There’s a post on the Newsnight blog about a book called The Cult of the Amateur by David Keen arguing that the media revolution (which he refers to as Web 2.0 - I don’t think that’s a correct application of what is a fairly meaningless term anyway) has significantly harmed our culture and society; blogs allegedly ‘collectively corrupting and confusing popular opinion about everything from politics, to commerce, to arts and culture’. There are extracts of his book in the Newsnight post, if you want to read more.
Having read the extracts published, his main issue seems to be that much user generated content (UGC) is poor quality, and that the ease with which it can now be published and reach an audience because of facilitating technology is therefore a bad thing, because poor quality content pushes out the considered, well informed contributions to the media.
So what defence does the accused enter? I thought this would be a good opportunity to actually examine why the new media phenomenon is a good thing, and while I’m at it rebut his argument which, in my opinion, fails miserably. Much of this post is an adaption of what turned out to be a rather long comment I left on the Newsnight blog.
His central premise seems to be based around the abundance of poor UGC. However, he has overlooked the fact that bad UGC tends not to reach an audience. A poor quality, ignorant rant on MySpace will not reach any audience significant enough for it to do any damage. Since most people producing UGC tend to want an audience, there is actually an incentive against creating ill-informed, poor quality content because anyone with two brain cells to rub together will be able to work out that it will have a negligible reach. Those without the aforementioned brain cells will continue to produce bad content, but hardly anyone will read/watch/listen to it. And no-one forces him to watch those ‘poor fools’ on YouTube.
Contrary to his belief, there is no threat posed by bad UGC to good quality content, and the incumbent providers of much of it. The risk to the ‘old media’ is that they fail to maximise their routes to content and thus as people become less likely to buy a newspaper, their reach decreases. So long as an old media entity produces content and makes it accessible in as many ways as possible, they will continue to be a powerful voice in our society.
The new media revolution has, in fact, increased good quality content in real terms. A long tail has been created, much of which is of real value. The technology sector perhaps has the most developed media ecosystem (simply because it was the first to adopt the new technologies, and has therefore had the longest to mature), and is a good example of this. There is a clear distinction (I hope) between GizBuzz, a member of that long tail, and an ill informed rant on MySpace.
The democratisation of media has brought profound benefits. The work of the charity MySociety (behind sites such as TheyWorkForYou and the Downing Street Petitions website) is an excellent example of what the internet can do to promote good governance and make a positive difference in peoples’ lives. More people can become involved in the running of their country thanks to better communication. More people can feel enfranchised, a powerful weapon in fighting dangerous political apathy. To dismiss all of this based on the increased availability of drivel, which does no harm and he is not forced to watch, is ignorant and unhelpful.
