The entire communication landscape has changed and will continue to do so. How it will look when the major shifts have settled into place, no one knows. But more people are going to be able to bring what they have to say to a wider audience than ever before because the gatekeepers are mostly toast. Perhaps the day of the true amateur - someone does something for the sheer love of it - is about to return. But there will always be employment of some sort for scribes, who, like the poor, we have always with us.
Who will read it all, though? I think gatekeepers will still be important, for the filtering. One can do a certain amount of filtering oneself, but I think the quality "stamp" will always be important, especially if one is reading news, opinion and speculaton on topics far from one's own area of expertise.
ReplyDeleteThe other downside is the bullying - I have lost count of how many threatening and abusive emails and invasions of my blog and privacy that have happened to me since standing up to anti-scientists. Without the Internet, they did not have so many places to go, and certainly not so publicly and instantly.
No easy answers.
Well, that is the question, Maxine. My feeling is that it's going to be a more natural process, somewhat the way time seems to favor quality. Mahler was not thought to be a great composer by most people until after 1964, his centenary year (I am proud to have been a fan long before that). One upside is that more that is good (I hope) will get through. Another downside is that more that is bad will as well. How many sides do we have now? But you're right: No easy answers.
ReplyDeleteAs for the anti-science troglodytes, just ignore them. These are people whose courage comes entirely from sitting at a keyboard. There is no excuse for not being civil and people who display a lack of civility should be give no encouragement whatever.
I think Frank is right on all counts. But so are you, Maxine. There will always be gatekeepers. But their importance and their relevance is changing. The big change in the landscape we're seeing now is the end of one period of a style of gatekeeping (people who know the history of technology and printing know that changes in technology ALWAYS change the publishing business dramatically), and we're in transition to a new style and means. I for one think the blogosphere, at its best, does exactly what Frank suggests: more people are going to be able to meet their audience directly. That's certainly been true in my own case; I've always been prolific, but the traditional gatekeepers have always closed their doors to my work. Now they can't anymore.
ReplyDeleteThe issue now is simple for me: my artistic limits are no longer set by somebody else's tastes, but my own. Face it, gatekeeping in publishing has always been biased, suffering from taste-making, fashion, and cronyism. For the moment, at least, the effect those properties have on publishing are greatly diminished. It's a breath of fresh air, at least right now.
Does this mean more crap gets through, too? Certainly. But I think Frank's idea that it will be a more natural process, with obvious quality being discovered when it often wasn't before, is true. The true democratization means that people get to decide for themselves, rather than have to be told by whatever gatekeeper what's good and what isn't.
It's a complex system, and it's still shaking itself. There may not be any easy answers, but in fact the system itself is not that hard to comprehend, if you step back to get an overview, and apply a little chaos theory to your overview. Think of the present day as the turbulence layers as the system transitions from a lower energetic state to a higher energetic state. Think McLuhan (boy, would he have loved fractals and chaos theory!).
There will always be trolls. But it's perhaps easier for the angels now to be heard, too.