LIVING DIGITALLY EXAM NOTES

CALIFORNIA DREAMING: SILICON VALLEY, TECHNO-UTOPIANISM, AND THE BIRTH OF DIGITAL CULTURE

Technological determinism

• depict computerization of society and digitalization of culture as inexorable, irreversible processes

• Digital technologies are seen as autonomous forces in their own right
• Technological development drives cultural and social transformations; not the other way around
• ex. Technical capabilities of mobile devices are encouraged culture of inattention and distraction
among young people
• ex. News talking about banning phones in the class for elementary school and high school
students
• Smart phones lead to a great distraction to people (distraction/inattention)
• “Science discovers, industry applies, man conforms”: slogan from Chicago World Fair

Social construction

• how the internet and computers are shaping our culture is irreducible to those technologies alone
• To understand their impact, we need to consider economic political, and ideological contexts in which
they are being assumed
• ex. Electric cars were actually around in the 70’s
o Today while electric cars exist, they remain more or less exceptions
o Due to comparatively high cost and inefficiency of hybrid and electric automobiles
o The limitedness of hybrid and electric automobiles is not due to any real technological
limitations or incapacity, but rather, to economic and political ones
o Much the same applies to digital and networked technologies like computers and the internet
o social, cultural, and economic considerations are often just as important as technical ones for
understanding how digital media are restructuring our lives
• Neither of these approaches (technological determinism and social constructionism) suffice by
themselves as accounts of digital media and culture
• We need to consider how the new technical capabilities and potentials of digital technologies are
leading to the possibility of new social, cultural, and economic realities
o From the 2 approaches, technological determinism has been by far more influential in popular
accounts and literature of the internet
o Therefore, students and scholars of digital culture and knowledge must remain vigilant against it

OF USERS, PRODUCERS, AND CONSUMERS: DIGITAL MEDIA, PARTICIPATORY CULTURE, AND USER-GENERATED
CONTENT

In the beginning… there was web 1.0

• in the early days of the Internet; online content was mostly commercial in nature
• Web 1.0 was “read only”, as Tim Berners-Lee put it
o Ex. H&M’s first website only allowed you to browse the clothes and not buy any of them
• The amount of content (sites, videos, etc.) was limited in both numbers and kind
• Fundamental shift: 1999; the beginning of web 2.0
LIVING DIGITALLY EXAM NOTES
• Web 2.0: led to the multiplication and simplification of codes, languages, platforms, software, &
protocols

From the WWW to Web 2.0

• users were just not consumers of content; they became active producers of their own
• Led to the explosion of non-commercial content available online
• Used to be able to count how many websites that were on the internet (web 1.0)
• Web 2.0: heralded the emergence of user-generated content
• Today web 2.0 and its successors (3.0, 4.0, etc.) have continued to thrive upon the user-generated
content

ORGANIZING THE WEB: THE POLITICS OF SEARCH AND RELEVANCE

How PageRank defines “relevance”

• One of googles most important algorithms judge’s relevance in terms of popularity of ranked sites
(PageRank)
o The more popular a site is, the higher it will appear in googles search results
• Neither the popularity nor the number of links that a site attracts from other sites are always useful
measures of the reliability of the information on that site
• Googles algorithms may be more or less objective but the engineers, software developers, executives
• Some of those biases may become manifest in the kinds of search results that are permitted
• The problem is not so much google, but with our reliance upon google

ALL EYES ON ME: SURVEILLANCE AND PRIVACY IN THE AGE OF SOCIAL NETWORKS

Surveillance as “panopticism”

• Michael Foucault says power in modern society is excessed less through overt, spectacular displays of
violence and authority

o Power works through subtle and insidious mechanisms to control, regulation and discipline

o Foucault: modern forms of power aren’t “spectacular” of visible, but rather, discreet and
invisible

• Ubiquity and anonymity of surveillance distinguishes modern disciplinary power from premodern
systems of authority

• “panopticism” is less violent and more humane than traditional regimes, but also more
comprehensive and in some ways totalitarian

