Digital Eastern Thought Subverting Western Culture
Jaron Lanier is a digital media critic, computer scientist, author, and musician who currently holds several adjunct faculty positions at various Ivy League schools around the country. In 2006 he wrote an essay titled Digital Maoism: The Hazards of the New Online Collectivism. The essay maps out Lanier’s views toward the subversive effect that many information aggregate websites such as digg.com and wikipedia (specifically) are beginning to have on our culture. Users of such sites receive their news, weather reports and whatever other information they spend countless hours hunting for through postings from unknown sources as if they magically appear out of the ether of the internet. These “one stop shopping” locations are not in and of themselves negative, but Lanier feels that “there's a frantic race taking place online to become the most "Meta" site, to be the highest level aggregator, subsuming the identity of all other sites”, and it is this race that may have the potential to dumb down our society and only increase the confusion related to many of the emerging digital mediums.
Why is this important to new media and the humanities? Lanier reminds us that “the beauty of the Internet is that it connects people. The value is in the other people. If we start to believe that the Internet itself is an entity that has something to say, we're devaluing those people and making ourselves into idiots.” Sites like wikipedia, informational as they are, are not in themselves purveyors of information and truth; they simply present facsimiles of what has come before and only regurgitate information into the “hive mind.” Humans do not think in terms of hive mentality, or at least not currently. For most people, the process of gaining knowledge from one singular source is a matter of convenience rather than participation in a collective conscious. But what these aggregate sites provide in addition to convenience is information provided in hive mind mentality, stripped away of all authorship, accountability and responsibility.
Lanier feels that one of the primary ways in which some of these “meta” sites are lacking is their lack of “checks and balances.” One of the primary tenets of wikipedia is the notion of “more eyes, less lies.” This mantra is helpful in most instances were grievous errors are made on a specific site or a person with nefarious means intentionally interjects incorrect information. But how does the collective handle information that is without an answer, information that is without an absolute “truth”? What if the collective, the hive mind, the masses of people are simply incorrect? Without accountability the collective is free to determine whatever “truth” they deem as correct.
Most of our culture would most likely include sites such as wikipedia within a definition of what is new media. They identify a specific technology or trend as fundamental to their definition, oblivious to the effect that that technology has on them. But most people involved in the study these technologies and trends would define new media it as its affect on humanity, with participation and interaction being fundamental to understanding the technology. If our culture continues to erase the humanity from their technology and information where does that leave us? How will we continue to cognitively grow? Or will we begin to have our technology thinking for us? Lanier brings his opinions to the fore front not to shut down information aggregates but (like a good student of new media) to add some humanity to the ether. Because ultimately that is what this discussion is all about.
Lanier, Jaron. Digital Maoism: The Hazards of the New Online Collectivism. Edge. May 30, 2006.
