REVIEWS
Citizen Four- The state of privacy and freedome of speech online
Having just finished watching the documentary CitizenFour, I’m stunned that I even feel like writing anything on the internet anymore. However, surprisingly its had the opposite effect partly because of Snowden’s bravery of being open and transparent with his reasons for being a whistleblower.
How things used to be
At some point in the past, approximately 25 years, the internet was an underground thing. It wasn’t mainstream and felt like commmunication could be open and free. Since then the internet has become more mainstream, commercial and controlled.
Expressing yourself and building a community
My first activities in online publishing were about expression. Over time they became about crafting content to an audience. The aim at first was to increase quality, but increasingly there is an element of needing to monetise this website to support it and being honest I’ve never been fully comfortable with that (and Google’s algorithms standardise how traffic works making it more about social media and paid advertising).
The Problem of Categorised Market Audiences
On the one hand you have the need to build a community of people who will actually read your viewpointss and hopefully monetarily support you. On the other hand the desire for freedom of expression is still there, and that might not be optimal for the aforementioned aim.
Growing Awareness
When I finished travelling and studied Critical Design I became much more interested in politics and different kinds of projects. Henceforth I felt a desire to diversify this blog, and the question arose, what is this website about anymore? It started of as a travel blog and is has become something else.s
Impact and Risk
Some topics are more risky and impactful to express. Impact has consequences and that makes you rethink your motivations for writing. It challenges you and brings in the subject of perceived risk.
Repercussions
With the question of risk, real and perceived I think back to the journalist Glenn Greenwald (in the Citizen Four documentary) who was instrumental in releasing stories on the leaked NSA information by Snowden. When risk is real, the stakes are high, and real things will happen based on the information that is released, then its less about the subject and more about the domain. Paradigms are shifted, boundaries are crossed, gatekeepers are challenged and this risks a comeback. Whether that is a torrent of people commenting on a controversial issue or an authority searching for Edward Snowden.
Self-censored Free Speech
The powers that be that uphold the ‘proper’ images of things, places, paradigms- media, politicians, state authorities, and many private businesses and personality cults (casting a wide net here to include celebrities and experts systematically removing criticism or contradictions) are heavily into media and they would like to be able to use the internet to say what a great example of free speech it still is. But the problem is that speaking freely is mutually exclusive with self-censorship, no matter how minor that is.
Different Types of Information
We now live in an age when there are different kinds of communication with regards to the internet. There is the information that is openly and freely available online and there are the encrypted channels of information. Although we have access to incredible tools for communication the boundaries between networks and channels are high.