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I tend to agree with much of what Siegel says. Last year was a Democrat year; his skin colour or use of 'new technology' did not win him the election, no matter how skilfully his handlers used it at the time. (It doesn't seem to be helping Obama now.)

One of the debates that has flowed through these threads is about whether the Web is likely to change human nature, the relationship between citizen and state etc, or is 'just' another form of communication?

Siegel's point of the Web being an 'amplification of human nature' is I think well made; one thing that I've noticed recently is that far-right groups are posting a lot of videos onto YouTube; they seem to have realised that this is a way of reaching people that by-passes mainstream media. But they are no means alone in this.

Don't believe the web favours just one political group, religion or set of aspirations or views as to how society should develop, any more than TV or radio does. Perhaps the open democracy, social media just holds a mirror up to humanity so we can truly see ourselves as we are, at that point in time. We may not like all we see.

President Obama's success is probably less about new media and more about him being personally multi-media.

I wrote in the Arianna Huffington rushes page: "Regardless of the era or the field, the talent and their message need to match the medium."

In a print-only world, if we read Obama's messages they stand-up well (whether on the topics of diversity, respect for ancestors, education or the future forward):

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In a stage-only world, Obama's ability to project himself (voice, body language and physical presence --- charisma) is well known.

In a radio-only world, the articulacy, timbre and tone of Obama's voice also stands up well (try it, listen to him without watching his image).

In a TV-only world, his facial expressions and body language also translate well. His features are even, his gaze is steady, he conveys warmth in his smiles and he uses his hands purposefully to emphasize points.

Now, since the Web is an amalgamation of print, sound, image and stage presence Obama's message only becomes more magnified by the power of 4 cornerstone media synergizing rather than each medium by itself. The sum of the whole is greater than the parts.

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Let's contrast this with Richard Nixon who had a mellifluous voice which was great for radio, but as soon as they started televising the debates against JFK he certainly did not translate across as strongly:

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He was perceived as less trustworthy and his nickname "Tricky Dicky".


Of course the media was instrumental in the Obama story and success as was situational timing (consensual desire for change that got articulated by the Obama camp and a disaffection for inarticulate Republican candidates with no standout vision, who simply reminded people of Bush's inarticulacy and likewise lack of vision).

Interestingly, we might be able to say that Obama is a relatively novice President which explains the recurrence of gridlock in the Senate over US healthcare reforms. However, what's distinctive is that his team are not media amateurs.

As for whether the Web is capable of changing human nature.............If we can re-imagine our existing constructs of human intelligence and consciousness, we have a chance of evolving human nature.

After all, we are one of the most adaptable species on this planet.

There are already anecdotal signs that human nature is being affected by the Web (and, no, I don't mean the truncation of our thoughts into SMS text or supposed loss of attention span). We're discovering that people in countries with a different language and culture to us can also share a similar sense of satire or an appreciation/curiosity for talent in its different shapes and sizes:

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Hi Dan and PNAB.

The ' Top 50 Most Watched Videos On Youtube!' URL PNAB posted above was great; I immediately viraled it by posting it on my Facebook status for others to watch.


I tend to see a meme simply as an idea, concept or influence (memes can of course form parts of larger memes), whilst a viral is a conscious attempt to spread or promote it; e.g. emailing URL links, producing an instructional video and uploading it, a blog post or comment, polemic produced to appear on a web page, photograph, artwork, music track and so on.

In its earliest form the transmission of memes was the transmission of skills, knowledge and culture from parent to child.
Society is a competition of ideas; ideas gained and spread by what we see, hear, read or experience.

Ideas can be and are continually transferred from one individual to another, often imitated or repeated, then further developed by mutation, crossover, adaptation, assimilation and so on. (Dawkins idea that memes like genes, can replicate and evolve.) Ideas can be expressed as objects, art, music, behaviours, and actions well as by printed words or the tools of pedagogy or propaganda.

Throughout human history cultural transmission of ideas took place along the great trade routes; ideas and knowledge - as well as objects, goods, plants and animals etc - were exchanged.

What the Web has amplified (and the printing press, the telegraph, telephone, TV and radio before that) is the speed and distance over which these can be transmitted and the number of people that can potentially access these.

The competition of ideas has become potentially fiercer. (Though many people express little curiosity whilst many others prefer the comfort zone of their own world-view and sites that reflect it back at them.)

The rate at which ideas (memes) can developed by mutation, crossover, adaptation, assimilation etc consequently has increased.

Not everyone welcomes innovation, new ideas or 'change'; another consequence could be sharper divisions within societies, an increase in paranoia, anger and anxiety, greater resistance to 'the new' and to change generally.

(There probably could be a cultural equivalent to Newton's 3rd law; for every action there is opposite reaction. With the difference that there wouldn't always have to be a reaction , nor would it always be equal response; after all human nature isn't governed by gravity.)

The competition of ideas within societies could become fiercer.

By no means are all memes benign; in his book 'The Tipping Point' Malcolm Gladwell defines a meme as an idea that behaves like a virus, it moves through a population, taking hold in each person it infects. The tipping point is the name given to the moment in the early stage of an epidemic when a virus reaches critical mass and becomes a full blown epidemic.


The spread of Hitlerism in Germany in the 1930s or Leninism in Russia two decades earlier could be examples of memes infecting a population. [My examples, not Gladwell's.]

