We had an awesome week in Intro to Digital Communication. Andy Johns of the Anniston Star led us Monday on a tour of multimedia journalism as he’s practicing it covering Anniston. I found it most groovy that he is using many of the tools we’ve been experimenting with this semester — map making software, Audacity, Soundslides, blogging, including live blogging, and video.
Ross McDuffie, assistant director of new media at the Rome News-Tribune, then joined us Wednesday for a discussion of the role of video in and for the future of print journalism. As if to prove his point, the newly re-vamped Web site of Major League Baseball. Video EVERYWHERE, and it’s all high quality. (The class might remember me celebrating MLB Internet for being a leader in digital communication, as progressive as MLB is retrograde.
We closed out the week discussing the origins of Facebook and the ways in which humans are organizing, socializing and networking online, trends that have re-made the Internet from a mostly commercial medium into one that is above all social. As followups to our weekly Friday morning confab, led ably this week by Hannah and Elizabeth, I pose these brain ticklers:
John Cassidy’s “Me Media: How Hanging Out on the Internet Became Big Business” in the New Yorker describes how Harvard forced Facemash to be taken down after some students and professors complained the site was offensive. I’m curious: Do you think Mark Zuckerberg violated students’ privacy and steal the university’s intellectual property by downloading pictures without permission? We haven’t discussed intellectual property rights and their evolution online much this semester. This is a good opportunity for us.
Venture capitalist Jim Breyer was quoted in the article as saying, “It’s not that the Googles and Facebooks are going to suddenly make the old-media companies obsolete. However, three to five years from now, the very best media companies will have Facebook- and Google-like characteristics.”
This article was written almost two years ago. Since then we’ve seen exactly what Breyer predicted >> big media buying or adding social networking (News Corp. bought MySpace, Microsoft bought 1% of Facebook, and news sites everywhere are seeking to leverage or add in their own domains social networking spaces. (This week I linked to a Times article on “business adopting social networking” and the U.K.’s Guardian newspaper “Cllippings” social bookmarking feature.)
Which media companies do you think are going about this in the most prudent ways?
Changing subjects, and getting a little psychological on you, if voyeurism and exhibitionism are the real reasons why Facebook-like sites are so popular, why do you think young people today are so eager to reveal themselves?
A related question, Facebook co-founder Chris Hughes seems to be saying in Cassidy’s article that you need an online identity in order for there to be traces of your existence in a college community. How do you feel about that statement?
We also read “From Ants to People, an Instinct to Swarm,” which had nothing directly to do with anything digital. From the Times’s Science pages, the article describes how advance many species of animals are relative to humans in terms of swarm behavior (don’t believe me? how much time do you spend stuck in traffic? ever see a flock of birds stuck in traffic? a school of fish? an army of ants? a swarm of bees?)
The commonality for these species is the ability to form out of the many one collective brain, allowing them to move and act as a single organism. “The behavior of swarms emerges unpredictably from the actions of thousands or millions of individuals,” the author, Carl Zimmer, writes.
Feedback in these systems is central, as is the willingness on the part of any one node to subjugate itself to the greater or common good. Hmmm…. I believe we are seeing lots of indirect connections to things we’ve been discussing all semester in terms of human behavior online. Nodes. Pheremones. Sugar. Word-of-mouse. Feedback. Do you think, after looking at Facebook, wikis, the blogosphere, digg, etc., that we (humans) can learn from our lower-order animal neighbors? How can our feedback mechanisms be improved to better inform the greater or common good, creating fast swarms rather than gridlock?
Next week we pass through the gates of digital communication DisneyWorld to ride the wonderful rides you’ve been developing for us. I’m looking forward to it.
