There’s much anticipation for Apple’s announcement today out in California about a new super secret insanely great killer hardware. Leaks by McGraw-Hill CEO have confirmed eBook capabilities and other sources revealed TV tuner, PVR, and videoconferencing features. This is sort of along the lines of my speculations:: “I’m thinking this new offering will be a hybrid that will be more like an iTouch that ideally offers users tools for the better management of and experiences with media—of all digitized forms,” but it’s still all speculation.

One implication that’s being focused on is how this new Apple tablet {some have dubbed it the “Jesus tablet”} could save the ailing print publishing industry, as newspapers and magazines struggle to remain relevant in the era of searchable digitized content. Will the Jesus tablet {or something like it} save publishing and what are the implications for the field of professional journalism, i.e., the fourth estate?  The business model of newspapers and magazines was simple. Create content that drives subscriptions that allows selling of adspace. The Internet allowed easy access to searchable digitized content and consumers just didn’t want to pay for it, from day one. Ad revenues at newspapers and magazines declined. Craigslist made matters worse with electronic classifieds further eroding revenues. McKinsey quantified the price destruction of the Internet and discusses paywalls as a avenue for some. While revenues dwindled, so did the staffs of newsrooms and magazine offices. Some night argue that citizen bloggers are filling the void and that “good enough” information is readily available free of charge.

Will a tablet that makes accessing multimedia content a snap, if indeed Apple delivers such a device, bring revenues that will enable journalists to get paid? I’m not so sure. The iPod is a triumph of usability. It creates a great user experience and a platform for MP3 sales and while it has spurred strong Internet sales growth, the revenues aren’t enough to offset declining sales of CDs. The iPhone creates a great user experience for telephony, texting, and the mobile web, creating a platform for apps, $3B US in apps as of this month. The steep subsidies in the US for the iPhone have hampered the sole carrier’s earnings, AT&T.

Apple is great at creating platforms, built around great user experience regarding digital content, that benefit them—for now. I think digital music and mobile communications are in a dynamic and turbulent trajectory and I see social media being a major decentreing force. Newspapers and magazines will need to rethink their business models and their relationship with content, pricing, and intellectual property enforcement.

Publishers need to look at new tools like the Apple tablet as a multimedia platform for their content that allow for contextual ads. Some industry analysts are on the same page::

“There’s a real opportunity for Apple to raise the bar here…
Not only by making digital publications accessible to the mainstream reader, but also seamlessly interweaving online features, apps and streaming audio/video content to enhance the general reading experience.” —Scott Steinberg, Digitrends.com Analyst

I feel that content is a “loss leader.” The music industry is coming to terms with this. Sales from the music are secondary to the brass rings of tours, merch, and licensing for TV shows and films. Over on Loudpaper, Mimi Zeiger made an interesting observation::

“What’s become more clear to me over the last year as more and more titles close, is that a publication can’t rely only on the stakes and rigging of print, nor is the move to a digital format as surefire fix. But maybe embracing publishing as pure folly—that is, as spectacle, as event—can offer a worthwhile model. Magazines like GOOD take an integrated approach, content is online as well as in print, and it hosts events based its featured subjects. It also has the good sense to team with other titles, like Readymade, to build cross branding and robust content.”

I couldn’t agree more. Once a path to cash can be mapped for publishers, then we can tend to our code blue patient, the profession of journalism.

