extensions

Yesterday, frustrated by yet another spambot, I took my Twitter account out of the “public timeline,” which is to say I’ve limited my tweets now to only my followers. Maybe I’ll change it back, but I needed a break, some time to think about where Twitter is right now in terms of publicity.

I’m using the word “publicity” here not in the usual sense, in terms of PR and attention-seeking, but as public-ness; that is, the “quality of being public” (m-w).

It might be quaint, or even foolish, to think of Twitter as anything less than fully public, for it has always existed within what danah boyd calls “networked publics,” these virtual spaces that enable “invisible audiences” and redefine our prior notions of what’s private and what’s out in the open.

But, for a long time (a long time in Internet years, of course…), Twitter was something less than fully public. It was, foremost, new, and that limited the number of people who used the service. Even today, it’s hasn’t reached a critical mass (many people I know have never heard of it, but everyone has heard of Facebook…). Current, although speculative, stats place the number of users at about 1 million, with 200,000 active users per week — compared to, say, Daily Kos, with its 1 million average users per day, these numbers aren’t all that large.

But Twitter is growing quickly, and along the way is becoming much less like an intimate social space (a feeling made all the more apparent because of the ability to “tune” the list of people you’re following), and increasingly part of the larger, media landscape. Perhaps most significantly, Twitter is now part of our politics, as journalists, politicians, and citizens have all begun using Twitter during the current election, including gathering around this virtual water cooler on every primary night of this long campaign season.

Twitter has also made its way into the business world. Many companies have tuned into these conversations that take place in 140-character tweets, to track what people are saying about them. This is something fairly new, made possible by a growing crop of services, such as Summize and Tweetscan, that use Twitter’s APIs to interrogate and index the site’s database. Using these new web sites, anyone can create a twitter search and corresponding RSS feed, and monitor anytime anyone on Twitter mentions the search term.

For businesses, this means real-time “brand management.”

Before sites like Tweetscan came along, digging into Twitter’s database was terribly difficult. Twitter had a significant orality to it, as the lack of an interface for its archives made conversations incredibly ephemeral, much like the spoken word. Now, recalling conversations from the database is easy and instantaneous.

So, for example, a few weeks ago I mentioned (ok, complained about…) NPR’s new talk show, The Takeaway. Soon after, someone affiliated with the show popped up, asking me what was it about the program I didn’t like. Another example is the spambot from yesterday — I mentioned “peak oil” in a conversation, and a few hours later was “followed” by a service that tracks oil prices.

Summize, in fact, has taken the business proposition of monitoring tweets one step further. With a recent deal with Huffington Post, Summize is now used to display real-time tweets for every tag on the HuffPost web site. So, if you tag-search for “Obama,” you’ll get a list of the most recent conversations mentioning the candidate. While it sounds innocent enough, and maybe even useful, what is also happening is conversations taking place on Twitter are being commodified, making the Huffington Post a more valuable web site, without anyone on Twitter necessarily knowing or agreeing to this.

But what happens on Twitter is “public,” isn’t it?

Of course, Facebook at one point took its public information and, with the introduction of the news feed, began using it in ways that hardly met the expectations of its users — a privacy “trainwreck” was the result.

I had a discussion about this, with Dave Parry (aka @academicdave) yesterday. And he made a great point. To paraphrase, while no one likes turning their thoughts into a commodity, we do “get something” out of the deal — we get listeners, we build community, we develop and enhance our reputation as individuals. These things, Dave argued, are more important than money.

To an extent, I agree. But that premise also has to be questioned, because in a neoliberal capitalist world (a world which includes the Web 2.0 ideology and business model), isn’t money, well, everything?

In a critical examination of Web 2.0, Petersen uses the term “loser generated content” to describe this political economy at work. In his essay, he describes the way social networking sites create strong ties for their users:

The demography of the people I interviewed places them on the left side of the political spectrum; they are at times directly anti–corporate/capitalist in the pictures they upload and their comments. Nonetheless, most of them do not see a problem in having such close ties with a particular company. This can only be explained with reference to the immense joy and pleasure they get out of sharing photos online. The huge amount of work that goes into each personal site is paid back in an affective currency: the joy and significance these sites bring to their users.

