The Blogging Communities as a Democracy affecting Democracy

The internet has allowed for sociopolitical communication and reflective propositions on a tremendous scale. People have been able to form online communities to discuss politics in real time. There are various websites that portray different elements of society and politics as well as illuminating a certain tone or overall theme within the community. It is ironic in form because these online communities are in form the literal definition of democracy as to where it is the rule of the people for the people. It is the members of these online communities that regulate and add to the ideals of their community. Moreover, web logging communities have minimized the normal media effects of political positioning and allowed for; individual and group reflections and feedback from an array of others on certain sociopolitical issues. Governmental affairs are highly discussed in web logging communities, because it is an intangible place where the individual feels that their voice will be heard. Evidently, their voices are heard indefinitely especially within their local and online communities. Noting that these communities are not only plentiful and adverse, as well as significant to politics, Alinta Thornton states in her essay, “How are Blogs affecting local politics?”

The internet will contribute to, or even be primarily responsible for, a new era of participatory democracy and a revitalization of the public sphere.

Apparently, Thornton holds a legitimate argument. The revitalization of the public sphere is concurrent in metaphorical or analogous participatory democracies such as web logs. There is a wide array of these sites with countless opinions and reflections on democracy. A site where there is an enormous amount of informative contribution is the website Democratic Conversation: Skepticism is a virtue located at http://www.democratic-conversation.com. Mark Beyer is a citizen logged on this site that has strong political beliefs and reflects upon the upcoming presidential primary in his article written on June 28, 2007, “Who’s Next?” His article is very intelligent, cynical, and illuminates a skeptical yet liberal tone. In analysis to this representation, Beyer states:

I am an artist by temperament and intellect; I look for insight in the beauty and the grotesque as beauty as ways to explore, help define, and enjoy the human comedy. This is not so difficult, as I need only look around with ears, if not eyes, open to the environment. I came to political inspection and commentary as a by-product of my literary artistic inquiry. Again, one only need read Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, Joyce, Wharton, and Sun-Tsu to grasp the significance that art can have upon a people caught in desperate struggle with authority (as well as themselves). Also, I believe in democratic principles such as discussion, dissent, and freedom of speech.

With articles that reflect such opinions about politics, one can be lead to believe that blogs are affecting local politics. Considering the fact that a local New Yorker has the ability to express his political views within the realm of the internet in co-ordinance with many others who not only express their views but also reflect upon others, the web log has definitely shaped a democratic influence. Thornton reiterates this point when stating:

The American approach to communications research informs much of the debate and policy making surrounding the Internet. This makes an understanding of the themes in this line of theory important to any discussion of Internet as a public sphere.

Conclusively, with the amount of political census data available via data mining technologies and information aggregation, politics are substantially affected by web logs and their affiliates. The needs of the people are heard and noted and it has allowed for the increase of power in numbers. Accordingly, the government must adapt to these technologies, information, and societal needs and opinions to better suit the majority. In turn, the blog is affecting technology.

Can you see me smiling at you?

The internet has quite possibly been the greatest invention of all time. It allows for people to communicate far beyond the capabilities of prior mass communication technology. On the other hand, the internet has allowed for the increase of communication, but researchers argue that it has limited, altered, and confined the realm of a social community. According to Jay Fernback and Brad Thompson authors of Virtual Communities: Abort, Retry, Failure?

“The notion of community has been long recognized as having a central place in our social fabric. But it was T”nnies (1988/1887) who, by distinguishing between community and society (Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft), placed this enduring aspect of social relationships in the context of modernity and the concomitant degeneration of traditional social structures.”

What used to be a physical or a location community has now morphed into an online virtual community. The concept of progressive diminishment of location communities is highly relative to my own life; as to where I am on the fringe of constant communication in location communities and/or also in certain online communities. The realm of these communities has determined the relational ties that I hold now and how I build or retract upon them. An online community that I am socially tied to is Facebook. Facebook is an online community of personal weblogs, where there is constant computer-mediated-communication occurring.

