 Dave Weinberger and AKMA at Vanderbilt Yesterday (click on it to see a bigger one, in my Radio blog, in another window) | It was a really fun thing to hear the dialogue, and hear from David and AKMA. After “canoeing” my way downtown amidst all the totrrential downpour, I listened and , in the afternoon session, contributed a bit to the groups discussion. |
In the morning session, there was some interesting discussion (and also a bit annoying) about the role of the “expert” and someone taking offense to Weinberger’s comment about the Web encouraging disdain for “experts”. AKMA and David weren’t going to say it, but I will: it FIGURES that at a place like Vanderbilt, you’d have some rather “elitist” mentalities defending the role of “expertise”, and another person expressed oppostion to “The Web is good” idea. Dave’s response was “Is the world good?” Which is what I usually ask people who emphasize the negative aspects of the Web. Yes, there will be manipulation and in-authenticity, and evil and perversion….and so it is in the world. Both presenters , in presenting an overview of their views of the role of the Internet in education , presented it as a “widening” of the sphere of influence, and a widening of the “accessibility” to the public for “contribution” to the body of knowledge. In the afternoon, the focus was Weblogs in education, which interested me further still. AKMA talked about his class (or classes) at Seabury-western where he requires student weblogs. The thing AKMA celebrated about that was how students are talking to each other more about their work, and about what they think of each other’s ideas. WIKIs were described and explored (as “Social Software”, which David pointed out as being a relatively new “discipline”). WIKIs allow for a kind of free-for-all editing of pages, and an easy interface for creating new links that create new pages and extend the “Web” for that topic. We also discussed messaging and chatting and commenting during a speaker or professor presentation. I asked if AKMA and Dave could illuminate “TrackBack” that is a feature on Movable Type and other Weblogs, where comments about a particular posts can receive “pings” from other weblog software (which have the feature) that a post has been made that points to that entry, thus extending the notion of Comments (usually a place on the blog in question where a reader who has come to this blog can post a comment about that entry. Trackback does not require the commenter to navigate to the entry and “Leave” a comment….but “Notifies” the post (usually in a link provided below the post, and usually right next to the link to the local “Comments”, indicating that on another page that opens up, there will be one or more links to blogs that “blog” this particular blog. A “distributed” discussion is thus possible. Someday, hopefully soon, the Church can wake up to this “revolution” (as I see it) in the idea of what a discussion is; what dialogue is; what EDUCATION is. | |
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Cult of Personality vs. that of Character
First, let me say that I don’t claim originality for the above quip, but I’ll use it as a starting point anyway. I hate to go against DW and his feelings about the world and the web, but the web, by its very nature tends to corrupt some things we have cherished in the past.
I see nothing wrong with the concept of the “expert.” To give an example, in the world of natural science, a researcher would devote many years of careful study and experimentation to examine a phenomenon such as animal behavior as in the work of Konrad Lorenz. From this would arise a book, and essentially it would be a summation of his life’s work. The few people who could fully understand and appreciate this effort would be enrichened. I attended a technology conference at a major east coast institution where the “evagelist” glibly mentioned that he thought the “Gutenberg paradigm is dead.” We no longer needed books. Essentially, he was saying the Web would do it all for you. And, most disturbingly, he said that we lived in the Ninendo generation, and it we didn’t accept this, our children wouldn’t listen to us. Our kind would go the way of the book. Obsolescence.
Now, we’re living in this world of the web, where no one should claim to be an expert, everyone has an equal shot at proposing a theory. And, if you want the most exposure (which is the highest valued quality), you say outrageous things, come up with one manifesto after the next. It’s more important that you create a persona that will generate links to your blog. As one book on advertising I browsed through said, “You’ve got to understand that you’re selling the sizzle, not the steak.”
I was watching a TV news program about SARS where the infectious disease expert said that in a few months no one would be talking about SARS. As the weather warms up, coronaviruses are not as contagious. We all know already that viral infections tend to be seasonal. But, he also said that this would be a major problem with the pursuit of an eventual definitive vaccine and/or elimination of this organism. With the Web, the daily blogs, the emphasis is on the buzz, the latest thing that was occurring and this should have equal importance with anything happening yesterday or tomorrow. It’s a shame we don’t revere the “experts” who work on problems that lose their currency when the rest of the Web is treading through bits of information, seemingly important because it’s “news.” Take a look at the outbreaks of infectious disease over the past few years, which have killed many more people than that of SARS, but this never hits the popular media. It’s not news. Again, this is the domain of experts. Maybe if all these victims had blogs, all us web denizens might get the point, and put SARS in the prospective it needs to be viewed in.
