Democracy, Governance, and the Digital Network

(sample post on Keen article)
On the one hand Keen is the classic example of an internet-troll: he makes outrageous claims, framed in hyperbolic logic, and places them in direct view of those most likely to disagree. And although I don’t have personal access to his psyche my guess is he does this far more for his own edification than fostering any nuanced dialogue or discourse about the matters he claims to be concerned about. And that is perhaps part of the problem, for behind his not so delicate approach lies some points worth considering, even if he doesn’t fully develop them as much as requires. Consider the question in Cult of the Amateur that Keen asks about the future of individuation in the media landscape “Where does it end? WIth a channel for every one of us, in which we are the solitary broadcaster and the sole audience?”(33). While Keen glosses this, and uses it as a rhetorical flourish to the end of a chapter, the idea repercussion of having such a fragmented viewing audience ought to be considered.

Take for example a recent poll by the Pew Research Center which found that Fox News Viewers are far more likely to believe the “Death Panel Myth.” Forty percent of Fox viewers believed that the government health plan would decide whether or not the elderly would be allowed to live, compare this to MSNBC viewers, who only 27% of whom were likely to believe the “Death Panel Myth.”

Now we could assign this to the networks, placing blame at the foot of Fox News, but we can also see how this is representative of a larger problem: audience fragmentation. That is, if I am conservative and agree with Limbaugh, Hannity, etc. I am more likely to watch Fox. And if I am a liberal I am more likely to watch MSNBC where I can watch Maddow. This means that I am likely to watch a network that shares my views rather than a network which presents views contrary to mine, or even say views that represent a middle/common ground.

The result is that when any two individuals get together they are likely to actually hold not just two different opinions on any matter, but actually two different sets of facts on which they would base such opinions. In other words they would have no common ground from which to draw in order to have a conversation about health care. This is in part what Keen is talking about when he references the echo chamber, and multiple this by ones entire cultural references and one comes to understand how there any two individuals are increasingly likely to not share the same cultural references, whether this is in the news, or art, or entertainment.

But here is the catch. Keen places the blame here at the foot of the internet. See the internet causes fragmentation, and hence death of our common culture. But as the above example shows, there is nothing here that is specifically about the internet. This is about cable news. Indeed audience fragmentation began before the rise of the internet with cable channels and conservative talk shows. So while there might be audience fragmentation, the internet is not the cause of this fragmentation, indeed it is only part of a changing media ecology. Sure conservatives visit Red State, and Liberals visit Daily Kos, but this is also true with respect to MSNBC and FOX. By limiting his critique to the internet and casting broad strokes, Keen misses this important, and crucial nuance.

There has been a great deal of “buzz” lately, centered around a recently published psychology survey which indicates that multitaskers might not be as good at multitasking as they think. While the details of the study are far more complicated and nuanced than the popular media reports, the theme here is a consistent one: divided intelligence does not make one smarter or more productive in fact perhaps the reverse. Or as Nicholas Carr argues in his no famous Atlantic Monthly article, Is Google Making us Stupid?:

my concentration often starts to drift after two or three pages. I get fidgety, lose the thread, begin looking for something else to do. I feel as if I’m always dragging my wayward brain back to the text. The deep reading that used to come naturally has become a struggle.

Now there is a lot to think about both in Carr’s argument and in this recent study, particularly about the way that technology shapes/reshapes the way we think, but what concerns me in both pieces is the assumption that there is a “natural” way to read or process. Carr says, “the deep reading that used to come naturally.” Of course this reading was not natural, anything but. Presumably Carr had to learn to “deep read” through years of practice. Now, I’m not saying that deep reading is bad, or that we shouldn’t do it, anything but. Deep reading has its advantages, but it also has its limits, same goes for scanning. But to treat one as natural and the other as unnatural is to privilege one at the expense of the other, rather than analyzing each on its own terms. Deep reading is a historically developed reading practice, not an intrinsic naturally good method of knowledge acquisition, one which might have to be adapted to manage the changing media landscape.

