Lawrence Lessig’s argument about copyright laws is based upon the nature of creativity. The story about his friend writing all of his university papers in quotes from other people is amazing. This to me shows how well-read a person can be. As scholars, we recognize a conversation about something, enter into that conversation, and raise our own voice in the discussion. What Lessig’s friend seemed to do was create his voice through “remixing” others’ voices. What an amazing talent, paralleling artists like Girl Talk—creating a totally original product by mashing up hundreds of songs.

A question that emerges out of this discussion is one that I’ve had for a long time. Following John Locke’s philosophy, we are born with a tabula rasa or a blank slate. Our environment informs us, acting as a well from which we draw information. Our “slate” is filled as we observe the world around us. According to this philosophy, it is nearly impossible to discern between what is originally produced in our mind and what is merely an amalgamation of information. When we see a movie, are we seeing something original or some kind of mixture between previous patterns of storyline, writing style, and directing? This idea seems to be intensifying as distinguished artifacts are remixed more and more. Not only is a movie like Cloverfield reproducing Blair Witch Project, Godzilla, and other movies, but directors are remaking their own movies (i.e. Bangkok Dangerous, 1999, 2008).

My concern relates to originality, if such a thing exists. When I write papers, how much “influence” from my environment is informing that writing to where it becomes plagiarism? I find this in my students’ work as well. One approach to answering this question is in the way Lessig does, by acknowledging other peoples’ voices and work that is related to your own. Pointing to the conversation as it takes place in the world, I can distinguish my own voice from others’ as I talk with them “side by side.” As I create a product (like an essay), I’m expected to recognize where the “influences” have come from. However, I’m concerned with what I’m not being able to recognize. Kris (I think it was Kris) mentioned that one of her undergrad students didn’t know if what she had written were her own ideas or if it was someone else, and therefore she could not be held accountable if she accidentally plagiarized. While I think it is ridiculous to claim complete victimhood of tabula rasa, I can’t help but worry about the example Von Lohmann discussed of movie theatres being sued for showing movies that contained un-authorized songs.

I’m intrigued by the remix culture that is expanding and how copyright is becoming more and more complicated. I believe it parallels the worries I have in my own head as I endeavor to write.

Banks and Humphrey’s article “The Labour of Co-Creators” discussed the use of the term “labour” in the context of commercial and non-commercial social networks and markets, and particularly in the Auran case study Trainz. They ask, “At what points do the actors themselves start to deploy the rhetoric and discourses of labour and work? How do these discourses contribute to the construction and meanings of these co-creation relations?” (403). The purpose of this study is to expand the research on the economic benefits of social capital.

It’s interesting for sure to think about not only the willingness but the eagerness in which a public will contribute to a company without necessarily being rewarded by it. This study does reveal that fans contributed to receive something in return in a few different ways: “Many of the fan creators were attracted to the content creators program by Auran’s promise that they would enjoy early access to builds of Trainz and, more importantly, to direct support from members of the Trainz development team. They also viewed it as an opportunity to provide feedback to the development team that may then influence the design of future versions of Trainz. The creators who were pursuing commercialization of their content also viewed it as a valuable promotional opportunity” (409). However, such compensation isn’t guaranteed, and it seems like building a game takes a lot of work on the chance that one may be rewarded for it.

While I understand the purpose of this study—to analyze co-creation, audience participation, social/corporate capital, and the exploitation of an audience all in the context of new media—I wonder if the implications of the study are limited to the circumstance in which this study was realized. Can we see the results of evaluating audience feedback, its ambition to participate, and a company that invites audience participation in other scenarios, or are the implications generated by this study strictly confined to the conditions by which the study took place?

I would like to see a survey study in which many different kinds of companies are examined and tested to see if the same results of the Trainz experiment are found to be true. My thought is that only a select number of companies lend themselves to the conditions necessary to financially benefit an organization if those benefits are based on user participation. In other words, I think there are only so many kinds of companies that can exploit their audience, and the implications of this study should only be viewed in the context of this study. What we might ultimately gain from this study is general principles that reinforce theories about audience participation and social/corporate capital.