• Modern societies are characterized by expansion and proliferation of surveillance

o Digital culture can be understood as “panoptic” in this way

LIVING DIGITALLY EXAM NOTES
• Technologies of anonymous, impersonal observation and analysis have become ever more powerful
and pervasive

o CCTV cameras in public and private spaces, GPS tracking in vehicles and smartphones

From panopticism to synopticism

• Thomas Mathiesen: under panopticism, the few watch the many, but now we are seeing emergence
of a kind of Synopticism, where the many watch the few

• Affordability and miniaturization of consumer electronics has made domestic, personal, and handheld
surveillance devices are widely portable and available

• Expansion of the internet and social media have provided means of sharing and disturbing videos and
photos

• Synopticism rests on participatory or peer-to-peer surveillance whereby ordinary citizens engage in

observing and tracking both themselves and others

o Ex. Checking in and photo tagging on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, etc.

• News reptile of crimes regularly invited viewers to identify suspects in video surveillance footage

• Expand citizens involvement in crime control and prevention, and normalizes and “democratizes”
surveillance

• Shows like big brother and survivor train us into the practice of watching others in their most
intimate, personal moments

• Promote a surveillance culture in which both watching and being watched are normalized, routine
experiences

FROM IMAGINED TO VIRTUAL COMMUNITIES: SOCIAL MEDIA, FRIENDING, AND NETWORKED PUBLICS

Primary relations

• Immediate and extended family

• Very little agency over our affiliation

Secondary relations

• Peer groups, work, professional, civic associations

• Some (limited) input into membership in these communities

Tertiary relations

• Communities of choice that are selective, filtered, personalized

LIVING DIGITALLY EXAM NOTES
o ex. Hobby or enthusiast groups

• Chatrooms, text-based messaging boards and forums that dominated 1990’s and 2000’s were based
on these kinds of tertiary relations

• Users joined together by interests, hobbies and passions: gaming, politics, music, etc.

4 features of networked publics

• Persistence
• Searchability
• Replicability
• Scalability

CROWDSOURCING HISTORY: PEER PRODUCTION, OPEN SOURCE KNOWLEDGE, AND THE RETURN(?) OF THE
COMMONS
“Free” advertising (ex. Gmail)

• Google offers a number of different services and applications for free, in order to enlarge audience
(which it offers to advertisers)

o Expanded into other services and media (ex. YouTube, Google+)

• By offering most of these services for free, google can compete with outside competitors who charge
for products

• Users capitalize on services integration and cross-cross-functionally (ex. Google maps is conveniently
tied to your gmail account)

o So, we get google for “free” — albeit at the cost of being transformed into commodities

• This is an example of free at a cost but there are other different examples of free as an economic
norm (fewer, or even no string attached)

Digital culture and capitalism

• Capitalism:

o Private ownership or wealth and assets

o Firms sell their products or services one the market

o Production is organized hierarchically with division of labour and authority between

management and employees

o The internet has clearly supported and promoted economic models that reinforce foundations
of capitalism
LIVING DIGITALLY EXAM NOTES
• Globalization underwritten by digital networks

• Globalization: when one thing happens on one side of the world it effects the other side of the world

• But on the other hand, we are also seeing new modes of production facilitated by the internet and
digital media

• Allows individuals and groups to be successful without competing on markets or establishing

hierarchies

FOSS as peer production

• FOSS “movement” is made up of large online communities of experts in self-organizing, decentralized

networks

o Provides both free software and open access to source code for other develop and modify

• Motivated by belief that collaboration and sharing enhance knowledge and productivity

• Harmless creative and intellectual powers of many, superior to solitary genius and intelligence of few

• FOSS can be more responsive to user needs, encourage more radical innovations than commercial
software

o ex. In early 2000’s, Firefox introduced tabbed browsing and extensions, quickly became
standard

• FOSS rests upon flexible licensing system

o By contrast, proprietary commercial software usually proscribes such practice (ex. Apple vs.
“jailbreaking”)

• While some companies have commercialized FOSS, many members of FOSS movement say their
concern is with improving software and user experience, rather than enhancing bottom line or
making profits

• Communities in which development of FOSS take place are typically (but not always) non-hierarchical

o There are no managers, supervisors, or other forms of authority — only a (more or less)
democratic community of equals

