Ptt In Close Shot
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Saturday, May 30, 2009
Tuesday, May 26, 2009
review: White Noise by Andrew Calcutt
White Noise: An A-Z of the Contradictions in Cyberculture by Andrew Calcutt
Inspecting and analyzing the cyberspace and the phenomena dwelling inside it from a deconstructive angle, Andrew Calcutt gives back the historical, contextual and human aspects of the cyberculture in the book White Noise: An A-Z of the Contradictions in Cyberculture. He picks up 26 contradictions in the current Internet era that he found intriguing to look into, arranges them alphabetically as the titles for each section of his book, and presents each one with elaborate and demonstrative examples. The book is indeed a very enjoyable piece: lots of inspiring and reflective thinking wrapped in the cute alphabetical structure as well as his accessible and clear wording.
This book was published a decade ago, yet the issues it noticed are still bouncing around with sparkles in the contemporary society. Discussions about the impacts of the Internet on democracy/diversity, war/peace, concerns about equality/elitism, free/fee, risk/safety in the virtual world, and inquiries about anarchy/authority, journalism/personalism, and so on keep being brought up from time to time. That situation has proved the rightness and necessity of Andrew Calcutt's efforts in weaving in the historical strings inside his book.
Throughout the 26 contradictions, Calcutt manages to draw out the time line of each issues that have been mistakenly viewed as "new" or "unique" to the cyberculture. For example, in the section of journalism/personalim, he points out that "narrowcasting", and the fragmentation it directly or indirectly resulted in, has taken place before the age of Internet. The show-up and popularity of specialized publications as well as cable TV can be regarded as some of such examples. And as Mark mentioned in the last seminar, the panopticon design examined and further developed in Michel Foucault's study about the prison (Discipline and Punish) is in fact executed in the society today while the Internet has observed and recorded and offered accesses to individuals' activities online. The brilliant novel written by George Orwell, 1984, is another prediction and warning of human beings future that has somehow been realized nowadays (thinking about the "Big Brother"). So, rather than focusing on how the Internet (or technology) contributes to the "creation" of the cyberculture, maybe it is more proper to say that the Internet has helped to amplify and extremize the concepts that have been long evolved and developed in the human society.
Calcutt's deconstructive reading/writing of the Internet is another impressive feature of this book. Using binary oppositions (boys/girls, play/work) as the start point of his thinking, Calcutt cuts through the boundary lines between each contradiction and reveals the twined nature of the cyberculture's duality. Again, the instability of signification is not news at all. The contradictory chaos has been sitting in the seperating lines between each opposition before the birth of the so-called "cyberculture". And again, these contradictions might have been maximized because of the development of the Internet, and thus are gaining more and more attention. Calcutt is obvious aware of the fact. He analyzes the 26 contradictions with a historical eye which helps to relocate the floating "cyberculture" into its social contexts.
The lacking of the online resources or references might be a concern point for its reader. Yet in my understanding, I figure that Calcutt diliberately excludes such information because his focus is more on rooting the cyberculture into the historical, contextual, and human ground it is supposed--but has been overlooked for a long time--to be in.
This book was published a decade ago, yet the issues it noticed are still bouncing around with sparkles in the contemporary society. Discussions about the impacts of the Internet on democracy/diversity, war/peace, concerns about equality/elitism, free/fee, risk/safety in the virtual world, and inquiries about anarchy/authority, journalism/personalism, and so on keep being brought up from time to time. That situation has proved the rightness and necessity of Andrew Calcutt's efforts in weaving in the historical strings inside his book.
Throughout the 26 contradictions, Calcutt manages to draw out the time line of each issues that have been mistakenly viewed as "new" or "unique" to the cyberculture. For example, in the section of journalism/personalim, he points out that "narrowcasting", and the fragmentation it directly or indirectly resulted in, has taken place before the age of Internet. The show-up and popularity of specialized publications as well as cable TV can be regarded as some of such examples. And as Mark mentioned in the last seminar, the panopticon design examined and further developed in Michel Foucault's study about the prison (Discipline and Punish) is in fact executed in the society today while the Internet has observed and recorded and offered accesses to individuals' activities online. The brilliant novel written by George Orwell, 1984, is another prediction and warning of human beings future that has somehow been realized nowadays (thinking about the "Big Brother"). So, rather than focusing on how the Internet (or technology) contributes to the "creation" of the cyberculture, maybe it is more proper to say that the Internet has helped to amplify and extremize the concepts that have been long evolved and developed in the human society.
Calcutt's deconstructive reading/writing of the Internet is another impressive feature of this book. Using binary oppositions (boys/girls, play/work) as the start point of his thinking, Calcutt cuts through the boundary lines between each contradiction and reveals the twined nature of the cyberculture's duality. Again, the instability of signification is not news at all. The contradictory chaos has been sitting in the seperating lines between each opposition before the birth of the so-called "cyberculture". And again, these contradictions might have been maximized because of the development of the Internet, and thus are gaining more and more attention. Calcutt is obvious aware of the fact. He analyzes the 26 contradictions with a historical eye which helps to relocate the floating "cyberculture" into its social contexts.
The lacking of the online resources or references might be a concern point for its reader. Yet in my understanding, I figure that Calcutt diliberately excludes such information because his focus is more on rooting the cyberculture into the historical, contextual, and human ground it is supposed--but has been overlooked for a long time--to be in.
Check Lubomir's review on this book: http://newnewmedialp.blogspot.com/2009/05/review-white-noise-a-z-of.html
Sunday, May 24, 2009
PTT in Close Shot (5)
So say that the conflicts between search engines and the privacy of BBS users are all solved. How to make the search results more useful? Even in YouSee now--the search engine that only covers some forums and couple BBS sites, the search results can be plenty if the key term is commonly used. Therefore, it is important to develop an efficient ranking mechanism that works for both telnet PTT and web PTT. With the operation of the ranking mechanism, YouSee would be able to sort out the results that have most visits or have been recommended most. The comment function has long been used in a different manner (chitchat mostly), as I said earlier, so it is not reliable to count the number of comments of each post to decide its value. Then how should the ranking system work? Concluding from the blogs I have been reading, one good way to do that is to make sure there is a correct URL in the web PTT for each post--or at least those in the public boards--in PTT. These URLs can be used as referral to track where does the post link to, where is the post linked from, and how the flow is directed between PTT and the web. To make the ranking base on the referral data should be workable if in the first place the corresponding URL is operating correctly. And, perhaps in this way the posts in the web PTT can be promoted to the preceding results in the usual search engine like Google or Yahoo.
Another suggestion that has been brought up many times is that to develop APIs for PTT. It is similar to how the APIs work for Twitter, Plurk, and other social media. Users might be able to navigate PTT with their cellphone, to receive latest posts or comments in the forum that they have been subscribed to on their cellphone, to send out comments, posts, even mails in PTT via cellphone, to use Skype, gtalk, or MSN to send messages to their PTT peers and vice versa, just to name a few. There are so many possibilities to look forward to if the connections can be really built by the means of APIs. With the help of properly designed APIs, the connectivity of PTT would be maximized and tightly woven into people's daily life, and consequently, the values inside the flow, the content, the networks PTT bears will also be utilized in a more convenient and efficient ways.
