Angela Daniels on Hiroshi Yamamoto's The Stories of Ibis

The second part of Hiroshi Yamamoto’s science fiction work The Stories of Ibis reveals the reason for the downfall of the human civilization, and the truth is less sinister than our imaginations would lead to believe. In the telling of “The Day Shion Came” and “AI’s Story”, Yamamoto creates a world that is much more optimistic than the science fiction of the Western world.

As I thought about this story as a whole, words from our discussion of Shaviro kept coming to the forefront of my mind – science fiction creates an alternative world to examine what is wrong in the present. Yamamoto also presents this point when Ibis says “You recognize that fiction can’t simply be dismissed as ‘just fiction’ – that it is at times more powerful than the truth, that fiction has the power to transcend the truth” (290). With that thought in mind, I present the following quote for exploration:

Human thoughts are digital.

Most people see things as 0 or 1, as black or white. They see nothing in between. All chemicals are dangerous. You are either friend or foe. If you aren’t left-wing, you’re right. If you aren’t conservative, you’re liberal. Everything that great man says must be true. Everyone who thinks differently from us is evil. Everyone in that country – even the babies – is evil.

We TAIs find it surprising that humans have trouble understanding Fuzzy Concepts. When we say “Love (5+7i),” people incorrectly assume that means we only love at 50 percent, or fifty points out of a hundred total. They can’t understand that 5 is a Fuzzy Measurement. How could a concept like love possibly be expressed as an integer? (334-335)

The idea that human beings think in dichotomies has become a recurring theme in our class, but we have never compared it to being digital. It is a comparable concept, though, when examined. Right and wrong are the same as on and off, which all boils down to 0 or 1 in the digital language. What Phoebus asserts in this declaration seems to be that the TAIs in their ability to use “fuzzy measurements” are able to sense emotions in a more gradient and less extreme way. When something is neither the extreme of completely right or completely wrong, there is room for learning, growth, and development. In this way, Yamamoto signifies that our digital thinking is hindering us from reaching our full potential. If we could think in a more abstract way, utilize the Fuzzy Measurement system or at least not dismiss it as foolishness, we would be better off for it.

  This is further expressed at the very end of “AI’s Story” when Ibis tells Hideo, “You don’t need to understand. Just accept it… Rather than avoid the things we do not understand, we can simply accept them. That alone will remove all conflict from the world. That is i.” (398) Instead of avoiding or labeling the unknown or different as “bad”, we can simply accept that it is unknown and different. From there, we can choose to learn more about it until we can create a knowledgeable fuzzy measurement for it or we can decide that it’s ok to remain unknown and move on. Both options are more reasonable than fear and the often negative reactions fear induces.

The artifact I would like to examine is the Lilith’s Brood trilogy by Octavia Butler. This includes the books Dawn, Adulthood Rites, and Imago. I will more closely look at a quotation from Dawn, but I feel like the entire trilogy is pertinent to the discussion of Yamamoto. Lilith’s Brood has very similar themes to The Stories of Ibis, including what it means to be human. However, Butler’s tale is much darker and very pessimistic. This is a prime example of cultural differences in handling similar subject matter, as Octavia Butler was an African American woman who grew up in the time of the Civil Rights movement and, from that, had a very specific viewpoint.

Lilith’s Brood is set in a post-apocalyptic world. Instead of humanity realizing they are flawed and leaving the planet for beings more equipped to handle it as in The Stories of Ibis, the US and Russia have annihilated the planet in a nuclear war. Those that survived were rescued by an alien species known as the Oankali and kept in suspension on their spaceship while the Earth was restored. The first book follows Lilith Iyapo who is chosen by the Oankali to awaken the first group of people that are to be “mated” with the alien species and being again on Earth. She is met with fear, distrust, and physical violence. At one point, Lilith is discussing humanity with an Oankali and he mentions that humans have two fatally contrasting characteristics that lead to their demise. The first is intelligence, which he says is the newer characteristic. The second is my artifact, and is written so well that it deserves to be quoted at length:

You are hierarchical. That’s the older and more entrenched characteristic. We saw it in your closest animal relatives and in your most distant ones. It’s a terrestrial characteristic. When human intelligence served it instead of guiding it, when human intelligence did not even acknowledge it as a problem, but took pride in it or did not notice it at all...That was like ignoring cancer. I think your people did not realize what a dangerous thing they were doing. (Butler, 38-39)

A hierarchy can be viewed the same as digital thoughts. In saying that this thing is better than that thing, you are creating rightness for one and wrongness in the other. In this example, that type of thinking lead to the destruction of a majority of Earth and humanity. The rebuilding of humanity is also hindered by this thinking as the survivors try to assign blame for their situation on the Oankali and Lilith without examining the hatred and lack of understanding that lead to the nuclear war in the first place.

The second book follows Lilith’s son, Akin, who is the first human-born male construct (half Oankali, half Human). Prior to his birth, all construct males were Oankali-born since they were afraid that human males were too unpredictable. Akin is abducted by a band of resisters that are allowed to live on their own, but have been genetically altered so that they cannot procreate. He spends 3 years with them, and comes to the conclusion that humans must be allowed to have their own society and children, and eventually convinces the Oankali (who operate in a hive-mind/consensus society) to allow the resisters to colonize Mars. This is a very hard decision for them to make, because they are certain the fatal dueling characteristics of humanity will prevail and the resisters will eventually destroy themselves entirely.

Both Yamamoto and Butler use their stories to explore flaws in human thinking. Looking through this artifact using the original lens of science fiction as a tool for revealing current problems in the world, I have come up with the following questions:

How can we use science fiction to disrupt the tendency towards binary thinking? Is it valuable to try to do so?

In examining this question, I decided to try a thought exercise. I started by mapping out some of the fuzzy measurements that Yamamoto mentions, such as Ibis’s perfect love for her master as (3+10i) (Yamamoto, 398). I was hoping that in by mapping these varying emotions, a pattern I could recognize or understand would emerge. It did not, but it did get me to examine emotions in a different way. From there, I began to think about a subject that raises my gedoshield, a concept Yamamoto describes as “the phenomenon of people who were convinced they knew the truth unconsciously shutting out information that would correct their misconceptions” (356) and something I had recently had a discussion about with my husband. We were talking about the current divide in the political climate of America, and he was criticizing how Republicans shut out facts at any cost to cling to their beliefs. I interjected that I was equally flawed. When presented with a statistic from a right-leaning institution, I immediately assume that it was taken out of context or question the legitimacy of the study itself. I am right and they are wrong, there is no room for compromise.

To critically analyze this phenomenon within myself, I took the emotion that I have for certain conservatives and attempted to turn it into a fuzzy measurement. I decided that (-8 – 10i) was my standard for the worst possible actions: rape, pedophilia, or genocide for example. Would I put Republicanism at the same level of revulsion? Certainly not, that would clearly be unreasonable. After consideration, I decided that my feeling for Republicans can be expressed as (-2 – 3i). I added this to the fuzzy concepts map and could almost feel my gedoshield weaken a little. My views on the subject have not changed and likely will not, but I feel more open to having dialogue with someone of the opposing viewpoint. By creating a physical representation for my emotions and acknowledging my own prejudices, I am able to recognize that labeling one party right and the other wrong is counterproductive. Hopefully, this will lead to a little less black and white and a little more “fuzziness” in my own mind. In this way, a concept from a science fiction book will have helped to disrupt my own binary thought processes.

In case any of you are interested, UT-Austin's Cinema Studies department puts out an awesome blog on film, TV, and new media. It's called Flow and you can access it at http://flowtv.org/. I worked as an editor for them when I lived down there and they do a great job of bridging the academia-public divide.