• Some well-known examples of FOSS have successfully competed with, or even displaced, commercial
alternatives

o ex. Firefox vs. Internet explorer 6, VLC vs. Windows media player

Wikipedia
LIVING DIGITALLY EXAM NOTES
• Emergence of Wikipedia in mid-2000’s demolished market for bound hardcover encyclopedias and
even commercial digital alternatives

• Christian Fuchs: Wikipedia can be understood as a retune of the commons (Public goods) made
possible by internet and digital media

• knowledge and culture were formally privatized, required some privileges or resources to access
(academic/university libraries)

• Now Wikipedia has information and knowledge about the world universally accessible

• Wikipedia is free in that the site is completely non-non-commercial; no one has to pay to access it

o Unlike Facebook or google Wikipedia is operated by a not-for-profit charity and funded through
donations, not advertising

• But Wikipedia is also free in the sense that anyone can use and reproduce its materials

• While content of the site and the servers that hoist is managed by the Wikipedia foundation,
Wikipedia’s “copyleft” license allows anyone to reproduce content from the site without restriction

• Wikipedia is frequently criticized by equators and academics for providing questionable or inaccurate
information

• compared to traditional encyclopedic resources, Wikipedia is mostly reliable (as reliable as

competitors like Microsoft Encarta or encyclopedia Britannica)

• When corrections are made to a page, they are provisional and revisable; someone else may come
along later to overturn those corrections

• So truth on Wikipedia is relativized in a very radical way

• Fuchs: the promise of wikipedia lies not simply in the results it is able to deliver, but in the process, it
established in order to produce those results

• Wikipedia draws parallel with encyclopedias

• Differs from the level of process in the production of truth and knowledge

• Wikipedia makes visible the mechanisms by which the community pools information and determines
what kinds of knowledge, sources, etc. matter

• Wikipedia renders transparent the process if verification or research and authentication of knowledge
and truth — in a way that no scholarly source ever does

• Challenged our assumptions about authorship and originality

• Traditionally, one (or more) authors labour to produce an original work

LIVING DIGITALLY EXAM NOTES
o Each contribution is noted and recognized, along with every source

• On Wikipedia, no one can claim authorship over an article

o In this way, Wikipedia formally recognized the collective and social nature of knowledge
production — the face that generating truth is ultimately a collaborative process

• Nicholas Carr: problems with Wikipedia is how it defines and establishes the truth (epistemic
commitments)

o Everyone is equally an expert

• Wikipedia expressly disallowed original scholarship or research — contributors can only cite other
works online to establish claims

o Professionals and scholars have no special authority in production of contributions, or in debate

about edits

Wikipedia, Truth and expertise

• when Philip Roth, author of the novel The Human Stain, found his Wikipedia entry misstated reasons
for writing the book, he was unable to have the entry changed

o The original (mistaken) entry had to link online newspaper article that repeated the falsehood

o Roth meanwhile could provide no link to another source — just his own personal account

• Wikipedia then takes the critique of hierarchy and authority implicit in principles of FOSS to its
extremes to the point that even the person an article is about can’t claim privilege over that article’s
content

o FOSS movement argue that expanding and multiplying the number of “cooks in the kitchen”
would be preferable to having one “master chef”

o But does crowdsourcing the production of knowledge lead to the dissemination of truth?

• Carr: some forms of expertise and authority are valuable and salutary, especially for the production of
knowledge and truth

The view from nowhere

• One of Wikipedia’s most controversial policies concern the “neutral point of view” it requires for all
articles

• Regardless of the subject matter, all articles on Wikipedia must be written from a neutral standpoint,
giving a fair hearing to various perspectives

o ex. Should a subject on the Holocaust be written from a “neutral point of view,” acknowledging
the perspective of holocaust deniers
LIVING DIGITALLY EXAM NOTES
• Is it possible to attempt to write from a “neutral point of view” about the Israeli Palestinian conflict?
Climate change? Same sex marriage?