But before cheering for the brightly looking future of PTT, it is helpful and important to be aware of couple things. First, like what I mentioned in the very beginning, there is no standard formula for the development of the Internet or the interaction between the cyber world and the offline world. There could be some broad ground rules, but it is hardly possible to copy and follow the exact pattern of the successful precedents. Also, the developing tendencies can vary regionally, because of the traditions, languages, values the local society are carrying. Same methods might cause dramatic variation in different regions. It is rather crucial to inspect how the local society has affected its interactions with the Internet, and how the Internet has responded to that. Knowing the people who are using--or even not using--the media is another key point. Mankind is always the agent that makes the differences. In order not to fall into the similar embarrassment of YouSee, one needs to take the logic, assumptions, ideologies embedded within people's daily use of the Internet into consideration.
Nevertheless, even if all the homework is done beforehand, how the Internet would keep growing and altering people's life is in fact hidden in the mist. After all, our generation is in fact right IN the middle, or the beginning, of the digital era. The Internet has been exploding in different speeds, into various directions. It is always possible and intriguing to expect, to deduct, or to predict, but we could never be certain.
-references:
Michael Netzley, CommunicateAsia (blog)
Sam Flemming, China IWOM Blog (blog)
MOBINODE (blog)
Mr./Ms. Days (MMDays) - 網路, 資訊, 觀察, 生活 (blog)
http://mmdays.wordpress.com/ (old site)
For Immediate ReleaseL The Hobson and Holtz Report - Podcast #408
TWNIC, Internet Broadband Usage in Taiwan, 2007 (a summary report)
林芳志, "「大學生你上網都在做什麼? - 淺談大學生網路使用概況", 數位典藏國家型科技計畫
Wikipedia,
-"PTT Bulletin Board System"
-"注音文"
-"Martian language"
Mark Granovetter, "The Strength of Weak Ties: A Network Theory Revisited"
"'Martian language' banned in Taiwanese college entrance exam", Taiwan.com.au
"鄉民團結力量大 救回自殺女揪甘心",
"網友串連 隔空救回燒炭女", 自由電子報
"PTT網友愛心串連 救出受虐姐弟", Peggy隨手拍 (blog)
批踢踢實業坊 (web PTT)
"淺談 BBS 與 Blog", Blog.XDite.net (blog)
"【６號成功分析室】批踢踢 (PTT) 為何成功？", Mr. 6 - 趨勢．創業．網路．生活
"Can we open up PTT?", cjin's fantastique world (blog)
"Open Up PTT!!!", ::run, tempo, run:: (blog)
"[yousee] 再談柚子，柚子到底做錯了什麼？", 小ken思路不轉彎 (blog)
"專找BBS文章的搜尋引擎「YouSee!柚子」", 重灌狂人 (blog)
PTT in Close Shot (4)
To What Ends is PTT a Valuable Site?
Without much thinking, so far PTT seems to be rather welcoming and public, because of the false impression given by its overwhelming flow of information/popularity. In fact, PTT is more of a guarded office building, with thousands of semi-public, semi-private conference rooms and personal offices. Why is PTT guarded? Well, first of all, even though the threshold for registration is pretty low, one still needs a registered membership to participate the discussions/activities inside the giant building. Otherwise, holding a guest ID will only allow people to have accesses to those conference rooms--that is, the so-called "public boards" in PTT, and no participation is permitted as well. Thus I am more like to think of them as "semi-public, semi-private", in spite of the fact that they are labeled as "public". Second, even if one has a registered ID, the complicated layout of PTT's forums/boards (the conference rooms and personal offices) makes it rather hard to navigate unless the person knows exactly what he/she is looking for. That means, the enormous amount of boards somehow creates a veil which helps to make some of the forums/boards "invisible" (they are open forums, but one has to find/locate them). This kind of forums often belongs to the category of personal offices; by personal offices I refer to those forums that are opened up because of a more personal, or relatively minor purposes. Course boards, class boards, alumni boards, group boards (school teams, clubs) and family/friend boards are some examples of this kind of forums. Third, the navigating system of BBS is so different and seemingly old as well as difficult (compared to the web world), that many people are blocked out from the very beginning.
So, indeed PTT isn't all that public, and that is why when people talk about how to maximize the value and potential of PTT, the discussions are often surrounding a main idea: to open up PTT. That direction is not surprising at all; while the web world has reached a stage of wed 2.0, and reached the preview and imagination of 3.0 or even 5.0, PTT still stays in the building. It actually has tried to join the worldwide flow, by opening up some new accesses to its offices. The web PTT has been launched for couple years, but not all the contents inside PTT are instantly transited to the website, probably due to some concerns about PTT users' rights and privacy. What's more, the web PTT is at most a set of archives; it follows the "read logic" but not the "read/write logic" of the Internet nowadays. People cannot make posts or comments or any other similar services that are provided by the telnet PTT. In this sense, this web version of PTT doesn't really take the step to make meaningful connections with the web. It is also possible to gain timely update of the posts in certain boards via RSS, or Atom feed. However, for some technical reasons this function does not work very smoothly, according to the feedback I found on the web.
(By the way, there is a site: "gaaan.com" established for the purpose of copying the entire package of a BBS site onto the web. It looks a lot like a BBS site and it offers a dual way to navigate--either to use the mouse or the traditional way in a real BBS site. Type "guest" into the blank and take a look! It's quite fun!)
Obviously there is still quite some room for PTT to improve in terms of opening itself up. The most frequently mentioned issue is concerning the search function. Many people have been complaining that despite the abundance of quality articles in PTT, it is easily for good articles (in the form of posts) to disappear in the daily wave of new posts, if the forum manager doesn't put them into the edited dossier. Also, search engines cannot find the articles in PTT; they can find the ones in the web PTT, but those are almost invisible (after flipping through many pages of search results, and there they are! Voila!). It means that it requires one to narrow down the search domain (for example: add "site:PTT.cc") for the contents in PTT to jump out immediately. But, to think that way is walking backward. Not many people would make their search terms so strict to simple one site unless they know beforehand exactly what they are looking for.
Before I go into the topic of promoting PTT's articles in the search results I want to talk more about the search issue. Lots of voices are asking for a way to search the contents in BBS sites. Actually, a search engine for BBS sites is already out there: YouSee. This site is built up by a group of graduate students, aimed to search the posts, comments, or other traces ONLY in BBS sites. At first it stepped on the stage with confidence and lots of cheering, but within a week, it was forced to stop operating and modified the range its search engine could reach.
