Archive for the ‘democracy’ tag
the global village(s?)
Following up on the FriendFeed discussion from Robert Scoble‘s post, some interesting questions were raised.
Susan mentioned that Robert was acting as “bionic human socnet filter” after which I asked if we were all becoming part of a social super brain. The discussion turned to the segmentation of the social web with George Smith commenting that:
“Birds of a feather flock together. And sometimes it’s people with polar opposite views arguing. But I don’t think one place really has a large enough spectrum of human discourse…yet. We have to remember there is still a large portion of the population that does not participate in these conversations.”
The web is often hailed as great boon for democracy and learning with freedom of information and global interconnectedness, but I think George makes a good point. The social web is, and tends to be segmented because that’s simply how people are tending to react to the capabilities of the Internet as a new communication medium.
So what brings people together?
privacy 2.0
Taking as a given that our old concept of personal privacy is an illusion as Chris Messina does, we come to conclusions that are counter-intuitive to older generations. To re-establish the protection and safety that privacy may have afforded us before the advent of the digital information age, perhaps we ought to fight not for our right to privacy, but for our right to be anything but private. We ought to fight for our right to be heard. Complete transparency, the very opposite of privacy, is the unlikely savior of our freedom.
Complete transparency is only useful however, if one can be heard above the din. If we are able to be heard, and if we are able to forge meaningful relationships with others online, we are afforded protection by the fact that somebody cares, somebody notices, and somebody is there to hear our complaint if we feel any entity is encroaching on our freedom or treating us unfairly. On the Internet, there really is power in numbers, with the rapid and ubiquitous spread of information even challenging the usefulness of permanent hierarchical models of organization. As mankind, are we ready for this new global democracy? As individuals, are we ready to live publicly?
