In his book "The cult of the amateur: How today's internet is killing our culture" Andrew Keen spends the first chapter ranting about how the internet is causing people in traditional media outlets such as the news, music industry, and movie industry to lose money and jobs. He mentions multiple times the issues craiglist has caused for newspapers in lost revenue due to free classified ads. He talks endlessly about the untrained ametuers posting their opinions and media and the untrained ametuers viewing the information that has been posted.
Well, WELCOME TO THE DIGITAL AGE. Keen suggests that consumers should pay for a product simply because the people that are charging are the people who have been doing it the longest. You should pay the newspapers for circulating news and for classified ads. His reason why, they are the experts at it. They deserve to be paid huge sums of money for their expertise. Well, the internet has proven that it doesn't take huge sums of money or experts to produce content that is of interest to millions of viewers.
Keen's argument is the equivalent of saying that we should never have adopted cars as a mode of transportation. Just think of the millions of people that were out of business. The lumber jacks that cut the wood to build buggies, the farmers that bred and fed the horses to draw the buggies, the people that fixed the buggies when they broke. The invention of the car ruined the transportation industry! The spread of the internet is in the same way destroying the media industry!
According to Keen, content on the internet is created by monkies then consumed by the same monkies that are creating it. Internet publications lack the trained professonalism of an elite group of media generators. Any Joe-Smoe can be a movie critic, a news reporter, or a movie star. My response:
1. I have never had any professional training, yet for the past two years I have been hired as a sports reporter and photographer for a local newspaper. Does that make me a professional journalist? Does that make me qualified to be a sports reporter or a blogger? At what point do I cross from Amateur to professional?
2. If someone can and will do it for free, then PLEASE do it. I for one hate having to pay someone hundreds or thousands of dollars for their expertise when my car breaks. I know lots of people that are frustrated with the money they spend every time their computer breaks. If people wouldn't charge outrageous amounts for their services in the first place, there wouldn't be a push to find the means to provide the same service cheaper or for free.
3. You will never be able to go to dinner online. You'll never be able to obtain physical merchandise online (you can buy it there, but it still comes from someone somewhere). It will be impossible to fuel your car on the internet. So there are many goods and services that the internet can't possibly destroy people's ability to make absurd amounts of money from.
4. I prefer the advice and opinions of people that are not paid for their advice and opinions. I have found that I don't like the majority of films that are highly praised and given awards at the Oscars each year. The expert opinion is rarely my opinion so why would I PAY for an expert opinion?
It isn't up to the world to put an end to the digital age so that we can continue to pay outrageous prices to the people that have monopolized the industry and profited for years off that monopolization. It is the industries' responsibility to adopt to the fact that their model no longer works. After getting something for nothing, few people are going to readily go back to paying the kind of money Hollywood and the RIAA charge or even the small fee charged by the newspaper company.
It is a digital age. The horse and buggy are now novelties as soon might be printed newspaper and high dollar movie and music distribution.
Wednesday, January 28, 2009
Sunday, January 18, 2009
What to believe
Many people have a problem with the information generated on the internet due to the fact that it allows anyone to say anything they want with no citation to empirical evidence. Many professors and teachers shrink in fear at the idea of students using a source as un-academic as wikipedia and believing most of what they read on the internet without questioning where the information came from.
To this I say BAH! In America, information is CRAMMED into our heads from the time we are five years old. Information that has no more grounding in fact than much of the information available on the internet... Don't believe me? Try this on...
1. Quick, who discovered America?
2. Who discovered that the Earth was round?
3. How many planets are in our Solar System?
Did you answer Columbus to number 1? If Columbus discovered America, then where did the native Americans come from? What about the Vikings that knew it was here long before then? Columbus landed in a place that Europe was not aware existed. Where does pre-colonial American history come from? Europe. The fact is that Columbus lays claim to being the first European to step foot on American soil and thus is credited with the "discovery". American history, however, does NOT teach this, still today we celebrate Columbus day and the discovery of America.
Did you also answer Columbus to number 2? In fact Columbus did NOT sail around the world. Columbus sailed half way around the world then turned around and went home. He did not make it to India. Why then was I educated less than 20 years ago to believe that it was Columbus? Because that is European (England and Spain) history.
Did you answer 9 to number 3? Remember that recently Pluto was de-classified as a planter. Ever heard of planet X. Astronomers believe that there may be as many as 12 bodies that act like planets in our solar system.
Finding the "truth" and using only "reliable" sources is not a problem that is new to the internet. All scientific "fact" is simply a best guess and all history is slanted to the perspective of the person that recorded it. This problem of best guesses and false information is illustrated in the fundamental ideals that every American child learns in elementary school. How can we expect to teach children how to search for "reliable" "trustworthy" sources when the very books used to educate them continue to present false hoods and best guesses as known facts?
One thing the internet does allow for is a wider range of opinions to be voiced and discovered by those that are interested in learning multiple versions of the truth. Now try a google search to find out what an internet search will reveal in answer to those three "simple" questions.
To this I say BAH! In America, information is CRAMMED into our heads from the time we are five years old. Information that has no more grounding in fact than much of the information available on the internet... Don't believe me? Try this on...
