Since I missed my blog for week one, I thought I'd use this catch up blog to explore some issues around social media. These concepts will be relevant to my research project that I’m doing with Ben Anderson, but may also be of interest to other groups as well.
Firstly, here is blog by Evgeny Morozov, the author of The Net Delusion: The Dark Side of Internet Freedom, a book that Teodor said might be useful to our topic. Morozov explores the effect new technologies and the internet have on democratisation and politics in general. Within this framework he discusses things like the impact of Wikileaks and the role the internet plays in social and civil revolutions, however he also says that the internet can also be used as a tool for control.
Another writer worth looking at is Clay Shirky, a professor of New Media at New York University that studies the effects of the internet on society. Shirky argues that social media enables people to challenge their governments by giving them tools mobilise themselves and organise large-scale protests, as discussed in this article.
Malcolm Gladwell provides a contrasting and controversial view in this article. He critiques many people’s view that Twitter and Facebook are tools for activism, for example that they played a critical role in the revolutions in Moldova or Iran. His arguments emerge from broader theoretical considerations about the nature of activism and revolution, the structure of which he claims are antithetical to the relationships created by social media.
The ideas from these articles and blogs have given me a good starting point for our research project, however they are also worthwhile reading as they provide a good deal of insight into issues surrounding digital networks in general.
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