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S Chou

Barry Wellman - Physical Place and Cyber Place: The Rise of Personalized Networking - 1 views

homes.chass.utoronto.ca/...ijurr3a1.htm

shared by S Chou on 28 Oct 11 - Cached
  • Rather than fitting into the same group as those around them, each person has his/her own "personal community" (Wellman and Leighton 1979; Wellman 1999a).
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 28 Oct 11
       
      I wonder how the idea of a personal community fits into someone's identity. Particularly teens or young adults, who are still forming their identity. Does creating a group of people in a community centered on you prolong or expediate the process of identity formation?
    • S Chou
      S Chou on 29 Oct 11
       
      SC - The Boyd article touches on this, and it seems like identity formation is as complicated as ever. I'm not sure if constant egocentric self-articulation changes the process of identity formation so much as it magnifies and reveals the process itself. People have always had to ultimately form and articulate identity on their own terms, in conversation/negotiation with groups and communities.
  • individuating nature
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 28 Oct 11
       
      I see a duality in this individuating nature with the uprising of collective action online. Can the two really exist together and both thrive? Maybe this is similar to the "seemingly-conflicting" ideas of democracy and capitalism?
    • S Chou
      S Chou on 29 Oct 11
       
      SC - There is certainly individual choice and formation of individual identity within aspects of collective action. Social networks seem to make the connection and dissemination of both much more visible and active than before.
  • forecast a century ago by E.M. Forster 1909
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 28 Oct 11
       
      Reference to a recommended reading from Week 3 - The Machine. If you haven't read it was an interesting little sci-fi short story that was a quick read
  • ...43 more annotations...
  • Just as employers complain about workers' use of the Internet for personal matters, family members complain that their loved ones are tied to their computers during their supposed leisure hours
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 28 Oct 11
       
      Is internet use leading to collapsing contexts offline as well?
    • S Chou
      S Chou on 29 Oct 11
       
      Our ties to place are getting increasingly transformed by increasingly mobile technology. We are so used to defining context in terms of geographic location that I definitely think contexts are collapsing everywhere. 
  • Contextual sense and lateral awareness will diminish.
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 28 Oct 11
       
      A little concern about this idea - if you're not exposed to something, how do you know if you do or don't like it? Connecting to education, this gets at the idea of choice: should we let kids choose to study what they are interested in, or are there some things that everyone "just needs to know"?
    • S Chou
      S Chou on 29 Oct 11
       
      SC - There are two interesting strings to follow here, the idea of increased globalization and access to new ideas, and the idea of increased autonomy and personal choice. On one hand, we have access to more knowledge than ever but on the other hand we have greater ability to filter, ignore, and not participate since group norms hold less power over individuals. Maybe the key here is to teach kids to be interested, and to have the tools/skills needed to pursue their interests. 
  • the spread of wireless towers to physically isolated and impoverished "fourth world" areas
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 28 Oct 11
       
      I feel like this might be exaggerated (and this was written back in 2001!). I know of, and have been in, plenty of countries/areas where people do not have easy access to cell phones, much less the internet. Even in the United States, there are large groups of people - of all ages - that are not comfortable using a computer because of access issues
    • S Chou
      S Chou on 29 Oct 11
       
      SC - This also paints a picture of technology use as only for global good, not for increased advertising, consumerism, and replicating power structures/agendas that already exist. I do not agree with the idea that increased communication is necessarily better.
  • neighbourhoods are not important sources of community.
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 28 Oct 11
       
      This is quite a generalization...I wonder if there is some data on this somewhere. Public schools in most of the country are still very much community-based and these interactions can drive a lot of community feeling. And I still come in contact with a lot of people that live near family.
  • decreased commitment of each milieu to its inhabitants' well-being.
  • People must actively maintain their sparsely-knit ties and fragmented networks.
  • No more are people identified as members of a single group; they can switch among multiple networks.
  • development of person-to-person connectivity has been influenced more by innovations in communication than in transportation.
  • "The nuclear family may be on a comeback," a Rogers ATT mobile phone advertisement says on Toronto radio (CFMX, Feb. 13 2000:0813EST) with no sense of irony. Dad is bowling with the boys, Mom is on the road making presentations, son Dick is at his computer club, and daughter Jane is out of town visiting her biological Dad. Yet they all can stay connected at low cost through flat-rate national mobile phone calling.
  • norms of this inherently person-to-person system foster the intrusion of intensely involving private behaviour into public space
  • totally self-absorbed
  • , and they seem to think that the impact of their actions on other people are absolutely inconsequential.
  • Women have set the rules of the community game in place-to-place relationships and borne the burden of community keeping. If person-to-person community means that it is every person for him/herself, then we might expect to see a gendered re-segregation of community (as in Elizabeth Bott's England, 1957) with the possibility that men's communities will be smaller than networking-savvy women (Wright 1989; Moore 1990; Wellman 1992a, Bruckner and Knaup 1993).
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 28 Oct 11
       
      Are there gender differences in the number of connections men have online vs. women? Maybe could look at Facebook friends?
    • S Chou
      S Chou on 29 Oct 11
       
      SC - Yeah, this seems like an assumption of Wellman's that I'm not sure I agree with.
  • Research shows that people interact happily and fruitfully online (for the most part) and in ways similar to face-to-face contac
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 28 Oct 11
       
      Appears to be meeting the human needs that were brought up in the first class
  • Will the Internet promote two-person interactions at the expense of interactions happening in group or social network contexts?
  • these are always deliberate choices.
  • Agency is a need as well as an analytic category.
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 28 Oct 11
       
      But how does agency fit in with social norms? It was brought up in discussion that people are expected to always be available in some way
    • S Chou
      S Chou on 29 Oct 11
       
      SC - I think personal agency definitely gets overrun by some social norms, the difference between work norms and other community norms will yield different effects on agency as well. 
  • The bad news is that schools do not formally teach networking skills.
  • Fortunately, poorer groups in society have always networked heavily for the want of other resources. The problem will be to move from local networking and migrant networking to cyber-networking (Lomnitz 1977; Roberts 1978, Espinoza 1999). It may be then that network capital may provide a partial way of coping with a lack of other forms of capital.
  • The Internet's very lack of social richness can foster contact with more diverse others.
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 28 Oct 11
       
