I think this article is high-minded and moralistic. I feel conflicted after reading it because while I sympathize with the plight that journalists face, I also just see so many problems with this author’s analysis and questions.
There is a fundamental distinction between the internet and radio/broadcast television in that the usable spectrum of airwaves is a finite public resource. If I’m broadcasting on 700 AM then you’re not. The licensing and regulatory structure that is (debatably) appropriate for public broadcast has no application to the internet. There is room for everyone to publish what they want.
The advertising model is not broken. The wealth of information and services available to users at zero monetary cost is a miracle of the “free-market free-for-all” and is most beneficial to those with the least amount of disposable income. Coining “surveillance capitalism” as a pejorative term to describe the success of this model is ridiculous.
While it’s true that public service media like Wikipedia have had to share the landscape with increasingly sophisticated commercial companies, it’s also true that they fill a void in the marketplace.
Wikipedia is not a “public service” media organization. The author uses the same term to describe the BBC. If that were the case, then the sale of every internet-connected device would be taxed to fund Wikipedia and the organization would be run by the government. Instead Wikipedia is funded by voluntary donations from millions of individuals. The fact that it fills a void in the marketplace is a testament to the success of the free market approach to the internet.
We’ve grown so used to the idea that social media is damaging our democracies that we’ve thought very little about how we might build new networks to strengthen societies.
Built into this is the assumption that social media is doing more damage than or is more susceptible to malevolent influence than state-run news organizations or the monopolistic broadcast and print publications of the 20th century and I reject that. If you don’t like Twitter and Facebook, then stop using them. Asking the government to get involved is the least productive thing anyone can do. Increased regulation will only serve to further cement the current crop of companies in their dominant position and we don’t need any more Quaeros. The alternatives are out there, you just have to be willing to put in the effort to find them and be an active participant instead of passive consumer.
Responses like this are why I am already obsessed with Readup, y'all really help me dig deeper into articles and gain a more nuanced view of what I'm reading.
I don't totally agree that it's always feasible to just "opt-out" of some of these platforms. For a journalist to opt-out of Twitter could be career suicide, since there is an expectation you will network and find leads there.
When people leave Facebook the friends left behind aren't applauding their value, they're wondering why that person is "dissing them" and those people are missing out on what's strangely become a normal part of how we build community.
I'm not informed enough to know what will help make positive change (and I barely understand how regulations hurt or harm in practice, it's not something I've researched), aside from moving to more mindful platforms like Readup.
Your response really got me thinking and I'm grateful for that.
It's a very good point that not everyone has the same options available to them as far as "opting-out." I suppose that phrase alone oversimplifies the relationship between social networks and their members. It's certainly not a binary state of either fully engaged or completely disengaged for most people. Even if you use nothing other than email you're still participating in a federated communication network with other individuals.
I was trying to be mindful that I was reading an article in CJR which seems to be written by and for a group of professionals that have been most harmed by and are most attached to existing social networks. I didn't know if it even made sense to post my opinion on it but so much just seemed so confused rather than even right or wrong. I feel like the one thing I know for sure from my own small area of expertise is that nothing can be built without a clear understanding of the problem and specific vision for a solution (and that was the title after all!).
I was also kind of taken aback by the lack of citations and supporting evidence for some claims. I feel like I have a lot of thoughts on some topics but I don't write about them because of the time that I'd need to do what I would consider the appropriate amount of research. Maybe I should just start writing or maybe it would all be wasted time that should be spent programming new Readup features. Regardless, your response made me glad I posted on this article, made me think about it more and I think this kind of dialog is always a good use of time.
heck yea! I would totally read if you wrote, features are nice but so are ideas.
At the very least your comments are v valuable. I like seeing the ways others read into an article. It's helping me revive my old deep reading skills, I didn't even think to take into consideration the home of the article (which was trained into me when I got my bachelors).
Readup is knocking the rust off my critical reading skills, I'm so glad for it.
I don't totally agree that it's always feasible to just "opt-out" of some of these platforms. For a journalist to opt-out of Twitter could be career suicide, since there is an expectation you will network and find leads there.
Yes! And it’s more than just the expectation to network, it’s the actual network, the audience. I can’t even count the number of people I know who are professionally- or financially-compelled to be on a social media network. It goes way beyond journalists. So many people will legit lose money and/or their job if they try to opt-out.
And yeah, the social “dissing” is a thing too, though less of an issue then the professional/money handcuffs. Personal story: I just found out, literally a few hours ago, that my cousin is eight months pregnant. It’s my fault more than anybody else, but this is just a reminder to all: stay in touch with all of your humans
Update (12/19/2019):
The point I guess isn’t about “dissing” as much as just the reality that these ad platforms are a communication-intermediary even within the family unit. So when you opt-out, the costs are big, real and personal.
I want to adapt this into a blog post. The last paragraph f*cking rules. So too does this:
The advertising model is not broken. The wealth of information and services available to users at zero monetary cost is a miracle of the “free-market free-for-all” and is most beneficial to those with the least amount of disposable income.
