Hi,

I hope you don't mind if I first suggest that you ought to post your comment as a full blog - so it gets seen by more folks. Second, can I ask where you are from, and you mention being a programmer - is it your job? 

There are many things you had to say I would love to talk with you about. But online - well, there are limits. Can I made two recommendations if you haven't already seen them: A book called The Shallows, just recently out, and another called You Are Not A Gadget. Neither are perfect - of course. But both are quite informative and bracing...

When you say you agree with my conclusion that online technology is playing a sinister role - I think we have to be careful about what the culprit is. For me, the technology is the capacity to flow information incredibly cheaply, widely, for easy access, and to store it in massive easily accessed volumes, also cheaply. These capacities are good, in my view. 

At the next level, and here I think already it is largely not technological capacity per se, but largely social relations and roles and the like, imposed on the technology - we have things like the specific types of protocol, etc. Then next, there are the designs and even cultures of use that have emerged, operating systems, web norms, etc. Finally, there are individual's choices while online. 

To me the culprit is neither the last - individual's choices while online (though some are terrible and other admirable) - nor the first the technological capacities (which could be used admirably).  The problems lie, instead, in the socially mediated aspects...

The more I read about it, the more I tend to agree that the cost isn't just a big and perhaps crushing hit on attention span, but is also a hit on "all the sort of slow "thinking" processes that sort of go on in the background seem to be affected as well." I think also there is due to the flitting and fragmenting, and also perhaps due to some of the underlying attitudes about computing, a subtle kind of degradation of that which is not digital. An extreme example - when people say they have a thousand friends - on Facebook or whatever - what is it doing to the meaning of being a friend? 

So, when you say, "are those ills inherent to the technology or are they just an unfortunate outgrowth of the way it is being put to use ? I find it very hard to separate the two, in reality," I know what you mean, I think. And sometimes it can be what we tend to call the technology - or what seems like that - as in, say, the electric chair, or the corporate assembly line, or nuclear bombs. They each have intrinsic horrendous attributes. Yet, are these really technology per se? Maybe it is a moot debaters point, but it isn't electricity or chairs that is the problem, nor sharing tasks to get things done better, nor even means to plumb the very small and aggregate the results, say. It is, in fact, the structured almost completely social choices. Technical artifacts can be pure bad as in it is virtually unavoidable in using them - or highly likely to be used for bad - or pretty neutral, or more likely to be good, or nearly impossible to use for bad, and so on. I don't know if there are congealed, locked in attributes that call into question things like unix, say, or the use of files for data, say, or internet protocols, say. Maybe. I am pretty sure, there are many elements of the social uses being made, which are close to locked in, that are quite bad. That's where I suspect we need to act.

There are other even more confusing/troubling examples. Investigation arrives at some technical insight - midi transfer or music, the familiar typists keyboard, the use of files for information storage, and many many others, which get locked in by being used incredibly often, incredibly tightly with other choices, to the point where no alternatives have a chance to emerge even in thought, much less widespread practice. Then, it can be essentially a technical choice that becomes a problem due to its implications for use and users. 

I think we agree about all this. What I think I am referring to in worrying about current networking, etc., more than anything else, is the social practices and software tools and their interconnections which are collectively coming to dominate communications of digital information and even more or less imperially, spreading into all communications, and, to an extent, dominate even the habits and attitudes people adopt bearing on communications use. I think what is called social networking - but is actually one particular very way of interacting socially online - and not the only possible way - as well as what now dominates our approach to browsing and thus creating sites as well (and I think it is quite different than the early days of the internet and again, not the only way things could be done) and finally, our evolving ways of messaging, also not inevitable - are all together doing a number on quite a lot of what it means to be a functioning and effective person. And I think much of what it is doing is bad, perhaps very bad.

It is true that the internet was born of military desires for communications even during nuclear attack - but I don't think the early days were marked by top down control that tried to bend online activity to serve elite needs and interests. At least not overly much or overly effectively. But more recently, yes, I would agree that such pressures have become very very strong, even as people ironically often seem to think they are completely absent, or almost. 

I quite agree that computers will of course be used to control workforces, and are being used for that. You say, "Industrial technology playing its ugly part in estranging us from ourselves and fellow human beings for the benefit of the powerful few is hardly a new development. But the ubiquity and centrality of online devices makes for a big leap forward. In societies that already suffer from a revolutionary lack of sociality, it's looking more and more like the final step to complete isolation. We have a mass of online acquaintances, yet we are mostly alone and atomised, with almost no control over our real lives. Nobody knows what happens to a society where most people spend most of their spare time staring at a display, but a democratic, participatory revolution it surely isn't. I sense that the inordinate hopes about what we might achieve through industrial technological means is to many of us becoming like the belief that capitalism will collapse all by itself one day soon: a warm fuzzy delusion." And I think what you say here, from your experience, is wise and insightful. But left and mainstream advocates of the current uses of the internet will see the sentiment as ludicrous if extended to things like Facebook and Tweeter - as compared to being confined to oversight uses by owners, etc. They will say, they like your motives, but think you are critical of one of the few elements of modern life which could be helpful in fulfilling them and overcoming atomism, elitism, etc. Who is right? Sadly, I have recently come to think you are - about what now exists and what is now being done, overall, online. But I think they are right about what could exist and what could be done, online - and I suspect you would agree about that, too. The trouble is, online they - we all - are overwhelmingly ratifying what is, not critiquing it and building what could be, day to day.

As you say, "the switching back and forth becomes the main job." I can feel it happening, too. Yes, it is anecdotal, but enough anecdotes, coupled to an explanation of how they arise that is quite plausible, starts to become very worrisome. Add the recent experiments showing the anatomical basis for it all - literally seeing and charting it in action - and the case starts to look rather solid, however contrary, to many people's impressions or beliefs.

When you describe seeing the implications all over - me too - recently. And yet, I don't want to lump everything - so, it seems to me there is something quite different about the comment you wrote reacting to my blog post - and a series of tweets, or notices of what you are doing - which in turn calls itself friendship no less. And yes, I would agree, that in context, even the good that occurs online can crowd out, rather than aid, the better that needs to occur face to face. That has troubled me for a long time.

Your comments about why no Z's in various places - are provocative. I don't know what to make of them...

You close by writing: "Can people with a progressive streak take out more out of online technology than it takes out of them ? With the lifestyles many of us lead in the radically impoverished culture of the industrialised world, i fear we might not, because this technology needs a solid cultural basis to be harnessed and it takes a (real) life to acquire that. At best, it is something we are stuck with and have to make the best we can of. I sometimes still think the redeeming potential of online technology is there. I am grateful for Zcom, for example; at the very least, it is an experiment worth pursuing and learning from. To do that, we should not shy away from asking questions of purpose and means. Its easy to take a middle-of-the-road stance on things we mostly do not comprehend, but that typically gets us nowhere. Facebook vs Civilisation ? Sounds right."

And so we keep investigating!

Hi Jason - 

I heard London is under the weather - cold weather - has it gotten any warmer...you doing okay with it?

You write, "Are there harmful effects of using social networking sites like facebook? yes. Is facebook precipitating the end of civilization? no, I don't think so." 

Well, it depends on how we use the word - what I meant is that it may propel a kind of devolution of social prospects and possibilities...a step back...

> I think currently the benefits of online social networking far outweigh the costs. 

Maybe - I hope so - I thought so too, like you and others, without any qualms about the balance, at all - until recently. 

> We are only discussing the negative aspects here and it is definitely disturbing how many hours a day kids spend on facebook and also the type of banal shallow content that characterizes most of the exchanges but I think it is  a question of moderation. 