      I don't think this prediction came to pan out...
  • Despite the Internet's potential to connect diverse cultures and ideas, people are drawn to online communities that link them with others sharing common interests or concerns. They may be more diversified than "real life" community in their gender, ethnicity and socioeconomic status, but they still communicate about only a limited set of topics and ideas.
  • They are truly in cyberplaces, and not just cyberspaces
  • Participants in online groups have strong interpersonal feelings of belonging, being wanted, obtaining important resources, and having a shared identity.
  • Many ties operate in both cyberspace and physical space, used whatever means of communication is convenient and appropriate at the moment.
  • This is a time for individuals and their networks, not for groups. The all-embracing collectivity (Parsons 1951; Braga and Menosky 1999) has become a fragmented, personalized network. Autonomy, opportunity, and uncertainty rule today's community game.
  • Yet the rapid emergence of computer-mediated communications means that relations in cyberplaces are joining with relations on the ground
  • it is when technological changes become pervasive, familiar and boring, that they affect societies the most
  • relations in cyberplaces are joining with relations on the ground
    • S Chou
      S Chou on 29 Oct 11
       
      Joining in complicated ways that involve navigating the impact of new technology. Definitely not literal or exact transfers of relationship. Joining/replacing/transforming?
  • become less aware of the importance of gospel music to southern Americans, farm news to midwesterners, and hip-hop to northeastern city dwellers
    • S Chou
      S Chou on 29 Oct 11
       
      Does this imply that society in general will become a more homogenous? 
  • personalization need not mean individual isolation
  • truly personal communities
  • Telephones allow much more body movement and glances at others than does personal computing
    • S Chou
      S Chou on 29 Oct 11
       
      Does the fact that physical acts of personal computing are so independent of others contradict with ideas of social networking as increased connectivity? To what degree does our physical behavior impact our experience with technology?
  • They regard their email address and alias as parts of their personal identity
  • Their awareness and behaviour is totally in private cyberspace even though their bodies are in public space.
  • email supports (a) within-network broadcasts; (b) personal communications between one or multiple friends, and (c) public address systems to strangers
  • digital computer networks convey more information per second than analogue telephone networks
  • Would we be wiser to wonder if online interaction will develop its own strengths and create its own norms and dynamics?
  • privatization may be responsible for the lack of informal help given to strangers who are in trouble in public spaces
  • People must maintain differentiated portfolios of ties to obtain a variety of needed and wanted resources
  • people with strong ties are more likely to be socially similar and to know the same persons, they are more likely to possess the same information. By contrast, new information is more apt to come through weaker ties better connected with other, more diverse social circles.
  • Where person-to-person community is individualizing, role-to-role community deconstructs a holistic individual identity
  • Cyberspace fights against physical space less than it complements it
  • false dichotomy
Liu He

Boeder - 6 views

firstmonday.org/...1200

shared by Liu He on 21 Nov 11 - Cached
  • Habermas
  • Strukturwandel der Öffentlichkeit
  • yet their format effectively prevents interaction and deprives the public of the opportunity to say something and to disagree
    • alperin
      alperin on 21 Nov 11
       
      i'm confused as to how electronic mass media prevents interaction. I guess its in comparison to meeting in the salons? 
    • Howard Rheingold
      Howard Rheingold on 25 Nov 11
       
      from Habermas view, the way that more people were influenced by radio, print, and the nascent television culture by a few who controlled the programming, combined with the emerging craft of public relations, with all the transmission of information going one-way from the few to the many. Habermas might see the #OWS as more akin to the salons -- the part where people engage in rational critical debate about the issues that effect their lives. But what Habermas didn't count on and personally refused to answer to me was the effect of Internet-based media on the public sphere. If he has a clue, he isn't talking. And I suspect that he lacks a clue. He once said that he doubted real discourse could happen in "a series of chat rooms." I've learned over the years that "series of chat rooms" is a signal that the person expressing an opinion about social media actually knows next to nothing about the subject. More interesting might be what Adorno and Horkheimer had to say.
  • ...40 more annotations...
  • advertising
  • the media serve as vehicles for generating and managing consensus and promoting capitalist culture rather than fulfill their original function as organs of public debate
  • arguments are transmuted into symbols to which one cannot respond by arguing but only by identifying with them.
    • alperin
      alperin on 21 Nov 11
       
      maybe this is the answer to my question above
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 25 Nov 11
       
      I agree that it is difficult to have true debates with electronic media when it is ultimately controlled by someone else. How much freedom can you have when the tools you are using are monitored? But I think social media plays a large role in organizing people to participate in the real world public sphere.
    • S Chou
      S Chou on 27 Nov 11
    • Liu He
      Liu He on 06 Dec 11
       
      That's interesting. Who are those using the Internet? What do they want to use Internet for? What can they achieve?
  • critical publicity distinct from the state and the economy
  • "critical theory"
    • alperin
      alperin on 21 Nov 11
       
      If you're curious about Critical Theory, there is a course offered next term: http://cl.ly/Byxe . Its called Critical Pedagogy, but it will be a great introduction to critical theory.
  • cooperation rather than competition
  • Mitchell Stephens
    • alperin
      alperin on 21 Nov 11
       
      prof at the ed. school at Stanford
    • alperin
      alperin on 21 Nov 11
       
      I should add that Habermas is still writing and publishing, including on issues of around media:  Political Communication in Media Society: Does Democracy Still Enjoy an Epistemic Dimension? The Impact of Normative Theory on Empirical Research. http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1468-2885.2006.00280.x/full
  • The prospect of the technical capabilities of a near–ubiquitous high–bandwidth Net in the hands of a small number of commercial interests has dire political implications. Whoever gains the political edge on this technology will be able to use the technology to consolidate power.
  • "the Internet is dominated by white, well off, English speaking, educated males, most of whom are USA citizens,"
    • alperin
      alperin on 21 Nov 11
       
      I don't have recent numbers, but this has changed significantly since 1996. Although there is still an imbalance, I am sure the demographic that has access is not as easy to define as it was in the mid-90s
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 25 Nov 11
       