The results of the study, to me, are based on a few factors that separate this company and the ability to exploit its audience from other companies: 1) some products are more suited to audience participation and co-creation, 2) some products have a certain kind of fan base that is more apt to participate, 3) the audience must have the means and tools to participate. (e.g. it’s much easier for gamers to participate than fans of companies devoted to medical advancements).

The nerds who work for Google have innovated the company beyond what they’re paid for because they are contracted nerds. They add to the company in ways they aren’t expected to. Also, fans who are able to engage with a product is different than fans who are the recipients of a product. It is the difference between reacting to a product and acting upon a product. Products like energy drinks don’t avail themselves to audience engagement like video games do. You “plug yourself in” to video games (how far can you plug yourself into a Red Bull?). Ultimately, I’d like to see a study that surveys products, fans, and companies and the different levels of participation and exploitation.

What I found most interesting about the notion of different motives to create content online (as demonstrated in the Jeong and Correa article) is that creativity reveals things in its very inception about what motivated the person to create it. What this article suggests is that race is a factor in determining the motivation. I’m not sure how one could know why that is, other than by maybe looking at the various ideological underpinnings of how race has been interpreted and discussed rhetorically throughout the history of a culture. It would be interesting if the participants in this study were asked questions about their perceptions about their race, how they thought others perceived them, if they feel connected to a larger community of people categorized by race, and what that category or community of people is culturally like—meaning what rituals, expressions, inside jokes, or symbols are recognized by the group.

I find it fascinating to study how new media enables previously disparate people to connect to each other as they seek after (the apparent human drive of) belonging, to connect, be a part of something greater. It never occurred to me that race could underlie a motivating factor or even represent creative differences as in self expression or self promotion. What is also I think at the heart of this study is that which separates races as a result of seclusion. If communities of race form cultural groups that “learn” what it means to be their race (due to ideological orientations), how does one then “learn” what it means to be not a part of someone’s race? Perhaps a study could be done that focuses more on the instances of races such as white that engage in self expression and evaluate participants to see if they were aware that it wasn’t as much of a “white” thing to do. Are creators of online content racially conscious of performing or creating that which is more predominant in communities of other races?

The Gerodimos article was important to me in a scholarly way but also in a practical way. It went beyond a communication theory and discussed how a component of new media in society has concrete applications in bettering that society. Essentially, it got me thinking about what are the underlying motives to engage in helping make society better, and how I as a citizen can proactively engage others based on the findings in Gerodimos’ article.

Upon reading this study, I thought back to my days as a boy scout. Countless service projects, merit badges, trips to shelters, first aid kits, cleaning parks, raking leaves, and other activities comprised my experience in the Boy Scouts of America. Being a scout was something that all of my friends did. Having grown up in a heavily religious community, scouting was very much a social expectation (of course scouting flourishes in non-religious communities as well). It’s just what everyone did. It’s what my dad and grandparents did. The benefits of friendship and the feeling of inclusion and personal worth were intertwined in scouting, and the bi-products were positive contributions to society, or civic engagement. In this way, Gerodimos’ article rings true: 1) My friends were actively participating in scouts or civic engagement, 2) I had leaders that showed me a need in the community that I did not previously know existed, and 3) I was instructed in how to meet that need. As I saw my friends meeting that need, meeting the need myself allowed me to engage with friends and engage in the community. Often, I would see how my contributions benefitted others.