Why? Well, the biggest controversy in the whole YouSee event is the privacy issue. As I mentioned before, the number of forums in PTT and the special way of navigation in a way have woven a seeming veil that creates a false impression of being invisible for the PTT users. This illusion further helps to fertilize a prevailing assumption about PTT's "privateness" which is different from that about the world wide web. Under such assumption, many users forget about the possibility of being watched, especially in those "personal offices". Yes, they might be unnoticed, but in the digital age, everything leaves some traces. So soon lots of people found out that the launch of YouSee was not merely non-beneficial but might also be harmful. This search engine offered a strong service that enabled people to find articles that were hidden behind the enormous newer posts in the forum, to find posts in both public boards as well as the "personal offices" (class boards, friend boards, and so on), and to search for the same key term across several BBS sites. The overwhelming search function of YouSee suddenly exposed everything to the ground, and simplified the ways to access the data that might not be so easy to get before. That made lots of BBS users very uncomfortable and some old histories were dug out and led to some harm. In the end, YouSee was suspended for some time and now its search engine only covers the BBS sites or the forums that have agreed to be included into the index. Isn't that interesting to see how the assumptions vary with different social media, and that people are so prone to be trustful with the Internet? (Uh, including me.)
Saturday, May 23, 2009
PTT in Close Shot (3)
What Impacts Does It Have on the Local Society?
Looking into the impacts PTT has on the local society in Taiwan, here I present three case studies by which I hope to simplify as well as exemplify the complex interactions between this particular social medium and the society.
* Case study #1: the prohibition against "chu yin wen" v.s. the popularity of the PTT slang
"Chu yin wen" is a Chinese language slang that was once very popular--and nowadays it is still being used and circulated, but not so much--in the Internet sphere in Taiwan. It is similar to the SMS language in the English-speaking area; both are reducing words to the simplest letters/symbols that phonetically represent the original words. "Chu yin wen" was widely used once in the cyber world but was soon viewed as a sort of downgrading use of Chinese couple years ago. PTT was one of the first opponents that officially made the prohibition against "chu yin wen".
The interesting thing here is, even when PTT bans the use of such slang, there is actually another kind of informal language that has been popularly used within the site. That is, the PTT slang, or more generally, the Martian language. The PTT slang is not an original kind of Internet language, but is derived from the Martian language--a general term for different slang going around in the Internet. The Martian language was slowly formed, produced, and accepted with its circulation in the cyberspace, and it has sneaked in the world of Internet smoothly and thoroughly: daily conversation, blog entries, instant messages, emails, and so on. The PTT language can be called as a dialect of the Martian language. While "chu yin wen" chose to phonetically represent the Chinese characters in the simplest way, the PTT language is semantically playing with the original language. That means, the PTT slang adds new meanings, or twisted meanings to the old language; sometimes it also borrows icons or symbols to present novel expressions that are hard to convey through the Chinese language.
In 2006, the committee responsible for the National College Entrance Exam made one of the questions on the Chinese subject out of some Internet slang ("3Q", "::>_<::", "orz"). This caused lots of controversies at that time, with teachers, students, and parents questioning the orthodoxy of the Internet slang. And eventually the College Entrance Exam Center announced that Martian language would be banned in the future exams.
So what do all those above imply then? Well, as far as I am concerned, I find it very intriguing seeing how PTT works as both the tool to stop and to spread the use of informal languages in the cyberspace as well as the offline world. It once helped to correct the trend of "chu yin wen", but it also helped to carve out rooms for the slang to be circulated. PTT's impact on the use of language is, on the one hand, indeed remarkable, but on the other hand, the instrumental role of PTT as a non-fixed medium that can be worked in various ways is even more worth-noting.
* Case study #2: let's buy together!
"BuyTogether" is a popular board in PTT that brings up a nationwide trend of collective purchase. The advantages of doing collective purchase are having more bargaining terms, splitting up mailing costs, reducing the risk and total expanse of abroad purchase, and so on and so forth. That particular board in PTT is set up as a public space for initiating and joining such collective buying. The idea of group purchase is not at all new, of course. But the set-up of BuyTogether board amplifies the workability and efficiency of such deed with the different networks it brings in, and regulates basic rules for such affair to protect participants' rights and benefits. This trend of collective buying has become so popular that the web version of the PTT BuyTogether board is blooming one after another. For example, "ihergo" is one of the many attempts to transfer the business from the BBS region to a more open and accessible field of world wide web. Not merely that there are its counterparts in the web sphere, but this craze of collective purchase has also led to the publication of books introducing the must-buy "hergo" (the term sounds like the pronunciation of collective buying in Chinese) products [see here] and books teaching people how to make the popular hergo snacks [see here].
The prosperity of BuyTogether board changes how people buy things, how people sell things, and how people make money. It lifts an action that was traditionally limited within the circle of acquaintances/friends to a new level of endless players joining in from different directions. It helps people to think and act beyond old boundaries and further to find new possibilities in their everyday routine.
Yet the amazing potential of PTT in terms of profit making also attracts many hostile attempts to make money in various ways. Advertisements, promotion, or branding hidden within the posts are quite normal, and fake customer feedback sharing is also very common. There are even cases of national frauds cheating hundreds of participants of their money. So while the board itself is established for the good use, it at the same time unavoidably makes rooms for the bad deeds.
* Case study #3: help me, PTT!
The popularity of PTT has made it the alternative place to turn to when it comes to emergencies. By means of mobilizing the human resources and networks in PTT, there have been many cases of successful rescue. For example, just couple weeks ago, the "villagers" (a term of the PTT language, it generally refers to users of PTT) helped to find a female villager who left a post in PTT as a suicide note, and stopped her from committing suicide [see here]. Similar event happened several times before. In 2006, the villagers in Kaohsiung managed to locate where the suicidal girl was and save her with only few clues (her name and that she just checked in an anonymous hotel) [see here]. In 2007, the villagers in the Hate forum read about a post crying for help; it described the domestic violence in the family and the unstable state of mind of their mother. In the end, with the assistant of the police force, the sister who made the post and her younger brother were both rescued, and their mother was sent to the hospital [see here].
The examples above exemplify the powerful capacity of PTT to mobilize. Because of the networks gathered in PTT, this BBS site seems to be "the" place to initiate actions or schemes. However, the water that bears the boat is the same that swallows it up. The key factor of variations is always people; that is to say, how people are utilizing PTT's strength in having influences or making changes is in fact the critical point for the outcome. For instance, a scandalous post accusing his ex-girlfriend of being a two-timer was posted in February, 2005. That post attracted lots and lots of emotional discussion which led to the exposure of the real personal information of the "heroine" in this event, as well as many insulting, attacking posts. The whole thing made a dramatic turn while the man making the original post admitted that he made up the whole thing for revenge. Issues concerning the blind enthusiasm of crowds, individual privacy in the cyberspace, and the realization of Internet as the ultimate surveillance in the society were brought up and pushed into the spotlight.
What does it imply for human beings when the Internet becomes the ultimate surveillance in our society? Do people falsely think that they are heading toward a bright era of freedom but in fact are putting themselves in the self-built prison of information? With the watching-over of PTT, or the Internet, surely people can make good use of it. Nevertheless, it is also very likely that people can get tripped by the endless string of histories left behind their freely marching and surfing in the cyberspace.