I feel that this metaphorical fringe of changing communities is an indirect result of post industrialization and the increasing individualistic nature the American society upholds. When communities were more location oriented there was a higher sense of collectivism in society, where people would interact with each other in a face-to-face manner and look out for the benefits for the community as a whole. “Because of our credo of rugged individualism, America is more vulnerable than other cultures to regard social intercourse in terms of personal feelings rather than in rational or objective terms. Thus, our community, our shared sense of collective self, fails to embrace the public and instead becomes enmeshed in the cult of personality this is the manner in which social phenomena are translated into meaningful interpretations.” Due to this social stigma of the integration of CMC, the online community has become a social norm as well as an accepted form of creating and obtaining social ties. This has changed the form and functions of communication amongst social communities. Jay Fernback and Brad Thompson articulate this point stating in Virtual Communities: Abort, Retry, Failure?

“The online world of computer- mediated communication (CMC) is one of those new ways for humans to relate to one another, and it is growing rapidly.”

The social network of Facebook is a highly interactive online community and also one of the largest in the virtual world. I am a current member of this community because it helps expand and improve upon my social ties. I am not a firm believer that this is the correct approach to communicating interpersonally, but it is highly accepted within my culture and refusal of my participation would result in lack of communication causing me to become a member of the out-group. I find Facebook to be quite contradictory to the actual elements of our so called location community. Most of the interaction that occurs on Facebook is between members of the location society that we already belong to. It allows for an array of person-to-person, person-to-many, as well as many-to-many communication. An individual can write a personal message to someone or they could write on their “wall” to show other people within their social network what message is being exchanged. There are various forms of information accessible to a person’s identity on Facebook. There is information supplied in a personal profile in which anyone in the community can access. Also, there is a forum called “news feed” that allows for anyone within the social community to view almost any form of CMC that is occurring in the community. What I find to be interesting about this is that the communication that occurs between people, as well as people’s identities is entirely different than in the location community. For instance, we all communicate with the same people whether it is computer-mediated or not. The difference is that people are able to communicate with a lot more people faster on the internet than in person. It also allows for people to communicate with many others and for 3^rd party commentary on supplied information. This in form helps to increase and maintain social ties by constant communication as well as entailing the disinhibitory effect allowing for people to express themselves in a way that would not be possible by any other means.

What is bothersome about these online communities is that the kind of friendly communication that occurs online is not apparent in the real world. People communicate with one another in an entirely different manner which confines social ties. People are not as interactive or friendly. They also cannot communicate their implicit emotions as well as they can through CMC. This causes me to believe that people will soon be incapable of true face-to-face communication and will be bound to these online communities. Barry Wellman and Milena Gulia confirm this in their statement from Net Surfers Don’t ride alone: Virtual Communities as Communities, April, (1996).

“By contrast, critics worry (mostly in print, of course) that life on the Net can never be meaningful or complete because it will lead people away from the full range of in-person contact. Or, conceding half of the debate, they worry that people will get so engulfed in a simulacrum virtual reality, that they will lose contact with "real life". Meaningful contact will wither without the full bandwidth provided by in-person, in-the-flesh contact. As Texas commentator Jim Hightower warned over the ABC radio network: "While all this razzle-dazzle connects us electronically, it disconnects us from each other, having us 'interfacing' more with computers and TV screens than looking in the face of our fellow human beings."

Conclusively, while these online communities are allowing for greater forms of communication and expression, it is eliminating the amount of real world interaction between people. Simply, a person may be able to find their soul mate via internet, but in all reality it is impossible for them to fornicate and reproduce on the internet. Therefore, although the online community can expand and develop social ties, it is eliminating the amount of real world interaction which could result in the cease of face-to-face communication almost entirely.

Can UB you?

There are many identities that a person can obtain. The most tangible identity is the physical body and the forms of interpersonal communication that it executes. There is a Master Identity that portrays and evaluates an individual’s identity by its distinct and unique characteristics. In the Online Community, an individual’s identity is highly manipulative, situational, circumstantial, an arbitrarily obtainable. There are many characteristics of an individual’s online identity that can inhibit, portray, conceal, deceive, or intercept information. Therefore, an online identity “plays a key role in virtual communities. In communication, which is the primary activity, knowing the identity of those with whom you communicate is essential for understanding and evaluating an interaction. Yet in the disembodied world of the virtual community, identity is also ambiguous. Many of the basic cues about personality and social role we are accustomed to in the physical world are absent.” The University at Buffalo’s online community is a highly interactive and abstract community. There are many, channels, servers, links, nodes, interfaces, and forms of accessing the community. In addition, an individual has an online identity that is required for accessing different facets of the UB network. What is significant to this identity is that it is constantly being recorded and analyzed while an individual is simultaneously accessing, using, and portraying different elements of this identity. Furthermore, UB has a rather secure and encrypted network, but there are still means of claiming or manipulating an individual’ UBID.

