Here Comes Everybody Reflection

Reflection on “Here Comes Everybody”
I found “Here Comes Everybody” informative and compelling, and my favorite book we’ve read thus far. Coincidentally, it corresponds with a book I am reading concurrently in another course, Herman and Chomsky’s “Manufacturing Consent” in Poli Sci 329 – “Propaganda, Media, and American Politics.” One of Chomsky’s key points is the big media networks, which are controlled by multinational corporations, dictate the information the audience receives and how it is conveyed. Herman and Chomsky discuss the several “filters” networks use to get rid of information before producing it for the people. Other material we have discussed relates to the media’s ability to control us (Big Brother concept), and whether or not that is democratic or totalitarian. From the perspective of the media, their content is democratic, not totalitarian, because the audience is not forced to watch a specific network and have a variety of sources to draw their news from. However, from the audience perspective, the media acts “totalitarian-like” because they control the content, doctor information through various filters to accommodate an angle they would like the content viewed through.
I bring up the readings from Pols329 because “Here Comes Everybody” addresses potential solutions to Herman and Chomsky’s many problems with the “totalitarian-like” media networks. Chapter four, “Publish, Then Filter” speaks directly to this point. The “many-to-many pattern,” or the ability for the audience to contribute and respond to content, has changed communications by adding a group element to the content produced. This is differs greatly from the “one-to-many pattern” used by the types of broadcasting media networks Chomsky refers to. A response is elicited and almost demanded upon from the audience instead of “I talk, and talk, and talk, and all you can do is choose to listen or tune out.” This new pattern of communication alleviates Herman and Chomsky’s concerns about media filter. The audience controls and alters the information produced by another member of the audience or a network source via “the Web [which] makes interactivity technologically possible.”
The chapter discusses the blur, “between broadcast and communications, which is to say between one-to-many and one-to-one tools, used to be so clear…” Reliability and source credibility are some of the main factors that assist to keep this line blurry. I can relate to this idea. As an avid “tweeter,” I’ve become annoyed with the volume of crap that appears on my feed and began to question the tool itself. Then I realized my problem was not Twitter, but the people I am following. So, I went through my Twitter and Facebook contacts and deleted/unfollowed several who post content I’ve rendered useless, unimportant, or simply annoying. I feel this is where social medias take a huge hit in the eyes of non-users. Twitter is often discredited as an illegitimate source of information and an excuse for public relations and marketing strategies. I disagree. Twitter can be a very legitimate source for news; it all depends on what you are contributing and whom you are following.
Another issue Herman and Chomsky address are costs networks incur and how economic incentives control their actions; “basic economics of publishing puts a cap on the overall volume of content… forces publisher to filter content in advance.” Through the interconnectivity on the Web, transaction costs have been lowered, and “social tools provide a platform for communities of practice.” Chapter ten, “Failure for Free,” speaks to the reduced costs of spreading information afforded by technology. Since the invention of open source software, or “the open source movement,” users have the ability to read and alter material from the original creators. The amazing thing about the open source movement is that it’s “remarkably tolerant of failure… open source doesn’t reduce the likelihood of failure, it reduces the cost of failure; it essentially gets failure for free.” This sort of economic break is not available to television and print publications, which is where conversations on the Internet via blogs, Wiki’s, Twitter etc. win – their failures only elicit more conversation instead of rack up costs.
I think the book makes a great point in this chapter to address “Manufacturing Consent.” I also really like the reference to the open source movement as an “ecosystem” and not an organization. I’ve never thought of the Internet through that lens, but it makes a lot of sense – it’s an ecosystem where everything cooperates together and boundaries are crossed.
While reading chapter ten, I was confused by the computer science – jargon, so I had to look up information online. Of course, my findings hailed from Wikipedia (ironic?) for Linux, C++, and open source software. I was fascinated by what I found and read through material for while. I was also provoked to ask my engineering and computer science friends about these soft wares, which expanded the conversation I found on Wikipedia. Maybe I’ll go back to the sites I was surfing and add my own contribution!