PTT in Close Shot (2)
Why is PTT Distinctive from Other Social Media?
Followings are some significant special features of PTT that, in my opinion, make it stand out among other social media in Taiwan.
* 1. A abundant collaboration of different online activities
Even though the essential form for PTT to operate as a social medium is forum--a place where people exchange and discuss information as well as experience--the activities taken place there are rather versatile. As I mentioned above, the boards in PTT cover almost every part of one's life. What's more, human beings are creatures with amazing creativity; people are utilizing PTT very differently and creatively. They are making friends, organizing study groups, playing detective games, co-writing stories, selling/buying second-hand stuff, and so on and so forth. When there is a crucial baseball or basketball game, or even just a very popular TV show, people would go online and open up a "Live Post" for instant reporting and discussion. The things one can do in PTT is versatile beyond believe. Like I said earlier, it is really easy to find a comfortable spot in PTT; sometimes it is also fun to just observe things happening there.
In addition to the forums, PTT offers some different functions for its users. The most popular and beloved one should be the function of giving comments right below each post. Users give out their comments with one simple line (they have to give another comment code to write another line), and they can choose between "tuei" (I agree, I approve), "shi" (I disagree) and "-->" (not taking sides) to show their opinion before giving out the comment. Somehow it looks a little bit similar to Twitter, probably because the limit of the length of each comment. And as usual, people never use the tool only as what it is supposed to be used. It has become a common thing to chat in the "string of comments," either surrounding the topic of the post or not. People also use the comment function to sign up for activities (the first fifty people to give comments can get a spot), to play games (give out answers via comments), and sometimes even to make images with the string of comments. Besides the comment function, there are also chat rooms, instant messages, mailing function (even to other BBS sites, or to the email addresses that are set in the www region), recreation zone (virtual pets, poker games, chess games), just to name some.
* 2. A contradiction in being disguised and being crystal clear
In PTT, people seldom use their real name as their user ID, and they seldom fill in real personal information when they register. Unlike that of Facebook, MySpace or some serious blogs, the ruling logic in the world of BBS is to be disguised (not that every people put their real identity out there in the former social media, of course). People interact with one another behind the image they have created in the online world. They chat, they discuss, they argue, they share, and gradually, they become friends, or at least, acquaintances. They build up connections with each other behind their PTT ID. Broadly speaking, these connections can be viewed as a sort of "weak ties" that bridge different groups of people, thus bringing in networks that one might not otherwise have been able to reach. The values of weak ties are well-discussed in Mark Granovetter's "The Strength of Weak Ties: A Network Theory Revisited", so here I won't go into that direction. But it is rather clear that PTT, because of the prevalence of the site itself and the generally accepted unspoken rule of having obscure identity, has helped to build up these weak ties.
However, there are also quite a lot of users have chosen to be crystal clear, under certain circumstances. By "crystal clear" I don't mean that they show everything to everyone, but that they bring a part of PTT into their real life, and let certain peers to know who they are in the offline world. A way to do this is to arrange offline meet-ups. The basic routine is to have a meal, or some coffee together. Of course, there are advanced versions. Meet-up participants can go to concerts, watch movies, have lessons, attend TV show programs, or go work out together. And the meet-ups can be anywhere, and have been held in many other countries, since the users in PTT don't necessarily only dwell in Taiwan. With frequent offline meet-ups and contacts outside PTT, people are bringing in the virtual world to their real life circle. It's likely that they can build up connections stronger enough to be the so-called "strong ties".
While weak ties are bridging different networks and carrying in various flows of information and resources, strong ties are working as the solid base for the stability for the survival of each forum, by building up powerful connections that link active participants tightly and firmly. This contradictory situation of being able to be disguised and to make overlap with the offline world in PTT for me is a key element that keeps it being so popular and prosperous in Taiwan, because that situation creates tons of weak ties but also gives space for strong ties to grow.
* 3. Absolutely noncommercial
Even since the very beginning, PTT has clearly stated itself as an always noncommercial BBS site for college/university students. Persistently it has kept its promise till now, despite the fact that there is enormous potential for profits in PTT. Any marketing, advertising, or profit-making activities are officially banned. With the technical as well as equipment support from school brothers and sisters in NTU, donation from certain companies, and money raised by concerts and other fundraisers, PTT has managed to survive and keep growing. Compared to the long commercialized BBS site KKCity, which has a more wild and sophisticated collection of forums, PTT appears to be more "school-like" and "naive". The absolutely noncommercial quality of PTT is a very important factor contributing to its popularity, because it is rather rare to find a spot without ads flying around in the cyberspace nowadays.
PTT's potential of making big profits is pretty well-noticed, and that has aroused many attempts to try it out: placement marketing, personal sales, disguised ads, and even frauds. Some of such examples will be discussed in the next section where I would like to talk about the impacts PTT has on the local society.
Monday, April 27, 2009
PTT in Close Shot (1)
PTT in Close Shot
--a primary survey of the Biggest BBS site in Taiwan
The scale of the impact of the Internet and its by-products on the world is, with no doubt, global. The Internet has brought a wide range of changes in people's ways of living; it brought a digitalized world that is interwoven into the physical world which human beings have long inhabited. The planet is fluctuating in the flood of the Internet. The waves sweep over the whole world and run in all kinds of direction. Each trend brings hardly the same result; there is no single default way of tracking and framing the development of a virtual society. Yet, while the majority of discussion and investigation of online activities is targeting phenomena in the West, the ecosystems of the Internet in Asia are often filtered out, or labeled as "weird" or "funny", because they don't fit in with the western ethnocentric logic (quoting and paraphrasing parts of Michael Netzley's blog entry #110).
As Michael Netzley points out in his blog entry #254 as well as FIR: The Hobson & Holtz Report - Podcast #408, "the popularity of BBS sites in parts of Asia" is one of the features that indicate how different the landscape of Internet development in Asia is compared to that of the West. BBS (Bulletin Board System), as a rather old kind of way to connect and communicate, not only survives from the dominance of world wide web, but also transforms into an unique type of social media that stands out and keeps prospering in the Chinese-based areas. So, here I would like to look into one single BBS site--PTT, the largest site in Taiwan--and to sort out three major questions: Why is PTT distinctive from other social media? What impacts does it have on the local society? and, To what ends is PTT a valuable site that worth all the resources that have been pouring into it?
PTT, the largest BBS site in Taiwan, was founded in 1995, by a sophomore student in NTU (National Taiwan University). As many other BBS sites gave way to the web, PTT wasn't wiped out in this global flood, and nowadays it remains to be the leading force among the few survivors. The current number of PTT's registered members is circa 1,500,000, each day there are 400,000-600,000 attempts to connect/log in, and its average number of users each hour is around 40,000. The numbers might be relatively not impressive compared to sites on the global level like Facebook or Twitter. Yet being a local social media, in a country with a population of 23 millions, the records are indeed significant.
