hal tweets ·11:28 AM
Ghostbuster zines from the Canzine Hollywood Piracy Zine Challenge are now online! http://t.co/RoAMEQTU
2008,
18:36 GMT
My First Comment and the Meta of Meta
Posted by: Hal
So got my first comment on the blog a few days ago. Very exciting. It came from an editor I know, who noted that essentially what I was doing was blogging about blogging. He astutely called the whole project very “met a”. It’s true, of course, though I would argue that the bulk of bloggers and others in the “peep” culture such as reality tv participants are also motivated by and conforming to the rules and expectations of a peep world, just less obviously.
In Joshua Gamson’s book Freaks Talk Back about the workings of talk shows, a talk show producer notes that it isn’t necessary to encourage the guests to act a certain way for a certain show. They already know how they’re supposed to act and come into it fully prepared to act that way because they’ve seen the show and they know that’s what’s expected of them. I feel the same way. I’ve seen the show and I know what I’m supposed to do.
But so far I’ve had a hard time doing it. I happy to blog about abstract ideas and emerging peep trends but I’ve been more reticent about blogging about my everyday life and feelings – which is, of course, part of this project. Hopefully once I get used to being a regular blogger, that’ll change and stuff will just start spewing out of me. Gotta train myself to be more like the talk show participant who doesn’t think about the performance they’re going to put on, but just goes out there and does it.
2008,
17:03 GMT
Nielsen Ratings and Doing the Work of Peep
Posted by: Hal
Interesting New York Time article here – Nielsen Looks Beyond TV . Basically the tv ratings giant needs to branch out because fewer and fewer people are watching conventional tv in a conventional way. So they want to track web usage, cell phone usage, shopping etc. Problem is, people don’t necessarily want all that stuff tracked. Here are a few choice quotes:
“Nielsen’s goal is eventually to coax all its television households to agree to Web monitoring as well.”
This month, Nielsen announced an investment in a small company in California that tracks people’s eye movement, brain waves and perspiration while they watch television. Nielsen had already acquired several smaller measurement companies, like NetRatings, which tracks Web surfing and is now called Nielsen Online.
“One of the things we will do better is provide a broad view of how a consumer goes through their day,” said Susan D. Whiting, executive vice president of Nielsen and the executive leading A2/M2. “Broadly, it’s about how are consumers spending their time, how are they consuming media, whether it be TV or music or movies or whatever they’re doing online. And as that content and all that activity moves from device to device, how can we measure that?”
Article goes on to note that stiff competition Neilsen faces as various different companies fight with each other to track the minutiae of all kinds of media usage. It’s interesting that the big problem Neilsen is having is getting people to agree to have all their different activities monitored — agreeing to have your tv or online use monitored is one thing but both plus cell use starts to feel a bit what…Big Brother? Invasive? Scary?
We are doing the work of peep for corporate entities pretty much daily, but so long as it is buried in the quotidian of shopping for groceries or doing a google search for a decent Ethiopian restaurant we don’t notice. At the same time it’s probably a positive that when people are actually asked if they’d like their media use to be monitored they tend to say no.
2008,
17:11 GMT
GoodReads
Posted by: Hal
So in addition to facebook, myspace, linkedin, friendster, twitter and probably a bunch of sites i don’t even remember joining, i’ve now joined GoodReads, a networking site for book readers. Basically you put up books you ‘ve read and give them a rating and share them with your “friends”. You can search by title and see who else has rated or reviewed it and read their reviews. Naturally I did this for my books then added all my books to my page, rating them 5 stars so that their rating would go up on the site overall. Pathetic. Maybe. No. Probably.
After that, I thought, okay, I’ll add a few books I’ve recently read and give them a rating. Then I remembered that I had already done that on Facebook, having added some book sharing application so that I could once again list my books and reccommend them highly. According to Facebook I’ve been reading Mr. Pip, a relatively short novel, since September. I’m either a really slow reader or having trouble updating my “currently reading” list. Anyway, did I want to start adding books to this GoodReads thing too, knowing full well it would probably be the first and last time I was gonna add anything?
In the end I added a few books just to see what it felt like. I added two books, actually. A book by the friend who invited me to join GoodReads (I sent her a message saying if she added my books I’d add hers and we could give each other 5 stars…pathetic? Maybe. No. Definitely.) Then I added Derek McCormac’s novel The Haunted Hillbilly about a gay vampire tailor who sucks the life out of Hank Williams while making him famous. I gave that book 5 stars. Then I started thinking about other books I might add. And I started thinking about the various writers and publishers and editors I know. And I started thinking, what if those people join GoodReads and see my ratings and are offended and then decide not to publish me or give me a grant or whatever?
I’ve been spending too much time thinking about the power of peep, clearly. But as of this moment I’m struggling. Do I really want to start rating and reviewing books for all to see? Granted, no one cares what books I like or don’t like. But it all just seems a bit too close to home. And I always get anxious and uncomfortable when people come into my office and start scrutinizing my bookshelves.
2008,
17:25 GMT
Seedy CNN peep!
Posted by: Hal
Some good peep material on CNN today. first up, we’ve got a “news” report on a nanny mishandling 7 month old twins. needless to say, there is ample nannycam footage showing the twins being swung around and left to fend for themselves on the couch. the actual public need to see this material is somewhat doubtful though the reporter tries to salvage her credibility by ending with something about how the mom wants other families to know that they can also get nannycams and bust their caregivers.
Next up, a couple of minutes of security camera school bus action featuring what is proudly advertised as a school bus brawl. Watch burly bus driver lady and burly teens pull hair. Again, there’s an attempt to pretend this is news, not voyeurism, by ending the segment with a 4 second clip of a mom saying something like, “I’m shocked.”
I’m not.
2008,
14:55 GMT
Google Pilot Project to Store Health Records
Posted by: Hal
Here’s an interesting bit of news reported by AP – Google to Store Health Records. Many people already immediately go to Google after they get back from the doctor with a diagnosis of everything from depression to cancer to cataracts. So there’s a kind of weird logic to it. It also theoretically makes sense to have our health records online so that any doctor anywhere could access them, though the image of the doc in the ER surfing your records is a weird one, hmmm…okay…allergic to nuts, ah, and here’s his blog and his online dating profile…interesting stuff he’s into, better check him for STDs while I’m at it…anyway, okay, you get the picture. The big point here is that it’s now time for us to think of some better system of making this potentially life saving info available other than 3rd party for-profit corporations who make a profit off, at least in part, reselling information about us. In Canada, for instance, where medicine is provided by the provinces, some kind of standardized government system could be imagined that 1) provides this service to everyone regardless of their access to the internet and their ability to sign up for a Google account and 2) doesn’t link it to everyday activities like logging in to your gmail. I mean how many people leave their email account open throughout the day? Overall, though, there are so many problems with how to keep this kind of material private and strictly between doctor and patient I’m frankly amazed that Google is even going there.
The Bloggist
Hey, I’m Hal Niedzviecki. I’m a writer/thinker who lives in Toronto, Ontario, Canada with my wife and daughter. Up till now I’ve always considered myself a private person. But at the same time I’m fascinated by people who effortlessly open themselves up to the whole world. So I’ve… more...
Ghostbuster zines from the Canzine Hollywood Piracy Zine Challenge are now online! http://t.co/RoAMEQTU
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