The question is does the current institutional array of options cause more and more use and orient the use that occurs to snippets and to moving fast - and by way of this to pretty much more and more banality and even a generalized loss of attention span that then pushes the dynamic even more forcefully? If so, then asking for less use, more substance, and retained or enlarged attention span, with our current arrangement of institutional structures, may be like asking for markets to generate less anti sociality... simply impossible - though we can mitigate some bad effects - unless the structures are dramatically changed.

> Spending hours a day hooked on facebook that takes away time from having real face to face conversations and pursuing more fulfilling pursuits is a bad thing but doesn't the same apply with watching t.v. or playing video games?

Yes. And the difference I have been suggesting, is that the current arrangement of how we interact with information online may have a trajectory toward more and more use of snippets - that's even what google calls them.

I find the games almost horrifying - they get more and more realistic to the point kids are shooting and making bloody what looks like real people, and in new versions even is images of actual people - Castro, for example. This is horrible, but the games actually have kids focussing attentively and are not, i think, part of what I am worrying about in the blog. In fact, I think the gaming market that involves long games that require real focus, may take a big downswing due to what I am talking about - with new games that involve snippets - little encounters and then again, and again - little sustained concentration, etc. will rise.

> Since we live in societies that breed individualistic, self-centered behaviour i think this is being reflected on the online medium. 

Yes, that would have been my take too - that it isn't the actual arrangement of motives and structures and social relations and even design in internet information engagements doing the damage, but rather people - due to other institutional structures - bringing their habits from elsewhere and as a result not using the available options as well as they might. But now I am thinking no matter who you are, the snippet dynamic - facebook, twitter, but also even much of browsing as it is currently done, tends to have serious and snowballing negative effects on us...

> I recently read a study in the American Scientist magazine published in the journal of Cyberpsychology, Behaviour And Social Networking which concluded that heavy Facebook users 'are insecure, narcissistic and have low self-esteem'. (Narcissim is defined as 'a pervasive pattern of grandiosity, need for admiration, and an exaggerated sense of self-importance'.) The study says that facebook provides an ideal setting for narcissists to monitor their appearance and how many 'friends' they have and thrive on 'shallow' relationships while avoiding genuine warmth and empathy.

It sounds plausible, though I think the even bigger point is that it may well breed that, as well, and amplify it, etc., though this wasn't what I was talking about in the blog post. I am reading lots of studies - showing diverse disconcerting things, for example, if you look at a flow of announcements fifty or a hundred times a day - and you are trying to get others to pay attention to your snippets - you even start to do things or not, based on whether you think you can tweet successfully about them, or not. There are lots of pernicious effects...yes. 

> Although these aspects are worrying, I am not yet convinced whether interacting over long periods of time with short bursts of information such as with facebook or twitter updates is causing a serious physiological change in people's brains and affecting our attention spans. You may be right about this but I think we will have to wait and see what the evidence shows us in more studies.

Well, for certainty, sure we need more evidence - or so I thought when I wrote the piece, basically hoping some folks would take up the implied investigative and reporting task - but sadly I have started looking within the limited time I have for it, and there is a lot more evidence than I anticipated finding. And what is perhaps most indicative is that the people who dwell on these matters deeply and make bets based on them - so to speak - are making decisions about tv, ads, print, the direction of investments in diverse info companies, etc., increasingly seem to be taking for granted that snippets will attract eyes far better than anything substantial... so that even book publishers are starting to think like that... it seems - and thus commences the snowballing on an even larger scale.

>> "Indeed, even the left sites start to think, we have to mimic the big boys who are succeeding. We have to compete on their turf. Fast, faster, fastest. Short, shorter, shortest, as even left users start to gravitate to venues that can and will deliver the largest crowd doing the least with their minds - the snippet twitting venues."

> Can you give some examples of left sites that are doing this and you think are on a wrong trajectory? 

Maybe ZCom. I am not sure. We are certainly trying to create a social community that involves networking - which would be a great thing to achieve - obviously we didn't want to create vapidity - but that was about the only attribute (other than what we can't afford) that we were ruling out, and ads, of course - but it may be that we need to think more about this...

Even regarding just the display of info - I think we are all perhaps becoming part of the problem - yet individually it is very hard to break from it. Pages that have lots of links and compartmentalized offerings - plus with stuff automatically changing even as people look, and even just lots of links to take people to new places, all of it, studies show, requires people to allot some of their mental space to decide, even if not overtly, do I go, or do I stay - instead of just focusing on reading - seem to be part of the problem. 

I am not sure Jason. I raised it all as a question, albeit one which was causing me to worry a lot - as I indicated. But it is certainly the case that statistics on the average amount of time people are on individual pages on the internet are incredible - and if everyone did the average - having a site like ours would be completely pointless. You can't get anything that seriously contributes to social change from a page in fifteen seconds... Okay, of course many people spend longer - but you get my point. What if our designs are helping to promote that kind of browsing, not the kind of serious critical thought we desire? And what if the alternative to contributing to the problem is not existing at all?

So why might we gravitate to approaches that are in reality contrary to our content aims? Well, if everyone is becoming totally acclimated to those approaches, and to those ways of engaging, providers like us switch not maliciously, but to make sure to attract and retain eyes on the site - even if barely momentarily on each page on the site. We think more about getting people to look, and look again, then we do about the duration of attention that will be given to that which matters - because the duration is zero if people aren't looking at all. And so the appearance and functionality and packaging of content all starts to change...

> Here I think the opposite in that I think we should be taking what is good from websites like facebook. I think we have moved on significantly in terms of our understanding of human computer interaction and how to design and layout content. Left sites should be just as easy to use, with a good layout and organisation of content. Websites and also magazines (the advertising aside) are way better designed now then they were 15 years ago. As we have already discussed a left alternative to facebook that uses similar features that facebook has and is also easy to use but that instead focusses on interesting content and political organising should have enormous potential.

Well, we may have to differ about what the underlying logic is - at least - and maybe the whole claim. The issue is NOT ease of use. But a good layout and organization is part of the issue, to be sure - good for what? I would say I am pretty confident, in fact almost certain, that you are wrong about magazines having better design through the years - unless you say, better for people going through quickly, seeing a ton of ads, not leaving the whole venue, etc. They get better at causing that, for sure. They test test test and opt for what works - but their definition of a magazine or a site working - succeeding - and mine, couldn't be more different.

I bet if you look at something like Rolling Stone say - I noticed that was in the racks in London so maybe you have seen it - fifteen years ago, or twenty, and now - the biggest change will be a trend toward lots and lots of short stuff, pages with many nugget size options, and at the same time many fewer long and substantive pieces. Plus mpre space given to ads - that are indeed fancier, etc. Why is that better? I think it is because the big guys care about sales, and ad revenue - and not communications - but, I am sorry, they say they care about communication, and this is how to do it, and we, well, tend to believe them for some reason. 

Newsweek, in the U.S. actually tried to mimic the web almost entirely, and failed, so they went back to a much slower trend toward snippets, etc. They just couldn't fully match sites in print... and trying to lost them more than it gained, or so say the reports I read. But the drift is there - leading toward sites and print (to the extent the latter even persists) conveying info as snippets and nuggets and with lots of things to constantly be choosing among getting people moving as much as possible - and with steadily less possibility of, and actuality of, serious immersed reading - and so on. 

