All you need is Talent

Klementina Pavlova
14 December, 2009

As I was glimpsing through the blog posts, one caught my eye and decided to respond to the blog post by Danniel Leahy. It was very intriguing the way he presented his points of view. We are definitely on two opposing viewpoints on the issue of Web 2.0 which helps for the healthy discussion. Although Danniel Leahy says that Web 2.0 helps people stay in touch, informs them and keeps them connected, I’d like to disagree because Web 2.0 destroys person to person interaction, hinders the function of the media and generates the idea that “I am the most important” which are slowly hurting our society.
Human beings express the need to belong to something, be a part of the solution and work towards achieving a goal but the most important part is that they need human interaction. And that is exactly what’s missing in Web 2.0. The neighborhood and the community used to be the center of politics but now it seems we do not know who our next door neighbor is because we never had the chance to interact on a personal level. Web 2.0 destroys the closeness of the community; people no longer interact the same way which causes neighborhoods to separate and not stand up for their rights together. Appearing and contributing in person is much more effective than writing a two line e-mail with your concerns. If you were not able to take an hour of your daily life to express the problems within the community it must have not been that important. Web 2.0 hinders the intended functions of town hall meetings instead of complementing them. For example, during the first town hall meetings that Obama conducted many of the submitted questions did not get asked, in fact only 10 different topics were discussed out of a pool of thousands. When you submit your questions to an online database the chances of your question getting selected are very slim. And that is a point Williams points out, raising awareness to the decay of our democracy.
As Danniel Leahy mentioned Zen Rizing got some popularity through Web 2.0 but their big break was when they went out and met with production companies and so forth. It was the face-to-face interaction with sponsors that helped them achieve their dreams. In regards to that it is inevitable not to have a few more viewers once you post your work is on Web 2.0 but Zen Rizing are still not popular. They are overshadowed by the big stars that are also major figures on the Web 2.0. People have the tendency to listen to their chosen music and rarely search for new artists, because as we all know time is money. We all need a quick fix from our stressful lives and we stick to what we already know. The Web provided an outlet for those who were already curious of music styles but it failed to make people reach out. And that is because we are so self centered we only care of what we need at a specific time. And it is no surprise we do not reach out; we automatically ignore what we label to being not our style.
Just like we pick our music we pick our news channels. We watch whatever agrees with us. Society relies on the media to keep them informed on the main issues locally and globally. As a nation, we value the information that we hear but in recent years our news networks have gone extremist. We have networks that reflect only one side of the story and so the public is stripped from the right of unbiased news. Web 2.0 does keep us informed if we want to learn, otherwise there is no mandatory requirement for any of us to sit down and read about the Iraq war or Health care reform. Web 2.0 has a vast amount of information that many people cannot always process and that is why we have journalists who are supposed to give us the information from credible sources. We cannot all be experts on various subjects and that is where the media comes in to give us the condensed information so we can be an informed nation. Web 2.0 gives us the option to only read and listen to what we agree with and what we want to know. That is Williams’s concern, with so much information you are more inclined to read only what interests you. And that has been proven for the past 10 years in which the Internet grew bigger and bigger but the American society did not become more democratic or more educated on global issues. Web 2.0 gives all the power to its user and cannot control his or her actions. In this “user generated media” who is guaranteeing the people access to all of this information. Who guarantees that people will take the time out of their day and read the opposing view?
Web 2.0 reinforces the idea of: “I am the most important” and the media has to compete with that. Thirty years ago it didn’t have to do that and that is why our networks are partisan now. Thirty years ago the news gave you the information straight. It didn’t matter if you liked it, agreed or disagreed. It was there for you to know. It was straight fact without personal bias from the journalists. The decay of the media is in a direct coloration with the usage of Web 2.0. People started reading up news online the ones they only care about. Media lost its viewers and now is doing everything to get them back; even if that means dumbing down its journalists (FOX ) or using holograms who look like a video-game characters (CNN) to inform us what is happening around the world.
Web 2.0 is especially great for social networking, some might say that and for them it would be true to the extent of ignorance because they haven’t thought about its negative aspects. If one tracks the time one spends checking their two emails, Facebook, Twitter and blog one will discover that it takes a vast majority of your time. “Social Networking” sites enable you to look for your old friends and when you have a broad array of friends you can talk to online you isolate yourself from the rest of the world. Facebook becomes a comfort zone and it is very hard for some to come out and socialize with a different crowd and meeting new people. Another negative aspect of Facebook is that it does not give a chance to teenagers and grow apart from their parents. This system doesn’t allow kids to grow up since they are always connected to their parents. Previous generations were able to become more independent on an earlier age and so being so connected comes this generation to be a child for longer. This affects their personal lives and professions. Now it is even acceptable to go back and live at home after college. Instead of beginning your life. And all that is caused by being so connected and constantly dependant.
Zen Rizing is using social networks to advertise their upcoming songs and maybe sell a couple of souvenirs. But Facebook could be a dangerous website; on top of staying connected with family and friends this website generates a lot of drama that might affect their music in a negative way. If you have a psycho fan you might be afraid for your or their life. Facebook is also known as a stalking source, I wonder how you would feel if your life was inspected under a microscope.
I recognize the claims made by Danniel Leahy and would like to point out a great quote by the author, “If the internet did not exist Ignorance still would.” You cannot make anyone interested in something they had no intention of learning, although you can make it more available. Johnson applauds this new version of the web for offering “a chance for ordinary people to converse about the local issues in their lives that the professionals largely ignore.” (446). In a democracy it is very important to hear the voices of the mass and not only the elected officials. And as Kevin Kelly says from the New York Magazine “Platforms like the Internet and Facebook, or democracy—which are intended to serve as a substrate for producing goods and delivering services—benefit from being as nonhierarchical as possible, minimizing barriers to entry and distributing rights and responsibilities equally. Wikipedia is not a bastion of equality, but it is vastly more collectivist than the Encyclopædia Britannica. The elite core we find at the heart of online collectives is actually a sign that stateless socialism can work on a grand scale.” It is possible to be nobody and achieve greatness.
With the usage of Web 2.0 you discover just how big the world is because even a simple word as ‘peace’ receives more than 330 million searches on Google. How do you find what you need? How do you read all of this information, well you don’t and so you would never know what you are missing. Solutions to these problems will come with time but it might be too late to save our society.