b.cognosco

We should be able to create with others.

[...] How come that so many people see the Web mostly as a large distribution and retrieval system? They see designers, creators, domain experts, etc., on one side ... and loads of consumers on the other. Hm... if I think about it... that last sentence reminds me somewhat of schools... [Sebastian Fiedler] [Seblogging News]

It's because we seem to inherently think of ourselves as consumers, except in some narrow area we call a job where we get paid to produce. I don't know if it's cultural or biological in origin (it seems to cross cultural boundaries), but we seem clearly predisposed to act, think, and respond like "consumers" most of the time.

Hence we end up with a 1-way Internet, brain-dead technologies like ADSL, and user-hostile service agreements that preclude the actual use of connectivity for anything other than "consuming". We get media conglomerates who see masses of consumers at the other end of broadband.

We get politicians who think starting the economy requires giving control of the Internet to the conglomerates, so they'll put movies on-line and inspire us to run like lemmings to consume them.

Sebastian also notes that this 1-way dichotomy is prevalent in schools. He's right. Our schools do little to embed in us the belief and understanding that we are all creators -- not just for our jobs, but for ourselves.

We don't all need to write the Great American Novel. We can as easily contribute by serving pictures up to the family album, transcribing family histories, supporting the local homeowners association, or whatever.

We can all create. We can all produce. We can each add something of value to the global collection of consciousness, even if it is of value only to a small group. And we are entitled to access to make that happen. But we won't get access until enough of us understand the equation. And that understanding can come only from grasping, at a fundamental level, the power of interactivity over the network.