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Much like the Apple corporation markets its products on generic functions that any computer can do (organizing photos, playing music, surfing the net, utilizing email), so was Web 2.0 synthesized to make possible for the blog-happy masses to do what had been possible since the early days of the internet with a little more ease and integration with their blog network.
Don’t get me wrong, though! Social interaction online isn’t a bad thing, by any means… but until my online/social journelism ‘profs started telling me how cool and neato Web 2.0 was, I’d never really cared about the doings of others online, and none of the innovations struck me as particularly inventive, indeed they just remodeled simple functions performed by many websites & computer utilities and made them easy for the interested to make use of. In other words, I don’t see what the fuss is about, and with me, old habits die harder than horror movie villains.
I just can’t get into a mindset that is friendly to this phenominon. Why would I care what my peers are looking at, bookmark-wise ( del.icio.us)? I have my own interests to persue online, and most of those are not topics that are enjoyed by many people I know. People who want to spread things they find cool to their friends traditionally runs into a dead end (the civilized world regards this as spamming when you get it in email form) and friends can and do share links of interest via MSN…I fail to see a practical use for del.icio.us other than voyeuristic cyber-stalking. I have my own interests, I do not need to peruse the doings of others online. Beyond that, I wouldn’t want them checking in on what I’ve been looking into either…the internet is about anonymity, isn’t it?
Hell, I never bookmark anything online anyway. Life’s too short to trod the same old ground, unless it bears exceptional fruit. Like Wikipedia.
Twitter is an entire web-network based on a simple side-function of Facebook. One of these sites ought to sue the other, since they do the same thing and one of them no doubt was inspired by the other. I wouldn’t be bothered to go to an entire website designed to change my facebook status, much less check it (and add ALL the people who’re already on my facebook…keep in mind that facebook adds its own contacts from the entire history of your MSN contact list, twitter requires me to add them all manually. Gimme a break.)
Some bloggers have more existential reasons for opposing twitter, and I’m inclined to agree with these seven tenants of philosophy.
Digg, however, I think has a neat concept behind it. I wouldn’t be bothered to use it for anything exciting (I prefer fark.com), but then Fark doesn’t integrate with blogs and this is a cool way to share articles of interest on your blog (if you “digg” that kind of thing. heh.)
Perhaps I’m hostile to all this Web 2.0 business because none of it strikes me as particularly new…its just simple gadgets remodeled to integrate with blogs, none of it makes my online-life any richer or more fulfilling, and thus I wouldn’t change my online routine to make use of any of it. I suspect that Web 2.0 friendly behavior has to be learned with a professional stake in the blogosphere or online communications, and not by a person who’s got their own well-developed online habits.
Facebook is an example of a social networking site that takes a few good ideas (scattered in their own form across dozens of Web 2.0 sites) and throws ‘em all together with ease of use for the user. And that’s quite enough for me.
Well, this morning, and by extention the week, was off to a helluva start. I awoke at seven in the morning, and then went back to bed for a half hour. When I awoke, I hurridly prepared myself for the day and was suited & out the door by 7:45. Unfortunately, being so early in the month I’d not been extorted $80 (!!!) for a bus pass and had to do so before I could make use of the transit system in February. So I missed the first bus.
Arming myself with a huge coffee (the one convenience store that sells bus passes in my neighborhood was sold out. ah, the pain!) I went to stack my ducketts at the bank before hitting up the bus station. I waited in line while some old ladies did everything I do on the RBC website at the one bank terminal. Painful though it was, I sat back and chilled while the seniors did their thing. I then did mine and proceeded to the bus station.
The first bus was full and paid our stop no mind.
Now, I’ve been describing my day to you thus far because I want to show you how I deal with things that annoy the hell out of me. I dont get all uptight about them, I let them sort themselves out because it just ain’t work the additional aggravation.
Now, when I’d finished my coffee, the second bus had pulled up. At the head of a throng of people and about 20 feet from a garbage can, I discarded my empty coffee on the ground.
Please bear in mind that nine times out of ten, indeed whenever convenient or rational to do so, I use proper garbage cans. I dont see a problem with littering when it suits my purposes. Indeed, compared to greater polluters (I’m lookin’ at you, Defasco), I’d done no damage other than cosmetic to our fair city. At least, thats what I thought.
