On Line Opinion has been featuring pieces on the internet and everyday life throughout August. My contribution, published today, examines some questions about the social and cultural implications of new media technologies, and in the process, busts some myths about ‘Digital Natives’ and cyber-utopianism. I think it’s important to have a realistic grasp of the actual cultural uses of social media in order to avoid the important questions which do arise collapsing into silly and dichotomised arguments about how the intertubes will either save the world or destroy all good things. The reach of the social web has now become pervasive enough that we’re in a position to assess where we are, and to debunk some of the more hyperbolised claims on both sides of the non-debate we have all too often about the web and social life.
I’ll have more to say about this soon, as this OLO piece is a spinoff from my talk for the Queensland Writers Centre on the Digital Age and the future of writing. I’m working that up in longer form for publication.
Good piece Mark. Now that Im back teaching undergrads I fully understand your questioning of the “digital native” myth. It just aint so at all!
And I noted it was authored by one ‘Dr Mark Bahnisch’!
Although given that the WWW didn’t really take off until 94-95, any hypothesised digital-fully-natives would still be at high school.
You’re just finishing off the last of the analogue-infused ones
Yes Martin, I’m mum to one of them!
I just posted a story on my blog about how her life and mine and our facebook/blogs intersected in an interesting way one night; It takes a global village to raise a child.
Kids I know use MSN messenger and facebook to interact with their IRL friends rather than befriending people on the net.
Martin – I suspect there’d be little difference. We’ve been getting our students to write blog posts about their first social media experiences (NB – almost 95% had never blogged before). My impression is that people get started when they’re around 10, 11 or 12. There’s also a large element of socialisation into these practices.
mmm maybe someone should write a song about you (~) I agree a lot of the Facebook stuff is only a tad more valuable than pub talk…
You may be under-rating pub talk, Barry – it can be informative as well as fun! But there’s another set of issues there. I’m aware of a lot of people who’d rather discuss public affairs and news and stuff with friends on FB than in the blogosphere, and indeed of some who used to comment regularly here. There’s a distaste for the boorish interloper, the obsessively argued point, the expression of prejudice, and so much other stuff that badly impacts on blog comments.
I think that’s partly to do with a lot of assumptions and practices about what constitutes public debate. More on this soon.
But I am not surprised that people might prefer to talk about things with others they have picked to talk about them, rather in a free for all with the ever-present spectre of the insane or oppressive troll (or just plain prejudice as you can see on the equal pay thread and many others). It’s certainly one reason for my increasing disillusionment with blogging and blog commenting.
Yes, it was a bit of a joke really.
It’s really another form of the generational debate, isn’t it? While it’s quite valid to reflect on how material and technological changes can shape experiences differently, it’s important not to be sucked into some kind of over-gerneralisation. There are as many differences within generations as there are between generations.
As a long-term blogger and fairly long term Facebook user, I’m a bit confused by your observation about a migration to Facebook to avoid the boorish commenters. Because I don’t see any long discussions on Facebook. Just short conversations, mostly jokey / casual. So I don’t really see much overlap – they’re different. Or is it how I use Facebook?
I have certainly found myself posting things on Slide Night (my personal term for Facebook – since in many ways its a socially acceptable, hi-tech version of that older social form)… that only a year ago I would have turned into a blog post at my blog. Its a whole lot easier (and in my case) it reaches more people!
I don’t see the overlap. Facebook is for three-liners, blogs are for paragraphs. But moreover, I kind of like that exposure that blogs get. It’s easy to pretend on facebook that world is filled with no one but people like yourself in one form or or another. It’s a bit (but not much ha ha) harder to do this blogs, opening up to the cut and thrust.
This said, it doesn’t exclude an active moderation policy that rewards better commenting etiquette. I’m pretty active on metafilter, and their community is diverse enough for very rich discussion, and a flagging/moderation system prevents things from getting out of hand.
Comment stuck in the queue, help please!
Helen @ 8 – thats how the people I interact with use Facebook too. Blogging is reserved for the lengthy analysis/conversations.
Mark – you might be interested in having a look at Google Wave – http://wave.google.com/help/wave/about.html – there is a video there which while long is quite interesting (at least for a geek). From what I understand of it (and much of it is “what we’re going to do rather than what we’ve done), Google Wave brings together email/IM/twitter/blogs/flickr into a very very neat interface. The design removes a lot of the annoyances with the current tools and I think if it can be successfully implemented it will radically change how we use email/im/blogs etc.
@7 –
Indeed, and that’s implicit in what I wrote, Martin – and not just about the digital divide.
@8 – Helen – aside from FB notes, I’ve had some really interesting discussions around links posted on FB. Often much more focused than on blog threads and without the annoyances and snark.