Others may find exposure to so many ideas too confusing to make sense of.
This returns us to past DigRev blog discussions as to how people are best equipped to filter and assess information and so on.

Memes. This is one of the reasons the Web as "a mirror on us and our society" concept isn't an accurate or helpful analogy for what it actually is, does and could be.

If everyone will allow me this time-space to synapse a little on mirrors, Newton's laws, consciousness and the electromagnetic (EM) spectrum..............

Recently, a well-known neuroscientist (who isn't Professor Greenfield but shall remain respectfully anonymous) conducted an experiment with light and some insects to demonstrate that the insects are conscious of EM changes. He then postulated that consciousness is a continuum like the EM spectrum.

Now, I'm not an academic and I have this other theory whereby consciousness may not be a continuum like the EM spectrum but, instead, a phenomenon that evolves and mutates dynamically and organically like DNA or any other biochemical molecule (ok, like a meme, enzyme or protein).

Consciousness may not be like EM light because:

(1.) Light does not react.

It reflects, refracts, re-emits and acts as a reaction catalyst (i.e. applies heat to excite electrons in the case of UV and photosynthesis). By comparison, DNA and biochemicals DO react and continuously so.


(2.) Light waves follow established "straight line" oscillatory paths in the absence of any obstructions, particularly steel and lead, and their masses don't change.

Meanwhile, DNA and biochemicals can mutate randomly, path in non-linear patterns, change their masses due to reactions with other molecules (adding, losing or substituting electrons during the process) --- all of which affect their shape, nature, velocity and future interactions with other molecules.


(3.) Light can't and doesn't adopt the features of other phenomena it encounters.

DNA and other biochemicals do.


Now, likewise, when i read about the Web being a "mirror of us and our society" I reason:

* Like light, mirrors don't react. They merely reflect, refract, re-emit an image (slightly distorted because no mirror has perfect aperture or concave/convexity that proxies our own natural vision yet).

* Like light, mirrors tend to offer "straight line" paths; they can't bend themselves round corners and provide a clear reflection from that!

* Like light, mirrors can't and don't adopt the features of other phenomena it encounters.


SO..........MY RATIONALE SAYS THE WEB IS MORE THAN A "MIRROR".


If we really examine the way in which, progressively, the technology is weaving and binding (various protocols cross-connecting and distributing to known nodes, e.g. the way the DIGG, Twitter, every other share button activates to publishing platforms like HuffPost, Facebook, Yahoo, Google Wave, etc.), the way in which content is being contextualized, cross-pollinated and even mutated (e.g. in mash-ups as well as in multiple sourcing of links, text, graphics, images within the same page such as in Wikipedia) and then the way online stories and characters spread via memes and spam-junk propagates like virus.........

The Web is actually like DNA!!! It's not some perspex/glass over a sheet of silver nitrate-coated cardboard. It's organic. It evolves. It interacts.

It fosters...........GLOBAL CONSCIOUSNESS.


Now as for Newton, the most interesting law of motion is arguably the First Law: "An object will remain at rest or in uniform motion in a straight line unless acted upon by an external force. It may be seen as a statement about inertia, that objects will remain in their state of motion unless a force acts to change the motion."

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Newton's First Law doesn't have applicability only in mechanical and aeronautical engineering for the calculation of the propulsion energy needed to accelerate an airplane to take-off or only in figuring out how much excitation energy is needed to make an electron leave its outer shell and interact with another electron shell, btw.

It certainly has socio-economic-cultural relevance and application.

If we look at the global financial crisis, the stock charts may have been oscillating but the financial institutions, central banks, hedge funds, etc. were all traveling along the same straight line paths. There was also inertia in the system from parties who wanted everything to stay the way it was. Then the crisis happened (the external forces). Subsequently, the velocity (direction, speed and destination) of the banking sector and the wider economy has been affected.

Similarly, the Web may experience some external force(s) that challenge it to evolve its course from focusing mostly on online revenue generation to actually collectively SOLVING the conundrums and challenges to Humankind like climate change, education provision, economic equivalence, etc.

Now, there's an idea --- LOL.


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Just for fun since I mentioned the EM spectrum, here's a story about a girl who apparently has X-Ray vision.

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It's not the competition of ideas which ultimately matters. It's in the financing, cultural support and EXECUTION (i.e. implementation) of SMART innovation that determines whether and how our species makes progress and succeeds in our common challenges.

Otherwise, we continuously make mistakes, learn little from history (or those mistakes) and continue to enable our egos rather than our intelligence, our humanity and our consciousness when trying to make sense of the situation, the relationships involved and take life+death decisions.

I observe this based on experience of the first dotcom boom and bust and realizing that Web 2.0 technology is not "all that or there and hype is the same but tweeted instead of embedded", the 1997 Asian market collapse and now the global financial crisis, various wars and other events.

Context and consequence.

When memes spread it's because someone has made the connection (the context) that their contact will find this content (story, character, Homer's arcs for the hero) interesting and so they start a sequence of transmittance via connections ===> consequence.


Ok, time for sleep eye.

The below may be of some interest to DigRev. (Unrelated to Siegal or the above.)

You’ve probably seen this TechCrunch article about how early Twitter reports (from inside Fort Hood whilst the recent shootings were in progress) turned out to be wrong; it is food for thought about how the instantaneous nature of web/mobile communication can also be used to spread inaccurate information.