BBS can be described as a collection of many different forums. The public forums, or public boards--as the BBS users may call them, can be accessed by all users (even "guests", the non-registered ones), and are nearly all available for any registered members to open up new topics, to post replies, or simply make a comment or feedback. Now PTT gathered over 20,000 public boards which cover almost every single issue in a person's life. There are boards for left-handed people (Lefty), for cross culture couples (CCRomance), for people who are losing their hair (hair_loss), for people who want to let out their anger (Hate, HatePolitics), just to name a few. The great variety of themes covered by the boards in PTT is a major attraction for its users. One can easily find a comfortable spot--or many, of course--there to sit back and read the discussions, experience sharing, debates that appeal interesting to him/her. It is also very easy to jump in the conversation. One can either choose to give comments (just to test the water) or to jump right in and post.
BBS can be described as a collection of many different forums. The public forums, or public boards--as the BBS users may call them, can be accessed by all users (even "guests", the non-registered ones), and are nearly all available for any registered members to open up new topics, to post replies, or simply make a comment or feedback. Now PTT gathered over 20,000 public boards which cover almost every single issue in a person's life. There are boards for left-handed people (Lefty), for cross culture couples (CCRomance), for people who are losing their hair (hair_loss), for people who want to let out their anger (Hate, HatePolitics), just to name a few. The great variety of themes covered by the boards in PTT is a major attraction for its users. One can easily find a comfortable spot--or many, of course--there to sit back and read the discussions, experience sharing, debates that appeal interesting to him/her. It is also very easy to jump in the conversation. One can either choose to give comments (just to test the water) or to jump right in and post.
Most of PTT's members consists of university students, grad-students, and newly graduated (or the "freshmen in workplace", a term that coined by the local media). According to TWNIC's report on the usage of broadband Internet 2007, in the list of "Purposes of Broadband Usage", BBS cannot get into the top 10 at all. Nonetheless, in researches where the target group is college/university students, BBS is always rated as the top 5 purposes students using the Internet for. Also, in the user statistics that given by PTT itself, the number of registered users would reach the high peek between age 20-27 if analyzed and divided by age. This special feature of PTT indirectly makes it the place where a big part of pop culture among the younger generation in Taiwan is produced, circulated, and reproduced.
-Want to know more about PTT? See the entry of PTT in Wikipedia
-Want to experience PTT?
telnet://PTT.cc
(have to use specially designed browsers to navigate)
-Some browsers designed for BBS
PCMan X http://pcmanx.sourceforge.net/
PCMan plug-in for Mozilla/Firefox http://pcmanmoz.mozdev.org/index.html
PCMan plug-in for Mozilla/Firefox http://pcmanmoz.mozdev.org/index.html
Tuesday, April 7, 2009
"craft it forward" received!
As I posted previously, I joined a crafty project, "craft it forward", couple weeks ago. (see the post here)
I sent out my work like a month ago (not sure if it has arrived safely or not; kind of worried... :P), but didn't receive anything until last week. As the idiom said, "good things come in pairs", not one, but two unexpected packages arrived in my mailbox on March 30.
One was sent from San Diego, USA, by a girl called Jennifer. In the small white package came three delicately made cards, and all cards are about the same theme: mushrooms! (YES, I LOVE MUSHROOMS!) I can feel the care and efforts put into those cards; they are really nicely made, with colorful illustrations on each of the cards and plastic wraps to protect them. Thank you, Jennifer. :)
Another package lying in my mailbox was also mailed from USA, but Durham, NC. It contains a modern orange thank card made by the initiator of this "craft it forward" project (follow him on twitter: @dudecraft). I love the fact that he combined materials other than paper to put together this card, and the cool slogan he put on the envelope: "MAKING SOMETHING CHANGES EVERYTHING." His package was truly a surprise to me; I didn't expect to get a thank card at all.
Actually, I think I really need to thank him for organizing this project. I love working with my hands, and knowing that my work can pass along some love to others makes me even more content. Because the project, warmth is being transferred to and from various spots in the world, embedded in the creative works of the project participants. :)
Wednesday, March 25, 2009
review: We-Think by Charles Leadbeater
We-think: The power of mass creativity by Charles Leadbeater
[W]e are witnessing the birth of a different way of approaching how we organise ourselves, one that offers significant opportunities to improve how we work, consume and innovate. (24)
Holding this positive attitude toward the web and the world the web is creating, in his latest book We-Think, Charles Leadbeater puts together a recipe for today's generation to either confront or embrace the changes that come along with the emergence of a global virtual society.
The ground rule of the We-Think recipe is to share, as Leadbeater titles his first chapter: You are what you share. Sharing itself is not a novel idea at all. However, "sharing"--the idea as well as the action--is being maximized and reaching a whole new level in the world of highly connectivity and dense networks. The web amplifies the possibility of sharing, makes it much easier than ever, and encourages such action with the feedback, comment, praise--or, using Leadbeater's word, "recognition"--from peers that are generated in the process of sharing.
The ingredients for the recipe are listed as well: a core (providing the original concept/project/platform/scheme), connectivity (among creators, users, peers, participants), being creative, willing to contribute, and collaboration (organizing participants, managing and negotiating the input as well as the output). Again, none of the ingredients is new or exotic. Yet Leadbeater emphasizes and strengthens the importance of these key elements by sorting out a detailed report on many real cases that correspond to the We-Think recipe. His report covers open sources (Linux), collective intelligence (Wkipedia), games (I Love Bees, World of Warcraft, The Sims), social media (MySpace, YouTube), projects that brings the professional, the amateur, and the pro-am together (Open Architecture Network, Instructables), financial/human-resource/political mobilization (Howard Dean's 2004 presidential campaign), and many other examples.
Like many other authors who writes cookbooks, Charles Leadbeater needs to try out his dish first. What is really interesting here is that We-Think the book is itself the recipe, as well as an experimental practice of the recipe. Leadbeater made his preliminary draft of We-Think available online and free to download, he created a wiki page for the We-Think project, then he collected responses, critique, questions, suggestions from hundreds of intrigued contributors around the world, and he developed, refined, modified his We-Think recipe either according to, based on, or in respond to the feedback he received.
The decision to try out the recipe with his book, in real life, is quite worth noting. First, such decision reveals the central optimism of Leadbeater in his take on the Internet, its consequential creation as well as side effects. Second, by executing his concept, Leadbeater gives credits to not only the recipe (he actually believes in it) but also the people out there--the enthusiastic ones can come along join the discussion, or make contributions to the project, while the skeptical ones can witness an actual practice progressing. Third, making his We-Think practice public, Leadbeater alters the traditional, single-direction way of collecting information. Now information are transited back and forth among peers, critics, and Leadbeater, in the connections built upon his call to exercise the We-Think recipe.