Sam

Thomas Wynne on Hiroshi Yamamoto's The Stories of Ibis

“’The accident happened right after I was born, so it doesn’t bother me much. Plus, I have MUGEN Net now. When I’m online, I’m able to live just the way the normal people do. I can go window shopping, see movies, read books. I really love being able to read words that aren’t in Braille.’” (84)

            Yamamoto, The Stories of Ibis, “A Romance in Virtual Space”

“’Yeah,’ I nodded. ‘They probably couldn’t bear the solitude. So they created fantasies to escape reality.’

            ‘But those stories aren’t any less valuable than the truth. At least the heroine recognized that.’” (60)

            Yamamoto, The Stories of Ibis, Intermission 2

Selecting a quote from this work that genuinely reflected the author’s thesis was a bit difficult because the first half of the book is essentially a collection of short stories with a parallel narrative woven between them to tie them together. The first quote comes from the second story in the book, in which a young girl who spends much of her time in a virtual reality world is later revealed to be blind. This girl is able to experience things in this world that she could never experience in the real world because of her disability. I feel that this quote accurately describes in microcosm the point the author is making. The technology in “A Romance in Virtual Space” is referred to often as problematic. Addiction is mentioned, and the interface devices even feature a recommended daily use limit to assuage fears of radiation poisoning. For the girl, however, none of these fears matter because this device is also the only way that she could ever experience the sensation of sight. The goals of this quote and this story are to highlight the amazing potential a technology like virtual reality has to better the human experience in spite of all of the unfounded fears around it. When looking at the book as a whole, we see each story has a revelation much like the one from which this quote is derived, and each tells a story that downplays the modern fear of technology by presenting a scenario where the technology in question has a positive impact on the lives of those interfacing with it. In this regard, the position of the author is exposed and the closest thing to a thesis can be excavated from the text, as it were; specifically, that technology is not to be feared.

The second quote is important as well, because it makes clear the means by which Yamamoto is conveying his message. The narrator raises the same point this quote makes very often in the early intermissions following the stories and as such draws attention to why the author is using the narrative devices he is using. The author uses powerful, positive fictional stories to act as counter-points to the aspects of modern or theoretical technology that people fear. Yamamoto is trying to make the reader question, “Are the technologies that so many fear really that frightening?” After all, most of the fears of the public are founded upon fiction in the first place.

Yamamoto does this by pantomiming this dialogue by pitting the skeptical narrator against the knowledgeable Ibis. In this instance, the narrator takes the place of the reader (this is even alluded to a few times, when Ibis explains that when reading a story the reader essentially role-plays the main character, or narrator) and the author takes the place of Ibis, explaining a world where these technologies can be used positively. The debate between the two of them is essentially the author responding to the skeptical, fearful public as well as the obvious problem his approach of using fictional works presents, namely “It’s all fiction, why does it matter?”

These debates are punctuated by stories that Yamamoto intricately weaves together of progressively more abstract science fiction told in such a way that a problematic technology is introduced then solved by a story, which then also introduces another problematic technology to be solved in another story. In doing so, he is making a case that these technologies aren’t as bad as people fear. The first story deals with society’s dubious stance on virtual Internet communities and explains how the bonds formed in these communities are just as real as those formed in “real life.” This also serves as a great frame for the author’s technique, ending with the quote, “An escape from reality? Laugh if you want. To be certain, no such vessel named the Celestial existed in real life. But the bond, faith, and friendship of the crew were undeniably real.” The other stories deal similarly with virtual reality, virtual communities, and artificial intelligence.

While the author’s stance on the fear of these technologies is fairly clear, it can also be reasoned that this piece is a reaction to other fictional works and popular tropes across a variety of media. The concept of internet/virtual world addiction is a fairly hot topic in the news right now, with many news stations decrying the freedom, privacy, and escape both the Internet and virtual worlds grant as potentially dangerous. Many people also believe that the technologies Yamamoto writes about could easily be used to control the population and create dystopian futures as with Brave New World, and Noir. Then we have the giant cloud of fear surrounding AI. Countless movies, books, videogames, and TV shows have been made with networked AIs as the ultimate antagonist. To name a few, Terminator, Star Trek, and System Shock come to mind. (The intro to System Shock 2 serves as an interesting example of a female AI less enlightened than Ibis - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MXPn6wcsUmk ) There are plenty of fictional works that capitalize on this fear to create an interesting narrative. Yamamoto seems to almost be moving in direct opposition to these works, however, glorifying sentient machines and VR while demonizing the people who dismiss the technologies as silly or dangerous. The detective in the first story, for instance, reminded me exactly of the naysayers of yesteryear who looked at children and adults reading comic books and playing video games as ridiculous, unable to see the point. The “color timer” on the VR interface in the second story mirrored the apprehension in the news surrounding cell phone radiation. The fear that a child could be addicted to Internet communication or a virtual world thusly stunting their social interaction also comes up in the third story, “Mirror Girl.” All of the tales Ibis tells have some level of commentary on recent events.

This is essentially the “limit” of the text. Yamamoto generates a compelling counter to the fear-driven technological fiction and theory of other authors, but never directly says that the more positive world and stories he has crafted represents the way it will or must be. The result is a planting of a seed of doubt – doubt that the creation of AI or virtual reality really will be the end of human civilization. It is up to the reader to then form his own opinion on what must be done, given the possibilities of such technology. As such, the question that Yamamoto raises about the validity of this technophobia still stands. This novel does a very good job of being a counterbalance to the more prevalent fictions where technology can result in the destruction of humanity or freedom, and while it often presents technology in a positive light, it also does so with reservation. The AI in “Mirror Girl” is an enlightened, radiant being because it was essentially raised with humanity’s best intentions in mind. In this story, Yamamoto likens AI to a child. This makes a few logical leaps, but the allegory is fairly powerful. After all, children can turn into terrors, and eventually into vile people, but to what extent is that the fault of the parent? How would a new intelligence be anything but innocent until it is taught otherwise? In this regard, Yamamoto seems to subscribe to the school of thought that humanity is ultimately behind whether or not our technologies will destroy us, not the technologies themselves.

While this doesn’t answer the question of whether fear of powerful technologies like AI is well founded, it does strike at the heart of the issue, and allows us to look at it from a different angle. Are these technologies to be feared, or is mankind’s irresponsibility that is frightening? Do we trust each other enough to believe that an AI would take on the selfless qualities of its creators? Do we love life and each other enough to prevent our society from being consumed by a virtual world? There will be a time when some of the fiction in this book becomes reality. When that time comes, will we be ready? I'd like to think that we will be, that humanity is mature enough as a species to leave behind its questionable history. Although the book raises another possibility as we see in "A World Where Justice Is Just" - perhaps we are just as dangerous as we seem to think, but maybe the machines and AIs that we create will end up saving us from ourselves... hopefully before there is nothing left to save. 

Finally, this book immediately made me think about a humorous, but equally curious video I stumbled upon a while ago. The video is part of a series entitled, “Kids React” and in this particular case, the video shows children reacting to a huge Japanese concert in which the star performer is actually a computer-generated image with a computer-generated voice (KIDS REACT to Hatsune Miku http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=egcfC7PCneQ ). The concert itself had a massive showing (as can be seen in the video) but the children seem taken aback by the fact that the “artist” isn’t real, going so far as to say, “It isn’t music because it isn’t made by a person.” It’s a very striking dichotomy of a culture that embraces new and interesting technology like this and one that is inherently skeptical of it. Also, one of the first comments made by the children is, of course, “Robots are going to take over.” Upon reflection, if this is where AI and VR are headed, I wonder if we have anything to worry about at all.