I am so diametrically-opposed to Mr. Weinberger, that even he can’t stand it. He’s got a good wit.
My life’s ambition is to be at a conference where he is giving his web philosophy. I think that I could provide a cogent argument against it.
RM – hopelessly addicted to Flannery O’Connor and other religious storytellers
The following statement in your comment doesn’t sound much like you are “diametrically-opposed” to Mr. Weinberger:
Take a look at the outbreaks of infectious disease over the past few years, which have killed many more people than that of SARS, but this never hits the popular media. It’s not news. Again, this is the domain of experts. Maybe if all these victims had blogs, all us web denizens might get the point, and put SARS in the prospective it needs to be viewed in.
This to me sounds much like what I would expect to hear Weinberger say.
I hear what you are saying about experts “losing currency” and I agree that there is some injustice in this, and I am a bit hesitant to put words in Weinberger’s mouth, but I think he would agree with whaty you said about experts, and point out that what you said about disease victims bringing home some reality that would not have been hammered home were it NOT for the Web is precisely what “lessens” the “dependence” (my emphasis) on experts. It’s not that experts have less to say or deserve less respect, but that there are now more avenues to experts that have a “true ring” to their voice/writing that give their audeince a “personal reason” to respect this information becuase of how they clarify the topic via providing relevance that helps the reader make sense of it.
For me, the better the “expert”, the more “personal”; the more “able to listen” and respond, the better. This works naturally against the idea of knowledge in whatver domain, as “authoritative” and places the emphasis on “meaningful”. I think Weinberger recognizes that Web has accentuated a “new breed of expert”, and rightfully places more of the “knowledge of the common man” into the realm of accessible, which “nudges” in to the place of authority and , as a result, displaces some.
I do NOT think that Weinberger himself disdains experts so much as it has raised the reputation of some previously unheard voices, and so lessened the degree of dependence on the voices of those in the domain of “traditional expert”)
There is also the problem of pomposity. I see it in theological circles as much as anywhere. The people who speak to me most profoundly are those who “pointificate” with humility. The breed of expert that Weinberger hails is the one who can interact; who can “listen”. It’s not that previous “experts” were neccessarily not able, but in one-way mediums, were simply not afforded much public opportunity to do so, or for the public to hear them.
Dear Me: (With all respectful intentions, I hope you’re not put off by what can be on some occasions [ask Dave] my satiric sense of humor)
No, that’s not quite right. Besides, if you even suggest that my views somehow coincide with DW’s weltanschauung, he’ll flip.
I don’t think that the world needs more bloggers to solve the problems of suffering humanity. I was being my usual sarcastic self by suggesting that plague victims be given blogs to work on. There’s a song by the Police, “Driven to Tears,” one line goes, “too many cameras and not enough food, this is what I see…” Media don’t heal.
“This works naturally against the idea of knowledge in whatver domain, as ‘authoritative’ and places the emphasis on ‘meaningful’.” Suppose a mathematician derives a proof for a longstanding problem, and then some snotty high schooler complains that this discovery is not relevant to his adolescent plight. How do we begin to isolate “meaningful” knowledge? Oprah and Dr. Phil are already working full time on this. 😉
“The people who speak to me most profoundly are those who “pointificate” with humility. The breed of expert that Weinberger hails is the one who can interact; who can “listen”. It’s not that previous “experts” were neccessarily not able, but in one-way mediums, were simply not afforded much public opportunity to do so, or for the public to hear them.” Does it really come down to this: anyone with a internet connection, no matter what the content of his or her respective cranium, can question the value of the knowledge of an authority on a subject, based upon the perception of this person’s ability to bring meaningfulness to these folks who might not have picked up a book, but did a Google search on the subject? We wind up placing a premium on celebrity and personality, not substance. We honor politicians and not scientists. That which can be marketed and commoditized, with wrapping and labeling best understood by everyone fills the shelves. Look at your local supermarket, and how many over-priced, over-packaged, over-marketed products eschew good nutrition?
[This is where I generally really ruffle the feathers of the prized web fowls] How many “Web experts” proffering their meaningful memes, make their living in marketing and PR? [Now, ducking for cover]
Again, no disrespect to anyone, or questioning anyone’s sincerity, the effect of the Web on advancing our fate as a civilization is highly overhyped.
RM – Can you imagine if Shakespeare had a blog…that no one found meaningful?
“We wind up placing a premium on celebrity and personality, not substance.”
That seems to butress an argument against what you’re suggesting. It is the “approved expertise” that can often be so because of HYPE; the “reputation” thatis buttressed by the media or by other “authority”, all “sold” in and through the media.