This is the class blog for EMAC 2321: Introduction to Emerging Media and Communication of as some literature has it Introduction to Writing and Research for Emerging Media. Regardless this is the blog. You might want to visit the the main class site as it has all the general info you might be after. This blog will have my own personal thoughts and ramblings about the class, but the wiki is the collaborative space for the class, the hub of the learning community. If you want the syllabus go there, or download the somewhat antiquated and already dated paper version.

Fall classes start soon, as this blog will transition into the class blog for an Emerging Media Class at University of Texas at Dallas.

Students presented their final projects this last week. The assignment was to produce a narrative that took advantage of digital technologies. The rest of the guidelines were pretty broad, and thus the projects I received were fairly wide ranging, from digital games, to blog fiction, to a few that defy categorization. Below is a sampling of a few of them along with a brief description (the first contains the explanation for my new twitter icon.)

The “Story” Virus: This was one of the more inventive ideas I have received from students (not just this semester but in general). The idea is to create a website which if accessed downloads an unwanted computer program (read virus) onto your computer. This program slowly takes over your computer, mimicking a sentient AI. As the AI grows, takes over more of your computer, it tells the story of how it escaped from NEDtech, and asks users to help fight the conspiracy. Essentially this story hijacks your computer in order to deliver the narrative. While the group didn’t write the code for this narrative, they did spend a lot of time developing the pieces, from how the virus would look, sound, and appear on your computer, to the the website which would deliver the virus (don’t worry it’s safe), and most importantly a fake news article covering the virus once the creators were discovered. (It is from this article that I took my new twitter icon, as apparently I would go to jail for encouraging dangerous student behavior.)

One Frigid Morning: This is a humorous murder mystery told through various internet platforms. The setting: the refrigrator. The victim: the butter. The murderer: (I am not going to spoil it.) You can download the stop motion video of the crime and if you want to see the details of who dunnit.

Perplexing Perplex: This is also a mystery, but told as blog fiction. The authors used google maps, and photos to create a dark but humorous story. The visuals for this one are particularly striking and worth checking out. The story develops via reader input, as individuals can help track Bob through the comment section.

Robyn: This is a serial video narrative, following Robyn and her group of friends. The twist, as this video explains, is that the audience supplies the music. We talked a great deal in class about allowing user input, but also limiting the channels via which users are allowed to contribute. This narrative is a creative take on that problem.

More later as students hand them in and give me permission to share.

Nothing you need to do to prep for class on Tuesday, just show up (on time) and bring material you need to work on your final project as there will be time in class.

On Thursday we will be discussing Super Columbine Massacre RPG!. Download and play the game (you will need a PC to do this, or a virtual machine on a Mac). Play the game for at least an hour (but leave yourself a little longer as it could take you 20-30 minutes to get it installed). If you are interested there is also a movie, Playing Columbine, about the game and the controversy it caused which is on reserve at the library.

For Tuesday take a look at argn.com and the forums for unfiction these are two of the “hubs” for ARG related content.

Also over the weekend some time send me what you have so far on your final project so that I can give you and your group some feedback.

P.S. On Thursday we will be discussing Super Columbine Massacre RPG!. Download and play the game (you will need a PC to do this, or a virtual machine on a Mac). Play the game for at least an hour (but leave yourself a little longer as it could take you 20-30 minutes to get it installed). If you are interested there is also a movie, Playing Columbine, about the game and the controversy it caused which is on reserve at the library.

Thursday we will begin looking at Alternative Reality Gaming. For class read “The Puppet Master Problem” by Jane McGonigal. (This article is a critical piece, so save some extra time to read it.) Jane is one of the designers behind the now famous I Love Bees. Finally check out her latest project/ARG (now complete): The Lost Ring.

If you are unfamiliar with ARGs you might want to read the Wikipedia entry before you read the above article.

Tuesday we will continue our discussion of digital games and look at two articles which address the question of how simulation differs from other forms of representation and what it means to “play a character.” Read “Playing the Bad Guy” (eReserve) and “Representation, Enaction, and the Ethics of Simulation” (First Person). Come prepared to discuss violence and the ethics of making and playing video games.