Twitterversion:: Leaks about #Apple’s new gadget pt to multimedia tablet w/eBook & videoconf. Can print publishers leverage this platform @Prof_K

I must admit I’ve been a bit intrigued by the Jay-Z song, “Empire State of Mind” featuring Alicia Keys, which is a perfect example of a crossover hit complete with musical hooks, orchestral pop grandeur, and an anthemic quality that goes beyond mere shout-outs. On my other blog, I have a link to a mashup showing the places the song is referring to. The comparisons to “New York, New York”, which Frank Sinatra made famous, are obvious and Shawn Carter makes it explicit::

“I’m the new Sinatra
and since I made it here
I can make it anywhere
yeah they love me everywhere”

What strikes me about this song is how it embodies an American mythology that’s perfect for the Great Recession and has the potential to transcend place. In contrast to the lyrics of “New York, New York”, “Empire State of Mind” crafts a narrative that contextualizes the American dream with its darker elements. Here’s a link to the lyrics. Granted, it’s just a song and not ethnography, but I think it offers up a revised mythology that’s from a different point of view and one that resonates in these times of uncertainty. The song makes references to being from Bed-Stuy in Brooklyn, but with characteristic bravado showing the upside of success::

“now I live on Billboard
and I brought my boys with me
Say what up to Ta-ta
Still sipping Mai Tais
Sitting courtside
Knicks and Nets give me high-5
Nigga, I be Spiked out
I could trip a referee”

“I made you hot nigga,
Catch me at the X with OG at a Yankee game,
shit I made the Yankee hat
more famous than a Yankee can”

The soaring chorus sung by Alicia Keys reinforces this part of the mythology, which may well be what listeners “hear” the most::

“New York!!!!
Concrete jungle where dreams are made of,
There’s nothing you can’t do,
Now you’re in New York!!!
These streets will make you feel brand new,
the lights will inspire you,
Let’s hear it for New York, New York, New York”

The overt and subtle drug references, e.g., “MDMA” and “If Jeezy’s payin’ LeBron, I’m paying Dwayne Wade” {a reference to Jeezy’s song, “Kobe and Lebron” that uses the players’ numbers as code for cocaine prices per kilo}, and cautionary tales of smashed-up dreams and getting addicted to the limelight, serve to juxtapose possibilities with the darker elements of modern life. A modern life increasingly “hard knock” for many in 2009-10. Falling prey to the limelight may not be a life lived by most, but serves as a metaphor. The public consumes through a thirst for the entertainment spectacle, pointing to our collective culpability with respect to what is valued.

I’m not sure how closely people are paying that attention to the lyrics, but I think it’s the simultaneous depiction of what “can be” and “what is” that resonates with listeners. It captures how many see the mythology of the American dream, in the wake of financial meltdowns, bailouts, and double-digit unemployment, which is now 10.6% in NYC.

Twitterversion:: DDoes Jay-Z’s Empire State of Mind create perfect depiction of the American dream, warts&all? Life in the great recession @Prof_K

Notes from North of 49ºN

This is a follow-up post to:: Postcolonial Canada, National Identity, & the Nature of Hegemony :: The Trajectory of Canada. This post will focus on the political implications of the current postcolonial circumstance.

Around Canada Day last summer, I talked about the role of media in terms of nation and globalization. I was contemplating the concepts of “nation” and “citizen” within the sphere of North American capitalism. If nation doesn’t matter, do we just become consumers?

In my last post, I echo these ideas, but derived my thoughts on the “fuzziness” of Canadian identity by rooting it in its postcolonial circumstance. The concept of Canada as a nation is problematized by its history and trajectory; going from a colony of Britain with a sizeable minority culture {Québec} to being a next-door neighbour to a superpower. This isn’t to say that Canada has no identity. Ask “Joe” from the classic I Am a Canadian Molson ads series.  This one is titled “Rant”::

While within the context of the cultural product of advertising, I find the ad interesting, as it plays upon the notion of Canada as stereotyped and misunderstood by its powerful neighbour to the south. It juxtaposes Canada by delineating what it is not—the United States. The ad inspired several parodies, including this one from a Toronto radio station titled, “I Am Not Canadian”, which illuminates stereotypes of Québec. At any rate, I think there is a Canadian identity, but I’m not sure how unified it is across the country.

