Technopeasants of the Academy, Unite!

Academia isn't, of course, the only realm where people are currently going at it hammer and tongsdebating the implications of the Internet as a tool for production and distribution of ideas both new and old. Some of those realms, though, might surprise people who are entering or becoming fully aware of the debate within history or other such fields, though.

Back in April, a fellow by the name of Howard Hendrix flew off on a self-described "rant" condemning writers who use the Internet to give their work away freely. He says that he is "opposed to the increasing presence in our organization of webscabs, who post their creations on the net for free," going on to define the neologism "webscab" as someone who undercuts his fellow workers (or in this case writers), thereby undermining the fight for better pay and working conditions, etc. He says they are "rotting our organization from within" along with a few other similarly loaded terms of phrase, and goes on to describe the victims of webscabs - the people who sell their work in the traditional venue - as being converted into "Pixel-stained Technopeasant Wretch[es]." The existence of these webscabs, in fact, offends him so much that, as part of his right to resist technology he sees as "destructive to [his] ways of life and [his] beliefs," that he's decided not to seek a renewed term as the vice-president of his organization. After his term ended, he would in fact step away from technology altogether, saying he'll answer emails but "won't blog, wiki, chat, post, LiveJournal, lounge or lurk -- and [he]'ll be the happier for it."

So what's so unusual about this? It does, after all, sound like a kind of complaint that has come from a variety of different directions in the last few years, though worded in less confrontational terms. And confrontational those terms are; Howard Hendrix's words sparked outrage of terrible power, still palpable when people in his field discuss it today, several months later.

Oh, I forgot to tell you what his organization is? I should probably do that - Howard Hendrix was vice-president of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America, one of the primary SF/F-related organizations on the planet, source of the Nebula Award, one of the higher honours a writer in either field can receive.

In a blog article over on Boing Boing, Cory Doctorow - who in January 2003 released his first novel, Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom, online for free in addition to releasing it as "a physical object" in bookstores, under a Creative Commons license - gives his own views on Hendrix's statements after having followed a debate between Hendrix and "web-novelist/podcast-novelist" Scott Sigler at a science-fiction event in San Francisco last week. As one can safely assume from the fact that Doctorow is one of the "webscabs" Hendrix rails against, he takes strong exception to the arguments against using the Net as a medium for releasing new material, particularly if it's being done freely. Hendrix made various arguments, ranging from economic problems to mere rhetoric, and these seem to be addressed in turn well enough. While Hendrix is obviously in the minority within the SFWA on this opinion - witness the vitriol in the LiveJournal thread relaying his original statement - there is still a debate going on there to the present.

So if big names in the science fiction community, one of the more technology-friendly bodies of people on the planet (at least for the most part), are arguing back and forth over the Net as a medium, there's clearly something worth discussing here. As I am posting it here, I rather obviously believe that there's some connection to digital history practices.

One of Doctorow's points, and IMHO his most important one, is that the Net as a medium "diversifies the ways in which works find audiences adn vice-versa, undoing the 20th century's enormous trend to concentration and more bargaining power for fewer media companies." The concerns about monopolization of knowledge are probably less pressing in academia - at least in the humanities or social sciences upon escaping the freshman level tomes. However, the potential benefit of getting information to audiences which want information but may not have access to it - or indeed, may not even know the information they want is out there[1] - is fairly obvious to me. I, like Doctorow, flatly reject arguments that suggest people will stop buying books, or the "ugly straw-man, visibly untrue" that those who support this kind of ready distribution are naive optimists.

What I do see as an issue in online distribution - particularly of the free and unfettered kind, particularly particularly of the free and unfettered kind dealing with academic topics such as history - is the problem of quality control. Sturgeon's Law holds for a lot of things released online, to the point where one may think that Sturgeon was perhaps being a little optimistic. There is no shortage of incomprehensibly weird, if sincerely-expressed material out there[2], and I do believe seperating the good from the bad, or the bad from oh-my-God-make-me-unsee-that, is a problem. While it's different in degree from what we run into in the average bookstore, or even the average university library, though, I don't think the matter is that different in kind.

Others may disagree, of course; I know full well that I'm nowhere near the "self-proclaimed Luddite" camp (and in fact often joke semi-seriously that I would love a brain-to-Photoshop interface for working with graphics). I certainly see more potential than risk or threat in the digital age, though. I'm unconvinced by the arguments surrounding The Imminent Death Of The Book and other such things, and have always believed that if someone wants to get their work out there for free (or for whatever they want to request in exchange for it), more power to them. The Internet and the media shooting off from it make it easier to do things like that in some unorthodox and interesting ways, and I enjoy seeing some of the things that can result from that.

As for the quality issue? I dunno. Even the bad stuff out there can spark discussions which can lead in interesting directions. And the bad stuff out there that doesn't do that, which doesn't languish either, but merely incites or misleads or otherwise displays itself as the result of abuses of history or cryptohistory? Well, they put their stuff out there, so what's preventing us from issuing forth refutations. Hendrix complained about the impact of free releases on the SF industry; Doctorow's response in both words (his refutation of Hendrix's argument) and deed (his first novel was a commercial success despite being available for no-strings-attached free download, and nearly won a Nebula besides[3]) is perfectly clear.

