The Unbearable Thinness Of Flatness

A summary of:
Lanier, J. (2010). You Are Not H5N1 Gadget: H5N1 Manifesto. Allen Lane: London.
Part 3, Chapters 9-11: The Unbearable Thinness of Flatness

"Flatness" is the term that Lanier uses to depict the agency that each novel applied scientific discipline is made using the same resources every bit every other i (120), which "reifies our philosophies through the procedure of lock-in before nosotros are ready" (119).

One manifestation of this flatness is the agency inwards which, amongst all of the hope of newness afforded yesteryear spider web 2.0, nosotros are inwards a creative rut, stuck trying to recreate before technologies. It is form of bizarre that the close celebrated spider web 2.0 output is a reinterpretation on a pretty bland creation, the encyclopedia.

We volition know nosotros possess got made progress if nosotros contend to generate exclusively novel things amongst the internet. In a way, this is a variation on the architectural notion of "truth to materials." Why practice nosotros seek to digitize things that were perfectly adept non-digital creations? We should last using applied scientific discipline to enable us to practice things that nosotros never could possess got before. This requires us to last creative inwards our technological designs. As Lanier correctly notes, "Making echoes of this fabric inwards the radical, new, 'open' globe accomplishes nothing. The cumulative effect is that online civilization is fixated on the globe every bit it was before the spider web was born" (123). Put roughly other way, "Freedom is moot if you lot waste materials it" (131).

Lanier suggests nosotros ought to rethink the persuasion that opened upwardly root is the respond inwards all cases; that it is "automatically the best path to inventiveness as well as conception is non borne out yesteryear the facts" (126).

He also suggests that nosotros continually seek closer as well as closer simulacrums, because "what makes something existent is that it is impossible to correspond it to completion" (133).

One of the tradeoffs we've accepted for supposed freedoms inwards spider web 2.0 is that nosotros straightaway possess got a disconnect betwixt numerical popularity as well as intensity of connections amongst people inwards the cloud (137). Furthermore, technologies similar Wikipedia brand us (and search engines) lazy (143): nosotros automatically defer to it every bit the tardily truth.

To overcome this, nosotros may desire to railroad train alternatives for interaction that allow for greater contextualization.

And before nosotros idolize a technology, nosotros bespeak to consider what life would last similar without it. Would the globe cease to be without Wikipedia? If not, if null is lost, how valuable is it really? Lanier writes, "It seems to me that if Wikipedia all of a abrupt disappeared, similar data would even as well as then last available for the close part, merely inwards to a greater extent than contextualized forms, amongst to a greater extent than visibility for the authors as well as amongst a greater feel of agency as well as presence" (143). That its degree mightiness last less consistent (i.e. non-standardized) may inwards fact last a blessing. What's incorrect amongst a fleck of human touch? This would last a overnice relief from the otherwise constant advertisement of the persuasion that the collective tin laissez passer on the sack ameliorate render "truth" than an individual. Two heads are ameliorate than one, nosotros say; merely nosotros also tell that likewise many cooks spoil the broth.

An instance of this mayhap ameliorate encyclopedia is that produced yesteryear ThinkQuest, which required contestants to larn how to "present their ideas every bit wholes, every bit good every bit figure out how to role the novel online medium to practice that" (146). This reinforces highly valuable skills! These are things nosotros should cultivate!