      I found this link - it seems the majority of internet users are in Asia. I wondered why I don't come across more Chinese sites. Perhaps it's because I don't seek them out particularly being an English speaker. But maybe it's not really the users that are important. I might argue that it's the producers of content that are highly affecting the discourse online and the demographics described here are fairly accurate. It's one thing to have access to the internet and be a consumer of content, but another to have the time, energy and be educated enough to contribute in meaningful ways.
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 25 Nov 11
    • S Chou
      S Chou on 27 Nov 11
       
      I would also add the power of (wielded by) search to this discussion.
    • alperin
      alperin on 27 Nov 11
       
      I once asked the head of Google Scholar about adding a 'language' feature on the search. He replied: "can you think of an example where your search does not define the language you want results in?" ... i.e. if you searched for chinese words, you'd get chinese results.
    • Liu He
      Liu He on 06 Dec 11
       
      Language could be a barrier to forming "one" Internet that involves all participants in the world. Otherwise we are unable to communicate effectively.
  • "What public relations does, in entering public debate, is to disguise the interests it represents — cloaking them in appeals such as ‘public welfare’ and the ‘national interest’ — thus making contemporary debate a faked version"
    • alperin
      alperin on 21 Nov 11
       
      I like the use of 'fake' here
  • the media are the public sphere
    • alperin
      alperin on 21 Nov 11
       
      do you agree?
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 25 Nov 11
       
      Not completely, although this might change after our class when we talk about the definition of public sphere. I think the public sphere is free of the political influence that can be found in popular media, but media does drive topics of debate in the public sphere and can be a forum for discussion. But my feeling is that conversations in the public sphere lead to political action and I'm not sure that is congruent with media that is influenced by political parties
    • alperin
      alperin on 21 Nov 11
       
      Given that this article was published in 2005, I am surprised by the inclusion of this outdated notion. Does the author think its accurate? Did the reviewers also?
    • alperin
      alperin on 21 Nov 11
       
      This reminds me of Francis Fukuyama's End of History. Somehow supposes that liberal democracy is the best form of government, and that we can only hope to refine it/tweak it. If we assume this is true, then past forms of democracy seem like a fair basis of comparison. I am not a fukuyamaist.  http://www.aljazeera.com/programmes/rizkhan/2010/11/201011111191189923.html
  • The concept of the civil society appears to be dated in what is essentially a network society.
  • unitary character of the public sphere
  • transforming
  • In a sense, the public sphere has always been virtual: Its meaning lies in its abstraction.
    • Howard Rheingold
      Howard Rheingold on 27 Nov 11
       
      "The public sphere," like "democracy" is a reification: there's no real "thing" there. It's an abstraction to describe a bundle of interrelated behaviors and situations that do happen: people either do or do not have freedom from fear of arrest when making public political statements; governments either do or do not let people know how decisions are made; people do or do not discuss issues that concern them; "public opinion" (another reification) either does or does not influence policy. Taken together, these constitute the idea of the public sphere. That it is a bundle of ideas, and therefore "virtual," does not mean it is unreal.
  • some ideas are more useful than others
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 25 Nov 11
       
      I do find it's easy to find validation for your ideas on the internet because so many people are involved. And some ideas are just not the best...
  • consumerism poses a threat to the public sphere
  • a mode of discourse is already established, which actively discourages other modes
  • New communications technologies are being used in ways that extend democratic communication practices. As networks become structurally decentralised, ever wider publics gain access to them in ways that lead to an increase in the rate and density of public exchange.
  • lost much of its original political character in favour of commercialism and entertainment.
    • S Chou
      S Chou on 27 Nov 11
       
      How much of politics today would you qualify as commercialism and entertainment? 
    • Liu He
      Liu He on 06 Dec 11
       
      Journalism may be in bigger crisis in terms of that
  • public debate has shifted from the dissemination of reliable information to the formation of public opinion
  • New forms of citizenship and public life are simultaneously enabled by new technology and restricted by market power and surveillance.
  • a cathartic role, allowing the public to feel involved rather than to advance actual participation
  • public sphere is not just a "marketplace of ideas" or an "information exchange depot," but also a major vehicle for generating and distributing culture.
  • "transparency"
  • tendency towards concentration of power when no adequate measures are taken to counteract this process
  • Theoretically, a network is both able to disperse and to concentrate power.
    • S Chou
      S Chou on 27 Nov 11
       
      Is this operating under the assumption of one constant network? It seems that new technologies allow for the rapid rise, fall, and constant creation of new networks possible - which seems to counteract this tendency.
  • transnational and specialist news media increasingly serve a well–educated elite, while national and local media increasingly cater to the taste of disempowered social groups for whom globalisation only poses a threat
  • Dominant currents in the philosophy of technology thus essentialise technology, decontextualise it, and abstract it from culture and human meaning
  • it is on the verge of extinction.
    • Liu He
      Liu He on 06 Dec 11
       
      Isn't it exagerated?
  • public sphere’s pre–eminent institution, the press
    • Liu He
      Liu He on 06 Dec 11
       
      Is journalism today still the key to the formation of public opinion?
  • If their ability to form political will, debate issues and influence society is expanded by the Internet, this is no way resembles a truly participative discourse of democracy
  • Notions of commodification and commercialisation still have their relevance in today’s mass communication theory: They pose a permanent threat to the cultural quality of media products and cannot be ignored.
  • He believes that the Internet can reverse the tide of public disdain for the media by providing a user experience that is immediate, interactive, and intimate. Bardoel (1996) points out that because of the increasing individualization and segmentation in communication such notions as "community" and "public debate" should be taken less for granted
  • "instrumental journalism."
  • Publicity loses its critical function in favour of a staged display; 4
  • Rather, the public sphere transcends these physical appearances as an abstract forum for dialogue and ideology–free public opinion, a lively debate on multiple levels within society. Interesting in this regard is that the German word for public relations is Öffentlichkeitsarbeit, which could both be translated as "work within the public sphere" or "work on the public sphere."
alperin

Boston Review - Cass Sunstein: The Daily We - 4 views

bostonreview.net/...sunstein.php

democracy public sphere community internet media free speech

shared by alperin on 25 Nov 11 - Cached
  • increasingly engaged in a process of “personalization” that limits their exposure to topics and points of view of their own choosing
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 25 Nov 11
       