Without warning, from behind, a good samaritan (a McMaster student, freeloading on the HSR) decided to inform me of the location of the closest garbage can. He pointed it out very clearly to me, so that I could find it. Never mind that I obviously live in the area, use the bus stop every day and would know where to get rid of my trash in a PC-manner.
Well, it was a different issue for me now. Glancing at the garbage can and the bus, I gave my reply with a thumbs-up.
“Stellar!”
Now, the poor guy probably thought he had the moral high ground. In fact, he went back and picked up the cup and disposed of it properly. What he did, paternally, condescendingly, implying that I shouldn’t litter, was ignorant and rude. To approach a stranger, indeed an apparent social equal, with a petty matter like this, shows a pretentiousness I can’t fathom. I dont try to impose my standards of morality on anyone around me. My litter did him no harm, yet he sought to humiliate me in public.
Its the principal of the thing, really. You just don’t tell other people-strangers- what to do in public. If it bothers you so much, fix it yourself. I can’t imagine anyone spoken to in such a manner would bow to the request. Instead, I turned the tables and made him follow through on his sentiments, lest he be thought a hypocrite.
I’m obviously making a big deal about a very small situation, but the example applies all throughout life as well. Some people get a real kick out of telling you what is right and what is wrong and exporting their morality to others. These people are the worst kind of tyrants, the ones who briefly outlawed alcholic beverages, criminalized marijuana and other God-given plants, and demonized free sexual expression. They’re the ones who’d like to see cigarette smokers thrown in jail…
Well, that was my trip to school. I hope I made that guy think as deeply about our brief encounter as he made me consider mine.
I read a lot, and as such, alternate history is one of my favorite subgenres of science fiction. The question “could it have been different?” is almost always certainly answered “yes.” The world we live in, in terms of history, I believe, is a fluke. An accident. There was never any guarantee our world would evolve as it has, that historical events would unfold as they have.
In my time as an alternate history reader, I’ve read heaps of novels exploring the subject. A 10-volume saga detailng a world where the Confederate States of America secured sovereignty during the US Civil War and the ensuing century of warfare on the North American continent was one of my favorites, as was an 8-volume epic supposing reptilian alien invaders had rudely interrupted World War Two, necessating a desperate alliance between the Allied & Axis armies. Alternate History is infinetely thought-provoking and limitless in possbility.
One of my favorite stories in this field has never been published in print form, but came into existance as a series of newsgroup posts to an alternate history based newsgroup on google back around the turn of the century (late 1999-2002). This novel, which amounts to roughly 161 pages when formatted, shows a world eerily similar to our own, turned on its head and twisted into a dark mirror image. For All Time, written by an early blogger known only as “President Chester A. Arthur” has a theme that the road to hell is paved with good intentions, and became disturbingly realistic during the september 11th attacks. In the current era of international instability, terrorism and the gradual slide-into-hell of domestic politics, it became even more relevant.
For All Time posits a world where President Roosevelt died in the last days of 1941, just after the US entered World War Two. His successor, President Henry Wallace, takes the helm of the nation and proceeds to be the worst leader the United States ever has. As a result of his failed foreign & domestic policy, the War is bungled. It ends later, and more brutally (three atomic bombs on Germany & Japan and generous helpings of mustard gas all around), with the Allies fragmented and the Soviet Union dominating most of europe. This grim post-war world goes gradually downhill and by the 70s & 80s, the world is rather dark and apocalyptic.
The UK cracks apart from nationalist terrorism, the Soviet Union is dominated by hard-line Stalinists, Western Europe Africanizes into contrant warfare and squabbling dictatorships, the United States is beset by waves of civil unrest & race riots throughout the 50s and 60s, and the French briefly resort to state-sponsored cannibalism. And, of course, Charles Manson runs for President, not to mention the dozens of cities and millions of people who perish in nuclear fire. Rock n’ Roll is never born, American Football is replaced with soccer, and Richard Nixon founds this worlds equivalent of McDonalds. It’s a disturbing read that flows like a train-wreck. Some serious psychopaths find themselves with a whole helluvalotta power, like this guy, who becomes Premier of the USSR after a rather destructive nuclear war with China.