Perhaps one of the products of fuzzy identity is a steady trend of increasingly decentralized federalism since WWII. This set the stage for the rise of regionalism, perhaps starting with Québec opting out of federal programmes. Decentralized federalism also means that Canada as an institution will have less and less meaning over time. Pragmatically, it opens the door up for political gridlock::

“There is disagreement not only between the provinces and the federal government, but also among the provinces themselves. Canadians are losing patience with the endless cacophony. They want high-quality services, delivered in ways that are transparent so that they can track results. They are pragmatists. Fix it, they demand. When it doesn’t get fixed, they grow impatient with institutional gridlock.” [1]

Perhaps a product of this impatience is tuning out. Canadian voter turnout has been the lowest it’s been in 100 years, in the low to mid 60s the 00s and dipping to 58.8% in 2008.  Moreover, decentralized federalism could explain the fragmentation of politics we’ve seen of late, which I’ve blogged about over on Rhizomicon, characterized by 35% of the popular vote not going to the major parties. Decentralized federalism forces much of the national political discourse on domestic issues to focus on the provincial or regional implications of policy.  One of my observations is the rise of regional politics in Québec and the West.

Here’s a map of the 2000 federal election, before the Progressive Conservatives and the Reform/Canadian Alliance parties merged to form the Conservative Party of Canada in 2003, but after the formation of the Bloc Québecois in 1991::

In the West, the Canadian Alliance {green} won 66 of 301 seats in Parliament, while in Québec, the Bloc Québecois {light blue} won 38 seats.  The predecessor to the Canadian Alliance , the Reform Party, was a socially and fiscally conservative populist party that had the bulk of the support in the western provinces of Alberta and British Columbia, making inroads into Saskatchewan and Manitoba.  Its policies and rhetoric were, at times, very divisive and anti-Québec, as evident in this ad campaign from the prior election in 1997::

“[Preston] Manning and Reform were roundly criticized by the other candidates when they ran an ad saying politicians from Québec had controlled the federal government for too long.

Chretien [Liberal Party leader], Charest [Progressive Conservative leader] and Duceppe [Bloc Québécois leader] are all from Québec, and the prime minister of Canada for 28 of the last 29 years has hailed from the province. Still, the assertion led to denunciations of Manning as ‘intolerant’ and a ‘bigot,’ though it seemed to play well in his Western base.” [2]

The Reform “style” members of Parliament of the Conservative Party, who are primarily in the West, have effectively formed a Western “Bloc,” as some argue that the policies of the Conservative Party are heavily influenced by the Reform wing. additionally, the Conservative Party has less of a stake in federalism, which frees them to serve regional interests.

Where does this leave Canada in term of its future trajectory? I don’t see identity formation occurring overnight and I see the likelihood of increased political fragmentation based on region and ideology {given the rise in support of the New Democrats and the Greens since 2000}. In light of this, it may be time to think about more centralized federalism, but the challenge will be how to configure it without a serious crisis at hand. On the other hand, what about leadership? Does strong leadership with results give the electorate meaning, a sense of identity, and increased civic engagement?

Twitterversion:: Thoughts on rising politics of region in Canada, stemming fr.”fuzziness” on concept of Canada as a nation #ThickCulture http://url.ie/4r5l #ThickCulture @Prof_K

References::

[1] Stein, Janice G. (2006) “Canada by Mondrian: Networked Federalism in an Era of Globalization.” Banff Forum. Accessed 24 January 2010, http://banffforum.ca/common/documents/Reading_polit_sust_stein.pdf

[2] CNN (1997)  “Canada poised for vote that may deadlock parliament”.  Retrieved 21 January 2010, from http://www.cnn.com/WORLD/9706/01/canada.elex/index.html

Notes from north of 49ºN

José’s post from late November, Exploding Empires, got me thinking about Canada’s postcolonial experience.  While the remnants of the British empire linger with political structures {including the viceregal Governor General} and the Queen on the money, before 1663 most of Canada was a part of New France.  If the Battle of the Plains of Abraham and the siege of Québec City went differently, it would have been interesting to see the trajectory of Canada, if New France stayed under French control or if there was a long protracted war with Britain.  That’s neither here nor there, but the reality is that Canada does have the legacy of being a part of the British empire, while arguably subjugating the First Nations and francophone Québec, which I’ll come back to later.