This “affective currency” is, in part, what Dave refers to above. But the real value proposition for Web 2.0 sites isn’t the photos we post on Flickr, or the actual words we say on Twitter. Content is no longer king — context data is:

What you buy, when acquiring a social networking site, is not content but context data produced by users and communities. In this way the architecture of participation turns into an architecture of exploitation and enclosure, transforming users into commodities that can be sold on the market.

…Relations are the key here. We need to acknowledge that relations of subjectivity, everyday life, technology, media and publics also are related to dimensions of capitalism. This relation reconfigures patterns of use into practices which caries a resemblance of work relations, transforming users into losers.

The problem isn’t really even with Twitter — it’s free right now, but it’s still someone’s idea of a business plan. Eventually, advertising will likely be added, and that’s how Twitter will make money.

The real problem is one that’s argued in Naomi Klein’s No Logo (via here):

“The astronomical growth in the wealth and cultural influence of multinational corporations over the last fifteen years can arguably be traced back to a single, seemingly innocuous idea developed by management theorists in the mid–1980’s: that successful corporations must primarily produce brands, as opposed to products… this corporate obsession with brand identity is waging a war on public and individual space: … on youthful identities, … and on possibilities of unmarketed space.”

No space. I started off this post talking about publicity. It’s a term Habermas uses in his discussion of the public sphere, and it’s directly related to the question of just how our tweets are used. I’m not so sure virtual space is endless — more and more of it is being co-opted by corporate interests. And while Huffington Post is an order of magnitude smaller than “Big Media” right now, that won’t likely last for long. (Arianna Huffington, in fact, doesn’t think of her site as a blog at all; she calls it an “Internet newspaper.”)

The point here is, we need space. We need a public sphere. We need a way to create publicity — to gain listeners, to establish and enhance our reputations — without creating wealth. Or becoming an ad for some Web 2.0 venture capitalist’s latest programmatic dream. There are pockets of this kind of publicity today — increasingly the political blogosphere is shaping our politics. Citizen journalism is on the rise. Wikipedia is a non-profit, more or less altruistic endeavor.

At the very least, we need to be cognizant of where our tweets end up.

Don’t worry, no spoilers in this post. But apparently they’re now out there for Season 4, on the fan site DarkUFO:

Apparently he has received very specific spoilers for the season finale, and has posted the synopsis of the first hour of three, apparently a very detailed scene-by-scene reveal…Andy, the proprietor of DarkUFO, says he received the information from a source claiming to call himself Lostfan108. If you don’t remember, Lostfan108 was the person who gave Dark the spoiler for the finale of Season 3, perhaps one of the biggest mindfucks in television history.

The Washington Post recently ran a story on spoiling, focusing on the idea of our need for instant gratification. Our “lizard brain” at work.

Rather than gratification, though, spoiling can be seen in the context of participatory culture, a term MIT’s Henry Jenkins uses in his text, “Convergence…” Jenkins calls the act of spoiling “collective intelligence in practice,” meaning that the new media paradigm today is two-way, that when fans act together to look for clues in media texts (and LOST, if anything, is about clues and reading-in-depth…), they are playing a role much different from a passive recipient of culture. Collective intelligence is about agency, it’s about empowerment, and it’s about play. And as Jenkins notes, “play is one of the ways we learn.” (Jenkins goes on to suggest the learning involved in spoiling television shows can also be applied to politics and civics, something we see realized in the political blogosphere.)

The question here, though, is what kind of “spoiling” is being done in the case of DarkUFO and Lostfan108? DarkUFO seems to have taken some care in announcing this turn of events:

Just to let you know that I’ve just been contacted by LostFan108 again and he has provided me with the main synopsis points for Episode 4.12 Parts 1, 2 and 3.

Tomorrow we will be posting a high level synopsis for 4.12 Part 1 and then sometime before 19th May we will post the key highlights from Parts 2 and 3. This will include all the main cliffhangers and talking points, including who the kiss is between, who is in the coffin (It shocked me) and what the Frozen Donkey Wheel is, along with any deaths.

