDOT shows a fair bit of that. Filtering and moderation biases messages to be sure. However, filtering and moderation within one community does not mean that all communities share the same biases.

The kalidescope of viewpoints is complete when viewing the many pieces out there, not one piece in isolation. The ability to bring messages from many places in a short period of time or to filter and refilter make it possible to enjoy that kalidescope of views more easily. However, it does not readily submit to control of messages and results, which does seem to be what Professor Sunstein wants. I do not fear as he does.

Indeed Beh. Since when is hype "culture"?

[Ungrounded Lightning]

I don't think it was a revolution as much as the natural progression of evolution in human communications. Did people think they'd use a telephone til 2246?

Quite.

Television was supposed to usher in a utopia of universal education and look what that's become: Mind-numbing fluff, and the highest return-on-investment of any industry. It's not going away any time soon, is it?

The net was put together by people who have individual dreams of doing something neat. The hype about the net was put together primarily by people who were putting together hype rather than putting togehter the net. Yes they quoted some of the people working on it. So what? It's still a lot of hype.

And some of the people who put together parts of the net's applications were inspired by the hype. Again, so what? Some of the people who put together Motorola's Star Tak cellular phones were obviously inspired by Star Trek communicators. But that doesn't mean there wouldn't be cellular phones - or even folding ones - without a "Star Trek Culture", or that the lack of Iridium service would mean "the Cellular Phone Revolution" was "Breaking Faith".

It's one thing to have faith in people who actually MADE you a promise, and have them willfully fail to execute on it. It's quite another to have faith in the promises of media hype-master hangers-on and blame the real workers when the bullshit you were doesn't match what actually materializes.

And if some investors are paniced because they believed the hype, bought into the scams, and something completely different from what they expected happened, again so what? Something damned profitable for all concerned is still materializing, and it will still change the world. There's no free lunch, and no guaranteed investment. You have to do your own due dilligence, sort out the companies that will really build something profitable and invest in THOSE if you want your money to grow, and to stay around once the storms have subsided.

The networked world will continue to be a thing and to grow in my opinion. The men who have invested their lives into it won't let it die without a fight from hell.

Hear hear. And as one of the people building it I can assure you we're still on the job and it will get better.

A Lurker Speaks

[The Dodger]

It's not the technology, but how it's used...

[cougio]

In the traditional medias (TV, radio, newspaper...), information flows in only one way, from a centralized point to the masses. It is more filtered than anywhere else. Everyone gets the viewpoint of a few and have to debate using only this information. Which means that even if people make their own opinion, it's still based on a narrow view. This isn't democracy.

On the net, everyone has the possibility to have an equal say. But, being used to the traditional system, many people still go get their news from CNN.com and don't comment much. Others are too excited about being heard that they don't stop to think about what they say. It's still too new to everyone. But life has an incredible capacity to adapt itself. Things will change, and are changing. And everyone sharing ideas, debating opinions are reaching compromises is what democracy is all about. This can only be achieved on a local scale through physical meetings. And it can't be achieved through traditional medias. The net can make this possible, but the net is only a tool. Everything will depend on how it is used. Tools to not make revolutions. Humans use tools to make revolutions possible.

To summarise, the net is not a revolution: it is merely an instrument of the revolution.

Will the computer revolution bring about the victory of one class over another?

Right now, the financial elite is winning over the people. Most of you don't want to see it, but your beloved capitalism is leading us to totalitarism and the plain destruction of our Mother Earth. The net is an awesome tool for the people to inform and organize themselves to counter this. Do not expect it to do it by itself. And the technology doesn't discriminate and make itself unavailable to the masses and make them poorer and poorer. The elitism of the distribution system makes it that way. The internet could be available to everyone without any problem. And internet doesn't deceive my expectations at all. It only deceives those who wanted it to make them rich.

A revolution only leads to the same starting point if the people then put someone else in power. A true revolution gives the power to the people. Participative democracy is not only possible: it's the way to go if we want to reclaim our earth, society, freedom and happiness.

Related Links : An Anarchist FAQ - Independent Media Center - Mobilisation for Global Justice - World Social Forum - Industrial Workers of the World

Dogmatic Leaders

[DeadVulcan]

It's a valid question, even if it assumes the computer revolution was shaped like other revolutions, by a handful of dogmatic leaders advocating specific principles.

Is any revolution shaped by one individual (or even a handful)? I'm not certain that's very often true. Just how much influence can a single individual have, in changing the world?

My (completely unenlightened) guess is that more often than not, revolutions occur when a significant proportion of the population already feel that things should be different. But most people don't want to do anything about it.

Then, somebody who has the balls stands up and says it out loud. If there isn't sufficient support among the people, the individual would get shunned, ridiculed, or nailed to a cross.

But if there is enough support, the individual is hailed as the leader of a revolution. Really, the individual is not much more than a figurehead.

If there is, indeed, a revolution taking place, I think we just haven't found the right figurehead yet.

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