This is me. Who are you?Hello, members of the digital culture, wherever you're from in the physical world! I'm on a panel at the #140conf on Wednesday, and I'm going to use *us* as an example of what I mean when I say "digital culture exists first in the physical world."
Does the digital culture cheapen our human connection? I don't think so. I haven't met many of you in person, but I've known you for years (yeah, you, Mac Tonnies!) Others, I've known for years in the real world, but we don't even follow each other on Twitter (what's the deal, Clifford Pickover?) Some, I've had the magical experience of getting to know first in the digital ether and then in person (including Josh Fouts, Cory Doctorow, Alice Taylor, Alexis Madrigal, Tish Shute, Clay Shirky, all manner of IBMers, Philip Rosedale, Jeff Joerres, Grady Booch and countless others who have become a global tribe).
I almost forgot to mention the Copper Robot!
I have work relationships with some of you via Skype, on a constant basis (Christa Dellaripa), and others are friends from third grade (Jenny Roman-Taylor, gorgeous mother of two who throws a softball like nobody's business, I will visit you soon in the physical world, I promise!) who, realizing that I have no friends on Facebook, joined Twitter and gets nearly instant replies. There's a level of access and adaptability that we have now in our relationships, which have grown stronger as a result of the candor and creativity we cultivate together within the digital culture.
On Wednesday, I'm planning to make a very brief but direct case for why the digital culture is the ultimate tool for public diplomacy at a time of unprecedented collaborative creativity. I'd love to hear from all of you about how you view the global tribe you've come to find within the digital culture. Who are you? What does it mean to be a member of the digital culture?
Please leave a comment on the post and I will create my statement for Wednesday in part from what I learn from you. Please pass the link along. Retweet! :)
Posts
13 comments:
Jez Kay - CEO now | house - www.nowhouse.tv. In the digital culture, great things can happen before breakfast.
I'm the author of two books, a collection of science fiction short-stories (published by a small press) and a speculative nonfiction exploration of the possibility of extraterrestrial artifacts on Mars (published by Simon & Schuster). I blog daily and indulgently; the same for Twitter, which I discovered a year ago. For better or worse, access to the Net has become an increasingly important aspect of my daily routine.
It's not exactly an original sentiment, but I think of the Internet as an extension of the human nervous system. As such, it should be used with a certain degree of care and perhaps even a sort of reverence. (We could be giving birth to a planetary mind, assuming we haven't already. Theorists have begun to discuss the prospect of the Internet taking on some rudimentary form of consciousness, casting our future trajectory in a fascinating new light.)
The digital realm not only augments the human experience, but alters our perception of the world in subtle and unnerving ways. (A relative latecomer to cyberpunk, I consider William Gibson's novels wonderfully prescient.)
Sometimes I pause to consider what I'd be like had the Web never materialized or if I'd somehow failed to discover it. I'd still be me, but a rather diminished version. I certainly never would have sold my second book, nor would I have met many of the people I've worked with on various literary and television projects.
The Net, by its very nature, fosters creative friction. Long before the proliferation of "social media," the digital world was cultivating networks of the like-minded.
I once saw William S. Burroughs speak. Someone in the audience asked him what he thought of the Internet. Burroughs didn't hesitate: "A step in the right direction."
I concur.
Interesting. Do the open links of social networking create tribes or diminish tribalism? Consider Twitter. I follow anyone with interesting tweets. After a while, I start to feel like I know them, somewhat anyway. But the connection is tenuous, not tribal. The ease with which they became a connection speaks not only to the ease with which they may disappear, but also to the potential for ANYONE to be a connection tomorrow. If anyone can be a member, it isn't really a tribe, is it?
Wow, those questions are at least as interesting as whatever answers you'll get. :) I guess the global tribe that I've come to find within the digital culture is a loose collection of people interested in virtual worlds, computer programming, philosophy, artificial intelligence, politics, ideas in general, stories in general... But really I'm not sure what the question means. Maybe because I'm something of a loner, I don't identify myself primarily as a member of one particular "tribe"; I do various different things with various different people, I belong to various groups, and we do stuff. But I don't get up in the morning and make sure that my tribal warpaint is properly applied. :)
Who are you? I am a husband, a father, a computer nerd, a philosopher, an employee, a reader, an occasional writer. I'm this guy, y'know. :)
What does it mean to be a member of the digital culture? I think it means to be of a particular age, such that we consider ourselves hep to the digital jive, but still find it new and shiny enough to be consciously aware of it. Ask my kids, though, what it means to be a member of the digital culture and they'll just roll their eyes. Of *course* they use Facebook and Skype and YouTube and eBay and Amazon and OS X and SMS and Adium and...; everyone does and why wouldn't you? They are members of the digital culture so thoroughly and inherently that they don't even think of themselves that way. What does it mean to be a member of the telephone culture? Of the electricity culture? :)
I think of social media as being the 21st Century equivalent of the local pub in Britain, or the neighborhood bar in America, or the coffeeshop in Arab countries -- it's a place you can go to visit, to play, and to get to know people you work with a little bit better.