April 18, 2008 at 1:49 pm |
I wish to address the issue of Zuckerberg’s facemash issue. It seems to me that he did violate the students’ privacy by placing their names and photos on a website to be judged and otherwise commented upon without their knowledge. If the students had joined the site voluntarily, that would have been a completely different matter, but to volunteer them for potential humiliation or even to put them in the spotlight without their knowledge and potentially against their will is irresponsible and rude. It makes me think about a point raised in discussion today that we trust Mark Zuckerberg with all of our information on Facebook and take it on faith that he won’t do anything underhanded with it, but, in fact, if you look at the facemash incident, you see that he has a history of doing just that. I find this interesting…
I don’t know how I feel about Hughes’s comment about needing to have “an online identity in order for there to be traces of your existence in a college community.” I particularly don’t think that’s true at a college like Berry where the student body is so small that you know everyone at least by face before the year is out. Yes, knowing someone by face is not the same as being able to put a name to the face and maybe some interests, but it’s still a trace of existence and, if you have friends on campus, it’s hard for you not to be at least somewhat known around campus. For that matter, these days not having an online identity makes you stand out more and boosts the awareness of your existence on campus because it’s such and anomaly. Most college students are shocked to find out a friend or classmate does not have a Facebook or Myspace presence and will, therefore, be more likely to remember that person.
As for our visits from Andy and Ross, I found both to be very enlightening. It’s both exciting and terrifying to me to see what’s going on in the news industry. On the one hand, from a consumer standpoint, it’s exciting that media is converging to this extent and the ideal of such versatility in our journalists is interesting. On the other hand, as a Com student a year from graduation and thinking about what awaits in the field, it’s terrifying. I’m not one to enjoy throwing myself into such a stressful environment willingly. I feel as if I could survive in an environment like the one that Andy and Ross described in newsrooms now, but I would be miserable always juggling so much work, stress, and chaos. However, this work, stress, and chaos is the future of news media, particularly newspapers and, despite my personal feeling sabout being a part of the workforce making the content, it’s undoubtedly fascinating to watch it all come together.
April 18, 2008 at 2:15 pm |
I’m so glad Caitie pointed out Berry’s physical or student size. I wanted to mention it during discussion but was making a very, very concerted effort not to say too much this morning. How different might the expectations and uses of Facebook by students at, say, UGA as compared to Berry. I went to a big R1 (UNC… Go HEELS!), where anonymity was quite possible, even normal. Facebook at a small college like ours should be used very differently, and these differences are really important.
I also applaud Caitie’s reaction to the presentations this week. If you saw anything in and from Andy and Ross, you saw adaptability, flexibility and a love for what journalism can do, which is offer you a passport to the world, a license to go all sorts of places, the benefit of no two days every being the same. And you saw two Berry COM majors kicking ass and taking names.
April 20, 2008 at 12:26 pm |
In COM law last semester we discussed that every time that you use credit or give any information in a transaction, there’s no telling who might receive your personal data. This uncertainty shouldn’t also be present when you are uncomfortably posed for your school photo. Of course it was taboo for Zuckerberg to hack into the Harvard servers and steal everyone’s photos, but in the grand scheme of things, who really got hurt, except for Harvard’s IT department? This is one of the least controversial things that he has done of late, in my opinion.
Breyer was onto something when he made his prediction about the future of media companies online. Just last week, Google posted the highest earnings of the first quarter, and its evolution over the past two years has been remarkable. It has incorporated news functions into its site and become a media giant as well as the advertising giant of the Web. News Corp. is the devil and in my opinion, it is insignificant that it owns MySpace. Its effect on such a hodgepodge of information is meaningless. I think that CNN on the heels of its success with the initial beta version of iReport could create a social network unlike any others out today; an informed worldwide community with the stated purpose of sharing knowledge that matters.
I can’t help but feel sorry for people who feel compelled to update their Facebook status every few hours, letting the whole world know the up-to-the-minute info. People implicitly trust something that they feel safe with, and seeing smiling friends’ faces provides that needed safety. People seem unaware that advertisers are lurking all over Facebook, Facebook is lurking all over Facebook, and any other number of crazies are doing the same.
On the flipside, I think that Facebook can improve someone’s standing at their college if its handled the right way. Treat it more like a LinkedIn, and you’re beating the system. Use it like a diary that you share with 468 of your closer friends, and you’re losing the war.