“In the physical world there is an inherent unity to the self, for the body provides a compelling and convenient definition of identity.” At the University at Buffalo this physical body is what conveys the prominent aspects of one’s identity. This identity is immediately recognized as authentic and can be analyzed by a variety of resources. First and foremost one’s identity is analyzed by the everyday interactions that they make. There is their physical appearance, their portrayed perceptual lens, their constant evaluation of knowledge and skill, and the interpersonal communication that one partakes in. This identity is far more concrete and accurately evaluated than one’s online identity.

“The virtual world is different. It is composed of information rather than matter. Information spreads and diffuses; there is no law of the conservation of information. The inhabitants of this impalpable space are also diffuse, and free from the body's unifying anchor.” The UB network can portray many elements of an individual’s online identity. An individual can interact, utilize, and communicate in various forms within the realm of their online identity. One can access the UB network internally or externally creating accessibility at any computer with an internet connection in the world. Once the network is accessed an individual can execute many programs and internet applications. The most simple and commonly used identity within the network is communicated via email through the webmail application. This identity can reveal the major one is in, the professors they have, people and organizations that they belong to or they communicate with, how one travels, what items they have purchased online, banking information, as well as the style of textual format and pragmatic information that an individual uses in syntax. Another identity that is available is attainable via MyUB. The find people application can reveal the fundamentals of one’s identity such as: name, UBITname, email address, major, occupational status, and office or residential location. In addition, one’s identity can be evaluated by their utilization of Ublearns. This also can provide the information and identity conveyed above, but pertains to utilization of different applications. One can reveal their identity through the Blackboard Academic discussion board forum. One can reveal how an individual interacts with others through computer-mediated-communication. An individual can reveal their knowledge and opinions on certain matters that would not be plausible within the classroom environment due to the dis-inhibitory effect. This also allows for a more on depth analysis of another’s perspectives, cognition, and response patterns, as well as their style of writing too. This forum allows for people to view tremendously more amounts of identity information than any other means of a UB internet application. A person’s grades are reflected on an array of UB internet applications. One can reveal their study patterns through utilization of the UB network and its applications. There is an enormous amount of information conveyed within the realm of the UB network and even its affiliated networks such as Facebook.

What is relevant to this topic of internet identity; is how secure is this identity? This identity can be obtained through information provided on Facebook, which was originally for intercollegiate communication and a private social community. Facebook is now a public community where information is easily obtainable by virtually anyone. UB has an outstanding engineering department and has an extremely encrypted network proving to be rather secure. On the other hand, how authentic is this identity? On the most extreme level, one can hack into the network from any where in the world, even on campus. Moreover, if one were to obtain access to ones identity information can altered, stolen, or impersonated. If a hacker had enough talent, he could hack into the UB network through a UB computer with another’s identity and acquire limitless information or even maliciously abuse and manipulate the network and its applications. In contrast, at the lowest level of identity theft or fraudulent use of the identity is quite simple. One can access the UB network by simple obtaining someone else’s username, person number, and/or UBIT password. This information is relatively easy for almost anyone to obtain. For instance, an extremely simple way to obtain this information can be executed via daily sign-in-sheets which provide name and person number. With this information alone, even the most profoundly computer illiterate individual can access and obtain a person’s “secure” identity.

In conclusion, an online identity can be willingly or unwillingly accessed. This identity can provide far more information about someone than their physical identity but has minimal authenticity. Even on a network as profound as the UB network, an individual’s information is not only being constantly monitored and analyzed, but can be falsified and manipulated on any level of an individuals capability to do so. With this in mind; who are you?

Private Parts or Public Property?

