Dillon Deliberating

Having just seen Clay Shirky talk about his new book Cognitive Surplus which I have not read but soon will. So this blog post is very much an impression of the talk he gave and what a talk. He is an assured speaker, compelling and calm like and idealised Catholic priest from the New Testament tradition. You can listen, feel calm and somewhat convinced as he effortlessly marshals  his arguement  replete with compelling examples. In terms of audience pulling power he is up their with Slavoj Zizek 

 However by comparision Shirky is calm, liberal and does not confront his audience with truths that will overly offend. That however does not detract from the importance of what Shirky has  been talking about since the release of his book 'Here Comes Everybody'. From tonights talk I would say that Shirky is very much still on that runway but the central idea of his work is that the web is radically changing how we live in the 21st century on a par with the advent of the printing press of which he cites many times during his talks. Essentially the web is a force for good when you stack up the benefits as opposed to the bad things that happen on the web. However defining good and evil on the web is a value judgement.

What Shirky is interested in, is what he calls our Cognitive Surplus that is the time we have going spare. Traditionally that surplus time would be spent watching TV and he shows a slide that stacks up the hours spent watching TV against that spent on Wikipedia. Yes time spent on Wikipedia is tiny by comparison but the effect is higher for society. Basically time spent online is not a waste but actually beneficial even if you are just publishing pictures of rabbits like I do, check out these bunnies.

However when not posting pictures  of bunny  rabbits in other parts of the world oppressed people are taking on pricks  by using social networks on the web. This is a familiar  Shirky narrative as women in Bangalore  fight the power that is Pramod Mutalik who denounces them as 'loose women'. Like angry from Ireland enraged by the 'Hand of Henry' they set up a Facebook page. The 'Pub-going, Loose and Forward Women'  organises a mass send your knickers to Mutalik agit prop action. Fair play to these women and Mutalik can be thankful that it is only knickers he is receiving the 20th century may have seen a much more violent reaction. So in effect these women whom I hazard a guess are not at the bottom end of the economic strata put their cognitive surplus to work for good.

Shirky is skilled at bringing these examples to the fore and they work when you have a panto villain or a savagely repressive regime like the one that exists in Burma today. You might be on the web working of some 'cognitive surplus' chatting but with just one click you could become a fan of a FB page supporting one of the many pages that rightly try to highlight the savage injustice that is Burma today. However we move onto Facebook pages that support regimes such as Castro's Cuba or the Twitter loving Chavez neither of whom could be described a 'freedom loving' in the American sense of the word things are not so clear cut. You will find some 'liberal left' that are ambiguous about condemning either of these regimes. Tonight Clay Shirky made no apologies nor should he when he said his belief that what he calls 'free societies' are vastly superior to those that are not. Shirky is a poignant thinker and symbol of the democratic project that is America's mission in the world. While that mission no longer creates the high political camp of 1950's America at the height of the Cold War. Though the rhetoric of the 1950's is evident on the web, ironic or otherwise: #theyhateusforourfreedom .

During the questions later Shirkys one person asked about the darker side of the web that between what was termed 'good v evil'. But getting people to use their 'cognitive surplus' to create, support, take action when the issues are not quite so clear like with Chavez and Castro. You could also throw Iraq and Afghanistan in that mix is much more challenging.  After Clay Shirky speaks I am emboldened but the cold water of Evgeny Morozov helps and infuriates at the same time. Shirky and Morozov debated over at the Edge and it is well worth a reading. For Shirky 'the tools don;nt make a revolution happen, they make it easier" a view greeted with some scepticism from Morozov.

Where I think Shirky is much better is when he talks about 'Cognitive Surplus' in respect of how we create on the web. Much like football fans we take the time, spend the money and fill the coffers of huge financial giants that care little for the fan, thats you Glazier and United. Shirky asks why we add videos, content and our family photos to social networks that gives them more data and drives their stock price upwards. For this Shirky pulls a rabbit from the hat by alluding to Lego "for years, Lego has been tricking children into assembling their products for free".

For all my qualms above Shirky is an idealists well worth listening to, his work I believe will be read well into the future. His book was on sale as they often are after RSA events. The sale of the book was quite a retro touch for the audience with the tantalising prospect of a signed copy awaiting them. Even Matthew Taylor, Chief Executive of the RSA assures that a signed and dated book had the potential to impress friends in the years ahead.  Where we leaving the web equivalent of the Sex Pistols gig at the Manchester Free Trade Hall? perhaps not but I skipped the book and will await the Kindle edition, just have to figure out how I get it signed by the author.