Group Discussion Blog Post | The revitalization of the public sphere?

Corporate Media, Democracy and The State of the Public Sphere

The state of the public sphere is a hotly contested topic, which is intrinsically related to the corruption of corporate media and the flow of information. Signs of the time include both malicious journalistic practices, empowered by governmental subsidies, but also, members of the social web working to intervene and reform corrupt praxis. Some believe optimistically that the communities set up by social networking technologies will revitalize the public sphere by providing space for informed discourse, assemblage of truth and a revolutionary shift away from commodity centered industries. While others hypothesize more modestly that the social network and Web 2.0 will grant individuals a platform to mobilize and speak out towards reform and modification of existing policy. One thing is for sure, the public sphere and democracy are in jeopardy, but the part digital media and the social web will play in the struggle is largely unfinished.

The State of the Media

How many media sources do you remember releasing apologies for their assistance in the propagating of false information on the existence of WMD?

In America after 9/11, the Afghanistan and Iraqi wars, it seems clear that the myth of journalistic integrity and non-biased coverage can be used to ground actions as extreme as war. Simultaneously, the corporate media mechanism silences, manipulates or makes mockery of dissenting opinions, maintaining its position of power. (Boler 2008, 1-3) McChesney’s recollection of his magazine industry days makes clear how the need for monitory solvency shapes the form and content of information presented. (Ibid. 56)

As a result the state of the public sphere is poor. There is no room for intelligent discourse when corporate media squelches voices besides the partisan approach it is endlessly repeats. However, there is a glimmer of hope, never before has the public had the access or the aggregation of resources, which translates to reforming power.

Media and Power

In the Introduction to Digital Media and Democracy Megan Boler raises two challenges about media and power. One, how do we approach/reshape the forces of domination so that those with little power or influence can enter the discourse. Two, how do we begin to imagine media with the ability intervene at the levels of public awareness and fight the malicious manipulation of information by the mainstream. (Ibid. 11) There seems to be at least three possibilities. The first, social networks are the medium, which will grant resourceless publics the power and voice they need. The second, the media event is as Wark discusses, a primitive, which cannot be dissected into puzzle pieces that form a truth. Instead of wasting resources in the attempt, a better attempt is to apply theory/criticism in a way that it “accompanies” the event, but without pretense of fully understanding it. (Ibid. 13) Finally, there is a combination of the two that functions as McChesney’s Free Press Project. That is, as an open community and continuing discourse on media reform, which moves to accompany/improve the modern media environment without relying solely on the advent of the social net for the salvation of the public sphere.

Check Out The Free Project. Think about the ways this project addresses Bolers challenges.

Free Press Project

Beginners Guide to Media Reform

Fernandes states that we should label media based on who owns them. (Ibid. 37) The public owns public media. Corporations own corporate media. Free Press has a section discussing media ownership, which helps to visualize centralization:

Guide to Ownership Concentration

Segue to Media Convergence and Collective Intelligence


While many individuals (i.e. McChesney, Dean or Lovink) active in the consideration of the public sphere and social networks are pessimistic about the ability of online social networks to revolutionize the public’s interaction with media and government, Henry Jenkins writes about the simultaneous processes of convergence and divergence. As media/technologies are dispersed and decentralized, they empower users to combine, remix and otherwise reassemble them for their own message. Conversely, as corporate entities condense and become protected by government, divergent periphery cultures emerge, like fan communities, spoiler groups and other beneficiaries of the “long-tail”. (Jenkins 2006, 11) Along the way volumes of technologies, momentary delivery mechanisms, evolve, become obsolete and are discarded. Cluttering the transmission with new and frequently unnecessary functionality. (Ibid. 13) But these ever changing tools are the driving force behind convergence, accessibility and social networking.

When we consider the dedication, intelligence and problem solving ability of the Survivor spoiler community (Ibid. 32-38). It is not hard to see how great collective intelligences like this can spawn hope for application in other areas, which is not to trivialize the autonomy and power socially networked fan communities grant.

At the same time corporate media is working hard to find new ways to capitalize on these communities. More so than ever, they are accommodating their fan’s loyalty and desire to participate, based on the strong connections this type of social phenomena creates generating “affective economy”. (Ibid. 20) This has both positive and negative effects. Fans get the interactive experience they enjoy, but is it at the cost of co-opting their grass roots initiatives?

