All Hail the Power of Blog!

It's pretty undisputed that bloggers have become a powerful group. Of course they are not one interest group, but rather a network that is able to instantly rally others to certain causes and quickly disseminate information, educate, or call for action. This story out of China is an illustrative case.

Earlier this month a bystander in Tianmen was beaten to death while using a cell phone to take a picture of an argument between government officials and villagers over the dumping of garbage near the village. The villagers were against it, shockingly!!!. Soon after the beating death occurred bloggers in China began to call for justice and the enforcement of the law. The bloggers took the deceased man in as one of their own, calling him a citizen journalist. The government essentially relented, or at least decided to act, and within days arrests were made and an investigation is now well underway.

Other examples of the power of the blog come from Jena, LA and Burma. In Jena a small group of African-American bloggers kept track of what was going on and acted as the catalyst to get the story into the mainstream media. In Burma, a small group of Burmese (and other) bloggers were able to sneak images and video out of the tightly controlled nation to expose the government imposed beatings and oppression of Buddhist monks and citizens calling for democracy.

Still, many journalists mock the work of bloggers. It is a constant topic on blogs concerned with media and politics. Bloggers are so plentiful that they are easily able to keep track of newsworthy events but also act as citizen watchdog groups on the media, in the consumer world, and far beyond. Bloggers are able to both out maneuver regular journalists and make sure the regular journalists aren't bullshitting their viewers at the same time.

Just this morning I was watching a cable "news" show that used "blogger" in a derogatory manner when referring to a reporter. The host of the show expressed his disbelief at an Associated Press reporters behavior towards Presidential candidate Mitt Romney during a news conference by saying something to the effect of "I thought he was a blogger at first but it turns out he works for the AP". (By the way you should check out this Romney v. Reporter video, it really exposes Romney for the little weasel he is.)

Point is, read this blog more and we'll help you save the world and tell you what's bullshit and what isn't. Because we have power.

Philly Giving WiFi a Shot

Philadelphia is attempting bridge the "digital divide". 90% of high income households have high speed internet compared to 25% of lower income households.

This article from www.philly.com discusses the case of Hercules Jones and his previous efforts to reach internet access by traveling for hours on public transportation. The article also addresses a criticism that people may not need or want the access or at least no one has stopped to ask whether or not people want it. I don't really think it should be an issue of want. Building the infrastructures for city wide networks now will thwart future more pressing issues of access. As commerce continues to grow on the internet many products and services may become more difficult to obtain. Also, hard copies of dictionaries, encyclopedias, newspapers (news, current events, politics) may become obsolete.

While a failure to bridge the "digital divide" may have heavier implications in the not-to-distant future, according to Philly.com the mayor of Philadelphia said this about immediate advantages of providing cheap high speed access to lower income households, "poor children can enroll in online after-school programs and use the Internet to help with homework" and, "the network would help people apply for jobs or finish coursework for college."

That's a pretty good start.

Chicago Gives Up On WiFi

The city of Chicago's plans to provide city wide WiFi were scrapped because of the cost. The city was in negotiations with EarthLink, Inc. to build and provide the system.

Because the city realized a large portion of the project would have to be publicly financed, the city backed out of its plans. This is too bad. The digital divide is a big problem and this would have been a great advance in bridging the divide. You can check out a previous post about bringing WiFi to Harlem and the implications of the digital divide right here.

Police Try to Start Riot

The presence of police "undercover" as protesters has long been reported. Generally, the police will place some of their own in the protest, alongside those perceived to be aggressive like the black bloc in order to give the riot police excuse to move in and push back the legitimate protesters. In this video, shot during Bush's recent trip to Canada,Union leader confronts three "protesters" who are clearly trying to start a violent disturbance. One man pushes the Union leader and carries a rock in his hand.

You see how everyone quickly realizes the three "protesters" are in fact "provacateurs". You see them cross the police line after their covers are blown where they are promptly arrested and carried away for show. Before they make their move cross the line you can see they are unsure what to do now that they are exposed as they simply stand around for a minute or so trying to stop people from pulling off their masks. The video does not definitively prove these men were "provacateurs" but if you watch you can just tell they are. At the end of the clip you see the Union leader explaining to reporters that the men were police and were trying to incite a riot.