Brilliant. Yes. You are describing a completely legitimate and reasonable perspective that we don’t hear often enough, because negativity spreads faster than gratitude. As more and more people begin to engage (meaning: read) more deeply on this nuanced topic, I believe (and hope) that your overall mindset will become the dominant, default opinion.
Yet, still, you and I have this radical divergence of opinion that occasionally appears (IRL and online) completely out of the blue, and it always stops me sharp. Here, it only happened once: the last sentence of the third paragraph. I thought: Wait, wtf, no. It’s a random example, but basically I think the term “surveillance capitalism” is helpful and productive and, if anything, we need more language to describe the situation we’re living in. That these platforms are essentially robo-spies was definitely not clear to end-users throughout the last decade. People MUST be in control over their own actions, but also, I empathize with people who feel like they “didn’t know what they were getting into” or “feel stuck” because I’ve had those feelings.
I think the question of whether we need more language to describe the situation we're living in is an interesting one. I'd argue that "surveillance capitalism" literally doesn't make sense. I know I probably sound like a broken record pedant but I think being precise with language is important when you're trying to understand or communicate ideas about speech, information, truth and public policy.
Seriously, go back and look at the paragraph that includes the definition of "surveillance capitalism." What is described are ads and cookies that have been a thing since the beginning of the web. That the description is contorted into something scary-sounding and serves as a prelude to the conclusion that online services are "sources of unregulated information that are easily weaponized" sets off my 1984 alarm bells in the biggest way imaginable.
Easily weaponized sources of unregulated information.
This is the most nightmarish Ministry of Truth level craziness that I've read in a long time. And I should be worried about seeing relevant ads on Facebook or Amazon?
Anyone (with the technical skills) can make a public service web site. But how to get users? That's the problem, people are used to the sites they use now and it's hard to get people to change, or even add a new site to the ones they regularly visit. Since discovering Readup, I've been promoting it to my online and IRL friends. As far as I know, no one has checked it out.
Echoing jeff, we’re hard at work on growing Readup, so it means so much to us that you’re inspired enough to spread the word!! Btw, email anytime, ideas always appreciated (and often implemented): bill@readup.com
If there’s any way we can help you spread the word, I’d love to know!
How to get users is 100% the problem. First off, thanks for promoting Readup to your friends! We're working hard right now to improve our home page marketing in order to better communicate our service to potential users who visit the site.
We can also see in the numbers that we fail to activate an astonishing percentage of users who do create an account. Education is at least as difficult as technically building something and we still have a lot of work to do on that front!
Using the radio as a comparison, the author imagines an internet that runs more like a publicly funded service. Hard to imagine today, but one may still dream, right?
If the contemporary internet is a city, Wikipedia is the lone public park; all the rest of our public spaces are shopping malls – open to the general public, but subject to the rules and logic of commerce. (...) A public service Web invites us to imagine services that don’t exist now, because they are not commercially viable, but perhaps should exist for our benefit, for the benefit of citizens in a democracy.”
Can we imagine a social network designed in a different way: to encourage the sharing of mutual understanding rather than misinformation? A social network that encourages you to interact with people with whom you might have a productive disagreement?
I think this article is high-minded and moralistic. I feel conflicted after reading it because while I sympathize with the plight that journalists face, I also just see so many problems with this author’s analysis and questions.
There is a fundamental distinction between the internet and radio/broadcast television in that the usable spectrum of airwaves is a finite public resource. If I’m broadcasting on 700 AM then you’re not. The licensing and regulatory structure that is (debatably) appropriate for public broadcast has no application to the internet. There is room for everyone to publish what they want.
The advertising model is not broken. The wealth of information and services available to users at zero monetary cost is a miracle of the “free-market free-for-all” and is most beneficial to those with the least amount of disposable income. Coining “surveillance capitalism” as a pejorative term to describe the success of this model is ridiculous.
Wikipedia is not a “public service” media organization. The author uses the same term to describe the BBC. If that were the case, then the sale of every internet-connected device would be taxed to fund Wikipedia and the organization would be run by the government. Instead Wikipedia is funded by voluntary donations from millions of individuals. The fact that it fills a void in the marketplace is a testament to the success of the free market approach to the internet.
Built into this is the assumption that social media is doing more damage than or is more susceptible to malevolent influence than state-run news organizations or the monopolistic broadcast and print publications of the 20th century and I reject that. If you don’t like Twitter and Facebook, then stop using them. Asking the government to get involved is the least productive thing anyone can do. Increased regulation will only serve to further cement the current crop of companies in their dominant position and we don’t need any more Quaeros. The alternatives are out there, you just have to be willing to put in the effort to find them and be an active participant instead of passive consumer.
Responses like this are why I am already obsessed with Readup, y'all really help me dig deeper into articles and gain a more nuanced view of what I'm reading.
I don't totally agree that it's always feasible to just "opt-out" of some of these platforms. For a journalist to opt-out of Twitter could be career suicide, since there is an expectation you will network and find leads there.
When people leave Facebook the friends left behind aren't applauding their value, they're wondering why that person is "dissing them" and those people are missing out on what's strangely become a normal part of how we build community.
