There was a very interesting article in the Observer today (here’s the link: http://observer.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,,2068107,00.html). Essentially it’s a backlash against web 2.0 for a dumbing down of culture – the idea that just because everyone can contribute doesn’t mean that what they have to say is worth hearing … that the web is in danger of creating a lot of noise which is drowning out more valid , profound cultural expression. The guy (who’s written a book) says that the web is becoming all about digital narcissism, that the wikipedia effect is blurring the border between the trivial and the significant. There’s a line in the article where he says: “I want to learn about Martin Luther’s epiphany, not the epiphany of the 11-year-old who blogs next door.”
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May 2nd, 2007 at 6:38 pm
Many thanks for adding this to a forum in Fronter. These things add to the debate and help people to think through their ideas.
May 7th, 2007 at 9:51 am
That’s an interesting article and I think I agree in part about all the rubbish that’s increasingly online – the internet is becoming like a really really badly organised library. And i do get fed up when people email me videos of cats skateboarding…
But also agree with the criticism of snobbery. I think it’s a bit like when the language ‘prescriptivists’ get their teeth into language change and want everything to stay the same. In my view, language evolves and if people increasingly don’t know the difference between less and fewer, for example, then maybe there isn’t a difference any more. So be it – language is socially driven (though i do draw the line at the grocer’s apostrophe!) By the same token, i often don’t use capitals when i write emails and blogs. I know how to, i just don’t think it’s considered necessary in that form.
So similarly, who’s to say who guards ‘culture’ from the masses? What is ‘culture’? Who says what is and isn’t being eroded? As long as people are still reading ‘real’ books and watching ‘real’ films, what’s the problem with some people playing around with ‘inferior’ stuff online? We don’t have to look at it if we don’t want to. People have always written rubbish – the difference was it used to be in private diaries that no one else ever saw..
Which i guess leads me back to the opposite argument, which is yes, why should all that dross be posted online when it really isn’t that great? Yes, Web 2.0 will always lead to a reduction in overall quality. But i guess it’s part and parcel of a kind of democracy – free speech and all that – it’s just that people don’t always like having to look at all that free speech whenever they log on! But all the stuff about MySpace not being healthy – is it any more narcissistic than a group of friends chatting in the pub? Surrounding ourselves with like minded people is what we do as humans…
It’s a fascinating debate – i could go on, but i’d just be rambling narcissistically… and i need to do some ‘real’ work!
May 8th, 2007 at 2:53 pm
It also links in a bit to “interactive TV”. When the news programmes first started asking for people’s comments on the day’s headlines, I thought, “Hmmm, this could be interesting …” However, I now often get a bit fed up with listening to some of the banal comments that are read out or appear along the bottom of the screen: “Bob from Bristol says: I think talking cameras are great. We need some here. Helen from Hampshire says: These will destoy the peace at night.” etc. The worst was when the BBC was reading out some comments regarding the Abolition of the Slave Trade, and the newsreader read out something that for me, sounded racist. He sort of finished it hurriedly, looked a bit sheepish, and carried on with the rest of the main news. I suppose the difference is on the web I can choose what I read, and I can roughly know what to expect from the front page (normally), whereas with the news I am wanting to hear some unbiased comment, and I am not convinced that viewers’ comments really add that much.