The stupid wisdom of the stupid crowds
Posted: Monday, June 18, 2007 4:02 PM by Will Femia
Every once in a while someone comes along and plays the role of troll to the Web 2.0 happy party. The most recent is Robert Gorman, blogging on the Britannica site about the shortcomings of Web 2.0 ideals. (Part 1, Part 2)
"This “wisdom of the crowds” and “hive mind” mentality is a direct assault on the tradition of individualism in scholarship that has been paramount in Western societies at least since the Renaissance and, before then, can be seen in the Church Fathers and the Greek philosophers, among others."
I usually skip these guys, but as often happens with online debates, I happened to read the rebuttal from Clay Shirky before I read his original argument so I had to backtrack. Now that I've read it I'm pleased to report that I'm not in a panic about having to find a new field of work. Even Nick Carr, who can always be counted on to resist Web 2.0 Kool-aid euphoria doesn't go as far as Gorman: "So while I’m happy to line up on Gorman’s side in battling the hive mind fabulists, I’m not going to kid myself that it’s anything more than a sideshow."
Speaking of the dubious benefits of citizen reporting, I was inclined to believe the story of a woman harassed by airport security over a sippy cup. I've had pretty good success so far at the airport with the baby's bottle, but generally I think the whole circus of airport security is misguided so my bias is to believe some of the horror stories we hear. So NowPublic, a citizen journalism hub published the report of this mother being harassed. The TSA responded with a "MythBusters" report of its own including video and a copy of the incident report. The middle video on the page is 45Mb but is pretty amusing when it gets to the part where the police make the woman clean up the water she spilled and more to the point, it does seem to confirm the TSA report, not the NowPublic report, that the woman spilled the water deliberately. In his follow-up, Bill Adler, the NowPublic poster is pretty forgiving of citizen journalism and himself for only writing "the first chapter" of the story. Like many others, however, I feel considerably less charitable about the job he did. Forcing government agencies to be more transparent by writing a factual expose is a win for everyone. government agencies to be more transparent in order to disprove false reports by lazy citizen journalists is not a win for anyone.
Speaking of citizen participation doing more harm than good, here's that Obama crush music video you may have read about. The source is BarelyPolitical.com. What's interesting to me is that a few political blogs I read saw the video and then had to confirm whether it was an attack ad. I'm sure this woman is sincere in her fancy for Barry Obama but I'm less sure she's serving the candidate well with this video.
(And speaking of the presidential horse race, "Maybe I missed a memo or something, but why do we need a presidential campaign that lasts over two f****** years?" When you consider the millions it takes to run for office and the percentage of those millions that go into media advertising, it's a wonder that the campaign ONLY lasts two years. The campaign could be, and probably eventually will be, an unlimited media cash cow in the guise of public service.)
Speaking of ambiguous benefits of the digital age, contrary to the laughably narrow perspective of the AP article, viewers who want a free look at Sicko are not out of luck just because YouTube pulled it. Duh. It looks like it's quite comfortable in the Pirate Bay top 100.
More interesting is an angle the cable folks have been taking in their coverage of the story today that it could be construed as a political attack - an effort to undermine the financial success of the film. There's probably equally valid speculation that it was his supporters who put the film up there to help distribute the message. I'd be interested to know how many theaters will be showing this movie. Significant to the story is Moore's views on illegal trading of his movies. "As long they’re not doing it to make a profit off it, as long as they’re not, you know, trying to make a profit off my labor."
Speaking of Sicko, A panel of anonymous physicians coughs up secrets of the trade.
Citizen mission control? "A Palatine mom got quite a shock when her baby monitor started picking up broadcasts from the International Space Station."
"The Justice Center has been evacuated eight times in three years, forcing the evacuation of more than 400 people. If the problem continues, it will result in a ban of all microwave popcorn." You just know there's one guy there who can't seem to get the hang of the microwave popcorn thing and is single-handedly responsible for all eight evacuations.
Why the question of global warming is moot. The guy in this video finally gets to his point just before minute 8: The risk of not acting outweighs the risk of acting. To be honest, I was expecting something a more profound, and the last minute of it gets a little sappy (but hey, I'm still linking to it, right?). I know I have a few readers who pay attention to skeptical perspectives on global warming so maybe one of you can tell me how much of a straw man argument this guy is setting up. As I understand it, the reason for debate over climate change has a lot to do with power and how much of it to give to environmentalists. I don't think anyone disagrees that a greener planet is a nicer one whether the globe is warming or not.
Here's an example: Freedom, not climate, is at risk - His point is that hysteria about global warming takes us away from the facts of the matter and ends up with a set of laws and restrictions that don't necessarily help the environment but do restrict our freedoms -- not unlike some anti-terror policies.
Speaking of which, Portrait of the Modern Terrorist as an Idiot. "Terrorism is a real threat, and one that needs to be addressed by appropriate means. But allowing ourselves to be terrorized by wannabe terrorists and unrealistic plots -- and worse, allowing our essential freedoms to be lost by using them as an excuse -- is wrong."
Speaking of the influence of fear, How children lost the right to roam in four generations - I'm not totally ready to by into my own "speaking of" introduction to this one. There are probably other factors at play that keep kids closer to home.
Chinese Eye Tracking Study: Baidu Vs Google - These are always really fascinating and to be able to compare cultural differences in how Web pages are seen is a real treat.
How America voted. It's an animated gif of a map of county-by-county election results since 1960.
G.I.s' Guide to Iraq (1943) - At the end of the entry there's a link to a similar guide from 2003.
Thing I'm watching instead of TV... Bust my ass - Actually, I think it is TV but I don't think it's available on my TV. I watched the first few minutes and thought it was clever.
Another look at who's online and what they're doing.
YouTube has released a "Remixer" that lets you edit your YouTube clips, piece them together, add captions and then put the whole thing back into YouTube.
"Long ago, I learned a single sentence that sends obnoxious juniors away from me as fast as their little legs will carry them." I won't keep you in suspense: "Lean over to the child's watcher and, as politely as you possibly can, just say, 'According to the terms of my parole, I'm not really supposed to be this close to children.'"
Top 10 science fiction novelists of the '00s -- so far
A woman catches her own identity thief - It's a pretty exciting chase story but the ending isn't terribly satisfying.
Casting amazing shadows with piles of junk. (This is a neat blog to just surf from top to bottom by the way.)
New Batsuit and Joker car for the upcoming Batman movie.
Multi-penised, six-legged, two-anused piglet given silly name - I hope the editor won an office pool with that headline.
US prof plans to send message back in time - The fact that he hasn't already received the message (from the future) should tell him something. For me the MIT time traveler convention a few years ago put the whole matter of time travel to rest. They held a welcome party for people traveling from the future and no one showed up (as far as they can tell).
Robot Chicken: Star Wars - Full Feature - I was skeptical, but laughed out loud twice in the first two minutes. "Full feature" means it's over 20 minutes long, so this might be a good one to add to the "what I'm watching online because TV is all summer reruns."
By the way, Paul Potts the opera guy won that British talent show. What I didn't realize was that he was up against a breakdance crew and a guy with a puppet monkey. (It's interesting to note that if you don't have a UK IP address you can't watch the video on the official show site. "This content is not for viewing outside of the UK due to rights reasons.")
Speaking of finales, now that the show is over, Tony and Carmella are having a yard sale.