I’m making this post to warn as many of you who don’t like the big spoilers to stay clear of this section of the site as well as any other unmoderated message boards as there will certainly be idiots who will post it wildly around the net.

Still, this is much less about “collective intelligence in practice” and more like simply spoiling the ending, giving credence to the lizard brain pleasures discussed in the WaPo article. For people who just want to know the ending, sure, that’s all about instant gratification.

But for fans sites such as Lostpedia, which is my go-to site for all things LOST, the fun is in the journey. There, episode synopsis pages each contain an “Unanswered Questions” section, such as this, from the most recent program. Each episode also has a corresponding theories page, where ideas and explanations are passed back and forth. Still rules about spoiling are enforced.

Lostpedia is spoiling-in-practice, much less about gratification than a journey, a quest for answers. This kind of spoiling is a way to move beyond passivity and shape media into something we discover, and make our own.

NPR’s BPP this morning had a segment on photobombing. And with one look at the photos featured here on this site, it’s easy to see this practice is completely and infectiously hilarious, worthy of Buzzfeed’s Internet meme status. What is it?

Intentionally turning up in the background of other people’s photographs with the goal of ruining them now has a name: Photobombing. I do this daily, unintentionally, walking along Canal Street to work, but the art of the photobomber is appearing in the background at just the right moment and with just the right face.

Curiously, it’s not the only definition out there. Wikipedia actually lists another definition: “the act of attaching a numbered series of photographs to public places.” The person behind this scheme has a website, where he explains in the FAQ how he planted his photos, and what to do if you find them.

I’m more interested, though, in the first definition. While hilarious, it’s also a bit strange, because the joke here is assumed. You really don’t get to see the look on your “victim’s” faces when they realize you’ve ruined (or enhanced…) their photo. It’s a joke in the potential, and, as everyone knows, pranks like this are funnier when you get to share in the laughter.

Is a whoopee cushion, or today’s high tech version, still funny if you’re not around to hear it?

So while it’s funny to think you’re going to show up looking ridiculous in someone else’s picture, you’ll never see it realized. It’s probably only a stoke of luck that you’d ever stumble across it posted on Facebook, or some other site. Maybe this makes more sense if this thing takes off, and we see photobombing sites appear, where you can see the fruits of your labor posted somewhere.

Oh hell. No sense overthinking it.

If something’s funny, it’s funny.

Discuss.

(Spoilers inside, of course.)

There is a site now up for Mario Batali’s new PBS show, “Spain..On The Road Again.” Apparently, Batali has convinced some public television executives that him, eating and driving his way through Spain in a convertible Mercedes-Benz with a food writer and two beautiful actresses, would make good television. And judging from the video sneak peek they’ve posted on the site, it probably will.

But Batali also gets to eat and drive driving his way through Spain in a convertible Mercedes-Benz with a food writer and two beautiful actresses.

That, my friends, is the kind of genius I can respect.

The top entries for applications on Google’s new mobile platform were announced, and one in particular struck me:

Locale - Locale is one of 7 Android applications submitted by MIT students. It enables you to set up location- and time-based profiles for your phone, so you can make it shut up when you’re at work, forward calls to your landline when you’re at home. Clare Bayley, Christina Wright, Jasper Lin, Carter Jernigan.

It’s a smart idea, and one we’ll see much more of, now that geolocation is all the rage. (See: Brightkite.com) But it’s also an idea that’s not at all new.

Back in the day, I tested a product called “Wildfire.” This was a telephony service that used voice recognition to “listen” to your commands, and act as a personal assistant. I did some searching, and found this article from 1994, describing the service:

Wildfire Communications has taken a fresh look at the act of communication and has created an elegant and useful speech-recognition interface that helps expedite and simplify phone use, yet is positioned to move beyond the telephone. It is one of the most creative designs of a communications interface that we have seen. Think of it as a glimpse into the future that isn’t a wishware video.

