06.14.06
Future Active: Media Activism and the Internet
"Future Active: Media Activism and the Internet" is a book by Graham Meikle that has completly changed the way I am thinking about this research project. When I set out to do this study, my original aim was to examine the local media (activism) landscape in Boston and focus on how local organizations, individuals, collaborations, etc. were using new digital technologies in innovative ways for social change. While this is still very much part of my focus, Meikle's book inspired me to think backwards, in a sense. What I kept stumbling over was the fact that I, for the most part, already knew the answers to the questions I was asking. Not only that, but I can't possibly complete–with the time and resources currently available to me–a comprehensive study of all of the local projects relating to this topic. Attempting to do so would almost cause me to make political, biased, or uneducated decisions about who I did and did not include in my research.
But there was a specific passage in "Future Active" that made me stop and think about how I should focus my research, and has caused me to read other related texts differently. The passage addressed the concept of the "in-built politics of technologies". He used an example relating to film saying,
"film scholar Richard Dyer described how photographic media and cinematic lighting have been developed to favour the filming of white people–on the assumption that this was where the money was–to the extent that within the film industry 'photographing non-white people is typically construed as a problem.' Dyer traces how photographic innovation has customarily used the filming of the human face as its benchmark, and taken white faces as the standard. He describes how experiments with lighting, aperture size, development times, and the chemistry of film stock 'all proceeded on the assumption that what had to be got right was the look of the white face.' Technologies of photography, then, come with in-built politics."
Meikle desribes this in terms that recalls Marshall McLuhan: "Not just those messages that we think of as content, but those that are embodied within the form of the medium itself."
The digital technologies that I am interested in for this study–open source software, Wiki, Blogging, digital distribution platforms, virtual communites, electronic civil disobidience, etc.–may not have in-built politics that are as clearly defined as the example above, however, by using the same thinking and applying them to the concepts of the Internet as an "open system" that fosters creativity, sharing, conversation and democratic media versus a "closed system" that is profit-driven and one-to-many communicative and using local efforts as a case for the larger theoretical subject, I think I can write a much more interesting paper.
I have also often thought about the parallels between the radio and the internet, how each was established and what ultimatley became (is becoming) of each both in terms of use and of the interests that they serve. With the infrastructure for both radio and the internet being developed and funded by the government, each was initially touted as a revolutionary tool for communication, education, public service, etc. Now we see the Internet being commercialized in the same was that radio was. Yet both technologies have been extremely successful tools for organizing, activism and social change as well. I'm interested in exploring this connection further and thinking about it in terms of in-built politics…not from a perspective of technological determinism, but rather what it says about medium itself as new uses are developed that transcend the use for which it was originally conceived.
More on this text later…there is so much good stuff here.
Currently reading: "We the Media: Grassroots Journalism By the People For the People" by Dan Gillmor
If anyone out there happens to read this, I welcome all your comments and suggestions.
Colin Rhinesmith said,
June 17, 2006 at 3:55 am
“Future Active: Media Activism and the Internet” looks like an excellent book. I look forward reading more about your impressions of it and getting a copy for myself to check it out.
Dan Gillmor’s book is fantastic. One of the great things about it is that he has made it available as a free download at O’Reilly, licensed under a Creative Commons License.
One of the great things about Dan is that he truly has an understanding of where conversations are happening on the web and he works to highlight them for others and encourages people to participate. Dan will be back at the Berkman Center in July for the fourth conversation in his Citizen Media Series. I highly recommend stopping by when he’s there next to talk with him and others about what’s happening in this space. He’s great. Looking forward to seeing how his Center for Citizen Media progresses.
Great blog, also. Thanks for sharing your workspace. This is rare and should happen more in education and new media. Look forward to seeing how your project progresses!
jgianvito said,
June 17, 2006 at 9:45 am
Nicole, It’s certainly up to you how you direct the emphasis of your study though at this still early juncture I would recommend letting your research and interviews lead you to the over-arching ideas rather than the other way round, which is in fact what it sounds like you are doing from your reflections of reading “Future Active”. Examining media activism in Boston through the lens of “open” and “closed” technological systems is certainly one way to go. But as you already start to suggest even technologies that have been subject to considerable governmental and market control such as radio have simultaneously been avenues for rousing progressive energies (notably in San Francisco with KPFA and Pacifica and in NY with WBAI). In Boston, one has to acknowledge THE SOUNDS OF DISSENT. And when expression becomes overly monitored and restricted, movements arise such as the burgeoning of satellite radio which gives the appearance at least of being popular and unrestricted (and, notably, also expensive). True as well of pod-casting. All throughout the years however an equally free radio culture has survived, namely the world of ham radio. It would be interesting to know if there is much low-power “pirate” radio broadcasting going on locally. I don’t think you need to think in terms of giving full-bodied respresentations of all the endeavors of the organizations and collectives you’ve outlined previously. But I do think you will want to feel capable of drawing general and wide-ranging observations about tendencies of media activists in one city in 2006 — what promise is being made manifest via these innovations and/or what questions/concerns do you find. I’m imagining you would like to emerge with not only a journalistic survey but a text that would give many of us an appreciation for some of the ways new media is or could achieve new kinds of social change. Back in a week and I look forward to continuing the dialogue.
Nicole said,
June 17, 2006 at 7:18 pm
Thanks for both of your comments Colin and John.
John – There are a couple things that I have been thinking about that may relate to what you were saying: One thing that keeps coming up in the texts I’m reading–and just from my own experience–is that people are always going to find new ways to use technology other than what was originally intended by those who developed that technology. What is most interesting to me, however, is that the Internet in particular and the infrastructure that lead to its creation is rooted in that basic principle to begin with. That is, it was built with this “open” system in mind…what Graham Meikle calls “unfinished”, the Internet is an unfinished technology and one that naturally fosters creativity and innovation by building off what others have already done. That’s why I think groups that are using these new tools of communication and production by building off what others in the movement have already done and creating something for others to build off of, all with the intent of working for social change or media democracy not only says a lot about the “in-built” politics of online technologies but also about how those on the other side of the debate–”closed”, for profit, corporate media–are having to adopt a more open approach in response to the overwhelming success of those of us who make conversational use of the Internet.
Also, I’m really thinking that I’d like to especially highlight groups that are working locally but are having/will have a larger impact either regionally, nationally, or globally. That is one thing that I got out of my interview witth Danielle, was that the work that she does here as a CTC Vista impacts all of the work being done by others in her position all over the country. That means that the media environment here and the interaction that Danielle is able to have locally with others working to build a democratic media and innovate new ways to converse and create online directly effects her work, and in turn the work being done across the U.S. Similarly, projects like Digital Bicycle out of LTC in Lowell, and Ethan Zuckerman’s Global Voices (a project of the Berkman Center) are examples of local projects that are radically advancing the conversational and open-distribution possibilities of the Internet and having an impact that reaches far beyond the Boston area. It’s projects like these that I may really want to focus on, because while there are a lot of wonderful organizations that are working for social change by providing technical assistance and skill training so that everyone can get online and be computer literate and then become part of the conversation, I don’t think Boston is unique in that. That said, there are unique projects taking place here that take advantage of and embrace the “open” view of the Internet to build of what others have done and create even greater opportunities for online networking, creativity, and conversations.
More later…