Hey everyone. I saw this article on NPR and it reminded me of our class discussion. I think it extends our talk about privacy and ownership, and positions them against freedom of speech and expression. What does everyone think?

Response 1 to Steve Lynch on Shaviro's Connected

Our discussions based on Steven Shaviro’s Connected was focused on the consequences of our increasingly networked society and the implications of the path we are taking toward that future. Given Shaviro’s bleak outlook on our future, Steve posed two questions:
-What (if anything) can we do to improve the present(future) condition?
-Shaviro writes that we have “moved out of time and into space” (p. 249) – if this is the case, then where is a place of critique and/or change?

Humans are always struggling to improve their situtaion, be that fighting over a scrap of meat so they can survive another day or lusting after a new piece of technology that will give them an added convenience. Shaviro (and a few people during the discussion) seemed very concerned over where we were heading, sacrificing our privacy in order to participate in a service that makes our lives easier. That this act of chipping away at our percieved rights is going to lead us to a world where no one has any rights over their own lives, that we will be a “zombie workforce” that are nothing more than mindless slaves that only live to service the Machine, be it a corporation or some vast super-intelligent computer system. I would posit that nothing needs to be done to prevent this sort of thing from happening, especially in Western societies.

Western science fiction is full of examples of intelligent systems bent on the destruction of human (or all) life: The Borg, HAL, Skynet, the bugs and many others. Westerners are terrified of such systems and no matter how much we work toward creating a network or machine that can effectively think for itself there will always be some sort of safeguard to shit down that system. The President of the United States has an Internet kill switch, there would be something built in to protect the creators, even if it is as simple as Asimov’s Laws of Robotics.

The concern over the erosion of rights such as privacy and ownership are problematic in that these are things that shift over generations. The American Indian tribes are often said to have had no sense of property or ownership, but they still fought for the land that the Europeans wanted to take from them. Generations past have all had their own ideas over what could be considered “theirs” or “private.” Starting with the current generation and perhaps more so with the younger generation, these concepts are shifting yet again; perhaps we are moving toward something more “enlightened” or maybe we will all be slaves to the successor of IBM’s Watson, we will not know until we are there, but the only certain thing is that humans will always act in their own self interest. Right now, it seems best for us to give up a bit of information about what we search for on Google in order to have an excellent tool at our disposal, but in 50 or 100 years, we might have a completely different system where no one has to give up anything because everything is already out on the Internet (or whatever comes after it) and no one cares what you search about because it really doesn’t matter what you are doing in your spare time as long as you aren’t causing harm to someone else.

In regards to Steve’s second question of finding a place of critique and/or change in our current state, humans are always in that place (provided they have access to what is to be critiqued/changed). Humans are capable of great insights into the world around them, every point on a person’s timeline (including the space they are in at that point in time) is a potential place of critique and change. It helps to be able to remove yourself from a particular situation in order to think critically about it and how someone might work to change or improve it, Shaviro is doing it in Connected and we do it every class period. Shaviro claims that we have “moved out of time and into space,” but I am going to have to agree with mainstream physics in that the two cannot be divorced from one another. Everything that makes a person who they are is a product of their experiences up to and including that moment, those experiences consist of a place and a time. Take a common activity: going out to dinner, everyone has a favorite restaurant and maybe a favorite dish at that restaurant. Order that dish at that restaurant two different times and your experience will be different. Maybe the cook added too much salt or the people at the table next to you were being obnoxious. You are at the same place but at a different time. If we are no longer beings of time and space then the jerks sitting next to you at the restaurant do not matter, just that you are in the same place. Experiences make us who we are and those experiences that we hold dear are only special because they happened at a particular time and cannot revisit them; we can try to recreate them--and maybe one day we will have a technology that lets us do just that--but that recreation is always a pale imitation of the original experience.

Follow up questions:
1. Why do we have to be afraid of letting the future happen?
2. Why should we be stuck to (potentially) outmoded ideas of privacy and ownership when those models may not suit us in our present (or future) states?
3. Would privacy even matter in a society where everything and everyone is connected?

Artifacts:
C-Net’s Top 10 Evil Computers:
Western culture is horrified of computers taking control, these are just a few of the many ways we have portrayed the evil computer. We are mortified by computers becoming sentient but if we are smart about creating them, they probably won’t exterminate the human race.

The Laws of Robotics:
Isaac Asimov created a simple set of rules that all robots must follow in his stories revolving around robots. These laws have been used in many different forms over the years and I do not see any sentient or near sentient forms of computer being created without a similar safeguard in place.

Humanity in the 24th Century:



A small series of clips from the episode The Neutral Zone of Star Trek: The Next Generation where members of the crew of the Enterprise explain society in the 24th Century to a group from the 21st Century. An example of a society where humans with advanced computers and networks were able to outgrow some of the concerns that Shaviro raises in Connected.

Steve Lynch on Shaviro's Connected

“Science fiction is about the shadow the future casts on the present” -- Steven Shaviro

“The future will be better tomorrow” -- Dan Quayle

The second half of Shaviro’s book turns from the vaguely unsettling predictions of authors like K.W. Jeter and attempts to paint a picture, not of the future casting a shadow on the present, but rather of the present casting a (formidable) shadow on the future. The misanthropy of predictive science fiction, ranging from dirtily noir to disgustingly horrific (e.g. the “trophy-ization” of copyright pirates) becomes grounded in a sort of all-encompassing critique of capitalism that not only depresses, but also leaves little room for the admittedly humanist emotional response to depression known colloquially as “hope”. No, former VP Quayle, the future will in fact not be better tomorrow.

Of course, in the face of such a future, can we not at least dredge up a bit of nostalgia for the past? Well, no – at least not according to Shaviro, who eviscerates nostalgia as the inevitable commodification of our own projections and fantasies of the past to be sold back to us in a sort Pynchon-ian nightmare-mall.

In the face of such a future, what recourse do we have affect some sort of change? That becomes a central question in the reading of Shaviro’s text. And indeed, he paints an intentionally dire/bleak/depressing picture of the future in a networked society in order to get the reader to think beyond vague revolutionary “fuck-the-man” ideology, and at least identify what won’t work – indeed, what won’t even be worth our time to try.

A familiar thread of dualism/non-dualism gratefully courses through Shaviro’s text, grounding it to a larger discourse that we can latch on to; even better, the concept of ‘being-in’, of existence in the space between dualities (what Shaviro calls extrabeing) appears as a sort of holy (non)place wherein crisis and critique exist. In that regard, then, the text connects at least to the work of Frances Dyson, who, as we have already discussed, critiqued the oppositional nature of duality. Shaviro’s argument is not totally congruous to Dyson’s, but at least it establishes a forum with which to unpack an excerpt of the text.

The struggle of Cyberspace versus Homunculus can be read, ambiguously, both as homogenizing, universalizing capitalist power versus local resistance, and as cosmopolitan versus oppressive cultural conformity. Biotech companies versus indigenous peoples, but also the World Trade Center versus Al-Qaeda. This is the politics of the 21^st century. As Castells suggests, the globalizing, capitalist “network society” is contested by a multitude of “local” affirmations of identity. These affirmations range from gay and feminist movements to ecological activism to various nationalisms and religious fundamentalisms. But what makes the situation even more complex is that the two sides borrow from one another. Global flows of capital invest and commodify all these local identities, even as the identity movements themselves take the form of networks, all the better to contest the networked global order. – p. 236, Connected

When Shaviro writes about Cyberspace, he means “the seamlessness and ‘unthinkable complexity’ of the system of post human, virtual existence” (i.e. the network); and what he calls Homunculus is the “stunted and shrunken residue of humanity, possibly monstrous” – referring, in part, to the zombification of the labor force (Shaviro p. 235).

