11 ms·

>But what about the possibility that the majority of people prefer to be passive consumers? By any reasonable measure, we're in a renaissance of creativity. Mo

>But what about the possibility that the majority of people prefer to be passive consumers? By any reasonable measure, we're in a renaissance of creativity. Most people in the creative industries are complaining of a total oversaturation of talent - too many bands, too many authors, too many artists, too many indie game developers, too many stand-up comedians. Maker culture and 3D printing has created a consumer market for CAD/CAM software, which no-one in the industry foresaw even a decade ago. By some measures, musical instruments and recording equipment are a bigger market than the recording industry. It has never been cheaper or easier to turn an idea into reality; there's abundant evidence that people are grabbing that opportunity with both hands. YouTube is full of crap, but it has also revealed a huge amount of demand for deep and meaningful content. My YouTube subs box is full of artisans, mathematicians, poets and monks. Some of them have seven-figure subscriber counts and five-figure Patreon revenue, some of them upload simply for the joy of sharing something that they love. It's easy to be cynical, but YouTube is a place of boundless magic and wonder. The internet isn't perfect, but it's not all doom and gloom either. The internet is full of assholes calling each other nazis, but it's also full of people sharing skills and making meaningful connections. Sturgeon's Law isn't going away, but we really have removed the stultifying layer of gatekeepers that controlled access to the media. There's an uncomfortable degree of consolidation and centralisation on the modern internet, but MySpace and Snapchat stand as testaments to how fickle and fragile that power is. To quote Ted Nelson in this interview: "The computer is a projective device, it is a Rorschach test. Anyone will see in it that which is of the most concern to him." If we choose to spend our time on the internet decrying the negative rather than contributing to the positive, we will get exactly what we deserve.

WJW 8y ago
Interestingly, both problems could be happening _at the same time_! If before (say) 1% of all people got a chance to publish their work and the internet has increased that tenfold, there is still space for 90% of the population to be passive consumers. That 10% might still be 'too much' for some types of content of course (how many bands, standup comedians or indie game developers do you need before you hit diminishing returns anyway?) In fact, I suspect that most people fall into both groups: They might be 'creators' for some types of content and only 'passively consume' some different types. For example, I sometimes contribute to OSS but have never uploaded a Youtube video in my life.
KineticLensman 8y ago
> By any reasonable measure, we're in a renaissance of creativity There is a really interesting historical pattern here where new communications technologies create an initial splurge of independent creators but after some time the technology is consolidated into a smaller number of platforms (by regulation or monopolisation or sometimes both) that provide the main route for content to its consumers. These platforms tend to stifle peer competitors and are only replaced by disruptive rivals. Creativity on the platform depends on how much it stifles the content, the classic example being the Hollywood film industry in the 1940s .. 1960s which was highly vertically integrated and thus became an excellent vehicle for enforcing the so-called Hays Code, which defined morally acceptable content and attitudes. This idea is explored really well in the 2010 book ‘The Master Switch’ by Tim Wu [1] who shows how this pattern is played out with Radio, Films, Television and latterly the Internet. It would be really interesting to see an update to this excellent book to reflect the consolidation of Google, Amazon, Facebook, etc since it was published. My own concern is that because the internet is perhaps more pervasive than the prior media, any lockdown could have more severe chilling effects. As an extreme, consider future cloud-based compute appliances that don’t allow side-loaded software and whose content creation tools delete or report inappropriate language. [Edit - just noticed a similar comment from Jedd below. Next time I should read a bit further before commenting!] [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tim_Wu#The_Master_Switch https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tim_Wu#The_Master_Switch [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motion_Picture_Production_Code https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motion_Picture_Production_Code
ataturk 8y ago
These are all good and interesting observations, particularly the ones about Youtube. On the other hand, I still feel like something is very wrong with the Web and the Internet in general. I think it is the incessant propagandizing and ad-mongering. I can't even visit most websites these days without "shields up" on my Brave browser. The NY Times and Washington Post websites are full of slant, required by their owners. Journalistic ethics are completely out the window. Independent news sites are totally unreliable for different reasons, some only because of lack of experience(?). It's an unruly mess. You mentioned CAD/CAM software for regular people--the prices don't reflect that these companies have gotten the idea yet. These days, basic free-market, small government, libertarian minded people are referred to as Nazis. It is not at all comforting that such a label could be so badly mis-applied while we witness the US Government dropping a bomb every 12 minutes in multiple undeclared wars, mostly for the sake of corporate profits, and yet people like me are the bad guys? I don't get that. It is all completely counter-productive.

WJW 8y ago

Interestingly, both problems could be happening _at the same time_! If before (say) 1% of all people got a chance to publish their work and the internet has increased that tenfold, there is still space for 90% of the population to be passive consumers. That 10% might still be 'too much' for some types of content of course (how many bands, standup comedians or indie game developers do you need before you hit diminishing returns anyway?) In fact, I suspect that most people fall into both groups: They might be 'creators' for some types of content and only 'passively consume' some different types. For example, I sometimes contribute to OSS but have never uploaded a Youtube video in my life.

KineticLensman 8y ago

> By any reasonable measure, we're in a renaissance of creativity There is a really interesting historical pattern here where new communications technologies create an initial splurge of independent creators but after some time the technology is consolidated into a smaller number of platforms (by regulation or monopolisation or sometimes both) that provide the main route for content to its consumers. These platforms tend to stifle peer competitors and are only replaced by disruptive rivals. Creativity on the platform depends on how much it stifles the content, the classic example being the Hollywood film industry in the 1940s .. 1960s which was highly vertically integrated and thus became an excellent vehicle for enforcing the so-called Hays Code, which defined morally acceptable content and attitudes. This idea is explored really well in the 2010 book ‘The Master Switch’ by Tim Wu [1] who shows how this pattern is played out with Radio, Films, Television and latterly the Internet. It would be really interesting to see an update to this excellent book to reflect the consolidation of Google, Amazon, Facebook, etc since it was published. My own concern is that because the internet is perhaps more pervasive than the prior media, any lockdown could have more severe chilling effects. As an extreme, consider future cloud-based compute appliances that don’t allow side-loaded software and whose content creation tools delete or report inappropriate language. [Edit - just noticed a similar comment from Jedd below. Next time I should read a bit further before commenting!] [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tim_Wu#The_Master_Switch https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tim_Wu#The_Master_Switch [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motion_Picture_Production_Code https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motion_Picture_Production_Code

ataturk 8y ago

These are all good and interesting observations, particularly the ones about Youtube. On the other hand, I still feel like something is very wrong with the Web and the Internet in general. I think it is the incessant propagandizing and ad-mongering. I can't even visit most websites these days without "shields up" on my Brave browser. The NY Times and Washington Post websites are full of slant, required by their owners. Journalistic ethics are completely out the window. Independent news sites are totally unreliable for different reasons, some only because of lack of experience(?). It's an unruly mess. You mentioned CAD/CAM software for regular people--the prices don't reflect that these companies have gotten the idea yet. These days, basic free-market, small government, libertarian minded people are referred to as Nazis. It is not at all comforting that such a label could be so badly mis-applied while we witness the US Government dropping a bomb every 12 minutes in multiple undeclared wars, mostly for the sake of corporate profits, and yet people like me are the bad guys? I don't get that. It is all completely counter-productive.