1. Quick, who discovered America?
2. Who discovered that the Earth was round?
3. How many planets are in our Solar System?
Did you answer Columbus to number 1? If Columbus discovered America, then where did the native Americans come from? What about the Vikings that knew it was here long before then? Columbus landed in a place that Europe was not aware existed. Where does pre-colonial American history come from? Europe. The fact is that Columbus lays claim to being the first European to step foot on American soil and thus is credited with the "discovery". American history, however, does NOT teach this, still today we celebrate Columbus day and the discovery of America.
Did you also answer Columbus to number 2? In fact Columbus did NOT sail around the world. Columbus sailed half way around the world then turned around and went home. He did not make it to India. Why then was I educated less than 20 years ago to believe that it was Columbus? Because that is European (England and Spain) history.
Did you answer 9 to number 3? Remember that recently Pluto was de-classified as a planter. Ever heard of planet X. Astronomers believe that there may be as many as 12 bodies that act like planets in our solar system.
Finding the "truth" and using only "reliable" sources is not a problem that is new to the internet. All scientific "fact" is simply a best guess and all history is slanted to the perspective of the person that recorded it. This problem of best guesses and false information is illustrated in the fundamental ideals that every American child learns in elementary school. How can we expect to teach children how to search for "reliable" "trustworthy" sources when the very books used to educate them continue to present false hoods and best guesses as known facts?
One thing the internet does allow for is a wider range of opinions to be voiced and discovered by those that are interested in learning multiple versions of the truth. Now try a google search to find out what an internet search will reveal in answer to those three "simple" questions.
Friday, January 16, 2009
Thoughts on this assigment / blog
One of the reported problems with the internet is that entirely too much information is being "created". Much of the information on the internet is simply a repeat of information from somewhere else. Additionally, much of the original content is written by people with no academic credibility, designed for a small number of friends within their social group, and not fit for consumption by the general public. While one line of thought is the desire to preserve, consume, and understand the vast amounts of information available from “everyone” that is connected, another line of thought contends that there is very little information of true value on the internet. Of course all of this depends on your definition of value and your purposes in utilizing and or publishing to the internet.
The assignment for this course adds to the ever growing collection of random unchecked thought and information being generated on the internet. Take for example the post that you are reading at this very moment. I have made several broad general statements that many of you will readily agree with. However, just because you agree doesn’t make them true.
Who is it that has “reported” this problem? Who are they to determine what the problems of the internet are?
Why is a duplication of information a bad thing? Would it be better to have the information stored in one place that everyone has access to rather than have the same information posted on a million different websites taking up hard drive space on internet servers all over the world? Or does a multitude of duplication ensure that the information is available and easier to find for all parties interested in consuming the information?
Who exactly is it that thinks that everything on the internet should be preserved? Is it enough that you or I think that way, or should someone more important with the power to preserve the information be convinced of this?
Who thinks that the majority (and again define majority) of information is not worth saving? If some of the information was carefully preserved while the majority was discarded, who then would determine what is “of true value” and “fit for consumption by the general public”?
Depending on what other topics arise during the course of the semester, I may attempt to answer (or at least provide reference to the arguments for and against these statements) some of these questions with my own opinions. OR, I might simply continue to post my own random mostly uneducated thoughts, conveniently passing them off to the general public as solid facts simply because the internet allows me to do that!
The assignment for this course adds to the ever growing collection of random unchecked thought and information being generated on the internet. Take for example the post that you are reading at this very moment. I have made several broad general statements that many of you will readily agree with. However, just because you agree doesn’t make them true.
Who is it that has “reported” this problem? Who are they to determine what the problems of the internet are?
Why is a duplication of information a bad thing? Would it be better to have the information stored in one place that everyone has access to rather than have the same information posted on a million different websites taking up hard drive space on internet servers all over the world? Or does a multitude of duplication ensure that the information is available and easier to find for all parties interested in consuming the information?
Who exactly is it that thinks that everything on the internet should be preserved? Is it enough that you or I think that way, or should someone more important with the power to preserve the information be convinced of this?
Who thinks that the majority (and again define majority) of information is not worth saving? If some of the information was carefully preserved while the majority was discarded, who then would determine what is “of true value” and “fit for consumption by the general public”?
Depending on what other topics arise during the course of the semester, I may attempt to answer (or at least provide reference to the arguments for and against these statements) some of these questions with my own opinions. OR, I might simply continue to post my own random mostly uneducated thoughts, conveniently passing them off to the general public as solid facts simply because the internet allows me to do that!
Purpose of this Blog
Whether you found this blog on purpose or by mistake, welcome to my insane domain of thoughts. This blog was started in January of 2009 as part of an assignment for a graduate course.
For those of you that are not in 695, the ideal behind the project was inspired by a former teacher of the class instructor. This teacher thought it was a good idea to have her students write more than she would ever read. The instructor for the graduate class liked the ideal and assigned it as part of the course. The goal is to blog on a regular basis and thus create more words than the instructor can or will read.
For those of you that are not in 695, the ideal behind the project was inspired by a former teacher of the class instructor. This teacher thought it was a good idea to have her students write more than she would ever read. The instructor for the graduate class liked the ideal and assigned it as part of the course. The goal is to blog on a regular basis and thus create more words than the instructor can or will read.
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