Personally I think the reliance on proprietary platforms (eg social medias) is not only problematic for activists from an ownership point of view - of both identity and data - but I think also the idea that social media attention 'automatically' looks after the delivery of your message to the people that need it is flawed.
Recently I made contact with a friend who is a social media consultant and I asked her to help me raise my profile online without using social media. It has been an interesting exercise and I have come to understand that social media has become a crutch. We believe that it 'looks after' the delivery of our messages to our intended audience and we dont need to much more than 'optimise' how we use it. buuuuuuutttt....and this might be a callback from my student radio days... its not how many that are listening that counts, but what the message is and *who* is listening. Hence I have started to cultivate my online presence around the good ole blog once again. I was squatting a few social media accounts but I handed them off and exist in my own space on the web. I can say, it feels great and I am having much more success with it than when I thought putting a tweet up would do the trick. After reading Roger Sheppards books this weekend (I'm hopelessly old skool) I am reminded that we have forgotten that spreading the message is a result of cultivating relationships, not of just blasting available networks. Thats why he wanted to retain one to one contacts with record shop owners and not go to a bigger distributor, because he understood (this is my reading of it of course) that he would actually lose his ability to generate empathy and engagement - which is everything. So, yes of course the world is no longer a vinyl world :) I understand that the idea of a 'homepage' is dated and scorn might be duly pointed my way for 'not getting it'. But I think I do get it :) and I think we have 'gotten it wrong' for some years now. We need to get out of social media for many reasons, politics of identity and ownership of data being 2 very good ones, but also to migrate back to building networks of empathy for the purposes of rallying people towards our mission. For those that are interested I blogged (scratchedly) about this as I was unpacking it for myself here: https://www.adamhyde.net/media-want-free/ https://www.adamhyde.net/webgetarianism-part-2/ https://www.adamhyde.net/julia-hildebrand-on-my-quest-to-break-out/ https://www.adamhyde.net/goldfish-swimming-around-the-web-part-4/ I think I'll write a summary final post soon. adam On 01/28/2017 09:22 PM, Luke Munn wrote: > Thanks for the encouragement and the recs Adam, though this'll be an > Auckland based event so pretty much limited to NZers or people passing > through. > > re: activism I do see a lot of orgs that ignore the operations/power > structures in the systems they use (medium) because they're keen on > getting their agenda across to the maximum audience (message) - part of > this is due of course to the lack of alternatives considered 'viable' > (rightly or wrongly) in domains like social media and cloud storage, > which in turn raises questions about the models and incentives which > hold sway in information design and development. the surge of work that > went into cryptography, for example, post-Snowden illustrates what > happens when these goalposts are suddenly shifted. > > But yeah, I think there's a lot of untapped potential both critically > and creatively in the topic so looking forward to it! :-) > > cheers, > Luke > > > > On 28 January 2017 at 08:00, adam <[email protected] > <mailto:[email protected]>> wrote: > > good topic! i think its wise to also think about how activists use data > (unfortunately) for propaganda - there is little in the way of best > practices here.... > > I would recommend for your panel: > https://responsibledata.io/ > > and Zara Rahman > https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FAoQHJH6l8Y > <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FAoQHJH6l8Y> > > adam > > > > On 01/28/2017 07:53 AM, Luke Munn wrote: > > Hey ADAers, > > > > I'm organizing a small panel around the politics of data, looking for > > critical and creative responses to how power is embodied and enacted > > through algorithmic processes - think Facebook and Google Search > but also > > broader systems in which the computational is key, like Uber, the > sharing > > economy, cryptocurrencies, financial trading, labour management, the > > Internet of Things, credit scoring, policing and so on. Indeed one > of the > > main points here is the increasing pervasion of these systems into the > > everyday and the necessary urgency of both understanding and > intervening > > within them. > > > > http://datapolitics.surge.sh/ > > > > Please circulate the call in your networks, either through the > attached PDF > > or through the link. Much appreciated and hope to see you there. > > > > best, > > Luke > > > > lukemunn.com <http://lukemunn.com> > > twitter:@lukemunn > > > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > > Ada_list mailing list > > [email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> > > http://ada.net.nz/ > > > > > > Manage your list membership (Subscribe, Change to digest, Unsubscribe) > > http://list.waikato.ac.nz/mailman/listinfo/ada_list > <http://list.waikato.ac.nz/mailman/listinfo/ada_list> > > > _______________________________________________ > Ada_list mailing list > [email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> > http://ada.net.nz/ > > > Manage your list membership (Subscribe, Change to digest, Unsubscribe) > http://list.waikato.ac.nz/mailman/listinfo/ada_list > <http://list.waikato.ac.nz/mailman/listinfo/ada_list> > > _______________________________________________ Ada_list mailing list [email protected] http://ada.net.nz/ Manage your list membership (Subscribe, Change to digest, Unsubscribe) http://list.waikato.ac.nz/mailman/listinfo/ada_list