[1] - I assume you've all had your fair share of "so that's what that is! now I have a name for it!" moments. If not, what's your excuse?

[2] - A friend of mine is attempting to popularize the idea of using "the Timecube" as a unit of measurement for just how, well, stark raving mad a given source or person or argument sounds. "Some guy called into the radio talk show this morning, and flew into this incoherent rant that topped out around 0.8 Timecubes!"

[3] - As a result of this whole debacle, International Pixel-Stained Technopeasant Day was declared on April 23rd, in which authors (and anyone else who wanted in on it) could release "a professional-quality work" for free on their websites. Somewhere between scores and hundreds of people, including some fairly big names in the field, participated, and thousands of amateurs had fun with it as well.

Cleverly-Named Introductory Post

"First post!" as they say over on Slashdot. Not quite as satisfying since I'm the only one who can post here, but oh well. That just means I can claim the right to a moderately rambling and self-indulgent introduction, doesn't it?

Who I am can be seen off to the right of this post, and this blog exists as a component of that public history program. Specifically, it's a component of History 513, also known as Digital History: Methodology for the Infinite Archive, taught by Professor Turkel here at the University of Western Ontario.

One of the fun things about being in a program as (relatively) obscure as public history is the raised eyebrows. If I had a nickel for every time in the last few months I've been asked "public history? What's that?" I would probably be gazing down upon you all in air-conditioned comfort from the privacy of my newly-purchased space hotel. It tends to result in interesting discussions, at least, and the topic is usually quickly understood, even if it's seen as a bit weird, not the standard "History of [Topic] in [Place] during [Time]" that most people associate with history classes.

When course schedules come up, and it's learned that I have something called Digital History on Wednesday afternoons, the same sort of question shows up, with a little less confusion, a little less "what's that?" and a little more incredulity, a little more "why's that?" Shouldn't history courses, after all, deal primarily with the hows and whens and whos and whats of the past - preferably involving, to complete the cliche, Dusty Old Tomes and entweeded professors with four hyphens in their surnames? Short of its use as an archiving tool, maybe, isn't most modern technology either irrelevant to the study of history or even an active hindrance to it?

I obviously don't think so, otherwise I wouldn't be here, doing this.

On the one hand, I'm well aware of the arguments and controversies and confusion and even contempt about the ubiquity of technology in modern life. I remember the large part of it firsthand, particularly the aspects to do with the Internet back in the early nineties. ("The Information Superhighway: Threat Or Menace?") On the other hand, I grew up sufficiently around and engaged with most of it that I take much of it completely for granted, wondering what the fuss over new technology is rather than wondering what the point of it is.

It's an interesting position to be in. Even though I can sympathise with some of the revulsion towards the more absurd or annoying[1] aspects of connected culture, and tend to take issue with a lot of the jargon and hype within it - I'm allergic to the prefixes "cyber" or (when followed by anything other than "-mail") "e" - I probably qualify as one of the digerati or whatever term is used to describe netizens this week. At least, I've been around net.culture long enough to remember "what's your major?" being a pickup line or understand why today's September 5122, 1993, so I know it's got its share of unique quirks and familiar mundanities. I think I've chosen my camp.

So here I am, in any case, one more drop in a delightfully growing noosphere. Obviously I'll be posting about digital history; it is, of course, required on the syllabus a terrific confluence of several of my main interests. This kind of topic, the wealth of resources and opportunities under its umbrella, brings together a lot of things: history proper, its research and presentation[2], ways of outreach that bring the materials to an audience outside the classroom or archives, and the various facets of digital and online cultures. It helps create the kind of environment in which someone can easily read Herodotus in the original, catch radio shows on obscure conspiracies, see the past without the monochrome, discuss counterfactual history (or more conventional fields) in a lively and active environment... the list goes on, and I am most happy that it does.

Much as I am aware and understanding of the anxiety and controversy over many aspects of the Net in this day and age, and much as I wonder about some of the people on it at times, I remain a pretty enthusiastic supporter of its adoption by historians (and people in just about any other field, from mathematics to metalworking). It's an area where a lot of the potentials are only starting to be tapped, and a lot of the concerns are, I believe, somewhat overblown, and it's something I intend to explore in considerable detail.

When I first became aware of this sort of field, back before I had a name for it, I almost immediately thought "I want in on this." As I start the transition from "just" studying history to "doing" it, that remains the case.

[1] - Don't lie: you've done this.

[2] - One of the more amazing examples of this I've encountered can be seen here. In this video, Professor Hans Rosling, a professor of international health at the Karolinka Institute in Sweden, makes a point of the usefulness of new technologies as teaching tools that is hard to ignore. Taking the fairly abstruse topic of developing-world demographics over the last several decades, he handily spins together a presentation which is both riveting and very easy to understand. Rosling's point - that a lot of relevant, important, practical information is lying fallow, and could be understood and applied very easily were it just for a different perspective - becomes clear as day starting at about five minutes in.