April 20, 2008 at 2:33 pm |
I think enough people were upset by Facemash that Zuckerberg took took it down. I know I’d be pretty pissed off if I found out some guy at Berry went into Viking Web or something and took everyone’s picture and info and put it on a site of their own creation. And, on top of that, people were rating how hot or not-hot I was. That sounds miserable. So, yes, I think their privacy was violated. Those students and faculty have a right to not have their image exploited, for entertainment or money. There’s no reason faculty or students should have been worried that their school pictures were going to be used for something other than their IDs.
I also don’t know if I agree with Hughe’s statement about needing an online identity. I think people feel compelled to have a Facebook or Myspace or whatever simply because lots of people have them. Facebook is fun and all, but if you truly need it to have an identity in college, what does that say about your impact on campus? Obviously not much. Facebook seems like a way to, within a group of friends or at a school, become a celebrity without doing much.
On the other hand, like Stephen said, Facebook could serve some sort of purpose, especially at a big school, where it could be used to rally people together for an important event or cause.
April 20, 2008 at 2:49 pm |
In response to Dr. Carroll’s question about why people are so eager to reveal themselves on sites like facebook and myspace, I have some thoughts.
People like to have control over the way that they are seen. I imagine that for many people, even if they aren’t what they would like to be in real life, they are able to pretend to be all the things they want to be on their carefully constructed myspace or facebook sites. For instance, if you want people to think you’re wild and crazy, then you’ll probably not worry about all of the Friday night drinking pictures you’re tagged in. If you want people to think you’re artistic, then you can put up your neat photography. If you want people to think you’re popular, then you’ll always be writing on other people’s walls.
But I think for some people it is more than just this.
We’ve talked alot in class about the death of traditional newspaper. I see facebook playing a small role in this move to digital when I think about the announcement section of the newspaper. At home my mother still looks at the announcement section of the paper to see who is engaged, who got honor roll, and she even looks at the obituaries page. We live in a smaller town, and quite often see familiar faces in this section of the paper. For people our age who don’t read the local paper, we have facebook as a substitution. But it is much more detailed, and instead of following our local community, we can follow our own personal community. People are always interested in what people they know are up to. And I think for the same reason many put their special announcements in the newspaper, they now put them online, but now more often and more detailed.
April 20, 2008 at 3:25 pm |
I think Chelsea is on to something here. Before newspapers, which means late 16th C, early 17th C, where did people get their news? The local tavern or pub. This is where people congregated; this is where the mail was brought, dumped onto a table, then rifled through as people stopped in for some ale.
What we’re seeing on Facebook, then, isn’t as much revolutionary as it is a return to the watering hole mode and means of getting the news, a highly localized news (though “local” in 2008 means something very different, much less geography-specific than it did in 1600). I like this; we should think more on it.
For more on pre-newspaper news, see Mitchell Stephens’s excellent book, A History of the News.
April 20, 2008 at 4:20 pm |
Yes, Zuckerberg was wrong in hacking into the system and taking the photos without students’ consent. However, did he give attribution to the source? I never read anything that said he did…or didn’t.
I agree with Chelsea that Facebook is a way for us to keep up with our own community. For example, when my mom tells me about one of my friends from back home that is engaged (she found out about it in the local paper), I always one-up her and tell her that I already know (thank you, Facebook).
One thing about Facebook that was mentioned in the Me article was the fact that it’s almost a competition to see who can get the most friends. Is this a voyeuristic venture–look how many friends I have–or a swarm behavior–I want to have as many friends as I can and become the leader so that everyone will follow what I’m doing?
April 20, 2008 at 5:05 pm |
. . . and in the process, hollow out or render meaningless the term “friend”, collecting them like stamps or coins or four-leaf clovers.