      Validating what you already believe in. We had a discussion about this when talking about why/when people use peer recommendation sites like Yelp
    • Liu He
      Liu He on 26 Nov 11
       
      A cycle of bias!
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 25 Nov 11
       
      It's interesting that almost none of these services (aside from Tivo and Intertainer, Inc?) are still around. But the ideas that they had about personalization have lived on. They had the right idea, perhaps before anyone else. Why did they fail?
    • Liu He
      Liu He on 26 Nov 11
       
      That's an interesting topic. Perhaps in his time there are dozens or even hundreds of similar services, much more than the five cases here. But only very few of them have survived the fierce competitions in the market.
    • alperin
      alperin on 27 Nov 11
       
      it could be just that their business models weren't right. Online businesses are easy to start (engineers are good at implementing them), but then turning a profit is another story. Many of the great websites operated for ages in the red, only surviving on investors believing in the idea.
  • people should be exposed to materials that they would not have chosen in advance.
  • ...45 more annotations...
  • Unanticipated encounters
  • are central to democracy and even to freedom itself
  • many or most citizens should have a range of common experiences
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 25 Nov 11
       
      In some ways these two requirements are the basis for the standard school system as well.
    • alperin
      alperin on 27 Nov 11
       
      but its too much of a burden on the school system to provide the basis for all our common experiences. These must continue well into adulthood, which means we should still have them outside of our school years.
  • consumers can entirely personalize (or “customize”) their communications universe.
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 25 Nov 11
       
      how close are we to this now? and is it a utopian dream?
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 25 Nov 11
       
      I mean in personalizing our internet experience, not in the course of everyday life as will be outlined here...
    • alperin
      alperin on 27 Nov 11
       
      the only place we have some encounters with things we don't expect is with searches. Sometimes, random things come up that are unexpected. Otherwise, yes, we get what we want. At best, we get a bit of exposure because someone we follow links to things we don't necessarily expect. 
  • many people are using it to produce narrowness, not breadth.
  • there is a difference of degree if not of kind.
  • dramatic increase in individual control over content, and a corresponding decrease in the power of general interest intermediaries, including newspapers, magazines, and broadcasters
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 25 Nov 11
       
      Not sure if I agree completely with this. I think the decrease in power might just be more subtle use of power
    • S Chou
      S Chou on 27 Nov 11
       
      I feel like this overstates the original power of general interest media, as well as the "general" piece of it. 
    • alperin
      alperin on 27 Nov 11
       
      I also think that these general interest media content providers are still alive and well, providing general interest content over the internet. How many ways can I get reality tv?
    • alperin
      alperin on 27 Nov 11
       
      and less tonge-in-cheek, most people still read the NYTimes, the Guardian, CNN, Fox, etc. Be it online, tv, or in print. There are a million ways to personalize your experience, but most people opt for the traditional sources for the majority of their news and then may dig deeper with personalized choices.
  • chance encounters,
  • When people see materials that they have not chosen, their interests and their views might change as a result.
  • common framework for social experience.
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 25 Nov 11
       
      Is the increase in fragmentation made up for by the fact that news/experiences on the Internet can travel instanteously to large numbers of people if they go viral?
  • group polarization
  • groups of people, especially if they are like-minded, will end up thinking the same thing that they thought before—but in more extreme form.
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 25 Nov 11
       
      I've read articles and heard from people that political parties now are much less likely to compromise with each other than in the past. A couple of questions: Do you think that's true or just a typical exaggeration that happens as the past fades away from public memory? If it is true, do you think the rise of individualizing content on the Internet and subsequently polarizing views of large groups of people have contributed to it as a reflection in the political parties?
  • If your position is going to move as a result of group discussion, it is likely to move in the direction of the most persuasive position defended within the group, taken as a collectivity
  • the group as a whole moves, as a statistical regularity, to a more extreme position
  • group polarization is likely to have fueled many movements of great value
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 25 Nov 11
       
      Appreciate pointing out the positives of group polarization as well. Sometimes we get bogged down in the negatives of a topic
  • it is extremely important to ensure that people are exposed to views other than those with which they currently agree,
  • In a heterogeneous society, it is extremely important for diverse people to have a set of common experiences.
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 25 Nov 11
       
      Builds community
  • congregate around a common issue, task, or concern
  • enjoyment
  • people who would otherwise see one another as unfamiliar can come to regard one another as fellow citizens, with shared hopes, goals, and concerns
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 25 Nov 11
       
      Goes back to communities included shared experiences and the thoughts on how time spent together leads to a community
  • to show how consumer sovereignty, in a world of limitless options, could undermine that system
  • Websites might use links and hyperlinks to ensure that viewers learn about sites containing opposing views
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 25 Nov 11
       
      would this just encourage more overt disparaging remarks?
  • The basic question is whether it might be possible to create spaces that have some of the functions of public forums and general interest intermediaries in the age of the Internet.
    • S Chou
      S Chou on 27 Nov 11
       
      Part of this argument seems to assume that qualities of balanced reporting do not apply to websites as well. As more brand name news agencies weigh in online does this change the need to a degree?
  • As a result of the Internet, people can learn far more than they could before, and they can learn it much faster.
    • Liu He
      Liu He on 26 Nov 11
       
      Yes, knowledge is power. However, has the Internet forever changed our lives? Do we adapt to it or do we make it absolutely work for us? Does the technology also open a "Pandora's box" at the same time it emancipate us? Whenever I come through here, I often remember a saying that fortune and misfortune comes side by side.
    • S Chou
      S Chou on 27 Nov 11
       
      Learning is not the same as accessing. 
  • the growing power of consumers to “filter” what they see.
    • Liu He
      Liu He on 26 Nov 11
       
      Yes, it's interesting. What you can see depends on what you are looking for. A clairvoyant would tell you that you are not going to see something you don't want to see.
    • alperin
      alperin on 27 Nov 11
       
      This has been shown empirically to be true, like the now well-known 'tale of two blog-o-spheres'
  • involving unfamiliar and even irritating topics and points of view
    • Liu He
      Liu He on 26 Nov 11
       
