<HTML><BODY style="word-wrap: break-word; -khtml-nbsp-mode: space; -khtml-line-break: after-white-space; ">Hi Trebor and All,<DIV><BR class="khtml-block-placeholder"></DIV><DIV>My point in referencing Evangelical models of collectivity is simply to question the ease with which technological modes that encourage sociability are seen as an intrinsically good or progressive in some of the list discussions. It's not the geographic diversity that concerns me as much as the a priori assumptions about the modeling of sociability in these varying contexts (and the need to move beyond the simplistic 'corporate' vs. 'populist'/hacker opposition). As I noted in a response to Ulises earlier, one of the most impressive models of a rhizomatic communications in recent US history involves the circulation of information within the Aryan Nations Brotherhood, while most of it's members were housed in maximum security prisons. For more details on the obvious similarities between Social Media rhetoric and earlier technological forms see James Carey's work, which explores parallels with steam and electrical power (vis a vis. political rhetoric). I discuss Carey's book briefly in an ancient essay on information policy and the Freedom of Information Act:</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><A href="http://digitalarts.ucsd.edu/~gkester/GK_Website/Research/Access%20Denied.html">http://digitalarts.ucsd.edu/~gkester/GK_Website/Research/Access%20Denied.html</A> </DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><BR class="khtml-block-placeholder"></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">Best,</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">Grant</DIV><DIV><BR><DIV><DIV>On Feb 11, 2007, at 3:53 PM, Trebor Scholz wrote:</DIV><BR class="Apple-interchange-newline"><BLOCKQUOTE type="cite"><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">A few responses. In 2004 Judith Donath provided a useful, long definition of "sociable media." She started: "Sociable media are media that enhance communication and the formation</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">of social ties among people. Such media are not new – letter writing can be traced back thousands of years – but the advent of the computer has brought about an immense number</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">of new forms."<SPAN class="Apple-converted-space"> </SPAN></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">The term *sociable* media acknowledges the possibility of sociality instead of blindly assuming that the online millions will simply come if you open up a room. "Sociable web media,"</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">then, specifies the meaning a bit more as it separates the meaning from its offline equivalents.<SPAN class="Apple-converted-space"> </SPAN></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">Web 2.0- I aint your friend. And that is not just because of your vagueness or silly suggestion of newness or your ties to the O'Reilly publishing empire. I am skeptical of your name</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">(not the phenomena that you stand for) because your branding is meant to explain and frame the emerging sociable worlds and the way we act in them.<SPAN class="Apple-converted-space"> </SPAN>The official discourse that</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">you stand for has become an important placeholder for corporate agendas in which your "brand began to be understood less as 'symbolic extensions of products' and more as virtual</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">communities constructed in media-space." (Mattelart)<SPAN class="Apple-converted-space"> </SPAN></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">It matters, which terms we use to name our worlds. It is also significant to realize that we are tenants and not landladies in most sociable web spaces that we inhabit. That Murdoch</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">has MySpace in his pocket means, as Ulises points out that "... social media create a 'market,' [and] we can expect only certain kinds of solutions to emerge from its application."<SPAN class="Apple-converted-space"> </SPAN></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">Grant:</DIV> <BLOCKQUOTE type="cite"><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">"Theoretical speculation about democratic will-formation and participatory ethics is great, but how about some discussions of social media that are grounded in an analysis of the</DIV> </BLOCKQUOTE><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">actual complexity, and contradiction, of social formations on a more global scale?"</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">In response to your two points: first, much of the discussions here are not speculation, Grant, but a look at the specifics of sociable web media. We are working with examples all</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">along-- it's not all hypothetical. Second, you ask for a global perspective. I, and many others, pay close attention to what happens in China, Brazil, India, Vietnam, Congo, Malaysia,</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">Iraq, Iran, UAE, and Cuba. While today it is still important to be tuned in to the American teenager who is hooked on MySpace, in a few years, sociable web media history will not be</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">written in the USA. In Africa, mobile sociality moves to the cellphone. In Asia, MySpace clones are crowding the WWW. I think your call for a more global perspective is useful. It'd be</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">silly, however, to ignore the substantial and indeed very important developments that currently still come with an American stamp on them. And, yes, echoing Ulises-- please give us</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">more insight into the history of cable TV and its parallel to sociable media.</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">Armin's account of the young hacker:</DIV> <BLOCKQUOTE type="cite"><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">"having looked at myspace et al, he came to the conclusion that whoever called those environments 'social' must have a very different idea from his about what is 'social' (marked by</DIV> </BLOCKQUOTE><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">or passed in pleasant companionship with one's friends or associates.)</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">While I'd not use Danah's exact words ("preposterous" and "idiotic") I agree with her that we cannot discount the current sociality as being social. All I can say, Armin, is: "log on,</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">have a look for yourself." Numbers can always be viewed with a skeptical eye but it means something if a recent Pew report showed that 55% of all American teens use social</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">networking sites.