1) Is Shirky's vision of a communal transformation of society a practical one?
2) How would this society be different from current society, and what aspects would have to change?
3) How does Shirky use his idea of a "transformed media landscape" to empower individuals and strengthen human agency?
I found his idea of technology very interesting and I never really thought about it before. The fact that things don't get socially interesting until they get technologically boring makes a lot of sense - because when things first come out a lot of people do not have them. It is not useful until almost everyone has their hands on the new technology, and it definitely makes sense. He talks about the transformed media landscape and says that the internet is the first source that supports many to many conversations or one on one. Everything is available on the internet, in one place - rather than going to different places you can find everything you need in one location. He also talks about how anyone can be a producer with the internet - as opposed to historically where there were specific producers.
ReplyDeleteAs Amber pointed out, Shirky mentions that the internet has created a new opportunity for many to converse with many. This development is what Shirky believes to be the most recent revolution in human communication. It was really interesting how Shirky described the various revolution as he sees them starting with the invention of the printing press and continuing to the introduction of broadcasting media and finally up to the internet of today. He also addresses this concept of the many conversing with the many in his lecture called how cognitive surplus will change the world. Through this lecture he discusses one specific form of communication over the internet. In this lecture he breaks down this new form of communication into two categories: communal and civic. He says that communal cognitive surplus is created by the participants for each other and civic is created by the participants for the enjoyment or benefit of society as a whole. I feel that each of these two divisions are equally popular when looking and the various conversation topics that take place over the internet and contribute to this new communication revolution as described by Shirky.
ReplyDeleteI think Shirky's view is a very practical one. He clearly creates a relationship with the new wave of social media, and its future potential for revolutionizing the communal media landscape, and the various technological innovations from history that have developed the social sharing of information, including the printing press for mass communication, and the telegraph and telephone for two-way communicaton. He asserts that "the media that is good at creating conversation, is no good at creating groups. And the media that is good at creating groups, is no good at creating communication." I thought it was very interesting how he brought up that the internet is the first source of media that can good at both. I think we'll continue to see an increase in the depth of communication within the groups that are created via the internet, because of the real-time accessibility of this medium.
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