Being a big fan of We-Think, Leadbeater still tries to be objective and reflective. He questions, "How far will We-Think spread?" and then, "For better or worse"? Carefully looking into different societal fields, Leadbeater recognizes that some aspects (design, research, creative works, public services) are prone to be affected by and involved in the chemistry of We-Think while other parts are less likely to follow the guidance (agriculture, mining, quarrying, basic energy production). Yet overall Leadbeater is rather enthusiastic about We-Think and its effects. He claims that the spread of We-Think recipe can make a profound impact on human life--especially more influential for people in developing countries, and that "Yes, We-Think will be good for democracy; yes, We-Think will be good for equality; yes, We-Think will be good for freedom."
A single instruction for diet cannot account for the complete health of everybody, so does the We-Think recipe. Leadbeater is aware of the fact. In the last chapter of his book, he writes that "it would be naive to imagine that a new way of organizing ourselves will necessarily be exclusively positive" (232).
For example, sharing, the fundamental base for the We-Think recipe, can be its Achilles tendon. Sharing (either the idea or the action) is open for people to utilize it, to make good use of it, or even to abuse, misuse it. One can achieve very opposite ends with amazingly similar ideas/tools/means. The hostile spreading of viruses, the scheming of criminal acts/terrorist attacks/conspiracy, or the intrusion of others' privacy (accidental or intended) are not at all hard to imagine in the world the web is creating. The challenge this kind of negativity pushes forward is not to stop believing in the ethics of sharing but "to create a sense of order and security without undermining our capacity for sharing" (235).
Writing with a barely concealed adoration for the interconnected world that keeps growing, expanding, and changing, Charles Leadbeater presents a dish that is rather simple and approachable than the actual flows--untrimmed, outbursting, and enormous--running through the web. This cookbook is more of a welcoming introduction that slowly leads people to the gate behind which sits the real labyrinth of mapping the virtual society and reasoning the logic(s) of living within such society. Without doubts, We-Think is a good start point to initiate the discussion about the future, the implication, and the meaning for mankind to situate themselves in a world of collective collaboration, massive connectivity, and sharing. Leadbeater opens up the banquet with the first course: We-Think. The rest relies on others to cook, to experiment, to produce, to create, all together.
Sunday, March 22, 2009
newspaper and...
This week I've been reading articles from "a flying seminar on the future of news". The articles are all orbiting around one central topic: the future of newspaper/news media/journalism. The industry of newspaper has been shrinking ever since the emergence and prevalence of radios, televisions, which have taken over most of the accountability of spreading the "fact-oriented" news, or the so-called "breaking news." Yet newspaper didn't face its death penalty until the online society became a crucial, inseparable, and unavoidable element of human life. Nowadays almost everything in real life is being digitalized, adapted, recreated, and relocated into the vase virtual world. Newspaper is, of course, one of the "almost everything." Newspaper is losing its stand point in the world where thousands of millions of ways of either receiving/retrieving or broadcasting/reporting news, facts, information, journals, comments, critiques are opened up to every inhabitants.
So what impacts does the dying of newspaper have on the news industry, on journalism/journalists, or even on the whole society? These questions are exactly what the articles in the seminar are trying to inspect, to break down, to reason, and hopefully to give some answers or directions for people who are facing, witnessing, effected, or unaware but influenced by this dramatic and painful evolving of the newspaper industry.
Compared to the future of newspaper/news media/journalism, I am actually more interested in the future of human beings' relationship to the world, to each other, and to themselves. Newspaper and the printing press have, to some extent, catalyzed the building, regulating, and solidifying of nation-states as well as citizenship. Through the action of flipping through the same paper, reading the same news, discussing and commenting on the same stories, people who live within the circulating region start to form a collective identification with the region and the people live there.
Now the boundaries of circulation have long been wiped out, and the monopoly of distribution of news/information has been broken; what kind of news media form, or new media will come next? And what change will the new, surviving, winning media species bring to the power structure, to citizens' identity, and to the relationship between the states and citizens?
Friday, March 13, 2009
"craft it forward" :)
About a week ago while I was wandering around on Twitter, a tweet from @dudecraft caught my eyes. It was like this, "Crafters, please participate and RT: http://tinyurl.com/d6r4oo". I clicked on the link and then became intrigued by this secret Santa in March project. For one thing, I love keeping my hands busy: drawing, paper cutting, sewing, cutting, gluing... For another, it always feels nice to pass along warmth to others with the thing I made. After one day of consideration, I wrote my application to Paul.
Then on March 7 I received this email with the information of my "makee"--a Vancouver guy who loves bicycling and am about to be a dad. Not sure what to make, I saw the two pieces of brand-new eraser sitting on my desk--"I can try to carve a eraser stamp!" Things didn't go well at first; I didn't have the transfer paper with me, and I didn't own a proper knife for carving either. Then I said to myself, "Come on! I am a left-handed. I can draw reversed images!" and I just went for it.
The drafting turned out to be quite OK. How about the carving? Well, the two stamps were a bit rough looking; I didn't do a very good job with curves and dots. Anyways, at least the images were intelligible. (I was soooo happy when I tried out the new-carved stamps and saw the clear images!)
In addition to the rubber stamps, I also made the box to put those stamps in. Making the box was another challenge; I spent quite a long time working with it. The gift box turned out to be very satisfying--my boyfriend: "I love the box!!!!!!" and he didn't say anything about the stamps. :P
Tonight I packed the whole thing together, along with a supposed-to-be-short note--it was, uh....kind of long. Seeing how this craft it forward project was formed from the very beginning--two small erasers, a plain cutter, a pair of scissors, and some pieces of paper--to the wrapped-up package waiting to be sent tomorrow, I feel really content. Yeah, it is always nice to work with my hands, put some care and good will into the object, and give it to someone. :)
to speak and to be heard
Having the right and freedom to speak doesn't guarantee the result of being heard. When the assumptions behind the current discursive space are dominated/pre-structured/mandated by the mainstream voices, how to keep the uniqueness of the marginalized and at the same time make sure they are being heard? The conversation between Henry Jenkins and Dayna Cunningham rotates around a similar but more specific question: Can African-Americans find their voice in cyberspace?
The conversation is divided into four parts; Jenkins and Cunningham respectively give out two sections of their thinking, inquiries, and ideas about the question. It is a long, rich, and very interesting conversation in which many sparkles are popping out here and there. I especially like the part where Henry Jenkins discussing the two models for the black voice to reach its audience. One is the "hush harbor" model, where "blacks could communicate with blacks largely outside of the vision of white America" (part two). The first model is basically aiming on creating a "black public sphere" where a particular kind of critical culture that belongs to blacks can be generated, inspected, articulated and circulated.