      This is one important reason that I still enjoy reading the newspaper, because I can "encounter" the information, news stories and points of views which might be surprising as well as fascinating.
  • group deliberation with like-minded people and insulation from alternate views breeds increasing extremism.
    • Liu He
      Liu He on 26 Nov 11
       
      Form a bias -- confirm the bias -- leading to prejudice. Does it work this way?
  • general interest intermediaries expose people to a wide range of topics and views and at the same time provide shared experiences for a heterogeneous public.
  • exposures help promote understanding and perhaps, in that sense, freedom
  • If the public is balkanized, and if different groups design their own preferred communications packages, the consequence will be further balkanization
  • raise questions about the idea that “more speech” is necessarily an adequate remedy—especially if people are increasingly able to wall themselves off from competing views.
  • “consumer sovereignty,” which underlies much of contemporary enthusiasm for the Internet
    • S Chou
      S Chou on 27 Nov 11
       
      Ties to Habermas, but puts more power in the hands of the consumer.
  • As a result of the Internet, cascade effects are more common than they have ever been before.
    • S Chou
      S Chou on 27 Nov 11
       
      An argument for media literacy.
  • New technology can expose people to diverse points of view and creates opportunities for shared experiences. People may, through private choices, take advantage of these possibilities. But, to the extent that they fail to do so, it is worthwhile to consider private and public initiatives designed to pick up the slack.
  • in a free republic, citizens aspire to a system that provides a wide range of experiences
  • Hence their views may shift when they see what other people and in particular what other group members think.
    • Liu He
      Liu He on 27 Nov 11
       
      What's interesting is that sometimes when I do group readings, I feel that other people's comments on the page may have more or less influence on my formation of opinions. It is especially obvious when we do group readings on the paper.
  • social comparison
  • when group discussion tends to lead people to more strongly held versions of the same view with which they began, and if social influences and limited argument pools are responsible, there is legitimate reason for concern.
  • often becomes quite entrenched, even if it is entirely wrong.
  • This is a simple matter of numbers.
  • To the extent that choices proliferate, it is inevitable that diverse individuals, and diverse groups, will have fewer shared experiences and fewer common reference points.
  • voluntary self-regulation.
  • voluntary self-regulation.
  • advertisers are willing to spend a great deal of money to obtain brief access to people’s eyeballs
  • a well-functioning democracy depends on far more than restraints on official censorship of controversial ideas and opinions. It also depends on some kind of public sphere
alperin

danah boyd - "Friends, Friendsters, and Top 8: Writing community into being on social n... - 4 views

www.firstmonday.org/...1336

shared by alperin on 29 Oct 11 - No Cached
  • Based on an internal understanding of the audience, participants override the term “Friend” to make room for a variety of different relationships so that they may properly show face.
  • When “my friend” is used to describe a person, it has performative qualities
  • What differentiates social network sites [6] from other computer-mediated communication sites is the feature that allows participants to articulate and publicly display their relations to others in the system
  • ...25 more annotations...
  • fake Profiles were developed to aid in this process.
    • S Chou
      S Chou on 29 Oct 11
       
      People will find ways to connect by group interests even if the site does not have specific channels for doing this.
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 31 Oct 11
       
      Yes - this goes along with user-created features on social networking sites that was mentioned in the forums. (like the hashtag searches on Twitter)
  • By tying Friendship to privacy settings, social network sites encourage people to choose Friends based on what they want to make visible.
  • what’s the loss in Friending them?
  • The process of removing a Friend on MySpace signals a shift in relationship status that is often not easily articulated in everyday life. There is no clear social script for ending a friendship
    • S Chou
      S Chou on 29 Oct 11
       
      Here is another instance of something new being publicly articulated through social networks. Is the impact here more personal, societal, or both?
  • Top Friends requires participants to expose backstage information. In a culture where it’s socially awkward to reject someone’s Friendship, ranking them provides endless drama and social awkwardness.
    • S Chou
      S Chou on 29 Oct 11
       
      This "four degrees" affordance takes a significantly different approach than Facebook, the dominant social network today. Do you think that part of the shift towards more private and restricted networks comes out of backlash from previous sites that allowed users to access thousands of profiles all at once? 
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 31 Oct 11
       
      Good question - I wonder if anyone in class has experience using Friendster and could shed some light on this. I never used Friendster but would be interested to hear how it compared to Facebook and Myspace...
    • alperin
      alperin on 31 Oct 11
       
      I was briefly on frienster. The thing to keep in mind is that nobody had any experience on social networking when Friendster made inroads. If you recall, at the beginning, you could only browse profiles of people who were in your 'network'. The network was first defined by your university, then you could pick a city. It was not until much later that Facebook opened it up so you could search for people anywhere.
    • S Chou
      S Chou on 29 Oct 11
       
      How much of this has to do with the average age of the user? 
    • alperin
      alperin on 31 Oct 11
       
      I imagine age is correlated to where on this list you fall, as well as your marital status, and geographic location. There must also be a link to different personality types. But I assume you're right that age is the highest determinant.
  • Rather than having the context dictated by the environment itself, context emerged through Friends networks
  • This completely inverts the norms in early public social sites where interests or activities defined a group
  • People define their community egocentrically
  • Friends are a critical signal in conveying the expected social boundaries
  • properties that have been present in all mediated spaces persist, complicating many social behaviors on these sites. Four properties in particular play a key role: persistence, searchability, replicability, and invisible audiences
  • Social network sites are not digital spaces disconnected from other social venues — it is a modeling of one aspect of participants’ social worlds and that model is evaluated in other social contexts
    • alperin
      alperin on 31 Oct 11
       
      @Sarah: do you think this is true? My sense is that it is only partially true, as social network sites also create a space that does not have a parallel/equivalent in the offline context. It is completely new, and enabled by the digital environment.
  • In thinking about Friendship practices on social network sites, it is crucial to evaluate them on their own terms
  • gateway friends
    • alperin
      alperin on 31 Oct 11
       
      these are bridges in Granoveter's (1973) sense 
  • meaning of Friendship
    • alperin
      alperin on 31 Oct 11
       
