That question is interesting to many people hence the second annual sold-out Web 2.0 Conference 2005. It's fun to look at the speakers bios and think about what got them on the speakers platform. There is a preponderence of white males...not to say it isn't an egalitarian gathering, but it's interesting to think about who's getting the graduate and doctorate degrees in engineering and computer science nowadays vs. who the movers, shakers and thinkers are that made it to the podium.
Over here, in my miniature Cafe, far away from the conference I'd like to present a few ideas about the WWW for my reader(s)/myself to mull over.
~ Years ago Bill Gates said that the challenge of the internet would be to provide "content", likening appeal of the internet sans content to the appeal to average citizens of citizens band radio.
That's a big 10-4 good buddy.
The internet could easily become a heap of miscellaneous bits and pieces of mostly useless data.
The latest spot where garbage is being heaped is the splog pile. If you want to get a feel for the problem use the "next blog" button up there on the right and keep clicking through to see what comes up. You'll see a lot of splog, and some well-meaning but boring or ugly or extremely self-centered content and occasionally something of interest and rarely something really cool.
~ Barry Diller recently commented that editor's are important and talent is rare. I was going to try and make a case that (a) human editor's could be replaced by machines and (b) the aggregate "talent" of a bunch of "untalented" or "sort of talented" people could be combined to make a masterpiece. It's interesting to ponder those ideas but I can't make a case that even gets close to being convincing that we could somehow replace editors and talent.
~ I came up with three ways to view the impact of the web.
Here's an excecutive summary -
The web makes us - dumber, has no impact on our intelligence, or makes us smarter.
Can I get you a cup of coffee? Maybe some nicotine?...a piece of lemon pie? Something to help keep you awake?
1. It dumbs us down.
Wiki articles are great, but they aren't the Encyclopedia Britannica (maybe that's okay..I could never finish those anyway, plus they needed more color pictures). The danger of the wiki concept is if we start to accept the content as the epitome of knowledge but the vetting process doesn't support that level of trust. Then we all get dumbed down.
We are all good at processing web information though; we know .edu .gov .org and .com can mean certain things - for example we don't take medical information from naturalhealing.com to be the same as something we find on nih.gov.
The web is ideal for promoting short attention spans and instant gratification.
On the plus side it can be interactive to a greater or lesser degree to help exercise our brains. It will always be more interactive than the biggest mind-killer of all, television.
Fran Lebowitz has absolutely no use for TV. I tend to be more of a middle of the roader, liking a little mindless junk TV, some great entertaining TV (Boston Legal for me right now) and some PBS things but try to avoid spending much time staring at the tube.
Another way to consider how we may be getting dumbed down by the web is to think about how we learn.
We learn from stories.
At least the important stuff of life. The web is not a replacement for sitting across the kitchen table and hearing about your family, telling jokes, sharing values, dreams, perspectives across generations.We learn experientially, a 2 dollar word, meaning we learn by doing. We learn to manipulate the web by doing stuff with the web...we learn about life by living.
"Ceçi n'est pas une life."
As an aside..I was watching Ross Perot talk yesterday and he said there is a Texasism that goes something like,
"If you're talkin you aren't learning anything new."
He was promoting the idea of listening and hearing what people have to say.Ross Perot's comment about listening, borrowing a phrase from Jim Hightower, shows me
"that guy is smarter than a tree full of owls."
I'm very guilty of being a constant "talker" on the web. I like to write in my blog...I rarely read anyone elses...very egotistical and self-absorbed. I like to jump around the web and read a bunch of stuff (maybe on a blog) so I guess I listen some too.
Finally on the "why the web makes us dumberer" thread - consider this - the web is to thinking what the car is to physical fitness. Isaac Newton wasn't surfing the web when that apple hit him on the head. He was thinking - hard. That's how any new, interesting thought comes about - by hard work.
There's a danger that out minds get so flabby that we can't really think...hopefully by that time machines will have taken over thinking for us so I can spend all day watching cartoons or telling myself jokes.
2. The Web neither increases nor decreases human knowledge.
It's just a repository. Smart people make tools that allow us to sift through that repository to add to what we know, integrate it, hopefully build on it, and thereby contribute to the world's knowledge base.
The talented people involved in web development are good at making tools. Not necessarily at using those tools to provide useful content (I'm defining useful content very narrowly as building upon knowledge that aides the human race in the long view...not how much ad revenue Google can generate in the next minute.)
Web 2.0 tools might be a really nice set of paintbrushes, but it takes an artist to paint the picture. In other words being talented at making a tool is not the same as putting that tool to a good (read furthering knowledge for the good of society) use. That's why diversity is so wonderful. It's how nature survives and why mono-crops fail..anyway..back to planet internet.
3. The Web increases human knowledge.
The web helps diverse talented people work together to come up with smart ideas that will aid society. Not so sure about this one. It might help a little but the web isn't going to feed the poor, clothe the naked or soothe the suffering. It isn't going to develop a person's roadmap to the "good life". Not to say it can't help. But nothing will every replace the real world thank God.
Just one final aside....
Yesterday I was sitting in an office, no outside light or air, for nine hours. At the end of that nine hours I walked outside into a damp, cool, foggy day - IT WAS GREAT!
Just amazing how my mind and body perked up as I got outside.
The web can never replace that...or the smile of a child, the touch of a loved one, the kindness of a stranger.
Sometimes it's all about perspectives.
Jack
Rene Magritte, The Treason of Images ("This is Not a Pipe"), 1928-29, Los Angeles County Museum of Art