• When we look at how google ranks search results, the problem was in how it privileges popularity
over accuracy in order to determine relevance

• Wikipedia’s problems are similar, in that it conflates neutrality and democracy with objectivity

• But sorties, maintaining objectivity requires abandoning neutrality and privileging expertise

THE REVOLUTION WILL (NOT?) BE TWEETED: THE PROMISE AND LIMITS OF DIGITAL ACTIVISM

How social media and the internet are promoting political activism

• Black Lives Matter movement began in U.S. in response to policing crisis that led to high-profile
deaths of several African Americans (Michael Brown, Eric Gardner)
• BLM has no national organization but various unaffiliated groups across North America
responding to local issues and concerns
• in theory, this makes it difficult for repressive authorities, state and police agents, etc. to
suppress such movements
• since there is no one “head” to cut off, a movement can’t be stopped simply by isolating its
leadership
• but social media can also encourage more democratic participation since these movements are
non-hierarchical
• hashtag campaigns, flash mobs, e-petitions, etc. and social movements not based on formal
membership can be more inclusive
Advantages of online activism and organization
• Getting the message across to everybody online
o Facebook posts, Instagram/Twitter pages, etc.
• Easier to access than non-online organizations/activists

Limitations and criticism of online activism

• Doesn’t reach to people who might not have internet/social media
• Could not be taken seriously with all the hashtags, challenges, etc.

Relationship between strong ties, weak ties, and political activism

Strong ties
• Malcolm Gladwell: genuine political reforms (let alone revolutions) require strong ties
o deep, personal connections among participants, along with hierarchical forms of
organization that allow for leadership and accountability
Weak ties
• Social media specialize in establishing weak ties
o Ex. connections with acquaintances and strangers
LIVING DIGITALLY EXAM NOTES

“JOURNALISM IS FINE BECAUSE EVERYONE IS A JOURNALIST”: SOCIAL MEDIA, NEWS BLOGS, AND THE CHANGING
FACE OF JOURNALISM

Relationship between rise of online advertising and decline of news media

• while journalism has always been more democratic than other professions (e.g., law, medicine),
the Internet and digital media have made it possible for everyone to cover, report, and
comment on news
• the Internet and digital media not only reduce to nil costs of acting as a journalist, but also make
it easier for people to find an audience for their ideas
Advantages of citizen journalism over traditional journalism

• citizen journalists can command an online public of millions with no budget at all, thanks to
blogging platforms and social media
• citizen journalistic coverage of crises (e.g., mass shootings, terrorism, natural disasters) has
helped reorient news to individual experiences of victims and witnesses
o provided voice to marginalized individuals and communities underrepresented within
traditional news media (e.g., women, radicalized groups)
o livestreaming video and live tweeting allow public to follow events and stories as they
develop with greater immediacy
• e.g., citizen journalists during Occupy or Ferguson protests captured on-the-
ground clashes between protestors and police
Some problems with citizen journalism

• citizen journalism often departs from routine journalistic practices and codes, allowing for more
democratic posting of unmoderated, unregulated, and unfiltered content
• partly due to platforms on which citizen journalism frequently appears (Twitter, YouTube,
Huffington Post) which lack editorial oversight or moderation
• citizen journalists are often advocating for a cause or activists in a movement
• amateur journalism reinforces expectation of public that news can and should be produced for
free
• more generally, “citizen journalism” often conflates difference between providing information
and relating experiences, and aggregating, filtering, analyzing, and critiquing information and
experiences, and presenting them in intelligible and readable way
Gatekeeping vs. Gatewatching

Gatekeeping
• Axel Bruns: mainstream news media have always acted as “gatekeepers” of news
LIVING DIGITALLY EXAM NOTES
o news organizations make decisions about both where to assign resources, and what
stories deserve coverage
o “…gatekeeping provides a model and process for news production which is…driven by
corporate considerations of paring down the totality of news events to a manageable
selection able to be packaged in commercially viable products…”

Gatewatching
• Bruns: citizen journalism engages in gate watching, whereby bloggers and commenters respond
to stories produced by news outlets
o while this ensures accountability, it requires original content from traditional news
organizations
Problems with Facebook as news curator