Check out some interesting fan communities, with strong senses of autonomy and collective intelligence. The first, Lost-pedia is a fan wiki centered around the popular TV show Lost. This group provided a space to discus canon, express thoughts in a communal fashion and helped to find clues/solve plot based questions during the Lost Experience, an alternate reality game lasting several months in 2006, leading up to the start of the season.

Lost Pedia

The second, is Survivor Sucks the original Survivor Spoiler Community Henry Jenkins talks about. Think about how this community empowers its users to hurt the corporate outlet, but also how these communities could be applied to reforming the public sphere.

Survivor Sucks

The Commodification of Communication


In the United States there is a tremendous disparity between politics “circulating as content and official politics” (Boler 2008, 102). That is, the voice of alternative media is simply not heard. Instead the many thick layers of information networks give corporate media heads an escape from the duty to respond. They counter with their own contributions to the flow, writing off opposing views. (Ibid. 102) Dean suggests that the advent of social networking technologies has not created a venue for public expression, but instead has prompted the formation of “…post political formation of communicative capitalism”. (Ibid. 102) Through the commodification of communication (that which unites us as a nation-state) democracy and capitalism have been merged. (Ibid. 104) In such a state there is a dichotomy between singularity of dissent, which treats political concern as person ailment and plurality of mindset that promotes the false image of a unifying ideology. (Ibid. 106) She discounts the notions of abundance and participation as masks to the fact that our messages lose value in circulation or when they become fetishized contributions. Thus actions, such as dissenting through the social net, just add to the data pool, detracting from the message and conversely assisting corporate media in the long run. (Ibid. 106-115)

How can purported political acts (though really techno-fetisthment/the desire to contribute) cause condensation or displacement? The Barbie Liberation Organization (B.L.O.) was a fairly well publicized political action in 1993, where members of a group (many of which would later become the Yes Men) swapped the voice boxes of Barbie dolls and GI Joe’s. This act was meant to protest gender stereotyping in children’s toys. How could acts like this be co-opted by corporate media and result in devaluation of true political reform?

B.L.O.

Documentation Video

Social Media and Democracy

McChesney suggests that democracy is impossible without a mainstream press. (Ibid. 65) However, it is questionable if the ideal press, for which government subsidies were originally made ever existed. Such a press would exemplify public discourse, non-partisan approach and political awareness. He established The Free Press Project to help reform the reform movement. He states media reform has four components. The first and most important is policy reform. Second, is participating in independent media. Third, is providing media education and critique. Fourth, is movement among media producers to take a larger role in the entire media process. (Ibid. 60) McChesney doesn’t think social web media forms are the answer to the contemporary media problem, but that they play an essential role in media reform. (Ibid. 66)

Discussion Questions:

Does our love of farce/satire really speak to fundamental problems in the mediascape?

Is thinking about media by who owns them a good way to categorize media? If so, what constitutes the mainstream?

Is the contemporary movement to decentralize media having a greater effect/more likely to succeed than the 1930’s movement (Boler 2008, 57)? If so what does this mean for the public sphere?

Has the advent of social web changed the way advertising/the need for capital shapes content?

Can viral communications circumvent/subvert ideologies of commodity and spectacle despite what Dean says about the myth of abundance and participation?

How do messages get converted into contributions? Do contributions circling in the data pool lose meaning, agency or urgency of response?

How has techno-fetishment affected online communities? Facebook vs Wikipedia? Instances of condensation? Displacement?

Which, if not both are true?

Web 2.0/social net creates a plurality of truths some from the mainstream others from critique or assemblage. Is this new method of collecting and coalescing media detritus, a vision of reformed media?

Web 2.0/social net is one of many tools for reforming the contemporary mediascape and public sphere?

And the obligatory question, how have Web 2.0/social net practices affected the public sphere? Which if not all is most viable, Convergence Culture and communities as the hope for revitalization, a tool for political reform or the realization that we live in a Communicative Capitalist state.

With great power comes great responsibility. If as Amy Goodman says, media is power (Boler 2008, 11), what responsibilities does it demand?

I am open to suggestions and may add one or two more.