<html><head><style type="text/css"><!-- DIV {margin:0px;} --></style></head><body><div style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;font-size:10pt"><div style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">hello mr o ms armin, <br><br>I had intended to send the message to the whole list. Thanks for clarifying your position. <br><br>-Ulises<br><br><br><br><div style="font-family: times new roman,new york,times,serif; font-size: 12pt;">----- Original Message ----<br>From: Armin Medosch <armin@easynet.co.uk><br>To: Ulises <arsalaan1-idc@yahoo.com><br>Sent: Sunday, February 11, 2007 2:50:50 PM<br>Subject: Re: [iDC] How does social media educate?<br><br><div>hi mr or ms ulises<br><br>you replied to me only, is that on purpose? <br>i follow the discussion closeloy enough to see that it is very<br>uncritical of those commercial spaces and i have not seen much<br>nourishing on this list so far of alternatives. so i still think that<br>this crowd buys too
much into the hype of anti-social software but that<br>was not the only thing i said<br><br>regards<br>armin<br><br><br>On Sun, 2007-02-11 at 10:45 -0800, Ulises wrote:<br>> Armin,<br>> <br>> I think a more careful look at what some people are saying in this<br>> discussion will reveal that most are critical of social media, and are<br>> not just 'buying' into the hype. As to why we pay attention to the<br>> 'big corporate' platforms instead of focusing on the indy<br>> alternatives, I think there is space for doing both. To ignore what is<br>> happening with the MySpaces and YouTubes would be like attempting a<br>> history of cinema while ignoring the role of the big studios and<br>> focusing on the independent films. Might make more interesting<br>> viewing, but certainly not a complete history. <br>> <br>> I anxiously await your thoughts regarding the pressure that educators<br>> currently experience to focus on things that are
relevant to 'the<br>> industry.'<br>> <br>> Cheers,<br>> <br>> -Ulises<br>> <br>> <br>> ----- Original Message ----<br>> From: Armin Medosch <armin@easynet.co.uk><br>> To: IDC list <idc@bbs.thing.net><br>> Sent: Sunday, February 11, 2007 5:38:06 AM<br>> Subject: Re: [iDC] How does social media educate?<br>> <br>> <br>> hi<br>> <br>> first of all, when I follow, loosely, I must admit, this debate here<br>> about social media an interview comes to my mind which I recently did<br>> with a young hacker. he said, haveing looked at myspace et al, he came<br>> to the conclusion that whoever called those environments 'social' must<br>> have a very different idea from his about what is 'social'.<br>> <br>> so why do eminent scholars and digital media experts on this list buy<br>> into the social media hype? is it because big capital and mainstream<br>> media has developed a couple of years ago
the notion of web 2.0? and<br>> now<br>> we are forced to believe that those things are important? how<br>> important<br>> are they really? I mean, apart from some of those platforms having<br>> been<br>> fetched by big companies for billions, how many users do they really<br>> have, how sustained is their usage? are those branded platforms for<br>> user<br>> generated content really an indicator of a paradigm shift? the net is<br>> still there and is still much bigger than rupert murdoch or myspace or<br>> even google. some empirical data would really help to contextualize<br>> such<br>> a discussion. <br>> <br>> secondly, maybe there are other types of youth out there who are just<br>> forming their local indymedia branch, installing their own drupal or<br>> wordpress and customizing it and so on. why not talk about them? why<br>> not<br>> talk about the software platforms used by free online communities
and<br>> socially activist projects rather than this overhyped culture of the<br>> lonely self looking for bu/oddies online to mate with? <br>> <br>> and another point, with myspace and flickr and all this stuff, once<br>> more<br>> commercial projects are stealing the show, when actually most of these<br>> concepts were invented and implemented first by the net culture of the<br>> 1990ies, which in turn, is based on the hacker culture of the early<br>> internet and bbs systems. big anti-social media wont acknowledge such<br>> roots because then they would have to recognize that a non-or<br>> anti-commercial net culture exists and that maybe it was or even still<br>> is the silent majority of the net, forming many smaller clusters and<br>> communicatoin islands away from the bright spotlight of the madness of<br>> modern media and writing code for open source platforms which then<br>>
gets<br>> appropriated by more commercially minded youngesters who invent the<br>> next<br>> youftubbie. <br>> <br>> i sometimes these days feel like living in a parallel world, of course<br>> there are many parallel worlds, but what I am coming at in particular<br>> is<br>> this split between the sort of 'public sphere' and 'public<br>> opinion' (there are not enough inverted komas to signify my level of<br>> disdain of what this nowaday means) created by mainstream media and<br>> what<br>> it creates attention for and the world of open source culture. In one<br>> world people are really gross, only care for themselves and a narrowly<br>> defined type of 'friendship' and sociality; their main goals are to<br>> get<br>> rich quick and/or become a celebrity; in order to achieve this you<br>> have<br>> to be really competitive and fuck everyone else over. In the other<br>> world<br>> people are involved in an