• both Facebook’s algorithms as well as Facebook friends’ habits in sharing articles are leading to
less balanced news consumption
• liberals are seeing only liberal-leaning stories, conservatives are only seeing conservative-
sympathetic stories
• popularity of news sites and blogs like Slate, Mother Jones, the Intercept on the liberal-left, and
InfoWars and Breitbart on the right, suggest preference among news consumers for opinionated
vs. objective journalism
o Facebook’s algorithms accused of indulging users in this preference
• whether corporate or citizen journalism, the news ecology to which most people are exposed
through Facebook is resembling a “filter bubble” that reaffirms their already existing beliefs and
worldviews
o this is arguably contributing to the polarization of political discourse and the public
sphere that has characterized the past few years
o “Facebook is a new kind of platform… it’s not a traditional media company” (Mark
Zuckerberg)
o “Facebook made itself the middle man of media, but has yet to take responsibility for
that role and its influence” (Jordan Crook)
• So, Facebook as a curator or “gatekeeper” of news content may not be much superior to
predecessors in corporate news media
• journalism appears to be commercially unviable – yet neither does it seem that “citizen
journalism” is capable of filling the void

COPYRIGHTS OR WRONGS?: DIGITAL MEDIA, REMIXING, AND INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY REGIMES

Writing vs. other cultural practices in relation to copying

• as a cultural practice, writing is democratic

• everyone is taught and practiced in it – both professionals and laypersons
LIVING DIGITALLY EXAM NOTES
• because everyone can write (in principle), and writing and scholarship are important to healthy
public domain, they don’t require consent from creators
• writing, then, is – in principle at least – democratic and inclusive
• by contrast, filmmaking and music have, until recently, been highly professionalized practices

Examples of fair use/fair dealing

• in Canada (as well as U.S.), legal doctrine of fair dealing allows for free borrowing and copying of
copyrighted content for personal use, criticism, commentary, educational purposes, research,
and news

Trademark vs. copyright vs. patent as forms of intellectual property

• trademark: word, phrase, symbol, and/or design that identifies and distinguishes one business
or brand from others
• patent: limited duration property right covering inventions, granted in Canada and U.S. for 20
years, in exchange for public disclosure of the invention
• copyright: protection for original works, e.g., literary, musical, artistic, dramatic, granting rights
to reproduction, distribution, and performance
o has the rights to legally produce, reproduce and publish the original work
Difference between read/only culture vs read/write culture

Read/only culture
• Lessig: read/only culture promotes elitism and professionalism
• most significant cultural works – high and popular – were produced by paid professionals who
were often formally certified, accredited, etc.
Read/write culture
• Lessig: digital media are democratizing these other, non-literary forms of culture so they are
more like writing
o they are promoting a very unique read/write culture of amateurism in the arts (music,
movies, etc.)
o for the first time ever, non-professionals are able to participate in the production of
these cultural works; indeed, most of the videos, music, and photos that are being
produced today are amateur
• This, of course, should all be old hat from our engagement with Jenkins. Lessig,
however, looks specifically at how participatory culture is coming into conflict
with copyright and other intellectual property regimes (to which Jenkins briefly
alluded, writing in 2003).
• but our intellectual property and copyright regimes over film, music, etc. still presume
professionalization of culture
LIVING DIGITALLY EXAM NOTES
• documentary Everything Is a Remix argues that making movies or recording music require
“quoting” – copying and sampling – as much as writing
o all cultural production and creation are “remixes”
Copying with analog vs digital media
• copying was limited with analog media – but so was the control, regulation and policing of
copying
• copying is almost unlimited with digital media – but so is the control, regulation and policing of
copying
Remixing vs traditional conception of authorship

• according to traditional view, there is a unique “author” or artist who can be credited with
having produced a work
o inspired entirely by him/herself
o emphasis on originality, uniqueness, absence of external influence
• this is the conception of authorial genius and individuality taught to students since grade school
• system of citations reinforces this ideology, i.e., that an idea is the product of a single individual
or group of individuals – to whom we must give proper credit
Example of non-digital remixing

