The author in “Border Hacks” differentiates between Web Activism and Hacking – which was classified as “information terrorism.” True, in some cases Web Activism can be harmless, and can be used to raise public awareness. But, as discussed in “Photoshop for Democracy,” activism, even in the form of parodies, photoshopped pictures, and other related “harmless” activities can cause great damage not only to political candidates but to larger groups as well. Some of these images are used as “terrorism” because, on the Internet, nothing and no one is really safe from un-filtered images, from controversial debated to outright lies. Just as Joseph Goebbels, a truly dark and sinister, but brilliant propaganda figure, once said, “a lie spoken a thousand times becomes the truth!” On the internet, just one YouTube video can become popular, “go viral,” as it is called. These will be copied not one thousand, not ten thousand, but hundreds of thousands of times, maybe even millions, as what happened to the now-famous Gary Brolsma video popularly called “The Numa Numa Guy.”
While a short clip of a teenager (Brolsma was 18 at the time) dancing to a Moldovan song may cause little alarm, the rate at which it spread across the internet (over 700 million views estimated by now, allegedly copied thousands of times to other websites) shows the power of the web to carry any information, including disinformation, inciting terror in the citizens of a nation, causing social disruption, and, possibly, rebellion.
One of the reasons for this is that people are basically willing to take what looks and sounds scary, frightening, out-of-bounds, and accept it as true. This is the same principle as that which dove hundreds of people to large-scale paranoia during the UFO-scares of the 50’s, thousands to protest everything from the Vietnam War to oppressive government control in the 60’s and 70’s, and still drives thousands of protestors today. Lies are easier to make attractive, they are, in a way, as Venus Flytraps to unsuspecting flies – they look very pretty, they are easily acceptable, no matter how illogical, and they are very often malicious on many levels.
Thus, Web Activism can and often is a very potent form of terrorism, especially in the societies where people easily believe in many things. One example is from 2008, when a YouTube user found a large number of black containers which reminded him of coffins and uploaded a somewhat long clip of walking around them and even inspecting one. A few weeks later, that very video became Russian News, with newscasters quite seriously claiming that America must be preparing for World War III, having allegedly made “millions of bio-degradable coffins.” News stories like this often appear in various Russian, European, and even U.S. publications, mostly about what happens in nations other than the one which published the paper. Thus, if one video was for a time a cause of serious dismay and un-comfort on a national level, then any political “activism” can be boosted to the level of a serious national security threat. And thus, should also be classified as potential information terrorism.
Oleg: Is it just me, or is your font so dark it's impossible to read on this background without highlighting it? You raise an interesting point about the "viral" nature of media, something that in this day and age marketing gurus and advertisers not only rely on but also, as you say, more malicious sorts. But rather than leap to the conclusion that even misconstrued innocuous videos should be taken as "information terrorism," why not argue that consumer publics and governments need to have some baseline media literacy, to be able to question and sort the kinds of input we all receive on a daily basis.
ReplyDeleteFor those of you who didn't make it to the Jimmy Wales (founder of Wikipedia and Wikia) talk last night, you should know that two of his founding principles for running those companies are 1) Be bold, and 2) Assume good faith. In other words, though a few people may be out to "screw up" Wikipedia's common knowledge, most people are well intentioned, and most disputes can be resolved through discussion.
I agree with Oleg that the “viral” part of media can be seen as “information terrorism”. It is utterly surprising how a YouTube video could potentially ruin a presidential candidate or perhaps even make him/her more popular in the public’s eye. Most of these videos are transformed or edited to make the political victim seem incapable of doing their job or just to simply embarrass them. I understand that this could be seen Web Activism but the amount of influence they contain is unacceptable. Political leaders should be chosen by the public for reasons that are legitimate. American citizens should choose their politicians through making highly informed votes and decisions. Instead, media is being implemented to shape the views of citizens towards politicians. The use of photoshoped pictures, YouTube videos, and other forms of parodies aimed at certain politicians catch the attention of voters because they are often comedic or clever. I feel this undermines democracy in our nation. What happened to watching critical political debates or comparing political agendas of a presidential candidate to make a decision on who to vote for. I can guarantee that most presidential debates have less views than a YouTube video parody of presidential candidates. An ideal example would be the 2008 presidential candidate between Barrack Obama (D.) and John McCain (R.). There were numerous YouTube videos praising Barrack Obama as the symbol of hope and change for our nation. Rap song parodies, artistic images, and photoshoped pictures were all implemented to give Obama a positive appearance and to rise appeal among the American voters. On the other hand, McCain was ridiculed through similar forms of media, not for his political views, but for his physical impairment in his arms. This malicious use of media is not at all Web Activism but simply illogical forms of entertainment that anyone who owns a video camera could have made. These types of videos are simply stupid and have no political intelligence but with a virtually limitless environment such as the Internet anyone can make a popular YouTube video.