The second model is more open and fluid. It follows the "very nature of the modern media landscape"; messages and ideas are moving across communities, networks, and social groups. Thanks to the broadband, online social media, and other technology, more and more open spaces for different people to express, or extend their mind. However, as Manuel Castells points out, "while the network society is organised on a global scale, not all territories, or people, are connected in this network society" ("Why Networks Matter"). People's life, ways of thinking, and perspectives are still being influenced, shaped, and redefined, but they are not necessary participants--for one thing, they might not even aware of the moving of streams; for another, they might have a hard time finding a spot in the chaos. The spaces are seemingly open to all kinds of users, but in fact some unintended restraints might be woven into the structures upon which those spaces are built. Therefore, another question arises. In order to reach the "mixed audience," should the black voice, or any other subaltern voices, play along or break down the rules/codes of the majority?
No answers are offered here or in the discussion between Jenkins and Cunningham, but the conversation has been opened up.
Tuesday, March 10, 2009
thinking about "public sphere"
What is “public sphere”?
According to the entry of “public sphere” in Wikipedia, the term “implies a spatial concept, the social sites or arenas where meanings are articulated, distributed, and negotiated, as well as the collective body constituted by, and in this process, ‘the public’.”
The birth of Habermas’ idea of public sphere was tied to the debates or discussion taken place in the actual open spaces existing in real world: coffee houses in Britain, or salons in France. Yet as Boeder points out in his essay, “Habermas’ heritage: The future of the public sphere in the network society,” to separate “[public sphere] from the medium in which it develops” is a rather crucial step in understanding “the Habermasian concept of public sphere.” So the public sphere is more of an abstractive concept than a physical existence; it resides in many public places in society such as café, meeting halls, book clubs…, just to name a few, but those places are not equal to public sphere. A coffee shop where customers sit quietly, sipping their coffee while reading magazines can hardly be viewed as public sphere. In other words, what is happening in those public spaces is another key element to form public sphere.
So, what is happening then? In my opinion, communication is the big umbrella here: conversation and dialogue are the basic forms of communication; discussion and debate function as negotiation mechanism when disputes occur in the process of communication; human reason, or rationality, is the underline rule for the communication to take place and to keep ongoing; consensus/public opinions are produced, regulated, circulated, and distributed in the process as well.
Public sphere is thus defined by and born with both the communication that involves and engages the public and the space where such communication is taking place. It is worth noting that a lively, healthy public sphere has certain political implication as an inquiring and monitoring force in society opposed to authorities such as government, church, or canons. And that is why Habermas claims that public sphere is destroyed by the prevailing belief and practices of capitalism, commercialism, and consumerism, as well as the growth and domination of mass media. Forged, fake public opinions are circulated and distributed for commercial or PR purposes; profit-making—to attract, entertain, or hook their customers—replaces the political implication of public sphere as the sole focus now; mass media also carry assumptions and imagination about certain “topical” subjects and filter out marginal issues that don’t fit in the mainstream discourses. To borrow Habermas’ words, public sphere as such is “a public sphere in appearance only.”
Then, will public sphere revival in the era of the Internet?
It is true that the spread of broadband network makes more and more people have access to the enormous cyberspace, and that the bubbling of online social networks carves out immediately useable spaces that, unlike mass media which restrain the possibility for public to interact, welcome and encourage participation and engagement. There are more spaces for people to utilize, to open up conversation/discussion/debate that would not have room in the territory of conventional mass media.
However, an open space is not necessary a public space. Forums or blogs that are wide-open to the public don’t guarantee the participation of the masses. People certainly have more freedom to speak out, to express themselves, yet without audience, whatever they are doing is only soliloquy; no communication is happening there, and no attention is drawn to there either. This is where networks will really help. Having networks helps to increase the exposition—more chance for people to meet, to get involved, and to recruit their peers to participate—to the world. Without such connections, these lonely but open spaces in the virtual world would probably be like some unattractive small stores outshined by the fancy, appealing, and well-known supermarkets nearby.
I believe that the concept of public sphere can be realized in the virtual world, but in a transformed, evolved manner—maybe more fragmented and more diverse. There won’t be a sole, unified public sphere but many open spheres of rather lower scale. These open spheres are accessible and connected to the public. Then the spheres build bridges among one another from different directions, in different levels, and for different purposes, according to their shared interests, similar focuses, or overlapping concerns, forming a variety of public spheres where prosperous communication is taking place, dispute and negotiation are ongoing, and opinions are examined, challenged, and reformed.
According to the entry of “public sphere” in Wikipedia, the term “implies a spatial concept, the social sites or arenas where meanings are articulated, distributed, and negotiated, as well as the collective body constituted by, and in this process, ‘the public’.”
The birth of Habermas’ idea of public sphere was tied to the debates or discussion taken place in the actual open spaces existing in real world: coffee houses in Britain, or salons in France. Yet as Boeder points out in his essay, “Habermas’ heritage: The future of the public sphere in the network society,” to separate “[public sphere] from the medium in which it develops” is a rather crucial step in understanding “the Habermasian concept of public sphere.” So the public sphere is more of an abstractive concept than a physical existence; it resides in many public places in society such as café, meeting halls, book clubs…, just to name a few, but those places are not equal to public sphere. A coffee shop where customers sit quietly, sipping their coffee while reading magazines can hardly be viewed as public sphere. In other words, what is happening in those public spaces is another key element to form public sphere.
So, what is happening then? In my opinion, communication is the big umbrella here: conversation and dialogue are the basic forms of communication; discussion and debate function as negotiation mechanism when disputes occur in the process of communication; human reason, or rationality, is the underline rule for the communication to take place and to keep ongoing; consensus/public opinions are produced, regulated, circulated, and distributed in the process as well.
Public sphere is thus defined by and born with both the communication that involves and engages the public and the space where such communication is taking place. It is worth noting that a lively, healthy public sphere has certain political implication as an inquiring and monitoring force in society opposed to authorities such as government, church, or canons. And that is why Habermas claims that public sphere is destroyed by the prevailing belief and practices of capitalism, commercialism, and consumerism, as well as the growth and domination of mass media. Forged, fake public opinions are circulated and distributed for commercial or PR purposes; profit-making—to attract, entertain, or hook their customers—replaces the political implication of public sphere as the sole focus now; mass media also carry assumptions and imagination about certain “topical” subjects and filter out marginal issues that don’t fit in the mainstream discourses. To borrow Habermas’ words, public sphere as such is “a public sphere in appearance only.”
Then, will public sphere revival in the era of the Internet?
It is true that the spread of broadband network makes more and more people have access to the enormous cyberspace, and that the bubbling of online social networks carves out immediately useable spaces that, unlike mass media which restrain the possibility for public to interact, welcome and encourage participation and engagement. There are more spaces for people to utilize, to open up conversation/discussion/debate that would not have room in the territory of conventional mass media.
However, an open space is not necessary a public space. Forums or blogs that are wide-open to the public don’t guarantee the participation of the masses. People certainly have more freedom to speak out, to express themselves, yet without audience, whatever they are doing is only soliloquy; no communication is happening there, and no attention is drawn to there either. This is where networks will really help. Having networks helps to increase the exposition—more chance for people to meet, to get involved, and to recruit their peers to participate—to the world. Without such connections, these lonely but open spaces in the virtual world would probably be like some unattractive small stores outshined by the fancy, appealing, and well-known supermarkets nearby.