      I can't help but think of Facebook, and how it has once again forced us to rethink the meaning of friendship. Originally in who we added, and now in what 'list' we add people to
  • They primarily found that Friendship stood for: content, offline facilitator, online community, trust, courtesy, declaration, or nothing.
  • In short, it’s socially awkward to say no
    • alperin
      alperin on 31 Oct 11
       
      Facebook got around this problem by giving you the option to 'ignore'. This is much less socially awkward than saying 'no' outright.
    • alperin
      alperin on 31 Oct 11
       
      it may only be a difference in word choice, but I find it effective
    • alperin
      alperin on 31 Oct 11
       
      Even among 'older' (late 20s) myspace users, I remember the Top 8 being something that was talked about. It was acknowledged as silly to care, but people did look to see if they were Top 8, and thought carefully before removing someone from their Top 8...
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 31 Oct 11
       
      I remember when this was used as well but don't remember much drama associated with it. I guess 8 was enough for me at the time to get in my close friends! I wonder if something like this would go over well now that people do follow closely so many people
  • I also suspect that a study of non-American practices would introduce entirely different dynamics.
    • alperin
      alperin on 31 Oct 11
       
      we never seem to get to the non-American... its too bad, because I imagine it is very different.
  • the boundaries between friends and acquaintances are quite blurry and it is unlikely that there will ever be consensus on a formula for what demarcates a friend.
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 31 Oct 11
       
      Is this magnified even more with sites like Facebook where people have 500+ "friends"?
  • the Web site’s creators put an end to their collecting and deleted both accounts. This began the deletion of all Fakesters in what was eventually termed the Fakester Genocide
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 31 Oct 11
       
      Sounds like the creators of Friendster were not very adaptable to what the needs of the users were. I wonder if this ultimately led to the downfall?
  • Unless you’re always randomly rotating these people
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 31 Oct 11
       
      sounds like a lot of work!
  • context collision when people from different facets of their lives joined the site.
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 31 Oct 11
       
      Same as context collapse?
    • alperin
      alperin on 31 Oct 11
       
      I think so...
  • participants there write their community into being through the process of Friending
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 31 Oct 11
       
      Decentralization of community?
Liu He

Network Capital: an expression of social capital in the Network Society | Acevedo | The... - 4 views

ci-journal.net/...317

social networks network capital knowledge-intensive process

shared by Liu He on 05 Nov 11 - Cached
    • alperin
      alperin on 05 Nov 11
       
      this journal is using the software I write, Open Journal Systems :)
  • positive externalities like the decentralization of initiative-taking and the spreading of responsibilities in a more democratic and participatory governance structure.
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 06 Nov 11
       
      Assumption that these would be positive? Direct democracy is not necessarily the best choice if the people participating in it are not keeping up with remaining educated about issues. The statement "decentralization of initiative-taking" remindeds me a lot of Stanford. Is it effective to be so decentralized?
    • Liu He
      Liu He on 09 Nov 11
       
      Not always. Yes, Jenn is right. Will people's initiatives have a negative impact on the public goods if they are not clear about what they are participating and the potential effects of their participation?
  • genetic in our ability to pool together for common goals
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 06 Nov 11
       
      Only if they are in our "tribe"
  • ...15 more annotations...
  • product of personal community networks as well as of formally institutionalized groups.”
  • Network capital could then be understood as a measure of the differentiated value in the Information Age that communities structured as social networks generate on the basis of electronic (digital) networks for themselves, for others and for society as a whole.
  • social as well as economic terms
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 06 Nov 11
       
      Economic = marketing campaigns, things that go viral, bad reviews?
  • combination of attributes
  • communal cyberplace
  • individuals to behave as ‘global citizens’, and to become involved in actions and issues not bounded by their physical location.
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 06 Nov 11
       
      Might be a problem if trying to push an agenda on another part of the world when you are not part of that culture/community. Especially if those that live there do not have access to the Internet and so can't participate in matters that affect them
    • Liu He
      Liu He on 09 Nov 11
       
      The concept of "global citizen" sometimes is tricky. People have a limited view of the world, especially of the international affairs they actually are unfamiliar with. And sometimes the view is distorted, when people rely heavily on certain news media's coverages and editorials concerning what happens abroad.
  • ‘all for the love of it’
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 06 Nov 11
       
      Or for self promotion?
  • global citizen will have more possibilities to become involved in social causes, with lesser constraints of place or time.
  • social cohesion is critical for advancing human development
  • Participation, trust, solidarity and reciprocity, grounded in a shared understanding and a sense of common obligations
    • Liu He
      Liu He on 09 Nov 11
       
      Trust, reciprocity and volunteer activities seem to be at the core of social capital.
  • It is a result of cooperation via electronic networks, and in turn fosters the habit of such cooperation.
  • volunteer action and contributions
  • Benefiting from the Internet, neither distance nor time constraints irrevocably limit the involvement of a significantly wider group of participants, many of whom may undertake this participation as volunteers
  • The collaborative working methods are sure to resonate with some of the people involved, who would apply them later in other spheres. Some of the relationships initiated by the projects would become lasting human bonds, either for professional or personal purposes.
  • by the distributed methods and electronic technologies which are inherent to networked operations in our days
Liu He

The New Atlantis » Virtual Friendship and the New Narcissism - 3 views

www.thenewatlantis.com/...endship-and-the-new-narcissism

shared by Liu He on 23 Oct 11 - Cached
  • On social networking websites like MySpace and Facebook, our modern self-portraits
  • carefully manipulated
  • interactive
  • ...21 more annotations...
  • ephemeral
  • Does this technology, with its constant demands to collect (friends and status), and perform (by marketing ourselves), in some ways undermine our ability to attain what it promises—a surer sense of who we are and where we belong?
  • There are sites specifically for younger children, such as Club Penguin
    • S Chou
      S Chou on 25 Oct 11
       
      What's in it for young children and social networking media? Here is what they tell parents: http://www.clubpenguin.com/parents/ 
  • the activities social networking sites promote are precisely the ones weak ties foster, like rumor-mongering, gossip, finding people, and tracking the ever-shifting movements of popular culture and fad. If this is our small world, it is one that gives its greatest attention to small things.
  • entrenched barriers of race and social class undermine the idea that we live in a small world. Computer networks have not removed those barriers.
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 24 Oct 11
       