In a business context, I think of it as a worldwide, 24x7 conference. Everybody knows that the best stuff at any conference are the hallway conversations and random encounters. Social media is all about the hallway conversations.
Social media's advantage over those places: Social media is right there at your desk, or on your cell phone, all the time - you don't have to go anywhere. The disadvantage: You don't get face-to-face content (although you *can* seek it out, and I often do, at local San Diego tweetups.)
Social media helps fill the need for neighborhood and community that 50 years of urban planning, resulting in suburban sprawl, have robbed for us.
One thing that troubles me a little, though: When I first became active on social media two or three years ago, I followed anyone who looks interesting. Now, on my three main social media -- Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn -- I only follow people I know, either directly or by reputations. I'm still meeting new people in Second Life, but SL, by design, throws up barriers for RL connections.
I've found my tribe first on a blog, then one by one we all moved to Twitter. One of the first things I do in the morning is see what my tweeps have been up to, and and it's one of the last things I check before bed. I like seeing the the daily directions their lives take.
I've grown close to most of the people I come in contact with and almost never follow anyone that doesn't engage in dialog. The one sided megaphone sort of leaves me cold, no matter how clever the content.
Mac, when are you gonna come visit?
The people here I think of as my "e-friends" but when granted the opportunity, I do my best to transition them into flesh and blood friends. E-friends feels to me one step removed and slightly less real than flesh & blood, but maybe that's because I transitioned into the medium instead of being born into it. Perhaps my poorly spelling 12 year old cousin may find the two to be equal. (hola peoples, my life is soo boring! i can't wait for summer! then i don't hav 2 work for over 2 monthes!).
Oddly enough though, I use the digital medium to hide from members of my immediate family, while granting access to to those who I feel are allowed to know "the real me".
Through Meetup.com I've also met a host of flesh friends who I see weekly and share with daily. In fact, my new friends have nearly replaced my old friends in that we have more things in common.
Now both sets of friends have blended together on facebook, but I communicate with my e-friends via twitter, almost ignoring facebook. However, my wife (who has only a couple of e-friends) communicates with the meetup folk and meatspace friends all the time via facebook. It makes her feel closer to them or maybe that they haven't embraced Twitter I dunno, but she too has cut her immediate family out of her digital life for personal reasons. Just because they're family doesn't mean they have to know EVERYTHING about you.
The bottom line is this: I feel a part of a particular tribe (of Speculative Thinkers, Writers & Artist Weirdos) who have an open membership to those who feel like contributing. And it is through the bond of shared media, that I know my place in the world, as well as being empowered to be the gatekeeper to my own data stream. Out here I'm just known at "That guy with the blue beard", but on-line I'm Cap'n Marrrrk, that guy with the blue beard who draws!" It might seem like a quantitative difference, but really it's qualitative of the highest degree.
Born in the 40’s, rotary phones, slide rules, remembering our first television set. Digital immigrant got my green card early on. My children don’t think about tech or no tech, just part of life, as they have always known it.
In constant communication with people I would have never known even existed without the net and am better for it. No age differential, no distance, and no cultural differences as barriers. Sharing ideas and interests and always proving we are more similar than we are different. A tool we use to advance social progress is not, in my opinion, a bad thing.
I'm a little kid inside of 38 year old's body. How I got this far I have no idea. I keep shooting from the hip and somehow it just magically works. The universe is taking care of me because I take care of it. I've been immersed in the digital world since I was 12 and it's my entire being. Do I go outside and "play"? Yes, but I'd rather play inside a "persistant world" where I can choose my own identity and not be branded "fag", "loser", "wimp", or "nerd". This is my world, and I'm happy that it's starting to dominate the rest of you.
Welcome to MY world.
