Tocqueville thinks that the democracy has a shining face. It allows to find a new successor thanks to the vote system instead of using weapons. Secondly, it protects the civil and human rights of the citizens. But, a democratic system has a dark face as well. Though many wars and battles have been fought in the past in order to establish the democracy in many countries, it distrusts the talent and proclaims the mediocrity. Tocqueville explained that the democracy is based on the quantity, and not on the quality of the system. The democracy transforms the judicial equality into a tool that imposes an egalitarianism on the society. The dark face is hidden by the fact that it guarantees all people to have the same rights from the birth. However, it damages the society because it flattens the talent, knowledge and culture in favor of the equality.
The same thought is outlined by Andrew Keen in his book “The cult of the amateur”.
The revolution of the Web 2.0 is killing our culture and destroying our economy.
Andrew Keen
We are the consumers of the mainstream culture. The larger use of the Web allows a democratization of the society. Keen points out that the revolution of the Web 2.0 has caused an impoverishment of culture and the unreliability of news. The person of the year 2006 for the Time was: YOU. In the digital era the amateur has the power of taking part in building Wikipedia, of saying his or her opinion on blogs and of giving reviews of books and comments of facts. It does not matter who is behind the PC, everyone with a Internet connection has such power.
Lemann of the New Yorker wrote that society creates the authority for the production and distribution of knowledge, news and ideas. Why do they do so? Because when an article is written by an author of the Economist or Financial Times, we are aware that such article has been subject to a proper research and reviewed by a team of journalists. But, today we can read news, opinions on blogs, and web sites. Nobody is able to guarantee the reliability. In other words, the lack of filters creates an ocean of mud where false and improper news find their raison d’être. It is easy for misinformation and rumors to proliferate in cyberspace. For instance, Wikipedia attracts more users than the Encyclopedia Brittanica (which relies upon experts and scholars). For Keen, the web 2.0 distrusts the talent and proclaims the mediocrity.
Furthermore, Keen criticizes the print on demand and the vanity press such as Lulu, but at the same time he praises projects such as the Citizedium. Moreover, Keen explains that the free online press allowing to be updated and read articles is damaging the newspapers all over the world. This is why Rupert Murdoch has stated that the Sunday Times is going to be paid for its online content. It is still unclear whether the site will charge a fee for each article or a subscription system. However, what is clear is that the Sunday Times plan can be a solution for protecting the even weaker newspapers.
While I can see the point in Keen’s argument, I still believe it might be misguided to say that Web 2.0 is destroying expertise. Let me bring one recent example: Il Fatto Quotidiano, a daily newspaper that is going to be created in September in Italy, being the first newspaper without open or covert political sponsorship. A newspaper that has gathered the necessary funding from Internet users, who have shown to be willing to pay and to reward expertise, whenever they are offered a product they value.
Secondly, I mean, whenever one reads a blog, the author’s credentials also affect the credit one gives to what the blog says. In other words, I think that Keen’s argument, while possessing a grounding of truth, tries to reach too far by lumping Web 2.0 altogether as a menace to traditional media, rather than, possibly, also as a resource. However, I enjoyed your post, which brings welcome diversity of opinion.
Not to take anything from experts and scholars who have trained long hours to establish credibility, but Web 2.O offers a great opportunity to the over 95% of people who are not scholars. Don’t tell me that among this great mass there is not very specialized knowledge. The mission ought to be to empower more people with internet access so that the world can move towards being flat, to borrow the expression from Thomas Friedman.
In giving opportunities and a platform to people to express their thoughts and experiences, the common person who by the way, is not stupid, will learn to discern truth. Individuals are coming to terms that doctors are not gods and journalists are not omniscient. It was great when theological power was shifted from religious authorities with widespread publication of the Bible. Naturally, one can put a “dark face” on this authority since doctrines were used to promulgate slavery or the subjugation of women when “there is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female… in Christ Jesus” (Gal 3:28).
It is about time that individuals are empowered to better search for truth and have a resource such as Lulu.com where they can publish their own narrative rather than being left to the mercy of a subjective editor.
News will still be reported, books will still be published but everyone will have to step up and be more creative and responsible in qualifying the source of their information. I think having less of an information powerbroker will force people to interface with each other and “peer review” what they are learning. The experts and authorities will still be there and they too will do well to dig deep or give us fresh perspectives that would reflect a committed professionalism. In the end everyone benefits and we will be on the path to being a more responsible person.