I believe that the concept of public sphere can be realized in the virtual world, but in a transformed, evolved manner—maybe more fragmented and more diverse. There won’t be a sole, unified public sphere but many open spheres of rather lower scale. These open spheres are accessible and connected to the public. Then the spheres build bridges among one another from different directions, in different levels, and for different purposes, according to their shared interests, similar focuses, or overlapping concerns, forming a variety of public spheres where prosperous communication is taking place, dispute and negotiation are ongoing, and opinions are examined, challenged, and reformed.
Sunday, March 8, 2009
what I am not so sure about Twitter
- things that I don't like so much
One thing about Twitter bothers me, that it's not possible to edit tweets after posting. So typos, or inappropriate word choice, or wrong links will always be there; no chance to correct it. (well, replacing the old one with a new, revised one is certainly possible, but troublesome.) But given the fact that the concept of Twitter is strongly related with text messages, I can understand why they don't provide such function. No one would complain about not being able to edit the text message after sending it.
*authenticity
The authenticity of information being circulated on Twitter is something worth noticing. Like all the other information or resources we find on the Internet, or even in real life, it is rather important to tell their truthfulness. Being quick, or close to real time is the biggest feature of Twitter. Yet its quick pace also, inevitably, increases the odds that the messages being sent might be wrong or flawed. People post the tweets as if doing live news reporting; they throw something out first--whatever they got, and then they correct the errors or give more details as the thing--a public demonstration, an earthquake, a plane crash--progresses or develops.
what I like about Twitter
*easy to use, and to keep use it
Because of the limit of 140 characters, people don't have to--and can't--write as much as those paragraph-after-paragraph blog entries. For me, or maybe just me, when I glance through someone's blog I usually expect certain length of each article. And I would want to be able to do so if I were to keep a blog going. Therefore, the load of using Twitter is not as heavy as that of having blogs. I feel more freely and easily to record some pieces of my life on Twitter.
*multiple roles
People can use Twitter to chat with their real-life friends, or to make friends with tweeters seem to be interesting and worth-knowing. Of course, Twitter can be used as a personal blog. Some tweeters post articles or stories in small pieces, like a daily or weekly column. If they want to share more than words, or more than 140 characters, they can easily insert a link to a full version of their article, a web album, to a YouTube clip, or to online newspaper in the tweet.
Twitter can be a very useful "information feeder" as well. It's like sitting in a super huge but super crowded coffee shop filled with people chitchatting, thinking aloud, communicating, discussing..--well, on the condition that one follows enough people. No need to listen to or absorb or react to all the information sent out. With proper Twitter-related applications it can be very easy to sort out things that are intriguing, things that are topical issues, that everybody is talking about, things that one wouldn't notice otherwise, or things that could be useful for research, investment, education,......
Twitter can, without doubts, be used to increase profits too. More and more business sectors use Twitter as a platform for communication, advertising, notices posting, feedback gathering, so as to shorten the gap between provider/store owner/seller and customer/consumer/buyer. Twitter can be many many other things, depending on how people use it.
*easy to link to more people, and further to expand connections/networks
The following system of Twitter makes it rather easy and not so frightening to build up connections between people. Users can follow whoever they find worth-following; no need for consent or confirmation from the target person. Being someone's follower guarantees the access to the person's tweets (well, except for people who use private account). As a result, the awkwardness of making new acquaintances/friends is, in a way, reduced, and consequently people are encouraged to expand their networks--OK, at least for me.
Also, if it turns out that somebody's Twitter updates are completely boring, or shitty (if they don't talk much--good, but if they update their tweets very frequently--that can be awfully annoying), people can always choose to "un-follow" without worrying the cancellation would be known--unless they are obsessively checking their follower list every five minutes!
Because of the limit of 140 characters, people don't have to--and can't--write as much as those paragraph-after-paragraph blog entries. For me, or maybe just me, when I glance through someone's blog I usually expect certain length of each article. And I would want to be able to do so if I were to keep a blog going. Therefore, the load of using Twitter is not as heavy as that of having blogs. I feel more freely and easily to record some pieces of my life on Twitter.
*multiple roles
People can use Twitter to chat with their real-life friends, or to make friends with tweeters seem to be interesting and worth-knowing. Of course, Twitter can be used as a personal blog. Some tweeters post articles or stories in small pieces, like a daily or weekly column. If they want to share more than words, or more than 140 characters, they can easily insert a link to a full version of their article, a web album, to a YouTube clip, or to online newspaper in the tweet.
Twitter can be a very useful "information feeder" as well. It's like sitting in a super huge but super crowded coffee shop filled with people chitchatting, thinking aloud, communicating, discussing..--well, on the condition that one follows enough people. No need to listen to or absorb or react to all the information sent out. With proper Twitter-related applications it can be very easy to sort out things that are intriguing, things that are topical issues, that everybody is talking about, things that one wouldn't notice otherwise, or things that could be useful for research, investment, education,......
Twitter can, without doubts, be used to increase profits too. More and more business sectors use Twitter as a platform for communication, advertising, notices posting, feedback gathering, so as to shorten the gap between provider/store owner/seller and customer/consumer/buyer. Twitter can be many many other things, depending on how people use it.
*easy to link to more people, and further to expand connections/networks
The following system of Twitter makes it rather easy and not so frightening to build up connections between people. Users can follow whoever they find worth-following; no need for consent or confirmation from the target person. Being someone's follower guarantees the access to the person's tweets (well, except for people who use private account). As a result, the awkwardness of making new acquaintances/friends is, in a way, reduced, and consequently people are encouraged to expand their networks--OK, at least for me.
Also, if it turns out that somebody's Twitter updates are completely boring, or shitty (if they don't talk much--good, but if they update their tweets very frequently--that can be awfully annoying), people can always choose to "un-follow" without worrying the cancellation would be known--unless they are obsessively checking their follower list every five minutes!
here I go again..
Here I go again, opening up a blog, hesitating about the blog name and URL, and hoping this time it would last longer but secretly knowing that it would die young, like any other personal cyberspace I once had.
Anyways, let's not look at the likely doom in the very first post of this new blog. Maybe I should say something about myself. I am a girl, from Taiwan, in Sweden. My name is Szu. I am also very confused by this strange romanization of my Chinese name. It actually sounds more like a longer, voiced [s]. Yet, please feel free to pronounce it as the common English name "Sue." It just doesn't matter to me. :)
I am also on Twitter. My username is runmelodyrun. You might find I am more talkative over there--mostly the tweets are just random thoughts or some quick reflections or day-to-day trivia or, I am sorry to admit, rubbish talking. Twitter is fun, I have to say. Strongly recommended to those who are terrified by the peer pressure from other bloggers: that one must produce decent blog entries frequently and steadily. I am one of the terrified--OK, and lazy too.
So, let's wrap this up here. I have this tendency of losing myself when I try to talk more...
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