Wildfire uses a session approach. Instead of placing a call, hanging up, then placing another call (and fumbling with all the phone numbers and contact information between the calls), you dial once into your Wildfire assistant from your desk or the road. You don’t need any special equipment to call in. Any ordinary phone will do. Once you are connected to Wildfire, it…well, she — the current Wildfire system has a woman’s voice, and people naturally personify it — can place multiple calls for you.

Funny, it was a “glimpse into the future” that, 14 years later, for the most part still hasn’t happened yet, at least not on a large scale.

What Wildfire did well, though, was location-based calling. You could tell Wildfire where you were, at the office for example, and “she” would know to direct your incoming calls to your work number. Or, if you were working late at night, you could have Wildfire take a message, unless it was your wife calling, in which case the call would go through. To a certain extent, the proliferation of cell phones and the decrease in phone numbers we have to manage has “solved” this problem. But tying location to your phone was something of a revolutionary and, yes, futuristic idea at the time.

And about that “she”… Using it, I can attest to how “lifelike” the interface was, responding to your requests to “Call Joe.” The company had a toll free number that had a demo, providing customers with a taste of what this service was all about. Curious, I gave it a call today — sure enough, the number still works.

Give it a shot: 1-800-WILDFIRE.

If you haven’t heard, there’s a terrific little game that’s started up on Twitter. Via Jason Kottke:

Last night, folks on Twitter began to contemplate what will happen if Barack Obama wins the nomination. The meme seems to have begun with Andrew Crow’s vision for the future:

When Obama wins… unicorns will crap ice cream and pastries

Kottke created a great microsite, that circles through many of the best tweets.

For what it’s worth, here’s mine:

When Obama wins, Bill Clinton will explain to us he was saying Obama was the stronger candidate all along…

Heh heh.

[Update]: Andrew Crow’s blog post explaining how it started.

[Update 2]: Credit where due — I had no idea what paparrati was talking about at first. Paparrati is much cooler than me!

I rec’vd an email from the “IRS” today:

Our records indicate that you are qualified to receive the
2008 Economic Stimulus Refund.

The fastest and easiest way to receive your refund is by
direct deposit to your checking/savings account.

Please follow the link and fill out the form and submit
before May 10th, 2008 to ensure that your refund will be
processed as soon as possible.

Of course, the link given doesn’t quite go to the IRS, despite that it came from a “.gov” email address. A quick whois search on the IP in the link revealed a server registered to an ISP that, from what I could tell with a few more google searches, seems pretty notorious for spam, etc.

If you google the text above, you’ll find it’s a well-known scam that the U.S. Attorney’s Office and the IRS began warning people about a few days ago.

These types of attacks, a phishing attempt at grabbing your bank account information, are increasingly becoming “commodities” in the world of cybercrime, as the economics are shifting to more profitable targets. From the NY Times:

Pilfered credit card numbers and bank account PIN numbers have become commodities on shadowy Web sites where stolen digital information is bought and sold. Company e-mail, business documents and personal health information are the new targets of choice for illegal hackers…

…A couple of years ago, credit card numbers and bank account PINs sold for $100 or more on sites selling stolen information…Now, the price is down to $10 or $20, compared to $150 to $200 for some of the newer documents.

Commodity or not, the phishing scam remains a tried and true way to get access to your money.

Rolling Stone had a blog post today, criticizing Jon Stewart for not going after John McCain last night on The Daily Show. Swampland today asked, “Is Jon Stewart A Journalist?”

No, he’s not. He makes jokes for a living. Nothing more. Jon Stewart is not going to save this Republic. That’s the job of the Press.

We’ve got, like, a whole Constitutional Amendment about that.

PC Magazine’s John Dvorak writes on the “fragility” of social networking:

I’m of the opinion that there is no such thing as a real community online. It’s a “pretend” community that we like to feel we’re a part of, but it’s composed of users who could jump ship at any moment, and often do.

…A good online community, whether it’s Second Life, Twitter, or something new, is indeed fun to belong to if you have the time or inclination. But please do not take it seriously, and never believe that you’re part of a true community. Get out of your house, and you’ll find the community out there in the street. That’s real.

