I invite you to read the abstract to this published (!) paper [pdf] by academics Antonio Maturano and Sergio Belluci.
You will learn that Facebook is a “tool able to amplify an individual‘s alienation and narcissism, which, are a consequence of the mercantile form of social organization which has reached its climax in capitalism.”
You will nod in sage agreement that “Facebook is not a promising example of a new shift from capitalism to a new form of economy based on openness, peering, sharing and global action.” [Emphasis added.]
And you will realize the obvious truth “under Marxist theory” that the new social media are “disguised forms of advanced capitalism aimed at eroding space to more challenging modes of Internet collectivism.”
Take that, you social-media-using patsies. Tools of the Man once again.
(omg i gotta fb and tweet this asap to my peeps.)
Or it could also be, as my friend Steve put it in commenting on the above, that “Postmodernism is alive and well and taking stupidity to new heights.”
I didn’t read the whole article (although that might be fun), but I did enjoy the final paragraph, although I have no idea what it means:
“Such a distributed view of spectacle seems to be an attempt to colonize the web using an hidden form of integrated spectacle (based on the broadcasting model), into an intricate and complex web of spectacles (working on the network model), which appear to be an integrated spectacle in which simulacra of individuals become consumable goods into a capitalistic logic rather than being a new way for collaborative efforts.”
Marx would have approved of more capitalism along the inevitable historically deterministic march to socialism. He’d have loved to tweet, for sure!
Great Post.
I am not going to bother reading the paper, but from what you have excerpted, I would point out that Facebook IS evil, be it for monopoly capitalist reasons, or simply because it is a closed standards, closed source, control freak, power trip, walled garden. Mark Zuckerberg is a douche, clearly.
Google Buzz had a very rocky and privacy-violating start, but the significance of the concept of Google Buzz is in its soon to be released Open Standards, and Open Protocol – (and maybe if we get really lucky we will also get an Open Source, externally deployable platform). Im not sure if these authors would still think Google Buzz was the enemy of Marxism and Class Struggle, but I am just saying…
Lots of academics are stupid, Chris Langan calls them “acadummies” but I really doubt Chris. L would agree with your pseudo-strange liberatarianism and cultish appreciation of Ayn rand and milton friedman
I didn’t read the whole article either, Barry.
But: Karl Marx tweeting away on his iPhone. There’s an image.
Thanks, Pace.
But I don’t get what’s behind the strong language: evil, douche.
Why can’t there be different kinds of online communities — some walled, some not; some closed source, some open source; etc.?
Why does everyone have to conform to the open standards model or else be labeled a control freak?
Agreed, “SocratesV3,” that there are lots of pseudo and cultish types out there.
But I wonder how you distinguish pseudo from real libertarianism and cultish from rational admiration for Rand and Friedman. If we set aside our childish urges to call people names, what are your criteria here?
Should be a straightforward question for someone with “Socrates” in his handle.
Sounds like they could have made the same argument about the printing press (just look at all those bound spectacles) and .pdfs ( those virtual e-simulacra’s alienated from the labor of the truly written word, not cleansed by bourgeoisie class language warfare under the benevolent guise of “spell check”).
Bill
We gotta rize up an overthro the tearannee of speling.
I feel liberated just writing that.
Stephen:
Both media critic Bob Garfield in his book The Chaos Scenario, and pioneering computer scientist Jaron Lanier in his book You Are Not A Gadget spend a considerable amount of time speaking to the online phenomenon of trolling, anti-social behaviour, bullying, and pathological and nihilistic hatred by some against others under the guise of free speech advocacy and freedom in cyberspace. It’s a real phenomenon with real-life consequences.
Lanier calls it an ideology of violation.
This ideology, he says, “doesn’t radiate from the lowest depths of trolldom, but from the highest heights of academia.” He cites the case of two university researchers that presented the results of their lab research at a respectable academic conference devoted to using digital technology to harm innocent people who thought they were safe. These professors and their lab teams spent two years figuring out how to use mobile phone technology to hack into a pacemaker and turn it off by remote control, in order to kill a person, and then making most of the details available.
Lanier summarizes this murderous ideology: “All those nontechnical, ignorant, innocent people out there are going about their lives thinking that they are safe, when in actuality they are terribly vulnerable to those who are smarter than they are. Therefore, we smartest technical people ought to invent ways to attack the innocents, and publicize our results so that everyone is alerted to the dangers of our superior powers. After all, a clever evil person might come along.”
He continues: “Another predictable element of the ideology of violation is that anyone who complains about the rituals of the elite violators will be accused of spreading FUD – fear, uncertainty, and doubt. But actually it’s the ideologues who seek publicity. The whole point of publicizing exploits like the attack on pacemakers is the glory. It that notoriety isn’t based on spreading FUD, what is?”
I don’t know enough about post-modernism to comment on whether this is a direct extension, but it’s irrationalism at every philosophical level would lead me to believe that it is.
Socrates knew ideologies are for suckers, and it’s obvious you are vitriolic towards people not as bright as yourself or who share your views, thats bad all around – be humble and explain your reasoning. I’m just saying intelligent people should admire people that had strong ideological leanings we should admire truth.
Socrates understood how limited human wisdom was and how arrogant men could be and you display that kind of arrogance and I think socrates would have had some choice words for you if in real life you were an asshole, on the internet it’s easy to be edgy and bask in your own glory.
Socrates understood the role of fate and determinism in peoples lives and intelligence and their ideas – i.e. people are fated to be who they become and only the truly wise can escape prisons of illusion, and pretense to knowledge.
I think with the internet and just the realization of how vst the internet is and what the internet would know if it was a mind should be ever present in the mind of all intellectuals.
Human beings as a species are not that bright, who would you be if you had an IQ of 195 like Langan and other High IQ types like Rick rosner? how would you change at 250 or more? Leaving yourself open for growth is paramount because life is short and the truth is vast and much larger then the individual – be humble and seek in earnest.
Human beings tend to want to live in their own ideal world rather then seek the truth, they prefer to bask in what is psychologically comforting rather then uncertainty and eternal awareness of the smallness of ones mind, and an eternal vigilance to see as clearly as possible with the limited ability of our minds to see that vastness, that galaxy of knowledge we are unaware of.
sorry that should read **… we shouldn’t admire people who have strong idealogical leanings..”
I respect very much your points about being open to growth and future possibility, SV3. One hundred percent agreement.
But while you speak much of Socratic skepticism and humility, you seem to be leaping to strong conclusions about someone you hardly know. And why all of the thin-skinned anger?
Barry Linetsky’s comment above on Garfield and Lanier strikes me as wise and worth reading again.