I think programmers, designers, and users ought to closely consider this observation - facebook, google, twitter, etc. don't give a flying fuck about communicating information for edification or for inspiration or for moral uplift, and so on. In fact, they would be horrified if that kind of thing actually happened in a big way. Instead, they care about profits, which are largely but not exclusively a matter of the largest number of people they can attract seeing as many ads as possible and liking them, which means not being in a mindset antithetical to liking them - sometimes also the direct sale of stuff, etc. Even for sites that don't have those type cares but much better agendas - they deal with an audience that has habits and expectations born of endless interactions in the larger corporate domains. The corporate sites want people to move, to keep looking, scanning, jumping. And they care about maintaining their ability to accrue their profits, as well, which bears on content choices but also causes them to be fine with the results in diminished attention span they are seeing, and to even work hard to appeal to it and exploit it. And if this picture is correct - and to me at least the broad motives ought to be, on the left, not even in a smidgen in doubt - then why wouldn't we take for granted as a guiding assumption that the big corporations are not in fact designing and inventing on behalf of communication flow and comprehension, but on behalf of profits and the reproduction of profits - and why wouldn't we then look at their choices highly critically, at least? 

This last part, I have always thought, and still think - they want to amass databases about people - gargantuan stores of information that can enhance ad revenues and perhaps other things as well...that's vile. They want to sell people to other corporations, like themselves. That's vile. People on the left sometimes talk about these companies as if they are somehow interested in good ends or as if their giant research efforts are neutral in motivation, or positive - I just don't get any of that. 

Again, I will write try to write more clearly, and offer more evidence, in another blog, in awhile...

But for now there are two different things that are possible areas of focus in these discussions, I think - 

Are the big information companies disgusting pursuers of profit and power - like in other domains - and does this have huge effects on their choices, which then ripple through the whole internet? This much should be utterly obvious to any serious leftist.

Are their byproduct unintended effects of interacting with information in the manners that have become very widespread which have a dynamic of their own, that makes the above obvious truism much worse? This is the part that is still unclear - and which I hope is false - though sadly, the more I look, the more it seems true to me, almost glaringly true. 

I have been recuperating from eye surgery - thus the delay in rssponding. I am afraid I will have to be breif, too...I just can't do this long, yet. 

You are certainly correct that different society - better - would yield different technologies, often. 

We would see many things basically as they are now - think fire, wheels, pencils, various clothes, medicines, building tools, etc. etc. etc. and yet some things may never have been created at all - think electric chairs, nuclear weapons, tasers, but also perhaps (and certainly in their current form) assembly lines, and so on and so forth.

Nothing here we don't agree about...

The example of creating technology aimed to increase output while weakening workers, rather than to increase output even more while however, strengthening workers - is an obvious and very important instance of social relations contouring the pursuit of, and rejection of, technologies, reflecting both capital and coordinator interests - sure.

Your take on Z's effort at social relations matches ours - but is, as yet, unfulfilled, I think...

> It is worrying, isn't it ? We have seen this happen to the concepts involved in work and production to the point that, for many people, it is hard to even think of a job as something that implies free and creative action or collective decissionmaking as an actual possibility. Now this evolution seems to have squarely carried over into the area of non-work relations, with things like friend, conversation, group and such at risk of devolving.

Indeed...sadly so.

> That's indeed how i understood your essay. I concur about the early days of the internet, too. I hear myself sounding like an old fart for saying this, but i do think that there were many engaging and hopeful features in internet use that have slowly grown marginal over the past 10-15 years. It's not that they are no longer there, but one has to look for them.

Yep...

For the rest of your comments, I think we mainly agree - and while it is perhaps a reflection of my liking your insights - I suggest you do some more writing...

Matt,

> I read the main theme of your blog post as saying something like "Modern communications technology (cell phones, the internet, email, facebook, etc.) is causing shorter attention spans.  This is bad because it will make everyone stupid and unable to concentrate on things they should be concentrating on.  Eventually most people will not be able to read a book or even watch TV, thus civilization will end."

Why would you put words in my mouth, even putting quote marks around them, instead of just quoting what I actually said, I wonder... though I would never and did not utter the above sentence...

> I also gather that this is from a gut feeling you have, and from some reading you have done, as you do talk about experiments and "flitting" but I don't know what experiments you are referencing.  After reading your blog post, I read a Wikipedia entry on attention span, and a few articles about whether or not social media is, in fact, causing shorter attention spans.  The answer: nobody knows, but there might be a little bit of evidence for it.  Which is hardly surprising, given that this is a social science question.

Yes. There is a book recently published I will get the name for it and post tomorrow - I can't now. Got to rush, I am afraid...

> (1) How do we even know that "attention span" can be influenced by environment?  Maybe it is intrinsic.  Again, who knows?

Well, what can I say - I reported, I think, if I remember right, the the recent studies. Since it was just a blog post, I didn't get formal about it. People are saying it about themselves all over, including in replies here.. I can even feel it in myself. I can see it in others. 

> (2) One thing I think we do know is:  people have greater attention spans for things they are interested in.  If something interests me, I pay more attention to it.  So with this in mind, let's look at your relatives on thanksgiving, who are "tweeting" instead of conversing properly.  Could it be that they are interested in what their friends are tweeting? Probably.  

Honestly, not really. What they were doing is jumping form thing to thing - when I asked them if they thought their time spent doing these things was hurting their attention span. One said no. The other two said yes, dramatically. When I asked why they did it, one said free choice, interest, and so on. The other two said, to keep up...

And so on. Including asking them about use in school, etc.

> Perhaps they find what their friends are tweeting as more interesting than the people around them. 

They were watching football, about which they are incredibly interested - which is no problem for me. But they couldn't focus on it, kept switching what they were doing.

> This is obviously rude, but also probably true.  It's like you can have a conversation with someone who is not there and may be saying something cool, or you can have a conversation with someone who is there.  What's more fun?  Depends on your surroundings.

I really really hope I am wrong and you are right - or the others who are doubting the ill effects being substantial. But I don't think so.

I used to think the only real problem with it all was the rude or anti social dynamic, which would no doubt get worked out in time, and which there are many worse and more powerful sources of, in any case. But then came the worry about a kind of downward spiral cementing this type behavior in place...

> Does this mean that they have lesser attention spans?  Not necessarily.  Possibly they are just bored by their surroundings and find their cellphone less boring.  And cell phones are darned interesting.  If I am bored with my math homework, I can stare off into space, if that is my only option.  If my computer is near, I can surf the web instead of doing my math homework.  Either way, my attention span is the same

I am not sure that this can really be resolved in a post. I guess we would need to watch say a roomful of students for a week - maybe see what happens if they didn't do any of this stuff for two weeks, and then did again, and so on. One can think up lots of things to check. I would suggest it would be good to do. My guess is, it has been done. My guess is it shows pretty much what I fear - maybe worse. .

> What cell phones do, is, I think, give us another option of something to do when we are bored.  

Maybe - they also turn a lot of people into isolated atoms, only able to or willing to communicate via little phones - putting a bit of exaggeration on it. And there is the incredible rudeness - people talking into them at high volume, etc etc. None of this stuff ever caused me more than minor concern.

> Also, it's like there is someone else in the room who you can pay attention to, someone that is "tweeting" you.  Checking your phone in the middle of thanksgiving dinner doesn't necessarily mean you have a worse attention span, but it means you are rude.  It doesn't mean that they  would be unable to read a book if put in aroom with only a desk, chair and a book and nothing else.

No, it doesn't mean that - but If I ask them, and I have, and they tell me the effect is what I reported - well that has some weight. If I look around and see it all over. If studies verify it. If books sales verify it. If the type of use, flitting about, seems to steadily grow...well...I notice. Perhaps I am just being paranoid...

> What to do?  Well, I try not to be rude, and I inform others that they are being rude.  I don't allow cell phones to be turned on in my classroom, and take them away if students are text messaging.   

That may be good, or may not, I don't know. I don't think it is obvious though I think I would do similarly - but in college you can't and I am told they are ubiquitous in college classrooms. I think what would be vastly better in any event, and may be the only thing that will have a real effect, is if the young people develop a different attitude about texting, tweeting, etc. 