The ambiguity and complexity and interchangeability that Shaviro describes I think captures the essence of the ‘extrabeing’. On the surface, the oppositional forces listed above generate conflict, but a reading of those forces as potentially non-dual reveals that “they are ways of finding ambiguous points of potential, gaps in the linear chain of causality, unexpected openings to new, emergent processes” (Shaviro p. 224). So it is not the space that exists between Cyberspace and the Homunculus that invokes extrabeing, as much as it is the fact that these societal forces have so much in common with the opposition and generate so much contradiction internally.

Again we come to the overarching question that shades any reading of Shaviro’s Connected, namely, in such a harsh critique of capitalism/society/the present, dominant ideology, what (if anything) can we do to improve the present(future) condition? Secondly, Shaviro writes that we have “moved out of time and into space” (p. 249) – if this is the case, then where is a place of critique and/or change?

As I have suggested, the where is an ambiguous in-between; Shaviro seems to think that this ambiguous in-between can be a place of crisis – which he says is “a point at which we are suddenly able to think (and to demand) everything, even the impossible” (p. 225). This seems like a pretty good start; except that Shaviro then goes on to cite Stars in My Pocket Like Grains of Sand, which describes a certain general state of crisis known as “Cultural Fugue”, which is essentially total planetary annihilation.

There are a number of threads to follow here. We could perhaps affect change from outside the network, except that Shaviro believes that one cannot exist outside the network except in cases where the network actively ejects and disconnects people and places from it (p. 176). What results from such an ejection is what Shaviro calls “informational black holes” wherein peoples are stripped of their identities and individualities, to apparently become one giant orgiastic “orgynism”. Or something. What is clear is that non-networked critiques of said network are generally assumed to be impossible.

Within the network, of course, you’re either a zombie (dead labor), or you’re the elite, skimming profits from the zombified work force (p. 166). So it would seem that critique from within the network is pretty difficult as well. Herein is the critique of capitalism, namely, that the work force is becoming ever larger even as it is becoming ever more hidden and invisible. Interestingly, Shaviro writes that the zombie/workforce circulates between alienated production and conspicuous consumption (p. 172); whereas I would suggest that the two are not antithetical or even endless feedback loops: in point of fact, an alienated workforce necessarily must consume the very goods they invisibly produce.

This discussion evolves into fields of sociobiology, and I found the segment on nature and culture particularly interesting. Shaviro sets up (as he has throughout the book) dual or opposing points of view only to point out that their opposition is at the very least deceiving and usually ambiguous and/or moot. In any case, Shaviro presents the work of Richard Dawkins contra that of Susan Blackmore, and the discourse generally revolves around genetic transmission versus memetic transmission (genetic traits being those that are inherent and passed down through parental lineage vs. memetic traits, which are suggested to be learned behaviors propagated laterally – like a virus). On a more basic level, the conflict (which, recall is not really a conflict because the two principles are not antithetical) revolves around notions of purpose. That is, there seems to be some disagreement as to whether the impulse for, say, religious belief, has any Darwinian survivalist purpose other than the continued propagation of that belief. As Shaviro puts it, “these ‘selfish replicators’ work just to perpetuate themselves, even if this be at our expense”.

In a recent episode of WTF with Marc Maron, Marc talks about a microbial parasite that uses mice to make them more fearless so that cats can more easily feed on fearless mice. This is a fascinating biological phenomenon that seems to operate in nearly the same way as the so-called selfish memetic replicators Shaviro discusses.

In any case, I think it is important to return to the idea of ambiguity and extrabeing. At its most basic level, Connected is a warning to not get caught up in the glam of ubiquitous connectivity, the sexiness of devices and the concept of progress. Much as Jeremy Bailey worked to actively create an amateur and unsexy aesthetic, Shaviro works to actively remind us that the network is not the triumphant socializing force it is often made out to be. Shaviro also warns us not to get too caught up in rushing to critique the network by joining some “other”, some ideological outsider that proclaims to be persecuted by said network. That is the path, according to Shaviro, of fundamentalist extremism – which shares many of the fascist qualities of the network itself. Shaviro doesn’t offer a rosy view of the future (which is now, or at the very least coming sooner than we think – another of Shaviro’s points), nor does he offer any easy solutions. And that, I think, is the point: we are meant to be frightened by Shaviro’s perspective, and we are meant to see that there are no simple solutions, for the very reason that a solution is antithetical to a problem; and – most basically – Shaviro is critiquing the notion of dualistic opposition. Therefore, we are exhorted to reside in a state of ambiguity and uncertainty.

Famous New Media Artist Jeremy Bailey

Here is a good introduction to Jeremy Bailey at the Creators Project site:

Famous New Media Artist Jeremy Bailey Finds Facts Funnier Than Fiction

Jeremy will be a virtual guest in the Hypercube at DU today, February 21, at 4pm.

Mike Wesch, Then & Now, Before & After

Here are links to Mike Wesch's major videos: "An anthropological introduction to YouTube"

"Web 2.0 ... The Machine is Us/ing Us"

And here is his recent article in The Chronicle of Higher Education:
"A Tech-Happy Professor Reboots After Hearing His Teaching Advice Isn't Working"

Response 2 to Sam Jay on Jaron Lanier

In his post regarding Lanier’s You Are Not a Gadget, Sam Jay asked the following primary question: How have the structures of the Internet, specifically web 2.0, influenced and affected the autonomy of its users?

Sam makes an apt observation in recognizing that sites such as Facebook and Twitter limit the avenues of expression available to their users. This is a prime example of how web 2.0 has hampered user autonomy. This is to more easily lump users into defined demographics, as the sites will deliver users to advertisers. One must note, however, that these services brought in enormous clusters of new users that likely had little or no web presence beforehand. Those with additional knowledge of the Internet and web development likely had web presences before joining sites like Facebook and Twitter, and such web presences were likely more autonomous and may have included personal websites.

Although sites like Facebook and Twitter limit avenues of user expression, they lower the amount of skills necessary to create an online presence, reducing the required skill level and allowing casual users to create presences. This is a critical point, and the answer to Sam’s primary question rests upon it. It seems as though the structures of the Internet have hampered autonomy for new, less skilled, casual users, but not for more advanced users. Those who had relatively autonomous presences before are likely to still have them on other platforms. Furthermore, some casual users who first create online presences on Facebook or Twitter are likely to expand their skill sets to create more autonomous presences. One could almost consider sites like Facebook and Twitter to be Internet training grounds for casual users. Consider Wordpress, which is popular among casual users who wish to create blogs. Wordpress makes the process incredibly easy, catering to casual users by allowing them to engage in high-level management, selecting from predetermined visual themes and styles when constructing their blogs. However, it also offers more advanced users the ability to engage in lower level blog management, customizing even the tiniest details of their blogs. This directly tempts casual users to learn more about HTML and web development to customize their blogs and thus become more autonomous.