My experience in civic engagement, however, had nothing to do with new media. And it begs the question (as Gerodimos’ article asks), can new media like the internet produce greater civic engagement? Based on my experience as a youth in Boy Scouts, I might extend the question to: Can already existent civic engagement organizations adopt new media to further their causes? I would like to know if or how the Boy Scouts of America has incorporated new media into its program as a means to encourage those outside of civically-inclined social circles to participate in civic engagement programs like scouting. If, like we talked about last week, young people communicate with their peers to a great degree on smart phones, how then can new media serve as a means to fulfill young people’s objective of contributing to society through organizations in which they are already engaged? How can visual material as stated on page 227 be incorporated to inspire and motivate young people to participate in service to the community? One idea that comes to mind: if adults know a need in the community and can somehow capture it on video and send it to his/her scouts’ phones, would that motivate the youth to participate?

One of the things I found fascinating about this week’s readings is the research acquired in the Johnson et al chapter, “United We Stand?” On page 189, they explain,

“Research indicates that the development of homogeneous social networks reinforces existing political dispositions, often leading to more actively empowered political behavior. On the other hand, a more diverse social network stimulates discussion of controversial topics. Past analyses have found that citizens with more heterogeneous discussion networks are more likely to participate in community forums and assorted political activities. It is apparent that interpersonal discussion with those of similar and different viewpoints is related to political activity at many levels.”

It’s hard to say, because of my own perception, that political discussions have increased within the community due to one of the following factors: 1) furthering my education connects me to more “politically minded” individuals, 2) getting older has put me in more “civically engaged” circles, 3) the rising generation maintains a more “politically-inclined” culture. The research above refers to new media as the means. I’m not sure if it’s just one of these factors or a combination of them, but it does appear that citizens are becoming more politically active, particularly the youth.

Having said that, for SNSs and other new media to catalyze civic engagement is a almost too good to be true (I’m not saying it isn’t true, but it’s a pretty remarkable finding). Based on past our discussions of gap-filling and the new media’s role in joining together previously disparate groups of people with common interests, I would say that the internet has the power of creating political force within groups (forums are huge in this regard). But I’m still leery of SNSs’ role in facilitating “serious” civic action.

When I enter Facebook, all I see are memes about “binders full of women,” “ponies and bayonets,” and “Big Bird.” I see a lot of sour rants and soap boxes and annoying political jabs from people who I thought were my friends but suddenly become something else altogether on Facebook. Overall, SNSs make me want to defriend my friends. Because of our conversation about Facebook mimicking reality, does this make me “hate” my friends in real life? That’s not the question I want to pose to our class, but I would like to have a discussion about how SNSs specifically foster civic engagement, and not do the opposite (which I’m not sure what the opposite of civic engagement is—anarchy?).

One last question: what does an SNS stimulate more, civic engagement or plain old trash talk? Even though trashing politics is easier than civic engagement, it seems like SNSs provide not just a medium for this to happen but a completely new means of understanding politics. Memes are the new political cartoons, and that is how, I believe, most of the public understand politics today.

Ellison et al’s chapter in A Networked Self discusses the motives behind making connections through social network sites, concluding that offline relationships dominantly make up the online connections. The factors that determine most of the connections include a desire to maintain contact with old friends, acquire more information about those one meets offline, and participate in online communities that represent familiar offline communities, like high school. According to their findings, “We believe the key way in which Facebook serves to support the generation of social capital is through reshaping the social network of individuals and by lowering the costs of communicating with (and thus contributing to and extracting benefits from) this social network” (137). This study presents Facebook in a very positive light, projecting Facebook as something that fills offline social holes and provides a means for people to expand interactions between friends. In my own personal experience, I have found this to be true, particularly with family and friends who live very far. I don’t often email dear friends who live in other countries, and calling them on the phone can be expensive, so Facebook has been very accommodating in that regard.

As I read Ellison et al’s cheery and seemingly accurate study of SNSs, I wondered about the growing number of people falling victim to cyber bullying. The study shows that friending people online is motivated by pre-existing offline relationship – they are already one’s friends and that one has an interest in getting to know them further. The inference of the study is that there is a positive correspondence in these offline/online connections, particularly because of the denotative use of the noun and verb “friend.” However, according to the i-SAFE foundation, “Over half of adolescents and teens have been bullied online, and about the same number have engaged in cyber bullying; more than 1 in 3 young people have experienced cyberthreats online; over 25 percent of adolescents and teens have been bullied repeatedly through their cell phones or the Internet” http://www.bullyingstatistics.org/content/cyber-bullying-statistics.html).