> Again, the fact that they are texting does not mean they have a lesser attention span or that their attention span capability is decreasing, it could just mean that there is something interesting in thier pocket, more intersting than science 10.  In general, it's possible to deal with this in society, like interfering with wireless signals by jamming devices that go on at the start of class and off at the end of class (this was tried in a school in Cnada, but found to be illegal for some reason).  If people are addicted, then they can take measures to deal with it, like overwieght people can take measures to exercise more.

I am not sure the upshot of the above...

> How likely is this explanation?  Looks as good as yours, but who knows?  To me it seems like a pretty reasonable explanation.  My guess, (which is worth as much as the next guy) is that there might be some small effect on attention span, but what I point to is the more likely factor (i.e. a mix of the two).

Well, if it is what you are saying it is better than if it is what I am saying. So I hope you are right. 

> So my conclusions? (1)  This is a subject we can't possibly know the answer to at this time.  (2)  There is another explanation, namely that facebook, etc. is just plain fun, and funner than many "real" situations, and attention spans are not worsening.  (3)  If attention spans are not worsening, then civilization is not ending, at least not because of attention span, but could end tommorow due to nuclear weapons.

All true. But I remain worried. Sorry.

> If I am right, and I don't know if I am, that does not mean that there are no problems.  For one, people are working longer for the same or less pay because of cell phones, where other workers and your boss can communicate with you outside of work, leaving less personal time.  People are being rude by not paying attention to those in front of them.  And people are being distracted due to the prescence of cell phones, which hurts their ability to concentrate in class, etc. And then there's privacy issues due to facebook, etc.

All true again, important, but not what has me worried, at the moment...

Hi,

> I also feel like the internet has decimated my attention span.

Funny, at the moment, it is decimating my schedules - he he....

> But I wonder about two things:

> - The technology is relatively cheap (so that even some poor people in this country have access to it) but compared to the billions on the planet, I think we are concerned with a relatively narrow slice. The US, Europe, and some narrow sector of the domestic elites in the periphery.

Actually, I think the internet is spreading quite rapidly, now - though I am not sure about the stats. Of course there is still an imbalance. Part of me feels like if it is true that social networking and text messaging and so on destroy attention span, then if it was confined tot he rich and empowered - over time it would have a redistributive effect. But I suspect it isn't so. My guess is that the really rich and privileged - in the private schools, and what not - use this stuff, but much less, and more often for substantive exchange. I don't know that, but it would not surprise me.

But, in any event, again, I am not talking about the internet per se - the fact that the world gets inexpensively wired up for the display and transfer of information. I am talking about the institutionalization that is occuring in diverse facets of that growth - and particularly, at the moment, about the part of it all that is about socially interacting, I guess one might call it. 

> - All of this is energy-intensive. As the price of energy rises (which it is inexorably doing) some things will have to give, and eventually the energy intensive servers and electrical appliances will become too expensive for all this froth. Perhaps 50 years from now, perhaps 100, but that's it. eventually, will energy expense will force people off the net?

Well, again I don't have any special knowledge but my guess is the energy and other costs of massive communications is a tiny fraction of the energy and other costs of other types of activity and service. It is nothing next to cars, say, and the entire infrastructure supporting them.

Brian, Hi.  

I don't know enough about fontal lobes - my guess is they are in the front and that's the end of my knowledge - to comment on observations about them.

I suspect you are quite right that TV, whatever its potentials, crowds out much conversation. Thus regarding that time spent, we become adept at watching a little window, but not so much at conversing. The same thing, and it seems to me even much more so, is now perhaps happening due to these other practices. And the difference is, this time I think it may have a built in slippery slope due to actual material effects on our minds.

I don't know about the extent to which families manage to control the time their kids spend on messaging, mobile phoning, face book viewing, etc. etc. From what I have been told, it is very hard to do. If, as I hear, high schools and colleges are full of students who are more focused on two inch screens than on serious lectures or multi person study sessions and discussions - how much chance do parents have - assuming they too are not plugged in?

What seems true to me is that it is very very hard to escape this type involvement alone - but vastly easier to do so if there is a collective attitude developed. 

Think of smoking. When people tried individually to kick it against the practices of their environment, friends, etc. - to save their lives and the lives of those in the vicinity, and their kids, and so on - they much more often than not failed. When critique of smoking became collective, however - so there was a widespread general attitude supporting dumping smoking - so that doing so was part of a social phenomenon, and had support, and wasn't constantly subverted by running into cigarette ads and packages and smoke and so on - the habit was widely beaten, relatively quickly - I am talking about the U.S.

There is a lot to be learned from that, I think.

I suspect that dealing with the flitting issue - if it is a real issue on remotely the level I suggest - may well require a similar generalized response if it is to make any progress. What we who are concerned can do, meanwhile, is to (a) try to provide insights that can fuel that collective reaction, and (b) try to show that the positive benefits of networking and communicating at a distance via mobile devices, can be had without committing a kind of collective mental suicide...to put it starkly. 

Hi Marcelo,

> I believe I have mixed reactions to this post, and therefore not haven't been able to position my thoughts properly on this subject yet. However, some things I believe social networking is good for are being missed by you, Michael, and I will try to demonstrate a few.

Hmmm. Why do you say they are being missed? This was a blog about problems, not benefits, current or potential - not including benefits, at least not including them much, doesn't mean I don't see them. 

> Distance: People say the Internet has this funny thing of getting you far away from closed ones, but closer from far way ones. And that is precisely true, at least for me. 

An interesting formulation and one that is mixed, clearly. But now you are talking about the internet writ large - and I am talking about flitting from thing to thing, short bursts of "communication," etc. 

> Relatives and friends I haven't had a chance to talk a long time ago are available on Facebook and other social networking channels, while those tools sometimes keep me apart from my own wife. This may seem very weird but I am sure it happens to everyone, not just me. 

Actually, there is growing concern that facebook is a marriage buster. That is, people are finding folks they went out with in high school, etc., and they are curious, get in touch, commune, and the tensions induced destroy marriages. This I did not call a problem - and I don't think it is. This is actually something - facebook - facilitating connecting. 

Facilitating connecting is in my view not a bad thing, and indeed, is a good thing. Marriages failing because people interact seriously with more people - isn't to my mind a bad thing, either, honestly.

What I am saying is bad is if folks look at facebook on and off all day, flitting around from short focus to short focus. That's the worst. What is also bad is if the communications via messaging and facebook, etc., are short and gossipy and not much beyond that.

> Is it good, bad? Hard to say. 

Here you are having at least some doubts about what I think is a benefit, not a debit...

> Availability: I personally believe this is the most important one, the one that gave social networking such an important place in humanity in such small time, or faster than anything else before needed to make part of our lives. Until a few years ago we used to socialize face to face, maybe making a phone call or writting a letter. Unless the later, both parties would need to be available for such socialization event to happen, become true. Letters would not expect that to happen but their response time was just too slow. 

You are right this is the big innovation - but is it good, overall? The speed means the communication is choppy, each time, and somehow it seems people become so acclimated to speed and brevity that they start to have them substitute for everything else, rather than just be an occasional augmentation to everything else.

> Then, e-mail came to give us some hand on it. But e-mailing a lot of friends at once to talk about some interesting news you have wasn't very attractive. Social networking sites rocketed to the air just because it is almost real time, without requiring both sides to be available. Wasn't that good enough, it is as if you wanted to socialize with 100 friends, all at once, each on its own conversation, real time, everyone available. Sounds crazy? Well, social networking sites provide you that. You socialize with everyone you want to, at any time you want to (or are available to) and in a very social-productive way. I can't say anything other than fantastic for this phenomena.