If one is to place value judgments on the lack of autonomy available on sites such as Facebook and Twitter, one must consider the alternative: no web presence for casual users. (Consider the first follow-up question: Is it better to have a web presence plagued with a lack of autonomy or no web presence at all?) It becomes interesting to ponder how Lanier would respond to this question. On page 70, he writes of the models that reduce autonomy. “When we ask people to live their lives through our models, we are potentially reducing life itself. How will we ever know what we might be losing?” Considering the rhetoric of the final sentence of the excerpt Sam selected gives some insight as well: “…using computers to reduce individual expressions is a primitive, retrograde activity, no matter how sophisticated your tools are” (Lanier, 48). Lanier does not consider the alternative, and it seems as though he may side on having no web presence. Sites such as Facebook act to reduce the channels of individual expression, which he condemns.

I would personally disagree with the thought that asking people to live their lives through our models potentially reduces life itself. While it may reduce one’s ability to thoroughly express his or her opinions, it at least provides some means of expression. Thus, returning to the first question, I would argue that a non-autonomous web presence is better than none. The dangers of opting out of web participation are simply too high. When important personal news is increasingly being shared on outlets such as Facebook, one cannot afford to exclude him or herself. This leads to an interesting question regarding the validity of information shared on platforms such as Facebook. (See question three: If the means of expression are inadequate, can the content being shared be deemed acceptable as a faithful personal expression?)

Follow-up questions:
1. Is it better to have a web presence plagued with a lack of autonomy or no web presence at all?
2. What might Lanier’s thoughts be regarding Wordpress, which allows users to both subscribe to existing models and create their own unique frameworks for delivering information?
3. Lanier feels reducing the avenues of individual expression available to users on sites such as Facebook is harmful. If the means of expression are inadequate, can the content being shared be deemed acceptable as a faithful personal expression?

Links
1. http://www.oregonlive.com/politics/index.ssf/2011/12/blogger_doesnt_get_journalists.html
In the spirit of the discussion of investigative blogs, this story in Portland-based The Oregonian addresses whether bloggers are granted journalistic protection. In this case, a court ruled that bloggers are not granted such protection, but that they are subject to punishments for violating journalistic standards.
2. http://www.fox43.com/news/wpmt-facebook-predator-charged-for-fake-facebook-profile-to-have-sex-with-young-girls-20120210,0,5052411.story
While yelling “fire” in a crowded theater may not be subject to free speech protection, the question arises of where an analogous line must be drawn on the Internet. Perhaps this news story will provide some answers. Perhaps the line should be drawn when bodily harm can result (in this case, possible rape).
3. http://www.facebook.com/seattledigitalliteracy
Whether Facebook and other social networking sites reduces digital literacy is a valid question. But what happens when organizations actually use Facebook to promote digital literacy? This non-profit from my hometown is doing just that. With the medium and the message being potentially at odds with one another, what is the end result?

Response 1 to Sam Jay on Jaron Lanier

Reflecting on the discussion and the numerous points Sam laid out in his blog, it seems to me that there is at once a great deal to think about with regard to Lanier’s manifesto. I will try to limit myself to a response centered on Sam’s questions regarding the Arab Spring, and I will pose an unasked but inherent question as well. Recall that Sam wondered what Lanier would have had to say about the Occupy movement’s lack of success, and about the repercussions of an “angry mob” putting the wrong groups in power. To those questions I would add: What problems might Lanier have had with Web 2.0’s so-called pervasiveness in the Arab Spring movements, especially in Egypt?

On the surface, let us acknowledge that the Arab Spring and Occupy Wall Street movements are an attractive comparison. While they share casual semblances (and while the Occupy supporters were wont to invoke mantras of the Arab Spring), the two movements highlight cultural differences between America and, well, pretty much everyone else. From an American media perspective, it’s tantalizing to look at the revolution in, say, Egypt, and see the power of social media at work. The reality of the situation, as Lanier might see it, is a difference in conceptualization. To Lanier, Web 2.0 is a tool. To the Egyptian protesters, Web 2.0 is a tool. To us, watching Revolution unfold on Twitter and Facebook and live streams on CNN, Web 2.0 is a triumph, a cultural prophet with the almost-divine ability to galvanize young people around a zeitgeist. For Americans, the Arab Spring was the ascension of Web 2.0: we mystified its properties, and gasped collectively as something material became something holy

Of course, no one bothers to ask how the Arab Spring and subsequent deification of Web 2.0 contributed to Facebook’s $5 billion IPO – the largest in web history - and its estimated worth of between $75 and $100 Billion (with a "B"). Likewise, folks seem to be okay with the ubiquitous dissemination of Western culture to Arab countries via Facebook and Twitter. I am reminded of the passage Sam selected to ground his discussion of the text. In America, Web 2.0 was deified by the Arab Spring, but its promulgation in countries like Egypt can only be seen as an attempt to convert pagan nations to an American religion. Lanier would see this act of Western globalization as an affront to cultural heterogeneity

Lanier’s problem with Web 2.0, I think, boils down to a problem of identity-crafting. In Lanier’s eyes, Web 2.0 locks people in to certain ways of crafting an identity. As Sam wrote, the elements of his Facebook profile may not limit his understanding of himself, but “they are the options I was given to describe who I am and they also allow me to mold my identity into a much more “ideal” me”. Lanier fears that the reductionism and categorization of identity will at some point work both ways. That is, what happens when we begin to conceive of ourselves in terms of a Facebook profile? Right now, we cram ourselves into our social network accounts, but only those parts that there are “boxes” for, and only those parts that comprise our “ideal” selves. What happens, Lanier might wonder, when we begin to see ourselves as a compilation of profiles and boxes for others’ consumption?

At the heart of this problematization is the latent concept that identities are now available for consumption – and not just by the sale of our interests, a la Google, but by other individuals as well. In a literal and metaphorical sense, identity has become currency, and everyone seems to be okay with this because of the ascendancy of Web 2.0. Not only do we have authoritarian control over our material identities, but we also actively try to capitalize on what we’re selling, just as Google has capitalized on who we are.

Of course, the next two things I’m going to do once I post this blog will be to check my Facebook and Twitter accounts. Does that make me a hypocrite? Yeah, probably. 

In addition to the question I posed in the first paragraph of this response, I’d like to ask: What would Frances Dyson, writing from a post-humanist, non-dualist perspective, have to say about the mystification and immersive qualities of Web 2.0?

I've linked an article that criticizes Facebook's structure for being non-democratic while positioning itself as a democratizing force.

Consider as well an article by Thomas Friedman that suggests Web 2.0 is "inverting the power pyramid".

What was that about anonymity?

Sam Jay on Jaron Lanier's You Are Not a Gadget

How have the structures of the internet, specifically web 2.0, influenced and affected the autonomy of its users?

“Something like missionary reductionism has happened to the internet with the rise of web 2.0. The strangeness is being leached away by the mush-making process. Individual web pages as they first appeared in the early 1990s had the flavor of personhood. MySpace preserved some of the flavor, though a process of regularized formatting had begun. Facebook went further, organizing people into multiple-choice identities, while Wikipedia seeks to erase point of view entirely.

If a church or government were doing these things, it would feel authoritarian but when technologies are the culprits, we seem hip, fresh, and inventive. People will accept ideas presented in technological form that would be abhorrent in any other form. It is utterly strange to hear my many old friends in the world of digital culture claim to be the true sons of the Renaissance without realizing that using computers to reduce individual expressions is a primitive, retrograde activity, no matter how sophisticated your tools are” (Lanier 48).

Lanier is making two significant moves in this quote: 1. He is highlighting the way web 2.0, specifically through programs like Facebook and Twitter, is fragmenting identities so that users can be more easily organized, controlled, and guided to create; and 2. He is making a comparison between the contemporary usages of web 2.0 and devices of authority we usually associate with more oppressive, i.e. non-democratic societies.

