Essay: The Democratization of Information: Power, Peril, and Promise
Each year since 1998 Beloit College in Wisconsin has published a “Mindset List” compiled by Professor Tom McBride and higher education communications expert Ron Nief. The list highlights the culture in which incoming freshmen have lived and can reveal a lot about the democratization of information. The Class of 2013 has always been able to read books on an electronic screen and always lived in a world in which they could watch wars, natural disasters, terrorist attacks, political elections, and police arrests in real time on televison. The words “wymn” and “waitperson” have always been included in the dictionaries they consult, most likely online. They have always been able to migrate one medium, such as radio, DVDs, and compact discs, to another. For the Class of 2013, rap music has always been part of mainstream culture, and Natalie Cole has always sung with her father. The health care system has always needed an overhaul. Official race classifications in South Africa have always been outlawed. Babies have always had social security numbers. Cristóbal Colón has always been criticized for “founding” the Americas. Their world has been shaped by the democratization of information.
Even for those of us who are not part of the Class of 2013, access to information has served as a powerful force for change in both our lives and in the world journalist Thomas Friedman described in his 2008 bestseller as hot, flat, and crowded. We live in a world where five years ago there was no Facebook or YouTube. Today, Facebook has 200,000,000 global users, and every minute ten hours of video are posted on YouTube. Social networking sites are ubiquitous to the point comedienne Wanda Sykes expressed the skepticism some people feel about them on the “The Jay Leno Show”: “If I didn’t want to speak with you in the fifth grade, what makes you think I want to speak to you now?” These sites are now popular enough with Baby Boomers and Generation Xers, parents and grandparents of the class of 2013, that younger people are considering alternate sites like Multiply for their social network needs.
Media, including newspapers, mail, movies, phone calls, documents, and television are now all delivered in digital form. These changes shift power from providers to users. If we choose, for instance, to watch television shows on our own schedules, we can easily do so. We can visit “Green Acres,” yearn to be part of the Cosby family, and watch “I Love Lucy” nearly every hour of every day on television worldwide, despite the fact that the series originally left the air in 1960. No time in our schedules to watch entire shows? No problem. We can watch video clips such as Lucy’s audition for a Vitameatavegamin commercial on YouTube. iPhone users have downloaded one billion applications such as Whrrl v2.2, which helps people tell stories with their personal photos; Shazam, which helps identify songs users hear playing, even on another medium; and BubbleWrap, which allows people to pop bubbles with their fingers using their phones. There are even websites that tell people which sites are the top ten free medical applications for their iPhones. These sites help web surfers check updated clinical data, decipher medical formulas, and even take an eye exam via a virtual chart. This shift in power has economic implications for providers and the advertisers in search of the best sites for their ads.
The power and promise of the ways information is disseminated on the Internet and through personal communication tools are extraordinary. Jeffrey M. Stibel argues in the introduction to Wired for Thought (2009), “Never before has the idea of a thinking machine brought together a greater confluence of thinkers and scientists…The Internet…will be (and already is) capable of creating a collective consciousness.” People around the world watched uploaded video in horror as an Iranian woman was killed by government thugs, and that focused the world on Iran’s 2009 election results and the protests that followed them. While the “net” can be a lifeline for people who are homebound, it has the potential as well to facilitate unprecedented cooperation between scholars and practitioners around the globe to use technology and shared information in finding cures for diseases such as cancer and AIDS. Information technology has also helped organizations such as Kiva match entrepreneurs with people who have donated more than $100 million in $25 increments to help start businesses in 185 nations.
There is potential peril in the democratization of information as well. Identity theft has grown exponentially. Twenty-four-hour news outlets often report inaccurate information in an effort to get stories on air before their competitors. Political candidates can get information to potential voters, but governments can censor information as well. As information becomes more accessible, critics charge that the tools with which we access and disseminate it breed incivility and destroy formal language skills.
Thirty years ago, futurists predicted we would use portable computers and use telephones without
cords. We would live in dormitories and travel in blimps. Today, they predict lifespans of 150-200 years, electronic contact lenses, and implantation of cybernetic chips for organ repairs. Commuters will wear video glasses that will allow them to watch television shows and films and gather information as they travel to and from work. We may increasingly “lifestream” by documenting all aspects of our lives. We should, futurists suggest, be able to communicate with our computers by merely thinking something.
Over the next two years, Phi Theta Kappa members will have opportunities to examine in depth the power, peril, and promise inherent in the democratization of information. We hope you will use what you learn to grow as scholars and leaders as you develop Honors in Action projects. May the promise of the democratization of information far outweigh the perils. Let’s show the power of Phi Theta Kappa members to do good worldwide A3 AISB. ATB.*
