Spalpeen

Jeff Jarvis writes on the subject of open source polls: “I say that if we could easily poll people about, say, indecency, we could counter the assertions of pressure groups that there’s an outcry — sufficient to threaten the First Amendment — when, in fact, there is no such outcry, only media spin and hype.”

Would that really work? If the media has published that there is an outcry, then it usually has the byproduct of creating one. Newspapers and media in general need to stop relying on polls, which, thanks to the nature of statistics (73.53% of all statistics are meaningless, don’t you know?) can be manipulated to show one point of view. An open source poll would guarantee the reliability of the statistics, but those statistics can always be interpreted to show the other side’s point of view.

The problem isn’t necessarily with the practice of polling, but with the actual implications of polls. The Guardian in particular seems to be fond of flashing headline stories based on poll results (Google reveals dozens of matches, and you can bet on seeing at least one front page story based on a poll result every week). I’d be very surprised if the data behind these polls was gained in an actively manipulative way, but I also know that all polls have an inherent bias: if not in the collation, then in the interpretation! Besides, nine times out of ten, the “controversial” poll tends to disappear from the headlines within the week, only to reappear the next time another controversial point of view is garnered from another commissioned poll.

Polls, like petitions, give the impression that society as a whole cares about things (and believes it’s possible to change the situation). The reality is that Government tends to do whatever it wants if it can reasonably expect to get away with it. The fundamentally ambiguous nature of polls and petitions means that they can never be considered a limitation on the power of Governement. An open source poll solution would be great of course, but just don’t expect it to be the solution to end all solutions.

A few tidbits on Gordon Brown and open government:

-On his site at the horrible titled GordonBrownforBritain.com, Gordon’s got a rather useless poll that asks readers “What should this site be talking about this week?” with a series of topics including the NHS, International Development, Education, and the Economy. What isn’t clear is that this message has been there for nearly ten days, with no content on the site actually discussing the NHS, which is the top voted topic. Guido Fawkes phoned up and asked about this topic, with not much luck. He also puts it all into greater perspective, here. How’s Gordon going to maintain a more transparent Government if he can’t keep a simple website on topic? Gordon Brown’s online campaign is a failure, because he knows he will be elected. That’s not democracy.

-Gordon had a nice little anecdote at the Deputy Leadership Debate in Sheffield, where he mentioned the Reagan joke (Sir, this man is an anti-communist … I don’t care what kind of communist he is etc.) and referred to press conferences in America. He mentioned that in public debates, people are only allowed to ask pre-approved questions in groups. The irony was that the layout for the debate and his talk was identical: several series of approved, grouped, three-at-a-time questions from the website, followed by questions from the audience in groups of six, with no follow up question. That means a very diluted discussion at best, and the ability for Gordon to ignore questions (which he did). To put this kind of ridiculous limits on the discussion is insane, and to mention it as open democracy in action is absurd.

-Final point: watch the first episode of Yes, Minister, “Open Government”. It doesn’t work without a radical change in behaviour/change in leadership.

Like a lot of politicians, Alan Johnson realises that the internet is “important”. More accurately, his PR guy does. Now, I know there’s a lot of controversy (see Miliband’s civil servant shadow blogger) over when politicians have shadow writers on blogs and other online mediums, but if we face reality, politicians are very busy people. They tend to have other people (like PR reps) to do stuff like communicate with people for them. That said, I don’t think it’s right if politicians aren’t open about who is posting on their behalf.

Take Alan Johnson for example. I know for a fact that he doesn’t write his own twitter entries over at Johnson4Deputy. How do I know this? Because I asked him at the Sheffield Hustings. He has a PR guy called Stuart Bruce running his twitter accounts, and it’s vaguely clear that the “Johnson4Deputy” campaign is being run by him (see the imprint section on this page). Still, I don’t think that makes is right for his twitter/facebook/flickr/meetup/youtube accounts to be written in the first person. He should acknowledge that the person updating his twitter isn’t him.

Putting aside the mildly deceptive element of the tactic, there’s the problem of what happens if a PR guy fucks up. Alan has to take full responsibility right? Well, it would probably force him to blame his PR campaign, which would then undoubtedly blow open the concept of why exactly he was letting another person speak on his behalf. Sure, his twitter account is a very staid affair (taking the “What are you doing?” concept to the absolute extreme), but that doesn’t mean it’s not potentially open to manipulation.

What I’m getting at with all this is that the internet has a potential that is greater than a simple PR campaign. It can be used for reasoned debate, when it is instead being used as a way to create buzz. What a deputy leadership candidate does now is directly indicative of what he/she’ll do when they get power. If Alan Johnson considers the internet as nothing more than another outlet for building buzz, he’ll go into power thinking of it as nothing more than a way of building popularity and as a support base.

Two of the first books I’ve been recommended to read by Prof. Noel O’Sullivan at Hull:

Gordon Graham’s The Internet - Buy here, read an academic review here. Note that this was published in 1999. The web has changed an awful lot since then.

From the review: ” … even if the Internet is a new world it is not a world unto itself for its members are already members of this, our non-cybernetic, world. The world of the Internet cannot, in short, supplant our world; at most it can grow out of and assume an enormous significance within our world. But its shape and character are determined by, and can be controlled by, the forms our present world choose to assume.” I think this viewpoint (that the internet was never designed to replace reality) has been accepted now. People acknowledge that sites like Facebook only compliment real life activities. Possibly this is why concepts such as Second Life are failing: they seek to emulate the concept of the “3D Internet”, a silly concept where people replace their real physical lives with an artificial world.