The “missionary reductionism” is one step in the colonization of the mind that Lanier fears is happening in the contemporary interactions between humans and computers. In the case of Facebook, Twitter, and many other social networking sites, users are given categories that influence their understandings of the self and their realities as these understandings are molded to fit into these rather specific categories. For example, according to my Facebook profile I am “married to Catherine Jay,” I “work at Regis University,” and I “study at the University of Denver.” These fragments of my identity are not how I understand myself, but they are the options I was given to describe who I am and they also allow me to mold my identity into a much more “ideal” me. Therefore, this may not be the “real” me, but this is the “Samuel Jay” that other Facebook users are able to consume.

It seems that Lanier is reticent to say this fragmentation is simply for economic purposes. It is the adage that Facebook is squeezing us into groups so that advertisers who will eventually use the site to market directly to our friends and us. This is yet to take off and Lanier does not see it happening on any earth-shattering scale. However, he does recognize that this move towards fragmentation is limiting creativity and forcing users to express themselves in a very specific way. Thus, while the splitting of identities into bytes of information might lead to a universal consciousness that we might be able to plug into, it is limiting the ways we are able to create and criticize. When the templates for art and the templates for analysis are handed to us, there are certain forms our creativity must take.

Lanier is also highlighting the hypocrisy inherent in viewing web 2.0 as a tool of liberation, especially in the ways it is being used at the moment. Web 2.0 and the programs making up its structure is taking up the same techniques of control that we tend to believe only exist in oppressive societies. People are fragmented into bits that come to define who they are, not necessarily to themselves or to those who have daily interactions with them, but to the system of control. Thus, I am not “Samuel Jay,” but rather a profile made up of likes and dislikes, hobbies and friends. This process of fragmentation not only allows people to be treated as objects (cogs in the system), but also allows people to be organized into controllable herds. Once this organization occurs we begin to think and create as a group rather than as autonomous entities, and our expressions are then much easier to mold.

Both of Lanier’s observations reaffirm the thesis of the first half of his book: that web 2.0 and the current state of the internet are beginning to fulfill the desires of cybernetic totalism and digital Maoism, thus leading towards a shared consciousness where creativity and criticism are structured by the system and autonomy is superficial. Lanier’s issue with the desire for shared consciousness is that it is driven by two beliefs: 1. Knowledge is finite and, 2. A complete truth can be known. These believers in technological utopia see us plugging in, combining what we know, and coming to a complete understanding of the world. This sounds great in theory, but what happens when you do not agree with the collective or when group-think trumps actual facts? Criticism becomes impossible and in a similar way, so does creativity.

Expressing one’s self becomes impossible in web 2.0 as it has drifted far from the collective dreams Lanier and his cohorts had for the internet during the 1980s and 1990s. If there is one thread that connects Lanier’s anecdotes and examples throughout the first half of the book it is that the collective is great in theory, but once the software (both figurative and literal) begins to lock us in, it becomes impossible to actually practice.

In trying to find a cultural artifact that might work against Lanier’s argument I am drawn to the “Arab Spring” and the role social media and Wikileaks played as catalysts in the uprising. In this situation it would appear that web 2.0 was being used in a collective and progressive ways, changing and advancing entire nations. Here hashtags, TweetPics, Wikileak information, and similar fragments were assembled by protesters and used for a mobilization that would eventually play significant roles in overthrowing the governments of Egypt and Libya.

In regards to this situation, I ask two questions:

1. If similar uses of fragmented information can be found in the “Occupy Movement” here in the United States, how might Lanier explain the lack of success it has had?

2. In his section “How to Use a Crowd Well” (56-59) Lanier argues that the collective can become an angry mob rather quickly allowing for change that comes too fast that puts the wrong people in power. What sort of affects could similar change have in these Arab Spring countries?

It was recently uncovered by a RealityTea.com, celebrity gossip blog using information from a collection of contributors, that a scene from E!’s Kim and Kourtney Take New York in which Kim Kardashian and her mother Kris are talking about Kim’s relationship with husband Kris Humphries was not shot in Dubai, where the daughter and mother were vacationing prior to the Kardashian-Humphries divorce, but was actually shot after the divorce in hopes of getting more sympathy for Kim when the season finale aired a few weeks ago.

The backlash has yet to coalesce, but in terms of Lanier’s work, the situation poses some interesting questions:

1. How does this situation reaffirm Lanier’s disdain for collective intelligence and networking? What might he say about a group coming together to crack popular culture mysteries rather than working towards more beneficial progress?

2. How could this event have repercussions for reality TV and if the backlash does happen, how might it change the media landscape in a way Lanier might actually support?

Data Claim Warrant

http://www.vanderbilt.edu/AnS/english/mwollaeger/cdw.htm

Response 2 to Steve Rakoczy on Henry Jenkins

In our class discussion, Steve related the material Convergence Culture by Henry Jenkins to the internet vigilante groups Anonymous and Lulzsec. From this, he posed the following questions:

…but if Jenkins sees some of the activities of groups like the Survivor Spoilers as "interference," what must he think when a relatively small number of people take down Paypal because they stopped processing payments for WikiLeaks? Should the world's population be subject to the whims of a headless organization that anyone can claim to represent? More importantly, are these forms of protests even accomplishing their original goals?

This is a lot to digest, and as we discovered in class, difficult to respond to in one coherent way. We went from discussions of the value of play, to personal stories about the effects of groups such as Anonymous, and somehow ended up exploring in depth comic books, continual reboots of beloved series, and responsibilities to loyalties versus attracting new fans. As you can imagine, formulating my thoughts from Steve’s questions and our class discussion has been challenging.

I’ll start with the first question. Would Jenkins consider Anonymous to be a natural progression of collective intelligence? Is it the personification of “imagine the kinds of information these fans could collect, if they sought to spoil the government rather than the networks” (29)? Well, on that account I would say that yes, it is the perfect example of what would happen if collective intelligence was used for more “serious” purposes. However, that doesn’t address the question on how Jenkins must feel about the way this power is being used. To explore this, I will jump to the end of the paragraph that the previous quote begins: 

 … I would argue that one reason more Americans do not participate in public debates is that our normal ways of thinking and talking about politics require us to buy into what we will discuss later in this chapter as the expert paradigm: to play the game, you have to become a policy wonk, or, more accurately, you have to let a policy wonk do your thinking for you. One reason why spoiling is a more compelling practice is because the way knowledge gets produced and evaluated is more democratic. Spoiling is empowering in the literal sense in that it helps participants to understand how they may deploy the new kinds of power that are emerging from participation within knowledge communities. (29)

From this, it can be inferred that Jenkins might think that Anonymous and Lulzsec are just part of the process of collective intelligence and that they are contributing members in shaping the future of participation culture. Whether he believes they are an “interference” or not might be beside the point. They are an active part of convergence culture, which can never be objectively judged, especially from the inside.

Jumping to the last question posed by Steve, if Anonymous represents collective intelligence, there can not truly be one goal. An individual acting at a specific time might have their own goal, and I might go as far as to say every individual working together to accomplish one task has an overarching goal, but those goals are very specific and limited. In speaking of the Survivor Spoilers, Jenkins says:

Because they are voluntary, people do not remain in communities that no longer meet their emotional or intellectual needs. Because they are temporary, these communities form and disband with relative flexibility. Because they are tactical, they tend not to last beyond the tasks that set them in motion. (57)

This is even truer for a group like Anonymous since members work only on the projects that interest them. While one member might belong to the group because they want to do better the world, another might be active simply because they are bored and possess the skill sets to hack into a major network. This, of course, brings up the larger issue of what “bettering the world” means. My definition of good is probably vastly different from even some people in our class of ten people, imagine that definition compared to hundreds of thousands of others worldwide. Therefore, assessing whether these tactics are effective in accomplishing their goal cannot be determined.