Well, I can say other things - does it yield a steadily declining atttention span, capacity for longer and more sustained interactions, willingness to take time, to delve deeper...

> Popularity: You dont need to be good looking, or hollywood contacts to be famous anymore. As long as you are funny, have great ideas, good writing, something new to teach or can simply cativate people easily, social networking will do the rest for you. And you will be known by hundreds, thousands. Guaranteed.

I think this is little more than myth. It is like people thinking they are going to play in the NBA. Relative to numbers trying, I suspect the numbers succeeding are no more than via other channels... People see a success - almost like seeing someone win the lottery - and ignore the gazillions of failures. 

> Multimedia: Think about how hard would it be to send last christmas photo album to all your friends and relatives. Or maybe pictures of your new born baby. You could use email, yes. But what about engage everyone into a conversation and comments? No way. What about a video of your funy slip on a wet floor? Youtube will do that for you. And for your friends. And facebook will help you share that too. Again, no need for contacts within nbc or any other television network just to put your video playing your guitar to be appreciated and, who knows, get new band mates!

Yes, these are all, taken alone, and in moderation, pluses - but so? I am not saying there are no benefits. I am asking whether the technical possibility of these and many more and much richer benefits are being hijacked into venues and forms that have very debilitating accompanying effects, that wash away the benefits.

> Socially Unskilled People: I believe people that suffer from some kind of anti-social behaviour or trauma (by this I mean people who find it hard to socialize, tell jokes among friends or has any fear of rejection), social networking sites have proved to be a best friend. I have lost count of people I knew before who would not open their mouths to say a word in front of more than 2 spectators who have found in social networking sites the best place to express themselves - maybe because of the lack of physicial contact.

Another posisble plus - but what if because rather than just getting the benefit as an addition - we are having these modes take over - we are producing more anti sociality than we are correcting?

> Now, getting back to the whole distraction, and faster, fastest information sharing scheme that may destroy our civilization. I agree with you it is unpredictable and terrifying. Unfortunately, we are a society of consumers. I believe most of us will swallow the most we can afford to, and that is true about collecting information as it is about buying goods. The easier we can digest something, the better. 

What you see, you take as a sign of what people are. What I see, I take as a sign of what social structures make rational and even essential, despite what people are. It makes no sense in terms of human potential or make up for people to be wage slaves - but, in context of a capitalist market economy, it makes very good sense, because despite the losses and suffering, the alternative is starvation.

I suspect it makes no sense in terms of human potential or make up for people to want to quickly swallow as much info, made trivial to be bite size, as possible, to the exclusion in time of all else, despite the loss of human potentials - but, in a commercialized info context such as is emerging, it makes very good sense to do so because the alternative is to be isolated and a loner... think teens.

> We created escalators to make it easier to get steps up. 

Yes, but what if it caused us to only want to ride moving platforms, not walk?

> Antiacids to allow us eat more and worry less about later. 

Yes, and what if it caused to eat more and more and more...

> Computers to help us sum and divide, 

And what if it reduced or eliminated the capacity to talk...

> and social networking sites to help us socialize. 

But what if it so reduces what the word socialize means as to render socializing much much less than it once was - and what if it simultaneously destroys attention span, and perhaps even the ability to seriously converse, or the inclination to...

In each case, it would be better - if the critique was true, to achieve the gain differently.

Take cars - a very good example, I think. Created ostensibly to facilitate rapid and self managed travel - that was the come on - they became under the selection effects of commercial domination, a hideously destructive social force - mostly horrible even for facilitating travel, incredibly destructive by the time, tension,energy, implications. 

Better to have had serious public transit, etc. But that was destroyed - not profitable enough for the powers that decide - and also too likely to actually facilitate movement by the poor, very dangerous to the rich.

Something similar is happening here. The internet must be tamed - from the point of view of elites. And they are hard at work, mostly be trial and error and selection, doing it. And I suspect the most effective step so far, oddly, is not the size of microsoft and apple - which are certainly a problem - or even google, more of a problem, I suspect - but, instead, the monopolization of interpersonal communications and its perversion into flitting with nuggets...to be blunt, that seems to be under way.

> The faster, easier and most manageable way we can. This has been true for ages and for any area of our lives, and so it is going to be on the internet.TV, one example you mentioned, might have been the end of civilization. It did not mean the end of our civilization though, but instead helped us evolve as human beings for all the information we can extract from it. For good, or for bad, or simply for entertainment.

Actually, the TV has I suspect been quite horrible - but my way of calculating is a bit different perhaps, than yours. Tens of millions a year die unecessarily. TV is currently - for a little while longer, the main mechanism for transfer of news and comment about social relations. It abets and certainly doesn't overcome the injustice. It is, therefore, even if I like lots of shows - and I do - on balance, utterly abysmal. 

> How could a Big Brother or American idol differ from a wall full of gossip posts from your friends? I mean, you watch the Big Brother knowing nothing really good or productive will come out of it, and the same happens on American Idol. It's not like watching a instructional channel (which you mentioned may be very boring and I agree - but not always), from where you could extract good information and learn something.

You are arguing about x - I am talking about y. I don't like that society is organized so we have the shows we do - but in context - we can get some minimal pleasure out of watching, and there is great difficulty getting it by other routes. That is not good...even if I and you and others still choose to watch. Same for this internet situation.

But the difference is the twitting seems to have a built in effect literally on our capacities and inclinations...that was my point. it is either true or not. If true, this trend is much worse than many other similar ones...

> There has been an avalanche of information coming from social networking sites, most of them considerably junk. 

Yes.

> But, again, so is true for TV and other communication channels. 

Yes. 

But with one, tv, you watch, and the more you watch the less you know, and that is horrible But watching doesn't seem to induce a veritable requiring of minds to no longer have an attention span. More, you don't do it all day, everyday, even in school or at work... And finally, the barriers to entry on generating better tv are enormous so critics ability to offer an alternative are slim to none, at least on a large scale.

With the internet things are different. Not only the obvious things - but the barriers to entry - at least the material ones - are lower. We could offer tools and venues that give people what is desirable, and much more, but don't fall into the trap of what is harmful...if w have the will to do it. 

> Differently from those, though, any fella could use a social networking site to teach hundreds about history, polictics or skateboarding, just for having a few positive feedback back as reward. And there are a lot of people doing just that on Youtube or Facebook. 

See, this is, I think, like the case of seeing someone win the lottery. Yes, some do it - and we do znet on the internet - and so far it is all tiny compared to the tsunami of invovlement occurring - and unless something interrupts that trend, rather than saying it is just fine and even being part of it - I think we, not just us, but everyone trying to develop something better, will stay quite marginal. 

> You may be missing that, but you can find great pianists, some maybe better than 90% of the musicians MTV or Simon Cowell promote, on youtube playing mozart or beethoven. Geniouses from all different areas that can get their word spread out through social networking.

I am actually quite aware of it - I just think that looking at that is seeing the trees - very nice ones - and missing the forest - a very dangerous forest, at that.

> This is the good part of it, it is happening, and better: in a much more significant parcel or percentage than in any other communication channel or humane era. 

I think you are seriously wrong about that last claim. I am quite sure that the early days of radio had proportionately more good stuff being attended to - even with barriers to entry, proportionately. There were once hundreds and even thousands of working class newspapers. There are more good sites now than there were ever good anything else, perhaps. But mostly they come into being and die off - or they remain for very tiny audiences. That is better than not - but we shouldn't let our pleasure at that - and after all, you and I are part of that - overwhelm our awareness of the rest. 

> When I first read your post I agreed right away with you. And I still do. But because most people would just consume it, without really realizing how good this could be if used right. 