The word privacy can hold many meanings and definitions under an array of circumstantial entities. Privacy can be unconsciously, yet voluntarily breeched by the individual’s own mishap. Alternatively, a person’s privacy can be breeched not only by friends, family and acquaintances, but also by the most powerful organizations and institutions in the world. A person’s privacy can be obtained by 3rd parties as well. Within the realm of the internet, privacy has recently become a highly debated sociopolitical issue. Privacy is defined in many ways and predominantly in co-ordinance with the stipulations at hand. More importantly, privacy is defined in a vast array, but it is a simple concept of perception of which information an individual wants to keep disclosed. “Internet privacy consists of privacy over the media of the internet: the ability to control what information one reveals about oneself over the internet, and to control who can access that information.” Many people portray privacy as a constitutional right, but unfortunately there are no strict and concise statutes defining the true rights of privacy.

The real issue at hand is whether or not people actually obtain privacy rights. There is also the possibility that hold none whatsoever. Since, the advent of mass file sharing over the internet, along with the passing of the Patriot Act as well as the Freedom of Information Act these rights have been stumped. Due to the vast information available on computer networks and the internet as a whole, people’s “private” information is being accessed, shared, and analyzed every day. Like every other sociopolitical issue there are conflicting stances. People are arbitrarily providing information about themselves all the time on the internet whether it is intentional or unintentional. To analyze the governmental and economical aspect of the issue; they argue that people are freely providing this information within the public domain and it should therefore be able to be replicated, reproduced and transmitted without the expressed written consent of the provider. This is because it had already been freely expressed. Also, there is a large dispute on the benefits of data mining technology and personal information sharing. Again, to take the elitist stance on the situation, this information not only provides the government and marketing agencies with necessary data to improve the security and the economy of the country, but it causes these organizations to market items to an individual that they hold of high interest or liking.

In my own opinion, a line must be drawn somewhere. I am not entirely against data mining and file sharing, but I do hold a strong opinion against the invasion of personal property and personal information sharing. The accessibility to someone’s personal information is ludicrous. You could type in an individual’s phone number on a search engine and receive their billing address free and immediately. Further, information such as living relatives, personal expenses, educational history, along with much more can be purchased for a few dollars. Ironically, that is just the power of an average internet user. More so, after purchasing that person’s information; the purchaser had single-handedly provided the internet site with their own IP address, their credit card information, name, address, etc. all on their own terms. The next step up in the hierarchy is governmental and business related entities. Businesses all across the world are trading, selling, and sharing information about people that the individual is completely unaware of. Furthermore, these businesses are in cohesion with the government and attain a symbiotic relationship to approaching personal information sharing. Once shared, this sort of information whether it’s an account number, and IP address, a person’s favorite place to shop, etc., the information it literally floating around the internet and even all over the world. What’s even worse, is the information that is, “legally shared,” is being hacked into everyday as well.

“This dilemma introduces another complication of how public life has changed. Just because it’s possible to get access to information, is it always OK to do so?” Why is this bad? Apparently, there are people sharing information about almost virtually everyone; even you the reader. Information as crucial and important as individual’s social security numbers, bank account numbers, and even PIN numbers are being illegally accessed and used in fraudulence. “If a third party has sufficient access to the computer, legitimately or not, this may be used to lessen the user’s privacy.” I myself became victim to this. I was always skeptical about sharing this sort of information on the internet, but since I totaled my car I found online banking and bill-pay to be extremely convenient. I then started to notice miniscule transactions appearing on my account, but thought nothing of it. After several times, I decided to keep record of all the transactions that I had made within the billing period. I came to realize that these minute transactions were not my own. What I find to be bewildering is that this would usually aggravate me beyond any tolerant threshold, but I simply accept it instead. It still continually occurs. I accept it though; because I knew from the start there was an enormous risk in providing this kind of information, but I did it anyway. To elaborate further, since these unauthorized purchases were only occurring one to three times a month of approximately one to two dollars I decided to allow it. I could have arbitrated this with my credit card provider, but felt that it would be a waste of time because I could not prove that it was not me that had made the transactions, especially since they were marked at places that I would normally go. Conclusively, if there were substantial reason to argue these purchases than I would, but I still feel that there is little I could do if anything at all. Obviously, there needs to be a stand in defending the little privacy we have or soon we may not have privacy at all.

Works Cited

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_privacy

Boyd, Danah. (2007). “Social Network Sites: Public, Private, or What?”
Knowledge Tree 13, May. http://kt.flexiblelearning.net.au/tkt2007/?page_id=28

Lackaff, Derek. (2007). “Privacy” Lecture Notes and Discussion 16, July.