Granted, these instances of cyber bullying can happen between individuals who are already friends, and I’m guessing that many instances of bullying are initiated by a falling out of some kind between friends. At any rate, I wonder what the motives behind cyber bullying are, if bullies go online to randomly bully other kids, or if the bullying experience arises from something that started offline. The Ellison et al study would imply that bullying is motivated from pre-existing friendships because those who make friend requests online do so from an already-established offline acquaintance. However, with cyber bullying happening so frequently, it begs the question, does online bullying reflect offline bullying (just as online friendships reflect offline friendships), or is Facebook an easy means for strangers to pick and choose their victims?

Brian Heslop

10-11-12

Final Paper Abstract

            Separated geographically and by politically-drawn lines, the nations throughout the world have traditionally engaged in conflict through physical interference. Colonization, land disputes, trade-discrepancies, revolutions, and “stone-throwing” among other events have mainly comprised the catalysts for friction and war. However, the influence of the media upon the cultural, ideological, and social domains of society has infused tension among citizens and government leaders as the media more forcefully juxtaposes each country one with another. At the latter end of the 19^th century, newspapers helped excite America to enter the Cuban War of Independence, a dispute between Cuba and Spain that did not concern the U.S. in the least. The Cold War was arguably a war amongst media; efforts to counterbalance the communist-controlled radio and television outlets is evident in the creation of Radio Free Europe. Newspapers, radio, telephone, and television have not only provided a means for conflicting countries to face each other more directly, but these media have increasingly framed the causes of conflict itself.

Now, in the 21^st century, media has become integrated into everyday society in a new way. The internet, social networks, and convergence culture have shaped the nature in which society interacts, thinks, and functions. Given the media’s historic role in discrepancies between nations, what are the affects of new media on an increasingly digital and interconnected world? What new conflicts arise from societies whose laws and cultures collide on a boundary-less virtual playing field?

Such questions have become more and more relevant as we have seen the affects of new media on society unfold. In July 2012, the short film “Innocence of Muslims” was released on YouTube. The film depicts scenes of Muhammad, the founder of Islam and considered a sacred prophet to Muslims. Many Islam scholars believe that visual depictions of Muhammad are forbidden, but the objections of the film are primarily due its inference of Muhammad being a terrorist. When the film was uploaded to YouTube, thousands of people throughout various countries in North Africa, the Middle East, Asia, and Europe began protesting its content. Google’s ‘freedom of speech’ policies came under scrutiny, and the film was taken down by YouTube in some countries or banned through legal action by others.

This episode is one of an increasing number of instances that have emerged due to new media. In 2005, a Danish newspaper published cartoons that depicted the prophet Muhammad as a terrorist. Several Danish embassies in Arab nations were vandalized as a result. In another case the next year, the world protested the sentence of an Iranian woman who was to be stoned to death. Iranians who spoke to news outlets in other countries, protesting the woman’s punishment, risked being threatened themselves. In 2010, Terry Jones, a Christian pastor from Florida, threatened to burn the Quran, Islam’s holy book, if the controversial Park51 community center was not moved from its planned location two blocks away from ground zero. His threats sparked outrage throughout the world, even getting President Obama involved. On March 5 2012, the 30 minute film “Kony 2012” was posted on YouTube. The film was hugely popular, receiving 100,000 views within 6 days of it’s release. A showing of the film in Uganda, however, was met with confusion and anger, as many people couldn’t understand why the U.S. would want to celebritize a war lord.

These examples reflect controversies that are catalyzed by new media. Several tensions arise from these scenarios: 1) freedom of speech vs. censorship, 2) the prominence of new media in society vs. previously isolated societies, 3) the policies and ethics that govern new media in one country vs. another, and 4) the control of sovereign-governed countries over a generation of new-media users.