So where am I going with all this? Well, basically, FaT ain’t so different from our world. In fact, most of the problems encountered early in that timeline, as in the late 40s, early 50s, are similar to what’s happened since 9/11. The ensuing breakdown of society has clear parallels with what is going on today, from short-sighted, bigoted politicians to the publics apathy for problems over seas and at home. A reliance on easy solutions (like atom bombs dropped on troublesome enemies or withdrawing from confronting rival powers) and inability for the traditional “good nations” like the UK and US to work together leads to an increasingly chaotic world. FaT’s nuclear doctine is disturbingly probable…atom bombs seen as just really big conventional ordinance, and their accepted use in war. By the 1970s, the effects of nuclear weapons have affected the planets climate in ways unimaginable in our history.
The problems posed in FaT mostly all befell us, albiet we dealt with them differently. Men like Martin Luter King led our civil rights movement while men like Meir Kahane were marginalized. All too often these days, fanatics guide our actions through manipulation of the media & the political/educational system. We could easily have fallen into a new dark age just as easily as we solved our problems peacefully.
Disturbingly enough the first decade of this millenium reads like the first decade of For All Time, thus far. I highly recommend anyone give it a once-over, with a wikipedia page open handy to glance unfamiliar names.
During my first year in the broadcast journalism course at Mohawk, one of my favourite classes (and perhaps one of the easiest) was Online Journalism with Wayne McPhail (sic). Its highlights included the analysis of new technology such as the iPhone, website design, and multiple new user-driven content sites. The class itself turned me onto aspects of the internet I’ve more or less been content to ignore.
I used the internet primarily as a source of current, historical and theoretical information, and as way to violate international copywrite law. I’ve read the ravings and opinions of the various breeds of online poster, but have abstained from voicing my numerous opinions to the faceless masses of the online world. Because really, who cares what a 20 year old white suburban raised scofflaw has to say about anything?
If your reading this, allegedly you do.
Believe me, its not because I don’t have the opinions to share, because I certainly can go on and on about mostly anything. But its the fact that others out there, in the cyberspace jungle, probably hold similar views and have more motivation to share them with you, the reader. I don’t know much of anything about professional sports, technology or automobiles, much less other such easily bloggable topics. Nor do I care to debate on matters of politics, ethics or activism, because these are ultimately fruitless pursuits.
What I could comment on could at worst bore you to tears and make you judge me as a loveable geek, or enrage you and cause you to give me a pariah’s brand.
Despite this, I’ve kept my mind open to the internet and how it has expanded and changed the position of a journalist in society and the industry. I think widespread access to the internet has changed our profession the most since the advent of the motion picture newsreal-its changed the way people percieve the world.
Note that although I’m not particularly “into” the idea of writing blogs, don’t think I shun them. Indeed, during the early years of the War on Terror, “right thinking from the left coast” assured me that people out there did indeed share some of the opinions I had. They just expressed them in a way that was both more socially acceptable (hey, I’m just passionate, like all us Armenians) and gathered an impressive online cult following. I could never do that. The internet has a strange power with its anonymous, worldwide nature. It gives us the power to say things we’ll never really have to answer for, to make wild accusations and not have to defend them in realtime. It can make you foolhardy, outspoken, and what does it lead to? Not much, really.
I think that people who have something valuable to say owe it to the world to preserve it. In the advent of an authoritarian regime in Canada, God Forbid, be assured that the bloggers will have the last word. After all, there is a reason that the Chinese monitor Google and Iranian bloggers end up in secret prisons.
Enough of my thoughts on blogging, and back to what I hope to get out of this class. In short, maybe it can make me change my mind. After all, passion is motivation, and if I find the right outlet for the right issue it may just make a convert to an advocate of online journalism. Keep in mind that when asked what I thought of the subject in class, I said that the internet is the new print, and there is no excuse for not making pre-written content (for newspapers, magazines & the like) available online. I support easy access to this kind of content, especially after the print edition has been published-if its being made available for free, of course. In this way the internet and print can perhaps find common ground and give each other validity as forms of media.
One area that does interest me is the use of the internet to promote other products. The viral marketing campaigns for Lost and the new monster-horror film Cloverfield show that multimedia campaigns can both add to the story and help build hype for the product in question. Many of these campaigns have made use of blogs, youtube and flickr to carry out the concepts and represent true media integration.
I hope this garbled communique has made some sense and given you some idea of the mindset I bring to this course. I appreciate the validity of the online citizen journalist…but will anything I write be more than a tear in a cyber-ocean?