I am many things- a mom, a wife, a friend, etc. but most importantly (for the purpose of this discussion) is I am a participant.
Social networking sites like Twitter are my virtual cup of sugar, in which I chat about things that may range from silly and mundane to those of dire importance.
Just like I would have gone next door to borrow a cup of sugar, I now go next door virtually and share. That might mean we change the world, or that might mean we just bake cookies. :)
I worked for years in public performance, before gaining highly technical work in a more sedentary line. The "grabbiness" of Facebook is insulting to me...intolerable, in fact. I've shut my page down. It's like running a gauntlet.
I use google bots to scan blogs of interest to me, and I comment on those posts that seem meaningful. My own gaggle of 100 blogs is dormant now. I use them only as extended comment spaces, when commenting on space-constrained sites. ( I just give a link, ... those who want to follow it, can).
I'm not promoting anything, nor myself, so the "wonderfulness" of all this digital coupling is no particular thrill.
However.... I am a global citizen, with a voice, and I participate because you guys need my opinions.
Harry
I love these comments so much! Reading them all as they come in, working on my statement from everything you're saying, thank you!
I'm glad you asked. Right now I find myself struggling with the limitations of a situation where people's online personas are converging.
In the circles where I move, people are typically silicon valley professionals OR mommies OR special needs kids advocates OR crunchy Californian educators OR entrepreneurs OR politically opinionated OR (insert here). I've actually had to go out and create different emails, different blogs, different websites, and in some cases, different names so that I can "package" my various interests, inputs, and outputs; and it's frustrating. Twitter actually lets you say "ah, what the heck" and just toss tagged information into the river. I find that a relief.
Although I've always had my small tribe of smartass friends, it wasn't until the late nineties that I really joined a more formalized tribe. It was through infertility medical forums. A Columbia professor of linguistics started up an email group that contained bright, well-educated, motivated women in their forties (I was a bit young but got in.) There were about 700, from many different countries.
As many of us succeeded in having children, we created a new group called vintagemoms and we're still friends. Canadian, Finnish, Australian, South American, Irish, Japanese. We went through infertility and kid raising together and now we're (thank goodness) still friends as we grow older.
The fertility experience taught me the power of medical forums and I spent several years setting up sick people with custom information channels and forums.
I am on Facebook now, although I'm quite picky about who I "friend." I'm also on LinkedIn, and appreciate the different levels of linking there.
But I'm quite frustrated at the limitations of tools. I would like a tool that would let me jump into a whole online life AS a mom, and a different one AS a silicon valley professional and one for sensory integration research and one for ... you name it.
When we leave our homes in the morning, we easily (and physically) glide between entire worlds of people. Family, school, work, where we shop, where we volunteer, where we hang out and play... I want a dashboard where I can start organizing this stuff for my life.
I also want a tool that will let me organize and sort through layers of life and activity in a new and different fashion. Luckily, my husband is an inventor who does this type of thing...
For now, I belong to 36 Yahoogroups and at least two communities on BigTent, plus have quite a few blogs. (Often neglected.)
As a mom, I tend to file things on my website: www.anachronisticmom.com. I've also set up and edited many wikis, and I blog under a pen name. As myself, I twitter under @catmikk.
Enjoy your project!
Hi, I'm a librarian, and so I get to play signpost, teacher, and early adopter, all as part of my job of connecting people to the information they want through the media they will accept. In my work life, I maintain a Twitter account, e-mail, and just now, our library system is starting to wake up to the usefulness of shared document space and other collaborative tools. The digital culture here is pulling the reluctant along, who can feel like weights against the more enthusiastic of digital embracers.
Away from work, I use the digital world to connect with a lot of people, some of whom I've met (and miss dearly, because I moved away from them to take my job), others who I will probably never meet, but that I feel are friends and people that I feel involved in their life. Using digital means like blogs and Twitter, along with "older" tech like IRC, we can have conversations with all of those people together in a shared space, instead of, say, having to call each one serially to keep them updated on our lives, and those friends can then see and talk to each other about the newest developments in my life, instead of each friend calling each other and gossiping. And for much less cost than maintaining an international party line that's continuously on.
I think the biggest achievement of the digital tribe is that once connected, people stop being limited to the space they can physically cover and the people they can physically communicate with. The growing connectedness of everyone might be the vector by which people can start thinking of themselves first and foremost as denizens of Terra, instead of as denizens of their locality, and then of their nation.
Post a Comment