The difference in “media” and the blog (and there certainly can be blogs that forward views that are no more unique, or no more “voice-ful” or authentic than marketing hype) is that blogs can and often are a way of connecting. We all have to deploy our own filters. You tend to “filter out” what you see as unworthy, others find connection with it and seek dialogue.
“The people said, ‘Let his blood be upon us and upon our children.’ At that, he released Barabas to them.”
“You tend to ‘filter out’ what you see as unworthy, others find connection with it and seek dialogue.”
Was it Ayn Rand who said, “Ethics is not a mystic fantasy–nor a social convention–nor a dispensable, subjective luxury, to be switched or discarded in any emergency. Ethics is an objective, metaphysical necessity of man’s survival– not by the grace of the supernatural nor of your neighbors nor of your whims, but by the grace of reality and the nature of life.”
Can the Church claim moral authority? Can Bill Bennett?
Regardless, I find that most blogs are starved for dialogue. And if there are no longer experts, why is every bigtime bloggenstein prominantly displaying and shamelessly marketing his latest book? Is this pontificating with humility? And, why do you have to write a book about blogging and the web? If there’s so much copious dialogging going on, why doesn’t it suffice to blog about blogging?
RM
RM,
Nobody is saying there aren’t bloggers who use the mediun for plugging their wares. Look what’s happened to the Internet in general. In general, there are more cases of manipulation and tasteless marketing than there are good uses and authentic expression. But that is like the world in general. I choose to keep pressing for the good uses, and keep encouraging.
I am my own best test case for what’s right with blogging (it got me writing and conversing again) and it re-conmnected me with folks by allowing them a regular “window” into my sense of calling (which is to help the Church get a handle on some of this and help the community keep in touch in additional ways).
If I trash the value of what’s happening here because SOME want to and will use it for cheap gain or “BIG BUCKS”, then I’d be shutting down my email account. I mean, who else would you communicate with regarding your own misgivings about the value of all this, if it weren’t for this thing through which you have contacted me?
I applaud your zeal and intelligence, but disagree, see the glass half full, and use this exchange of ours as yet another case of valuable dialogue about something which is a key element in the “success” of the Weblog.
I too, often rant about the disgusting and clueless uses of the Web and of technology in general. But I also see all of this in the context of a community of writers/bloggers with whom I constantly engage and “follow their writing about their own discoveries, insights, and “Web treasure hunts”. It is a collaborative process, which does indeed take a lot of filtering. Focusing on my community’s list of “respected bloggers” (getting reccomndations of what’s worthwhile from other bloggers I consider trustworthy) via “Blogrolls” and daily postings, I can receive help in this filtering. And of course, I do my own perusing, find my own “gems”, blog about them, and “widen the ring” a little with recccomendations of my own.
RM,
Do you have a website, or , God forbid, a “Blog”? Reason I ask, is that MOvable Type has a feature called trackback that posts to a blog being blogged, notifying the blog that another blog has linked to a particular post (Trackback).
This , to me, is another “cool” and useful feature of some blogs. It allows for a “distributed” conversation that avoids the linear, scrolling, comment anfter coment upon comment sequence like what we are developing here. While this is OK, it’s not the best, and tends to get hard to read. Also , it allows the commenter to bring the interested observer and potential ally or “reactor” into closer acquaintance with the larger body of the commentor’s work. That’s why I asked if you had anything out there. I was interested in how you layed all of this out in other writings.
Dale
RM wrote: “Regardless, I find that most blogs are starved for dialogue. And if there are no longer experts, why is every bigtime bloggenstein prominantly displaying and shamelessly marketing his latest book?”
I find it interesting that you don’t see the dialogical nature of blogs. The feature I mentioned in my previous commment is one, and the legion of links to other blogs who comment upon other blogs. Again, MOST is probably accurate, since there may be more than 50% of the blogs who have little dialogue.
But I would not be a blogger myself if not for the dialogue, and for the way in which I am engaged in new dialogues as a part of the process. Heck, the community of Weblog software developers and related technologies (such as web services and RSS) is a fully engaged community. Macromedia has legions of developers blogging and allowing other developers and interested parties to anticipate and sometimes participate in the shape of upcoming releases.
And, NOBODY is saying there ARE NO experts. It’s that their role is changing, at least in the minds of the audiences, and the EXPERTS are increasingly becoming expected to “engage”. I see this as a problem for heirachically -based Church denominations. They , thus far, seem to be unwilling to “dialogue” except amongst their peers, and issue statements from on high. I would have more respect for these if I could also see how they work that out in dialogue with “the people”.