      Computer networks maybe increasing the barriers between communities just through access
    • alperin
      alperin on 25 Oct 11
       
      Work I've read on real social networks (such as a network of every MSN Messenger conversation) show that the average shortest path length is < 8. Of course, this is still restricted to people who are digitally connected, but MSN is a relatively low technological barrier.
    • S Chou
      S Chou on 25 Oct 11
       
      The digital divide can be hard to keep track of given the page of technological change, but here is an interesting (if slightly dated) place to start: http://wireless.ictp.it/simulator/
  • protean selves
  • Today, our self-portraits are democratic and digital
  • one giant living dynamic learning experience about consumers
    • S Chou
      S Chou on 23 Oct 11
       
      Actual article, if anyone is interested in the business point of view. http://customerlistening.typepad.com/customer_listening/2007/01/pg_boosts_socia.html
  • certain kinds of connections easier, but because they are governed not by geography or community mores but by personal whim, they free users from the responsibilities that tend to come with membership in a community.
  • The secret is to tie the acquisition of friends, compliments and status—spoils that humans will work hard for—to activities that enhance the site.
    • S Chou
      S Chou on 23 Oct 11
       
      Implies that, on some level, real human needs are being met.
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 24 Oct 11
       
      The antedote on choosing between 2 pages - is it because we are blindly following based on numbers or is the pattern about authenticity (more people=more reliable)? Maybe the two are inseparable and it doesn't really matter...
  • Real intimacy requires risk—the risk of disapproval, of heartache, of being thought a fool. Social networking websites may make relationships more reliable, but whether those relationships can be humanly satisfying remains to be seen.
  • level of social involvement decreases
    • S Chou
      S Chou on 25 Oct 11
       
      Does not mean causality.
  • people you might have (should have?) fallen out of touch with—it is now easier than ever to reconnect to those people
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 24 Oct 11
       
      This brings up the idea that maybe there is a reason that we lose track of people or outgrow them. Now, with Facebook it is very awkward to acknowledge that you are no longer friends - and that it's not necessarily a bad thing
  • we should be asking isn’t how closely are we connected, but rather what kinds of communities and friendships are we creating
    • S Chou
      S Chou on 25 Oct 11
       
      Are there different expectations around social networks and their consumers/users/people? In other words, why do we seem more offended by a social network calling their target audience consumers than we would say, a shampoo company?
    • S Chou
      S Chou on 25 Oct 11
       
      Like multi-tasking, which originated in reference to computers, is this another instance of computer-based concepts and languages seeping into our cultural sense of self? 
    • S Chou
      S Chou on 25 Oct 11
       
      MySpace hosts a population of primarily young people, to what extent is age and maturity not being considered in this argument? 
    • S Chou
      S Chou on 25 Oct 11
       
      Does this argument ignore the degree to which social networks are pathways and representations of friendship, and not the end-all-be-all?
  • Vital statistics, glimpses of bare flesh, lists of favorite bands and favorite poems all clamor for our attention—and it is the timeless human desire for attention that emerges as the dominant theme of these vast virtual galleries.
  • “an entirely new way for consumers to express their individuality online.” (It is noteworthy that Microsoft refers to social networkers as “consumers” rather than merely “users” or, say, “people.”)
  • it relies on e-mail to determine whether “any two people in the world can be connected via ‘six degrees of separation.’
S Chou

3 Necessary Conditions for Human Cooperation « Bokardo - 0 views

bokardo.com/...ary-conditions-for-cooperation

collective action relationships

shared by S Chou on 11 Nov 11 - Cached
  • People will act selfish if there is no future to the relationship.
    • Liu He
      Liu He on 11 Nov 11
       
      Have some doubts here. Although the knowledge of future cooperations change our behaviors right now, do we tend to act selfish all the time when we know there is no future to the relationship?
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 12 Nov 11
       
      I feel like this will be come less and less true as virtual communication increases and the power of networking grows. Even if you won't meet a person directly I think people are becoming more apt to believe they might have someone in their network that would lead to a strong connection
    • S Chou
      S Chou on 15 Nov 11
       
      At the same time, virtual communication removes the physical and more reciprocal long-term repercussions of not cooperating so this might turn into one of those double-edge situations.  
    • Howard Rheingold
      Howard Rheingold on 25 Nov 11
       
      I think your doubts have illuminated something important. People do act selfishly. But not all the time. The assumption that people are overwhelmingly selfish sets the stage for a self-fulfilling prophecy. But people act altruistically, cooperatively, even heroically toward others -- even strangers -- all the time.
  • If people can’t identify who they’re dealing with, then they can’t hold that person accountable.
    • Liu He
      Liu He on 11 Nov 11
       
      Yes identity is imporant. But are we missing something else here? Even if we can "identify the person as someone to the system he is in and the person we are dealing with", as what the author says, can we hold this person accountable? Is that enough?
    • S Chou
      S Chou on 15 Nov 11
       
      We would have to identify, but still hold personal choice and ultimate responsibility for our choices. Being able to hold someone else accountable is really just the first step to any cooperation among strangers. After time, history and relationships form, and that should move us well beyond identity and accountability alone.
  • Thus having a positive record of behavior leads to cooperation.
  • ...2 more annotations...
  • We have learned to assume
    • S Chou
      S Chou on 15 Nov 11
       
      Interesting how this statement is phrased. "Learned" implies that there was a time when we didn't count on indicators of past behavior, and "assume" points out that we may still have more learning to do.  
  • no repercussions
Liu He

Howard Rheingold - Why the History of the Public Sphere Matters - 4 views

blip.tv/...rs-in-the-internet-age-1709056

public sphere democracy public opinion

shared by Liu He on 25 Nov 11 - No Cached
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 25 Nov 11
       
      I wonder how the public sphere as a democratic process will play out as in a global internet where other countries do not value democracy in the same way
    • Liu He
      Liu He on 27 Nov 11
       
      I think there is a difference between the interest of the dictators and the interest of public in some countries. For the people, knowledge could be power.
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 25 Nov 11
       