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Bringing the Internet to Harlem

While browsing through my reader I came across a story about the Wireless Harlem Initiative on Scientific American. The Wireless Harlem Initiative's (WHI) stated mission is to, "Close the 'digital divide' by making access to information ubiquitous for all its residents." This is pretty important idea and, I think, exposes an under appreciated problem, the so called, "digital divide". In New York City it costs anywhere (this is approximate) between $30 a $70 per month for a "household" to establish high speed internet service in their homes. This is a very high price to pay for families at low income levels, so much so that is probably, largely, dismissed out of hand.

One major reason for the high price is a strangle hold held by a few internet service providers over the city. For example, where I live in Brooklyn, the only service available to me is through Time Warner, thus insuring no competition for my business. Also, the prices for internet service are higher unless you "bundle" it with cable and digital phone (does anyone use digital phone?). But, I digress.

Access to the internet has become an afterthought for many. Can you imagine your life without it? While many people simply use the internet for simple email access or occasional shopping, more "advanced" users have been using it for years to shape public opinion and voice their opinions. A great example of the power of the internet is the online political site DailyKos. That blog has become so powerful that it attracted all Democratic nominees for President to its yearly convention to take questions from its largely way left members. On a more basic level, many jobs, especially higher paying jobs, only allow for application for employment by electronic means.

The digital divide is leaving people behind and it should come as no surprise that those being left behind are, again, low income minorities. The internet is becoming the most important meeting point for people with ideas and desires for change. The future of organization on local and national (global?) scales is the internet. Luckily, many of those who are most "tech savy" tend to be liberal and thus accepting (or at least not antipathetic to) making sure that the internet become accessible to all. At this point the internet should be considered to be on par with broadcast television or AM radio. The internet really is just cable access on a ton of steroids. As such it should be 100% free. Of course specifics of bandwidth could be dealt with, i.e., high speed internet access is free up to a reasonable point so that all can have access.

Of course, something so large scale would never be government run so organizations like WHI are important. In addition to working to establish a network of WiFi hot spots in Harlem they say they will be working with other groups to get computers and presumably other necessary hardware out to members of the community.

Hopefully soon, blogs will be created by pissed off citizens of Harlem calling attention to the injustices that affect them. Hopefully, they will be able to comment on news stories about issues that matter to them or issues they want to affect. Hopefully, they will be able to use the internet to have their voice heard.

Yearlykos and the Democrats

I am a registered Democrat but I don't consider myself to be a cheerleader. However, one thing worth chering about is the fact that all of the candidates for President on the Democratic side will be attending the yearly convention for the online community DailyKos.

DailyKos is an online diary site consisting of thousands of left wing bloggers who are all free to blog on the main site. It is a pretty left wing group and most of its members are pretty outspoken about the war, health care, and Bill O'Reilly. I mention this to make the point that this influence of the Kos is an example of direct democracy in action. Many of the members of the DailyKos community are like you and me. They are not necessarily involved in specific political campaigns (although many are and the various campaign definitely try to utilize the community to their advantage).

In contrast you have the Republicans who are not even willing to participate in a debate in which the questions come from real people posting their questions via video on Youtube. Honestly, it's kind of a joke that they won't do it. Although, I guess it's no surprise that direct democracy would be lost on them.

The "New" Media, Technology, and Politics

It's no secret that parts of the internet, like blogs and social networks, have become a way for politicians, more specifically candidates for President, to reach out to and turn on a group of people who in the past may have been more difficult to reach and influence. All together, this fact is very good. The more people involved in the system the better, clearly. User generated content like blogs (like this one) are their own media outlets with views unbiased by mega forces like corporations and political parties.

There have been weird and embarrassing stops along the way that show how these politicians and their advisers don't have a real good grasp on how this whole technomalogicamal-internets thing really works, or at least how it is perceived by the people they are trying to reach. And it goes beyond the internet. In what must have been some sort of triumph for an enterprising Obama adviser, a set of wildly ill-conceived ring tones were recently released by Obama's campaign. The Daily Show mentioned it a while back and Huffingtonpost mocks it this week as well. For those who may not know the set of ring tones are generally snippets of Obama talking about Iraq and Healthcare as well as a few "remixes" of his 2004 convention speech. Oh and they are set to music, you know, the rock and the hip-hop. They really are more hideous than you can imagine. One has Obama repeating the phrase, "What I do oppose is a dumb war..." presumably until you silence the dumb ring tone.

The ring tones and the silly You Tube videos are a reminder that while the "New" media and new technologies may be playing powerful roles in politics and elections, the people pulling the strings behind the scenes can get things horribly wrong and shroud the newness of it all in camp and irrelevance.