ReplyDeleteOleg, while you talk about Web Activism as being a negative influence- and indeed, your example about Russia misinterpreting the YouTube video of the black canisters is scary, Web Activism does appear to have some redeeming features. You are right that YouTube does attract a large number of visitors who seek to be entertained. However, Google has permitted sites that branch off from yet imitate YouTube in the form of educational sites such as TeacherTube - which provides instructional videos on a variety of topics. Educational videos are activism in their own right, clearly seeking to influence behavior without manipulating it to the extreme - as do political parodies or other excessively radical forms of social commentary. There is actually a site that compiles especially valuable YouTube videos online - called Open Culture and titled Intelligent YouTube Video Collections. Some of these videos contain valuable information that is factual and has the potential to act as a powerful source of persuasion - as an example, the site contains videos about Human rights created by Amnesty International. That Russia interpreted a mindless video to be a threat only highlights the importance of learning to discriminate the truthfulness from the libelous from the meaningless in new media.
ReplyDeleteI attended the founder of Wikipedia’s lecture and found his take on this site’s development to be fascinating. As Ms. Chang mentioned above, he stated that most people were extroadonarily gracious when they were informed that some information they had posted on the Wikia site was incorrect or needed to be moved to another location. He also responded to a direct question about how to address the issue that the majority opinion is always right; essentially, his argument was that if the majority of people believed false information, this information as well as its popularity should be addressed on the site. However, the minority opinion also needs to be addressed to balance the issue.
I agree that the media can be viral, and that information terrorism is a significant threat. However, not all web activism is web terrorism - as shown by educational sites containing factually correct videos as well as sites in which knowledge can be shared such as Wikipedia.
I do agree that sometimes media on the Internet can be "viral". But to me, that's really an intrinsic fault of just any media, and not necessarily new media alone. We've seen plenty of magazines and newspapers that have jumped on the rumors of a scandal, and ruined some celebrity's reputation. It's just that the problem seems more relevant now, because ANYONE can post malicious vidoes on youtube.
ReplyDeleteI also attended Jimmy Wales's lecture, and I was very impressed with what he had to say. I believe just like Wikipedia, what we really need is not to stop malicious users from posting viral content, but to have an active system of constructive peer review.
I would also like to elaborate on Quetzal's point by pointing out that most of the time, the public opinion is still painted by mass media. Search "Bush" on youtube, and the first three pages results are videos that mock him. But really, would all of this have existed if mass media hadn't started the trend first? How many times times does mass media really stop to say "okay, he had some good moments too". I am by no means a Bush fan, but I do think that mass media needs to be more fair.
What we really need is to educate internet users more. Sure, it's funny to get a laugh out of Youtube videos of a reporter throwing a shoe at the president, but how sensible is it to let a 5 minute video determine our opinions about...well...anything?
What you say here is very interesting and correct. Not only can things on the internet spread very quickly, but they don't always have to be done for some political goal or end. In the case of trolling, an internet user looks to spread anger and rage by posting inflammatory pictures, comments, or videos all over 4chan and other blogging sites. It is sad to see that since information can be spread so quickly over the internet it is used in malice. One such trolling example was when trolls found out about a boy who committed suicide and the trolls found out about it, hacked his myspace and found out that he had posted something about a lost ipod. They then proceeded to make pictures of him moaning over a lost ipod and claimed that was the reason he killed himself. This whole incident spread quickly across the internet and was a huge hit on the /b/ forum of 4chan. It is a scary thought how certain things going "viral" can cause such pain and strife for some.
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