I think that is wrong too. I think first of all everyone always talks about how great it all is, almost never out in public, openly, seriously, about how bad it is. I think it is a bit like the emperor without clothers - facebook, that is, and tweeter. And of the people who might read what I write, I think virtually all of them know that internet connectivity and communication can be incredibly beneficial - how could they not - not to mention that they use the site regularly, etc. I suspect a great many also have very serious misgivings of the sort I ranted about - but in isololation, largely, and feeling them, but then not pursuing them. I was trying to give some voice to that.

Justin,

Hi. I hope you are doing well!

Your report of your own experience is disturbing in ratifying the views of the blog. I would be rather be wrong about all this, than right.

What you say about work adding to the pressure for fast, faster, and fastest - short, shorter, and shortest (yes, I like that formulation) rings true to me, of course. 

I might add, that I don't think this result s a conspiracy of explicit intent on the part of owners and managers on the one hand, and heads of information firms and their high level designers on the other hand. Rather, I think it is a bit like a perverse Darwinism. Those making decisions in each realm flounder around a bit, more so when something big and new comes along, trying many things. The deadly selection effect organizing their floundering is that outcomes and trends that prove consistent with their interests and aims, however mutilated from their original design or intent they have become, tend to emerge enhanced, and outcomes and trends that prove inconsistent with their interests and aims tend to emerge marginalized.  

If a longer and longer workday and more and more fragmented and overseen one not only hurt output (which it does relative to a much more sane and participatory setup) and also induced serious conscious raising in workers, threatening the system - then it would disappear. But, instead, this combination proves consistent with, at least in the short and medium run, pretty much maximal capacity of those in power to coerce and grab wealth while at least seeming to maintain the conditions of doing so into the future. 

I think the pressures are similar on the realm of information and communication over the years - journalism, entertainment, etc., as they are on things like workplace organization, etc. Information practices and arrangements get molded by the direction of investment as well as by the massive response in media elevating some aspects and crudely or subtley denigrating others. The emergence of the internet, browsing, and so on is one of the most tumultuous examples - because there are so many relatively inexpensive system challenging possibilities not ruled out by the usual high cost barriers to entry, which were, at the outset, largely absent. Nonetheless, as time goes by, I believe we see the power of capitalist and coordinator class interests, sexist and racist interests, contouring the uses of these new options, as they did the old. Is there still room for people to challenge that trend and win better information results, even system challenging information results which lead toward a better future - yes, I think so. Just as I think it can still be done in all other realms, which are generally far more entrenched and stable. But even regarding information - and networking and so on - we can't do it if we don't even realize what is happening, and why, and how - including our own complicity.

I think you also add another important point when you say, "I feel more comfortable in an online environment where I have greater control. All these things are worrying to me." 

They are worrying me too! And this last one makes me wonder even more about not just the debits of the messaging/face-booking/tweeting flitting phenomenon, but even of those aspects that are deemed benefits. 

I got one communication from a very astute left publisher saying they felt it was even worse than I argued in that they thought not only were people losing attention span, but even the inclination and ability to seriously converse. Your comment adds to that concern, which may have other causes too, if true.

Chris,

About my worries concerning the effects of Facebook on civilization - you think it is primitivist. Hmmmm...as you are sitting next to me - I suspect you know I am not of that ilk. So why say it?

As to my saying what is good about social networks - again, I would think that is a bit of a given. Why do I have to do that?

We all know the benefits so to me it seems that time spent on the ills is time better spent.

Do I see what is good about social networking - sure. I think so. 

The possibility of engaging, seriously, with people who you otherwise couldn't. It is a similar benefit as telephones had - or telegraph, earlier, and so on. 

Of course the possibility of conveying much more info, much easier, much cheaper, enhances the possibilities. So all that has good potential - personal, social, political. 

What I wrote about is a tendency embodied in these approaches insofar as they have actually emerged in practice that counters all those benefits - yielding, on balance, what may well be a very serious net debit, threatening to grow almost without bounds. Everyone knows the pluses - they are trumpeted far and wide. I saw no need to reiterate those.  

I try to build social networks, after all - as do you - so clearly I see potentials. But in doing that we encounter a great obstacle: the tendency of folks to prefer faster, faster, and fastest, short, shorter, and shortest, to substance - and this is not some kind of innate human tendency, but, I am claiming, instead one that is nurtured by the very activities that are supposed to be opening new avenues of benefit.

You say the tools are "extraordinarily powerful for communicating, socializing, and information sharing." Yes, of course, so? We all know that. The issue is, are they being used that way, mostly, or mostly not? And are there reasons why. And we even aware of what is happening?

You say, "This is a power that is literally placed directly into the palm of all of our hands, and in the center of our homes, workplaces, communities, social relations, and so on."

So was the telephone and telegraph, so was radio, and then TV. The issue isn't only what is the optimal potential, however. We agree on that. I said as much. The issue is, are the potentials being hijacked into a system-maintaining mode - and in this case, maybe even worse - into what threatens to be a dumbness inducing mode? 

If you are going to offer praise for what might be, much less what is, you are going to be talking about apples to my oranges. Or rather, you will be talking about apples - tasty - to my talking about apples, rotten. I fear there is a blight spreading in the apple barrel. 

When you say "That it has adverse affects as you (Michael) describe means it is being abused or misused, which is not unheard of for new tools, and I think means adapting to these new circumstances, practicing discipline around them, using them in ways that don’t affront the people around us in the same room, but also are able to reap the social and political benefits."

Yes, but in fact that is so far utterly overwhelmed, even, I suspect, among those who think it is what they are doing, but certainly among others. And the real point is that this little new tech has a built in slippery slope - which is what I wrote about. You use it in certain ways for good reasons, and even against your intentions, you tend to then slide into what you call misusing it more and more. Again, if you don't address that, then you won't be addressing what I wrote. 

Back as it was first coming into being I saw elements of this that were serious, but not this serious. An example I used to offer was people who liked to play chess. They would play at clubs, social places, with joking and so on. Then along came the internet. They could now also play in their den, on their computer, against people all over the world - but not much joking, no sharing a snack, etc. etc. Of course people liked being able to find players at any hour, without having to get travel to the club. They still liked the clubs, to, even more. But the clubs needed donations, and the users dropped by some percent due to playing online, and many clubs, against the desires of all members, closed. You see the same kind of thing with Amazon - which is in some ways an incredible boon to access to books, and small bookstores. Things can have side effects which overwhelm they process, even as everyone is doing what they are doing freely, and without that intention, and for locally good reasons.

Same idea with teens tweeting and facebooking and messaging. If you don’t do it, you lose out relative to others who are doing it. So you do it, everyone does it, more and more, and soon, unintended side effects are swamping the benefits into the dust. That is the picture I am trying to convey, probably not too well. People are making perfectly reasonable choices, but the net effect is a changing environrmant in which contextually sensible choices are, in fact, counter productive in their overall impact.

But I have to say, why would you, or anyone who uses ZCom, suggest to me that the internet can be put to good use, or that social networks can be, as if you think I don’t think that. It seems like pushing an open door, no? Obviously I know that there is potential - much better than most now it, given my involvement with it and commitments to it. But I also feel that that potential is getting obliterated by eeveloping trends and habits that swamp the benefits with a new context that is hurting, not helping, in the large. 

You write: “I am too young to have been anything when TV was introduced into the world, however, I have seen images, and heard stories about how that affected family and social life. Suddenly people could have access to news and entertainment right in their living room, delivered from all over the world, however, over time, people began to maybe go out to social clubs less and began to listen to the TV more, even than discuss the daily happenings of each other’s lives or issues covered in newspapers. This too had good and bad affects and what we are seeing now, I think, also has good and bad.”

So? Why is it necessary for me to state the obvious? Which I actually did, somewhat. So far, you have not addressed what I offered as the bad... 