@10 – patrickg, next on my to do list!
@11 – Chris – thanks, will check out.
As a blogger for nearly five years I have seen lots of people come and go from blog writing and many who give up on the medium do so because they don’t have enough of a work ethic to make their postings regular enough for the development of any kind of audience. Without regular readers and commenters its hard to keep writing a blog. So many bloggers give up before they get over this stumbling block.
The other reason that so many blogs are started but fail to continue is the simple fact that blog writing, like all writing, is a craft and it must be learned but there are no courses on blog writing so most practitioners are stumbling along in the dark seeking a niche and an appropriate ‘voice” Many fail to find either and they give up.
The final characteristic of a “successful” blogger is a “work ethic” that enables them to post on a regular basis, daily is best in terms of keeping/ building a readership but a couple of times a week can “work” but anything much less than once a week is really a waste of time for readers.
I really don’t think that Facebook or twitter can compete with blogging in the way that it can canvas the issues de jour or provide a forum fro discussion or debate. I use Facebook but I have no expectation that it has much more than a phatic function.
Twitter is obviously very attractive to those individuals who are welded to their mobile devices but my survey of various twitter streams shows that most of the communication is utter garbage unless you want to know when someone is on the dunny or off to have a wank and it has no value if your interests are not scatological
I’ve found that blogging is a very good way of bringing my phatic rap message to the people. Twitter and facebook are not good for spreading hip hop. Facebook bans anything it thinks is ‘offensive’.
The final characteristic of a “successful” blogger is a “work ethic” that enables them to post on a regular basis, daily is best in terms of keeping/ building a readership but a couple of times a week can “work” but anything much less than once a week is really a waste of time for readers.
Yes, I agree with this commenter. I have found it very hard to keep up my craft every week. I don’t know how people manage to blog every day and still have a full-time job.
Blog: Facebook: Twitter divergences seem to me to be very real. And I have reservations about quite how the twain will meet in venues such as Google Wave. I’ve never found Facebook of much interest or use – the group functions are too amorphous; Ning groups are for professional use much cleaner. And while Facebook will track blog posts, it still lacks a desktop notification process that is clean and tight (though I haven’t spent too much time looking for such…).
Twitter to my considerable surprise I have found really really useful. Yes there is some unbelievably banal content sloshing ’round out there, but by culling who you follow, it can throw up materials or links that would otherwise take hours to find via links from blogs or alt-media. What I’m finding frustrating is who ISN’T using Twitter (Tom Dispatch for one) to notify of new posts, happenin’ thangs etc etc – RSS feeds collect in the inbox like tissues in a dressing gown pocket. Onscreen real time notification is also sweet using something like Twitterfox. Far less time consuming than Facebook which I find cluttered and mostly irrelevant.
But the main point is that I don’t have a sense that blogging will be made redundant yet by these other mediums – they serve very different needs across and between different audiences. Nor is language & writing style convergence likely. Yet.
I’m surprised you find the time to work at blogging in between the hours you spend googling phrases of commonality and the employment you don’t have.
Interesting point though – Blogging is definitely a hobby, something you have to commit to. (I hope some other bloggers don’t feel insulted by that, BB and HAT are certainly more towards a professional feel, but in general I feel that’s what it is.) As opposed to Facebook, which is more of a tool for everyone to use.
If I wasn’t interested in learning how to write (or alternatively had an interest in photography or other blog friendly content) I wouldn’t blog.
Da cheque’s in da mail Ms H….
Kevin,
once you get into the swing of a regular blogging routine, daily blogging is not that time consuming. personally I am an early riser so I find that hour or so before sunrise is my time for writing posts to my blog. I spend about an hour to read the news feeds and to find something worthy of a post and I seldom take more than half an hour to actually write and publish a post on what takes my fancy for that day. As hobbies go that is not a big time commitment. Further, the more you write the quicker that you can do it.
Strangely more time spent writing something does not always produce a better post than the quickie that you dash off without a great deal of thought which can get more reaction than the lengthy tome that you sweet blood over.
I know what you mean Iain, but I think I am a bit of a blood sweater. I can only lay down cables as the muse takes me.
I definitel agree. It’s good advice, and I may try it. Some of the best and most successful bloggers, like Andrew Bolt or Tim Blair, seem to always write posts that probably took about 10 seconds.
I don’t think blogging is something you need to do every day or even every week. The way LP works with regular posts with the intent of provoking discussion is just one way of running a blog. There are many useful blogs out there that are resources for technical information. Subsequent discussion often occurs elsewhere. But the information in the blog post remains very useful years later, accessible via search engines.