There is a really interesting rant by Jaron Lanier at Edge.org about Wikipedia. He warns of a dangerous groundswell towards "hive mind" type social models, wary of the disastrous political precendents for rampant collectivism, which he distinguishes from "representative democracy" and "meritocracy." Lanier connects the popularity of Wikipedia with the economic push for meta-level sorting of the internet where information becomes farther and farther removed from its original context and the levels of useful subjective information associated with authorship. And he relates all this to artificial intelligence and points out an uncomfortable phenomenon of people degrading their expectations of human intelligence in order to claim success for artificial intelligence. He also notes that the internet is good because of all the people, but there is a trend to depersonalise the content. (As with Wikipedia, which he says "is like reading the bible closely. There are faint traces of the voices of various anonymous authors and editors, though it is impossible to be sure.") The essay has some analysis (quoted) below of collective versus individual systems, and also talks about the valuable checks and balances we developed pre-internet that helped us generate good shared knowledge, like independent media and ethical journalism!
"Collectives can be just as stupid as any individual, and in important cases, stupider. The interesting question is whether it's possible to map out where the one is smarter than the many.
There is a lot of history to this topic, and varied disciplines have lots to say. Here is a quick pass at where I think the boundary between effective collective thought and nonsense lies: The collective is more likely to be smart when it isn't defining its own questions, when the goodness of an answer can be evaluated by a simple result (such as a single numeric value,) and when the information system which informs the collective is filtered by a quality control mechanism that relies on individuals to a high degree. Under those circumstances, a collective can be smarter than a person. Break any one of those conditions and the collective becomes unreliable or worse.
Meanwhile, an individual best achieves optimal stupidity on those rare occasions when one is both given substantial powers and insulated from the results of his or her actions.
If the above criteria have any merit, then there is an unfortunate convergence. The setup for the most stupid collective is also the setup for the most stupid individuals."
I found this interesting, in regards to a recent study comparing Wikipedia favourably to the Britannica for accuracy.
"The items selected for the comparison were just the sort that Wikipedia would do well on: Science topics that the collective at large doesn't care much about. "Kinetic isotope effect" or "Vesalius, Andreas" are examples of topics that make the Britannica hard to maintain, because it takes work to find the right authors to research and review a multitude of diverse topics. But they are perfect for the Wikipedia. There is little controversy around these items, plus the Net provides ready access to a reasonably small number of competent specialist graduate student types possessing the manic motivation of youth."
There was a bit of Wonkette gossip a while ago about congressional aides being assigned to whitewash and maintain the entries on their congressman. (manic motivation of vanity). I appreciate some of the points he makes about individual voices and veracity, but I still think Wikipedia as a whole is fucking amazing, and I double check sources anyway. (not because I'm rigorous, but just because I have to read 70 different versions of any given info before I retain it)
I think Wikipedia is totally awesome. And Von Bark points out that in Lanier's complaints about its decontextualised anonymity he neglects the fact that the history of each post, including who has made what changes for what reasons, is all available for anyone interested. I remarked that Lanier was approaching Wikipedia as a consumer rather than a participant and VB said "Yeah, a consumer! He should be paying for it." The other thing about Wikipedia being, of course, that its not only readily available, but free! Lanier talks about the problems paying content providers for work online, but of course the flipside/upside of that coin is free content. He also misses the instructive aspect of participatory collectives... with this kind of media you get to witness the compromises to the group as they unfold, unlike TV where it's all a done deal.
Von Bark isn't here right now, but I think I can safely say that he thinks Lanier is full of crap. I'm a bit intrigued. Particularly because of his reminders about the value of authorship, which are interesting in an art context where the 20th century avant garde has thoroughly dismantled originality in theory, and yet the mainstream/art market continues as if nothing had happened (see all the hoopla about the Cady Noland "approximation" art show in NYC). We art-types are in a constant weird flip-flop about individuality versus collectivity. There's a kind of "dare-you-to-go-all-the-way" attitude about appropriation, and in this post-post Warhol era those who do it are often dismissed, misunderstood and/or villified. Even here, in the public commons, maybe even especially online, acknowledging credit and giving props is very important. As Lanier says about Linux, "Linux programmers are not anonymous and in fact personal glory is part of the motivational engine that keeps such enterprises in motion." Maybe its a good idea, at least for art discourse, to take a new look at the so-called death of authorship and see if anything really died!