You say, often, quick socializing is ubiquitous and it has good and bad aspects. Okay, among the tsunami of users who obviously feel they are in touch with the good - I think talking about the bad contributes more than repeating about the good. So I did.

I am lost, I use my phone. I am late, I use it. I need help, I use it. Fine. It is a pinprick worth of the actual use of cell phones as compared to the way phones used to be used. Is the rest good, or bad? As to messaging, it is entirely new, but again, there is some good, and I suspect tons of bad - people having to keep up with the flow or be out of it. I mentioned the political uses...and clearly work on them. Are you going to address the debits? 

When I wrote, "The point is, and i am serious about this, attention span is plummeting toward zero." you reply, "I don’t understand what this has to do with Facebook. I imagine you will get to it. But this phenomena that you are describing is of course bad. I agree. However, you seem to be pointing our attention to this trend, which I agree is bad, and you seem to be identifying the corporate interests behind this trend, which is also bad, but I’m afraid that maybe you are about to make a leap that we have discussed before and that I have disagreements about… "

The idea is simple enough. Facebook plus messaging plus flitting from page to page quickly - these are a type of behavior - some call it multi tasking I call it flitting - that seem to me to have steadily declining content and concentration and to induce a declining attention span. I watch people looking at their facebook page, at little notes, and then watching tv or messaging, or reading homework, and then five minutes later they are back on their page to read a few more notes - same with tweets - and messages.

Yes, there is some analogy between turning channels and flitting among the newer sources, but not much, I think. Because when I watch people turning channels they stop on one, pretty quick, and watch for a half hour or an hour. The turning is a means, not the heart of the thing. They don't want the shows to get shorter so they can channel surf some more - or they didn't, in the old days - in the future, I am not so sure. 

Yes, there are probably people who get more or less addicted to turning the channels, into the sport of it, the pattern of it, and can barely break out of it. But they are very much the exception. What I am suggesting is that with the new technologies they may become the rule...

When I say, "Now added to the mix is Facebook with its never ending flow of snippets of personal gossip and news, and of course, talking about snippets, we have Twitter,:” you say, "But you haven’t said anything about Facebook yet, which no doubt has some of the problems you mention and others, but also embodies many other good things that you are looking over, and reasons why hundreds of millions of people participate in it. They don’t do it simply because of corporate pressure and pap. There are very real social benefits derived – benefits that were not possible even 5 or 6 years ago, for example, very easily overcoming much of the social isolation that you are arguing it is causing."

I very much doubt facebook is overcoming social isolation, even ignoring its inducement of new social isolation via the gossiping and bashing that no doubt occurs. Unless one thinks very nearly empty communications overcome isolation, that is. Yes, some people are finding mates. Yes, some people are turning up old buddies and renewing sincere and substantive friendships. Yes, some people are conveying insights and pointing to valuable stuff for others. Sure. But on balance... how much of that is there - to weigh against declining attention spans?

Who would have thought that what one can say about what became of the potential of TV - the more you watch the less you know - may ultimately be true for using the internet too? Will it come to the point where, of course with some exceptions, those who are online the most know the least?

When you say there are benefits, of course there are. The worst dynamics are, however, typically those that also have real benefits, which, however, also have very very grave downsides. Markets are a fine example. We all use them. Without them, in the context, we inhabit, we die. But in using them, over time, we suffer incredibly. The current direction of the internet and social networking and communications is crowding out and over-running what you are excited about - that is my fear and impression. And when those who are trying to get the really valuable benefits and avoid the debits use the commercial providers, they are probably contributing almost as much legitimacy to the whole mess that is developing as they are replacing it with anything better.

About tweeting, yes, I got cute. But telling me I have to enumerate the benefits strikes me as more or less like saying if I want to write about what's wrong with markets, or private ownership, or fathering and mothering rather than parenting, or you name it - first I have to bow down and praise that which I came to critique, first. Why? 

I am not going to tell one person who uses ZCom one thing positive about the internet or social networking that they don't already know. So why take the time for that?

You say, "You are right that the drive for corporate profits, and I would add class rule, pressures us to use these in dysfunctional ways often out of our control and against our own interests. But that is not the same as engaging the reason why people might use it or what might be good about some of the technology, and ways that we can use it differently for our own socially conscious ends rather than corporate ones. So far, I’m not seeing much balance here…"

Right. But what makes you feel I have to write about the potential benefits - which everyone knows - and which I work on all the time - in order to write about the debits?

And what I wrote was overwhelmingly not about the corporate element - for example, the explicit impact of profit seeking and reproducing class relations, etc., on the issues - It was rather about aspects that seem almost intrinsic to the current way the technology is organized and thus used - even for well intentioned purposes - and my suspicion is that to find other ways of doing things is unlikely without knowing the problems. 

You write, "So far I have really only seen you address corporate interests behind the media tools and also a digression of attention span. I have not seen anything that is really a critique of these facilities yet, or how the facilities are bad, etc. I will assume you get to that below, however, I suspect we will disagree."

I am not sure what you were reading. I spent virtually zero time on the corporate aspect - for example, selling people, via recording and utilizing their personal communications, to sell them to advertisers. I overwhelmingly talked instead about a kind of catch 22. To get the ease of use and efficiency and connectivity to others that the tools offer, we so far have overwhelmingly wound up using them in ways that against our desires reduce the value of that connectivity, steadily toward zero, perhaps affecting other dimensions of life as well - via the effects on attention span.

You want me to write answers - what to do. I don’t know answers, I cant do that. You want me to write the benefit of what people are now doing, their motives - I am pretty sure I don’t have any insights into that that aren’t already familiar to everyone else. But I do fear that a very significant and growing reason for the choices people are making is basically that everyone else is doing it and to not do it is to lose touch. If so, this is not any longer pursuit of great benefit, but rather to a significant degree avoidance of loss.

I write, "We are told about a massive increase in communications. Okay, yes, I admit that - there is certainly more sending and receiving - more bits and bytes are transfering - but the content conveyed is declining even as the number of messages is climbing. The duration of each communication is approaching zero. Fast, faster, fastest." You reply, "What you describe is true, I think, and I also think very important. But it doesn’t address any of the positive content that people get out of it or how it has affected their lives positively." Correct. So? I am not sure on balance there is any where near as much positive effect as you seem to be suggesting, but, however much there is, why do I have to list it?

You suggest that socializing online attempts to permit what people do in person. My guess is, to see if in fact the sending of snippets remotely corresponds to the dynamic of face to face - we would need to have a log of all the snippets and the time involved and info conveyed that we could compare to similar time and effort in face to face exchange. We would also need to see if when doing it online it is sustained, or a jump cut process of going from brief post to brief post - and if that leads to ill effects, as I suggest. All this is worth investigating. What I wrote was conveying my guess as to what we might find.

I write, "And here is the scariest part, the individual and thus also the collective brain is rewiring itself in accord." You reply, "This is also very interesting and potentially disastrous. And while I think this is important to pay attention to it I’m skeptical about running with it simply because this technology is only a few years old and I think it is too soon to tell."

But this effect is quite like markets and other relations and practices which build into themselves need for more of themselves. Thus, at the outset is precisely when it is necessary to be critical. To go a bit overboard again, you don't wait until you have a gigantic addiction to a drug, which is most certainly making you feel infinitely better when you take it, then you felt just before, to get critical about it. 

Your way of saying it is, "Although I do agree that sometimes this technology can be like the craving for junk-food over exercise and discipline for a healthy body or mind, where corporate interests are also at play trying to get us to consume crap for food. So I do think there is a problem, but rather than say it is the “end of civilization” or the sky is falling, I think we need to get it under our control, which is also related to getting the rest of society under participatory control."

