Peer Production: Difference between revisions
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[[User:Gary Brown|Gary Brown]] ([[User talk:Gary Brown|talk]]) 20:14, 20 April 2015 (EDT) | [[User:Gary Brown|Gary Brown]] ([[User talk:Gary Brown|talk]]) 20:14, 20 April 2015 (EDT) | ||
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While reading Eric Von Hippel’s Democratizing Innovation, particularly the passage about windsurfing, I was reminded of the first in-depth article I read about Twitter. I started my own account in January of 2009, but I rarely used it until that summer when I read an in-depth article about it in Time magazine. The article described how Twitter users – not the software team – developed the concept of the hashtag, as well as trending topics. Since that time, these innovations have more or less come to define Twitter as we know it. I specifically remember a quote likening Twitter’s use innovation to a group of people buying a toaster and transforming it into a microwave. This article was directly responsible for my increased usage of Twitter. At a time when Facebook was making sweeping changes to its platform, often to the dismay of its users, the idea of Twitter’s user-based innovation felt refreshing, democratic, and empowering. | |||
What I was feeling is similar to what Yochai Benkler described about Wikipedia: that it has given us "a way of looking at the world around us and seeing the possibility of effective human cooperation, on really complex, large projects, without relying on either market or government processes” (of course, Twitter itself relies on the market, but its users do not necessarily). I was also struck by James Surowiecki’s arguments for the wisdom of crowds. I often fall into a trap of thinking that large groups succumb to the lowest common denominator or develop a mob mentality. However, the way Twitter users make use of hashtags should constantly be reminding me of the opposite. Consistently over the past several years, users have redefined media narratives that have traditionally excluded certain voices. For example, the #yesallwomen and #blacklivesmatter hashtags have given voices to women and African Americans and have launched conversations around gender and race in society in productive ways. It seems like I constantly hear about how the Internet makes us secluded, narcissistic, and vapid, so it was encouraging to read about the ways large numbers of users contribute to the public good through peer production. | |||
[[User:Beccalew|Beccalew]] ([[User talk:Beccalew|talk]]) 12:05, 21 April 2015 (EDT) | |||
Revision as of 11:05, 21 April 2015
April 21
Although the point may seem obvious now, one of the Internet’s most powerful attributes is how it can facilitate the social production of information or computing. From the earliest experiments with dividing memory-intensive tasks amongst different computers, to modern efforts to crowdsource solutions to challenging or urgent problems, peer production is a major benefit from our networked world. And it raises some interesting questions of both Internet control and production theory: How much hierarchy and control is needed to produce? How good is the material that peer production creates? Are there types of things that should not be produced by the crowd? What are the risks to producers and society inherent to peer production?
Joining us this week is Berkman Fellow SJ Klein.
Assignments
Assignment 4 is now due on April 28th, but they will be accepted if turned in today. You can submit your assignment here.
Readings
- Development from the edges
- Eric Von Hippel, Democratizing Innovation (Chapter 1, focus on pages 1-3 and 13-15, skim rest)
- Development as a crowd
- Jerome Hergeaux, Cooperation in a Peer Production Economy: Experimental Evidence from Wikipedia (video, watch from beginning to 47:50)
- Yochai Benkler, News, Information and the Wealth of Networks (video, watch from 8:32 to 26:07)
- if you’re not familiar, you may want to spend a little time looking at Wikipedia’s entry on Seti@home.
- Crowd intelligence
- James Surowiecki, The Wisdom of Crowds (read excerpt)
Optional Readings
- Jonathan Zittrain, Minds for Sale (video, watch all)
Videos Watched in Class
Links
Class Discussion
Hey all, I'm screening the NYT at work this week and came across two articles that I thought would be relevant to share here:
Fighting homelessness with smartphones (a case for why technology has become a basic need): http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/15/upshot/fighting-homelessness-one-smartphone-at-a-time.html?abt=0002&abg=1
Europe formally challenges Google's dominance in web searches: http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/16/business/international/european-union-google-antitrust-case.html
Enjoy!
Thumbs up for Zittrain Video
I usually post quite late, just before class, in case I think of something profound. Today I am posting early, firstly because experience has taught me profundity is unlikely in the hours remaining, and secondly to leave enough time that you might follow my thumbs-up for the Jonathan Zittrain Minds for Sale Video in the Optional Readings section of today’s assignment page. It is a little over 90 minutes, but I wish it were longer. It illuminates many of the questions I wrote in the margins of my notes on the other readings.
I was particularly interested in the discussion about the unusual world we are creating for ourselves as we begin to employ diverse human resources to perform tiny increments of work in return for pennies, points in a game, or nothing at all. Zittrain touches on the many imaginative ways that peer production, including the gamification of peer production, is employed. He asks whether our children will spend their leisure time making a few more dollars on their phones, rather than being a part of real/live activities. It is a fascinating discussion, very well presented.
I highly recommend venturing into this optional reading activity even if you don’t usually go there. If this subject area is at all interesting to you, Zittrain’s video is worthwhile.
Gary Brown (talk) 20:14, 20 April 2015 (EDT)
While reading Eric Von Hippel’s Democratizing Innovation, particularly the passage about windsurfing, I was reminded of the first in-depth article I read about Twitter. I started my own account in January of 2009, but I rarely used it until that summer when I read an in-depth article about it in Time magazine. The article described how Twitter users – not the software team – developed the concept of the hashtag, as well as trending topics. Since that time, these innovations have more or less come to define Twitter as we know it. I specifically remember a quote likening Twitter’s use innovation to a group of people buying a toaster and transforming it into a microwave. This article was directly responsible for my increased usage of Twitter. At a time when Facebook was making sweeping changes to its platform, often to the dismay of its users, the idea of Twitter’s user-based innovation felt refreshing, democratic, and empowering.
What I was feeling is similar to what Yochai Benkler described about Wikipedia: that it has given us "a way of looking at the world around us and seeing the possibility of effective human cooperation, on really complex, large projects, without relying on either market or government processes” (of course, Twitter itself relies on the market, but its users do not necessarily). I was also struck by James Surowiecki’s arguments for the wisdom of crowds. I often fall into a trap of thinking that large groups succumb to the lowest common denominator or develop a mob mentality. However, the way Twitter users make use of hashtags should constantly be reminding me of the opposite. Consistently over the past several years, users have redefined media narratives that have traditionally excluded certain voices. For example, the #yesallwomen and #blacklivesmatter hashtags have given voices to women and African Americans and have launched conversations around gender and race in society in productive ways. It seems like I constantly hear about how the Internet makes us secluded, narcissistic, and vapid, so it was encouraging to read about the ways large numbers of users contribute to the public good through peer production.