Comments for Hackers, Cyborgs, and Wikipedians http://blogs.bgsu.edu/afamigl Another amazing bgsu blog Mon, 22 Jun 2009 03:41:23 -0400 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.4 hourly 1 Comment on A Brief Note on Wikipedia and the Situation in Iran by Gavin http://blogs.bgsu.edu/afamigl/2009/06/20/a-brief-note-on-wikipedia-and-the-situation-in-iran/comment-page-1/#comment-9 Gavin Mon, 22 Jun 2009 03:41:23 +0000 http://blogs.bgsu.edu/afamigl/?p=102#comment-9 I am not completely familiar with wikipedia as a news site, but my impression is that because you have to cite your sources, Wikipedia would be aggregating the information published on other sites (twitter, youtube, news articles written about those places) rather than being the place where stories break. So this hypothetical situation only exists if Wikipedia is the "last resort," i.e. everything else BUT wikipedia has been blocked. Which was not the case here, and doesn't seem realistic to me since in Web 2.0 you can add content to almost anything, indeed that is Web 2.0's injunction to its users: "Contribute!" Do you know of any situations where Wikipedia was the only source of breaking events online? I am not completely familiar with wikipedia as a news site, but my impression is that because you have to cite your sources, Wikipedia would be aggregating the information published on other sites (twitter, youtube, news articles written about those places) rather than being the place where stories break.

So this hypothetical situation only exists if Wikipedia is the “last resort,” i.e. everything else BUT wikipedia has been blocked. Which was not the case here, and doesn’t seem realistic to me since in Web 2.0 you can add content to almost anything, indeed that is Web 2.0’s injunction to its users: “Contribute!” Do you know of any situations where Wikipedia was the only source of breaking events online?

]]> Comment on Tasty Theory Clusters! by Gavin http://blogs.bgsu.edu/afamigl/2009/03/26/tasty-theory-clusters/comment-page-1/#comment-6 Gavin Fri, 27 Mar 2009 20:31:07 +0000 http://blogs.bgsu.edu/afamigl/?p=98#comment-6 I really think this is an important topic: why (most) free culture people aren't Marxist, don't see themselves aligned with other leftist movements... Part of it I think has to do with the kind of labor hackers engage in: intellectual, immaterial labor. They also tend to be well educated privileged (i.e. white male) members of the imperial core who benefit from private property relations that provide them with cheap and plentiful commodities. There's a pronounced libertarian individualist ethos running through hacker culture -- do you know where this comes from? I mean, obviously nerds spending lots of time by themselves, but is there a kind of intellectual genealogy you've come across? Anyway I would love to see things like thepiratebay come into the leftist fold. I really think this is an important topic: why (most) free culture people aren’t Marxist, don’t see themselves aligned with other leftist movements… Part of it I think has to do with the kind of labor hackers engage in: intellectual, immaterial labor. They also tend to be well educated privileged (i.e. white male) members of the imperial core who benefit from private property relations that provide them with cheap and plentiful commodities. There’s a pronounced libertarian individualist ethos running through hacker culture — do you know where this comes from? I mean, obviously nerds spending lots of time by themselves, but is there a kind of intellectual genealogy you’ve come across? Anyway I would love to see things like thepiratebay come into the leftist fold.

]]> Comment on Introduction: The Problem of Digital Media by Gavin http://blogs.bgsu.edu/afamigl/2009/02/22/introduction-the-problem-of-digital-media/comment-page-1/#comment-4 Gavin Mon, 23 Feb 2009 00:37:47 +0000 http://blogs.bgsu.edu/afamigl/?p=73#comment-4 Well shit, consider me signed up to read the rest of yr diss! One thing that comes to mind when I'm faced with the overly optimistic hype about the democratic potential of Peer Production (is this the official term for this?) you actually point out in yr excerpt with Palin anecdote. Large structures with money have an advantage in writing Wikipedia articles: they can devote the manpower and expertise and shape the discourse by controlling (however incompletely) a major web portal. Read the articles for most businesses and you can tell they are written by the businesses themselves. Even the types of knowledge in articles can get shaped by these forces (though I love "Criticism" so much I click on that first usually). I think it's often glossed over just WHO makes WHAT on a wiki or whatever else -- it's not just that cliche of the lone gunman geek that Lessig etc love. Anyway, I love Wikipedia, and I am pretty much the only instructor at my school that doesn't see anything abhorrent about it -- yes, anyone could have written stuff, but isn't that true of any source? I mean, why NOT start with Wikipedia as a source? I certainly use it for learning all types of things, including research. Really, I don't think research papers have caught up with the internet, MLA Citation guidelines notwithstanding. Oh, and I don't know where you are going with your combination position, but you might be interested in this wiki devoted to lacanian psychoanalysis as something more specifically "academic"... Would love to see some kind of Marxist wiki for marxists.org... Well shit, consider me signed up to read the rest of yr diss!

One thing that comes to mind when I’m faced with the overly optimistic hype about the democratic potential of Peer Production (is this the official term for this?) you actually point out in yr excerpt with Palin anecdote. Large structures with money have an advantage in writing Wikipedia articles: they can devote the manpower and expertise and shape the discourse by controlling (however incompletely) a major web portal. Read the articles for most businesses and you can tell they are written by the businesses themselves. Even the types of knowledge in articles can get shaped by these forces (though I love “Criticism” so much I click on that first usually). I think it’s often glossed over just WHO makes WHAT on a wiki or whatever else — it’s not just that cliche of the lone gunman geek that Lessig etc love.

Anyway, I love Wikipedia, and I am pretty much the only instructor at my school that doesn’t see anything abhorrent about it — yes, anyone could have written stuff, but isn’t that true of any source? I mean, why NOT start with Wikipedia as a source? I certainly use it for learning all types of things, including research. Really, I don’t think research papers have caught up with the internet, MLA Citation guidelines notwithstanding.

Oh, and I don’t know where you are going with your combination position, but you might be interested in this wiki devoted to lacanian psychoanalysis as something more specifically “academic”… Would love to see some kind of Marxist wiki for marxists.org…

]]> Comment on Data Blog by Mike DuBose http://blogs.bgsu.edu/afamigl/2008/10/02/data-blog/comment-page-1/#comment-2 Mike DuBose Thu, 02 Oct 2008 17:39:15 +0000 http://blogs.bgsu.edu/afamigl/?p=43#comment-2 Hmmm. Y'know, for someone who studied fiction writing, I though your new blog would have better narrative flow. Is this postmodern? Hmmm. Y’know, for someone who studied fiction writing, I though your new blog would have better narrative flow. Is this postmodern?

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