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Digital impacts, Local Democracy
Alison Powell, London School of Economics
Online Neighbourhood Networks Conference, November 30, 2010
DIY CITIZENSHIP
social media and social change
Alison Powell, FutureEverythingManchester, May 14 2010
Media and democracy – past and present
Social media and local democracy
– Filter
– Feed
– Funnel The Dark Side Discussion
In the beginning – the ideal for public
discussion?
The Mass Media: all the news that's fit
alternatives
Alternative access
Alternative content
Alternative governance
Community networks: community memory
Alternative content (save our playground)
This belongs to us:Community Wireless in
Montreal
Hotspots in 2006
Hotspots in 2009
Portal Pages
GuiFi.net - Catalonia
• 6,100 nodes• Participation of 25
town councils• Bandwidth sharing
through backhaul• “extending neutrality to
the edge by providing an alternative” - founder
Part Two: Social Media
FilterFeed
Funnel
Filter
Feed
Time is of the essence
Funnel
Where's my train?
Dark sides
- Access divides reconfigured
- We don't govern our platforms
Echo Chambers
“the Internet often makes the jump from deliberation to participation even more difficult, thwarting collective action under the heavy pressure of never-ending internal debate. This is what may explain the impotence of recent protests in Iran: Thanks to the sociability and high degree of decentralization afforded by the Internet, Iran's Green Movement has been split into so many competing debate chambers—some of them composed primarily of net-savvy Iranians in the diaspora—that it couldn't collect itself on the eve of the 31st anniversary of the Islamic revolution. The Green Movement may have simply drowned in its own tweets.” (Evgeny Morozov, New York Times Feb 20 2010)
Some questions:
What opportunities do filter, feed and funnel provide?
What constraints do they pose?
What does effective use of Twitter look like?