      It seems that the examples pointed out have in common people that had the time to have these discussions in the public sphere, such as the more affluent or educated. Will the internet as the public sphere allow an average working person to also participate?
    • S Chou
      S Chou on 27 Nov 11
       
      The idea of a life-or-death need to participate is also interesting. Are there other means of moving large groups of people from theory to action? 
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 25 Nov 11
       
      A general question - has there been any other instances in human history of many-to-many communication?
    • Howard Rheingold
      Howard Rheingold on 25 Nov 11
       
      Science fiction fans used to circulate letters, and Joseph Priestley got the system of scientific peer review started by sending letters to everybody who experimented with electricity, asking for details about their experimental equipment, methods, and results, then circulated these details among the community of "electricians" and recirculated their replies. But this wasn't really many-to-many, and of course, very slow. I can't really think of much else. Anybody?
    • S Chou
      S Chou on 27 Nov 11
       
      Does the public school system count? 
    • Liu He
      Liu He on 27 Nov 11
       
      The Public Forum of ancient Rome? It is a public meeting place for open discussion and the center of Roman public life for centuires.
    • alperin
      alperin on 27 Nov 11
       
      the first academic journals, including Philosophical Transactions, were a result of letters circulated by Oldenburg, to the different scientists (like Newton). Like the electrician's letters Howard describes above, this was slow, but it was many-to-many, and the results were eventually circulated via printed works.
  • ...1 more annotation...
    • Liu He
      Liu He on 27 Nov 11
       
      Lippermann raised the question whether the public is educated enough to self-govern. In his words,the unsuspecting public is a herd of sheep and could be easily misled. John Dewey said in response that this is perhaps why we need better journalism. Is this also the case in the Internet age? Is the public armed with the new technology necessarily more educated? Does journalism have a new role?
    • alperin
      alperin on 27 Nov 11
       
      Dewey also promoted free public education, under the belief that the way to a healthy public sphere was through educating the masses.
S Chou

Can You Hear Me Now? - Forbes.com - 7 views

www.forbes.com/...176.html

shared by S Chou on 15 Oct 11 - Cached
  • it is more important to stay tethered to the people who define one's virtual identity, the identity that counts.
    • Jennifer Bundy
      Jennifer Bundy on 15 Oct 11
       
      What about the identity in "real life"? Does virtual identity really count more than that one? Maybe quantity of people that are seeing us virtually matters.
    • alperin
      alperin on 15 Oct 11
       
      juan alperin: I also ask: is it the virtual identity that they are trying to remain connected to? Or their 'real' identity, the person they are when they are 'home', instead of at a conference?
    • Liu He
      Liu He on 16 Oct 11
       
      Is it because online world boosts their self-esteem the reason that people care more about online others? If the virtual reality does count more, what's the point about being real and making face-to-face contact? What's real about virtual reality?
  • The culture that grows up around the cell phone is a communications culture, but it is not necessarily a culture of self-reflection--which depends on having an emotion, experiencing it, sometimes electing to share it with another person, thinking about it differently over time. When interchanges are reduced to the shorthand of emoticon emotions, questions such as "Who am I?" and "Who are you?" are reformatted for the small screen and flattened out in the process.
  • ...1 more annotation...
  • The robotic crocodiles slapped their tails and rolled their eyes; the biological ones, like the Galápagos tortoises, pretty much kept to themselves.
S Chou

Brainstorms: Rheingold Mind to Mind with Sherry Turkle - 1 views

www.well.com/...turkle.html

community turkle identity presentation of self

shared by S Chou on 23 Oct 11 - Cached
  • What is this activity doing to our minds?
  • object-to-think-with
    • alperin
      alperin on 23 Oct 11
       
      What do you think about this "object-to-think-with" characterization? is it out of date now? does it still apply?  I content that this is not the case, computers and networks are not an "object-to-think-with", but perhaps an "object-to-think-through". We don't think WITH the machine, but rather a medium through which to convey our thoughts.
    • S Chou
      S Chou on 23 Oct 11
       
      SC - that's an interesting distinction. I would agree that calculators seem much more like objects-to-think-with while computers allow for a much broader range of interactions including self expression. I think Turkle's point about the power of computers to shape and influence our thoughts still stands though. 
  • ...2 more annotations...
    • alperin
      alperin on 23 Oct 11
       
      You are welcome to follow the links. Several are annotated with Diigo as well
  • Are we living life on the screen or in the screen?
    • alperin
      alperin on 23 Oct 11
       
      this is a nice distinction. ON or IN. Where are you living yours?
    • S Chou
      S Chou on 23 Oct 11
       
      SC - I like to think that I'm ON the screen because the idea of living IN the screen makes me uncomfortable, but I can't deny that the majority of my personal and professional interactions are now mediated through a screen. I'm sure that some of my relationships are more grounded now IN the screen purely out of necessity, I just hope that people don't confuse the two versions of me - to the extent that they're different to begin with. 
alperin

Brainstorms: Rheingold Interviews Turkle - 0 views

www.well.com/...turkleint3.html

turkle identity presentation of self

shared by alperin on 23 Oct 11 - No Cached
  • It seems to me quite understandable that at moments when the unthinkable becomes possible, there are these dramatic paradoxes in our approach to issues -- but it means that when the paradoxes become apparent, technology is there to blame.
  • Computers and communication networks are not drugs.
    • alperin
      alperin on 23 Oct 11
       
      Is Sherry dismissing important aspects of addition? It is not just the amount of a substance that makes it bad, it is also the way, context, and reason for why it is consumed. So it is possible to get addicted to the Internet in a way that is detrimental to your personal development. Each person will have a different amount of 'online' they can handle. We can think of it as tolerance, for which we each have a different threshold, and which our usage patterns help determine.
    • S Chou
      S Chou on 23 Oct 11
       
      SC - I agree, you could make the argument that drugs are also complex channels that different people use in different ways. By saying that X amount of heroin use is never a good thing, she's operating out of the assumption that all drugs are necessarily bad in any amount, which is also not true. 
  • ...1 more annotation...
  • The fear is of making too many of our encounters into transactions.
  • alperin on 23 Oct 11
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