Another interesting quote from the review: ” … the worldwide web, for all its puffed social and political ramifications, is principally a world of commercial activity.” I love this quote, because it questions the concept of the web as a force for unequivocal good. Commercial activity is tied inexorably to making money. It’s arguable whether that can ever be “good”, no matter what the optimistic college student CEOs in Silicon Valley think.

Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri’s Empire - Buy here. Also first published over 7 years ago in 2000. Interesting review here: ” … the book is a breathtakingly incoherent hash, composed of loopy 1960s utopianism, apologetics for the Soviet Union, paranoia, and sheer blood lust. Neither author appears to have really been prepared to handle a book of this attempted scope.”

Yesterday I went to the Labour Deputy Leadership Hustings in Sheffield. I noted down a few phrases (which may be paraphrased) from the debate, of which I’ll be highlighting the best, worst, and most cringeworthy, and making commentary.

David Aaronovitch to the audience: “Lets have a democratic round of applause.” (Because clapping isn’t about conformity and unquestioned respect.)

Hilary Benn on Grammar schools: “At 11 they get a letter through the door telling them they’re a failure.”

Hazel Blears on mental health treatment in the UK: “It was a Cinderella service under the Tories.” On the topic of alternative treatments, including art and drama for mental health patients: “More imagination, more innovation.”

Peter Hain on 16 years old, potential voters: “They’re the future.” (Do I even need to say “duh?”)

Jon Cruddas questioning the same issue: “Are 16 year olds of one voice on this?”

Alan Johnson: “The age of candidacy for elections should come down to 18.”

Hazel Blears on David Cameron: “Man of the people won’t wash.” Harriet Harman on Cameron: ” … David Cameron or Paris Hilton … “

Alan Johnson on John Humphrys: “He’s a bit of a pussycat.” Alan quoting Jeremy Paxman who didn’t do his homework: “‘You went to University Alan?’ No! … I hope for a softball question like that in the future.”

Harriet Harman: “We need someone who can listen to what people can say.” (Even by the low standard of the speech soundbites, this was a bad one…)

And last but very much not least, Alan Johnson had the worst soundbite by far, with an elaborate metaphor that made very little sense. Audience laughed over it. I paraphrase: “As we say in the North East, you don’t blow your own trumpet. But if I join the Gordon Brown brass ensemble, I hope to play some pretty attractive tunes.”

The Guardian redesigned its website’s front page the other week. I wrote about how tabloidy it is, but Jeff Jarvis in his Media column put the view across much more effectively today. He talks about news being more of a feed than any other format. Instead of having a homepage with some big, large image pointing to the biggest issue of the day, Jeff suggests that they should redesign around a feed format. Allow people to customize what they see on the homepage. Add video, audio, and text commentary from other sources on the web to add context. Make it collaborative. He cites figures where only 20% of readers come to the front page of the site sites. The rest all read The Guardian through links that were originally collated through feeds and deeper linking on other sites, using RSS or otherwise.

These are all nice ideas, but it’ll take a significant culture change within a paper like The Guardian in order to effect a move away from what editors have always understood: a front page, with a leading story. Unfortunately for newspapers, the days where the newspapers get to decide this story are coming to an end. What makes it all the more depressing is that “All this can be done today. And doesn’t that make the notion of the home page, the web site, and the site sound antiquated and quaint like, oh, a newspaper?”

Jeff’s got it right. The real change that has to come at newspapers is cultural, so it’s rather strange that Jeff’s voice comes from within The Guardian. I hope the old hands on the front page read his articles.

Ben Goldacre put together the definitive article on the BBC Panorama WiFi program. Starting with the Independent’s stupid headline the other week, the BBC followed up with a scaremongering report suggesting that WiFi causes illness. Where did they go to measure the WiFi signals? In a school: because they know that anything affecting children is at least three times as important as issues effecting adults…

It may actually turn out that WiFi is harmful to health, but until a study finds conclusive evidence that it is, we probably shouldn’t follow people around who sell tin-hats (as the BBC reporter did) and believe what they say.

http://www.boingboing.net/2007/05/02/everything_is_miscel.html

This has some implications for video games. Think of how categorised video game reviews are, and the implications that these categories have. Are games that are classified as “casual” less valuable than “hardcore” ones? Is it the other way around?

The ultimate category is of course, platforms. Why should video games have to be limited to individual platforms? The wide expectation is that either HD DVD or Blu ray will “win” the format war. That means that you can almost be certain that a film will play on the box you’ve got at home. That’s not the case in video games. Instead, you have at least three “big” platforms; the Xbox 360, the Nintendo Wii, and the PlayStation 3. Why should video games be limited to individual platforms, and why do people go nuts and “support” platforms? To me, being a “Wii” or “PS3″ or “Xbox” fanboy is akin to getting excited about DVD region limitations.

http://www.the360loop.wordpress.com/2007/05/03/the-ultimate-console-pswii60/

Also, these two ideas have been running around my head for months. The insanity of system platforms, and incessant categorisation in life. Then I find out someone’s written a book (which I’ll be buying) and a blog post about them already. That pesky Baader-Meinhof Phenomenon.

P.S. I love the irony that I’ve tagged this post with categories…