4.5: Nate Hill

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Executive Director, Metropolitan New York Library Council (METRO) http://natehill.net/

Listening to the preliminary findings from the algo study left me reflecting on networked spaces as a medium made for individuals, rather than communities. This is a bit counterintuitive. I think we all expected the opposite. We planned for this utopian, freeing “cyberspace” community, but instead we have been sold a network for mass personalization that ultimately rewards individual vanity over community building. This really clicked when I heard about study participants (students) embracing a certain amount of targeted advertising as long as it benefited them, but then transitioning to calling this “creepy” when they were reminded of the scale of this kind of activity. My takeaway: we need to stop talking about the internet as some kind of inherent good, some kind of human right. This is inaccurate; advancing the interests of individuals above those of the greater community is wrong.

Shortly after the “thinking leaders” session I attended a talk featuring the leader of an excellent organization that is focused on connecting all communities to affordable broadband. The speaker kept on talking about our “transition to a digital society” as some kind of inevitable phenomenon. I know librarians frequently talk about the need for ubiquitous and equitable internet access by citing examples like “people cannot even apply for jobs without going online now.” Have we as a society just succumbed and accepted that efficiency and profit will drive all activities into a networked space? What are the ramifications of that? It seems problematic to accept that all activities will inevitably move online, therefore people all need to be online. Perhaps, at the same time that we focus on connecting everyone, we should talk more about what activities should and shouldn’t happen on a network. Should we do all of our reading online? Should the census be digital? If we did disagree with some kind of activity moving online, how would we handle that? So as grumpy as it may sound, I am concluding that human beings need less mediated connection and more human connection.

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