This paper discusses the significance of such tensions as they are discussed in blogs, scholarly articles, and other outlets. Eide et al’s Transnational Media Events: The Mohammed Cartoons & the Imagined Clash of Civilizations discusses free speech theory in the context of the Muhammad cartoons occurrence. MacKinnon’s Consent of the Networked: The Worldwide Struggle For Internet Freedom will provide a solid framework by which I can organize the most important components of the juxtaposition of formerly isolated countries, and the repercussions of the growing digital movement. The book Fundamentalism in the Modern World relays how religious fundamentalism functions in a modern global society, particularly through mass media. Other journal articles include “Re-thinking the Cultural Codes of New Media,” “Online Communities versus Offline Communities in the Arab/Muslim World,” and “Political online communities in Saudi Arabia” among others. Finally, I will discuss the importance of the role of communication scholars in this culture clash brought on by the digital movement. Specifically, I will answer the question, “How can communication (particularly rhetorical) scholars provide a means for new-media users to understand the implications of a boundary-less virtual venue, and how can scholars equip these users to engage in productive discourse that may constrain instances of cultural friction?

The idea of constructing a professional identity is interesting to me in the context of social networking sites. In A Networked Self, Giplin explains, “Public professional identities are constructed through a combination of social ties and relational content…Connections to other users on such sites have been described as ‘public displays of connection’ that add value and validity to an individual’s identity performance” (233). If we think about the idea of professional identity as it is shaped through our engagement with social networking sites, it seems like the online-networking arena lends itself more suitably to some professions than others. I’m thinking of academics (and perhaps specifically communication academics, and perhaps more specifically rhetoric academics).

My brother owns a body-care business and sells products to spas. He for sure has a twitter and Facebook account as to foster “information sharing, networking, and establishing professional expertise” (232). The success of his business greatly depends on his online presence and interaction because his associates, clients, and even competitors are always online. You would think that, based on the idea of “information sharing, networking, and establishing professional expertise,” that a profession in academia would go hand in hand with social networking. However, that doesn’t seem to be the case.

In class, we have talked at length about collapse among our social circles, and Giplin mentions, “Online interactive media further complicate the question of boundaries” (233). Through our in-class discussions, we have become spooked by the idea of privacy breakdown, although Danah Boyd in The Social Media Reader attempts (albeit pathetically) to argue in behalf of public disclosure (76). Most of my professors are super conservative in class and online about what they disclose to students, and I personally will not become “friends” with any of my students on Facebook until long after the semester is over. There is an inherent resistance to let those boundaries collapse in academia, even though one could argue that the students are our “clients,” or at least those of the university. What’s more is, I know graduate students who are incredibly leery of making public anything in their professional toolkit. Vitas, lesson plans, and teaching philosophies are kept locked up because of the fear that they will be copied or somehow altered.

This doesn’t mean that academics haven’t attempted to enter into the social networking world. Academia.com allows academics to network within a scholarly context, but my own account doesn’t seem to garner a lot of traffic, and I’m not really interested in other people’s profiles. Based on the principles of “information sharing, networking, and establishing professional expertise,” why wouldn’t academics take to the opportunities of online networking? Have they? Furthermore, Giplin says, “Constructing a professional identity also means constructing the identity of the profession” (234). How can communication scholars help the much needed effort to construct a distinct discipline for the professional world of communication, especially amid the barriers I’ve mentioned?

Willemsen et al’s article discusses the judgments people make about products being sold online and how such judgments are influenced according to the nature of the reviews for that product. Essentially, negative content for products of experience has a stronger impact on choice, and positive content for search products is more influential. Looking at argumentation, the density and diversity of the kinds of arguments surrounding a product are important for a consumer. If there is a star rating and also descriptions, it’s more likely that a person will make better judgments. Lastly, the expertise claims didn’t show a very strong correlation to the perceived usefulness of reviews.