So, in 1867, Canada became a Dominion in the British Commonwealth with its own Prime Minister, Sir John A. MacDonald {who is on the $10 bill}. This was a trend with its “white settler” colonies. In 1931, The Statute of Westminster made the Canadian Parliament independent of British control and Canada ceased being a colony.  Nevertheless, there were and are ties to Britain. In fact, during WWII, many of the archives for Canada were destroyed in the Battle of Britain, which were housed in London, England, not Ottawa.

The relationship between Canada and Britain has shaped Canada’s character.  The obvious way to characterize the relationship is one of parent and child, but how to characterize it further? Canada as the abused Cinderella? Benign neglect? For decades, the British sought to assert imperial authority and reduce the influence of popular control of the government, which was viewed as a precursor to the American revolution [1]. Once British control began to wane, the rapid industrialization of the United States resulted in a dominant cultural and economic power at Canada’s doorstep.  Many argue that Canada traded one hegemon for another. Many Canadian writers, including Margaret Atwood, saw this pattern and sought to “decolonize” Canada, but what exactly does that entail?  What does a decolonized Canada look like? Is a strong national identity required?

The simmering legacy of the ghost of an old colonialism, i.e., New France, along with First Nations and immigrant communities, serve to further complicate matters by generating tensions from within.   Québec, a province with about 23.9% of the population where 40% of its residents support some form of sovereignty for Québec.  Urbanist Jane Jacobs around 1979-80 even went as far to say::

“Montréal cannot afford to behave like other Canadian regional cities without doing great damage to the economic well-being of the Québécois. It must instead become a creative economic centre in its own right… Yet there is probably no chance of this happening if Québec remains a province.” [2]

Despite hundreds of years passing since the Battle of the Plains of Abraham, there is definitely a strong francophone cultural identity in Québec and a resurgence of separatist politics enabled by the Quiet Revolution/Révolution Tranquille of the 1960s.

Add to the mix, globalization and the resultant Appaduraian flows of financial capital, human migration, media, ideologies [3, 4], and brands [5].

I feel all of these four factors::

1. Historical trajectory of British colonialism
2. Proximity to US cultural {media} and economic forces
3. The subjugation of francophone culture under a trajectory of British colonialism
4. Current state of globalization with flows of people, media, capital, ideologies and brands

serve to strongly decentre the very concept of Canada and Canadian identity, i.e., Canada as an “imagined community” in the Benedict Anderson sense [6]. Extending Anderson’s ideas about print capitalism being critical in defining the concept of nation, I would argue that Canadian identity is being undermined because of the dominance of US media, particularly film, television, and Internet content. I’ve argued for increased funding of the CBC and I feel it can and should play a role in defining nation.  This post isn’t meant to be an accusation or to sound an alarm, but open up a dialogue about the future trajectory of Canada.

If Canadian identity is indeed decentred, doesn’t this imply a fuzziness in people’s meaning systems regarding Canada and does this fuzziness lead to less resistance of hegemonic forces?  Does any of this even matter?  Aren’t these just market forces in action?  Antonio Gramsci says hegemony requires acquiescence [7], but as global consumers, aren’t we all willing to submit to hegemony if it strikes our fancy?  Sweet, glorious hegemony. Hasn’t China proven that global consumers are willing to purchase in ways that are detrimental to their own economies?

I think national identity matters, as does resistance to hegemonic forces.  Identity matters, as a shared sense of communitas and comradeship should guide policy and everyday actions. Citizens should derive meaning from the institution and social construction of nation. Resistance to hegemony matters, as this allows for culture to remain dynamic by allowing its redefinition, rather than continually self-replicating in the same fashion in the style created by the powers that be, i.e., the corporation and the state.