• pre-existing melodic fragments and larger musical frameworks were freely reworked
• visual, sound, and text collage were central to 20th century artistic movements
• futurism, cubism, surrealism, Dada, situationism, and pop art all practiced montage and pastiche
– aestheticized forms of copying
Examples of digital media controls over copying and remixing

• the Internet has made it possible to track online behaviour of users and identify when and
where they are engaged in “illegal” copying
o e.g., U.S. file-sharing trials prosecuted on basis of IP address of users
• technical measures aimed at controlling uses to which technology can be put
o e.g., proprietary formats, regional locking
• before digital media:
o imperfect copying
o imperfect control
• now:
o near-perfect copying
o near-perfect control
LIVING DIGITALLY EXAM NOTES
Differences in both freedom to copy and remix, as well as control over copying and remixing, with
analog vs digital media

• so digital media have undermined traditional notions of authorship and intellectual property
and encouraged remixing and copying
• but they have also yielded new forms of control (as well as new commercial markets and
opportunities) and constrained remixing and copying, too

SELFIE LOVE?: SOCIAL MEDIA AND THE PLEASURES AND POLITICS OF SELFIE CULTURE
How older practices or portraiture are similar to, but also different form, selfies of today

• Self-portraiture dates back to renaissance as part of craze upon wealthy classes to immortalize
social and cultural standing for future generations
• Portraits often contained symbolic images or distorted expressions ti share feelings of artist or
subject at the time
o Ex. Frida Kahlo’s self-portraits included necklaces of thorns, black monkeys and cats to
convey transcendence and suffering
• Selfies are not necessarily new but can be traced back to portraits dating back to the
renaissance
• Big difference: amount of time and money required to create them
o Self-portraits might have taken months and cost exorbitant sums for painting and other
supplies
• First camera self-portraits in the 1800s were time-consuming (since photographers couldn’t see
what would appear in the frame beforehand)
• rather, selfies today are greeted with growing distrust and skepticism from critics of
contemporary digital culture and social media
• in some cases, moral panic has materialized around selfies (ex. funeral selfies)
Critique of selfies as promoting narcissism, consumerism, and surveillance

Narcissism/Self-Destruction

• Henry Giroux: selfies represent rise of pathological narcissism in consumer societies

• Popularity of selfies coincides with explosion of plastic surgery industry
o Selfies also coincides with rise of populist politicians in Italy, UK, US, Canada, and
elsewhere
o Politicians who tell people what they want to hear pander to narcissistic impulses
cultivated by selfie culture
• In recent years, some individuals have died while taking selfies on edges of cliffs or in front of
speeding trains
o Since 2014, nearly 50 people have died around the world in selfie-related accidents
o The relationship between selfies and a destructive vanity
• Selfies have – to some extreme examples – literally led to self-destruction
Consumerism
LIVING DIGITALLY EXAM NOTES

• Giroux: selfies contribute to waste of consumerism in promotion of novelty (and disdain for
obsolescence)
o Quick turnover and disposability of photos and short attention span for fads encourages
wasteful consumerist mentality that dismisses value of the past
Surveillance
• Giroux: what’s more, selfies accommodate rise of surveillance state and society
o users are habituated to disclosure and publication of themselves online
• surveillance becomes normalized through the provision of pleasure, public recognition, and
other forms of enticement and gratification, e.g., likes on Facebook, favs on Twitter, followers
on Instagram
Defense of selfies as encouraging self-empowerment and challenging hegemonic beauty ideals

• in encouraging and rewarding gratuitous displays of consumerist excess, selfies promote beauty
and lifestyle ideals unattainable by majority of population
• selfie culture is encouraging conformism and uniformity
• Derek Conrad Henry: selfies can be understood as strategy by women to renegotiate terms of
visual representation in patriarchal culture
o from this perspective, selfie culture reflects response on part of young women to
patriarchal and exclusionary beauty norms and ideals
• Derek Conrad Murray: selfies represent strategy among many young women to challenge and
reclaim hegemonic gender norms re: beauty and femininity
• Murray: on Tumblr, Instagram, and Flickr, many self-identified feminist women have used selfies
to challenge Eurocentric beauty ideals, question misogynistic representations of women, and
call out anti-feminist slurs and invective