Web 2.0 and the 2008 US elections

Watching the incredibly long line-ups of patient Virginian voters waiting in the early morning rain is really watching history happening. This election has shaken things up. Candidates in the future will not go through the same hurdles if they are not white, middle-aged and male. And youth have shaped the use of media with Web 2.0, texting, etc key to campaigns.

Regardless of the outcome, this election has made changes already in terms of the democratic deficit, voter fatigue and the crisis of confidence in the electoral process.

I was pleased to see my images used in this historic event through Flickr’s Creative Commons License:

“My Boots My Guitar “Wake Up America””

which James also embedded in his makepoliticalsnowviamedia blog providing a full list of clickable credits to the authors whose Creative Commons licensed works used.

Future of Film is Film less: Digital Multiplex not Cineplex

Adina Lebo, Executive Director of ShowCanada in “Rollin’ in the Rockies” about the 22nd Film Industry Annual Convention, Banff, AB claimed that the cinema of the future will be based in digital projection technology. In 2008 5000 Canadian theatres switched to pricey large digital screens. In 2009 that will increase by 150%.

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See also http://snurl.com/26ixa [oceanflynn_wordpress_com] , http://snurl.com/26i1s [www_filmjournal_com] , http://snurl.com/26iw9 [www_marxists_org]

Next Wave of Semantic Web: a Time-Relevant Widget

Zeldman suggested a plug-in to time-associate lifestreams (egostreams), microblogs, blogs, aggregators, social bookmarking, social media, etc. My use of a myriad of semantic web services has become a virtual mnemonic tool, a digital cartography of memory . . .

Visitd bloggersblog through my twittr stream http://snurl.com/25t6q [twitter_com] and read this post http://snurl.com/25t5r [www_bloggersblog_com] which referrd 2 this comment on http://snurl.com/25t5z [www_zeldman_com] about potential of a plug-in to time-associate lifestreams, microblogs, blogs: Flickr, Ma.gnolia, del.icio.us, Twitter

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Google, YouTube and Smirkoff: Pseudo Hiphop for the Conspicuous Consumer Sells

Chester (2007) illustrates how the Google-sold media ad Green Tea Partay on Google-owned YouTube (viewed 3M times) featuring a pseudo-hiphop-for-the-conspicuous-consumer cleverly conceals an ad for Smirkoff Vodka.

A single tab (window) in Web 2.0 and Web 3.0 presented as a single ‘page’ on a computer screen resembles the classic print-version newspaper more than the classic web page from the 1990s. With Web 2.0 and Web 3.0 blogs (and even your very personal Gmail) and ad-enhanced content there is a cacophony of voices, a postmodern irony to the conflicting messages in advertisements, news, opinions, reviews, classified ads displayed within one frame. We became used to the classical (but now largely outdated) unique web pages in one frame, window or tag that presented information from an author from a specific standpoint with virtually no peripheral advertising. As powerful search engines like Google using complex algorithms to connect information seekers to information providers combine with a brilliant ad-service, the boundaries between page-frame-window author and paid-publicity have become so blurred that the argument in the content of the page can conflict with the products and services sold on the page. In one blog, for example, articles, reports, studies, entertainment, infotainment, advertisements, news, opinions, reviews and classified ads all appear to have resonance, when in reality their messages diverge completely. The confusion is even greater when the content-author is not clearly identified.

We can no longer say that “the media is the message” because the rhizomic media network of Web 2.0 sends mixed, often conflicting messages.

Unfortunately, in the one area where conflicting ads are absent — academic journals — the exclusive, proprietorial nature of most of these require registration or pay-per-use. They are not easily accessible and are relegated to the realm of the deep Web or Internet (once called the Invisible Web).

The solution will probably not come from more policing of Google-like service providers. In an ideal world readers might be compelled to become increasingly sophisticated in distinguishing sources and might engage in more robust critical thinking. In a dystopic highly materialistic world-view we are only one click away from buying more of what we don’t need.

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Related entries on Speechless

Flynn-Burhoe, Maureen. 2007. “Synset, Semantic Web, CBC and Alberta Oil.” September 28.

Filed in Blogosphere, Google Docs & Spreadsheets, Learning from users, New generation social marketing, SEO, Web 2.0, collaborative, energy, ethnoclassification, ethnoclassification: faceted tagging, findability, folksonomy, folksonomy:faceted tagging, search engine optimization, semantic web, social bookmarking, tagging

Pearls Before Breakfast

Joshua Bell is one of the world’s greatest violinists. His instrument of choice is a multimillion-dollar Stradivarius. If he played it for spare change, incognito, outside a bustling Metro stop in Washington, would anyone notice?

Do you stop and listen? Do you hurry past with a blend of guilt and irritation, aware of your cupidity but annoyed by the unbidden demand on your time and your wallet? Do you throw in a buck, just to be polite? Does your decision change if he’s really bad? What if he’s really good? Do you have time for beauty? Shouldn’t you? What’s the moral mathematics of the moment? (Weingarten 2007)

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Webliography

Weingarten, Gene. 2007. “Pearls Before Breakfast: Can one of the nation’s great musicians cut through the fog of a D.C. rush hour?” Washington Post. April 8. Page W10.