I enjoyed reading the article because it made me think about what I look for in reviews when I shop online, and I think the authors’ findings are consistent with my own experience. For example, when I moved here, I needed a bike to get to campus, so I looked at different department store websites like Target and Walmart for something cheap but with good reviews. I found myself taking more seriously the negative reviews because I didn’t want a piece of junk, even though I wanted it cheap (*irony*). The more reviews I read, the more leery I noticed I was becoming of positive reviews. Is it possible for online reviews to be fake, a deliberate attempt by the company to entice the consumer by providing a positive review? How could I discern between the authentic reviews and the fake ones?

A study presented at conference for computational linguistics provides the answers to these questions. In this study, Hancock et al develop a system that detects “deception opinion spam,” testing the veracity of reviews from hotels and other companies. An example of a deception opinion spam is based on yelp.com: “My husband and I stayed at the James Chicago Hotel for our anniversary. This place is fantastic! We knew as soon as we arrived we made the right choice! The rooms are BEAUTIFUL and the staff very attentive and wonderful!! The area of the hotel is great, since I love to shop I couldn’t ask for more!! We will definatly be back to Chicago and we will for sure be back to the James Chicago.”

Some of their findings show that truthful reviews commonly speak about “spatial configurations (e.g. bathroom, on location)” as opposed to the liars. The liars tend to speak more about “aspects external to the hotel being reviewed (e.g., husband, business, vacation). Deception also includes less usage of first person singular, and reviews tend to be more positive than negative.

Here’s a link to the article: http://aclweb.org/anthology/P/P11/P11-1032.pdf

and how it is discussed in the New York Times: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/20/technology/finding-fake-reviews-online.html

I’m thinking that fake reviewers could learn a lot from both articles. I feel weird about making this conclusion because it’s almost as if I’m encouraging deception in reviews. But I’m glad to be better informed about what to look out for when I shop online.

In Kolsaker and Drakatos’ article, one’s attachment to one’s phone is correlated to being open to the benefits of mobile advertising. They explain, “those who are emotionally attached to their mobile device will react positively to such initiatives, provided they feel they are contributing rather than merely receiving communications intended to trigger a buying response. They wish to receive information about products and services and to become more involved with the companies with whom they deal” (277). It’s interesting to see how Kolsaker and Drakatos incorporated the cell phone attachment factor into the idea of responding positively to cell phone advertisements. I wonder how different this concept is from people who subscribe to online stores/magazines like newegg.com, sites that are basically ads. I’m not an expert in advertising, but based on the article, advertising in general makes appeals to peoples’ needs and wants. If loneliness, sense of belonging, and information-management are things that drive people’s dependence on and desire for cell phones and thus the receptiveness to phone ads, then what makes non-cell phone products any different?

I am particularly interested in the third component of emotional attachment in the lit review—the “sense of belonging to a group and being part of a scene” (269). I would like to see a study similar to this that replaces cell phones and focuses on other products that connect people together to form an identity to which they could belong. The television is one such product, although you can watch it by yourself (it’s not made specifically for connecting you to another person). But it can act as a medium for bringing people together. The television brings many Americans together every year as families and friends gather to watch the Super bowl. I’m betting most of these people aren’t avid football fans, but on this day, they are. The event ‘Super bowl’ together with the medium ‘television’ creates a culture where people can belong to something. During this yearly ritual, people make comments on sports figures, root for teams, and eat Vienna sausages. And I wonder, because of this feeling of belonging and connectivity, do they anticipate advertisements during this particular event as a part of the shared “Super bowl” culture. This sort of ad reception is different because people do not see the ads as something that can serve toward the betterment of a device that is connecting them to people. Super bowl spectators don’t look for ads that specifically are for televisions because it’s the television that is connecting these people together. What these ads do is give spectators a reason to connect to each other. They act as the cell phone in this case. So perhaps the Kolsaker and Drakatos study is just as much about participating in a “digital” culture as it is about the emotional connection one has to a digital device.