Further Questions

1. Our recent discussions have made me think about dichotomies in my own life and beliefs, and I was astonished to discover how easily I label things right or wrong, good or bad, and even justified or grievous. Is this human nature, or are we taught to polarize everything?
   
2. At the end of the introduction, Jenkins asserts that “we are entering an era of prolonged transition and transformation in the way media operates” (24). In the 5 years since this book was published, do you believe we are still in a period of transition, or is convergence and participation so engrained in our current media that we can say we are transformed?

Links

1. This is an example of how good intentions can lead to unexpected consequences. http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2011/nov/02/anonymous-zetas-hacking-climbdown
2. Henry Jenkins wrote this blog post about the Occupy movement, but there are parallels to further explore how he might feel about Anonymous. "Occupy, if anything, pushes tactics of transmedia mobilization even further. Refusing to anchor a singular meaning behind the movements keeps the conversations alive, allows for more people to join and help reshape the message, enables quick and tactical responses to outside challenges, and supports creative responses from all participants." http://henryjenkins.org/2011/10/the_revolution_will_be_hashtag.html
3. Perfect example of how American Idol has shaped current TV practices. Winners of The Voice are determined not only by votes, but also by revenue generated from iTunes purchases of their performances. All the while, the TV show and contestants are Twittering during the show. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Voice_(U.S.)

Response 1 to Steve Rakoczy on Henry Jenkins

In the first discussion of Convergence Culture by Henry Jenkins, the question of the day was whether or not these “knowledge communities” discussed in the text were effective.  This question alone led us to a varied array of discussion topics from knowledge communities to ethics. In regards to the effectiveness of knowledge communities, I feel like they genuinely are. This efficacy is, however, limited in some capacity by not only the knowledge of their members but more importantly the desires and flaws of their constituents.

In an attempt to analyze the efficacy of the knowledge community, we found it necessary to identify the knowledge community’s goal before we were able to truly decide whether or not they were effective. This proves to be very difficult, as the knowledge community itself is comprised of many different people, all with their own individual goals. As we saw in the first chapter of Convergence Culture, the members of the Survivor Sucks community didn’t feel vindicated by ChillOne’s predictions being somewhat accurate. They felt let down and even went as far as to say that he “ruined” the season (Kindle location 1009, just before the “Monitoring Big Brother” sidebar). This directly contradicts the community’s self-proclaimed goal of “spoiling” the survivor results for themselves because that is exactly what ChillOne did – he spoiled the ending of the entire season by telling the community with a fair degree of accuracy what was going to happen. This raises the question, “If they didn’t want the show spoiled, then why go through all the work to spoil it?” Jenkins alludes to the fact that this community in particular was more interested in the process used to spoil the show rather than the actual spoiling. While I think this is partially true, I think looking at the goals of Anonymous provide a much better example of why the Survivor spoilers were so upset.

In our discussion of Anonymous and whether or not their goals are being accomplished, I came to the conclusion that they didn’t really have “goals” in the traditional sense. There was no grand scheme or overarching agenda to their actions; they simply did whatever they felt like at the time and did so until they were successful or got bored.  Upon reflection, I began to wonder if this is actually the case with similar knowledge communities. There are definitely strong parallels to be drawn between Anonymous and the Survivor spoilers, both in their seemingly limitless access to information and organizational structure (or lack thereof). I initially thought that the reason the spoilers were so upset after ChillOne’s predictions turned out to be largely true was because they were confused as to what their true goal was. Upon reflection, however, I’m starting to think that each member of the knowledge community has a different goal. Some, obviously, were in it for the thrill of the hunt whereas others were there to genuinely find the answers before the rest of the world and be happy with that. Perhaps in these knowledge communities there simply isn’t a shared goal. It might even be wrong to consider these knowledge communities cohesive wholes and more accurate to consider them as a sort of amalgamation of individuals with widely varied goals. I believe the mathematical concept of a “line of best fit” might explain the goals of these groups as opposed to something more concrete like an equation. Normally this lack of a common goal would result in nothing being accomplished, but perhaps these knowledge groups work like a Ouija board in some way, where no one person drives the change, but rather the collective consciousness of the individuals drives the group toward an end.

As with many other concepts we’ve analyzed in this class so far, truth and understanding regarding these knowledge communities that Jenkins brings to light seems to lie somewhere in between our understanding of the individual and of organized groups. Much like a riot or a mob they seem to move in bizarre and often unpredictable ways while still maintaining efficacy and a semblance of rationality. Understanding these knowledge communities will, as I see it, prove to be very important in the coming days. Obviously, most corporations and even the governments themselves are ill-prepared for the potential power groups like these hold and understanding them will be invaluable to dealing with them and/or placating them. I also think understanding this strange form of mob mentality will be very important to the future of advertising. As communication between individuals becomes more efficient on the Internet with services like Twitter and Facebook, companies are quickly (if awkwardly) spreading their influence through these media. As Jenkins discusses in the second chapter, the masses can just as easily do your advertising for free as they can spread dissent about your product and kill it before it hits the shelves. Engaging the audiences of social networks will undoubtedly be very important to generating revenue for the companies of the future. Overall, I feel the proliferation of groups like these is quite uplifting. It seems the Internet, through easing mass communication between large numbers of different people, may finally be putting power back in the hands of the people.

Questions for continued discussion

   1.     From the examples we have seen (Anonymous, Survivor Sucks), most of these knowledge communities have been forming around message boards. To what extent do Twitter and Facebook also constitute a knowledge community? Could members of Twitter possibly organize to accomplish similar feats as Anonymous or the Survivor spoilers?

   2.     There was a lot of discussion in the text about the communities centered on “spoilers” and how the interests of major content producers and their audiences are sometimes opposed. Sometimes other members of the audience not only spoil the content for themselves, but also for others (as we see with ChillOne as well as various other instances such as the Harry Potter books). To what extent do audiences have the right to experience the unfolding of events or a story for themselves? To what extent should producers of this content limit the availability of knowledge that could “spoil the ending”?

   3.     In many modern science fiction and fantasy works, the antagonist is some form of “hive mind” that generally seeks to destroy the individuality of humanity or human society. Often protagonists are victorious solely because of their individuality. In what ways are these knowledge communities also like the hive minds that are so reviled in fiction, and how are they different?

Bonus: We discussed the possibility that a system requires some manner of antagonist to grow stronger, much like the immune system requires constant attack in order to defend itself from a variety of pathogens. Is this true for all systems? What are the implications of all systems requiring an antagonist to thrive?

Annotated Links

   1.     http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kkAngvkWVkk

This is a FOX news video on Anonymous before they "grew up" and began being politically active. Interestingly enough one of their “invasions” was spoiling the Harry Potter books, which I think not only ties Jenkins and our discussion together but also raises issues I mentioned in my second question above.

   2.     http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2012/02/acta-on-the-edge-in-europe-poland-suspends-ratification-greece-gets-hacked.ars

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2012/01/internet-awash-in-inaccurate-anti-acta-arguments.ars

The first link is an article regarding the social change and awareness that Anonymous has become the mascot for, if not the cause of.  The second is an article explaining that not all the information that Anonymous is proliferating is actually true. Does spreading misinformation make them less effective?