My next blog post will extend these ideas to Canadian politics.

Twitterversion:: Thoughts about “postcolonial” Canada given its relationships with Britain, USA, & Quebec. Interplay b/t media & identity. http://url.ie/4q9t @Prof_K

Song:: Weakerthans-“One Great City”

References

[1] Smith, Simon (1998). British Imperialism 1750-1970. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 052159930X.

[2] Philpot, R. (2006) “She Stayed Creative Until the End: The Rich Life of Jane Jacobs” counterpunch.org, retrieved 21 January 2010, from http://www.counterpunch.org/philpot04262006.html

[3] Appadurai, A. (1996) Modernity at Large. Cambridge, MA: University of Minnesota Press.

[4] Appadurai, A. (1990) “Disjuncture and Difference in the Global Cultural Economy” Retrieved 21 January 2010,  http://www.intcul.tohoku.ac.jp/~holden/MediatedSociety/Readings/2003_04/Appadurai.html

[5] Sherry, J.F. (1998) ‘The Soul of the Company Store: Nike Town Chicago and the Emplaced Brandscape’, in J.F. Sherry (ed.) ServiceScapes: The Concept of Place in Contemporary Markets, pp. 305–36. Chicago: NTC Business Books.

[6] Anderson, Benedict (1983) Imagined Communities. Verso. http://books.google.com/books?id=4mmoZFtCpuoC&dq=benedict+anderson+imagined+communities&printsec=frontcover&source=bn&hl=en&ei=cZ9YS–eFcLO8QaZq-jKAw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=5&ved=0CCgQ6AEwBA#v=onepage&q=&f=false

[7] Gramsci, A. (1971) Selections from the Prison Notebooks, Lawrence and Wishart.

I’ve always been interested by Forrester’s work on social technographics {click on this link to see the Forrester categories defined}, but I’ve been interested in extending these ideas by incorporating concepts like identity, sense of belonging, and meaning, as they relate to online social interactions.  While social technographics creates a one-dimensional hierarchical “ladder” along a continuum of passive consumption to interactive consumption and production of content, I’m interested in added dimensions of::

How the social construction of relations we have affects our use of social media, as they relate to our identity and the meanings we derive from our online interactions.

How a sense of community or belonging shapes our use of social media.

I think these are fundamental human activities, i.e., finding meaning and belonging to a “community” {broadly defined}.   The diagram I created above explores the idea of how social processes may affect technological engagement with social media and content.  It’s clearly not meant to be a definitive model, but the idea is that the greater the meaning an activity has, the more the activity fosters one’s identity, and/or the more an activity fosters a sense of belonging or community, the greater the interactivity with social media, in terms of consumption and production of content. In the diagram, the boundaries are meant to be fuzzy and the percentages sum to over 100% because the profiles overlap.  The Forrester profile groupings are based upon “participating in at least one of the indicated activities at least monthly” [1]. Addressing the interplay between 1 & 2 listed above would advance social science theory {e.g., symbolic interactionism [2] and sense of community [3]} and practice {from marketing to civic engagement} through the understanding of everyday online interactions within the context of social structures like groups/communities.

I see many of these clusterings of activities, distinguished from being characteristics of individuals, as non-hierarchical.  I will say I haven’t seen what’s behind Forrester’s paywall, which may addresss this, as well as my sociological interests. That said, I would hazard to guess that over time {as social media diffuses} there are a certain percentage of users who engage in “spectator” and/or “joiner” behaviours who are content to do just those activities. I’m not sure that there are that many who are or will ever be interested in “creator” activity.  My hunch is that those interested in “creator” activity won’t go much higher than 20%, along the lines of the 80/20 rule.

Nevertheless, I view social technographics as a useful concept and in my applied work, I’m interested in the specifics of online community and how they relate to online and offline actions.