April 20, 2008 at 8:24 pm |
Today we are all very busy. Everyone has a cell-phone and email addresses, facebook and their favorite blogs to keep up with, in addition to everyday normal activities like eating, going to school, going to work. We are constantly moving and going. I think this is part of the reason a tool like facebook has become such an important part of our lives. It gives us a place to compartmentalize who we are, who are friends are, what they are all up to, etc… It gives us a place to interact with people at half the effort. A quick hello, a quick gossip update, and on our way. We just don’t have time to sit down for 232 cups of coffee and talk about details of our lives with everyone we know. As Dr. Carroll put it, facebook is our modern watering hole, our modern pub.
And, I think as Stephen updated schedule is every fifteen minutes? Perhaps as Chelsea pointed out, facebook is really just a friendly environment for people to control their image and who they want to be. I think this is in fact the reason that facemash was not a success. Zuckerberg hacked people’s identities and took away the control they had over their image. And, why facebook has worked. Facebook created yet another forum/ place where people are able to control their image.
I don’t think facebook is necessary to survive in the college environment. Especially, as Catie pointed out, at a small college like Berry. Community will exist in your life if you make a concerted effort for it to exist. You don’t need facebook to exist, but facebook does need all of us to exist.
April 20, 2008 at 10:05 pm |
I think Facemash violated people’s privacy because they did not willingly sign up for it. It would be a completely different story if Zuckerberg was given permission from those students (or administration) to use their pictures. I would not like it if my face showed up on something like that when I had no idea beforehand.
I can understand what Hughes is saying about how you need an online identity in order to exist in a college community. I don’t think it is a requirement or anything but when someone doesn’t have a Facebook some people think they are weird or act surprised that a person would not want one. This attitude usually makes those people want to get Facebook in order to fit in. And sometimes when people hold off getting Facebook during their college years they get one after they graduate so they can keep up with people. In a way, that is to hold onto their identity in Berry (or whatever school) because they feel they’ll be forgotten without one. At Berry this last scenario is more likely to happen, because it is easier to find community outside of the Internet at a small school.
I still think Facebook will die down after awhile. Eventually something better and “cooler” will come out and people will go to that. Our age will move on to something different, something more “mature” and the younger generations will start signing up for the latest trend.
April 21, 2008 at 6:05 am |
I think we mostly react the same way to the notion that there is something about social networks that our generation needs. It is easy to reject that idea because it is kind of insulting to a class full of people who all have Facebook. However, I do think that there is some truth to that idea, or why else would it have become so popular.
I really like what Chelsea said about Facebook serving as a new source of news (mostly social news) that replaces the announcement section of newspapers. This idea is actually what I am doing my research project on. I do think that social networks fill some of the gaps left by the decrease in other forms of communication. However, you could also argue that social networks are filling the very gaps that they are making wider.
April 22, 2008 at 7:56 pm |
To comment on Mark Zuckerburg’s right to take the pictures, I would say, if the student body already had access to these pictures or had seen them before in the “face book” that the Harvard students received, then I think it’s perfectly fine that he used them for his site. The students had already given out that information for the people at the college to view and know, so why would their pictures being on his site be any different? If that isn’t exactly what happened (if the pictures were only allowed to be seen by faculty and the administration) then I do not agree with what he did. I don’t think I would like it at all if my picture appeared somewhere when I didn’t even sign for it to be public anyway. But from what I remember reading (the book was open to everyone), I don’t think what he did was wrong.
Its hard to tell between the three examples which one sounds the most prudish, but I think that Microsoft was a bit prudish to purchase 1% of Facebook. I don’t really know what they were trying to accomplish with that, but if it’s just to have closer ties with a company that is a new social network (and to link to the popularity as well) sounds a little prudish to me.
I think that most people jump at the opportunity to let their community know special things about them. Everyone likes to be known and to know that others would take the time just to write you a message or ask you how you’re doing on your wall, or comment on a funny picture of you. As much as people love their privacy, they love to be recognized too, and so I think that is why some of the most shy introverted people still have facebook profiles and ask to be people’s friend. As for people needing an online identity to be considered a member of a school or university, no, I don’t think most people would agree with that. Some of their friends might get on to them about making it more difficult to communicate with them aside from when they see each other, but I think there are plenty of other things that can make a student feel a part of their school even if they don’t belong to facebook or have a myspace or blog. The lack of an online life does not take away anyone’s identity by any means.