   3.     http://news.discovery.com/tech/cyber-security-immune-system-110421.html

A small article tangentially related to the concept of a system needing an antagonist to grow, specifically digital security mimicking the human immune system.

Hacker Crackdown

Get Bruce Sterling's Hacker Crackdown digital book here...

Harlot of Hearts

I thought some of the class might get a kick out of this video. I found it on "Harlot of Hearts," a great media rhetoric blog (if you're interested).

http://youtu.be/S_vVUIYOmJM

-Sam

Steve Rakoczy on Henry Jenkins, Convergence Culture

Consumption has become a collective process—and that’s what this book means by collective intelligence, a term coined by French cybertheorist Pierre Lévy. None of us can know everything; each of us knows something; and we can put the pieces together if we pool our resources and combine our skills. Collective intelligence can be seen as an alternative source of media power. We are learning how to use that power through our day-to-day interactions within convergence culture. Right now, we are mostly using this collective power through our recreational life, but soon we will be deploying those skills for more “serious” purposes.
- Jenkins, Henry (2008-09-01). Convergence Culture: Where Old and New Media Collide (Kindle Locations 198-203). NYU Press. Kindle Edition.

The notion of “collective intelligence” has interested me for some time and Jenkins, through Lévy provides a definition that fits with the way a large number of people use the Internet in their day to day lives. According to Jenkins, experiencing the various forms of media that we have available to us is no longer an activity that takes place in the comfort of our homes or in the cinema; people now consume their media as a group. The primary viewing of a television show may be done alone or with a small group of friends or family, but once that has been completed, fans across the globe flock to message boards and websites to analyze, discuss and dissect that episode. The fans no longer have to rely on their friends and family members who happen to enjoy the same program to discuss what a particular line of dialog meant or what contestant will get voted off the island on Survivor.

Jenkins’s first case study is that of the Survivor Spoilers forum, a place where fans of popular CBS reality series Survivor gather online to do whatever they can to figure out what is going to happen on the current (or next) season of Survivor before anything is announced publicly. Participants in this “knowledge community” have done everything from harmless cross referencing satellite image data with locations that could be likely locations for the next season to hacking into the email accounts of CBS employees who are working on the show. Jenkins sees the power in such communities saying that their shared knowledge “allows them to exert a greater aggregate power in their negotiations with media producers,” but also wonders “when does participation become interference?”

The second case study focuses on the American Idol franchise, particularly on the meticulously crafted advertising efforts behind it. A main point of this chapter is that advertisers no longer want the viewers to simply see their commercials or product placements but to engage with the brand and “to understand the emotional underpinnings of consumer decision-making as a driving force behind viewing and purchasing decisions.” By accomplishing these two objectives, advertisers are able to tap in to the communities that develop around their products, creating “brand advocates” that will evangelize others, defend the product and even “act as moral guardians,” when the company strays from their stated values. All for free.

The case study regarding the transmedia empire of The Matrix is interesting in the amount of work that Warner Bros. and The Wachowskis put into creating an experience that could be experienced across a multitude of medias: movies, video games, websites, comics and animated shorts. According to Jenkins, “The Wachowski brothers built a playground where other artists could experiment and fans could explore.” The brilliance of this strategy was that they knew that a subset of the fans of the first Matrix film would seek out other forms of entertainment based in this universe and provided those experiences to them in the mediums that are often associated with young, male science-fiction fans. By producing these other forms of entertainment, they were able to cash in on the communities developing around their creation. Fans did not have to play the games or read the comics to understand what was going on with the movies, but it helped. The games set in the universe of The Matrix even allowed players to take part in the events that occurred between the films, such as escorting a character to the point where she is later featured in one of the films. Using these techniques the Wachowski brothers created a cohesive experience that had fans playing what seemed to be an integral part in the overall story.

Across these three case studies Jenkins shows that, when done properly, fans can have an impact on their favorite media franchises and the companies producing the entertainment can engage with consumers on a deeper level. Each fan has their own insights as to what might be going on and they each can share those thoughts with the rest of the community and attempt to predict what might happen next. But this method of sharing information is capable of so much more. As Jenkins states in the above quote, right now people are using the collective intelligence primarily for recreation: talking about television shows, organizing fan meet-ups, writing fan fiction, et cetera but “Imagine the kinds of information these fans could collect, if they sought to spoil the government rather than the networks.”

Jenkins asserts that the knowledge communities of the Internet could accomplish great things if they simply put their mind to doing something that benefits more than their entertainment interests. People are spoiling governments and companies that have committed some wrong. Jenkins hints at this potential at several points, but he never really digs too deeply into what could happen if knowledge communities were “serious.” Over the past few years, various groups have sprung up to take on various entities, but the most interesting of these are Anonymous and LulzSec. Anonymous sprang out of the discussion board 4chan (be careful) and have committed very high profile attacks on groups like the Church of Scientology (their message to the church is embedded below), the FBI, the MPAA and many others. LulzSec was a group loosely affiliated with Anonymous that committed similar hacks, but rather than for any serious purpose, LulzSec did it for the entertainment value (“the lulz”).

These two groups show what a knowledge collective is capable of. Should someone invoke the wrath of Anonymous, the members (who insist that they have no leader) gather on various message boards and chat rooms to organize attacks, produce messages to distribute and discuss what courses of action should be taken to accomplish their goal. The reasons for Anonymous attacks have been to show support for groups that share similar ideals (ThePirateBay and WikiLeaks), to express distaste over politics (response to the US Government's takedown of MegaUpload), or even because they just plain disagree with the ideals of a group (the Church of Scientology). LulzSec on the other hand picked its victims over what would cause the most chaos and entertainment for them, such as taking down Sony's Playstation Network service.

Anonymous and LulzSec are essentially the best and worst case scenarios, respectively, for Jenkins's argument of what is possible when the power of a knowledge community is harnessed for a goal beyond exploring the media that we all consume. When the gears of Anonymous begin to crank, there is seemingly nothing that will stand in their way, taking on the US Government was as much of an attempt to show that they are not afraid of any governing body as much as it was a sign of protest. While the high profile targets of Anonymous are often powerful corporations, organizations and governments, they have also been known to target single people who have committed some wrong, often hacking their email and social network accounts, sending lewd messages to everyone on their contact lists. LulzSec, while seemingly subscribed to some of the same beliefs, do not bother themselves with motives or attempts to expose any injustices, they simply wanted to insight chaos by taking down services that millions of people used.

To Jenkins, groups such as these must be fascinating now that people are using knowledge communities to fight for against what they see as the evils in the world. But if Jenkins sees some of the activities of groups like the Survivor Spoilers as "interference," what must he think when a relatively small number of people take down Paypal because they stopped processing payments for WikiLeaks? Should the world's population be subject to the whims of a headless organization that anyone can claim to represent? More importantly, are these forms of protests even accomplishing their original goals?

Attacking Paypal, Mastercard and other corporations that refused to process donations for WikiLeaks was certainly a bold move that sent a message to the companies, but ultimately, it changed nothing. Julian Assange is still considered a criminal in many countries and WikiLeaks is still considered of questionable legal status. A more successful campaign by Anonymous was Operation DarkNet where Anonymous took down 40 child pornography sites and published information about the members of these sites and asked the FBI and Interpol to look into the people on the list. Any activist group will have successful and failed protests but what Anonymous might lack in their success rate, they more than make up for it in their wide reaching influence on the Internet. And for Jenkins, success rates do not seem to be too important, the real importance of these knowledge groups is that people are coming together for a cause and the more groups like Anonymous that spring up, the more potential there is for everyday citizens to have an impact on the world.