Follow ups: Responses to Lanier's essay from Douglas Rushkoff, Quentin Hardy, Yochai Benkler, Clay Shirky, Cory Doctorow, Kevin Kelly, Esther Dyson, Larry Sanger, Fernanda Viegas & Martin Wattenberg, Jimmy Wales, George Dyson, Dan Gillmor, Howard Rheingold
Thanks for that updated link with the responses to the Lanier article. A big flaw in the initial essay, for me, was the title "Digital Maoism". It sure got my attention because we should be aware that tyranny doesn't just function at the level of the state, but that majorities, collectively, can tyrannize too. (a serious subject for any time) That said, I was having a problem making that particular connection with the phenomenon of wikipedia.
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There is a really interesting rant by Jaron Lanier at Edge.org about Wikipedia. He warns of a dangerous groundswell towards "hive mind" type social models, wary of the disastrous political precendents for rampant collectivism, which he distinguishes from "representative democracy" and "meritocracy." Lanier connects the popularity of Wikipedia with the economic push for meta-level sorting of the internet where information becomes farther and farther removed from its original context and the levels of useful subjective information associated with authorship. And he relates all this to artificial intelligence and points out an uncomfortable phenomenon of people degrading their expectations of human intelligence in order to claim success for artificial intelligence. He also notes that the internet is good because of all the people, but there is a trend to depersonalise the content. (As with Wikipedia, which he says "is like reading the bible closely. There are faint traces of the voices of various anonymous authors and editors, though it is impossible to be sure.") The essay has some analysis (quoted) below of collective versus individual systems, and also talks about the valuable checks and balances we developed pre-internet that helped us generate good shared knowledge, like independent media and ethical journalism!
- sally mckay 6-02-2006 3:22 am
I found this interesting, in regards to a recent study comparing Wikipedia favourably to the Britannica for accuracy.
"The items selected for the comparison were just the sort that Wikipedia would do well on: Science topics that the collective at large doesn't care much about. "Kinetic isotope effect" or "Vesalius, Andreas" are examples of topics that make the Britannica hard to maintain, because it takes work to find the right authors to research and review a multitude of diverse topics. But they are perfect for the Wikipedia. There is little controversy around these items, plus the Net provides ready access to a reasonably small number of competent specialist graduate student types possessing the manic motivation of youth."
There was a bit of Wonkette gossip a while ago about congressional aides being assigned to whitewash and maintain the entries on their congressman. (manic motivation of vanity). I appreciate some of the points he makes about individual voices and veracity, but I still think Wikipedia as a whole is fucking amazing, and I double check sources anyway. (not because I'm rigorous, but just because I have to read 70 different versions of any given info before I retain it)
- L.M. 6-02-2006 6:58 am
I think Wikipedia is totally awesome. And Von Bark points out that in Lanier's complaints about its decontextualised anonymity he neglects the fact that the history of each post, including who has made what changes for what reasons, is all available for anyone interested. I remarked that Lanier was approaching Wikipedia as a consumer rather than a participant and VB said "Yeah, a consumer! He should be paying for it." The other thing about Wikipedia being, of course, that its not only readily available, but free! Lanier talks about the problems paying content providers for work online, but of course the flipside/upside of that coin is free content. He also misses the instructive aspect of participatory collectives... with this kind of media you get to witness the compromises to the group as they unfold, unlike TV where it's all a done deal.
Von Bark isn't here right now, but I think I can safely say that he thinks Lanier is full of crap. I'm a bit intrigued. Particularly because of his reminders about the value of authorship, which are interesting in an art context where the 20th century avant garde has thoroughly dismantled originality in theory, and yet the mainstream/art market continues as if nothing had happened (see all the hoopla about the Cady Noland "approximation" art show in NYC). We art-types are in a constant weird flip-flop about individuality versus collectivity. There's a kind of "dare-you-to-go-all-the-way" attitude about appropriation, and in this post-post Warhol era those who do it are often dismissed, misunderstood and/or villified. Even here, in the public commons, maybe even especially online, acknowledging credit and giving props is very important. As Lanier says about Linux, "Linux programmers are not anonymous and in fact personal glory is part of the motivational engine that keeps such enterprises in motion." Maybe its a good idea, at least for art discourse, to take a new look at the so-called death of authorship and see if anything really died!
- sally mckay 6-02-2006 8:45 pm
Follow ups:
- jim 6-11-2006 6:11 pm
Thanks for that updated link with the responses to the Lanier article. A big flaw in the initial essay, for me, was the title "Digital Maoism". It sure got my attention because we should be aware that tyranny doesn't just function at the level of the state, but that majorities, collectively, can tyrannize too. (a serious subject for any time) That said, I was having a problem making that particular connection with the phenomenon of wikipedia.
- L.M. 6-11-2006 11:19 pm