As silly as this sounds, I really do think that humans can learn alot from little ants or animals that form swarms and travel/work together in units. They all have a common goal and their instinct tells them that if they don’t work together, it is dangerous for the group and for each one individually. They constantly serve one another, and because humans are so self-centered and aren’t perfect enough to serve the common good all the time, I know that we will never (even with all the greatest technology in the world) be perfectly united like ants. But I do think many of us strive for what they strive without even knowing it. I think that online entities and social networks are models after some of natures famous phenomenons. But I think, to avoid gridlock, we can always try to communicate as clearly and directly as possible through the many many communication tools we have accessible to us every day. The network will take care of itself, as long as the information floating around in it is what we all mean to say….
April 22, 2008 at 9:07 pm |
To answer the first question I think yes that the student’s rights were violated and that permission should have been given before anything was put anywhere.
I agree with Tracy and I think it was interesting that microsoft only got 1% of Facebook. I mean what are they trying to do with this. 1% is not that much so I dont see how that can have a big effect on anything. Therefore I think that microsoft is doing this in the most prudent way.
I think that young people today on Facebook want people to know about that and what to tell people what they are like. Some people just like being open like that online. I
dont know how I feel about Hughes comment about having an idenity online in a college group. I mean in a small setting like Berry I think that everyone is so close knit that a lot of people already know a lot about each other and therefore stuff online is not new. Although I will say when we did the online assignment for class on one of our classmates Facebook did give me a lot of information on my person. Stuff that I did not know about. So I think it does show some that people can actually know more about each other from things like Facebook because it is on someone’s profile. I dont think you need to have a online idenity but I think it helps some. Although I dont think students shoudl put everything online.
I think that the question about the “From Ants to People, an Instinct to Swarm”
I think that we can learn from the animals. I think that things like blogs where people can talk about different things allow people to learn new things that they might not have know about. I think that people can learn from little things like ants in following the leader and learning about things. Blogs are a great way that allow people to express their thoughts out in the open. Another thing that I think would be like forms where people talk about certain things and what other people would do about it. People give other people insite on what they would do about something or how something should go.
April 23, 2008 at 12:17 am |
For the first question, I have to agree with the majority in that it was wrong to have students’ pictures posted on Zuckerburg’s site. Obviously, consent would have been the proper way to go about the creation of it.
As for Microsoft purchasing 1% of Facebook, I think this it was a pretty smart move on their part. Although, the single percent was costly, about $240 million if I’m not mistaken, it allows Microsoft to get the scoop on who’s joining and what they’re using it for. Eventually, if Zuckerburg finds a way to turn a profit with Facebook, I’m sure having a stake in the company will really pay off.
As for what Hughes seems to be saying, I don’t really think that an online persona is necessary to be known in a college community. Maybe I’m reading into that statement wrong but that just seems foolish to think “If I’m not on Facebook, I must be a nobody,” and almost backwards in a sense. Honestly, if you spend more time online tucked away in your dorm room than you’re missing out on the opportunity to leave “traces of your existence” in a college community.
Like I said in the discussion, I see Facebook as an online toy and something not to be taken seriously, but rather just for fun. Use it if you choose, enjoy it, but don’t let it consume your life.
April 23, 2008 at 8:28 pm |
Harvard seemed to go a little far with its claims of intellectual property but I suppose I can see how posting pictures could be seen as violating students’ privacy.
Maybe people are eager to reveal themselves because they’re just a pictures on a profile page. Perhaps people feel more comfortable disclosing information when they are not physically face-to-face with others. And while there will be consequences for revealing too much online, people may get carried away when they sit down in the privacy of their dorms and start typing away.