<SPAN class="Apple-converted-space"> </SPAN></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">Armin:</DIV> <BLOCKQUOTE type="cite"><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">"i follow the discussion closeloy enough to see that it is very uncritical of those commercial spaces and i have not seen much nourishing on this list so far of alternatives."</DIV> </BLOCKQUOTE><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">Well, my former high school teacher comes to mind who always demanded: only comment on the book if you actually read it (or, as I’d add-- care to dig in the archive). For starters:</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><A href="http://mailman.thing.net/pipermail/idc/2005-December/thread.html">http://mailman.thing.net/pipermail/idc/2005-December/thread.html</A></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><A href="http://mailman.thing.net/pipermail/idc/2006-March/thread.html">http://mailman.thing.net/pipermail/idc/2006-March/thread.html</A></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><A href="http://mailman.thing.net/pipermail/idc/2006-June/thread.html">http://mailman.thing.net/pipermail/idc/2006-June/thread.html</A></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">Armin</DIV> <BLOCKQUOTE type="cite"><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">"The net is still there and is still much bigger than rupert murdoch or myspace or even google."</DIV> </BLOCKQUOTE><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">Perhaps, Armin, you do not recognize the criticality of commercial spaces in our discussions because they do not fly the traditional flags of activism (no tactical media stickers here). In</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">my opinion, one of the tracks for criticality today is to device "new 'social scripts' that deal with the tensions in these new social architectures." The corporate-bad, hacker-good logic</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">does not work here. I agree with Ulises who writes that "sure, authentic alternatives can emerge, but most of them tend to be co-opted sooner or later, and those that don't still have</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">to operate within a capitalist framework."</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">And finally, Danah:</DIV> <BLOCKQUOTE type="cite"><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">"What do we gain from valuing participation?<SPAN class="Apple-converted-space"> </SPAN>And what does it mean that participation in some arenas is perceived as more valuable<SPAN class="Apple-converted-space"> </SPAN>than others? (And what does it mean that</DIV> </BLOCKQUOTE><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">enforced participation makes me sulk in a corner like a two year old throwing a temper tantrum?)"</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">"Lurking" for me is also participation. Forwarding, subscribing, commenting, moderating, reading... that's all participation. Contributing to knowledge networks is a valuable activity in</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">my opinion. Here, knowledge unfolds over time, (in many cases) not as a broadcast statement but as an evolving addition of one point of lived expertise to the other.</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">However, the various intensities of participation that I just mentioned contribute in different ways to the value of a research network. Why bother participating in this or that arena</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">when I can have more (expert) readers, social capital, micro-fame and respondents in the other? Sure, we situate our participation for a myriad of reasons but nudging participation is</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">not the same like "enforcing" it.<SPAN class="Apple-converted-space"> </SPAN></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">In terms of participation in an educational context, I agree with Ulises:</DIV> <BLOCKQUOTE type="cite"><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">"People need to develop the critical skills necessary to differentiate between open and proprietary platforms, and be aware of the repercussions of what happens when the former</DIV> </BLOCKQUOTE><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">mutates into the latter. People need to be able to determine when it's appropriate to use corporate platforms to disseminate a message, and how to maximize its effect." <SPAN class="Apple-converted-space"> </SPAN></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">Best,</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">Trebor</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">_______________________________________________</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">iDC -- mailing list of the Institute for Distributed Creativity (distributedcreativity.org)</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><A href="mailto:iDC@mailman.thing.net">iDC@mailman.thing.net</A></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><A href="http://mailman.thing.net/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/idc">http://mailman.thing.net/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/idc</A></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">List Archive:</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><A href="http://mailman.thing.net/pipermail/idc/">http://mailman.thing.net/pipermail/idc/</A></DIV> </BLOCKQUOTE></DIV><BR><DIV> <SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: separate; border-spacing: 0px 0px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; text-align: auto; -khtml-text-decorations-in-effect: none; text-indent: 0px; -apple-text-size-adjust: auto; text-transform: none; orphans: 2; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; "><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: separate; border-spacing: 0px 0px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; text-align: auto; -khtml-text-decorations-in-effect: none; text-indent: 0px; -apple-text-size-adjust: auto; text-transform: none; orphans: 2; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; "><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: separate; border-spacing: 0px 0px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; text-align: auto; -khtml-text-decorations-in-effect: none; text-indent: 0px; -apple-text-size-adjust: auto; text-transform: none; orphans: 2; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; "><DIV>Grant Kester</DIV><DIV>Coordinator, Ph.D. Program in Art & Media History</DIV><DIV>Associate Professor, Art History</DIV><DIV>Visual Arts Department, 0084</DIV><DIV>University of California, San Diego</DIV><DIV>9500 Gilman Drive</DIV><DIV>La Jolla, California 92093-0084</DIV><DIV>(858) 822-4860</DIV><DIV><A href="mailto:gkester@ucsd.edu">gkester@ucsd.edu</A></DIV><DIV><BR class="khtml-block-placeholder"></DIV><DIV><BR class="khtml-block-placeholder"></DIV><BR class="Apple-interchange-newline"></SPAN></SPAN></SPAN> </DIV><BR></DIV></BODY></HTML>