Twitterversion:: New & interesting @Forrester research on social technographics.My graph ponders how social psych/sociology may shape this http://url.ie/4pxm  @Prof_K

Song:: Weezer-“Pork and Beans”

References::

[1] Bernoff, Josh {2010} “Social Technographics: Conversationalists get onto the ladder”. Groundswell, Forrester Research, Inc. http://blogs.forrester.com/groundswell/2010/01/conversationalists-get-onto-the-ladder.html

[2] McClelland, Kent {2000} “SYMBOLIC INTERACTIONISM”. Grinnell College, Theoretical Perspectives in Sociology.  http://web.grinnell.edu/courses/soc/s00/soc111-01/introtheories/symbolic.html

[3] University of Maryland Baltimore County, PROMISE-Alliance for Graduate Education and the Professoriate.  “Psychological Sense of Community:  Theory of McMillan & Chavis (1986)”  http://www.umbc.edu/promise/documents/Community,%20Psychology,%20Psychological,%20Sense%20of%20Community%20Theory%20of%20McMillan,%20Chavis%201986.htm

From a Simon at bloggasm:

I don’t know if you’ve seen this, but the international non-profit group CARE already has over 100 of its workers on the ground in the country and the organization is also raising money to deliver aid to the 3 million people affected by the disaster. The group has been there since 1954 and they have the infrastructure in place to begin giving aid immediately:

In case you all are looking for a place to donate, you can go here.  If you want a quick read on Haiti’s current social and political situation, go here.

Update: org.theory has lots more places to donate

Via Matt Yglesias ,

The new CQ study gives Obama a higher mark than any other president since it began scoring presidential success rates in Congress more than five decades ago.

Yglesias thinks that legislative success won’t lead to electoral success in the 2010 mid-terms because to get these legislative victories, he’s had to alienate his base on the left thereby eroding support among the die-hard activists needed to work for democratic candidates to keep them in power.

He’s probably right. At least that’s what history would say. But I can’t shake a nagging feeling that our assumptions of a Republican landslide won’t come to fruition. I still hold to the view that this president is playing a different game than his opponents. The fact of his legislative successes is testament to this. While he has received non-stop criticism for his handling of health care, he’s about to get near universal coverage (imperfect bill, I know). He seems to be able to “grind out” policy debates until the opponents run out of steam.

This grinding has undoubtedly taken its toll on his popularity. CNN has his approval rating at 46%, an all-time low for him.

It seems to me that what makes Obama a special politician is he has a keen sense of politics as narrative. He seems to have these periods where he doesn’t seem in control of the message, where he’s allowing others to define him (e.g. 3 am phone call). But when this happens, he has a unique ability to respond to what others might consider a political crisis (Pastor Wright, Nobel Prize, etc.) and actually coming out stronger for it. I have a hunch he’s playing some kind of “rope a dope” with his political opponents, but I’m not sure how it’s going to end

An elegant poem highlighting the varying ways in which Western (and some non-Western) writers make Africa the “other.”

This highlights a delicate balance that we must strike in teaching students. On one hand, we want out students to be engaged in the world, but we want to ensure that their engagement isn’t entirely on their terms….one in which they get to construct themselves as the “savior” towards the “less fortunate.” How do we achieve humble engagement in ourselves and our students….my thought for the day 🙂

A good video for talking about privilege on a global scale.

From RuShay Booyen

Happy New Year everyone! I’m currently writing an article on how social media (Facebook, Twitter, blogs, etc.) are changing universities. I’m interested in how academic research, teaching, and service, as well as the administration, admissions, and other aspects of university life are being reconfigured (or not) in light of these new technologies. I’d like to open up a conversation and see if anyone has empirical or conjectural thoughts on this. Please let me know, as I’d like to cite others’ experiences or ideas if possible.

If it helps, I’m adapting McLuhan’s “tetrad” to interrogate this within the university context: What do social media enhance or intensify in universities? What do social media render obsolete or displace? What do social media retrieve that was previously obsolesced? What do social media produce or become when pressed to an extreme? – Don Waisanen