exchange economy, often based on a friendly<br>> competition; they care for each other and the liveability of the wider<br>> world. Incidentially, or not, on the BBC or Sky Television we never<br>> hear<br>> about this other world. It is almost completely blanked out. Since the<br>> Guardian changed the name of its 'Online' section to 'technoloy' even<br>> there we read only about new gadgets and ego shooters. It is strange<br>> how<br>> capitalist media manage to blank out everything that does not fit into<br>> its concept. <br>> <br>> as critical intellectuals we should be careful what we pay attention<br>> to.<br>> Maybe it would be better to nurture real culture rather than discuss<br>> the<br>> anti-social media phenomenon endlessly, especially in a context where<br>> education itself has become commercialized and there is a very direct<br>> pressure on educators to focus on things relevant to the 'industry'.<br>>
more about the latter maybe at another time<br>> <br>> each one teach one <br>> armin<br>> <br>> <br>> <br>> <br>> <br>> On Fri, 2007-02-09 at 23:06 -0500, Trebor Scholz wrote:<br>> > The question of context, which Danah raised, is important. If a<br>> teenager writes on MySpace she speaks to her friends and not to a<br>> potential employer. That is often forgotten when<br>> > people read MySpace pages. All topical mailing lists with large<br>> subscriber numbers have an aspect of professional visibility that is<br>> distinctly different to friends-of-friends<br>> > environments. In MySpace teens speak for the very most part to their<br>> friends. That is obviously a completely different context than<br>> speaking to a large group of people (most of<br>> > whom one does not know). <br>> > <br>> > The point is not that professional discourse equals
closed-minded<br>> conservatism. (Where did those who pose as radical anti-academics get<br>> their formal education, which now<br>> > privileges them to this position?) What matters is that different<br>> contexts ask for different speech; it is crucial to understand who is<br>> addressed in the framework of a social networking<br>> > site, for example. Professional language has many often-discussed<br>> limitations and advantages. I'd not want to "talk shit" on a mailing<br>> list (as Danah put it) but on MySpace (where i<br>> > talk to my friends) that's fine. It's not the same to chat in the<br>> pub or talk to a group of a thousand invisible people.<br>> > <br>> > The cyber-archipelagos or ego-islands or cyber-cocoons or whatever<br>> you want to call it-- that are based on special interests and exclude<br>> difference (the "haters") are not only specific<br>> > to social networking sites. They emerged all
over the sociable web.<br>> (Just think of Robert Putnam who was thrown out of a chat room about a<br>> particular model of BMW as being<br>> > "off-topic" when he wanted to talk about BMWs in general.) <br>> > <br>> > Many of the questions that we raised in this thread about sociable<br>> web media and education (social networking sites, educational<br>> resources delivered through mobile phones, virtual<br>> > worlds, new scholarship and emerging forms of publication, massively<br>> multiplayer educational gaming and user-generated content) were also<br>> cohesively addressed in NMC's Horizon<br>> > 2007 report. <br>> > <br>> > <a target="_blank" href="http://www.nmc.org/pdf/2007_Horizon_Report.pdf">http://www.nmc.org/pdf/2007_Horizon_Report.pdf</a> (Thanks to Geert for<br>> the link). <br>> > <br>> > I'm curious about Danah's suggestion that "What I think changed has<br>> more to do
with social organization in networked public life." Danah,<br>> you say: "I don't think<br>> > that the shift is about becoming social." You do point to the<br>> history of online group formation (a shift from interest group to<br>> ego-type "friend" networks) and agree that they enabled<br>> > sociality. But you say - "what has changed has more to do with<br>> social organization in networked public life." Well, there is a huge<br>> step in the scale of networked sociality. That, in<br>> > fact, is new and that is why I'd call what happens now a "social<br>> turn." You, when I understand that correctly, emphasize the shift from<br>> clustering around interests to crowding in<br>> > groups of "friends." You complicate the term friend, of course<br>> ("friend"), but even American notions of friendship, which are really<br>> more about weak ties, don't really describe the<br>> > arbitrary looseness of these
relationships. Remember Zefrank's rants<br>> about "small worlds"? (<a target="_blank" href="http://www.zefrank.com/smallworld/">http://www.zefrank.com/smallworld/</a>) <br>> > <br>> > What is portrayed as "friends" is really more often than not, an<br>> interest group. I may call people in my del.icio.us network, "my<br>> friends," instead of the silly "fan" language Joshua<br>> > put there. But the Del.icio.us Network is really a loose interest<br>> group. And arguably, also in many larger mailing lists subscribers are<br>> grouped around their interests rather than their<br>> > friendships. (In Myspace that's a different story.) <br>> > <br>> > And in response to Tobias, yes, I do think that one reason people<br>> take to the web is the vanishing of the public sphere. I use Putnam's<br>> "Bowling Alone," however problematic it may<br>> > be, to demonstrate the decline of civic
participation in the US, and<br>> then show the “massification” of networked sociality. <br>> > <br>> > Trebor<br>> > <br>> > <br>> > Technology and the changing face of relationships<br>> ><br>> <a target="_blank" href="http://www.blogherald.com/2007/01/16/technology-and-the-changing-face-of-relationships/">http://www.blogherald.com/2007/01/16/technology-and-the-changing-face-of-relationships/</a><br>> > <br>> > <br>> > <br>> > <br>> > <br>> > <br>> > <br>> > <br>> > <br>> > <br>> > <br>> > _______________________________________________<br>> > iDC -- mailing list of the Institute for Distributed Creativity<br>> (distributedcreativity.org)<br>> > iDC@mailman.thing.net<br>> > <a target="_blank" href="http://mailman.thing.net/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/idc">http://mailman.thing.net/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/idc</a><br>> >
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