Douglas Rushkoff writes in the March 2007 issue of Discover magazine, (page 70), "I wonder how many people picked up Time's "Person of the Year" issue, gazed into the silver mirror on the cover, and felt genuinely proud to be among the 300-million-or-so people the magazine's editors felt deserved this special honor. After all, we had some stiff competition."
I say, "Yes, how about the American soldier? Eh? But he only counts if he resides in a body bag." I digress.
I wasn't proud. My initial reaction was to hold the magazine delicately with two fingers and gaze about for a trash can. What a cop out! The 300-million-or-so people of the United States "Person of the Year?" Condescending snobbery. If I had any questions about how intelligent the Powers of Media thought I was, I am now no longer in doubt. They're convinced I'm an idiot.
"Welcome to your world," the Time article begins. "For seizing the global media, for founding and framing the new digital democracy, for working for nothing and beating the pros at their own game..."
"Welcome to your world?" What? You're sitting in my house and you're welcoming me? Excuse me, where's the barf bag. The only way these clowns can acknowledge ordinary joes like MySpace users, bloggers and YouTube freaks is if they can do it from the safety of their corporate towers in the secure knowledge they still hold the power they deign to assign to us. I'm not fooled, o, ye Corporate Honchos with your six or nine figure salaries and trips to the Bahamas on corporate accounts.
As Rushkoff rightly points out, "Instead of our paying to watch a movie in the theater, we pay to make and upload our own movies online. Instead of paying a record company to listen to their artists' music on a CD player, we pay a computer company for the hardware, an Internet access company for the bandwidth, and a software company for the media players to do all this..."
Yes. It's true. They've come around from behind, while we thought we were empowered and took our money in order to empower us.
Rushkoff says, "Time's willingness to acknowledge the power of Internet users everywhere hints at corporate America's confidence that it has finally weathered the storm: If what's playing on YouTube is the best "the people" can come up with, then media monopolies have nothing to fear."
Does your face sting at such a thought? And we've thought we mattered.
Rushkoff agrees with my first impression of the Time article--gee, the mirror isn't very clear and it seems more like a snub than anything. A snub, a "see--you're not as hot and mighty as you thought, you 300-million-or-so slobs you. We're still "da man!"" It just fits with my general conviction that the media thinks the ordinary joe is basically an idiot.
We, the people, have made some headway, but becoming Time's "Person of the Year," makes it look like it hasn't been much! Like it's all been symbolic! Like we've actually just been wasting our time. Being chosen "Person of the Year" with such confident nose thumbing shows "journalists" (a group of persons the Founding Fathers thought of as the lowest class of humanity), are still in the power seats telling us what they want us to hear and guiding our stupid lowlinesses toward what they feel are correct decisions. Hear, hear. Where's that barf bag?
We are, according to Rushkoff, "...creating content using expensive consumer technologies and uploading it to corporate-owned servers using corporate-owned conduits...we're doing it with software made by corporations whose own interests are embedded in its very code...User agreements...require us to surrender some or all of the rights to our own creations..."
Our behavior is monitored, we're categorized and cubbyholed for advertizing campaigns on sites like this one, iTunes, Second Life, Gmail..."Each and every key stroke becomes part of our consumer profile; every attempt at self-expression is reduced to a brand preference," says Rushkoff. Gak.
Rushkoff concludes, "...But in the end we're still glued to a tube, watching mostly crap, arguing like angry idiots, surrendering the last remains of our privacy, and paying a whole lot more to large corporations for the privilege."
Oh well, here I am blogging away. I'll be looking for a way to get back at you Corporate Honcho.
I say, "Yes, how about the American soldier? Eh? But he only counts if he resides in a body bag." I digress.
I wasn't proud. My initial reaction was to hold the magazine delicately with two fingers and gaze about for a trash can. What a cop out! The 300-million-or-so people of the United States "Person of the Year?" Condescending snobbery. If I had any questions about how intelligent the Powers of Media thought I was, I am now no longer in doubt. They're convinced I'm an idiot.
"Welcome to your world," the Time article begins. "For seizing the global media, for founding and framing the new digital democracy, for working for nothing and beating the pros at their own game..."
"Welcome to your world?" What? You're sitting in my house and you're welcoming me? Excuse me, where's the barf bag. The only way these clowns can acknowledge ordinary joes like MySpace users, bloggers and YouTube freaks is if they can do it from the safety of their corporate towers in the secure knowledge they still hold the power they deign to assign to us. I'm not fooled, o, ye Corporate Honchos with your six or nine figure salaries and trips to the Bahamas on corporate accounts.
As Rushkoff rightly points out, "Instead of our paying to watch a movie in the theater, we pay to make and upload our own movies online. Instead of paying a record company to listen to their artists' music on a CD player, we pay a computer company for the hardware, an Internet access company for the bandwidth, and a software company for the media players to do all this..."
Yes. It's true. They've come around from behind, while we thought we were empowered and took our money in order to empower us.
Rushkoff says, "Time's willingness to acknowledge the power of Internet users everywhere hints at corporate America's confidence that it has finally weathered the storm: If what's playing on YouTube is the best "the people" can come up with, then media monopolies have nothing to fear."
Does your face sting at such a thought? And we've thought we mattered.
Rushkoff agrees with my first impression of the Time article--gee, the mirror isn't very clear and it seems more like a snub than anything. A snub, a "see--you're not as hot and mighty as you thought, you 300-million-or-so slobs you. We're still "da man!"" It just fits with my general conviction that the media thinks the ordinary joe is basically an idiot.
We, the people, have made some headway, but becoming Time's "Person of the Year," makes it look like it hasn't been much! Like it's all been symbolic! Like we've actually just been wasting our time. Being chosen "Person of the Year" with such confident nose thumbing shows "journalists" (a group of persons the Founding Fathers thought of as the lowest class of humanity), are still in the power seats telling us what they want us to hear and guiding our stupid lowlinesses toward what they feel are correct decisions. Hear, hear. Where's that barf bag?
We are, according to Rushkoff, "...creating content using expensive consumer technologies and uploading it to corporate-owned servers using corporate-owned conduits...we're doing it with software made by corporations whose own interests are embedded in its very code...User agreements...require us to surrender some or all of the rights to our own creations..."
Our behavior is monitored, we're categorized and cubbyholed for advertizing campaigns on sites like this one, iTunes, Second Life, Gmail..."Each and every key stroke becomes part of our consumer profile; every attempt at self-expression is reduced to a brand preference," says Rushkoff. Gak.
Rushkoff concludes, "...But in the end we're still glued to a tube, watching mostly crap, arguing like angry idiots, surrendering the last remains of our privacy, and paying a whole lot more to large corporations for the privilege."
Oh well, here I am blogging away. I'll be looking for a way to get back at you Corporate Honcho.
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