Dividing digitally for dummies

Data Deprivation (Herbert Schiller)

Schiller touches on a lot of interesting arguments in the segment of his research included in this reader, especially considering that it was written in 1996 and remains topical today. Schiller's statement that plans to commercialize the Internet "may be expected to be implemented in the time ahead" (271) is perhaps the greatest understatement of the entire book, but that aside, his concerns about the loss of true democracy and of pure, unsaturated information in our society thanks to the overreliance on corporate power. The idea of the "commercialization of activites once social" was the most interesting aspect of his argument to me, and made me picture the faceless figure dancing across the screen in Apple's iPod ads. Apple has captured the essence of a lot of what Schiller is talking about with how they have propagated the idea of self-expression and dancing to your own iTune with incredibly profitable results. They have made the iPod something that our generation has to have. As a result, Apple can gain control over what people listen to through their online music store, the sort of news they hear via podcasts, and to a large extent, the very lives we lead. It's scary, and is just one example of the power that corporations can control in the way their information is represented.

The Digital Divide (Pippa Norris)

As Norris describes in this chapter, I would have to say that the digital divide is very real and a serious issue that this administration is largely ignoring. I think that many of the ideas Norris discusses are very accurately described as "rosy scenarios"(278) that get so wrapped up in nostalgic ideals of reclaiming the democratic grandeur that we never truthfully possessed. As a result, they really don't actually apply to the world that we actually live in. With the human rights struggle, for example, how can anyone realistically describe how the use of cyberspace will end the racial violence occurring currently in Darfur? What about female genital mutilation in Egypt and Somalia? Or the seemingly endless struggles in the Middle East? NGOs face a strong wall of stubbornness with their attempts to enforce any international standard of human rights as these countries are unwilling to give up their national sovereignty. A "global platform" on this issue enables the production of a snazzy PHP site where all of the unenforceable "reports" can be uploaded, and little more. (Sorry, that got a little bit ranty, but human rights is another area of particular interest to me and over-simplified, Western "solutions" to very real human rights atrocities grate at me.)

Degradation of the Practical Arts (Christopher Lasch)

Lasch's argument is sounding very familiar now, compared to some of the previous writings we've read in this class. I think it is true that a trend in some industries has turned toward eliminating some of the "human limitations" as much as possible in order to ensure higher productivity. This has occurred as many industries have downsized to meet the pressures of increasing costs and a somewhat patchy economy. This certainly pushes the power/capital into the hands of a smaller and smaller group of "key" players. It is my hypothesis, however, that we are heading away from this ideology, as humanity will become increasingly valued by our society. I think many have come to realize that cyberspace truly does have some limitations, and that some experiences and encounters need to be kept face-to-face. As a result, perhaps us "information workers" will be able to find some decent jobs in the future, once people grow tired of spending 10+ hours a day sitting behind a computer.