George Orwell’s novel 1984 told the story of a totalitarian regime called Oceania where the state gained total control over the people through its technological ability to provide total surveillance.
Orwell’s glimpse into the future of government monitoring everything through the use of recording equipment. Written in 1949, the book reflected its times with the excesses of Nazism and Communism firmly in everyone’s minds.
Yet history has turned out differently than what Orwell predicted and in the 21st century we have seen not the emergence of Big Brother but of “Little Brothers”. The “Little Brother” reports on himself and on others. He twitters, provides status updates, uploads, photographs, reports, blogs and wikis.
Under Little Brother, the private domain no longer exists. Surprisingly, the grip of Little Brother tightens as people move closer to power, fame, fortune and influence. When the President of the United States speaks before an audience, he is met not by waving arms, but of hundreds of phones with cameras lifted above people’s heads. In any day, he might face thousands of cameras, all broadcasting his movements to small audiences around the world.
In the 1980s and 1990s, the most photographed woman in the world was Diana, Princess of Wales. Day in and day out dozens of photographers followed her and she died in 1997 in a car crash that occurred as she sought to avoid a chasing pack of photographers. Yet that world is so different than today – if she was alive today and walked down the street, or ate in a restaurant or went to a movie, or worked out in a gym inevitably she could expect to face people holding phones in front of their faces. Surveillance that is total and complete.
Dan Gillmor in his e-book “We The Media” highlights the rise of the citizen – and the end of the dominant centralized media culture. Correctly he argues that it means the rise of a multitude of voices, that are uncensored, authentic and fresh. We report on everything from the mundane to metaphysics.
No longer do we rely on one movie critic, but hundreds, ordered and structured on movie review websites. We report on bad driving, photograph bad parkers, review bad teachers, comment on boring lectures and provide status updates on everything we see and hear. We even seek out love through the development of “profiles” and seek out the perfect partner through searching the images and profiles of others.
And what will be next – nurses uploading photos of famous patients? morticians blogging on the grief of their clients? Ex-lovers reviewing the performance of former partners? Children reporting on the disciplinary codes enforced by their parents? Or will we see parishioners providing weekly ratings of sermons provided by their church ministers? The stark reality is – its all up for grabs, there is no limit – the grip of the Little Brothers tightens each day.
So the question is, are the Little Brothers as dangerous as Big Brother? Are they a counterbalance to the possible power of the State, or are they easily co-opted conspirators? Or worse, are the Little Brothers, creating the end of privacy in any and every form – are we both volunteering up our own individual anonymity and seeking every opportunity to steal the private moments of all others?
The rise of the citizen journalist, the citizen communicator is a new phenomena with social norms still forming, but it is clear we need a community debate, that allows us to consider and ponder the world we have and are creating – and the world we have created without any reflection or thinking.
26march2011's Blog 