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When the internet first got kicking, some scholars of democracy and civil society thought that online discussions could create what they called a "conversational democracy”: an ongoing town hall without bricks and mortar. But the internet may not be as democratic as they'd imagined, according to a study in the journal Communication Research. ["Civil Society and Online Political Discourse: The Network Structure of Unrestricted Discussions"]
Researcher Itai Himelboim gathered eight million messages posted to 35 political and philosophical newsgroups—like alt.politics.usa—over a six-year period. And he analyzed the connections among the messages. Turns out that 50 percent of all replies were directed at just 2 percent of people who started threads, and who thus came to control the discussion. And the larger the newsgroup, the more polarized this effect became.
But these newsgroup dominators weren't posting much original content. Sixty percent of their posts were just content lifted from traditional news sources like the New York Times. Which is good news for the news business, the author says. Because it means people still want someone else to search out information and deliver it. After all, isn't that one reason why you listen to this podcast?
—Christopher Intagliata
[The above text is an exact transcript of this podcast,]
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8 Comments
Add CommentThere was a great deal of naively idealistic enthusiasm for the internet as a vehicle for free thinking and free expression of individual ideas. There have been some important instances of political progression of individualism, particularly in China and recently in the middle East.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThere were also some early ideas that the internet would decentralize manufacturing and corporate control of markets, spawning high-tech cottage industries - allowing individuals to successfully compete with multinational corporations. Don't see much of that, especially since most urban internet users are so dependent on those global conglomerates for basic resource requirements: food, water, fuel, energy, etc.
Seriously? It took a study to find that out? There wasn't already enough known about the failure of so-called democratic communities like the counter-culture communes? Democracy, as Plato knew, has always been tyranny in fancy dress and any society which attempts it invariably ends up dominated by bullies and loud-mouths because all men are not equal however much we may attempt to delude ourselves to the contrary!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI wonder if Himelboim took into account the sometimes-peculiar etiquette of newsgroups, which dictate that all responses to a comment in a thread remain under that thread, and that changes in subject line are to be avoided at all cost? A newsgroup conversation, like a real conversation, can have many, many changes in topic and responders while superficially appearing to remain constant. It's the sort of thing a poorly written data mining algorithm is likely to miss.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI'm not a big fan of large group-discussion forums for a number of reasons discussed in this 'cast. I'm an administrator in a moderated 500+ person bipartisan discussion group on facebook. We have a much higher percentage of user-generated data posts, and those post coming from third-party sources are derived from a broad spectrum of non-traditional outlets.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWe're still heir to the issues of any online discussion group, in that we're still people with flaws and bad days, but we've found that by giving patient reminders and setting good examples, as well as being understanding of the occasional lapse (against a history of civil dialogue), we've developed stronger lines of communication and greater empathy for the "opposition", while fostering a sense of community.
In addition to a smaller membership, our community standards have played a considerable role in helping contributors develop real relationships with one another. Things like "attack the argument, not the person"; "avoid the use of absolutes"; "back up your argument with reliable data" and its corollary, "asking for factual support is not rude, please be civil and acquiesce" have minimized the trolling, hyperbole, and name calling. When smaller forums insist on civil substantive dialogue, they often get it.
As for the percentages issue, it's true that our regular contributors are a small percentage of our overall membership. As they range from socialist, liberal, centrist, conservative, and libertarian to anarcho-capitalist (though admittedly A-C's and Objectivsts don't tend to do well in our formulation of intellectual biodiversity - Stephen Molnyeux and Ayn Rand don't provide much in the way of reliable data), we don't see them broad base of ideas expressed by a smaller number of people as an indication of problematic domination. Rather, we have a large number of people who prefer to draw from the information provided and discussed without contributing regularly. This is acceptable to us, as that's really one of the main reasons we exist - to disseminate data and points of view generated by civil discussion.
The Internet offers a new medium that permits bloggers have more liberty to express their opinions, not subjected to the power of censorship of the employers from big companies of journalism.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisScientific American has a session that mimics the new power exerted by independent bloggers. What is the name of this new session? Guest Blog, not is it? And at the end of those blogs are placed this warning:
*The views expressed are those of the author and are not necessarily those of Scientific American.*
CORRECTION: I wanted to say SECTION, but I wrote erroneously session.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisExcellent posting - thanks!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWow. Interesting facts, however, I respectfully disagree with the conclusions that you have drawn. The reason that a small group of people dominate discussions is because we have not been taught to engage people in online discussions since the practice is so new. I have taken many online, offline, and hybrid courses. Participating in online discussions must be rewarded in school and on networks to encourage more participation. It's good netiquette. NetworkEtiquette.net
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