Okay, the point of your reply to the blog post is basically to tell me, as best I can tell, that I should be balanced, note the benefits, and curb the crusade tone a bit. The thing is, from where I sit, which is about four feet from where you sit, it seems that some screaming bloody murder is needed if anyone hooked into all this is going to take stock.

I describe what seems to me to be a trajectory of use that virtually inexorably becomes what you might call abuse but I might just call more use - which in turn diminishes attention span, and you say you agree. Then you say, "Again, I understand, but you are being extreme and not reasonable about this…" What is not reasonable? If something is diminishing the attention span of its users, and its use is very wide spread and growing incredibly and more use induces still more use, and then still more decline in attention span, then there is a massive threat to attention span - and isn't that worth shouting about?

You write, "It is a lot of things, but not the technology, or at least not mostly, I think…. And as you’ve written this blog, and in discussions we have had, I’ve never been clear if you are saying it is the underlying drive for corporate profits and class rule that have the negative effects or if it is the technology itself. When I read this I am still unclear."

The internet can be used, we agree, in diverse ways. 

Many would incredibly enrich knowledge and social ties and even thinking capacity and skill. Those are anathema to corporate elites. 

Others have an effect more consistent with maintain social hierarchies - or even enforcing them. 

As with all technologies, there are pressures and cumulative selection effects which tend to enhance the latter, and bury the former. That's what's happening. So it isn't the most basic technology - that there are pipes that can carry information - that my blog post was about. Facebook, instant messaging, even web sites and pages, etc. are not technology per se, but applications. When four or six web sites have half the traffic among mlllions of sites, that is serious. When the conveying of short and gossipy messages is the overwhelming bulk of internet traffic - not counting porn, I guess - that is serious. It is fine for profits. As is the growing presence of ads, etc. And it is fine for system reproduction. So it is what the big firms put resources behind, of course. But as social critics, it is for us to discover the ills, and try to create something better - as you would agree. The thing is, I have been feeling more and more that the critics are not in fact seeing or arguably even open to seeing the ills. You think I am overlooking or underplaying  the benefits. I think you and nearly everyone I encounter are overlooking or underplaying the debits - not least, I suspect, due to enjoying the benefits and rationalizing doing so...

You say, "I actually think this (the political benefits) is a weak reason to be in favor of it (although this use is growing) and I post 99% political stuff…. But I think the social benefits far outweigh the political benefits of Facebook—at least in my personal experience—and that this is probably what matters to most of the 500 million users on it."

Well it is certainly why they are using it, yes. But those benefits - rediscovering an old friend. Communicating more easily than by slow mail, or even email, albeit in nuggets. Being in touch while on the road. And so on. To me, don't mount up to much compared to declining attention spans, assuming that problem is real. And to me, one could get those benefits, without the declining attention spans, if one could break from the commercial providers and generate new ways of engaging. But if one is most intent on using what is there now, on not giving up the easy current access, and gets uptight about criticizing it, then the chances of coming up with better approaches, and managing to get people to relate to them, drop, I think....

You say, "Again, the good is not just the political organizing that is happening on the periphery, but is much larger than that."

Okay, what is it? If we must mention it more than already, what is the good that facebook and instant messaging and tweeting provides that I am missing? What is the benefit that justifies humanity elevating these operations to incredible power, conveying to them incredible control, expending on them enormous amounts of time - not to even mention using them at the cost of declining substance and attention span?

You write, "But then when you go on to say we are using the commercial and the “fundamentally deadening parts“ I say to myself “well, the entire internet is commercial, the ISP’s are commercial, the hardware is commercial, the software is commercial, etc. (with exception of the open source communities), so I think this is kind of wrapped up in our need to move beyond capitalism too. Okay, still not any disagreement… But when you talk about the “fundamentally deadening parts” I am worried that this contains a seed of thinking that is really throwing out the baby with the bath water and not differentiating between the bad parts you talk about and the many benefits that have improved many people’s lives and has, and will have, long-term affects in the world."

Well, I think using isps and the trunk lines and on and on, is like using roads. Yes they are commercial. Yes, they are alienated by profit seeking. Yes, one wants to transform it all, of course. But we can't - we must compromise there, and can do so, knowingly, and with hate in our hearts for the profit seeking, etc. 

But when it comes to having our social interactions mediated by commercial firms, well, that's a bit more nervous inducing, for me. And when I look and see that as it is developing it has incredibly bad built in dynamics which could be avoided without losing benefits - then I get actively upset...

When I say, "And so everyone who might have built networked options that advance civilization is left without audience, you say, "As one of the people who has worked on this I definitely agree with the concern. However..."

And then I continue - "pretty soon without motivation - and they join the stampede into mindlessness, too."

You write, "Ouch… I really don’t think this is productive thinking. This is what I sense when I read the above blog and  unless we can work with some of the virtues that this technology is offering and providing people, on an alternative platform that is not corporate but instead promotes classlessness and self-management, etc., I don’t think it is very helpful to be so fatalistic or insulting to people who do use the mainstream version."

I am not sure it is insulting - it certainly doesn't intend to be. We rush to use markets - every time we exchange - and it cements the injustice we endure. Same idea. The difference is in this information realm even the leftists are acting as though its just neutral, it is okay, it is good - and it seems to me it isn't. And it seems to me everyone is rushing to do it mostly because everyone else is rushing to do it...which is fair enough, and understandable - but the only escape from that is, I suspect, escape. 

You and I are trying to figure out and create means to use online capacities for serious engagement and socializing - but I suspect that as long as almost everyone thinks facebook and tweeter and the like are okay operations that are delivering good and needed services sensibly, we are doomed to fail.

Most people on the left get very nervous about dating sites. I think they are vastly preferable to tweeter and facebook - because I suspect on them people mostly do serious looking for, dates. On the other sites, people who ought to be having serious dates - are passing time with snippets. Compulsively... 

"I skimmed the rest below and, as above, I agree with some, and disagree with the overall emphasis and attitude. Sorry to say this, but it sounds like being against TV all over again…"

Well, maybe you are young and with it, and right. And I am old and out of it and not right. Or maybe the critics of TV had a good point, and I do too...

It seems like of this is testable, but I haven't looked around very hard yet. 

But my intuition tells me that T.V. does have the potential to hurt one's attention span, and it seems like the internet has even more potential to do that. 

And as far as age gaps go, it's pretty uncontroversial among the college age people I know that things like facebook are a huge source of distraction.

Some people can handle the distraction.  I think looking at it as a question of 'how you use it' is a little too narrow though, because some people, I'm thinking of myself here, have a lot of trouble using something like facebook without spending more time on it than I really want to. 

It's kind of of an odd issue, but it seems like it has similarities with drug abuse. 

I don't know what this all means though.

I have a friend whose passion it is to play computer games.  It seems like that can be an unhealthy thing for some people, but I would judge it as unhealthy if the person has regrets about it, which he doesn't.  He does spend an absurd amount of time on them, but he plays them competitively.  Apparently he does find time to go on the odd internet forum though, because when I showed him znet (or sent him an article by Chris) he said he'd seen 'Chris Spannos' somewhere.  I was a little suspicious, because he is not very political, but he was quite sure he remembered reading long posts about the war in Iraq.  He said "yeah, that guy writes everywhere.  He always writes ridiculously long posts, like 3 pages, but I read them because he writes them really clearly".  I would guess that had to be one of the only political things he'd read.  So ... I don't get it.  Chris, have you been on forums where you can buy chickens?  (That's what he was doing if I remember correctly.  I don't know how that would relate.) 

But as far as I can tell, it is reasonable to think that increasing distraction is something to worry about.  In school I see almost everyone who has a laptop staring at facebook during lectures.  It continues outside of class as well.  Strange stuff.