I'm not informed enough to know what will help make positive change (and I barely understand how regulations hurt or harm in practice, it's not something I've researched), aside from moving to more mindful platforms like Readup.
Your response really got me thinking and I'm grateful for that.
It's a very good point that not everyone has the same options available to them as far as "opting-out." I suppose that phrase alone oversimplifies the relationship between social networks and their members. It's certainly not a binary state of either fully engaged or completely disengaged for most people. Even if you use nothing other than email you're still participating in a federated communication network with other individuals.
I was trying to be mindful that I was reading an article in CJR which seems to be written by and for a group of professionals that have been most harmed by and are most attached to existing social networks. I didn't know if it even made sense to post my opinion on it but so much just seemed so confused rather than even right or wrong. I feel like the one thing I know for sure from my own small area of expertise is that nothing can be built without a clear understanding of the problem and specific vision for a solution (and that was the title after all!).
I was also kind of taken aback by the lack of citations and supporting evidence for some claims. I feel like I have a lot of thoughts on some topics but I don't write about them because of the time that I'd need to do what I would consider the appropriate amount of research. Maybe I should just start writing or maybe it would all be wasted time that should be spent programming new Readup features. Regardless, your response made me glad I posted on this article, made me think about it more and I think this kind of dialog is always a good use of time.
heck yea! I would totally read if you wrote, features are nice but so are ideas.
At the very least your comments are v valuable. I like seeing the ways others read into an article. It's helping me revive my old deep reading skills, I didn't even think to take into consideration the home of the article (which was trained into me when I got my bachelors).
Readup is knocking the rust off my critical reading skills, I'm so glad for it.
Yes! And it’s more than just the expectation to network, it’s the actual network, the audience. I can’t even count the number of people I know who are professionally- or financially-compelled to be on a social media network. It goes way beyond journalists. So many people will legit lose money and/or their job if they try to opt-out.
And yeah, the social “dissing” is a thing too, though less of an issue then the professional/money handcuffs. Personal story: I just found out, literally a few hours ago, that my cousin is eight months pregnant. It’s my fault more than anybody else, but this is just a reminder to all: stay in touch with all of your humans
The point I guess isn’t about “dissing” as much as just the reality that these ad platforms are a communication-intermediary even within the family unit. So when you opt-out, the costs are big, real and personal.
I want to adapt this into a blog post. The last paragraph f*cking rules. So too does this:
Brilliant. Yes. You are describing a completely legitimate and reasonable perspective that we don’t hear often enough, because negativity spreads faster than gratitude. As more and more people begin to engage (meaning: read) more deeply on this nuanced topic, I believe (and hope) that your overall mindset will become the dominant, default opinion.
Yet, still, you and I have this radical divergence of opinion that occasionally appears (IRL and online) completely out of the blue, and it always stops me sharp. Here, it only happened once: the last sentence of the third paragraph. I thought: Wait, wtf, no. It’s a random example, but basically I think the term “surveillance capitalism” is helpful and productive and, if anything, we need more language to describe the situation we’re living in. That these platforms are essentially robo-spies was definitely not clear to end-users throughout the last decade. People MUST be in control over their own actions, but also, I empathize with people who feel like they “didn’t know what they were getting into” or “feel stuck” because I’ve had those feelings.
I think the question of whether we need more language to describe the situation we're living in is an interesting one. I'd argue that "surveillance capitalism" literally doesn't make sense. I know I probably sound like a broken record pedant but I think being precise with language is important when you're trying to understand or communicate ideas about speech, information, truth and public policy.
Seriously, go back and look at the paragraph that includes the definition of "surveillance capitalism." What is described are ads and cookies that have been a thing since the beginning of the web. That the description is contorted into something scary-sounding and serves as a prelude to the conclusion that online services are "sources of unregulated information that are easily weaponized" sets off my 1984 alarm bells in the biggest way imaginable.
Easily weaponized sources of unregulated information.
This is the most nightmarish Ministry of Truth level craziness that I've read in a long time. And I should be worried about seeing relevant ads on Facebook or Amazon?
Anyone (with the technical skills) can make a public service web site. But how to get users? That's the problem, people are used to the sites they use now and it's hard to get people to change, or even add a new site to the ones they regularly visit. Since discovering Readup, I've been promoting it to my online and IRL friends. As far as I know, no one has checked it out.
Upvote.
Echoing jeff, we’re hard at work on growing Readup, so it means so much to us that you’re inspired enough to spread the word!! Btw, email anytime, ideas always appreciated (and often implemented): bill@readup.com
If there’s any way we can help you spread the word, I’d love to know!
Will do!
How to get users is 100% the problem. First off, thanks for promoting Readup to your friends! We're working hard right now to improve our home page marketing in order to better communicate our service to potential users who visit the site.
We can also see in the numbers that we fail to activate an astonishing percentage of users who do create an account. Education is at least as difficult as technically building something and we still have a lot of work to do on that front!
Using the radio as a comparison, the author imagines an internet that runs more like a publicly funded service. Hard to imagine today, but one may still dream, right?
Yes! We can imagine it! It’s here!!
Yes it is! 🎉 go team Readup