This seems to counter the actual experience of anyone who has participated in an online community, as people indeed take these social interactions seriously. Howard Rheingold, in The Virtual Commmunity, writes about his life as part of the 1980s online site, The WELL. Here, he considers the question of “realness”:

Some people–many people–don’t do well in spontaneous spoken interaction, but turn out to have valuable contributions to make in a conversation in which they have time to think about what to say. These people, who might constitute a significant proportion of the population, can find written communication more authentic than the face-to-face kind. Who is to say that this preference for one mode of communication–informal written text–is somehow less authentically human than audible speech? Those who critique CMC because some people use it obsessively hit an important target, but miss a great deal more when they don’t take into consideration people who use the medium for genuine human interaction.

Rheingold, in fact, has just posted an old video on his blog, from a WELL party back in the day, which was picked up by Boing Boing. A quick glance through the comments shows just how much this community meant to its participants:

“…at 5:00 the man walking behind Howard is, I believe, David Morgenstern, a mordant wit whom I later worked with at MacWeek. I still recall (and tell) his joke about the thrice-married virgin.”

“I miss those days. Of all the services from back then (GEnie, Compuserve, Etc.), I wish I would of hung on to my Well account.”

“Yo bobert!”

“…FWIW, pozar had a 50th birthday party this weekend and I got to see a bunch of the old WELL gang f2f. Didn’t see flash, even though he had said he was coming. Hi to the rest of you!”

“…I was on the well from 1988 to around 1991, when I left to go to Asia to be a Buddhist nun, and then a bit after I got back (still a nun). Howard put me in his book about virtual community after the Well pulled together to help me when I was dying in India, and it’s sweet to see everyone again.”

A close look into other online communities reveals similar types of strong connections between people. Consider this exchange between bloggers in a post on Daily Kos, as one of them discusses his or her struggle with addiction:

…While I find myself re-entering the world outside my home gradually, I realize I’m still having a hard time connecting to people. I know I need to be patient but I also realize that it is this feeling of loneliness that triggers the desire to use. I only really feel I deserve to be around other addicts because I still feel too much shame about the damage I’ve done to myself. And the best thing for me to do would probably find some 12 Step Meetings with people I am comfortable with…

Good Ideas (38+ / 0-)
Working out, or riding a bike, or what about helping others? I’ve never been in your shoes, but my brother is a dead man walking and his whereabouts are unknown.
I’d give anything if he could be clean for even a week.
Stay strong.

… part of the process maybe? (25+ / 0-)
hang on. it’s my understanding learning how to deal with those feelings is part of the process of recovery from addiction.
do you have a counselor or a sponsor you can talk with?
if not, we’re always here …

… 18 years in May is nothing (25+ / 0-)
compared with your 83 days. Your success is immense and the world of goodness that awaits you hinges on you staying “clean and sober” today, not one week at a time.

Participants in online communities often share deeply personal, touching stories about their lives. While these examples are presented here anecdotally, they are actually quite common in the blogosphere, and speak to the strong, and often intimate, social ties created online. (To relate this to some of my prior posts, this parallels oral cultures, in what Walter Ong calls being close to the “human lifeworld.”)

Dvorak seems to be saying online communities aren’t “real” because they’re not permanent, that their users could “jump ship” at any time. Is this really all that much different from communities in the offline world? Don’t offline communities fail, or fizzle out, or base themselves on trivialities? Are we still friends with everyone we knew in high school, or college? Is the after work TGIF’s beer crowd anything more than a convenient gathering? Do most of our offline “communities” involve discussions about addiction, or engender the kind of heart-felt responses as seen in those comments about the WELL?

Perhaps more importantly, what Dvorak misses completely is that online communities are often conduits for real-life interaction. We see that in the WELL video, and we saw it in the Dean campaign’s use of Meetup.

Positive, working communities can certainly develop both online and off, and to question an online community’s “realness” misses the point completely. The trick, it seems, when considering the question of community, is to figure out why they work, and how we can replicate these successes more often.