How Wikipedia Puts The Existence Of A Free Press At Risk, And A Free Press Will Die, Not With A Bang, But A Wiki Options Rating

[Jon Awbrey]

How Wikipedia Is Putting The Existence Of A Free Press At Risk

Wikipedia has shown us that a mass medium can be rendered so plastic and so well-leveraged that any part of it can be manipulated by a relatively small number of people, in ways that defy a free society's usual means to guard against it, so long as the special interests in question have a moderate amount of resources and the will to do so. If there are portions of the content that remain untouched, it is for two reasons only: (1) no one has conceived a stake in them yet, (2) virgin forest makes for good cover.

If you're thinking that Wikipedia is the Latest Thing in Blows Against The Empire, then you have a DoubleThink coming.

Jon Awbrey, Comment in The Guardian, 30 Jan 2009, 2:02am

[MZMcBride]

There's an undertone here that I think unfairly glamorizes the old media. I'm not sure there's been a very compelling case made that today's Web 2.0 spin is any worse than the spin and propaganda of a century ago.

There is a greater accessibility today, both from a creation and consumption standpoint, to be sure. However, the central argument here seems inherently flawed. When has the press ever been "free" in any sense? And how does greater accessibility in the Digital Age make it less free (or put it "at risk")? I'm still not seeing it.

[Jon Awbrey]

There's an undertone here that I think unfairly glamorizes the old media. I'm not sure there's been a very compelling case made that today's Web 2.0 spin is any worse than the spin and propaganda of a century ago.

There is a greater accessibility today, both from a creation and consumption standpoint, to be sure. However, the central argument here seems inherently flawed. When has the press ever been "free" in any sense? And how does greater accessibility in the Digital Age make it less free (or put it "at risk")? I'm still not seeing it.

Maybe you need to read this.

Jon (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/dry.gif)

[Jon Awbrey]

There's an undertone here that I think unfairly glamorizes the old media. I'm not sure there's been a very compelling case made that today's Web 2.0 spin is any worse than the spin and propaganda of a century ago.

There is a greater accessibility today, both from a creation and consumption standpoint, to be sure. However, the central argument here seems inherently flawed. When has the press ever been "free" in any sense? And how does greater accessibility in the Digital Age make it less free (or put it "at risk")? I'm still not seeing it.

Maybe you need to read this.

Jon (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/dry.gif)

Now, any such “undertone� is of course purely the sound of your own wiki driving you crazy, since no one with any sense whatever who's been paying attention the last 20 to 40 years would be found romanticizing establishment ways of doing anything. But since we are still paying attention we can tell that kicking the last vestiges of accountability and transparency out from under the estates of public education and public information has made things far worse than anyone could have imagined 10 years ago. What you romanticize as some kind of new age is simply the latest extension of old-fashioned brainwashing, with fewer checks against the power of oligarchs to con the public and sabotage the public interest.

Jon (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/dry.gif)

[MZMcBride]

Now, any such “undertone� is of course purely the sound of your own wiki driving you crazy, since no one with any sense whatever who's been paying attention the last 20 to 40 years would be found romanticizing establishment ways of doing anything. But since we are still paying attention we can tell that kicking the last vestiges of accountability and transparency out from under the estates of public education and public information has made things far worse than anyone could have imagined 10 years ago. What you romanticize as some kind of new age is simply the latest extension of old-fashioned brainwashing, with fewer checks against the power of oligarchs to con the public and sabotage the public interest.

I'm not really romanticizing a new age, but I'm also not starting threads with titles intended to alarm such as "How Wikipedia Puts The Existence Of A Free Press At Risk." I don't think this thread establishes how Wikipedia is putting the existence of a free press at risk. I also don't think this thread establishes what a "free press" even means or how Wikipedia might even be capable of disrupting it.

A site like Wikinews or the Internet in general are more "free" than most news organizations of the past century. If there's a decent argument that Wikipedia is threatening the existence of a free press, I'd be very interested to hear about it and discuss it.

When you say "Wikipedia has shown us that a mass medium can be rendered so plastic and so well-leveraged that any part of it can be manipulated by a relatively small number of people," however, it comes off as complete nonsense. Wikipedia hasn't shown anyone anything of the sort. Everyone with any sense has already known that the mass medium can be manipulated by a small number of people and in fact has been for a long time. The editors of the major newspapers and the directors of the major television stations controlled what was and wasn't news for decades. Advertisers are able to manipulate reality in order to generate huge profits for their clients. The Internet Age has changed the news dynamic to an extent and Wikipedia is perhaps a small component of this change, but the central argument here�that Wikipedia is threatening the existence of a free press�still seems to me to be unsupported by the evidence presented.

Putting blame with Wikipedia for "undermining [the] acceptable standards for information and knowledge publications" seems to be rather naive and misplaced. A bit similar to a person blaming their phone for the performance of the phone network. Wikipedia is certainly contributing to a change in how people view and accept information, but again, your central argument that its threatening the "free press" seems unfounded and seems to dramatically belittle the minds of real journalists.

It would be nice if you would make fewer assumptions about my views and present your own views more clearly.

[Avirosa]

A site like Wikinews or the Internet in general are more "free" than most news organizations of the past century.

Where exactly does all this 'free news' come from ? Oh that's right from the same news organisations that have been accessing news and publishing it for the last (at least) 100 years. News (i.e emerging data on human societies, individuals, the environment that they inhabit and the economies within they are active) is only as 'free' as the context of the accumulation of the data in a process at one time called 'news gathering'. Do you have an argument for how or why the contexts of news data accummulation have changed so as to make news 'more free' ?

A.virosa

[MZMcBride]

Do you have an argument for how or why the contexts of news data accummulation have changed so as to make news 'more free' ?

I'm not sure you're familiar with the various meanings of the word "free." When you compare, for example, the copyright status of articles posted at CNN.com to those posted at Wikinews, there is an entirely different sense of the word "free" that emerges than the senses you're considering, I think.

When you compare the advertising on the front page of the New York Times' website to the advertising on the front page of Wikinews, another sense of the word "free" emerges that I'm not sure you're giving any credit to.

[Avirosa]

I'm not sure you're familiar with the various meanings of the word "free." When you compare, for example, the copyright status of articles posted at CNN.com to those posted at Wikinews, there is an entirely different sense of the word "free" that emerges than the senses you're considering, I think.

I find it helpful to start with the meaning commonly understood to be relevant to the context of use:

If a country has a free press, its newspapers, magazines and television and radio stations are able to express any opinions they want, even if these criticize the government and other organisations. (Cambridge.org)

When you compare the advertising on the front page of the New York Times' website to the advertising on the front page of Wikinews, another sense of the word "free" emerges that I'm not sure you're giving any credit to.

Faced with this kind of jelly brained response I can see why Awbrey has retreated to the device of one liner obscurantism. Grudgingly I'll spell out for you the source of doltary in the above:

If Wikinews or anyother scraper, re-caster, demi plagiarist or shamateur scribbler uses the New York Times to source 'news' then the cost of gaining the intial data, whether it's gained by NYT journalists, NYT partner organisations or a commissioned News Agency, is underwritten by all the sources of income achieved by the NYT, including advertising on the NYT website. The regurgitation (Wikinews as the disgorging of bolus seems particularly apt) of material originating with NYT, on a site that doesn't carry advertising, does not make the achievement of the initial data cost free. And if advertising free news is what anyone wants, they can go the BBC - the citizens of Britain pay for this so it's free of both cost and advertising at the point of access - and there's unambiguous editorial responsibility.

A.virosa

This post has been edited by Avirosa: